Happy Birthday, Susan!!

This spunky, bright eyed, curly haired princess has turned 5!!! It's hard to believe my baby girl is 5 years old! She loves to play with dinosaurs and little animals and real animals. She likes to watch cartoons and expects to everyday. She loves to be outside and plays outdoors about as much as the tv is off. She loves all of our animals and is our egg gatherer. Susan loves to play with and talk to Ruth. She is assertive and opinionated. No one needs to wonder what Susan likes or what she wants. She is more than willing to make her points clear. We all adore our cute, curly-haired girl.

This Week at House #24 A Beach Day and Father's Day

 

Johnny, Adam, and I got a lot done this week, and I am so glad. Johnny fixed the subfloor in the living room. Johnny, Adam, Ruth, Kate, and I finished installing the new floor. Johnny fixed 4 spots on the roof and we now have it all papered and ready to be shingled. Monday we will draw in all of our lines, so that we get the shingles on straight. On a rainy day, we got one more wall worth of wallpaper removed. We will get that painted and wall repair done in the two last bedrooms on the next rainy day. All dry days, we will be on the roof. 

The younger kids had a pretty good and pretty free week. I was busy enough with repairs that I did not make them do any sort of school work. 

 Anya and Rachel took care of Gideon and the dishes a lot. While I am up on the roof, Anya or Rachel put Gideon in a stroller and walk him around the yard. Gideon likes to be outside, so that works well for everyone. I have to be careful not to call him from the roof, because then he gets upset that I am not with him.

Rachel likes to use holding Gideon as a good excuse to play computer games. Gideon actually is quite fascinated with computer games, so it works and we do not tell Rachel no.

Joseph and Joshua have been very diligent about spending time each day on foreign languages because that is how they earn computer game time. Joshua asked me to help with Spanish. We spent a few minutes conversing about the weather and then I counted to one hundred in Spanish with him twice. At the end, Joshua said, "Oh that was a good half hour. Now I have a half hour." I actually think we spent no more than ten minutes on it. 

Joseph comes to me while I am hanging laundry outside to dry and asks me questions and tries to tell me things in Spanish. I actually don't speak Spanish, but I do remember some things from high school Spanish and that has helped with teaching the kids. Having Joseph come and converse helps both of us.

Sam continues to potty train. He is starting to have fewer accidents each day, so I know that he is getting it. But he will not use the toilet. He has

a potty chair and uses that, but it means we have to have someone available to dump and clean it. I am glad that he is training easily now, but I will be more glad when he goes in the toilet. Currently, I pay Joseph and Anya with their own jug of simply orange juice to empty the potty chair.

Saturday afternoon, I took the kids to the beach. We had worked so hard, I wanted to have one fun day. There were things that we needed to get done on the roof still on Saturday, though. Johnny started at

8am. Adam and I joined him at 9am and we worked until 11:30. Once the sun rises, it is too hot to be up there. You cannot even hold the tools without burning yourself. By the time we got down,we were getting burned from the just sitting on the hot roof and it was not a hot day.

The beach, as always, was beautiful. This is the best time of year for the beach. The waves were neither crashing nor gentle. It was nice and fun to swim in the ocean. The water is warm,  but not the warmest yet. By July, the water will be very warm. 

Kate took Gideon and Sam for me so I could go for a long swim. I loved having the older kids come out into the water to swim with me. Johnny started to swim out with me, turned around, looked back, and said, "Woah, we are out too far." I looked back and opted to swim out another 30 feet or more. I love to swim in the ocean!

We had a couple of funny things happen at the beach. When we got there, I let the kids out of the van near the board walk so they would not have to burn their feet on the black pavement of the parking lot. Ruth and Kate walked everyone to an open spot. When I got to

them, they told me that Sam got to the spot and said, "I peed." Kate was like, "We can take you pee." Sam said , "No, I peed," and tried to take off his swimsuit. I asked Sam if he peed his pants, and he said yes, unzipped his swimsuit, pointed down to his boy parts and said, "It's there."

Later, Adam took Sam out into the water. Sam is mostly afraid of the water at the beach and did not approve of this. A big wave came up and splashed over his head. Adam brought Sam back to me. Sam was

upset to be wet. He stripped off his swimsuit down to nothing and would not put it back on. At first, he was willing to sit in the sand with a blanket around his waist, but later, he kept trying to run off naked. I sent Johnny back to the van to get a diaper for him. Once Sam had a diaper on and nothing else, he did something that surprised all of us. He went and played in the water. I guess Sam feels comfortable in the water with next to nothing on.

Another time, Adam made a sand

bridge that went fairly deep and was very stable. It did not cave it having Adam walk his 150 pounds over it. Josh slipped his legs into it, and Adam caved it in. I told Adam to get Josh free. Adam started to pull Josh by his arms and Josh yelled, "Don't pull me. It is too stuck, my legs will come off!" I told Adam to give him a good tug and nothing happened. Kate and Adam both grabbed an arm and again Josh protested lest he lose his limbs. Again nothing happened. So Adam and Kate dug him out. He was pretty stuck, but it only took about 30 seconds to dig him out. We all had a good laugh and Josh did not lose his legs.

Arwen and Susan watched a little video on youtube and since that time have been singing the song they watched in parts. Susan sings one part and then Arwen another. It's fun to hear the little ones coordinate like that.

After the beach, we got home, started a fire and roasted bratworst and smores for an easy dinner. 

Today is Father's Day and the kids and I all had food plans, so John has been well-loved and well-fed. Joseph made John corn beef hash with poached eggs. Ruth made him pancakes. Kate and I made homemade spicy wings (that was a first and they came out well and were easy and cheap to make, so now we have a new fun meal that everyone loves.) Adam made chocolate milkshakes, and when I am finished here, I will make John's requested dinner of chicken parmesean. 

John spent individual time with each kid. All of the kids love and adore John. He is a very attentive and very involved father, and a very much loved father. His older kids adore him and love to talk to him. Ruth and Kate are always going to John to ask him questions or to just chat about the scriptures. The boys like doing boy things and playing games with him. Rachel loves to sing to John. Anya loves to just talk to him or sit by him and draw. The little ones like to takes walks on his shoulders or wrestle around with him.

Here are some of the funny conversations I recorded through the week:

Conversation between Joseph and Suzy
Joseph: You have to ask Dad if you can work on the puzzle.
Susan: No, Dad can't say yes!
Susan crying: Wait, can Dad say yes?

Susan said, "I know why I am cute. I am cute because I can do puzzles."

Sam is potty training and I asked if he needed to pee.
Sam said, "No, I can't pee."
Then he paused, and said, "yet."

Ruth sent me this:
Susan speaking about mum making chicken wings

Susan "Mom is cutting petunia wings"
in reference to her dead chicken
Me "for lunch"
Susan "Mmm hmm"
Me "Right now?"
Susan "Mmm hmm!"

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This Week at Our House # 23 Lots More Work

I drove the five hours home on Monday with no older kids and no other drivers and a baby that wants to breast feed every hour or two. We stopped 3 times. One time we stopped for the bathroom. I pulled into a parking lot with a Lowes and a McDonalds and asked Arwen, Susan, and Sam where we should go to the bathroom and they all said Lowes. So we walked through Lowes to the bathroom. The trip took just over 6 hours and Gideon cried the last hour and a half.

The rest of the week, we worked and

worked and worked. We keep coming to points where things aren't going the way we think they should, and we have to change things or go to the store for more wood or supplies or whatnot, so the work is going very slowly. We are still on the roof and I know it will not be done soon. And this week we worked a lot on replacing subfloor near the front door. That will hopefully be done tomorrow. Then we can finish the floor and have our living room back.

Friday is our clean the whole house day. Since we did not have Ruth, Kate, and Rachel and since Johnny and Adam were working on the subfloor predicament, Joseph and Anya had to work really hard. They did a lot of the picking up. They vacuumed. They cleaned the kitchen. I washed the bathrooms, swept and washed the floors and did the laundry and some dusting. Then I let Anya and Joseph have free computer time for all of their help.

My mom and sister drove the girls home. They got here late Friday

afternoon. They came home happy with little treasures my mom gave or showed them how to make. Ruth made her first dress and it came out well. Rachel made some nice bracelets with help from my mom. Kate did not show me anything she had made, but she did say that she washed the dishes twice a day while we were there.

It's nice to have the family back together again. We had fun conversations on the way home from church and at home with all the older kids goofing around together. The little ones are happy to have the big kids to cuddle and play with.

Arwen started picking up books and reading on her own this week. She shyly asked me for permission to read the Complete Curious George book. Of course, I said yes, and she read it a few times a day over several days.

Sam continues to potty train. He has not pooped his pants at all. He has that down. But he pees on the floor more than the potty. I'm thinking that he'll have it down in a couple more weeks. Sometimes he cleans up his own mess, sometimes he just leaves it. We have all learned to become suspicious of anything wet.

We lost another chicken this week. That makes 3 of our birds dead this spring. We have a fox that has a den in our woods. He has killed two of our hens and our mother duck. It's so sad because these are our egg layers and our pets. The kids love them. Joseph particularly. He is always worried and carefully watching over our chickens. He tries to keep them in the fence and herd them back in when they fly over. We all know we are trying to move and that we cannot take all of our animals with us, but it is hard to lose our pets.

Joshua and Anya spent their free time building lego space ships. So legos have been out again. That makes for a tricky trap to get through our hallway, but I am glad that my kids like to build and create things.

Gideon grabs things, gets up on his hands and knees, growls at people, smiles at people, touches everyone's faces, and is beginning to sit without support for a few minutes, and he is just four and a half months old. It makes me laugh at my worries during the pregnancy. He is strong and healthy, alert and very communicative.

Suzy and Arwen got into our duck's pond (it's actually a little hole the kids dug that is usually filled

with rain water) and made big mud pies all around it. I was glad that I saw them before they came in the house fully dressed dripping with mud and duck poop. I stripped them down and sent them to the tub and hung their clothes outside.

John and I had our anniversary Friday. We have been married for 22 years now. I suspect, we will get that many more at least. The older kids were all home. I made fancy cheeseburgers with onion rings for all of us. Then the older kids took over and John and I hung out alone in our room. It wasn't what we planned, but it worked. And John and I enjoyed our time talking together.

Conversation with Sam:
Me: Are you Sam?
Sam: No!!
Me: Are you Johnny?
Sam thinking.
Sam: Yes.
Me: Okay Johnny. Are you going to fix he floor?
Sam: Yes, fix floor.
Me: You will need your tools. You will need a drill and screws and a saw.
Sam: Yes! My tools!

Kate's Conversation with Sam:
Ruth was holding Sam
Kate: Hello Sam
Sam: Hey Kate! I'm with Ruth. It's a girl.

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This Week at Our House #22 Visit to Grandma's

We definitely had a busy week. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we worked on the roof. Thursday, we took the long, long trip to the temple, and Friday Ruth, Kate, Rachel, Arwen, Susan, Sam, and Gideon drove to Charlotte to visit my parents and sisters and brother. I left Monday morning, but Ruth, Kate, and Rachel will stay for a week.

We were originally planning on attending the temple on Wednesday to give me a day to relax during drives, but when I was getting ready

to leave, I felt like all would not be well with my kids at home and that we should postpone the trip a day. I talked to John and we prayed about it and decided to stay home. About a half hour after we would have left, Johnny got really sick. It was good that we were there for him and that he did not have to babysit. He was better by the next morning and we went to the temple and all was well.

At my parents, the little kids enjoyed tv watching, playing with their cousin Sadie and playing with my parents' two dogs. My parents have 4 large tvs and tons of movies that my kids have never seen. Arwen and Sadie are getting along quite well. Suzy is a little unused to the idea that Sadie would not want her to take all of her toys.

I enjoyed chatting with my siblings and parents. In another couple of years, all of us will be in our forties. I think we are more relaxed than we were a decade ago. I also think that we tend to agree about things a little more, or at least have more respect for each other's opinions.

Ruth, Kate, and Rachel seem to be fine. They will spend the next week sewing and doing crafts with my mom. I think they will really enjoy that.

The kids left at home had a fun time with John. The first night they carved wood together,

practiced archery, and watched a movie. Then Joseph asked John what he planned to do with them.

When I got home Monday evening, I made the kids quit playing video games and clean the house. Vacation was over for us, much to all of our dismay.

Earlier in the week, I wrote this down:
Johnny turning on a tv show for Sam and Susan and Susan crying that it is the wrong show saying, "I'm telling mom."
Me: "Johnny turn on the show she wants.
Johnny: Why do you have to give in to all their whining.

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