Alexander is 5!

Alexander has become quite adept at calendaring and numbers and things lately, so you'd better believe he'd been counting down to his birthday for weeks prior to the event. Now that it's happening, he's been counting "days since" he turned five.

Here's is morning message, alerting us that he'd finally done it and "today" (October 14th) he was five:

Here he is with his "5" crown on (Benjamin made it for him to wear, and, boy, did he wear it with pride):

This week

We started this week with a quiet Canadian Thanksgiving dinner, made 100% by Rachel (except, I suppose, for the potatoes, which were left over from Sunday's dinner). We didn't get around to our traditional Thanksgiving FHE lesson because Miriam had a different lesson prepared already (since she taught YW/Sunday School on Sunday and in this house we recycle), but we did have an "underwear talk" focusing on giving thanks and we'll start our Thankful Tree soon...after Alexander's birthday.

Here's a picture of our Thanksgiving dinner:

Spiders and bones

Having only recently been home to a chipmunk, our ol' cookie container soon found itself habitat to a number of jorō spiders—eleven, to be precise. Benjamin went around snatching them out of their webs and filled this jar:

They're not very aggressive...toward humans...nor are they particularly venomous...for humans...but they were clearly uncomfortable being in such close quarters. It's not unusual to see multiple spiders in a tree, but each usually has its own web. We learned they're rather particular about that...

Hanging out with the fam

By Friday (September 16, our last day in Utah), I could tell we had worn out our welcome and it was time to go home. Well, perhaps we hadn't quite worn out our welcome, but Phoebe was finally feeling comfortable enough that she started getting into mischief. 

A tour of HBLL

When I said Phoebe had never been to the library, what I meant was that she had never been inside our own little public library. I've always left her at home or, when she was really little, sitting in the car with Rachel while I ran in really quick. 

She has, however, been inside the library at UGA and at BYU. 

Naanii took us on a little tour of the Harold B. Lee Library (the HBLL), showing us all the things that have changed since I was last there—which was a lot! I hardly recognized the place!

Perhaps the most exciting thing right now is this exhibit that my mom put together (with some collaborators, of course) on Provo Pop Music Connections—from the Osmonds to the Killers and beyond. It's pretty cool!

I went to Utah and I saw...

In case you'd forgotten, Phoebe and I flew out to Utah about a month ago for an "epic" (according to Zoë) "Mom-and-Phoebe" trip (she was a little bit bitter she didn't get to come along and wrote Naanii a letter expressing her disappointment). 

She says "I wish I could go to Utah with Mom to visit you and Josie, but it's supposed to b a "mom and Phoebe" trip. I've missed you a ton, but I think we're not moving back to Utah. I wish we could, though. Mom has taken Phoebe everywhere! Either an epic travel, or a simple journey to the doctor's office or the library, PHoebe's always there!"

In Zoë's defense, Phoebe is rather attached to me at the present.

In Phoebe's defense, she's never entered the library. So there's that.

38 is great!

Andrew's birthday was just a few days after I returned home from Utah (I still have plans to finish posting about that trip, but life is moving on at a ridiculous clip). Rachel, of course, made his cake. I didn't really do much of anything, other than make the children fill out some birthday balloons for him. 

Since Andrew always makes fun of everyone for always settling on acrostics, I challenged the kids to pick a different short-form poetry. My mom will appreciate our attempts since she also has been writings some short poems

Alexander wrote:

We liv in Gorgu. You are fothor. 

[We live in Georiga. You are father.]

RLiv togethor in Gorgu Bhord thrho 4 not mozior thtim.

[I'm going to be honest; beyond "we live together in Georgia" I'm not sure what he's getting at here.]

YYoui Aare Tthe BEE Best DDad
["You are the best dad," but I think he was going for an acrostic-vibe with the extra letters in there, though I don't think he understands that acrostic poems spell something because YATBD doesn't really mean anything.]

HPPY BORTHDAY DAD! I LOV YOU!

[This doesn't really need a translation.]

Chipmunk Trap

On September 7 (or so), the kids left this trap—an open animal cracker container (our summer bug-collecting jar), with a trail of acorns leading inside—hoping to catch some sort of critter. A squirrel would be ideal. The thought was that a squirrel would follow the trail of acorns into the container and then flick the lid with its tail on the way in and the lid would somehow magically spin right around the mouth of the container, thus locking the squirrel inside.

But it didn't have to be a squirrel! It could have been anything! They just wanted to catch something.

Caterpillar details

One of the very best things about Poison Control is that they always call you back to see how things are going. That second phone call has traditionally been much calmer from my end of things. 

Traditionally?

Apparently I have a tradition of calling Poison Control. 

But, like, despite my best efforts apparently my kids are going to do things like drink insect repellent (Zoë), eat random yard mushrooms (Alexander), or...you know...bite a venomous caterpillar (Phoebe). 

Before that I evidently was able to keep track of my kids well enough to keep them out of such mischief. 

Or I was just plain lucky. 

The first time I called Poison Control it felt like I was some kind of human failure because...I don't know why. I'd messed up my streak of not calling Poison Control? But I learned that they are the nicest people so now I call with only a little bit of sheepishness and say, "Hey, yeah, hi. Me again. So, my kid ate a weird bug. What do I do?"

And they are always very nice. And they always make a follow-up call. And if everything could run as smoothly as poison control I think the would be in very good shape.

But this isn't really a PSA for Poison Control, though, seriously, do not hesitate to call them if you think you or a loved one may have ingested...or touched...or inhaled...something poisonous because no matter how ridiculous your story is, they will take you seriously, help calm you down, and give you excellent advice (which I assume is sometimes, "Get thee to a hospital!"). 

And then they'll call you an hour later to make sure you're no longer hyperventilating and your toddler is still alive.

Probably better to never have to call Poison Control, really. But I'm just saying that if you find yourself wondering whether you should call Poison Control, better safe than sorry. 

So, anyway...Phoebe bit a caterpillar today.

I thought it was dead. 

Cat(erpillar)s and Dogs!

I spent all day on campus, along with Miriam, Phoebe, and Grandpa (who so kindly rearranged his schedule to shuttle me down there because we were supposed to be having windows be installed today, but the windows were all finished being installed yesterday, so I realized just now at this very moment (9:45 PM) that Andrew could have done the driving, but Andrew had meetings scheduled in the morning and we just didn't think of it until right this very minute). Anyway, I had to run a booth at the Banned Book Fair. 

Here's Phoebe hanging out by Gage the UGA Dawgs mascot: 

Phoebe helped me while Miriam and Grandpa hit up the art museum, and then they came and took Phoebe for a long, long walk outside while I finished up at the fair. 

Here's Phoebe chilling with her air purifier: