The Vivs Turns Six and Preps for School

Vivi is 6!  

 I'm afraid her birthday wasn't quite as glorious as she would've liked it to be, with Daddy out of town and a bunch of babies for siblings, but we do our best.  I had hosted Book Club the night before out on the porch (we put up twinkly lights for it!  It was very festive) . . .

. . . so all the chairs in the house were downstairs that morning.  Vivien and Rafe snuggled up in the papasan for some Reading Rainbow while I made oatmeal, which is a treat to them, not a punishment.  They love it because it makes them warm.

 Vivien wanted to open presents right away.  They were supposed to be attractively wrapped, but that didn't happen.  She didn't mind.  She was just excited!

 She got a new pair of shorts she wanted, I gave her a reading light for her bed since she knows how to read now, she got a fun princess night light projector from Grandma Paula, and Drew made her a magic wand.  This is a terrible picture of the wand, which is actually quite beautiful, but it's a good picture of her excited face.

 In the afternoon I made her a cake while Rafe and Annie struggled to accept the fact that it was not their birthday.  "That's how it is, Alice.  Your birthday is always the one that is not now."  Annie did a lot of crying.  Right now if something displeases her, she says "I don't want to!" even if it doesn't make sense.  "It's Vivi's birthday today!"  "I don't want to."  Rafe turned to vandalism to vent his frustrations, taking a running race medal and scratching the paint off part of the wall in the family room.  My friend recommended "Raising An Emotionally Intelligent Child" to me.  I think it may need to be my next book, if I can ever finish Les Miserables.  The nice thing about birthdays is everybody gets some cake.

 I just used a chocolate cake mix, but I did make delectable blackberry/raspberry filling from scratch and I successfully made Italian buttercream frosting.  I was inordinately proud of myself for not ruining it--so many places it could have been a disaster!  I had to give myself a couple whoops and do a kick when it finally came together at the end.

Things people like about Vivien:

Dad sent his via message: "I love that she will ride with me int he car and tell me all her wonderful stories.  She is so creative and it always makes me laugh and smile."

I like that she is such a good helper with her siblings and that she is so smart.

Rafe and Annie both liked that she plays with them.  

We love our Vivs!

On Wednesday we had a meeting with Vivien's new teacher, Ms. De La Cruz.  She is from AZ and graduated from ASU.  I like her, if for no other reason than she painted her table with whiteboard paint and has a basket of mittens for the kids to use as erasers.  Brilliant!

Her classroom decorations are not your usual kindergarten variety.  It's very cute.  Here's her board out in the hall.

 Vivi's first full day will be tomorrow.  I hope we are ready!  In honor of school starting, I put up the fall decorations.

I am hoping to have a little time this week to "teach Annie to use the toilet."  Big bottle of Gatorade=lots of opportunities to learn to use the toilet.  I decided not to call it potty training because I already know I am terrible at that.  But Annie is a teachable thing, so surely I can teach her to use the toilet?  On Thursday I was trying to finish Les Mis before book club (didn't happen!) and I could tell she had been needing to go for awhile and was just holding it in, but I wasn't paying enough attention to do something about it.  She heard Merrick wake up from his nap on the monitor and went running up to his room, climbed into his crib, and then peed all over him, herself, and the bed.  Heavy sighs were heaved.  

 Vivien asked me to teach her to play the violin this week, so we got it out and gave it a whirl.  I'm trying to not be A Suzuki Teacher teaching Vivien to play and instead being Vivien's Mom teaching her to play, because it's a lot more fun for both of us the second way.  Semantics is important to me!

 Rafe was persuaded to give it a try too.  I think little boys look so cute with violins . . . He participated for a minute or two until it got a little hard and then he said, "I JUST WANT TO PLAY DRUMS!"

 Rafe's been having a really rough time with this separation from Drew.  He has days where he asks me every few hours when Dad'll be back, and he's at once clingy and prickly.  Vivien's been sad too.  She suddenly burst into tears yesterday at dinner because she missed her daddy.  I try to just give them hugs and reassure them he'll be back soon.  Rafe laid down with me the other day during nap time while I was reading Les Mis.  I fell asleep, and when I woke up I looked around for him and saw that he had slid off the couch and fallen asleep on the floor.  As soon as I got my camera to take a picture he woke up, then flatly denied he had ever been asleep.

 Yesterday I took the kids to a ward service project where we did some yard work around the church grounds.  I did not want to go.  I felt like I had a pretty good excuse to stay home, with 4 tiny kids and a husband at sea, but I went anyway.  Not because I wanted to give service, but because I knew I'd get blessings from it, and I wanted the blessings.  Does that count as having your heart in the right place?  I put Merrick in the baby backpack and pulled weeds while the other kids ran around the church parking lot for 3 solid hours.  Everyone slept very soundly that night!

 Here's a picture of Merrick snuggled up with Diana Byron during Relief Society today.  She's the one who watched my other babies when I went to have him.

 And last, here is the random thing I found in my freezer this week.  It is an old kiwi container full of individually paper-towel-wrapped ice cubes.  I'm not sure when or how or why.  I have a feeling these unexplainable oddities around my house will become more frequent the more capable my children get.