We went to the Playtorium in Factoria. What a fun place! We had actually gone to go to the Children's Museum that we have a membership to. It turns out they aren't open on Mondays. :( But we were there so we just went next door for some fun on the padded toys, trampolines, tunnels, and slides.
Tommy had a hard time keeping up with his sister but he had a ball.
While we were there, though, three boys ganged up on Elsy and bullied her pretty bad. They tried to knock her down on the tramp and chased her pelting her will balls. I got her away from them when they started hitting her with some of the padded hanging toys. She was pretty sad and shaken up about it. On the drive home it was all she talked about and when we got home she just sat on the ground for a while. I could tell she was really hurt by the whole experience. One thing I was kind of upset about was that none of the moms of the boys seemed to do anything about it. Maybe they didn't see, I don't know, but I decided I really want to do a good job of keeping an eye on my kids and stepping in if they are ever being unkind, and especially if they are being violent.
We talked about it but I tried to make it lighthearted because I realized that it wouldn't do her any good to keep thinking about it. We read a Bernstein Bears book about bullying and then we decided to say a prayer. We made sugar cookies together and she seemed to get back to her happy self after lunch. I was surprised when, at bedtime, we talked about it again real quick. Then I told her we should take cookies to people and she asked if we could take some to the boys. I thought that was so sweet of her.
The next day I got a sweet email from Logan's mom that helped me to feel better. Elsy had told David and Natalie the story of Jesus on the cross and referred to the men who hung him as "bad guys"...
I had a sweet insight this morning as I lay reflecting in bed, still having that image of Elsy in my mind - and being stirred again by her sweet innocent suffering. Then all of a sudden, It kind of merged with the last scene we had of her in your bed --sharing the story of Jesus and the Resurrection. And the picture and words about the mean men that hurt Jesus - all of sudden were like the bullies who hurt Elsy.
And I found myself going back to Elsy’s own little words and lesson and thinking of it in this situation:
Im sad when I think of Elsy being hurt, -- but I’m happy when I think that Jesus can bring her happy feelings back to life again.
And thinking of sharing this with you reminded me of some other words in the scriptures , from that account that we commemorate this week, — of Mary, his mother, 'at the foot of the cross.' And what was told to her when Jesus was still an infant, that a sword would pass through her heart also.
Tender glimpses all around. My hearts, and hopes!, go out again to both of you.
Take care! and Happy Week of Easter!
Elsy and Logan building a tower together.
Lately every time I tell Elsy to smile for the camera she makes some cheesy weird smile. Its hilarious and I love it... but I also wish she would just smile!
Logan, as always, is quite busy but he has been making time for the kids and I. Just tonight the kids were racing back and forth on the couches and he was wrestling them and making them laugh so hard.
My kids love reading books. Tommy will often come find me holding a book. He will proceed to make his little grunts and hold it out to me... he wants me to sit down and he will plop right on my lap and wait for me to read to him. We found a great library in Sammamish to go to. Elsy always wants to watch Curious George videos on the computers there. I let her while I pick out "Car Books" - we get a handful of board books every time to keep in the car for the kids to read while we drive places. Then I get her off and she gets to pick three bed time books that we read to her before naps and bedtime.
Since it was Easter we decided we needed to dye eggs. I haven't dyed eggs in forever and I realized I had sadly never, in my memory, made hard boiled eggs. I found out that you need to be careful or they will crack and cook in the boiling water haha!!
Logan put a towel down to protect our new table and Elsy had a blast. All the colors were mixed by the end but she was happy.
Tommy ate hard boiled eggs for breakfast for the next several days but Elsy couldn't stand them... although she did enjoy peeling them.
Here is another of her silly faces.
This is Logan doing scriptures with the kids. Every night before family prayers we either watch a Bible Video, tell the story that accompanies a picture from the Gospel Art Book, read a few verses from the Book of Mormon, quote an Article of Faith, or read a few paragraphs from the Illustrated Book of Mormon Stories (we just got this one on Easter morning).
I have been trying to lose all the baby weight I put on before we start trying to have #3. I'm worried if I don't loose it all then it will keep adding. I weighed 128 when I got pregnant with Elsy and I weighed 130 when I got pregnant with Tom. I am now 134 so I have a bit to go. I have just been stuck at this confounded 134 for far to long and nothing I do seems to help. I am worried that with each pregnancy I will have a few permanent pounds added to my frame... but I look at my sister Leisha and she weighs less than she did before she got pregnant... so that can't be true!!
At our new complex they have a kids play room in the exercise area. Its hardly adequate and therefore my children are playing in the water from the water jugs, trying to climb on other peoples treadmill, etc. So I decided to put them in one of the bigger lockers to contain them with Daniel Tiger on the iPad. It works... a little.
I have been trying to take better care of my body so I try and go to the gym three times a week for cardio and then I do strength training twice from home. I have been cutting my portions and trying to make healthier eating choices. It is definitely a journey, one that I often go backwards on, but I definitely feel like I am making progress.
I also started a new crochet project, one that I am really excited about. I found the pattern a long time ago and have always loved it but kept putting it off because it is like 120 granny squares and quite the project. But I decided it would be worth it so I have begun the many square project. Logan and I have bee watching Person of Interest on Netflix every night after we put the kids to bed. I have been crocheting a little while watching and it helps me feel more productive with my evening than just sitting and watching a show.
Happy Easter! At our house, the Easter Bunny comes on Saturday morning. Elsy got a stuffed cat (in hopes that she would become the 'master' instead of the 'cat' haha) and Tommy got some stacking cups. Logan and I got nothing in our baskets... he got a TV and I got a new couch this last month so we figured we could do without. ;)
The kids had so much fun running around getting eggs. I just love it! We had a little golden egg that was empty and we had Elsy cash it in for a little cut out of Jesus and the tomb that we used to tell the story of the resurrection. We talked a lot about it that week and Elsy has it all down now. Sometimes she still will randomly say to me, "I'm sad when Jesus died, but I'm happy that he was rezarected!" Her testimony is just blossoming and she just laps up anything to do with the gospel.
Later that morning we went to Pine Lake park for our ward Easter egg hunt and a hot dog lunch.
The next day was the real Easter. Logan let me sleep in because I still have been having rough nights with the kids. Before I got out of bed I thought to myself how we didn't have anything to do special for the real Easter (besides the fact that I had gotten the Illustrated Book of Mormon Stories book that I had set out the night before and two little Jesus puzzles to keep in the church bag). My family always had Easter eggs on the regular Easter day and I thought, we still grew up with testimonies and knowing what Easter was really about! But as I came out Logan had a little morning devotional all prepared. It was really special and made all my sad feelings go away.
And of course, the kiddos got Easter outfits!
I did end up getting cute pictures of them, but it sure was hard. I may have grumped at them a bit to try and get them to hold still and smile.
Oh my gosh, though I could not stop looking at Tommy! Since church is at 1pm I spend most of Sacrament meeting walking the halls trying to get him to fall asleep and then transfer him to the umbrella stroller. This day I just held him instead. Sometimes I just can't get enough of my babes.
These two have become quite the pair. Every night before bed, while they are having snacks, they run the entire length of the apartment back and forth screaming and laughing. And when I rock them and sing before bed, on the rare chance I let them both on my lap at the same time they just giggle and laugh and dig their heads into each other... makes quite the wrestling match for me. We have taught Elsy to say "Mom I need help!" instead of resorting to violence with Tommy when he takes something from her or is bothering her. It has taken a while but the last two days she really has gotten it down and I am really proud of her.
Last week my couches arrived! Yippy!! I have been wanting to get rid of the green beasts for quite a while. Logan and I finally decided to make the plunge and upgrade our living room. I was and still am so excite and happy about them! Instead of paying the delivery fee Logan rented a truck and moved them with Cameron.
The kids seemed to catch the excitement in the air as Logan unwrapped them all and got them all arranged.
Tada! I am totally loving it. I think I might eventually get different pillow covers because I want to do my living room in greys and blues but for now, since my living room doesn't have any blues yet, the yellow works great. A nice sunshiney touch. :)
Logan's uncle Hiatt came to visit us for Family Night. He was in town for work and brought us some ice cream. Elsy talked his ear of and he was a good sport to read her Frog and Toad. We hadn't seen him in a very long time so it was a lot of fun to catch up.
The other day I heard Elsy and Tommy laughing in my room. Elsy shouted to me, "Mommy!! We are friends, Mommy!" I am so glad they are getting to be such good friends. However, Elsy has also labeled Tommy as "Not nice and not reverent." She is pretty spot on since he loves bugging her just to see her react and and usually screams through every mealtime prayer because he is hungry and can't figure out why we are always delaying the meal.
Elsy continues to surprise me with how many lyrics she knows to songs. She is always singing and never wants me to help with the words if she misses a few. She also never wants help with her prayers. She usually says something along the lines of, "Heavenly Father, thank thee for dis day, thank thee for my warm bed, thank thee for my mommy and my daddy and for Tommy, and my mommy and daddy, in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." So to broaden her focus I try to slip in some new ideas... she will reach over and cover my mouth and say, "No I'm say it myself!" but then she says what I just told her to say. So... ;)
Logan found this cooking app that the kids love... and he loves too. Haha, they are so funny playing it together. Here they are on his lap.
I realized I somehow had the remote to the TV at the Hilton's house as well as their garage door opener, and we had a book to return to the Trussel's so we spent a wonderful morning up in Redmond. We had only been gone a little over a month but it had become so green up there. I was instantly sad the moment I started driving down Avondale road. I have been really loving Issaquah, it is so beautiful here with the mountains, the forests so close by, and the crisp air... but the instant we drove into Redmond I wished we had never left. :(
After running our errands we went to our favorite park, Ferrel McWherter. The weather was amazing and all the animals were out and about.
I sent Logan a lot of pictures and he was so sad he couldn't be there because he was at work.
Later that day we got invited by some of the girls in our ward to the beach on Lake Washington. It was the first nice day in a while and I didn't think we would be getting wet but apparently I was wrong. I was ill prepared but decided to just run with it.
The kids were sopping wet by the end and quite muddy but we all had a blast so it was worth it. I have felt so welcome in our new ward with the other girls. They are always inviting us on outings, to playgroups, and over for breakfasts or dinners. It has been so helpful in our transition here because our ward in Redmond was so amazing and I think I really needed some good friends here. We have been blessed!
No matter how hard I tried I couldn't get Tommy to stop eating the sand. The next day he had a pretty gritty diaper but he didn't get sick so I figured it was fine.
By the end my children were more naked than not haha. Oh well. I decided I can no longer judge when I go to the park. ;P
We also were able to watch General Conference a few weeks ago. Every Saturday morning session we have some of our friends over for a potluck breakfast. Our group of friends are all from BYU-I. All thanks to Kurt, we all ended up out here, helping each other get jobs. Kurt and Lauren Daniels helped Logan to get his job out here as well as Johnny and Alyssa Rodriguez. Then Logan helped Cameron and McKenna Bullock get their job out here at Contsrux and then helped Chris and Camille Woodhouse get work where Johnny and Kurt work, an agency called Fresh Consulting. For a while all the guys would meet once a week because they wanted to start a business with each other. They called it Dudesday (because they met every Tuesday) and their group was called "Airship". After a while that slowly stopped and now its just Logan and Johnny working on Showit.io. I'll have to tell you more about that later because I have so much to catch up on today but it is an awesome startup they are doing together.
It is fun having our friends over for something that is so important to our family. I hope it is an opportunity for our friends to know that we love the Lord and want others to feel the spirit when they are in our house. :)
The kids actually did pretty good this time around. We drew shapes and Elsy would color them in.
Tommy would stand in front of the TV and lead the music.
In between sessions (both on Sunday and on Saturday) we went to the dock on Yellow Lake and ate a picnic lunch in the sunshine.
What beautiful weather we have been having! After thinking we were going to drown and maybe have to build an ark in order to survive the weather finally pulled through. I am starting to like it here again, I sure do loath the rain.
The kids slept through the afternoon sessions and it was nice to get to cuddle with Logan on our new couch and listen.
The kids woke up for the last little bit and were cuddly too so we just enjoyed a big ole cuddle fest.
Logan let Elsy do his hair with barrettes.
During the last session Elsy woke up and was laying on my lap. I snapped a photo because I just looked at her and thought she looked so old. If I changed my perspective I could almost imagine her as a teenager laying there. It made me feel so sad to think someday she won't be tiny anymore.
I have been trying so hard to love each little moment recently. So often I am stuck just going through the motions... getting on pajamas, giving baths, making food, reading books, singing songs, and rocking to bed. I have caught myself many-a-time trying to rush through the bedtime routine, or any of our routines, in order to get to my own free time. I have been gaining a stronger and stronger love for my children these last few weeks as I tell myself to live for those little moments instead of live for my time off. I will still spend the same amount of time singing and rocking, but now I am enjoying it so much more. It is amazing. I know I will never be more adored by my children than I am now while they are young and I need to do a better job of adoring them back. My heart could burst with how much love I have for them. And for Logan, too. It has been wonderful setting the goal to show him specific love each day. That was one of my conference goals, to show him each day the love I have for him. I still am not perfect and sometimes I forget. But just a little back rub or a good conversation or a funny text help a lot, especially when we are both so busy with kids and work.
Some of my other goals from conference are to attend the temple once a month. I am planning to go on Saturday mornings early before the kids wake up because Logan usually has work to do on Saturdays. (This month I am going for a RS activity instead). I am also going to be doing family history work every Wednesday during nap time. So far the last two weeks I have just been reading from the family book my Grandma Volmer wrote about her ancestors but I think that counts as I am learning about my ancestors and the struggles they faced and how they still remained strong. It has already been amazing. My other goal is to see out opportunities every day to teach my children about the gospel and about their Savior. Tommy loves to look at books about Jesus. He points at Jesus in the pictures and makes a weird guttural sound as if he is trying to say Jesus. It has been really special doing this with Elsy because I am trying to use moments to teach her rather than planning specific lessons for each day. It has really been cool and I know she can feel the Spirit when we have these little conversations that come up. For example, our friend McKenna just had a baby and I used that as an opportunity to tell her that babies are a gift from Heavenly Father and that she was a gift to our family. Or we were singing "A Child's Prayer" and she naturally had questions about what "now surrounds you" means or the "Kingdom of Heaven". I was reading in a talk about how we need to have 'intentional parenting' in today's world. It kind of scared me because of how often I do get stuck in the routine of everything. But this goal has helped me to take advantage of situations, as well as helped me to be more open to talk about these things. It is not uncommon for me to get watery eyes while I talk with Elsy about spiritual things. When I do, she just locks her eyes on mine. I can't tell if she is worried about the tears or if she is also feeling the spirit. ;)
I love being a mom, even though it is hard. Logan and I decided this week to start trying for another baby. I have been feeling so often lately that someone is missing. It is such a strange feeling. We will be sitting all together as a family and when I usually felt a feeling of security because we are all together I feel this little feeling like "Wait, where is...? Oh.... we are all here." I'm excited for another chapter, but I am also very nervous. My pregnancy with Tommy was really hard, I suffered from a lot of depression. And I do not want to go through that again. But at the same time I look at Tom and I would do it all over again over and over just to have him. I know whatever challenges another pregnancy will bring, they will all be worth it.
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