Birth Certificate

We went and picked up Sarah's birth certificate and on it was Aaron's name as the birth attendant. It also showed our home address of for the place of birth. We knew it would say that, but just to see it officially on there was crazy!

Aaron had a work conference in Salt Lake all this week. It was a national conference for electrical engineers--so it must have been some pretty exciting stuff I am sure ;). Anyway, he actually had to work a regular 8-5 schedule meaning he got home late every night since he had to come from Salt Lake. Don't worry the kids survived, but just barely. I know why there should be two parents so when one has had enough the other is there to spell them off. It is hard to remain patient while juggling homework with dinner and whiny kids on top of it while trying to feed a newborn and being sleep deprived. I will be glad to go back to his regular schedule next week.

For good behavior at school Matthew works toward little prizes every day. His teacher has a good selection of toys. Much to Aaron's chagrin the other day he chose a hot pink My Little Pony that came with a brush. When he brought it home all the boys loved playing with it and combing its hair. I thought it was funny, but Aaron didn't quite see the humor in it. I am just waiting to see what they play with when Sarah gets all the little girly toys as she gets older.

It cooled off this week so Daniel was able to wear his new long sleeved 'school' clothes to playgroup. He had fun and also made a puppet. Josh is still excited about homework so I took a picture of both.

Never Say Never...

I have said that I would never do a lot of things and I must say I have learned the lesson Never Say Never!! I have had to eat my words many times, but here are the top 10:

1. I said I would never listen to Country Music--that changed when my son, Matthew, could memorize and repeat the lyrics back to me word for word. When I realized what was being said and what Matthew was repeating to me and whoever else would listen I changed what I was listening to. Country seems to be somewhat cleaner than alternative music.

2. I said I would never nurse my baby longer than a year. That changed when I had Daniel and the only thing he could tolerate was breast milk. I ended up nursing him for 18 months until I just couldn't take it anymore. I had also found some other things he could eat and tolerate by then.

3. I said I would never shop at a health food store. That also changed with Daniel when I was desperately trying to find food that he could eat. I didn't consider myself a naturalist, organic or herb person; however, they have a lot more things than that with the prices to match--unfortunately. Desperate times call for desperate measures. FYI--Soy milk really isn't bad tasting after all.

4. I said I would never marry someone from out of state. That changed when I met Aaron who incidentally is from Texas in my college karate class. Good thing he learned to love Utah!!

5. I said I would never feed my kids poptarts. That also changed with Daniel and Matthew. It is one of the few foods Daniel likes and can eat and one of the few things Matthew will eat because he is quite picky.

6. I said I would never let my kids play in a playland--that changed when I realized I can have a normal conversation with Aaron that is somewhat uninterrupted for longer than 5 minutes. It also helps get some energy out when it is cold outside, too. I just try not to think about all the nasty stuff that is inside or coated on the insides of the playlands-ooooooooooooo!! The kids just have to have a long, hot shower when they get home.

7. I said I would never have a home birth because that is CRAZY!! Well, as you all know that changed 3 weeks ago. My opinion of home births still has not changed and that they are still crazy, but sometimes you just don't have a choice.

8. I said I would never touch raw meat. I kept true to that until I started college and my roommates helped me handle it once or twice--thanks KiLee! Pasta Roni was my staple in college :). I still don't enjoy handling raw meat, but Aaron just wouldn't go along with my vegetarian ways. We still don't have a whole lot of meat, but we definitely have more than what I did when I was single.

9. I said I would never tell my kids, "Because I said so." Well that flew out the window soon after they started talking and asking why even after I had already given a reason.

10. I said I would never pay for cable or satellite service, but Aaron wouldn't hear of it. He did patiently wait for the first three years of our marriage until he couldn't handle watching the fuzzy channels anymore. I had to succumb because it is the only thing he wanted for his birthday five years ago. I still don't know how I feel about it, but Aaron won't hear of going without again.

Like I said...Never say never!!

OUCH!

Sarah's latest thing is when she gets really upset she grabs a fistful of hair and won't let go. Once she gets a hold of it she really starts screaming. I just hope she doesn't pull out all of her hair.

Weekend Update

This weekend both boys had soccer games. Josh was less than interested in his. He was more interested in goofing off, but he did run around following the ball. He didn't kick it much, but at least he followed it. We are making some progress. Matthew had his first game of the season. When we showed up he insisted on being the goalie, but it was someone else's turn. He kept pestering the coach until he put him in as a replacement. When he is the goalie he needs some help so Aaron stands by him to help. Well Matthew seems to have an excess of energy that running will get out, but being goalie you don't run much. In the middle of the game Aaron traded Matthew places so Matthew could run after the ball. Well as goalie Aaron was trying, but not really because it is a special needs soccer game, to block the goal when one of the stronger players got hold of the ball. Aaron ended up taking one for the team in the manly nether region because the stronger player got a good kick in. We'll see if he volunteers to be goalie again.

After both soccer games Matthew, Josh and Daniel got invited to a friend's birthday party at the Dinosaur Park. They all had fun participating in the different activities. They have an area where you can pan for gold--Fool's Gold and another where you dig in the rocks to find different gemstones. Our kids aren't the most aggressive so they didn't bring home too much, but they had fun doing it. In panning for gold Daniel was more interested in dumping the water all over his clothes while Matthew got so excited after finding one piece of gold it took the rest of the time calming him down to find any more. In another social faux paus that only happens when you have kids the super-skinny-no-body-shape-female employee of the dino park was showing everyone where to do the activities when Matthew turned and asked her if she was a man. She stopped and looked at him asking, "Excuse me?!?" Aaron had to quickly jump in and explain as best he could. Sometimes the excuse of autism can be a good thing :).

We have been enjoying the fruits of our garden--or at least the vegetables. We had fajitas today with the peppers we grew. Matthew has issues with the texture of most vegetables and fruits so to try something different I pureed his fajita insides. I know it sounds and it also looked disgusting, but Matthew and the other two ate it without any hesitation and without any complaint. We were pleasantly surprised! Also we had some yummy cantaloupe from our garden as well. We still have a ton of tomatoes, but we found another sucker to take them--Aaron's friend from work--so hopefully we can get rid of the next bushel.

With Josh's Tooth Fairy money he chose to get an ice cream cone rather than getting Starbursts. Since I had a coupon for Baskin Robbins Josh and I got an ice cream cone and some quiet alone time from everyone else. Josh enjoyed the attention and I enjoyed the break. I will have to see if he has any other loose teeth we can get out sooner rather than later :).

Tooth Fairy Made Another Visit

The Tooth Fairy made another visit last night. Josh lost one of his front teeth. It had been loose for a while and Aaron decided it was loose enough to work on it. After about five minutes of wiggling it (without pliers like my Dad used to use :P) it came out. Josh was pretty excited to get some money from the Tooth Fairy.

Sarah had her two week check-up today. She looks great and has gained all of her weight back to her birth weight and then some. She is up to 7 pounds and 11 ounces. Her head is in the 25th percentile and her height--21 1/2 inches is in the 90th percentile. Her weight is in the 25th percentile. I just know she is small enough to fit in the pink basin inside the kitchen sink when she takes a bath :).

Firsts

Daniel had his first day of playgroup today. He was so excited to go. I was a little nervous about dropping him off since I have to bring his arsenal of medications and his own snacks just in case. I had to explain to the other Mom what to do in case he eats something he shouldn't and hope everything would be OK. Everything turned out great. Daniel even made a little door knob hanger which he was quite proud of. Unfortunately, he did get stung by a hornet on the neck, but luckily it turned out that is one of the things he is NOT allergic to--imagine that!

Josh is enjoying kindergarten. He got his first homework today and was quite eager to start on it. I wonder how long he will be excited about homework--I am hoping for at least another 12 years ;). The teacher let the students choose where and who they wanted to sit by. Unfortunately all of Josh's neighborhood friends got placed in the other class, but he chose to sit by a little girl who he met during the summer at Kids in the Park. I stayed for the first 10 minutes and she really took care of Josh. I am glad he has a 'little mother' to help him.

Matthew on the other hand is keeping his teacher quite busy. Out of the 11 kids in his class ranging in ages from kindergarten to second grade he requires the most attention at this point from what she told Aaron when she ran into him in the hallway at school. The school work he brings home looks great and he manages to come home with all smiley faces on his behavior chart. I am just employing the don't ask don't tell policy because I don't really want to know the nitty gritty details :). He is really happy when he comes home so he must be enjoying school--I just hope the teacher is as well.

As for Sarah she is really enjoying her 3 am feedings that she stretches out for at least 90 minutes--I am soooo TIRED!! She has a doctor's check-up tomorrow so hopefully things are going great. Her umbilical cord fell off, but she has a small umbilical hernia so she will have an 'outie' belly button. Josh finally realized the difference between girls and boys when I was changing her diaper the other day. At least we have a jump start for the maturation talk in a couple years. Sarah has also decided that bottles are the ickiest thing in the world, but she will eventually take one if you try hard enough. I think we might have to work a little harder on that!!

Back to Reality

Aaron's two week baby leave is over tomorrow. I don't know if I am quite ready to face reality yet. Ready or not here it comes, though. Sarah has been a fairly good baby except it takes her over an hour to eat. She does like being held a lot which we aren't minding too much, yet. That might change later on...

We were getting a little bit of cabin fever this weekend. Saturday we decided to go for a drive up Sardine Canyon into Logan. We did stop by and get some ice cream cones which the kids loved--Daniel got 4 packages of fruit snacks. While we were driving we turned on a movie for the kids to watch. Daniel started screaming that he couldn't hear it and he needed his cell phone. We didn't quite know what he meant so we ignored it until he got too loud. I finally realized he wanted his headphones. I guess headphones and cell phones sound close enough, right?!? Aaron gave him his headphones, but didn't plug them in. Daniel put them on and didn't complain anymore about not being able to hear even though they weren't plugged into the sound. He just wanted to wear the headphones. Kids are funny like that sometimes.


Matthew gave the prayer in Primary yesterday. They had a hard time containing him until it was his turn. When it was finally his turn he got some stage fright and couldn't think of what to say. One of the presidency had to help him. After he was done he jumped off the podium and excitedly yelled that he said the prayer and ran down to his seat. He loves being able to participate in primary. Aaron got suckered in to speaking for sacrament meeting. They called and asked him Thursday night to speak for the Sunday meeting. Since we have sacrament meeting last Aaron gathered all the kids up early from primary to bring them home to me since I wasn't at church yesterday. Aaron went to pick up Daniel from nursery, but they had just started snack time. Daniel was little upset to be leaving during snack so he shoved whole handfuls of snacks into his mouth so he wouldn't miss out on the yummy food--even though we have the same stuff at home. I guess things taste better somewhere else. I wanted to see Aaron give his talk, but I wasn't about to wrestle with four children during the meeting alone. At least I am hoping this gives us both a long break from having to speak in church again.

Grandpa M came back for a quick visit Friday. The kids were pretty excited to see him again.