3.8.16 wedding

This weekend my brother got married! It was a quickly planned event, thus proving once again great things can happen when many people work together! Kevin asked me Thursday night to play the piano for the occasion Saturday at 5. I have not practiced the piano seriously for years.

I therefore spent about 6 hours in the next 30 practicing the piano. Addie told me Friday night "Mom your practicing is getting really old!" I would have slapped her sassy face but my wrists were too sore and I needed to keep my concentration on the piano. She did however settle comfortable into a chair and enjoyed reading for an hour while I played. Mark joined us as well laying on the floor near the piano bench reading. It was one of those golden mother moments where you can feel the spirit and goodness in your home even in spite of those that live there. This opportunity also reminded me how much I do love the piano, trying to make it a less sporadic activity around here. And how classical music does invite different feelings than even the ok classical music we usually indulge.

So we showed up after grabbing Anna and Aliza from a friend who had taken them to Pendleton Oregon (4hours away) to compete in a book knowledge competition. We rushed to the church got there 10 minutes early where I immediately commenced playing the piano. It was like a piano recital with unknown ending. I played for 20 minutes finally just starting the song she had requested walking in to and viola the bride appeared. She looked beautiful I think (I stared a minute during the long picture taking session) I didn't dare while they were getting married, didn't want to detract at all. I saw them start kissing and that was my cue to start playing again.

All photos courtesy of my enterprising Addie!

We adjourned to the gym for a lovely post wedding feast and lots of visiting. About half the wedding guests were under the age of 8. You might notice little people in or around most the pictures. These kids love their uncle and aunt. We posed for pictures and went back in for the cake cutting and finishing our dinner.

This is my reliable attention to detail sister cutting the delicious and beautiful cake the brides mom whipped up. Mary made sure the cake served everyone equally. She is such a great sister to make sure things turn out right.

Anna caught the bride bouquet (this was a mini version) and lucky Reed (age almost 6) caught the garter. Never saw that so I think he may have just tossed it in the nearby garbage can. Guess I need to talk to that boy.

And our favorite part the clean-up. This gym was organized a bit different than most. The tables had to be lifted on the stage and the chairs had to be stacked 2 to the Left 2 to the Right all night! But the kids are well practiced and made quick work of the take down. Along with some strong dads! Thank goodness for manly men.

And the great dads did the final spit polish- I mean mop. Love these guys. Always one to make the task more pleasant the one in the white shirt played some good ol' Chris Laddeux on his iPhone and the job was done perfectly and quickly. Greg was vacuuming the halls and we were loading cars.

It was a great night and another fun chapter in being a family. So thankful for all these great people that are my family. I'm grateful for the good they bring and their individual talents. Each person contributed in their own way to make it a good day!

3.4.16 birthday cake

Everything is a team effort here. Livy and Mark had birthdays close together so we shared a cake. Livy went first on the candle tradition. She was studying the situation when John blew out the candles.

So we re-lit them and Mark told her she could help him.

It obviously takes a lot of help and instruction to light candles.

Again studying the situation not sure. She really likes to figure things out before proceeding.

Mark showing her how. A special candle and one on the cake for her to blow out. The deep concentration she works up to blow and success Livy blew out her candle for the year. Hopefully next year is easier after observing everyone else for a year. Thank goodness for help.

3.2.16 Be not weary

Addie has quite the knack for photography. Thank goodness she takes my phone and captures some of our adventures. Sunday night was the last Sunday of February thus is was home teaching time. The girls had made a deal with our home teacher to bake him a pie. This turned into a dinner invitation after some quick unexpected bartering on Greg and I's teaching route, landed us with some Jersey steaks. Jersey's are a bread of cows that some people think is the premium beef. We are not convinced yet but as our home teacher spends a lot of tiem and energy providing fun  memorable experiences for our family it was the least we could to share his favorite meat with his family.

We traded some smoked salmon and chocolate chip cookies for the steaks. They were happy we were happy! And Aliza didn't have to eat salmon which she hates. Funny kid.

So after a 10 hour day of church service we came home did chores and made dinner and dessert for 20. No big deal, all in a Sunday!! Sundays are long days for me, I don't look forward to them anymore.
But it was thoroughly enjoyable to have the company and enjoy visiting. And some important conversations came from the experience.

Our home teacher who our kids adore!

Pre-attention activity, as the lesson was on airplanes and turbulence the kids and dads made paper airplanes.

My sister and her family came. Love how cute these two little girls are, becoming friends.
And I love John's dimples can you see them. They are deep and defined. He is a cutey, unfortunately growing up and dealing with stuff that is the garbage of modern living. How thankful I am to be able to hear my children and to be blessed with insight and inspiration to be able to teach them and hopefully help them navigate the muddy waters of perversion that are ragging unchecked at this time in our society.

I can't emphasize enough how important it is to listen and listen and question and listen to kids these days. There is much going on at each age that is not okay. We have to teach them to be better and how to handle the things they hear and see.

Some of dessert. We had apple, coconut cream, blackberry, and berry cream. Lots of people means lots of selection.

The little jersey steaks are on the bottom corner of the pan. Our main complaint it takes forever to put meat on a jersey. That breed gets a great big belly- which is good for nothing and little cover on the flanks and hips which is where most cuts of meat are. But again it was a special treat for our guest of honor so we were glad to share. And a very kind present from our other friends who gifted it to us.

3.1.16 livys day

Livy had a pretty spectacular birthday. First off she got sang to at church and received her candy necklace. She was delighted!
Second her Sunday school teacher dropped off valentines cookies for her. Livy graciously shared them around. She loves to be noticed might have something to do with being child #8. But she loves to be listened to and to have the light on her for a while.

Then we had a birthday dinner and presents with grandma and papa. Yeah!! Livy loves new clothes.

In the midst of all the action Reed lost a tooth.

And thanks to some intense training with her big sisters Livy has learned how to pose like a emotionless model. No smiles just blah I'm so cool. She loved the belt and jacket. She loves to be fancy!

Yes we love this cutey of ours. Can't believe how fast time is going but love all the added maturity and handling of life. Less crying more doing. For all that encompasses we are grateful.

2.29.16 Cub scout cake auction

Last week was the annual cake auction. It was a crazy busy church week so we didn't do anything really fun or creative. I only have so much to give and cake awesomeness just wasn't in the cards. We did 4 cakes and remembered our 2 pans of cornbread as per our assignment.

The angel food cake was a new creation here and so had to be checked for quality. The result made is unsaleable so we gave in and ate it. Yum! Reed declared it tasted like marshmallows!! I think it just tasted good. We also did 2 German chocolate and 1 cream filled white cake. I used cool whip for the frosting as we are out of butter and it's so expensive these days. I love how easy the cool whip was to use on the cake. spread nicely, colored easily and piped quickly and held it's shape. I would use it again for sure.

Mark also finally received his Wolfe badge. We are definitely loosing steam and lacking in the organization department for scouting. He finished the requirements a while ago and also earned a lot of arrow points. But we could never keep track of the book long enough to get the information transferred from our house to his leader. Oh well. Such is life these days.

Harold has the opportunity to serve as a den chief. Meaning he goes and helps the women leaders with the cub scouts every week. He is really enjoying this, and loves the double scouting adventures. He teaches knots, and plays games, and does whatever else the lady in charge asks of him. Each level of cub scouts has about 15 boys attending every week and most the leaders have babies under 6 months old so it can be wild times I'm sure.

My kids were most impressed with these cakes. Me too, way to go mom's and boys.

My hand ached for the women who piped all this frosting. Wowsers, but they were impressive

And unwrapping all those smarties. Cute idea.
Well this was the last cake auction. Our stake president banned any scout auctions from here on. Kinda sad and kinda happy about that. All good things come to pass and are replaced with better or different things. Now hopefully on to a slower week.

2.23.16 Helpers

I haven't cooked much since the rush of Christmas. I mean the normal 3 meals a day but nothing interesting. There's enough dishes and challenge in just keeping that routine going. But, Greg has been discreetly asking for something good, so last week we took the time to make cinnamon rolls. My old recipe of cinnamon rolls before I came across the pioneer woman's cheaper recipe. 

After the required hours of mixing, rising, rolling and baking they were done just in time for lunch. Reed suggested we eat any weird looking ones so dad didn't have to see them.... not many look weird. But he being the quality control guy polished off a few sharing with his cute sisters. They are so funny. Greg was busy with a big project so couldn't run home and we didn't go into town until a few hours and a whole pan had vanished. He got one. I did manage to get some in the freezer for later.

While I worked Afton of course played. She loves her cupboard and has a grand time crawling in and investigating. It's like a reusable box I guess! Someday she will probably marvel she was so small.

I've been realizing lately just letting children grow takes a long time. It's not just the 9 months of pregnancy or even the first year of slow independence but years of just slowly redundantly training them. Loving them, disciplining, reading the same books over and over, making the same macaroni and cheese or peanut butter sandwich again and again. But it's the slow safe environment that lets their brains and spirits grow. Some grow fast some grow slower as they enjoy childhood freedom more. It's hard and requires much sacrifice of self. Not just your body but your mind, your expectations for being on time, for efficiency and for accomplishment. It is sacrifice of most of your prior life to one that is slower, more repetitive and more nurturing. Yet I think if we can just hold our horses and ambitions the result is happy, peaceful kiddos. Kids that aren't always looking backwards. Kids that are ready to move on and kids that are capable! It's something I've just been noticing and piecing together now in my 14th year of children in my home. But I think as I'm seeing the effects of our choice for me to be home it is so important to just be. Be available, be calm-ish, be there- the olders need that comfort of mom being there too. I'm amazed at the conversations and comments I hear as they walk in the door. Things that don't come up again as they are washed away with hunger, homework, chores, responsibilities.

Mom's are pretty important not just for cleaning and cooking but for caring and comforting and teaching always teaching. Best to you today. 

2.22.16 Painting

This weekend we painted a lot of our house! I bought the paint over three years ago on one of the holiday sales. I have had big ambition but the reality of lots of not so helpful helpers and too many other things being higher on the priority list made it a far off dream. But I decided the time had come and we could accomplish this task if everyone was on deck helping. It was also motivating that when cleaning the walls we were down to dry wall and texture in many places. After 9 years of living here the paint had just been scrubbed/rubbed or chipped off by so many people and so much use!

I got paint testers earlier in the week and picked a color but then forgot to take the right can back with me to get that color, so we guessed. I gave instructions to the kids as to who was responsible for what for the weekend and we got into the prepping. That is the worst part I think because you just want to see what the paint will look like on the wall but if the walls are ready then it will look bad. We scrubbed, patched, caulked, sanded, and cleaned some more. Anna and Harold were my assistants. They taped and sanded and washed. It was so great to work with them. I found they work for a song. We listened to hours of Pandora this weekend. Which really was ok. I like music and I love being able to select the kind of music I want to listen to. I listen to Oklahoma Broadway musical type stuff with a mix of 1950-1960 era songs, and some Adele thrown in. Fun to sing along and hear them getting a taste of some different songs than are currently on the radio. They like Lindsey Sterling radio but I can only take that for so long.

We finally got down to painting and man were they awesome!!! We started with the white ceiling and trim. My arms are still quivery from all the rolling but it was nice to switch off. It looks so nice. The next day we did the walls. I'm so thankful for all the instruction cousin Garrett gave those 9 years ago on how to paint. I'm definitely not as good as him but we got a good look going and now I just have some more wall to patch- our house has some structural issues I'm not ready to dive into but will have to be addressed in the not too distant future.

My eager beaver. She wanted to paint so badly. On the second day I had some big wall areas I let her do, along with all the floor board she could handle. While I was talking to my sister she took it upon herself to do some of the upper walls between the windows and the ceiling. This got a lot of brown paint on our new white painted trim...I got the brown off along with a fair measure of not cured white paint.  I sure wish this tiger would just do what is assigned and not roar ahead to what should clearly be out of her reach.

Our house went to pot but it was put mostly back in order as the walls had sufficient drying time. It was a nice weekend and Aliza graciously and willingly played and played outside with the little girls. The middle boys washed dishes, pulled posts, and stayed out doors lest they too be put to work on house stuff. It worked well that everyone had a task and could do so many different task. Monday is such a bittersweet day. Nice to rest from the busy weekend and sad to see my team disperse.

Finished project. Mark and Reed replaced covers while we made dinner that night. It was so great to see each kid step in and do a part. When we moved in I did a lot of this myself and I know how much work this is. This time while I am sore I am mostly just grateful for all the helpers in my home. Now to scrub the paint off the floor and windows but that sounds like a good consequence for poor choices these next few weeks. Best to you today.