Updates by Person

MERRICK

Let's start with Merrick, because he's the BABY.

  

But actually he's 18 months, so he gets to go to "noisweet" as Annie calls it. *celebratory dance*  We can barely make it through sacrament meeting with any sort of decorum, so having the time cut by 2/3 that we have to try to keep him quietly entertained is yuge.

Here are the rest of the 18 month olds, for comparison.

Merrick likes to be outside.  It is starting to get too cold for him to wear his favorite outfit: a diaper.

 I just want to be able to sit like this so much.  It looks so convenient for observing things close to the ground (I have to do this a lot: "Is that poop? Oh no, it's a mangled brownie." or "No puppy! What are you eating?" or "Why are you so sad that you have thrown yourself down on the floor?" or "Ok, let's sort all these tiny toys into their appropriate bins for the 6th time today." etc.).

 Merrick does not like to be left alone.

  

He likes to wear Daddy's shoes.  But he always needs help to put them on, even though the mouth of the shoe is bigger than his entire foot.

 He ends up in our bed 80% of nights by 6am.  It was the main reason we got a king sized bed last month (I don't have any pictures of it yet because I need to build a frame for it before it's presentable, though the beautiful sheets and pillows mom sent for Drew's birthday definitely helped!), but Drew and I both like to sleep next to the edge, so now when there are no children in bed we are sooooo far apart that our half-asleep selves can't find each other for snuggling when it gets cold in the middle of the night.  I'm sure we'll adjust.

And it is certainly very convenient for nights when stuff like this happens.  Add Merrick in your mind on the right side of the bed and then see if you can fit Drew and I in there somewhere.

Merrick likes to copy Annie and step on two square Duplo bricks and "skate."  A dangerous past time...

 They are enjoying playing together while the older two are at school.

  

Merrick loves to sit in the front seat and push all the buttons.  Here we are getting our tires filled.

 And Merrick loves Allen, our next door neighbor who hangs out with us Tuesdays and Thursdays while his mommy teaches Kindergarten.

 Merrick calls him "Al-Li!  Al-Li!"  We were at Rafe's soccer game one Saturday and Merrick spotted a little boy about Allen's same size waaaaaayy over on the other side of the field and went running over to say hello. He was confused when it wasn't Allen.

 I tried to take them all out one day, because Allen has a tendency to get into everything in my house.

And it's not just toys.  He loves to open ALL the drawers.  In fact, one day I couldn't find his special Meow Meow (a plush kitty whose face gets lovingly chewed off during every nap time).  I looked everywhere for it for 2 hours.  I even walked around the house on my hands and knees to get the same vantage point a toddler would.  Couldn't find it.  I was putting away my laundry later that night and who should I find tucked into my kitchen cloth drawer?

It turns out Allen gets into everything regardless of the setting, but he has less of a chance of falling into a sting ray enclosure at my house (it was a close thing), so we haven't gone out again except to the park.  

  

But look at the little baby sea turtle!  Shelldon has been an ambassador from North Carolina for the last year raising awareness on the plight of his kind, and will soon be headed back to North Carolina to be released into the wild.

 Back to Merrick.  He likes to put raspberries on his fingers before he eats them.

 

And he is becoming very vocal about his wants.  This was cute before he started saying it 5,000 times a day.  He's so happy when he gets it though.

  Last night he upgraded "ainsum" to "take bite?"Other words he knows right now are unk=drink, up=pick me up, and thergo=there you go, for sharing purposes.  He'd like to share a kiss with you. Mmmmmmhmmmmm.

 He likes to ride his bouncy horse and he does not like it when anyone else rides it.  Oh WAIT.  It's ANNIE's bouncy horse from her birthday.  So yes, there are frequently fights over this toy.

Once Vivien and Rafe leave for school I have to lock their room so Annie and Merrick don't trash it (just remembered I forgot to do so today, brb.....They pulled all the clothes off the hangers and demolished Rafe's plastic fireman's hat.  I guess it could have been worse).  I think last time I blogged we were trying out boys in one room, girls in the other, but Vivi and Rafe are on a much more similar schedule than Annie and Merrick, so we switched back.   Annie took this of Merrick's cute little baby boy back, getting into Vivien's stuff.

 He loves to see dogs on our walks.

 He loves, loves, loves his Daddy.

And lastly, Merrick is pretty much crying from the time he wakes up from his nap until he goes to sleep unless he is being held.  And he's too heavy and unwieldy to be held constantly, so he cries a lot.  I don't know if it would help to put him down earlier, but I have to leave to pick up Vivs and Rafe from school at 1:30, so I have to keep him awake till then.  He falls asleep in the car and I can usually transfer him to his bed when he's home, and he sleeps till 4ish.  Poor little whiny-kins.

ANNIE

Annie shouted down the stairs the other day something it took me three tries to make out.

Annie: Mooooooom! Merrick wah wah woo!

Me: Merrick's in your room?

Annie: No! Merrick wah wah woo!!

Me: Merrick touched your poop??

Annie: No! Merrick wah wah woo!!!

Me: Merrick took your boot?

Annie: Yes!

 I need to take more videos of Annie saying things.  She has that same squeaky little voice Vivien had, but with the added fun of the same "r" difficulty that Colette and Daniel had when they were little, plus a couple other adorable ones that I probably should correct but don't want to because they're so cute.  Like "That looks like fundow [thunder]!" or "somepling."  "They's somepling wrong with Mewwick.  He can't open the doi"  It's too hard to write down.  I'll just take a video right now.

She's a little confused on pronouns.  "Her is going to the stoi wight now."  And she doesn't quite understand the limited interchangeability for really and very.  They can both be an intensifier (i.e. It's really hot, it's very hot).  But really is also a synonym for actually, and very, not so much.  "These shoes are very mine."  In my mind I change it to "verily" and it makes me laugh.

  

She likes to sit up with the kids after school and do her 'homework.'

 Though often she gets tired of coloring and starts chewing the wrappings off all the crayons.

  

This is a bee's nest.  We all thought she was saying "beezness"  like business in a Spanish accent.

 She came up to Drew with a huge rock in hand the other day and said, "I'm going to kill my sista, Anna."  Drew looked at me with concern and said, "Where does she get this?"  Annie didn't miss a beat and told him she'd gotten [her rock], "Fwom the gaiden!"

 Back when I was trying to have her share a room with Vivien, we'd put her to bed and then she'd close the door and turn on the light, so when Vivien would go to bed she'd be met with something like this:

I've especially enjoyed watching Annie pick up Spanish on the fly.   Sometimes I'm a good mom and sit down to play learning games with my children.  We were playing a game with the body parts flash cards I made.  I laid them all out and would say a word and they'd try to be the first to find it.  She legitimately beat Vivi and Rafe to three different words that I have not actively taught her.  All three of them like to say ombliiiiiiiiigoooo and go for each other's belly buttons.

 I let Vivien paint her own nails the other day (outside), and Annie came in awhile later, rubbing her hands and saying, "I got pay-lo-molish on me!"   The biggest thing we are working on right now is teaching her not to haul off and hit people.  They'll take something she's using and she gets this determined look on her little face and let's them have her best right hook.

Here's me trying to keep Annie still during Conference.  She is a wild thing during any sitting activities.  Better during nightly stories, but only just.  She's is a sweet, squishy, screamy (happy and sad) little girl.

RAFE

Rafe is turning into a really fun child.  He was so prone to crying and pouting as a 3-4 year old that I think I assumed he would never enjoy anything and that we'd have to struggle to get him to participate in any worthwhile activity his whole life.  But he actually seems to love a lot of things right now, and be surprisingly good at them too!  His Kindergarten teachers send home lots of pictures from school on our class app.  

  

We have homework every night and one of the assignments is always for him to read a book.  Over the summer we went through Lesson 75ish of the Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons book, where they switch to normal writing, and that just about did him in, so we scaled back and are just reading BOB books.  And he doesn't cry every time now.  Yay!

  

One of my favorite things to watch Rafe do this year is interact with his friends.  He's so friendly and excited.

 One of these things is not like the other...

 His All About Me poster.

 I love when he draws himself.

SO much!

 It's fun to see some of his other stories as well.

At home he prefers to watch Vivien play on the computer than work the mouse himself, but he will apparently do so at school.  

 In Spanish class they have pen pals from an elementary school in Spain (where Ms. Laura is from).  Here is Rafe's pen pal.

 This is the picture we sent back to Unai.

 They had a fundraiser at school, and they could earn a pizza party if their class won.  Drew told the kids they could earn money by doing chores.  Vivien was confident her class would win without her involvement and declined to work, but Rafe worked all day at odd jobs for spare change.

He is enjoying soccer this year.  It's so exciting to watch him.  I feel like he's getting a better grasp of where he needs to be on the field.  He sweeps around between the ball/children cluster and the goal on defense very well, and he's super fast on offense.  

Now we just need to help him learn to take little touches so he actually has a chance to put the ball in once he breaks away!

 Our neighbors gave us the soccer goal that the previous owners of our house gave to them, and Rafe will actually go out and practice with us sometimes (he was highly reluctant last year).

 Rafe is killing his pictures this year.  I can't wait to get his school pictures back.

This one, too, from a birthday party.  I can't even.

At home Rafe likes to climb on the walls in the back, which is exactly what I liked to do as a child in Albuquerque.  They like to get to their friend's house down the street by walking along the terrace walls in the backyards.

 Unfortunately, he also falls off the walls a lot.  After three falls in a week I grounded him from climbing until he could be more careful.

Rafe loves to play with the neighbor boys.  I have happened to have good cookies the last couple times they've come over, so now I apparently have a reputation.  It's nicer than the other one I have.  Last time Elliot was here he came in and said, "Every time I come here you are watching music on your computer.  That must be your thing."

Some funnies:

Our neighbors are the Asbury family.  Rafe likes to call the dad Mr. Raspberry.

Me: Rafe, where's your jacket?
Rafe: I left it in the hallway of the car.

Me: Should we have pancakes in the morning?
Rafe: Yes, but NO zucchini.  And NO carrots.

Rafe at dinner: "The potatoes are so hot!!  WHY DID YOU COOK THEM?!"

"I have more burps than sneezes, so that's why I'm a good frog."

I was enticing them to come practice Spanish vocabulary with candy corns.  His retort: "I don't want a candy corn dog because then everyone will cry for one and I don't want anyone having the things I get to have, so I don't want one."

Rafe rolls his r's as often as he can.  "I will grow a bearrrrrrd!"  "I'm going up into the darrrrrkness!"

And this is what Rafe does whenever he eats something too hot:

VIVIEN

 Vivien became a voracious reader overnight.  After dinner, the kids take baths while I do dishes, then when they're ready for bed I read The Chronicles of Narnia to them (we're on Voyage of the Dawn Treader), and then I give Vivien and Rafe some reading time on their own.  

I caught Vivien finishing one last book by nook-light nearly an hour after I'd said lights out.

 I am exasperated by this, because then I can hardly wake her up in the morning, but secretly proud.  She's burning through Magic Tree House books like a wildfire.

 She's doing well with Spanish.  Still not saying much, but she's doing well with dictados.  I loved this drawing.

  

And this book report.

 And this advertisement.  "Shop or store: $7, or more than that."

  

She has lost another tooth (again during a sleep over--Ocean's grandma went out of town, so Ocean stayed with us for a night so we could take her to school the next morning).  I'm not sure what's going on with those top teeth.  Her gap keeps getting wider and wider, but the teeth on the side don't show signs of loosening, and nothing's coming up...

Vivien had a phase for about a week where she wanted to catch a lizard to date and eventually marry.  She's an expert lizard and bug catcher, but pretty much everything she catches ends up dead.  The lizards get squeezed too hard, and the bugs end up in plastic bags, stuffed with "food" and with an air-hole, but left inside far too long.  We're working on responsible nature viewing.

We're also working on not stealing stuff.  She is an avid junk collector, and sometimes it's hard to realize that junk might belong to someone and that she needs to ask before she takes things out of people's houses or backyards.  Yesterday at Target she did pick up a gift card she found on the floor and return it to the cashier, which was a very good step in the right direction.  I don't know if it would've been different if it had been a piece of candy, or a toy, but she did tell me the other day in the car on the way home from school that she had resolved to work on her difficulty.  She is a good girl.

Vivien, diligently doing homework at the table: "Annie!  Stop bumping me! You  made me scribble my 9.  Now it looks like a face with a party hat."  She is doing awesome with her homework this year and getting very good at math.

Vivien, watching conference: "Hey!  They say Nauvoo in Star Wars too!"

We had the "Children's Sacrament Meeting Presentation" (as our Primary President insists it be called) and Vivien did what she always does: decides she's too scared to participate, then spends the whole thing sitting on her teacher's lap and crying once we tell her she has to go up anyway.  She did say her part this time, so that's an improvement.  She still hasn't given a talk, scripture, or prayer in this primary yet.  It's a funny thing.  I can't figure it out!

The other day I had to pick up the kids from school and I unexpectedly had 2 extra children with me, so I needed to put Vivien in front, just to get home.  She was all excited and got settled in, then read, with increasing unease, the warning sign posted on the sun shade.  "Children could be killed or seriously injured by airbag."  She silently contemplated her potential demise for a moment, then proceeded to tell me, unprompted, over the next 15 minutes all the reasons she doesn't want to die yet.  It was incredibly sweet and coaxed more than one tear from my eye.  I wrote down as many as I could remember: I want to get married and have babies.  I want to be a grandma.  I want to keep going to school.  I'm good at math so I want to be a scientist or an astronaut.  Or a teacher!  I want to make up for all the mistakes I've made in my life.  I want to be there for Christmases.  I want to go on all the cool trips and vacations.  I want to explore the sea.  I want to go to Disneyland!  I don't want to miss play dates or birthdays.  I want to get tall.  I think it's best to live as long as you can.  

SABRINA

I have been trying to prep our side yard for rubber mulch so we can put our jungle gym up.  It has involved lots of moving of gravel from one place to another.  Feels a little bit like Milo's task in Phantom Tolbooth... There's a weed that's grown over a lot of the gravel back there that's kind of a nice ground cover.

But you have to be careful because there is also puncturevine, which is quite possibly the most horrible plant ever.  Those wicked goat head seed pods!  Why would you ever need a thorn that long?

 My front garden beds are so beautiful.  They make me love Rachael Boyle that lived here before more and more with every new thing that starts blooming. These are Cosmos flowers.

  

And the mums are in full splendor now that it's fall.

  

I enjoyed my elf sunflower garden very much this summer.

 The birds have enjoyed eating the seeds, and I like to stand or sit facing the window while I practice so I can watch them.

 I've got quite a bit of music stuff going on.
1. I'm singing in the Messiah that our stake is putting on and loving it; we practice odd Wednesdays and Sundays.  We've got about 5 men and 15 women, but the men we've got are MEN.  I assume my regular spot in the soprano section--back row as close to the tenors as possible so I can really enjoy my part against everyone else's.  It's so much fun!
2. My friend Bo is a masters student in opera at UNM and asked me to play the violin for a Handel aria she's doing, so I've gotten to go down to UNM for her lessons and descend to the practice room in the basement where all the harpsichords live.  Whenever we play/sing for anyone new, like at master class, Bo's teacher always introduces me and adds, "She has four children!"  The recital is on November 16th.
3. I got called as the ward choir accompanist, so that's given me lots of excuses to play my new piano.  Bo is the choir director, and she's given me some really beautiful music to play.  

My other calling at church is assistant nursery leader, and it's been so very fun!  There are two nurseries in the ward, and Annie and Merrick are in the one I am not.

 I finally gathered up all the data and made my family measuring stick.  Apparently I didn't take Vivien to the doctor for the last 3 years, so I just had to guess along her growth curve for those heights.  I love to see my Fat Boy's height difference from the rest of the pack, always about an inch taller than everyone else.  And Rafe was smaller than Vivien until they turned 3, at which point he overtook her and is now significantly taller at 5 than she was.  Drew's height was confusing.  We measured him in at 5'11" on his birthday.  He thinks my stick is wrong since he's been consistently 6' for his military physicals, but I am measuring at my usual 5'8" and my stick does match up with our tape measure, so...

 I have been the best kind of busy with visitors.  More on that in subsequent postings.  I fear I am not a very good hostess, but I do love my people, and they all say they have been comfortable, so I hope they are being truthful.  It has given me lots of 'practice' changing sheets.

 I snapped this picture at Costco the other day.  They are all transfixed by the televisions for sale.

 Moms in our stake will often meet at the roundabout park on sunny afternoons to chat and let the kids run themselves out.  I've enjoyed getting to know everyone a bit better.  We have some truly stellar women in this area.  I should probably look nicer more often... My hair is sort of long enough to put in a messy bun, so guess how my hair is almost all the time now?  Maybe it's time to chop it off again.  I also am trying really hard to exercise every day, so sometimes that means I'm in my exercise clothes for quite awhile until I can get my act together.  I go to a dance aerobics the sister-I-minister-to teaches on Wednesday mornings, a toning class a personal trainer in our stake teaches on Thursday that kicks my butt, and the rest of the time I do Fitness Blender or PopSugar workouts on YouTube.  Or sometimes I just count moving gravel.  Or mopping the floor.  Or...folding clothes...

 Here are my beautiful lesser goldfinches.  Also, I finally spotted a Northern Flicker driving around the other day!  It was slam-on-the-brakes-for-a-better-look exciting.  Don't worry, I was the only one on the road.

 And here was my budgeting/bills companion the other day.

DREW

On top of all the traveling the last little while, Drew's had a big company IH audit last month and OSHA audits this month at work, and he's really feeling the pressure for his CIH exam coming up mid-November.  He has been spending evenings studying.  He probably should be studying more, but he insists on helping me get the kids to bed, because he loves me and he is a good dad (and maybe because he hates studying?).  I hope he passes so I don't have to feel guilty for selfishly taking away from his study time, because I am perfectly capable of putting children to bed myself.  It's just not very fun.  But neither is having to retake tests... We'll all breathe a little easier come Thanksgiving! 

Drew has been coaching Rafe's soccer team.  

Well, he's the 2nd assistant coach, but the head coach knows nothing about soccer, and the 1st assistant coach is already coaching another team and is more of an older children kind of coach.  Drew does a great job with the little kids, even when he has to juggle Merrick at the same time, who will scream on the sidelines until Drew holds him.  

 A week or so ago I was picking up Vivien and Rafe from Sunshine Generation (the singing/dance group my sister-I-minister-to runs), and Andrea told me whenever it's Vivien's turn to lead the kids in a dance, she always does these very interesting modern-dance sort of contortions.  I know where she gets her moves.  The other day at dinner I told the kids if they ate their broccoli then Daddy would have to do the broccoli dance.  They ate their broccoli, and Drew was a very good sport and delivered.  I did not record it because it kind of just needed to be experienced, but Drew is very good at vegetable interpretive dancing.  He's good at lots of things.  And I love him.  

He turned 33 this month.  We had ice cream Sundays in lieu of cake.

 He got a puppy for his birthday.  It kind of made his actual birthday awful, because he didn't get off work as early as he wanted, then it took longer at the pet store than he was planning, so by the time he got to the Santa Fe animal shelter and met the available puppies, the adoption center had actually closed, so he had to make his way home in the dark, sans puppy, to eat his birthday steak dinner by himself, and then drive back to Santa Fe the next day.  We wanted to surprise the kids.  I told them Dad was bringing "a surprise" for them.  Rafe threw a huge fit, since he could tell by how I was saying it that there was only going to be one surprise and he'd have to share it and that was going to be the worst!  He's still whining about it at the beginning of the reveal video.  I have such lovely, grateful children.  I think he warmed up to the idea by the end. Merrick had just woken up from a nap, and as I said earlier, he's not a happy boy post-nap as a general rule.

The kids wanted to name him spot because of his little brown eyebrow, but Drew didn't approve.  I found him the day after the puppy arrived, sitting in front of the book shelf contemplating the titles in search of a good name.  He decided on Pip.  We are not sure what kind of dog he is.  I bought a DNA panel for dogs off Amazon and sent the samples in yesterday, so we'll see!

 He has an up-ear and a down-ear, and likes especially to be held like a baby by Vivien.

 My favorite thing about him is his long whippy tail with its white spot.  It looks like a flag when he wags it.

  

He is a good baby dog and sleeps many hours a day.

I am trying really hard to be a good doggy mom as the not-a-natural-pet-person that I am.  When Drew dropped him off after picking him up, the poor thing was crying horribly because there are 4 tiny strangers here that do a lot of crying themselves, and I was reeeeeeally close to freaking out.  But it is getting better.  Drew wakes up with him at night, which significantly increases my fondness for the beast, and he is very fun to play with.  And will be even more fun when he has learned to be soft with his needle teeth!