Sweet Home Pennsylvania

Last night we got home from nearly 3 weeks in PA visiting with my family. (Rob came up to join us for the last few days and help with the drive home.) Maybe you're wondering what we did during that time?  Here is a small sampling...

We hiked in flip flops. (My specialty.)

Charlotte took this pic- not bad!

We spent time with animals.

A certain horse named Simon even tried to kiss my baby bear.

Jennifer recognized a kindred spirit in Charlotte.  In her words- 'when we find one that seems to have the sickness, we like to encourage it.'

Even my serious little man took a ride on Simon.  

Look out Cowboy Woody!

Kaufman Kousins- most of them.

We went to gymnastics.

Charlotte got brave on the balance beam. (And yeah that's Jake buzzing by on the trampoline in the background.)

My sisters and I finally finished going through my mom's photos.

I really like this one of her from the 1960s.

We learned not to take a water gun from the baby.

(Jake took his first steps while we were in PA as well.)

We ate things that turned our tongues blue.

We celebrated!

We bounced!

(Ben and Toby may have had a wrestle-mania moment here.)

We drove things with motors!

And more things with motors!

We spent time just hanging out.

And helped build paths with 150+ lb. rocks.  

(Well, some of us did.)

We used fireworks to have tank battles and destroy toy soldiers.

Occasionally we slept.

But not very much.

  

Mostly, we made some new memories.

Thanks for the good time, y'all!

a child's prayer

Toby offered the following prayer at bedtime tonight:

"Heavenly Father,

Thankful for this day. Thankful for our chairs, and our pillows, and blankets, and the doors, and for the walls not falling down.  Maybe someday they'll fall down... but not today. * Please bless mommy for preparing it. ** Thankful for our family. Please we have a new baby BOY sister in our family. ***

In the name of Jesus Christ- Oh I forgot- thankful for our tables, and chairs, and blankets, and all, all, aaaaallll our toys. [silence] Please bless mommy for preparing it.****

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."



*I think this is fallout from a nightmare he had 2 nights ago.
** This is a common refrain at dinner, and Toby has adopted it at bedtime as well.
*** Charlotte has been praying for a baby sister for about a month now, I guess Toby has decided another girl in the house would not benefit him.  Also, no, I am not currently expecting a baby.
**** Now he's just procrastinating bedtime.

Happy Mudder's Day!

(In case you haven't seen my facebook profile, I thought I'd blog about the Marine Mud Challenge that I did on Saturday.  Besides, I want to remember some of these details, so this is also for me personally.)  

First let me say that I had no intention of doing this.  A week ago a friend of mine posted on Facebook that someone had dropped out of her team, and she needed a new member.  On an impulse, I signed up.  The team was called "RMFAO" which stood for: Running My Fat BUM Off.  Since I have been trying to get to a healthier weight, this sounded like a good workout for me.  :)  And, well, it was.

The course is 5 miles long.  We started out running up a mud bank where a very nice Marine then shot us with a fire hose.  Then we had to run through some muck, up this mud bank, slide down the other side under the cargo net, and crawl out through the tunnel.  5 minutes in, and I was wet, muddy, and scraped up.  Fun!

The course had a lot of challenging obstacles... especially for a girl like me who has no upper body strength. I managed to do them ALL, except this one.  With some team assistance, I got my bum up onto the lower bar, but I was too scared to go up over the top bar and then drop down.  That bottom bar is about 8 feet high.  (I had to jump up to grab it.) I went over much higher things, but they all offered a little more to hold onto.  I was shaking like a leaf on this one, and it was the only time on the whole course where I was freaked out.

This was the first of many walls to climb over.  I had never climber over a wall before in my life and I was so proud of myself for getting up there!  Little did I know there were like 4 more walls to climb on the course.  Nathan and Eve were spotting me on my drop down, but I still managed to scrape up my knee on the wall and land on my bum in a pile of pine cones.  Also, a teenager from our church was racing just behind us and broke his leg coming over this wall.  He's having surgery on it today.

This was the taller of two sets of "stairways."  No problemo.

This was the beastliest thing, that I actually accomplished.  The tire wall was very high (15 feet?) and you climbed it like a cargo net.  That was tricky enough, but then you had to go over the top- and my legs weren't long enough to be holding onto anything as I scooted over the top, so I held onto that chain for dear life.  Then you had to climb down the other side.  

Running down the sand cliff. 

Wading through the "big pit" there were I think 5 of these logs that you had to climb over... funny that I don't remember exactly, but I was just very focused on whatever was directly in front of me. 

I'm in the foreground here getting ready to climb over yet another wall out of the last mud pit.  Eve is behind me.  The Marines were yelling at us to belly crawl through this mud... it was so thick and deep, it was hard to lift your feet out of it.

Go team!!  

I'm so glad I did this.  It was HARD, but it's great to feel like I can do hard things.  Been there, done that, got the t-shirt.  ;)

When i got home I was welcomed by 3 beautiful roses from my 3 beautiful babies.  Thank you sweet Rob for encouraging me and supporting me in all my dorky plans! 

After a long, hot shower we headed out with a picnic dinner to Lady Antebellum Amphitheater to hear the Symphony Orchestra of Augusta.  The kiddos danced and played to the classical tunes.

It's a lovely venue.

And I am a lucky momma. 

Best. Mother's Day. Ever.

boys and girls

These kids crack me up.  

Here Charlotte and Toby are modelling some pajama pants that I made them.  Charlotte's have pink and white stars and Toby's have pirate ships.  This dynamic duo can be unstoppable when they work together, but when they fight with each other, watch out!  I love seeing their relationship evolve as their individual personalities become more and more pronounced.

Toby is ever the engineer.  

We have these foam letters to play with in the tub.  Toby uses them to build interesting, and always symmetrical, towers and shapes on the tub wall.  Some of them have been very elaborate.  He will take anything he can find and use it as a building block.  I love seeing his ideas take shape.  Right now he is fixated on college.  He talks about going there every day.

Charlotte is the imagineer.

In this instance polar and lady bug were set up on a dinner date in her bedroom.  Charlotte comes up with elaborate play-acting scenarios with her brothers and her stuffed animals and can be very entertaining.  She also recently told us that when she grows up she wants to live in Paris and be a cook.  Guess we should start saving now for French culinary school?

 Even dress-up is like two sides of a coin around here.

Toby suits up in his Spiderman costume (over his swimsuit,) accessorized with a sword, shield, and a belt tied around his head.

Charlotte dresses as a princess and accessorizes with everything girly she can find.

I love their differences.  And I love that they find ways to play together while still being themselves.  I hope their special relationship continues throughout their lives.  :)

A Jakey update

Jacob is 8 1/2 months old now!!  If I haven't blogged in a while, it may be because this baby boy is keeping me quite busy. He is a speedy crawler, and a mischief maker.  He can also pull up to standing and is cruising around the coffee table everyday building up those muscles to take off running. 

Jacob is now self-feeding with little puffs, soft fruits and veggies (like bananas and peas,) and drinking from a bottle or sippy cup.  He is all about meal time and gets very cranky if you don't feed him fast enough or the spoonfuls are perceived as too skimpy.  

I like how his pinkie finger is raised in this picture- such good table manners.  ;)

One of his very favorite things right now is a tasty door stopper.  As soon as he hits the floor in the morning he makes a beeline to the nearest door stopper and either flicks it around to make a noise, or rips it off the wall and sticks it in his mouth.  I have a pile of them sitting on my nightstand right now.

He also has a taste for paperback fiction.  I've had the pleasure of fishing many book pages out of his slobbery jaws this week.  This is one subject that Rob and I disagree somewhat on- Rob thinks we should relocate things for the time being (I know this is traditional baby-proofing philosophy and would protect our books better.)  I prefer to leave things where they are (our every possession can't be out of children's reach) and work with Jake on a case by case basis... "no, no," take it away, relocate the baby, repeat.  We're doing a little bit of both.  

Jakey is still my cuddly Little Bear.  

He is such a happy boy.

I am so thankful for his sweet spirit in our family.

Through the river and over the woods

(aka Rocky Mountain highs and lows)

The mountains along the Wasatch Front are beautiful. They really are something you have to see to believe. So every time we are in Utah, we try to get up in the mountains a bit. On this trip we went twice.

Rob and I finished a date night out for Indian food by taking a drive into Little Cottonwood Canyon. We weren't really dressed for hiking, but we walked around just a little and took a picture. This past week was Rob's birthday and it was also our 6 1/2 year anniversary. I was a smart girl to marry this nerdy wordy man. I love him so! (I don't know why I'm scrunching my face so you can see up my nose. Ah well.)

On another lovely sunny day we took the 3 kids and headed up Big Cottonwood Canyon.

We drove all the way to the top where the road closed because of snow (in the summer you can continue driving up and over to Park City on the other side of the ridge.) There was still significant snow up there and skiers enjoying the runs at Snowbird (I think it was Snowbird anyway.)

Then we drove back down and found a place to park so we could go for a little hike. Jakey however, insisted it was time to eat, so Rob took the big kids off on an adventure and I stayed at the car with the baby man and enjoyed the views.

So amazing.

After we were all back together, I still really wanted to go somewhere, and there was a waterfall not far down the path, so we all headed out again- Rob carrying Jacob. We came to the part of the stream pictured above. And we couldn't see the falls really so we decided to cross.

I told the kids not to worry about getting wet shoes, we'd just go back to Grandma's and change. The water was frigid cold though (snowmelt) so we didn't want to get wet. Rob crossed with Jake and Toby. Then Charlotte and I were crossing. Rob took Charlotte's hand as we approached the other side and pulled her across, then he took my hand. I took one more big step onto a rock and slid right down it and went WAIST DEEP into the water. (Yeah, it doesn't look that deep does it?) Rob tried to pull me up, but only had one hand free and it really hurt as my arm went up while the rest of me went down. So I started to cry and hyperventilate.

***At this point I would like to say 2 things-

1. I know that I should have tested the rock before stepping onto it, I don't know why I didn't.

And 2. Don't hyperventilate at high altitudes.***

I realized I was getting close to fainting at this point (ears ringing, world going black,) so Rob somehow lugged me out of the stream to sit on a rock and breathe deeply with my head between my legs. I really didn't want the kiddos to worry, and I REALLY didn't want to leave Rob on the wrong side of the stream, on the side of a mountain, with 3 little kids and an unconscious freezing wife. But I was okay, I promise.

I pulled it together enough to cross the stream - again - and get to the car where we turned on the heat full blast. Rob wanted to go to the hospital, but it really wasn't necessary. I teased him about ripping my arm right off my body with his massive upper body strength. (He's been working out for a few months now and is quite muscular.) But we got back to Casa Anderson and I took many ibuprofen and a long nap. 3 days later I was fine.

We know we were dumb... and we know we got lucky. I am very thankful it was me and not Rob who slipped. I am thankful none of the kids got hurt and that I didn't get hurt more badly. We'll exercise more caution in the future, k? But I hope that me sharing this story made you laugh maybe a little bit... but not too much! It was kinda traumatic for me! And if you are in Utah, please go see the "hidden falls" in Big Cottonwood Canyon and let me know what they look like. ;)

Over the river and through the woods

We just got home from a nice visit with our Anderson family in Utah. (At 3:45 this morning to be exact. Red eye flights with small children are not for the faint-hearted, but thankfully our kids are pros at that stuff and didn't give us much trouble at all.)

We got to do lots of fun stuff with Grandma Anderson. We went to the Hogle Zoo, the LDS Church History Museum (it's not as dull as it sounds- lots of hands on pioneer stuff to play with,) and Temple Square. We shopped, visited with a few of my friends from college, played many board games and Mahjong, and ate at In-N-Out Burger and Cafe Rio. We dyed eggs, got baskets from the Easter Bunny, went to church, and had a nice Easter dinner. It was busy but laid back. It was great. :)

Toby practices giving a talk at the podium. This is identical to the one in the Conference Center, where General Conference is broadcast from to church members throughout the world. We just watched it a few weeks ago, so the kids totally recognized it.

This is what often happens when you ask an obliging stranger to take a picture of your family in front of the Salt Lake Temple.

Toby and Charlotte dyed eggs with Aunt Becky.

She was so nice to get all of the stuff ready to do that with them. :)

Jacob didn't help dye the eggs, but he was willing to taste test them.

Easter Sunday, just home from church.

Charlotte and Toby got new outfits from the Easter Bunny, and Jakey got a new outfit from my dear friend Suzanne. (Toby got his first tie-- "just like dad's.")

He's not heavy, he's my brother.

(I especially like that the tie is clipped onto his pocket in this photo. Toby also likes to wear his watch on his ankle. He's got his own ideas, that kid.)

Thanks Grandma for letting us come to your house for Easter!

put a little sole into it

Friday night Toby and Charlotte each had their first soccer games. Rob and I don't have much of a background in team sports (at all,) so the whole family was kind of excited and a bit nervous leading up to these games. They have been enjoying practice, and they both have great volunteer coaches teaching them some basic skills, but we just didn't know what to expect come game time. What happened was NOT surprising, but it was hilarious, and Charlotte and Toby's very different personalities came out full force on the field.

Toby was up first. His team of 3-4 year olds have mostly never played before. He has one little girl on his team that can REALLY play. (Seriously, she is a killer in pigtails.) At this age they allow the coaches to be on the field to help direct the action. There is no ref. It is slightly organized chaos.

In practice, Toby listened very closely to his coach, sometimes, but would get distracted by everything going on around him. There is one little boy on his team though that won't even get on the field yet, so I guess that's normal.

In the game, Toby was awesome.

Whenever the coach would say things like, "Who thinks they can get the ball?" Toby would jump up and yell "I can!!" He was all enthusiasm and joy. He ran up and down that field the whole game. And he kicked the ball like 5 times. Maybe. He was just happy to be there and so proud of himself. It had Rob and I grinning from ear to ear on the sidelines.

Next up was Charlotte's game.

Charlotte has a difficult time listening during practice because she is very busy socializing with the other players and kicking the dirt. She is here for the party! These 5-6 year olds have mostly been playing for a year or two and a few of her teammates seem to be frustrated by her flightiness already, and to them all I can say is, "I feel your pain." ;)

Charlotte's game had a referee... and a VERY particular one at that. He made sure they followed every rule. I realize they have to learn these things at some point, but the very first game for some of them??? I guess it's good to start off on the right foot? Anyway. Charlotte started off strong! She ran hard- for about 3 minutes. Then she got frustrated that she wasn't getting to kick the ball and stood on the field gesturing- Shock! Frustration! Twirling and leaping like a ballerina!

She sat out the second quarter. At the half we asked her how she was feeling and she said, "Oh, the coach just had to talk to me about some stuff." (In a way to suggest that she is the assistant coach and wasn't riding the pine pony.) Even the mom next to us burst out laughing at that one.

In the third quarter Charlotte stumbled upon the idea of defense. (Less running involved.) And she was really pretty good at it! She blocked a goal and LOVED hearing all the parents cheer for her and kicked the ball away from the other team when they would approach. I think she has found her niche. :)

So this is our life for the next couple of months. Like I said, Rob and I had a great time, so I'm looking forward to the rest of the season. Rob was genuinely surprised that he had so much fun watching these pee-wees play. I just hope it doesn't get too dang hot. It's already reached 90 here once, and the temp is bound to be warmer in May!