40 hour work week

School is over for the semester. So my husband has a break of about a month where all he has to do is work 40 hours a week. It's so amazing! He works eight hour days (can you believe it? we're used to twelve hour days)

Sometimes, he's still home in the morning when the kids wake up.

He comes home from work and he has time to play with us. After the girls go to bed we do whatever we want. Like read books together or play games. Not that there's nothing else to do, there are still applications to graduate school that have to be finished soon, and callings and other things, but basically, it's amazing.

I have a feeling that this is not ever going to be normal for us. And I'm okay with that, busy is good, but man, less busy is REALLY nice (at least for a little while.)

I just have one thing to say

Mid November Update

So my two year old has an imaginary, well friend isn't the best description. She has an imaginary dinosaur. Sometimes she'll be crying about something and she'll say, 'the dinosaur scared me.' Then, sometimes right after that she'll say, 'the dinosaur made me happy' and she'll start laughing. It's kind of disturbing how quickly she can turn her crying on and off, even when she seems to have a legitimate reason for crying. And the dinosaur is green, in case you were wondering, but we don't know much else about it except it seems to be controlling my child's mood.

Also, my novel is coming along a lot better than I thought it would. I have written about 21,000 words so far, so I'm almost halfway. I guess I have more creativity than I thought I might because I am somehow managing to keep my story going. At least so far.

Finally, Leah has just barely started crawling in the last few days. It's taken her nine months, but she's much more interested in walking. I can't wait to have her underfoot all the time :) :| :(

My Novel

So my sister told me that November is National Novel Writing Month. There's a website that sponsors writing a novel in thirty days. (NaNoWriMo.org) So, I'm going to write a novel. Yes, you heard me, I'm going to write a novel. Sure, the only real reason is to say that I've written a novel. It's one of those things like not eating candy anymore that is satisfying just because it's hard (and out of the ordinary). I am supposed to start Nov 1 and I have no idea what I will write about. I'm pretty sure it's going to turn out lame and sappy, but that doesn't really matter (I have to keep telling myself) all that matters is that if I finish in a month I will get a great certificate saying I am a certified novel writer. Hmmmmm. That didn't sound as impressive as I thought it might. Oh well. My sister is doing this as well, and we've promised each other we won't back out. 50,000 words in a month. I can do it, even is it's trash. The way I see it, a lot of stuff out there is trash anyway, so I'll just be in the norm. Hopefully I'll be able to come up with some idea in the next three days. I'll keep you posted.

Frills

So, I've never really been a frilly girl myself. Sure it's fun to dress up sometimes, but mostly, give me my jeans and a well fitting t-shirt (by the way, I'm in the process of constructing my own pattern so I can make the perfect-for-me t-shirt.) Janie is a different story. We fight every morning about getting dressed, unless she gets to wear a skirt. She doesn't like me doing her hair unless I put a bow in it. I just acquired some bows from my neighbor, and apparently I need to make more because it saves a lot of argument in the morning. I made some tutus for the girls' Halloween costumes, and she loves to wear hers around, she calls it her 'ballerine.' Too bad I don't know much about ballet, then I could teach her something. The word is still out on Leah, but I gave her my name so maybe she'll be more like me?

The Carpenter of Nazareth

In Nazareth, the narrow road,
That tires the feet and steals the breath,
Passes the place where once abode
The Carpenter of Nazareth.

And up and down the dusty way
The village folk would often wend;
And on the bench, beside Him, lay
Their broken things for Him to mend.

The maiden with the doll she broke,
The woman with the broken chair,
The man with broken plow, or yoke,
Said, “Can you mend it, Carpenter?”

And each received the thing he sought,
In yoke, or plough, or chair, or doll;
The broken thing which each had brought
Returned again a perfect whole.

So, up the hill the long years through,
With heavy step and wistful eye,
The burdened souls their way pursue,
Uttering each the plaintive cry:

“O Carpenter of Nazareth,
This heart, that’s broken past repair,
This life, that’s shattered nigh to death,
Oh, can You mend them, Carpenter?”

And by His kind and ready hand,
His own sweet life is woven through
Our broken lives, until they stand
A New Creation--”all things new.”

“The shattered [substance] of [the] heart,
Desire, ambition, hope, and faith,
Mould Thou into the perfect part,
O, Carpenter of Nazareth!”

George Blair

Heart Swelling

Recently my husband and I were talking about how wonderful it is to be parents. Our daughters are so precious to us, our hearts swell when they smile and laugh, talk and play. We also decided that the reason they whine must be to stop our hearts from exploding. I mean, if they were sweet all the time, we might go crazy and lose track of reality. Crying is just a way to bring their parents back down to earth, really, we should thank them.

Creativity

Some of my recent creations

Matching dresses for the granddaughters. (they look a lot better with shirts underneath)

Janie's birthday cake

And of course, technically, these are my creations too

Pictures

So when it comes to taking pictures, I'm very fired. I have a great digital camera, I am very good at remembering to bring it with me but not so good at taking it out and getting pictures. We recently spent a week in California, we went to the beach several times, Disneyland, Six Flags, the pool, and we had lots of hanging out with Benjamin's family. Guess how many pictures Christina took the whole vacation? 5. That's right. Luckily, my sister was with us most of the time and she got a lot more pictures than I did. Hopefully, I will get them from her sometime. Below is one of the pictures of Janie in toon town.

Also, we've been trying to get a family picture with all of us and this I'm pretty sure this is the first picture of all of us.
Nice huh

Learning

Well, I've recently learned some valuable things.

1st My mother brought me a late birthday present of a sewing machine!


I have been wanting to do several projects but it's hard to get going when I have to pack up the kids and go to Mom's and try to entertain the children while I finish my project (or not feel guilty while someone else entertains the children). So, the first thing I did was buy fabric to fix our futon cover. The giraffe fabric is very sturdy but the black is very worn, the whole front piece ripped away from the other fabric. Kind of tacky, but I really like the giraffes. So, I sewed a new piece on to the front. Of course, the whole time I was thinking about the parable of sewing new fabric on the old. I knew it wasn't the best idea, but we're looking for a quick fix. When I was putting the cover back on, the cover ripped in a couple of places in the back. So, I guess the scriptures are true. However, you can't REALLY tell, at least it will last for a little while. Yay, I'm actually a homemaker!


2nd When I was younger I would get sick to my stomach on the first day of school, when anything exciting or different was happening really. I'd been feeling very proud of myself that I haven't had that problem since high school. But, I'm not as over it as I thought. Ben is in Turkey for two more weeks and the old friendly stomach ache is back. I'm doing much better than I was at first, at least I'm not constantly on the verge of a breakdown. No thank you to being a single parent, that's all. However, I'm very glad that he's only gone for two weeks, he's not gone for months on end, and he doesn't leave very often. I am learning to be very grateful for the time I do have with him. And learning how to have more sympathy for people who are depressed all of the time.

Incidentally, I'm pretty sure my mother was divinely inspired to bring me the sewing machine when she did, I needed more things to do to fill my time. She brought it the morning Ben left and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have made it through that first day if it hadn't been for some project to try and keep me occupied.

Oh boy, I'm so glad I get to do hard things because it helps me learn. (That was only partially sarcastic too)

Also I'm learning how the heck to put the pictures where I want them in my blog posts.

Haircut

Yes, I cut my daughter's hair. All by myself. No, I have no official training except that I cut my own bangs back when I used to have them. Her hair was all mullety in the back so I trimmed it. I am very pleased with how it turned out. Good job me.

Mac & Cheese

Janie can reach the bottom shelves of the pantry. Yesterday she was shaking a box of Macaroni and Cheese and asking about 'pasta?' This morning Jonathan told her it was Macaroni and Cheese and she talked about 'maca cheese' all morning. It's not something we eat very often but how could I refuse? Apparently she likes it because she ate three helpings.

Reblogging

So maybe this time I will keep it up. I say that every time I start writing in my journal. Have I ever filled even half of a journal? No. But now I have something worthwhile to write about and even more incentive (my children may have no information about their young lives if I don't). So, here we go again.