I'm Trying to Catch Up, Brian's Trying to Catch Fish

Since it took an hour to upload the new picture to our blog (slow internet?), this post will be a lot shorter than I had intended, but I'll be back with more soon.  I'm out of school for the summer which makes me feel like I have all kinds of free time...even though I have yet to see any of it.

The boys are doing great.  They are smart, healthy, and so entertaining.  Grant is almost finished with first grade.  He has been learning Aikido on Saturdays through Parks and Recreation and is enjoying it.  He takes it much more seriously than most of the other children in his class, and he also appears to have some natural abilities (I couldn't possibly be biased, could I?).  Brian got Grant his own fishing pole and has been fishing with him as an opportunity for some father/son bonding time.  I was beginning to wonder if Brian's fishing gear would ever see the light of day again.  Up until a couple weeks ago, he hadn't gone fishing since before we had children.

While Grant is counting down the days until school is done, Christian is counting down the days until he gets to start school.  He and Grant will be in summer school together for four weeks in June; then he will begin kindergarten in August (although Christian will likely go to first grade for math and reading).   Christian is my sweetest boy.  He loves to draw me pictures of hearts and flowers or pictures of me and him together.  I think he is getting bored here at home, though.  I will miss him very much when he starts school, but I am glad he will soon have some new experiences and challenges that I can't give him here at home.

Justin has been changing and growing up so fast lately.  He wants to do everything his older brothers do, and he is interested in everything they are interested in.  He is still like a combination of Grant and Christian in appearance and personality.  It's cute now (how he follows them), but I hope he will be able to find his own identity as he grows.  I can't believe he's about to turn three.  He loves to go swimming, swing, watch bugs, play sword fight with Grant, and eat cookies - among other things.  He is still talking about our trip to the St. Louis Zoo almost two months ago!  He especially loved the hippos.  I'll have to post pictures of the zoo and other happenings later this week.

~Andi

A Little Reminder

Happy New Year!  I can't believe the holidays have come and gone and the fun and cuteness of my kids have been undocumented for so long.  But away with the negative, self-deprecating thoughts...I am trying to have a more positive attitude.  What better time to get a new attitude than the start of a new year?  While it's not exactly a resolution, per se, I do expect that just looking at myself and the people/things around me with a better perspective will lead to greater happiness throughout our entire family.

For example, in the past I spent too much time thinking about how I do everything around the house and Brian does very little.  But that's not exactly true...here are some of the many reasons why I love my husband lately:
~On cold nights he gets into bed first and warms up my side so I can get into a nice, warm bed.
~He installed a new garbage disposal.
~He cleaned out the really gross drain in the bottom of the dishwasher.
~He tells me how beautiful I am, and he always makes me feel that way even though it has been a struggle my whole life to accept my appearance.
~He likes to cook, and he's good at it.
~He loves our boys with a tremendous father's love.
~He is quick to forgive me when my words are harsh.
~I watched in wonder as he dismantled an electric heater that no longer heated - that I was just going to throw away.  He took out the motor/fan and hooked it up the way he needed it to use in his forge.
~He got me a food processor for Christmas, gave it to me early enough (Grant gave away the surprise anyway) to use for making a carrot cake for Christmas dinner, and he still surprised me on Christmas morning with a gift - my newly repaired laptop!  Yay!  Now I can blog - at least when I'm not doing everything else around here (grin).

~Andi

Exactly

I seem to be writing a lot about Christian lately.  I hope that doesn't make Grant and Justin jealous, but I get to spend extra one-on-one time with Christian each afternoon while Grant is in school and the other children are sleeping...and he constantly amazes me.  Christian is so fascinated with numbers and math right now.  Here is one of our conversations from earlier today:
CHRISTIAN: What is 181 divided by 66?
ME:  That's a tough one to do in my head, but the answer would be close to 3.
CHRISTIAN:  I don't mean what it's close to.  I need to know exactly.
ME:  Then we will need a piece of paper and pencil or a calculator to figure it out exactly.
ME (with the calculator):  181 divided by 66 equals 2.742  with a repeating 4 and 2.
CHRISTIAN (laughing):  You were way off!
No, I never did ask him why he needed to know the exact answer to 181 divided by 66.  There was probably not a reason - at least not one that I would understand.
Now you know what I go through every afternoon!
~Andi

Crescendo

Christian has given himself a new nickname, and I think it's so clever that I just had to share...the artist formerly known as Christian is henceforth to be called Crescendo (not sure of the spelling just yet - it might be more like "Christian-doe").  He keeps me laughing.  They all do.

~Andi
  

Back to School

Sometimes it doesn't take much to make me feel like an inadequate mother.  Grant's first day of school was Thursday.  I made sure he was well rested, well fed, well dressed, well supplied with pencils, crayons, kleenex, hand sanitizer, etc.  We arrived at the school with plenty of time to spare...only to find that all the other mothers were taking pictures of their children on their first day of the new school year, but did I have a camera with me?  No - on this one I failed.  I don't have pictures of his first day of kindergarten from last year either.  Maybe I will do better with Christian and Justin.  There are some benefits to being a second or third child.

Christian wants to be in school so badly.  He was completely convinced that he was going to get to go to school as soon as he turned five, when he finally learned and understood this week that it was going to be an entire year before he could start school, he was very disappointed.  I told him we would have school time at home each day that Grant was in school.  He liked that idea.  I haven't pushed formal learning times with Christian because he is so scary smart already.  But with "school" each day he will feel like he is helping me practice to become a teacher.

Speaking of teaching, I start classes again tomorrow.  I've so enjoyed my month-long break, and I'm not looking forward to having class every night (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday...might as well be every night anyway).  Oh well.  There's no denying it is what I am supposed to be doing, and my children are not neglected in the process.  Brian is a huge help with the children when I am in school.  We are getting through it together.
Happy New School Year!

Maybe the Dishes Will Clean Themselves

I have dishes to do, but I want and need to write some things about what's going on around here.  I don't know what's wrong with me...why can't I get more done in a day?  I am busy all day long, rarely taking any time for myself, but still the house is messy and I haven't posted anything to our blog since my birthday nearly 3 months ago!

Lots of things have happened since my birthday: Justin turned 2, I started my summer classes, Grant finished kindergarten and started summer school, we had a big party for J's birthday and Brian's college graduation, I had the worst class of my entire college career (sorry, no details here...I do not wish to dwell on it...I made my "A" despite the worst instructor ever), Grant finished summer school, we went from too few kids in my daycare to too many, Brian started Enduring Creation (check out his blog for details on that - enduringcreation.blogspot.com), Grant and Christian had their first formal swimming lessons, they attempted a week's stay at Grandma and Grandpa's (they stayed a day before getting homesick), and the highlight of my summer -  I got to spend a day with my Mom and go to the Nauvoo Temple with her to do some of the work for my great grandmother.  How I needed that!

How's that for a quick update?  Maybe I can still get those dishes or something else done tonight. 
~Andi

Another Year Older and Wiser, Too

It's my birthday. It's been a good day. Brian prepared me some amazing food and the boys made me cards without anyone telling them they should.
There's been a slight change of plans regarding my summer break: there won't be one after all. I was just going to take the summer off because I thought I didn't have any financial aid to cover summer courses, but I found out this past week that I do have some free money for school that I just can't pass up. So, I'll be starting classes again on the 31st of this month. Oh well - fewer classes to take later, right?
Once again, it's late and I need to sign off, but I did promise pictures, so here are a few:

Christian and his best friend, Duckie

Grant and Christian with Duckie and New Duck (thanks, Grandma)

Justin needs a haircut

~Andi