Ideas

I am feeling almost back to normal. We didn't really leave the house yesterday though, so today will be the test of my energy levels. We are going to attempt the library and Walmart. Not major grocery shopping Walmart, just a few random things. I am bored still, so if anyone wants to hang out this week let me know.

We passed 90 degrees yesterday and I couldn't sleep last night because I was so hot. I am going to have to dig out the fans from the garage today and pump in the cooler night air tonight. I am so excited for the outdoor pool to open this weekend! We will for sure have to check it out. I couldn't resist posting this adorable picture I took of Davin yesterday. He just all of a sudden looks like such a big boy! Still not walking, but he's getting closer every day. It probably won't be long now.
As for the ideas that I am looking for. I got my produce box this morning. It was a good mix of things that we like and will use: lemons, apples, pears, lettuce, baby carrots, broccoli, and then this. I have no idea what to do with this bunch of raw beets. I have been scouring allrecipes.com, but so far haven't seen anything that looks remotely appetizing. Does anyone have any ideas of what to do with beets? I can only remember ever eating canned beets on salad as a kid.
In other food news I actually ate solid food yesterday! I ate scrambled eggs, hash browns and toast. It tasted so good. I still have to eat softer food since it hurts to chew hard, but it is encouraging to be able to eat something other than yogurt and slim fast. I am slowly trying to get my house in order and start feeding my family again. Also, I forgot to mention it earlier, but Weston passed his Tot 1 swim class! That means when we do our end of summer sessions he will be in the next class up. I am so proud of him for sticking it out and doing so well, even if he was a little nervous about some of the skills. I am also letting go of any and all guilt that I had from making him get in the pool when he was crying.

Do Not Operate Heavy Machinery

Light machinery, on the other hand, is perfectly acceptable. Feel free to do all the laundry, dishes, and baking you feel like while on narcotics. I am actually only on ibuprofen at the moment, but wish I was on something stronger. I am feeling pretty good post-wisdom teeth extraction, but certainly not 100% yet. It is my first day on my own with the kids. I hope we all survive. It's 10:15am and Weston is already bored. Not sure what to do with him all day.
I am slightly swollen, but not too bad. No major chipmunk cheeks.
I still can't really eat anything solid that requires chewing. I am considering this a good thing for my weight loss strategy, but I am getting rather hungry. I didn't do much this weekend, obviously. I did go to Sacrament meeting yesterday. It wore me out. I am laying low today, but I'm bored, so if you find yourself with some extra time, call me. :) I planned to be more witty and cohesive in this post, but it's just not coming. I must still be a little out of it. Just wanted y'all to know I'm alive and kicking.

Impending Pain

In less than 24 hours I will be getting my wisdom teeth out. Probably most of you have already had yours out and are thinking I'm such a big baby, but I am nervous. I have never been under general anesthesia before. I am mostly nervous about a non-hospital, non-nurse giving me an IV. I tend to not do so well with needles.

I am lucky that so many of my friends are helping me out since Ian can't take tomorrow off work. I have Cindy driving me to and from my appointment. She is the lucky one since she will more than likely be privy to all my deepest darkest secrets as I babble post-anesthesia. Becca is my lifesaver and is going to spend the entire day at my house watching my kids. Finally, my friend, Danielle, will be taking Weston to his last swimming lesson. Hopefully she won't have to deal with any fits.

Things I am looking forward to:
-not having to change diapers this weekend
-drug-induced sleep
-potential weight loss from not being able to eat anything solid
-ice cream (probably preventing any weight loss)
-catching up on all my shows
-snuggle time with my kids
-reading time
-naps, naps, naps

In other Shannon news, I have come down with a cold. Blah. I figure I am going to be down for the weekend anyway, why not add one more ailment to the mix. Also, we signed up for a fresh grocery home delivery service about a month ago. We get an organic produce box every other week. Last week I received this:
Last night I finally got around to turning it into this: Baked Fennel with Parmesan.
It was delicious. Ian loved it. Now I have a go-to recipe if we get fennel in our box again. If you are interested in getting an organic produce box too, check it out HERE. If you do sign up, mention my name and phone number as a referral!

Happy Mother's Day!

Last night as I was tucking Weston in . . .
Me: Do you know what tomorrow is?
Weston: Mother's Day!
Me: That's right!
Weston: Are you going to just sleep and sleep and sleep?
Me: (laughing) Nope, I'm going to get up and get ready for church church church.
Weston: Oh well I guess I'll get up and get ready for church church too.

Apparently my Saturday sleep-in made an impression. I did end up sleeping in a bit more than normal for a Sunday morning. It was a fabulous Mother's Day. Ian got me some books about motherhood that I wanted and the movie Princess Bride. My Young Women's lesson went really well, and Davin behaved well enough that we made it all the way through Sunday school without ending up in the hall. Unfortunately I forgot Davin's binki and burp cloth on our way out the door, so Ian ended up taking him home halfway through Sacrament since he was inconsolable. I got my first kid-made Mother's Day present. It was a cute beaded necklace with a picture of Weston as the pendant. I also got a gorgeous red flowering plant at the end of church.

Our friends blessed their baby today, so after church Weston and I went to the park for a little luncheon. Weston loved getting to run around at the park and I enjoyed the chat time. Ian was so wonderful and stayed home while Davin slept and slept and slept. We video chatted with the Bowles clan. I locked myself in the bedroom and talked to my mommy for a while. Ian made me a delicious dinner of spaghetti with browned butter and mizithra and asparagus. Yummo. We all played Zingo. Now I am having some quiet time. It really was a perfect Mother's Day.

As difficult as it is to be a mom sometimes I wouldn't trade it for the world. I love my boys. They are so cute and sweet. I have a wonderful, supportive husband. I am blessed. Happy Mother's Day to all!

Murphy's Law

Thanks for all your advice about the swimming lessons. We are powering through. Friday Weston started crying and telling me he wanted to go home and take a nap as I was trying to take his shirt and sandals off at swimming lessons. I held him and tried to explain to him that he didn't have to do anything in the water he didn't want to, and he should tell his teacher if he didn't want to do something. Turns out his teacher wasn't there on Friday and he had two girls as subs. I pulled my clinging, crying 3 year off me and put him in the pool. Within 2 minutes he was smiling and totally fine. To me, this is further proof that this current teacher is affecting his attitude towards swimming lessons. He was great the whole rest of the 40 minute lesson and was beaming when he got out.

Success. So we go get dried off, get Weston dressed, and head out to go home to put Davin down for a much needed nap. I get to the car and can't find my keys. Crap. I must have locked them in the car. I looked in all the windows and didn't see them. I must have locked them in the trunk when I was getting out the stroller. I hate having to call Ian and tell him that, once again, I have been lame and locked my keys in the car, but my options were limited, so I made the call. He came over from work and opened the trunk. No keys. Search the car. No keys. Re-trace all my steps. No keys.

I still have no idea what happened to them. Since a criminal would have found the keys and promptly stolen the car, or at least the stereo, I am assuming that some punk teenager found them and chucked them over a fence somewhere just to be annoying. Needless to say, I am very saddened to have lost my keys. Sigh.

That evening we went down to BYU to watch my cousin, Blake, pitch. This was the last home series, so we won't see him play again until next year. It was really quite fun. There was a balloon guy there, so Weston ended up with 3 balloon swords by the end of the evening. He also hounded Cosmo again and got a hug, a high five, a pound it, and a picture. After that we made him leave Cosmo alone.
I had already decided that since we have early church on Sunday, I would sleep in on Saturday for Mother's Day. It was great until Ian woke me up at 8:30 with "Happy Mother's Day the fridge is dead." Since Ian gets paid every 2 weeks we end up with an "extra" paycheck a couple times a year. This month is one of those times. We already had this money all spent in our heads, so, of course the fridge would die. I guess we will have to wait a little longer to get a swing set.

One of my young women came over around noon to watch the boys while Ian and I went refrigerator shopping. We ended up decided to buy an older, used fridge because it fit better in our budget, rather than the new energy star rated fridge at Lowe's. This new fridge looks almost exactly the same as our old one from the outside, but has nicer shelving inside and a deli drawer. So far I like it. The new configuration will take a little getting used to though.

Ian and I were supposed to go on a date tonight to the temple, but we didn't get the new fridge in and food transferred over until about 4:30 and the house (specifically the kitchen) was a wreck, so we decided to stay home and put things back together. We are both bushed. It was a busy day.

I wanted to also share what I loved about Thanksgiving Point Farm Country this week:

Our totally rockin, cool carriage ride. Apparently when it's not crowded they give rides in this. Even though Weston's not smiling he loved riding in this comfy carriage.
Eating a Creamy before heading home. You can buy them there for 50 cents apiece. Not a bad deal.
Watching a worker feeding a tiny baby goat from a bottle. So adorable. (No pic of it though)

I hope everyone has a very Happy Mother's Day tomorrow and gets to relax and get pampered by the hubbies and kidlets. I know I am looking forward to a nice day tomorrow and I sure hope my mommy and MIL know how much I love and appreciate them and all, ALL they do.

Boy Stuff

A quick update as to what we have been doing with our days this week/last weekend. This past Saturday we spent the evening having dinner and playing with our friends, the Miller's. They are just so much fun and it had been months since we had gotten together. They taught us how to play Ticket to Ride. We really enjoyed it. If you are looking for something to get us for whatever reason . . . that would be fun. I hardly saw Weston the whole time we were there because he was busy playing with all the new toys in the basement and watching movies. Weston was especially enthralled with this. I thought he looked so funny in it. It made his head look like it was half his body. If you are looking for something to get Weston . . . he would love it.
Monday brought the start of round two of swimming lessons. It was less successful. Weston had a new teacher and a new group of somewhat older kids. He got his head dunked a couple times and was just not having as much fun. About 10 minutes before the end of his class he started crying and said he needed to go potty. He didn't. When I asked what was wrong he just said he wanted to go home and take a nap. I put him back in the pool after trying to get him to calm down, but he pretty much cried the rest of class and tried to get out a few times. I was pretty frustrated. He had zero reactions like this in his first session of swimming lessons. I don't know if the teacher is less kid fun or if he is having to do more actual swimming skills or what. Needless he came home, ate lunch, and went straight down for a 2 hour nap.

Anyway, that afternoon I had told Weston that we could go and buy some paint for his wooden truck that he made back in October with Grandpa Bob. He has been asking to paint it for months. So we hit up Michael's and left with red, green, and blue paint. For our FHE activity Daddy helped Weston paint and I kept Davin out of it. Weston had a great time working on his truck. That tongue was out the entire time.
I will post finished product pictures when he is done painting the bottom and gets the wheels back on it. I also took this picture of Davin on Monday afternoon. He was just looking so cute and grown up. He is getting really close to walking. I give him a few more weeks. (Notice the tongue on Weston while he was playing a computer game).
Yesterday we went back to the aquarium and it was practically empty. We had a better time exploring everything and Weston said his favorite thing was watching "that big, red octopus." I was happy he thought the sea creature was cool. Afterward we went to Chick Fil A for a shake and some play time in the empty playplace. It was a nice afternoon.

Flash forward to this morning. I told Weston that if he didn't cry and stayed in the pool during his swimming lesson then I would take him to the Thanksgiving Point Farm Country this afternoon. He did much better. He still cried a little bit after the first head dunking, but he calmed himself down and didn't cry the rest of the lesson and stayed in the pool. I think he earned his outing. However, he is still sleeping. I put him down for a nap again right after lunch and he's out. I might have to go wake him up if we want to have time for an outing.

So there you have it. That is what we have been up to. Any advice for the swimming lesson issues?

Musical Thoughts

This weekend our ward held a talent show. I felt completely guilty a month ago that I hadn't signed our family up to do anything, so the last week the sign-up went around I put us down without any specifics as to what we would be doing. I mentioned to Ian that I had put our family on the sign-up. I was thinking we could sing something with Ian playing the guitar. We ended up choosing to do a duet of "Falling Slowly." This song won an Oscar a few years ago and is from the movie "Once."

For the last couple weeks we have been practicing. It has been so much fun to sing together with Weston running circles around us and attempting to sing along. I learned all the harmonies to sing back up. Ian was the star of the show. He was so excited to be getting his "guitar fingers" back. I love that my husband is so musically talented. He played his guitar and sang with me all the time when we were dating. It was one of the things that attracted me to him. Getting ready for this tiny ward talent show brought back some of that dating spark . . . if you know what I mean. ;)

So Friday night rolled around and we were ready to perform. When we were practicing right before we left Weston wanted to know what he could sing. I asked him what he wanted to sing and he replied "I am a Child of God." Well no arguing with that.

We were the last act of the evening. Weston got up on the stage and sang like a pro while I accompanied and Ian sang along with him. It was so adorable. I was so proud of him. When he was done Ian and I did our song and it went really well. I hit all my notes and we didn't mess up any words. We got lots of compliments on it. Most people were surprised that Ian sang.

I have always loved music. It has always been a part of my life. I have been singing for as long as I can remember. I took piano lessons for years. Several of those years I hated having to get up and practice at 6am before school, and I begged my mom to let me quit, but THANK YOU mom for saying no. I am so grateful that I nurtured my musical talents. I love having a piano in my house where I sit down several times a week and play and sing Primary songs with, or to, my kids. It brings the spirit to my home and to my heart.

I am so grateful that I can be of service with my talents. My ward doesn't have lots of piano players, so I get my share of opportunities to play. I also help out by singing in the ward choir. My next step is to volunteer for a special musical number.

I guess my point is that I am just so grateful for the gift of music in my life. I hope that I will always make it a constant in my home and in my life.