W35: Its about Time

August 25 - 31, 2013

We did it. First full week back in the school schedule. The kids did great to wake up and get ready. But by the afternoon/early evening we had melting moments. Especially from my kinder who is transitioning to a long, full day. I miss my Ruth! I know it'll get better with time.  

Kurt and I also started exercising this week. This is huge. We have never done an exercise program together. Hopefully we can help and motivate each other in our journey to get healthy again. We are doing the T25 program (25 minutes 5x a week for 10 weeks.) We survived the first week! 

With this exercising we are also eating clean. I'm really exciting about this! It is something I've wanted to transition our family into for a while now. Lots of fruits and veggies, protein and no processed foods. The kids have done well with our new dinners this week. I'm grateful and excited. And praying that feeling will continue through this process as life will get more busy as activities and homework start.

I finished up my visiting teaching for the month so that resulted in lots of play dates at the park during the mornings. Lucy was quite overjoyed with it. She is happy to have friends to play with as she misses "her guys." She asks daily, "Can I go to school next week?" 

The other big news is that Bill and Cindy officially moved to West Fall on Friday. Traci came into town to help Cindy. Madison and Lincoln came to play so they could get a lot done without distractions. Maddie even spent the night Wednesday. We LOVED having them! They are cute and good kids.

Maddie and Lucy played ok but when Ruth got home that's when all the fun started! Of course we had to dress up and dance.
                                               

                                        Did you know that coyotes love cantaloupe?!!

 Maddie LOVES baby Jane and wanted to hold her and help all the time. I think she needs a little sister!

Monday I got some OTC medicine for Jane to kick the thrush once and for all. The 2 antibiotics hadn't completely cured it. So back to my favorite purple dye. Love my blue berry.

We tried to go swimming with the Bairs on Saturday. We were dressed and in the car to go when Marti called to say that the pool was closed {someone pooped in the kiddie pool.} This is how the boys decided to have their own fun at home.

Lucy is loving all the grapes I've been buying with our clean eating. At any given time you can find her with a bunch of grapes in hand {reading a book, playing Barbies, dancing, etc..}

I've decided to make good use of our school driving time. In the morning we start out by learning a song. Currently we are memorizing hymn 232 "Let Us Oft Speak Kind Words." We sang it as the closing song today in church! It was so cute to hear Lucy sing, "warbling of birds on the heather..." Then we do a prophet study. Austin chose Moses this week. We've been having great discussion and solves our fighting problem.

Wednesday when we got to school the doors were locked. The secretary came out and asked if we had forgotten about the late-start Wednesday. The what??? I had NO IDEA what she was talking about. So apparently this year they start at 9 am on Wednesday. Seems random but whatever. So I was given the gift of extra TIME with my school kids that morning. We went to the park and played before school. Austin said we should do that every Wednesday.

Jane is 7 weeks old. She had quite a few fussy days this week. I am grateful for so many older siblings and their extra helping hands. She is alert and responsive to interaction. Thrush has created bad habits and she cannot sleep at night unless she is near me. Personally I don't mind and I know it won't last but a short time. As of today the thrush patch is gone. We have actually come to a ideal feeding situation through the course of our thrush battle and trying to maintain health. Its a nursing/bottle combo of whatever is convenient. For my life on the go it really works out perfectly.

~~~~Romans Reflections~~~~

- Lucy calling Jane sissy. "She's my sissy. I love my sissy!"

- Spencer tells Lucy he thinks she will grow up to become a good singer. She responded, LAAAAAAA
-Lucy learns lyrics quickly and often busts out a line from a song on the radio. Shake It Up is this the current favorite though.
 Ruth has a new best friend every day and a plan of who to become friends with tomorrow.
- Austin learned how to do parenthesis equations this week.
- Emma Lynn read her FIRST Spanish chapter book this week! Sophia la Fabulosa. She worked hard every night to finish it by the end of the week. So proud of her. She was also invited to dance in the ballet 11 class at school.
- Spencer has been hanging out with Austin and his prep schooler friends. He likes to make them laugh.

Kurt asked me if I had laughed this week. Look who I get to hang out with. Of course I've laughed!!