Insecurities

So, many of you probably don't know this about me, but I was an art major back in the day. Actually I started off as an animation major, then switched to illustration when I found out that the computer really isn't my best friend all the time. Then I went on a mission and somehow ended up switching my major to art history, which I love. I was going to graduate and then move to Europe or somewhere equally "cool" and work restoring rare old finds and all that fun stuff. I had come to terms with not getting married right away and had planned out a fun future for myself. But then I met BJ. And had a baby. And then another one.

It's kind of hard to run off to Europe with a baby and toddler......let alone find yourself in that line of work without finishing the degree first. But I digress. (actually, when I finally get back to school I think I'll be switching once again, but back to animation this time).

Anyway, the point is that I enjoy the fine arts. I have a teensy bit of training and (in my opinion) an even teensier bit of raw talent. I've entered a few shows and even been paid to do portraits for people. But that is all part of the things that represent my "former life". And those things got shoved in the deep, dark recesses of our messiest storage closet. The trouble with those kinds of closets is that you have to clean them out eventually. Recently we did just that. And now I've had a husband, a mother, and even a very LOUD three-year old urging me to start drawing again.

I finally decided to give in to the peer pressure when my dad sent me an email about the 8th International Art Competition for the LDS Museum of Church History and Art. Now, I'm madly trying to brush up my rusty skills and have something presentable done in time to enter this competion. Ummmm, wow! Whatever possesed me to do this?

Don't get me wrong, I do feel like I have some limited skill. I WAS all gung ho about the competition when I found out about it in the spring. But as the due date approaches and the speed of light, I'm becoming more and more insecure. Maybe that's why I waited until there was only one month left to even START the piece I plan on entering.

This is something that I would ultimately love to do for a living, or at least as some "on the side" work to help support our family. But, a lot of the ideas that come into my mind are so personal and emotional. To spend the kind of time required to do these ideas justice and then just turn around and have them be rejected is almost unbearable. And before I get too much farther into the fluffy, emotional babble that rolls around my brain on a daily basis I will just ask you all to think of me. Please send me any positive "vibes", or prayers, words of encouragement, or whatever you want to call it before I chicken out and settle for mediocrity. Just wish me luck. I promise to do the same for you if/when needed :)

Quick! Somebody Stop Me!

I have a cupcake in the fridge and a Frosty in the freezer.....I know how to use them......and I'm not afraid to either! I guess that's my problem. No matter how hard I try, I just can not be frightened by the idea that that ooey, gooey, chocolaty goodness will use the momentum it gains from those oh so delicious pirouettes of flavor on my tongue to increase the size of my thighs (stomach or other "too large" problem area) three fold.

Hmmm, looks like I think way too much about the tasty qualities of my food and not enough of the other, less desirable qualities. Guess I better work on that. Maybe tomorrow. For now, I think I'll go get the cupcake before it starts screaming so loud it wakes the kids :)

It's Too Quiet in Here

Last night while I was cooking dinner, I needed some help. So BJ put Evie in the exersaucer and came in the kitchen to help. Amazingly there wasn't any hitting, or screaming, or crying going on. It was a beautiful sound.....until something finally clicked in my brain and I realized that the silence must mean there was something far more terrifying than fighting going on.

We went to see what the munchkins were up to. And of course by munchkins I really just mean Elliot since Evie was contained. And sure enough, we found Elliot "painting". His medium? Balmex. His canvas? Evie. Yikes!




But of course we got the camera out before we cleaned them up.

As Promised......

Here are some pictures from Elliot's first day of school. We wanted to remember everything so we have quite a few :)

First Day of School!

Three years ago you would have had a near impossible time convincing me that Elliot would ever come off oxygen, let alone be starting school someday. Well, that "someday" came and went on Friday. Elliot had his first day of preschool and he LOVED it! He gets to go twice a week for two hours each day. They sing songs and play games and they learn their numbers and letters too. PLUS, once a month we get to go on a field trip....so FUN!

This month he is learning about dinosaurs and we will get to go to the dinosaur museum. I know he will just love it!

Friday I didn't get much out of him when I asked him what he did at school. He just told me that his teacher's name is Mrs. Redd, there's a boy named Logan in class, and then he showed me his art project. He was all worked up though and wouldn't go down for a nap.

Today he was a little more open. He jabbered away during our entire walk from school to Magah's house. He told me all about how they made necklaces (his said Elliotsaurus on it...so cute!). And then he told me that they played outside, and jumped on the trampoline while counting jumps, they watched a video, and ate snacks.....dinosaur fruit snacks and applesauce...and how applesauce starts with A.

It's only been two days but he seems more grown up to me. Or maybe I'm still being a little lot sappy. Oh well, I'm a mommy. That's my job.

Now hopefully he'll pick up on the fact that the other kids use the potty.....I'm not opposed to that kind of peer pressure at the moment ;)

Oh, and I know I promised pictures. But being the doofus that I am I left the disc at my parents house. Guess now you'll have a reason to check back!

What a Weekend

It's been a super cool, super fun, super busy past couple of days. There is so much that I want to write about, but it's going to have to wait for the time being. Partly because I'm waiting on some pictures I want to post (from Elliot's first day of preschool....he's getting so big...*sniff, sniff*) and partly because I'm exhausted! Even though we've had some really fun things going on, we also, as Elliot has been telling anyone who will listen, "had a bad night" last night.

I was having a really hard time getting to sleep but finally drifted off to dreamland around 1:30. At 3:30, a car alarm started going off in the parking lot. Followed by other car alarms beeping on and off as just about everyone within hearing range checked to make sure it wasn't their car. Except for the car that actually had the alarm going off. Elliot woke up terrified, but luckily Evie slept right through it (I'm not exactly sure how, but I'm counting it as a miracle that will of course get many thanks in my prayers tonight).

After another neighbor called the police, and they finally got in contact with the owner, the alarm was silenced (hallelujah!) around 4. But BJ, Elliot, and I were WIDE awake. Elliot actually seemed slightly traumatized. He wouldn't stop talking about it (and hasn't stopped all day). He kept saying "that noisy car scared me. I freaked out. I cried. That noisy car needs to stop....I'm gonna shoot it with my pop gun and make it shut up!". It was really kind of funny, but after two more hours of that talk we were beyond relieved when he finally went back to sleep around 6. But he's still been talking about it all day, we finally had to tell him that the car went to sleep and tonight would be a GOOD night.....I think he bought it :)

The funny thing is, that when we finally felt like rolling out of bed to rush and get ready for church.....the POWER WENT OUT! Holy moly! Trying to bathe a baby and a toddler by candlelight is neither relaxing nor romantic (which are the only reasons why anyone would WANT to bathe by candlelight that I can think of) it is just plain silly. And time consuming. And I was not too keen on the idea of going to church with wet hair. And I was making my opinion known to BJ when the lights came back on. "Woohoo! Somebody sure loves me!" Unfortunately I wasted those few precious moments of light (yep, the power went out again) BRUSHING MY TEETH instead of drying my hair. So I got to go to church with wet hair anyway. And we were late. And Elliot was noisy. And we forgot a spoon to use to feed Evie. Oh well, what can you do?

There's no way our neighbors could have known that their alarm would go off in the middle of the night, and we really do still love them, so I hope they don't feel bad. It really was a circumstance beyond their control and a funny beginning to a series of unfortunate events that acted as the finale to our weekend. And the reason why I'm too tired to write about Elliot's first day of school, or our family fun night last night. Lame excuse, I know, especially since I just spent a half hour writing out this story.

BUT, I did make some pretzels that I saw on Throwdown with Bobby Flay, and they turned out great! So maybe our luck is changing........*knocks on wood* ;)

Oh, and I will be sure to post all the new, fun pictures I have tomorrow!

Boys will be boys

This has just not been Elliot's week. First his burn on Sunday. Then somehow the nail on his big toe came off. And then yesterday he had a run in with sidewalk.....and the sidewalk came out victorious :(

I can't get him to stop running. He runs. He runs everywhere. He runs ALL the time. And yesterday was no different. He was running down the sidewalk when he tripped and did a face plant. He scraped his knees. And his face. AND he has a pretty nice bump on his head. He looks better today but last night it was awful!

Luckily the tears didn't last for too long. It helps when you have 4 adults attending to your every wish. He got some ice for his head, lots of kisses and he even got to watch a movie. At least until he got bored and was up running again....yikes!


And here's an updated pic of his burn

Disclaimer: We may not be spectacularly amazing parents, but I SWEAR we are not neglectful, awful parents.....we are just parents to a particularly busy, curious, and fearless boy.

It's official...

I started my first quilt today. I'm super duper excited about it! Does that make me a nerd? Hopefully it doesn't take TOO long to finish in the midst of all the other projects I have going on at the moment, and my children that tend to get cranky when I'm finally wanting to do something fun for myself. Oh well, we'll see.

Side note: Elliot totally head-butted me in the nose today! Now that is something I would definitely expect from Evie, because kids at HER age do that. I remember when Elliot was that age and that happening all the time. And you can't really get mad at them because they are still little and don't really know. But no, Elliot KNEW what he was doing. He did it on purpose! AND he laughed about it afterward.....until he saw me crying of course. Then he kissed it better and gave me a hug. It hurt, but I guess kisses really do make booboos better :)

Bath Time Fun!

So, I believe I have sufficiently gotten over myself since yesterday's debacle. Now I'm ready to share some pictures from Elliot and Evie's first bath with each other. I'm sure they will bathe together occasionally, but not into their teens or anything weird like that. For now, I thought they were pretty cute having fun in the bath together :)

And the Mother of the Year Award goes to........

So today was just one of those days, and look what we have to show for it. Don't worry, it's not a cast, there are no broken bones. But we do have a pretty good burn that stretches the full length of that bandage :(

Let me back up a little......

This morning we were in a bit of a hurry. Yeah, it's Sunday, and Sundays are always a little chaotic. But today was a little more hectic than usual. We had a missionary "farewell" (I know that's not what they really are anymore) to go to, and we were supposed to pick up Ashley and her friend Sharon on the way. So I got up and started getting ready while BJ and the kids slept a little longer. By the time they were up, we only had about thirty minutes to finish getting ready. So BJ put the kids in the bath (their first bath together and the pictures are really cute....I'll post them when I'm done feeling sorry for myself) and I went to iron my skirt. When I was done, I unplugged the iron and put it up on the counter, safely out of the way, or so I thought. Then I went about my business of trying to get things ready to go.

While I was madly trying to gather the massive amounts of toys, books and snacks that are required to keep two kids reverent (or at the very least....quiet) during church, Elliot spotted a step stool left too close to the counter and an egg timer which must have been calling very enticing things out to him. I barely saw him out of the corner of my eye and briefly said "Elliot get down, and stay out of things that aren't yours!" while shuffling around for the fruit snacks. I forgot all about the hot iron that was mere inches away from where he was playing. That is, UNTIL I heard the screaming. Yep, that's right, his hand met the iron and the iron did NOT make a good first impression.

The burn was pretty bad and I was worried we would need to take him to the doctor. But after some burn ointment, an awesome and slightly over the top bandaging job, and a few silent prayers in his mommy's heart.....it looks like he's going to be okay. Phew!

Needless to say, the stool is no longer by the counter, the iron will not be left out any more, and we were a lot later (but still miraculously on time) to church than we intended to be. Sorry Ash for not making it to pick you up, but thank you mom for dropping her off!

On the positive side.....Elliot's jammies are not lying....he is, in fact AWESOME!

Wait, what?

So, ummm, yeah.....several evenings over the past week or so I've had something so hilarious that I knew I should write down. But, no, I have an AMAZING memory and instead decided to "just remember" and write it down later. So here I am now, which is in fact the "later" that I just referred to, and I can't remember a darn thing. Yikes! That'll teach me!

Since I can't remember the funnier things of the week, I will bore you with some of the more mundane details.

I'm trying to potty train Elliot. It's.........fun. Not going so well, but I do crack up every time he says he wants to "use the potty train". He REALLY wants some Wall-e "unerwear pants" so hopefully that will help motivate him.

We took Evie in for her six month check up (yeah, it's a month late.....what's your point?) And she is just as healthy as can be. She's only in the 25th percentile, but she's also only 6 lbs lighter than Elliot. She's crawling like a pro and can get in and out of sitting by herself!

We did get to celebrate the anniversary of Elliot coming home from the hospital on saturday. He's officially been in our care for three years! He's our little miracle!

And tomorrow is our fourth wedding anniversary. It seems like it's gone by so fast and that it's been so much longer than that all at the same time!

Now that I'm rambling, I think I'll go relax for a while. Unless, of course, I can remember some of the stuff that I wanted to write. In which case I'll jump right up, come right back, and write it all down......because I've totally learned my lesson. Hopefully that will still apply with how lazy I'm bound to feel in about two seconds :)

Terrible Twos??

Are you sure they didn't mean threes? Because right now I have a pretty terrible, or at least crabby three- year old on my hands!

Generally he's a pretty well behaved little boy (we've had some bullying issues in nursery but he's getting better and it seems we get only good reports now) but the past couple of days have been hard! He has been very disobedient. He's been screaming a lot. He's been mouthy. And he's been hitting and pinching. Ugh!

I have no idea what it is, except that I know he's not getting enough sleep. Monday night he would not go to sleep until 11, only to be woken up by our (insert sarcasm here) awesome grounds crew at 7 am Tuesday. Then last night he didn't go to sleep until 10:30, and woke up at 6:30 this morning. And the napping situation hasn't been much better.

Tonight, we had jammies, FOUR stories, prayers, milk and bed. I'd tell you how he's doing but I don't want to jinx myself......call me superstitious if you like. Fingers crossed. I could use some sleep myself :)