Where's Tyson? Peek-a-boo!

Hello, My Name is Becky

and I am an edging addict.

A week and a half ago I bought a rotary lawn edger. I remember helping my dad edge our lawn occasionally growing up, and I don't remember it being a pain. Well...we've been in our house almost 2 years and never edged the yard. And I'm not sure the people before us ever did, either. And because it's never been done, it's a huge project. Huge clumps of sod are growing up up and over the sidewalk. It takes a lot of work to do this for the first time! So I bought the edger and started working on it. Well, guess what? We have a TON of edges. And I didn't realize quite how much until I started this little project. It's not just the main lawn (which I'm done with), it's the strip between the sidewalk and the street (which is an insane amount since we live on a corner -- there is a lot to do!) and the curbing which goes around our entire house. I would estimate that I've spent 7-8 hours working on it over the last 10 days, and I probably have a good 5-6 to go. My hands are blistered and tired, but the part I've finished looks SO GOOD that I can't stop. I woke up this morning, fed Tyson, got Alli out the door, put Tyson down for a nap, and spent the next 2.5 hours in the yard. It's very fulfilling, and I'm so excited to see how crisp and beautiful the yard will look when it's all done!

Sunday 10

1. So it's 11:45 and the kids and I have been ready for 1:00 church since 11:00. The girls are all quietly coloring right now, Tyson is sleeping, and I'm enjoying the sound of light rain outside.
2. Alex has been at his annual work convention since Wednesday morning, and I'm pretty sure this is the best we've done without him. Don't get me wrong, we're really excited for him to come home tomorrow, but I've been blessed with an extra dose of patience this time around, and we've done some things to really make this time away be fun. I have to say, it really helps not having a newborn or not being super pregnant!
3. Brynne had her last kindermusic on Tuesday. She has loved that class, and I've enjoyed spending that time with her. I'm a little relieved it's over now, because my Tuesdays have been so busy lately! It's nice to take something off the schedule.
4. Alex left Wednesday morning. From what I hear, it sounds like everything is going well for him! I love to hear that. I'm grateful for texting during this time, because he's so busy that I don't really get to talk to him at all throughout the day, so it's nice to get a text or two just to know how things are going.
5. Thanks to this rain, which I have been LOVING, Alli had a soccer practice and a game cancelled this week. I'm not gonna lie, I was relieved -- less things I have to load up the kids in the car for.
6. Thursday night we went to Pirate Island Pizza for Bobo's birthday. That is a really cool place! My kids loved it. Our little 3 year olds are so cute and fun together, but I'm crossing my fingers that when they're both 4 year olds, they'll be slightly less mischievous together!
7. Friday afternoon it finally stopped raining, and it was so great to see all the neighborhood kids come out of their houses and hop back on their bikes and scooters. My girls went out to play for awhile, and then we came in for dinner, locked the doors, closed the blinds and started our much-anticipated sleepover! We had pancakes for dinner, then set up blankets in the family room and watched "Cheaper by the Dozen". The girls actually all slept really well, and they finally allowed me to sleep on the couch instead of the floor.
8. Saturday morning Alli had a soccer game. The weather was amazing all day Saturday and we spent aaaaalllllll day outside. We stopped at Lowe's on the way home from soccer and picked up some flowers and ground cover. Tyson chilled in the stroller and the girls played in the yard while I pulled weeds, planted flowers, edged the lawn, and even mowed the backyard. (For the record, that was my first time ever mowing a lawn. Gold star for me.)
9. Last night we went to the Marshalls for a little bbq with them and the Gardners. It was nice to hang out and let the kids play. We came home and the kids took baths and went to bed.
10. Alex has both the camera and video camera with him, so I don't have any fun pictures from this week...but trust me, it's been fun!

More Brynne-isms

She's been having a lot of fun playing with our 3 year old neighbor lately. One morning I caught her kneeling on the family room floor with her eyes closed saying, "I wish, I wish, with all my heart, that Chase was at my house."

She is in a bad sleeping cycle right now where she sleeps a little in the day, then can't fall asleep until late at night, but still wakes up early-ish, so needs a little nap again. It's awful. A couple nights ago, as I was putting her to bed for the umpteenth time, she told me she couldn't fall asleep because there were "wolvses" in her room.

She was playing with a flower and pointing out the colors, which were not traditional colors but "lemonade" (yellow), "frog" (green), and "cloud" (white).

She spent her birthday money on a charm bracelet yesterday to be like her big sisters. She was throwing it up in the air today and I told her to be careful not to throw it too far.
Brynne: How come?
Me: Because then it could get lost.
Brynne: That's okay!
Me: If you lose it, I'm not going to buy you a new one.
Brynne: If it gets lost, it will still be somewhere.

She held up her hand and said "say 'aaah' to my fum (thumb)". I complied. "Now bite it softly". Uhhh, no.

Tyson and the Tie

With a fresh buzz and his first tie, I think this boy is looking awfully grown up these days!

Sunday 10

1. Perfect time to do my Sunday 10! Tyson is still taking a nap, and Alex and the girls just left to walk to church. I LOVE a quiet house sometimes.
2. Is it pointless to say it was another busy week? I think they all are. I'm really starting to look forward to summer in the hopes that things will slow down a bit.
3. Tuesday morning Alli had a quick dentist appointment to make sure her frenectomy was healing okay. It was! That was followed by a PTA meeting which I had to leave early from to go to Kindermusic. Alli had piano lessons that afternoon. Her first recital is in less than 2 weeks!
4. Wednesday morning I babysat my niece Jill. About 10 minutes after that was done, Cindy came to drop Logan off so she could get her haircut. For the first time, Logan actually liked me! And by liked me, I mean that he wouldn't let me put him down the whole time. Luckily he was (mostly) happy, though.
5. Thursday afternoon I had a PTA conference at BYU. Lindsay watched my girls and Cindy took Tyson. I love any opportunity to be back on campus. My class got out a little early, so I had time to browse the bookstore before Cindy came to get me. The only disappointment: I picked up some bread and honey butter from Sugar & Spice for old times and the bread was a little stale. Major bummer!
6. After I got Tyson, I went to get the girls from the Gardners and we ended up staying there for awhile. We went to pick up Alli and her friend Ellie, then raced to get pizza for dinner, scarf it down, then went to Alli's soccer game.
7. Friday started out being a relaxing, no-plans day, and then we decided to get Brynne's hair cut. We went from the haircut to get snow cones, to Alex's work, lunch with Alex, quick trip to Smith's, and back home just in time for Alli. Holly went to a birthday party that afternoon.
8. Friday night Alex watched the kids so Cindy and I could go shopping. SO FUN to go shopping without kids! Alex watched the kids again on Saturday afternoon so I could grab lunch with Lindsay. Did I pick a winner, or what?
9. Alli had another soccer game yesterday morning, and Mark and Liz came to watch the last little bit of it, then take her to Logan with them so she could play with Abbie. Alli loved it! We got some yardwork done at home, then went to a birthday party in Orem last night.
10. Holly learned to ride without training wheels yesterday! She's been determined to learn, so I took them off yesterday afternoon, and within 45 minutes she had it down. So impressed with my girl!

Rapunzel No More!

Here's what our morning conversation was like today:

Alex: Brynne, why don't you go have a special day with mommy and go get your hair cut?
Brynne: NOOOO! I don't want my hair cut! I want my hair down to the floor!
Me: Brynne, your hair keeps going in your food and it's too long!
Brynne: *tears* I don't want to have a haircut!
Alex: Mom will get you an ice cream cone after!
Brynne: Okay. But if I cut my hair it will turn so so brown!
Me: No, that only happens to Rapunzel in the movie. You don't have magic hair.

After much of the same conversation, Brynne was finally tear-free and ready to cut her hair. She did a great (slightly wiggly) job and I LOVE how it turned out!

At Cookie Cutters, waiting for her turn.

Holding her ponytail of chopped-off hair.

Finished!

We picked up snow cones afterward and then dropped by Alex's work to surprise him and show him the new hair. Such a fun afternoon!

Alli's Birthday

We gave Alli her present in the morning: a new bike. She's been loving it!

(Don't worry, Mom, she always wears a helmet -- she was just trying it out!)

After she played outside with the bike for awhile, Alex took the younger 2 girls to run a couple errands and Alli and I got ready for her party. We turned the unfinished part of the basement into a little carnival. Before we knew it, there were 16 girls (including my own) at my house, eating popcorn, playing games, and winning tickets. We played penny toss, ring toss, tower tumble and clown throw. After games, the food was ready. The girls ate, then we opened presents and had cake. I think Alli had a really fun day.

After the party was cleaned up and all the guests left, we packed up for the weekend and headed to Logan. The kids spent the evening playing with their cousins. When they went to bed (side note: there were 7 kids in one bedroom and not a single one of them got out of bed ONCE -- miracle!) the adults played some card games and ate ice cream. Pretty much my idea of a perfect night!

Sunday 10-ish

1. I stink at doing Sunday 10 now. Late church makes it hard, because after church, dinner, cleanup, and getting the kids to bed, all I want to do is sit...and not at my computer.

2. Today was a good Mothers Day. Alex made breakfast this morning, and gave me a movie and a steam mop (you know you're growing up when you get a cleaning appliance and get excited about it!). Let's be honest, though, Alex pretty much helps out around here all the time. I get special treatment every day, and Mothers Day is no exception! So thanks to the man (man makes him sound old...kid? boy?) I married for being so amazing and allowing me to be a mother. I love my life.

3. We spent the evening at Becca and Jeff's place and had a fabulous dinner and dessert. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I LOVE barbeque season!

4. I spent a lot of time this week out in the yard, pulling weeds, planting flowers, playing with the kids. It's been such good weather! Alex put his foot down this year and said I had to help with the yard work since I didn't do anything last summer (my excuse: I had a baby. I'm allowed to not help, right?) So Friday morning I got to work weeding my strawberry patch, and here's what happened: Brynne brough Tyson dirt to eat. Holly fell down the patio steps and scraped up her hands. Brynne fell off the enclosed trampoline (how does that happen?!?) and got a bloody nose. Holly got stung by a bee in the house. Yikes. This is why I don't do yardwork!

5. I went on a field trip with Alli's class on Tuesday. They were so cute and loved being at the nursery and learning about plants. It was a great field trip to help with because I could bring Tyson and Brynne along while Holly was at preschool.

6. Lindsay and I took the kids to Trafalga on Thursday. A lot of rides were down that day, but we managed to find enough to do to keep the kids happy! I love that it's just minutes away from my house.

7. Alex took Alli to the Father/Daughter dance at the school. Alli has been so excited about it and loved every second. She was so cute! Alex said she was dancing crazy and had a great time.

8. I took the kids to Alli's soccer game on Saturday morning. She scored a goal and was SO excited.

9. We spent a lot of time cleaning the basement on Saturday. I helped the girls rearrange their room. I used to love doing that as a kid. Michelle and I would cut out not-quite-to-scale pieces of paper to represent our furniture and spend all afternoon deciding how we would rearrange.

10. We spent the afternoon and evening at the Gardners. The guys golfed and Lindsay and I played with the kids. Then we made dinner and ate dessert outside. Such nice weather!

Flowers

This boy
gave Alli these flowers
for her birthday.

I went on a field trip with Alli's class yesterday. These two kids were buddies for the walk to the nursery, and they were so funny together. We're lucky to have so many neighbors with kids the same ages as ours!

Seven

Alli turned 7 yesterday. She is so old, and this is going so fast. I have lots of pictures to post from her friend party and our quick trip up to Logan for the weekend, but for now I just wanted to give a little shout-out to my sweet daughter.

Alli might be going through an identity crisis. She went by Alli her whole life until she hit kindergarten. Then she told her teacher she wanted to be called Allison. Okay. Sounds good. So all her friends call her Allison now. A few weeks ago she told me she wanted to go by her middle name -- Rebecca. I told her that would be really confusing to all the people who knew her. She agreed. Last week she said she wanted to go by Alli again. Whatev.

She started piano lessons in March. She loves practicing! Her teacher writes down what she needs to practice every week, and not only does she practice the new stuff every day, she practices ALL the old stuff, too. It's so good for her, but I wonder how long it will take until she realizes she's practicing forever! She has a Theory piano book, but she likes to pronounce it "thor-y". I correct her everytime, and she says "Mom, I'll call it theory to my teacher and thor-y to you". Yes, ma'am.

She cried about something silly the other day and I told her that she needed to act like a big girl and decide if that was something worth crying about. She then informed me that she didn't like when I used the phrase "big girl" around her. That made me sad. She's not just getting big, she's getting OLD!

Alli loves school. She's a great student and loves reading. She's little miss social and has lots of friends. She also loves coming home from school and going downstairs to play school with neighborhood kids.

Alli got her first flowers from a boy yesterday. Her friend Tanner from across the street brought her a bouquet of flowers for her birthday, along with a note/picture about whales, which he loves. I decided that it's really cute at age 7, but it better stop by around 13 or 14.

I'm so grateful for my Allison. She's helpful, sweet, well-behaved, and loving, with a little sass thrown in for good measure. I love my 7 year old!