Visitors Near and Far

What a beautiful weekend we've been having!  We've been getting out between conference sessions and making the most of the wonderful weather.  We've played in our yard quite a bit. Monica cleaned out the garden in the backyard, and there's been a lot of swinging, and hoola hoop tossing, and running the bubble machine.  We've also made several trips to the park, which has been great.  The girls rode their bikes over and we'd get about an hour to play until we had to head home.  Grayson's been all over the playground, and he does everything but the climbing stuff (like ladders).  He really loves this slide that's over on the side of the hill.

Rewinding back to last Sunday, we had the Smiths over for dinner!  They brought a dessert, and they had these bunny pastries that we put whipped cream and berries on.  They were very good.

And Grayson took right to them.  I mean, I hope he actually just recognized them from church.  Actually, as I'm writing this, I know he recognizes them, because as soon as Brother Smith walks in the building Grayson will point to him and say "can I get a PEZ?"  They became sworn book brothers, which is the highest bond you can achieve with Grayson these days.

During our dinner, Bro Smith also mentioned a workout class he attends at the rec center.  I signed up and attended with him the next day.  It's good to finally use our rec center membership for myself :).  I really like the class, and while I do work out on my own, I don't typically worry about weights much, so it's nice to have some different things to do that I don't usually do on my own.  The first day I pushed a little too hard, and I almost passed out...  Like, my vision was going fuzzy and I thought I was going to throw up, but after laying down for a little I felt a lot better.  I took it easier on Wednesday.  I had a lot of fun, and I was sore most of the week.  I already signed up to go back again this upcoming week.

There was a little bit of snow on Monday.  Yeah, it's in the 60's today, but we started the week with snow.  I looked out our front window and saw a bird huddled next to our house.

On Thursday Brooke was feeling sick and didn't go to school.  I went to pick up Winry at the end of the day, and once I got her she started playing on the retaining walls on the hill next to the school.  She thought we were waiting for Brooke once school was out.  I told her we didn't need to wait and could just go because Brooke was already at home.  She asked if we could stay a little longer and we ended up staying until school got out anyway.  I think Winry spent most of the time rolling down the hill.

I believe the background of this next game was the girls laying on the floor kicking each other.  Eventually, however, kicking turned into making a "tent" with their legs, and Grayson is NOT the kind of person who passes up a perfectly good tent, so in he went.

Michael has been staying with us this week.  Most of his time has been spent in Colorado Springs, but he's been up here in the evenings, and stayed late some mornings to see the kids.  They love having him around, and get a little too wild when they interact with him.  Good news, he also got into Grayson's book brothers.

And now we're back up to this weekend, and hitting up the park.  Grayson had a great time climbing up the hill and going down the slide, but that can't last forever.  So what do you do when it's time to move on from the slide?  Well... just stop halfway up the hill and slide down the grippy rubber.  My first thought was that he was going to wear out his pants, but as the bottoms of his shins suggest, he won't be in this size much longer.  And he was having a good time.

Today during General Conference Jelly was acting playful, so I got out the laser pointer, and guess who took notice?  Yes, Grayson.  Jelly ran across the room when she saw the laser on, but then even when I shone it right by her paws she just sat, and didn't even always watch it, so Grayson was a way better participant.  He really believed he was going to pick it up when he walked over, but was never quite able to get it.

Brooke and Grayson were going down the double slide together, and when they'd get to the bottom Grayson was singing "where are we going? To some slides! Where are we going? To some slides!" which was a word change up from his favorite Dora the Explorer episode (and, honestly, that song is probably in all of them).

How do you race down the slide when your race partner goes to do something else?  Simply, race your foot!  That's probably not actually what's going on, but Grayson started intentionally sliding over the divider in the middle of the slides.

There is a tube at the playground, and it's sloped and you have to climb up it.  Yesterday Winry got pretty upset trying to climb it because she couldn't make it up.  I talked her through how I'd do it and tried to help, but she got sad yesterday and we ended up just playing other things.  Today, when we went back, she gave it another go and was able to climb up all on her own!  She was VERY happy, and climbed up several times.

And back to conference.  I hope everyone who's been watching has been enjoying it and learning something for themselves.  I really liked President Nelson's talk about controlling your temper and keeping control of yourself.  That's something I've been trying to work on, especially when dealing with the kids, and I want to listen to that talk every day!  Hopefully it comes out soon.

Quick Update

Well, not a ton of pictures this week.  It was mostly just a typical week, though it was a birthday party Saturday!  Earlier in the week Monica took Winry and Grayson to the park.  It looks like they were there with the Cammacks as this is Winry and Clara swinging together.

The prism glasses I ordered came at the start of the week, and I mostly plan to wear them running for now.  The running motion tends to make my double vision its worst, and the doctor said to try to wear them minimally so my eye doesn't get lazy.  Anyway, the first time I put them on it took a little getting used to, so I figured it'd be best to do my first run or two on the treadmill.  The weather was pretty nice, so I was excited to get outside for a run after seeing that things went well with my new glasses.  I got ready to head outside, and I stepped out to... hail.  Hum... so it was back to the treadmill for me!  There was nothing while I was getting ready, so once the hail started I really had no idea how bad it could get.  Hindsight, it think I would have been fine 5 or so minutes later.

Shouldn't be too surprising to see that it also snowed this last week.  Winry took advantage and went out to play, which I thought was great, but much like the Lion King, "everything the light touches..." was gone.

One of our good friends had her first baby recently.  She moved 20 or 30 minutes away when she got married, but we still took her dinner.  Dinner was ready a little late, and Grayson just couldn't wait any longer, so I stayed home with him to have dinner, while Monica and the girls went.  And when I saw their baby!!  I told Monica we need to take them dinner again!

Grayson is really into doubling up media lately.  Usually this means reading two copies of the same book.  He really loves these bear books right now, and just because we own one does not mean we don't NEED it from the library.  I let him watch his bedtime stories on the tablet, and wouldn't you know it, he needed the book as well!  It was awesome.

Speaking of library books, we had a pile that needed to be returned, so on Saturday on the way to a birthday party we stopped by the library to drop them off.  I arrived to this sight.  A library card does allow you to get up to 100 items, but I've never seen someone take full advantage of that.  I thought the 15 or so we were returning was a lot, but they pulled past the book drop and opened the trunk.  And they put a LOT in.

Saturday was crazy birthday party day.  We went to one in the morning, and one in the afternoon, and couldn't make it to another that overlapped!  The first one we headed to as a family, but Grayson didn't want to stay so I took him home.  The one in the afternoon was a girl in Winry's class, and her brother is in Brooke's class so they said Brooke could some too.  The girls had a lot of fun party hopping.

And that's about it for the week.  Have a great week ahead!

Spring Break

Whoo, spring break!  The girls had the week off school, and we had quite a bit going on.  At the end of the week Monica had her Lamb of God performance, and both of the girls went on Saturday night.  I'd say we haven't adapted to daylight savings yet, and I think it'll be a rude awakening tomorrow morning, but that's not till tomorrow. :)  Anyway, it helped the girls stay up through the performance, and they both loved it!  Brooke and I actually went the night before as well, but Winry took my ticket Saturday night and went with Brooke and the rest of my family who came into town.

Last Sunday we went to the Runkels' for a baby shower.  It was great to get up there and see them again.

We played a few games while we were there, and our family swept the prizes!  I won putting on a diaper and drinking a bottle.  Monica won blowing up a balloon and dropping a ping pong ball in a cup, and Brooke won the game where you couldn't say baby.  If you heard someone say baby you got to take their clothes pins, and Brooke basically had everyone's by the time the game ended!

On Monday Monica asked the kids what they wanted to do for spring break, and they said work on 72 hour kits.  So they pulled out the backpacks and started going through them.  Lots of food swapping for fresher items and checking clothes sizes, etc.  Winry got to try on her poncho and really liked wearing that.

The kids spent the WHOLE day talking about emergency scenarios.  They all had the general gist of what if our house caught fire to them being stranded alone in the wilderness to how much food they may or may not eat, and how long they'd save stuff, and where they'd find water, how many times they'd blow their whistles, how many items of clothes they'd wear before going to sleep, and what they'd use for a pillow.  It was a LONG day of "doomsday" prepping.  You know, cause if our house caught fire, all civilization would end.  Anyway, I did my part, and took them in the backyard after work and showed them how to make a tent with a rope and throwing one of their emergency blankets over the top.  They loved it.

Mmmmm, pie day.  Monica made a key lime pie, and it makes me sad now, because it is gone now.  It was very tasty.  It deserved the elegance Grayson brought to the eating of his pie.

Grayson at times decides that the stairs would be an ideal place to lay down.  He just fits onto one step so nicely.

Friday brought leprechauns, which brought St. Patrick's day.  We had shamrock waffles for breakfast with whipped cream.

And Brooke had shamrock hair.  It's really too bad it wasn't a school day, because that's hair worth showing off.

Winry was playing with Barbies and one of their heads broke off.  I told her I'd try to glue it back together, and I used the good stuff, which means 2 hours to set, 24 to fully dry.  So Barbie got the clamps!

Saturday morning we went bowling as a family!  I thought I got pictures and videos all around when we got there, but looking back it seems I really just have pictures of Winry, this being my favorite.

Here are the final scores.  Grayson beat me by a pin!  I do pride myself in my aiming of the ball ramps that the kids use.  Grayson actually took off part way through to wander the arcade with Monica whose back started hurting.  Winry and Brooke filled in for Grayson, and I filled in for Monica.  I never quite got hooking the ball down, and helped her get several gutters in a row.

Friday night Brooke and I went to Lamb of God, and Niki stayed at our house and helped Winry and Grayson get to sleep.  When we were heading into the building Brooke and I found this cool statue seat.

The original plan was for Monica's parents to go to Lamb of God on Friday night, and then watch the kids on Saturday when Brooke and I would go with the rest of my family.  However, thanks to COVID they didn't end up making it out, so Brooke and I used their tickets on Friday.  We found out there were boxes there, and headed straight to one when we got in!  It was a pretty cool seat.  I would definitely take a box if possible again in the future.

Katie and her mom also came on Friday night, so they sat in our box with us!  They're both singing coaches and have degrees and stuff, and I could definitely tell they were listening to things differently than I was.

The show ran until 8:30, and Brooke was getting pretty tired by the end.  She never actually fell asleep, but was pretty tired at the end.  The show was SO good.  I was a bit bummed that I didn't get to go again on Saturday night.  Many of the songs took scriptural stories and made them more conversational, with a singer taking the part of someone in the scriptures, and I really like how it brought the story more alive.  The music was all super good, and Monica did a fantastic job.  I'm really excited for her next show.

Saturday morning Grayson saw Buc-ee and had to wear that!  He was also playing with this balloon, and I believe trying to blow it up.

Niki drove down in a rental car on Friday, but on Saturday Celeste and my dad were going to come down too.  Niki headed up to meet and pick them up, but instead went rogue and headed all the way up to help clean the church.  My dad ended up staying at Tyson's house to help work on their addition, but Niki and Celeste went out for a day on the town with Brooke and Winry.  They went and got their nails done, and I can only imagine how excited the girls got when they suggested it.

After they got their nails done they went to lunch at the Old Spaghetti Factory, and then stopped at the grocery store to get some stuff for dinner.  The girls had a wonderful time, and I'm really glad they "went rogue" as they said.  They got to go see everyone, and have a special day.  I think they had a lot more fun than if we'd all just been hanging out at home.

As for the rest of us, we went to Target to look at Easter candy and see if there was any clearance St. Patrick's day stuff.  It was a great trip.  Grayson sampled many toys, but this stuffed peep definitely had the most staying power.  Many were a hug and then put it back, but this guy shared his seat for quite a while.  Monica and I relished in remembering how simple things were with just one kid, who you can also confine into a cart when you head out.  So the whole family was having a wonderful day.

I've really been enjoying playing the piano recently, but it's too loud once the kids go to sleep.  We have a digital keyboard, but we didn't have a sustain pedal, so I made one!  I found a design online and 3d printed it, and then wired up some electronics inside of it.  I got lucky and ended up having everything I needed on hand.  It works really well and it's really nice to have!

And I think that makes it a wrap for the week.  Oh, march madness kicked off.  I was able to get the first 3 games wrong, and I had Purdue winning it all, and they lost to a 16, so... it's looking bleak this year.  At least it's fun to watch, right?

Family Fun

It's been a pretty swell week this past week.  Grayson's eye is looking better, I went to the doctor again and should start therapy soon, Monica planted some seeds to start the garden indoors, and we had friends over last night before they took off for spring break.  For family movie night we played Mario Kart, which has been the hit choice for the last few weeks.

Monday was pretty windy, and the kids saw someone flying a kite on the way home from school and really wanted to go.  I ran out with them after work, and it was COLD!  My hands were freezing by the time we left.  The girls had a lot of fun, though one of the kites we brought just didn't want to get up in the air.

The other kite, from the dollar store, was doing just fine and I got it all the way out to the end of it's string.  The wind is much nicer above the houses, and the girls enjoyed flying the kites.  They actually really liked the kite that wouldn't stay up because they wanted to run around pulling the kite behind them.

We finished up Grayson's eye drops this past week.  He was supposed to have 2 drops 3 times a day for 5 days.  The very first time wasn't bad, but then it was hard for a day or two, and eventually he started doing great with it.  The captured moments are from the height of difficulty, but later he'd even just tilt his head back and look at the ceiling and let me drop one in quick.  Always for some chocolate chips or marshmallows, but at least he did it willingly.

Reading music (well, reading in general) has been rough lately, so I've started wearing an eye patch when I play the piano.  Jelly wanted to help show it off.  After going to the doctor I'm not sure it's a great idea any more.  I think it's better to make my eyes work hard, but that said, I also think it's bad to sit in double vision.  Anyway, I'm getting some prism glasses soon, and I think I'll probably wear them quite a bit at first to try to get myself back to seeing single as normal, and then start working my way off of them.

Grayson LOVES stories right now.  If I had to pick a favorite thing for him, it would be books.  He also loves to watch videos of books being read.  Here we are at bedtime watching The Very Hungry Caterpillar.  Technically this one is animated, but he loves all stories.  When they went to the library this week he picked up like 5 or 6 bear stories.  They all have the same characters, etc.  He just wants to read them all day ever since.  In fact, we brought one to church and I read it to him on repeat for most of sacrament meeting.

Monica was cleaning up the floor this past week, and Grayson really wanted to help sweep everything up at the end!

On Wednesday someone called in a bomb threat, or bomb tip, or whatever you call it, to Brooke's school.  In the end it was fake, but they still evacuated the school, and it was about 2 hours before they got back to school.  They brought in dogs and cleared the whole building before letting anyone back in.  It was a pretty cold day, and Brooke's class was in music at the time so they didn't even have a chance to get their coats.  They brought school busses in to keep everyone warm while they waited though, and Brooke did enjoy her time on the bus with her friends Abby and Addy.  When Monica picked her up Brooke told her it was the worst day of her life, so they stopped to get ice cream on the way home.  I'm glad everyone was safe.

Monica was doing the girls hair, and Grayson picked out some rubber bands and needed his hair to be done.  Looking pretty stylish!

Winry started to try to find interesting ways to wear her pajamas.  First she was putting them on backwards and having us zip them up her back, but eventually they went on upside down!

Grayson still loves holding himself up and hanging around.  Even handing this kid a banana wont stop him!

I took the kids to a park Saturday morning, and while we were there I was walking by a tree and thought... maybe I should climb this.  It's been quite a while since I've climbed a tree, but it went quite well!  I didn't go too high up, but it was fun.

There was a big rock under the pavilion, and Grayson decided to make it a family!

And today, in spite of our bear book, we didn't make it through all of sacrament meeting.  Instead we ended up in the Relief Society room, doing... this.

Other than the scare on Wednesday things were pretty good out here.  Thursday was even Spanish cultural day at school, and Brooke had so much fun going around seeing other classes projects and going to the assembly and watching the kindergarteners sing.