language lessons

The language geek in me is continually fascinated by Andrew's increasingly sophisticated language aquisitions. Today he told me that he was "make sureing," a phrase that made me pause until I realized how perfectly logical it was . . . how was Andrew to know that "make" was the verb and "sure" the adjective? We use the whole phrase like a verb all the time. As in, I need to go make sure that Andrew isn't taking apart the room right now.

Happy Holidays

Having spent entirely too much time playing in the last week, we now find ourselves in the quiet lull before the storm of work descends upon us again next week. But we have to admit that we enjoyed ourselves.

But first, some make-up photos from Thanksgiving. Since we finally retrieved our camera from Bubby and Poppy's house, we can display our shots of the kids in their Thanksgiving/Christmas finery.

There's really not much to say about the week preceding the break, except that it was entirely too busy. Saturday, we had a family party with my family, replete with a Bethlehem lunch (and entirely too much food, as per usual). Although the meal was not terribly authentic (cheese sticks? fish sticks? chicken nuggets?) at least everyone found something to enjoy.

After the party, we loaded up the car and headed down to Cedar City, trying to catch the lull between the big storms that had moved into Provo during the week and were set to start again in the next day or so. We managed okay, arriving to Cedar City just after dark. Evelyn, however, did not enjoy the ride. We're starting to notice a rather unfortunate trend: anytime we spend more than an hour or two in the car, she spends most of the last hour screaming. Since she's normally a happy, placid baby, this is rather hard on all of us!

On Sunday, we went to the blessing of Matt and Laurie's baby, Leo, the newest addition to the Eves clan. However, we don't have any pictures of the baby, or of Andrew and Evelyn in their Christmas finery. (Evelyn was particularly lovely in a chocolate brown satin and velvet dress that just matched her eyes. Not to mention the little gold ballet slippers. Can you tell I had a little bit too much fun accessorizing my baby?). After the blessing, we had a big family/friends gathering at the clubhouse behind Bubby and Poppy's house. The food and company were both lovely, but we retreated early to put down our increasingly tired and cranky kids.

True to the forecast, the first few days of the week were cold and snowy. Not that Andrew minded. We found him a child's shovel at the Cal Ranch store and he was more than happy to help his dad and Poppy shovel sidewalks. (Although truth be told, Andrew did more hindering than helping--he still hasn't exactly grasped the concept that you shovel snow *off* of the sidewalks--he's just as likely to shovel newly removed snow back onto the concrete.) Since both Bubby and Poppy had to work the first couple days of the week, we had a couple of nice, slow days just hanging out.


On Christmas Eve (and, not so coincidentally, Andrew's third birthday), we spent the morning at Dan's cousin Jodi's house. Andrew was thrilled to play with her boys (especially Zach, who's only a few weeks younger than he is). He was even more thrilled to try sledding in the back yard.

After wearing him out in the snow, we joined the rest of the family at Costa Vida for lunch. (Apologies if you've already seen these pictures--Poppy borrowed some of them to post on their blog). After lunch, Bubby brought out this lovely DQ cake for Andrew. Although Costa Vida may not have been *his* first choice for lunch (he was initially upset because he couldn't order a hamburger and french fries), he was more than recompensed by the cake.

I was undoubtedly a bad mother by giving my baby a few tiny bites of ice cream. It didn't take her long to warm to the idea, although it will probably be another five months until she gets to try this again.
Sarah and Laurie, looking charming, as always.



That afternoon, after naps (well, mostly just Andrew's nap), Dan and Aaron were instructed to take the kids sledding to get them out of the house and wear them out while dinner preparations were underway. However, the evening proved the adage that the best laid plans often go awry--the upstairs toilet backed up and overflowed, and Poppy, Dan, Matt and Aaron spent the better part of the evening trying to figure out how to fix it. (I'm still not sure if it *is* fixed--I know the toilet was off limits the rest of the trip). So we fixed the kids a quiet meal and the grown-ups waited until the kids were in bed to eat ourselves. We did finally manage to get everyone together to watch Andrew open a few birthday presents--I think the poor kid's sense of entitlement was seriously bent out of shape during this past month (and not necessarily in a good way). Between scattered birthday and Christmas presents all through the month, I think he thinks it's his permanent right to open any and all presents . . .


Christmas morning started bright and early at 6:30, when the last of the kids finally woke up. The kids were uniformly enchanted by what Santa brought them--and maybe even more enchanted by what Santa brought the others. Lydia seemed fascinated by the little animal zoo we bought for Evelyn; Andrew spent the rest of the weekend half-thinking that the stroller and bassinet sets that Lydia and Katie got also belonged to him; and all of the kids had fun playing with Andrew's jungle set.

Sarah's girls got a cute set of princess dress-up clothes that Andrew also wanted to lay claim to (but he was too bulky to put on the dresses--I was afraid he would rip a seam). Luckily, I had picked up a clearance knight costume for him after Halloween, so, despite his ardent desire to wear a pretty princess dress, he was eventually pacified by his knight costume. I was pretty entertained, afterwards, to find him and Lydia hiding from the "dragon" (Jake, I think) under the piano. Lydia shrieked a few times, and Andrew told her, encouragingly, not to be afraid because he would "fight the dragon. And dragons are scared of being fighted."




After exploring the contents of the stockings, we had a nice breakfast of monkey bread and some kind of egg casserole (it was good, but I think we all agreed we could do better next time). And then the real work of the morning began: presents. Because the family is gradually increasing (there were fourteen of us there that morning) it took a couple of hours to work through all of the presents.
Andrew got more animals from Bubby, and spent most of the time playing with them while waiting his turn to open more presents. Evelyn slept through most of the precedings (the only time, ironically enough, that she napped for more than 45 minutes our entire trip!).

Andrew also got another addition to his dress-up chest with a prince costume from Matt and Laurie. He looks pretty good with a crown on, I think.

Dan was less than excited by the ties I gave him (don't worry, that wasn't the only thing he got!),


but at least some of our gifts were appreciated! We found these great mugs from the Office (Kevin and Andy, respectively) for Poppy and Matt.


After that, Christmas settled into the post-presents lull that always makes the day seem sort of anti-climactic. The kids played with (and fought over) their new toys, while the grown-ups settled into cleaning up and just hanging out. We did have fun playing with Aaron's new Settlers of Cataan after the kids went to bed, though.

Friday morning, we all endured the ordeal known as Family Pictures for Trisha. That afternoon, we took the kids to the cultural hall at the church and ran them around for a while, playing four square, soccer, baseball, bowling, racing, and anything else we could think of to get them moving. I'm not sure what Lydia was doing here, but she sure looks cute. Apparently Lydia spent the early part of the afternoon (I missed part of it, as I was home with Evelyn) stealing some of the bowling pins from the bowling game. No matter how upset Andrew got, or how earnestly he tried reasoning with her, she simply refused to part with her prize. Lydia is definitely an independent spirit!

Saturday afternoon we returned home--we fully enjoyed our trip and were sorry to leave family, but, it must be confessed, we were rather pleased to be sleeping in our own beds again!

We hope that all of our readers also enjoyed a happy, hopeful Holiday season.

Entering the final stretch

I love this time of year--crisp, cold mornings; hot chocolate; the anticipation of Christmas and my smug enjoyment in having already bought all my presents . . . oh, yes, and finals. I have to say, being the one to *give* a final is much less stressful than taking one (even if this year I'm doing exit interviews/portfolio evaluations in lieu of a final). Much as I have loved teaching this semester (and I have loved it), I'm looking forward to a break!

This last week was pretty crazy--mostly for me, I think, since finals don't really seem to interrupt the rhythm of Dan's research-oriented existence, and they barely register on Andrew's perceptions (with the possible exception of a crankier-than-usual because more-stressed-than-usual mother). And Evelyn is pretty uniformly sweet, although she's developing a new bad habit of wanting to be held all the time--more specifically, wanting to be held by me if she can see me at all. While it's undeniably flattering to be the center of her little universe, I wouldn't mind sharing some of that glory some of the time!

So, this week. (And I have to apologize for the lack of pictures--last week's photo-fest was due to my parents' generosity in loaning their camera. We apparently left our camera in Cedar City over the Thanksgiving break). I held my last two sessions of class. I somehow had this naive idea that, since my students were doing presentations in class all day Thursday, this week would be a light work load. I'd forgotten that I still had to meet with some of the students I supervise (still do, in fact) and that I was largely in charge of our closing social, which, due to stricter regulations of how university funds ought to be spent, was a bit trickier to plan than usual. (I was under the impression that we would have to do this mostly pot-luck, because of the new regulations, only to find the day before our party, in talking with the woman in charge of the budget stuff, that they're not going to crack down on implementing this policy until next semester. . . which resulted in a rather embarassing breakdown on my part right there in her office. I find that unlooked for kindness when I'm stressed out is often my undoing). But the party went well, despite its irregular set-up: we picked Hawaiian Haystacks as one of the easiest, cheapest things to prepare, but this meant setting up crock-pots and rice-cookers in three different rooms in two different buildings on campus (one was our office, the other two were rooms we'd reserved for our party) so that we didn't blow the fuse in any given place. I'm sure people looked at us strangely as they saw us setting up, but it all worked out okay in the end. And I found myself feeling a faintly maternal sense of pride as I looked over the collected group of students I supervise. They really are a pretty amazing bunch.

At any rate, we survived the week--shopping for the Writing Fellows closing social, for the few unpurchased presents we need for family, and for the two names I picked off the angel tree at the local Macy's. I thought that by choosing names of kids close in age and gender to my own kids, it would be easier to figure out what to get for them, and easier for Andrew to understand the concept of giving Christmas presents to a little boy like himself. That part worked out okay, I think, but the whole process did have one unintended consequence: this little boy was enough like Andrew that Andrew thought *he* needed to have the same kind of book and movie (Diego) that we got for this other little boy. Maybe next year we'll pick out a girl his age instead.

On Saturday we braved a snowstorm to go up to Salt Lake to see family--most especially Dan's sister Sarah. If I'd known how bad the snow was going to be in the morning (most people were going 35 on the freeway) we might not have gone. But we went and we had fun, despite the dismal weather. Andrew was in heaven running around with his cousins. After Evelyn went to sleep, Sarah and I (mostly at my instigation) abandoned the crew for the lace store where I stocked up on ribbons to make accessories for Evelyn. We came back and Sarah made some yummy coconut-lime cupcakes w/ sour cream frosting. About mid-afternoon, once the snow had stopped falling, we headed back home and spent the rest of the day at home, in pursuits mundane enough not to need mention here.

Andrewisms #379

Today, while I was on campus, my mom let Andrew help her wrap Christmas presents (I never knew my mom was so brave!). Then tonight, as I was getting Andrew ready for bed, he recounted to me the events of his day: wrapping presents was apparently one of the big highlights.

He told me, "Mommy, we wrapped some shoes for you and some chocolates for Daddy."

Since I knew about the shoes, this wasn't too big of a deal breaker. But I told him, "Andrew, you shouldn't tell people what you wrap in presents. It's supposed to be a surprise."

"But I didn't tell you what's in your present. I just told you the words."

I had to stifle a laugh. "Don't even tell the words, then."

"Okay. I'll just tell you the letters."

Needless to say, I don't think he quite gets the idea of Christmas surprises. Family, beware! (And don't let Andrew tell you what we're getting you . . .)

Rue is for Remembrance

Today would have been my grandfather's 88th birthday, had he lived. It's also the 67th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. On that day, my grandfather turned 21--not a good time to be 21, I might add--and shortly thereafter enlisted in the U.S. Marines.

But despite the somewhat somber remembrances with which we open this blog, our overall interest here is in preserving some happier memories: yesterday, we poached Jake's real birthday to celebrate Andrew's birthday (we're hoping this way to give him some separation between his birthday and Christmas).

Although the planning and execution of the party took a lot of time and effort, I'm rather pleased with how things turned out. Since one of Andrew's abiding loves has been animals, we decided to go with an animal safari theme. I picked up cheap plastic pith helmets at the local party store, and between the dollar store and Michael's dollar section, I managed to put together some safari bags with coloring books, fruit snacks, magnifying glasses, little books for field journals, and some animal stickers. Dan and I also put together a pretend safari--we scattered all of Andrew's stuffed animals (and some of my mom's) throughout the upstairs and added a tent and tunnels, along with a mini trampoline (snake pit), slide (mountains) and blanket (swamp). To help the kids follow the safari, I posted signs with arrows and I also put together a map. On the flip side of the map was a check-list of animals (with pictures) that they were likely to see on the safari.

It took us probably an hour to actually put the safari together--it took all of ten minutes for the kids to go through our mini obstacle course and identify the animals.

Here are our little explorers, outfitted and ready to depart base camp.

First, we had them push through the "jungle vines" to climb the "cliffs of insanity" (Dan's choice--I'm sure I don't have to tell you the reference).

A couple of our explorers emerging from the caves.


After getting out of the caves, we stopped in the "savana" portion of our safari to take stock and identify the animals (for me, that meant trying to keep Andrew from actually collecting the animals).
Although Brielle wasn't officially part of the safari, she still enjoyed going through some of the obstacle course. (Like our "alpine slide" here).


My friend Karin's youngest, Nolan, preparing to embark across the Okey-Dokey Swamp. (At one point, there were actually some large bugs in the swamp, but I think Andrew absconded with them.)
Winding down the safari.

Once we arrived back at base camp, the kids used their stickers to decorate their field journals and "record" the animals they'd seen.


I think the universal favorite item in the safari packs I put together was the $.30 magnifying glasses I found. Here, our exhibit of "Monkey see, Monkey do."


Evelyn slept through the first half of the party (thankfully!) but she woke up just in time for lunch. Dan (who was conspicuously absent from these pictures b/c he spent the time in the kitchen) was our chef, and he made Andrew's favorite: pasta and meatballs. I think most of the kids enjoyed their lunch (Jacob ate an impressive four meatballs--possibly to make up for Joshua not eating any), so score one for us.


After lunch, we had cupcakes. But the camera decided to malfunction at that point, so you'll have to use your imagination. The cupcakes were actually about as easy as they could be. I bought a bunch of miniature plastic animals, colored the cupcake frosting bright green (initially I was going to use my Wilton grass tip, but the frosting was too soft and I realized it would take way too long, so I just covered the cupcakes. I guess it worked, because Jacob's excited exclamation upon seeing the cupcakes was, "Look! The cupcakes are covered with grass!"), and put an animal on each cupcake. The kids all liked the animals, and if they all seemed to like the frosting more than the cupcake, at least the adults actually appreciated my cream-cheese filled chocolate cupcakes.

Andrew precipitated the present-opening by, well, opening a present before we'd actually gathered everyone together. He seems pretty thrilled by all his presents: he's already played with all of them: my mom gave him a set of games (Candyland, Hi-ho Cherry-o, Chutes and Ladders, and Memory), and this morning while I slept in, Andrew insisted on playing every single one of them with his dad. As penance, I had to play a long-ish game of Hi-ho Cherry-o with Andrew later.

Although I'm not in a hurry to put on a party like this again, I was glad that everyone (with the possible exception of my dad, who's peaceful domain was invaded by squealing children) seemed to enjoy themselves. And now, I'm being summoned by my daughter, so I'll close!

Jekyll and Hyde

On Thursday I underwent a transformation. For most of the morning I was a reasonably even-tempered (not perfect, of course) mom humoring her toddler and playing with her baby. And then we went to the grocery store. Andrew wanted to sit in the car in front of the cart--which was fine, great even, because it had a strap. But not very long into our trip he started whining to get out. And I, foolishly, let him out, after reviewing our rules for good behavior in the store (i.e., if he touches anything or runs away he has to go back in the cart). And of course, it took all of thirty seconds for him to start breaking rules. I warned him, and then, after the second infraction, I tried to put him back in the cart. Since he is now approximately 40 inches and 38-9 lbs, trying to stick him back inside the little car so I could strap him down (Evelyn was occupying the other set of straps, and there were too many groceries in the back of the cart) involved a lot of straining on my part and a lot of screaming on Andrew's part. In fact, he screamed so long and so loud that I was afraid he would start puking, so I consoled him that, if he was good, I would let him out again. He calmed down, swore he would be good, and I (foolishly, again) let him out (again).

And thus began my transformation from a mild-mannered Dr. Jekyllish sort of person to something more resembling Mr. Hyde (but not this one, thank goodness!). I was already frustrated because of feeling humiliated as I tried to force a reluctant toddler into the car/cart (I'm sure there were people in the store wondering if they needed to call child services), but after Andrew got out of the cart again he began to flout our rules again. While I was trying to evaluate which brand of sauce to buy, Andrew wandered down to the end of the aisle, started taking things off the shelf, and then, before I could catch up with him, skipped around the corner--which meant I had to temporarily abandon Evelyn to grab him. I saw red. Hot, surging, unreasoning anger. I wanted--quite literally--to strangle him. I refrained, but the force of that sudden rush of anger was a little frightening. What is it, I wonder, about this child whom I love more than my own life, that makes me so spitting angry? How is it that I can have reached adulthood with a reasonable self-control (again, not perfect, but most of the time I manage to control things), and yet have this two-almost-three-year-old undo all of my good intentions so fast? Are all children like this? Or we just peculiarly blessed (or am I just peculiarly weak)? I've talked with a few other moms--enough to suspect that I'm not alone in this transformation, but it doesn't make it any less frustrating, or challenging.

But at least I've learned one thing: next time we go to the store, Andrew stays in the cart!