For Tyler

Tyler took this picture of Nora while she was eating breakfast this morning, then he asked me to upload it so he could look at it while he was at work.  So, here it is.

Reading? How boring

I like that Tyler is still soldiering on with his book in this last shot.

Camping at Lake Patagonia

I want to think of our family as One that Camps and Hikes.  After this weekend, I'm not sure that this is to be.  A few days ago, I was seized by anxiety about the impending summer and decided that if we were going to go camping anytime this year, right now- this weekend, in fact, was when it was going to happen.

Driving home this afternoon, I felt like a failure.  I had planned and executed this trip due to the fact that Tyler has had to work late pretty much every day this week.  I forgot a few items when I was packing: all toiletries except a brush and rubber bands (toothbrushes, toothpaste, contact solution and cases), tongs to turn the hot dogs, and I didn't get enough wood to have an evening AND morning fire.  This is not where the failure comes in.

 No, the failure comes in when you consider that the children were AWFUL the entire time.  They cried and whined about e v e r y t h i n g.  Lillian and Nora shared a sleeping bag that we opened up and folded like a hamburger, something we've done on other camping trips, this time it was unacceptable to both parties.  I brought the bear jammies for Ethan when he wanted the rocketship ones.  And, (this has been a growing trend around our house) they complained that they couldn't eat constantly.  I only brought so much food, the rations were not meager, but the lack of choices was devastating and could not be recovered from.

The lake was too cold to swim in, the boat tours were pricey, and Tyler has a semi-unexplained hatred of paddle boats, so we decided to take a hike.  This was a bad decision.  The kids were OK for about... half a mile... of our planned 2.5-mile hike.  It was too hot (approx high 70's), too sunny, not enough food, not enough of the food they want to eat, too much walking, not enough scenery, and I LOST ONE OF NORA'S SPECIAL ROCKS.

Side note: did you know that Nora loves rocks?  She always has at least one on her person, a special collection stowed away in her closet that she takes out and admires frequently, and I am constantly reminding her to take them out of her mouth.  At least once a day, I make her spit one out.

This picture was shot at the turn-around spot by the creek... right before Ethan wet his pants (something he hasn't done in a long time) and proceeded to cry the rest of the way back out of embarrassment and anger that I hadn't thought to bring him extra pants.

Tyler ranked the hike as a FAIL but the kids really liked the fire, so it was a net gain.  Lillian asked me when we'd go camping again, and I told her when she turned 10... in 3 years.

Ren Fair

I haven't been to a renaissance fair since high school, so when a lady in our ward offered free tickets, I eagerly accepted.  I spent so much time in what I feel like can be described as literally hauling the kids around, that I only took 3 pictures.  That's it.  Three.  I apologize for this one being sideways, but this is the fire whip guy; by far the most awesome attraction at the fair.  Or faire.

I like that I didn't take a picture of any of his tricks: the one where he used a huge bullwhip to whip roses out of a lady's mouth, the one where he did two whips at once upside-down and backwards, or the one (as his name suggests) where he LIT HIS WHIP ON FIRE and used it to whip things OFF HIS OWN HEAD.

No, I took a picture of when he was doing a silly crowd-working thing by making a phone call on some guy's phone.

It could be that I was too in awe of his whipping prowess to take any pictures but probably it was the children.  It's always the children.

These are the other two pictures I took.  It was pretty hot, like 90 degrees, and I felt bad for this guy dressed up as a tree, so we paid a dollar to take a picture with him.  Ethan and Nora were completely freaked out by him, and you can see Lillian is not so sure.

Other activities we enjoyed were: seeing acrobats, watching a glass blowing demonstration, eating a turkey leg, Tyler threw some axes, there was a merry-go-round, and a falconry show.  I wanted to get my hair done in a fancy braid but they wanted $25, so I passed.  We'll have to go back one day when our kids are older so we can watch all the other performers with their Elizabethan humor and puns.  I do love a good pun.

Tucson Book Vegetable

I have this feeling that I'm not living as much life as I used to, on average.  Probably this is because I've spent 80.95% of the last 7 years and 4 months being either pregnant or nursing a child under 1.  Also, I finished my degree.  And worked.  But I feel like I haven't done anything else.  We used to be fun and do fun things, we used to have people over.

I'm turning 30 this year, and Tyler asked me what I wanted.  I tried to remember what I did for his 30th and I couldn't remember.  Oh, that's right, I had just started working 2 weeks before and I had 3 weeks left of school so I had no mental energy left to spend on planning anything.

See? Boring.

So, the past few weeks, since I've been feeling a little better, I've been trying to ramp up the interesting factor around here.

Fun-Slump Amanda never went to the Tucson Festival of Books.  It's a huge deal on the U of A campus.  I pictured something overcrowded that my kids wouldn't be interested in and it was often times hot and I didn't want to drag myself all the way into town to have my kids cry and try to run away and freak out while I was trying to look at things and listen to people.  Plus people always complain about how you have to park really far away.

New Amanda is up more up for fun... within reason.  We had to go up to town anyway, so we went and checked it out.

Nora couldn't say "festival" so she called it the "Book Vegetable" which was funnier.

Ethan is always up for hugging people in costumes.

Nora, not so much.

Also... there was a CIRCUS!  They were all characters from The Wizard of Oz.  Here are the two witches doing a double trapeze act.

Nora's favorite part was when the lion, the scarecrow, and one of the flying monkeys started dancing to Gangnam Style.

Near the end, they pulled Tyler out of the crowd to do... nothing.  He stood there for a little bit, and then they sent him back to his seat.  Haaaaawkward.  We didn't stay for too long because we got there late in the afternoon.  Also, we didn't go to any of the approximately 5,000 lectures.  But I did see a real whale brain on display, and that was cool.

I think I might have gone a little overboard on this new more life-y life.  We have secured a babysitter for the next TWO weekends and then I'm going out by myself the weekend after that.  When am I going to have time to knit and watch back episodes of Star Trek: TNG?  They're not going to just watch themselves.

Fast and Slow

Now that I'm spending a lot more time with my kids, I am more aware of what I say to them.  I find that I am giving my kids two different messages all the time, and that might be confusing for them.

All the time, I'm telling them to move faster.  I'm constantly emphasizing that we're going to be late if they don't get their shoes on and get in the car, their cereal will get soggy if they don't put down the ponies and get over here, I am always trying to figure out ways to get Lillian to read more smoothly so she can make 80 WPM and pass off her stupid reading assignments (she has these dumb paragraphs that she has to read over and over and over again until she can read them in a minute or less... we've read the current one every day for two weeks), or pushing her to be able to do her timed math wherein she is supposed to do 72 simple addition and subtraction problems in 10 minutes.  She can do about 20; it takes her about 40-45 minutes to do all 72.

And then sometimes in the same breath, I tell them to slow down.  Be patient, wait, I know it's boring, take your time and do a good job.  Lillian has very sloppy handwriting and Tyler and I harp on her about it ALL THE TIME.  I\We make her erase and re-do, do practice worksheets like the kind you do in kindergarten, and emphasize that she has to think about what she's doing before she does it.  The kids complain that their chores take too long or that it's boring when we go to the park with just a soccer ball and no organized games or activities, or when we have to wait at an appointment or a restaurant and I didn't bring the iPad or any books or toys.

I was thinking about this on our a hike we took recently.  All three kids were walking and there was much emphasis on hurrying up, putting down the rocks, stop touching the grass, catch up, OK I'm leaving without you, and that sort of thing.  The kids kept telling me that they were bored; they wondered when we were going to "get there," and I told them that there was no "there."  I told them that the point was to be out in nature and to get some exercise.  Speed up and slow down at the same time.

I worry that they can't keep up with life, that they won't be fast enough; but then at the same time, I worry that they won't know how to slow down and do "boring" things like wait, study, practice, and enjoy nature.

I suspect that this is why parents make their kids play sports.  It has elements of both things- you need to think fast to keep up with game play, but at the same time, you have to do boring drills and go to practice over and over again.  So, although I have no idea how soccer is going to fit in our schedule, I plan on signing Lillian up for the spring season.

Yeah, you *thought* you'd just pop over...

Last week was Rodeo Week in Tucson, and Lillian had a few days off school so we decided to pop over to California for a quick Disneyland trip.  I actually wanted to go camping, but it was too cold, and I need 15 pillows to sleep in a bed, so I probably couldn't handle sleeping on the ground.

On the way, we stopped to see my Uncle Jim and my cousins (not pictured) in Thermal.  Jim's pig had babies 2 days before we got there.

Baby pigs = super cute.  Mama pigs = super scary.  Also, did you know that pigs are huge?  Like, I was looking at the daddy pig and then looking at Tyler and I decided that the pig was taller.  And weighed 500 pounds, or something.

We were cooing over the pigs and I wanted to pet one but the mama pig was making it clear that she wasn't even OK with me *looking* at her piglets, when Uncle Jim launched into a big spiel about how he's going to sell them at the Easter auctions because the price of ham goes up at Easter and he can get X amount per piglet inside I was like "I'm never eating ham again!"  Easter Means Carnage!  But then I looked at the daddy pig and he was huge and ugly and I thought that I could eat him.  I'm awful, I know.

This is what the kids look like in the car.

 Waiting for the tram.

Disneyland actually worked out really well.  My sister Anne came so there were 3 adults for 3 kids.  It was convenient that I am pregnant because I can't go on the big-kid rides.  So Tyler would take Lillian on the Matterhorn, or whatever, and the little kids and I would chill out on the kiddie rides.  Except I took them on Snow White, and Ethan will never be the same again.  He still talks about how creepy the witch was.

Then I wanted some nature, so the next day, we headed to Laguna Beach with my brother Andrew for a little hike.

The kids haven't quite caught the vision of hiking.  The hike was probably 1.5 miles, and it took a good 2.5 hours.  There was much rock throwing, flower picking, and asking where we were going and when we were going to get there.

There was lots of grass that the kids kept running over and sitting in.  It's like they've never seen real grass before... oh, wait... they haven't.

 We decided to head over to California Adventure the next day.  This day went slightly worse for several reasons:

1. Turns out I'm allergic to Southern California.  "Didn't you grow up there and never ever have allergies?" you ask.  YES! I developed allergies when I lived in San Luis Obispo and I had a cold that wouldn't go away.  Tyler told me it was allergies and I told him he was nutty.  He persuaded me to just try a Claritin and it worked like a miracle.  Still, I was OK when we went to visit my parents.  Then I moved to Arizona for a few years and now whenever we cross the Colorado River, my face explodes.  So I was a little bit miserable from that.
2. Two adults for three kids is not as desirable a ratio as the above mentioned 3:3.
3. Ethan was like, "Didn't we just do this?" and proceeded to freak out.  Also he told me it was too loud there, and this is kind of true.  The rides are all loud, there is loud music playing everywhere, there are loud people, and as soon as we sat down to lunch, the rag-time band started up 10 feet away.

 
Apparently, this is just how my face looks.

This ladybug ride is my favorite: the line is pretty short and the ride is pretty fun.  While we were waiting in line, a little girl who was probably 4 or so told me all about how her favorite ride is Tower of Terror.  I have never been on this ride, so I didn't know what it was like, but if this little girl loves it then it must not be so bad.  Both Lillian and Nora were tall enough so Tyler took them both.

I was waiting at the exit when they came out and both the girls looked like they were going to cry.  Tyler said that he was a little bit scared on the ride and Nora looked at me and solemnly declared that we were never going on that ride ever again.  Ever.

For me, at least, the trip would have been 30-35% more fun if I wasn't constantly sneezing, blowing my nose, or spacing out from the medication.  Oh well.