Project Simplify: A little hiccup

I thought it'd be a great idea to make pine cone ornaments.

I still haven't sent out Christmas cards.

I entered the wrong shipping address for one of our gifts.

Due to a four hour Primary Presidency meeting last night, our neighbor gifts still haven't been delivered, and we missed our 12 Days delivery last night.

BUT, all my shopping and shipping is finished (except that one that's going to who knows where; haven't figured out what to do about that yet).  Really all that's left is wrapping and baking.  The fun stuff.  Oh, and those pesky Christmas cards.  Grrrr.

I relapsed yesterday into thinking about homeschooling organizational stuff.  But, I've repented and am thinking of it no more.

5 Days until Christmas!

The Grinch has come

As I write this, Anthon is on his way to tattle on Erilyn.  Erilyn is screaming at the top of her lungs, and Tanner has been rudely woken up from his nap.

This morning some evil thing has swept through my house and turned my normally sweet and happy children into total monsters.  They have been fighting with each other and with me all morning long.  I'm exhausted.  At the end of my rope.  And it's only noon.  And Tanner just woke up--two hours too early.

And our only car is in the shop when I have last minute errands to run.

ARGH!!!!

Deep breath.  1....2....3....4....

Okay.  I can do this.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas decorating

Okay. If you know me well enought to be reading this blog, then you probably know that decorating is NOT one of my talents. I have no vision for it whatsoever. NONE. For the sake of my family, though, I'm trying.

Here's what I did this Christmas:



I made the wreath (bought the wreath and bow and put the bow on the wreath. Done. So clever, I know.)
I painted the letters J-O-Y (just don't look too closely, please.)
I redid the bow on my BELIEVE glass block from red to gold, put nuts and a candle in a tall glass vase and put a bow on it.
And--here's the big one--I made new stockings.
Our stockings were mismatched and ugly. What I really wanted were the cable knit stockings from Pottery Barn, but who wants to spend $30 on a stocking? And no one else had any that were similar. SOOO, I made them. I bought some sweaters at a thrift store, cut them up, lined them with fleece, and sewed them into stockings.

I must stay, I'm feeling pretty darn good about myself. Honestly, I was impressed. I think they turned out pretty well, and I was totally flying by the seat of my pants on that one. No pattern, no tutorial, no anything but a picture and an idea. None of them are exactly the same shape, but...who cares? They are cozy and soft and (almost) exactly what I wanted for less than 1/4th the price. Sweet.




Something's still not quite right about that candle in the vase...but I don't have any mental energy left to figure it out or fix it. Maybe next year.

These very simple projects took an embarrasing amount of time and energy. I have to work hard, REALLY hard, at any kind of decorating. What can I say...I love my kids?!

Project Simplify--Update

We're doing pretty well.

The teacher's gifts are done.  Well, the kids haven't wrapped them yet, but it'll get done before Friday, for sure.  We're giving the kids' Church teachers a 6-pack of Sprite and a box of popcorn with a little note that says: "Pop, pop, fizz, fizz: Oh what a great teacher you is!"  I know. I know.  So cheesy.  I got the idea from one of my BYU Bishop's wife.  Cheesy can be cute, coming from a kid, right?!  For school teachers, I bought some fancy cookies, and then gathered up some supplies from around the house that were on their "classroom wish lists:" file folders, address labels, books etc.  Should be good.

I have (almost) all the neighbor gifts done.  I ran out of supplies.  I made a "Santa's trail mix" with red and green M&Ms, Golden Grahams, white fudge pretzels, and chocolate covered raisins.  It's pretty good.  Anyway, put  2-3 cups in a treat bag, tied with a cute bow, and attached a little card with a map and "Santa's Trail Mix: He's headed your way!" on one side, and "Merry Christmas!  From the Morgans" on the other.  The cards and the bags are ready, but I need to throw some more mix together and then we can deliver.

I've also started with all the Christmas baking.  The kids love to help, and my house smells scrumptious.  Fun fun.

I've set up a corner in the office for gift wrapping and I've started wrapping several gifts every night, so I don't have so many to do on Christmas Eve.  Some of my friends have all their shopping and wrapping done by Dec. 1st, but that's just not me.

I've prohibited myself from thinking about homeschooling stuff until after Christmas.  Then I can go crazy.  So far, it's working and it's extremely liberating.

I canned our daily activity countdown.  I had collected, emptied, and decorated little matchboxes and printed off an activity for every day in December up until Christmas.  Every night, one of the kids could open the box for that day and see what we were going to do the next day.  It wasn't working.  Looking back, we've done pretty much everything that was on the list, but I can't be nailed down on the day.  I have to be flexible about when to do things, and when the kids are expecting something and it doesn't quite work out, everyone's bummed.  So, I've posted my list up by my calendar, and we keep doing stuff when we can, and now that the pressure is off, I'm having a lot more fun.  Very good.

Three nights in a row, now, I've sat by the tree, soaking in the lights and the Christmas spirit.  Awesome!

So far, project simplify is running smoothly.

Feeding jungle animals

In the car today, during our marathon errand-running trip, I gave Erilyn some beef jerky as a snack.  The following conversation ensued:

E--Is this what lions eat?
S--Something like that, yes.
E--Well, next time I go to the jungle, I want to feed this to the lions.  It's so yummy.
S--Yes, beef jerky is very yummy.
E--They'll probably lick me.
S--Probably.  You're pretty yummy, too.

I didn't have the heart to tell her that lions don't live in the jungle.

She'll learn soon enough.

Conversations with a four year old

Today, in the check out line at Dick's Sporting Goods, Erilyn and I had a fascinating conversation that went something like this:

Erilyn--Mom.  Reindeer can fly, but they don't have wings.
Sonja--You're right.  How do you think they do it?
E--(quietly thinking)
S--Maybe they have jet packs in their hooves.
E--(somewhat indignant) No, Mom.
S--So how, then?  Magic?
E--Yes.  It's just magic.
S--Wouldn't it be fun to ride a reindeer while it's flying?!
E--Yes!  Just like a pegasus!  (Lightbulb moment)  MOM!!  Reindeer and pegasuses are the same except pegasuses have wings and reidneer don't!
S--You're right.  And reindeer have antlers, but peguses have horns, like unicorns.  Do you think unicorns can fly?
E--Yup.  But they don't have wings.
S--So how do they fly?
E--Mo-om.  Magic!
S--Oh.  Of course.

It was about this time that I realized everyone in the checkout line was listening to our conversation and smiling.  We payed for our stuff and went about our way, business as usual.  Because, when you have a four year old girl, these kinds of conversations are business as usual.

A million random things...

I give up.  My brain is fried.  WARNING:  too much information comin' your way.  And, I'll probably regret this over sharing tomorrow.

But I'm so tired!  I know everyone is busy.  It's Christmas time and there's lots going on.  I get it.  But I'm stressed and I'm not enjoying it.

I finally got to the gym today, for the first time in 3 weeks, and I'm STILL in my sweaty stinky clothes, 14 hours later.  I literally haven't had a spare minute to shower.  The worst thing about this is that it's TYPICAL for me!  Something's gotta give.

Part of it is that I'm trying to get ready to start homeschooling in January.  December is just busy.  My husband has two jobs and is never home. And Primary is crazy trying to get ready for next year.

But also, my downfall has always been that I'm interested in everything, I want to be good at everything, I want to DO everything and BE everywhere, read everything, talk to everyone, and get everything done.  I love to cook/bake, so I have glorious plans for Christmas food.  Because I'm too stressed, probably none of it will happen.  I like to give handmade gifts, so I have plans to MAKE gifts for friends, neighbors, teachers, and grandparents.  Not going to happen.  I want to make cute Christmas cards and make each one individualized and sweet and witty and homemade.  NEVER going to happen.  This is, by the way, why none of you has received a Christmas card the last several years.  I'm a perfectionist, and I won't do something until I can do it the way I want to.  So, I end up not doing a lot of things.  I'm seriously debilitated!  As part of our Christmas countdown, I printed up an activity for every day up until Christmas and put each one in a little decorated matchbox that we open every night.  We're already behind.  (The matchboxes are cute, though.)  But I'm stressed about the things we're not doing, so then the time that I AM spending with my kids, I'm stressed out and not enjoying.

I have to stop this.

It's time to simplify.

Sorry friends, neighbors and teachers, NO handmade gifts.

Christmas cards will be sent, but they won't be cute or individualized, and probably not witty.  (AHHHH!  Not sure if I can handle this one).

And I'm finally going to turn the Christmas shopping over to Kirk, which he said two weeks ago that he'd do, but that I haven't given him a chance to do.  It's all yours babe.  I'm outtie.

I haven't even looked at my Christmas binder, so it's time to hit the book and get organized.

Okay.  I'm slightly relieved....and cringing just a bit.

I can do it.  I can do it.

Time to take a warm shower and sit with hot cocoa admiring my Christmas tree lights.

And breath.

And go to bed before 1am tonight.

Wish me luck.

November

In a nut shell:

Here's Tanner playing outside in the middle of November.  Totally bundled up because it was pretty chilly. 50s, probably.  That's chilly for Texas.

Here's Tanner one week later, the week of Thanksgiving, enjoying going down the slide in short sleeves.  We get lots of warm spells when it's really supposed to be cold.  Even though I'm a cold weather girl, I kind of like the warm spells.  It lets us get more use out of our outside toys!

Tanner and his new ride.

Did I mention that Tanner loves slides?  And he and Erilyn are buds.

Anthon must be going through a smile-in-a-pained-sort-of-way-for-the-camera phase because I know for a fact he was totally psyched in this picture.  He spiked his hair himself.

These pictures are actually from way back in August, but I just found them on my phone and couldn't resist posting them here.  Eat your heart out, Harry Potter!  So stinkin' cute.

A few  more things of note:
1. Tanner is officially the sweetest little boy.  He will cuddle with me any time, any place.  He loves his blankets and he loves snuggling up on my shoulder.  He gives great kisses, and loves helping Dad put his shoes on. He's fascinated with whatever's going on above him and is constantly climbing on the table or up onto his stool so he can see what's going on.  With tile floors, this leaves Mom in a constant state of panic. I especially find his "fat eyelashes" (phrase courtesy of Erilyn) and curly hair adorable and his cheeks are still irresistable.
2. Erilyn is becoming my right hand girl.  I've discovered some helpful things about her: spanking her doesn't work.  She laughs, no matter how hard you do it; you can't reason with her when she's emotional, but when properly motivated, she can control herself pretty well; she responds extraordinarily well when you point out something she's doing well, and she'll go out of her way to help or please me as long as I  keep pointing out the things she's doing.  This is a great trick.  I especially love reading with her, and how she sings "Sam-e-el" in the primary song about Samuel prophesying of Jesus. She loves to play with friends, and is learning how to stand up for herself to Anthon.  Their playtime is much more cooperative now, rather than dictatorial (with Anthon as dictator.)
3. Anthon continues to bring laughter and life to our home.  He's taken to telling me what he wants to eat by saying the brand name.  For example, at breakfast the other day, he said, "Mom, I need the Mrs. Butterworths."  He loves to read and will read almost anything.  Erilyn frequently gets frustrated that she's waited all day for Anthon to come home from school and play with her but all he wants to do is read his book.  I've found the best way to deal with this situation is to sit down with Erilyn and read a book with her.  Works like a charm.  He's recently developed an intense interest in reptiles (ew), and is constantly asking me what my favorite kind of snake is.
A--"Mom, which snake do you like better, a Texas rattlesnake?  Or a king cobra?"
M--Hmmm....."A garden snake."
A--"Are they venomous?"
M--"Nope, completely harmless.  That's why I like them." 
A--walks away shaking his head.
Don't worry, he'll be back.  He's a hard one to shake, that one.
4. In other news, I've decided to start homeschooling.  Not an easy choice, in some respects, but in others, it seems weird that I haven't been doing it all along.  Scares the pants off me, though.  More on that later.  In fact, I think I'll start a separate homeschooling blog to chronicle the adventure.  Anthon's thrilled; Erilyn's holding judgment.  She seems cautiously optimistic.

Thanksgiving rundown:
We celebrated the holiday here.  It was nice.  Relaxing.  A lot of cooking for a 10 minute dinner.  Worth it?  Jury's still out.  It was nice to incorporate our own traditions, though.  We spent some time in the week leading up to it writing down what we're thankful "4" on number fours I'd cut out of scrapbook paper and the posted them up on our wall.  I've now put them all in a container that we'll open on Christmas morning and read before opening presents.  On Thanksgiving Eve we had a little devotional and talked about the pilgrims, watched some Mormon Messages on gratitude, talked about how the more we see something, the less we notice it and then practiced noticing the things all around us that we take for granted.  It was nice.  The kids love Mormon Messages.  They could watch it all day.  We were going to try to go hiking Thursday morning, but it was cold and raining, so we just hung out.  Good times.

Happy Thanksgiving!

And now I'm caught up. 

October

The Quick Version:

Erilyn likes to swing.  And to smile sweetly.

The boys like to swing, too.  Mom likes October weather.  It's perfect for playing at the park.   (We don't do parks in the summer.  At least, not in Texas.  October thru March is park weather here.  At least for me.)

Erilyn got to ride Joe at preschool, and I got to help the Pony Lady give all the kids rides.  Besides watching Erilyn fall in love (again) with horseback riding, what I enjoyed most was smelling Joe's neck.  Ahhhh....I love the smell of horses.  It makes everything right in the world.

I try to be crafty.  I really do.  For the sake of my children. Here we are trying to make mini caramel apples as a Halloween activity with friends.  You use a melon baller to get out balls of an apple, stick a pretzel in the top and then dip it in melted caramel.  Really cute idea.  Didn't work at all.  The pretzels would slide out too easily, so we always had to fish the apple-ball out of the caramel bowl with a fork.  Nice thought, though.  And a caramel dipped apple tastes just as good from a fork as it does from a pretzel.  Thank goodness.

Tanner likes to climb.  He loves to climb up the ladder and go down the slide by himself.  The first time I saw him do it I almost had a heart attack.  I didn't even know he could climb the ladder.  When I ran out there, the kids assured me he was okay, saying, "Mom.  It's okay.  He does it all the time."  !!!!!  He does though.  And he loves it.  LOVES it.

I love this sweet baby face.  

Erilyn's Halloween costume.  She was a black kitty a couple of years ago, too.  What can I say--she likes black cats.  (I think it goes back to our cat Shadow that we had when she was a baby.  I know she can't possibly actually remember Shadow, but she still knows she loves black cats.  

Not sure why Anthon looks so scared, or sick, or sad...can't decide.  He's a vampire, and Tanner's a spider.  In case you couldn't tell.

With no planning or communication whatsoever, Jessica, Erilyn's best friend, also chose to be a black cat for Halloween.  And Dallin, Anthon's friend and Jessica's brother, also chose to be a vampire for Halloween.  We didn't realize it until we all showed up at the ward Trunk or Treat party.  True story.

September...the rest of it

Quick version:

Tanner started walking.

Tanner likes to climb.  On anything.

Getting there.

Tanner not so used to Grandma

  

We had lots of fun playing with Grandma and Aunty Susan

 

Erilyn and Tanner are friends.  And yes, they are playing at a splash park at the end of September.  Welcome to Texas.

Tanner likes purple ice cream.  Thank you Purple Cow.

The end.  (Of September.)

First day of preschool

I love this little preschool. They do all the usual preschool stuff, but it has such a sweet vibe, and they also take care of farm animals, and get to ride ponies on Fridays, and they grow a vegetable garden and make their own snacks. It's great. And she loves it.

Here she is being shy for the first five minutes of the first day, and she hasn't been shy since. Everyday she loves it.

I can't believe she's four and starting preschool, and yet, she's been four for years. I think I miss Erilyn's babyhood the most.

I love this girl! She's sweet, and surprising, and social, and smart, and girly, and fun. I miss you already, preschool girl!

I love this outfit on him. There's a little tie that goes with it, and some cute shoes, but apparently he's deathly afraid of ties and shoes.

2nd grade

Anthon's first day of second grade. I almost forgot to take his picture, and then at the very last second he pulled this face. Typical. I love this kid!

First day of ballet

She's in heaven. I personally believe she's a natural born dancer, though I'll admit I know nothing about dancing. She just loves it and it's adorable. Worth the sacrifice of having to take two babies and a restless 7 year old to the studio and wait for an hour for her class...most of the time, at least:)

Tanner's first birthday and sweet baby bathtime

He was thrilled, of course, with his cake. I can't believe my baby is one. (Cliche, I know, but true.) I love, LOVE this adorable little boy! He's cuddly, and sweet, and playful, and easy going. The perfect baby.

Bathtime is one of his favorite things to do. He loves to unplug the water, and then try to plug it up again. Which he almost never can do. So we're constantly re-filling the tub, which he also loves, because then he fills up his cup and gets lots of drinks. Adorable!