sleeping arrangements

I've been looking on the internet and I can't believe there's hardly anyone who has the same problem as me. We live in a two-bedroom apartment and I'm trying to figure out if there's any way I can get my kids sleeping in the same room. Heidi sleeps in a pack n play in our room during the day and in a crib in the living room at night because she doesn't sleep well when I'm in the room. It seems like almost everybody in this situation has been afraid that the baby will cry and wake up the toddler or else they are worried about having enough space in the kids' room. I'm not worried about those things at all! What nobody mentions, and what is keeping me from putting Heidi in Kevin's room, is that I'm afraid for Heidi's safety. I'm afraid that Kevin will wake up in the night, or wake up before me in the morning, and climb into Heidi's crib, toss her out, and then bring her to me by her neck telling me she's hungry.

So, for those of you out there who are in my situation, I have no advice for you. But know that you are not alone. And that when you figure out the magic solution, I am all ears.

Meanwhile, there is a crib in my living room, and there will be until Heidi can hold her own.

new goal

As I mentioned a few weeks ago, I am taking a new approach to goals and becoming more disciplined. I've decided to make smaller commitments and work on them one at a time, about a month at a time, instead of feeling bad about my lack of discipline all the time.

My old goal was to only eat sweets for a treat on the weekend and on special occasions. I've slacked off a little bit over the holidays, but not too much, and now I'm back on track. I think this really has made a difference in how I feel. In particular, I feel better when I wake up in the morning. I used to frequently wake up with a slight headache and didn't feel very rested. That's not usually a problem anymore, and it stopped about the time I started working on my goal.

My new goal is to start getting up before the kids are awake to read my scriptures and say my prayers. That means I need to get up by 7:30, and therefore I also really need to be in bed at around 10:00. I realized a week or so ago that if I have some quiet time to collect myself and invite the Spirit to help me before I have to deal with breakfast and diaper changes and all the other early morning craziness, then I can handle it all more patiently and calmly than if I try to also take care of my prayers and scripture study after the kids are up. It's hard to get to bed early for me because after the kids are in bed it's a good time to get things done, but it's worth it to have the patience during the day.

What goals are you working on?

Christmas 2011

We had such a nice Christmas. I was having a hard time getting excited about it because we were going to be away from family again, but getting everything ready on Christmas Eve and spending Christmas at church and with the kids was so fun and happy, so we had a great day. I know it was magical when I was growing up to open presents the next day, but it was so much more magical to make Christmas for my own kids, especially because I knew that this year Kevin would understand it a little better than he has before.

I was also a little nervous because a couple of packages weren't arriving, and it had been a few weeks since I ordered them. I knew it wasn't a big deal, but I sort of wanted to have everything put together for Christmas Day instead of having a couple of things arrive late. The two packages arrived in December 23rd, so that was a relief.

On Christmas Eve we had hot chocolate and marshmallows, in some mugs I got as a sort of present for the family. (I was going to make it a cute surprise, but then I decided not to because I was afraid it would be lame or cheesy or something, and when I explained all that to Ryan he said I should have just done it, and in retrospect he was right. Silly me.) Ryan made Scotcharoos. I finished Heidi's headband. We read the Christmas story from Luke. Every year I appreciate that tradition more. When I was younger it was fun to dress up, and now I enjoy it because I know the Atonement is part of my life every day and I appreciate the significance of Jesus Christ coming to the earth. We sang some Christmas songs.

Ryan strung the lights around the ceiling fan so we could say we put the lights up. Kevin thought it was so fun and had a fun time making the lights swing (under strict supervision). We only left the lights up for about a day because that was about as long as we could keep it under control. But it was nice to have Christmas lights up for a little while. Next year we might feel brave enough to try getting a tree.

After the kids were in bed I got to work on the stockings, while watching The Return of the King. Then we put out the presents and went to bed. 

In the morning when Kevin got up and went in the living room, he whispered, "Wow!" and went straight for the Reese's. He was excited about the presents too, but they were in the way of the lights, so he did the family a service and moved them all to the couch.

We joined with another ward for Sacrament meeting at 11:00. It was a really nice meeting. There were a couple of musical numbers and then people bore their testimonies of Christ.

Back at home we had a short testimony meeting. It was nice, but honestly Kevin was wired and didn't get much out of it. I still think it will be a nice tradition in future years.

This was Heidi's first Christmas. I knew she wouldn't care what she got, so I wrapped up a couple of old baby toys for her. She also got a new book, But Not the Hippopotamus, by Sandra Boynton. Heidi loved the wrapping paper. My sister Ellen sent her several books, some headbands, and some adorable flower clips that can clip onto the headbands. I don't think I'll ever have too many headbands for my baby girl!

Here's a video of Heidi chewing on her first Christmas present:

I finally managed to choose presents for Kevin that were developmentally appropriate. This year he got Mega Bloks and stickers, and he loved them both! After opening his stickers, he literally spent ten minutes putting stickers on his shirt. We also got him Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel, and he got books and clothes from my parents and my grandparents. It's nice to have some new books to read to the kids.

Here's Kevin playing with his new Mega Bloks:



In the evening we had Christmas dinner with three other families at the Coles' house. I had been planning to make egg rolls and rice, but when Sister Cole invited us I realized it was kind of a relief to not have to worry about that. We had the egg rolls yesterday, and they were great!

The day after Christmas we went to the Johnsons' annual Annendag Jule party. (I wrote about it last year here.) There was the usual food, but I look forward to it every year! And every year the Kransekake is even more delicious than I remembered it. We brought some yummy mint fudge (using this recipe with 1/2 tsp. of mint extract added).

Christmas Eve walk

On Christmas Eve we went for a walk at the Bolin Creek trail. Kevin enjoyed it when we let him get out and walk. He loved to see all the dogs and pick up sticks. Heidi had a good time too in the double stroller.

playing kitchen

Heidi and Kevin started playing together with a pot, a potato masher, an ice cream scoop, and a couple of wooden spoons. It's always fun when they play together.

The game of Kitchen turned into a spoon sword fight with Dad.

Kevin had an advantage because his "sword" had three prongs, but unfortunately Ryan's sword was more durable and Kevin's sword broke. Too bad, because it used to come in handy for cooking sometimes.

Christmas sewing projects

Last summer while I was in Utah I bought a shirt on clearance at Shopko. Bad, bad idea. Do not buy shirts on clearance at Shopko, especially if they have embellishments on them! So I wore this shirt twice before it fell apart and shrunk up but not in, if you know what I mean. The embellishments were attached to each other with glue that was more like silly putty and the whole thing was very poorly sewn to the shirt. Most of the embellishments were ruined with the glue that melted all over them. So I thought that I could probably cut the shirt up and make a headband out of it as a present for Heidi. Attempt one was based on this tutorial. It looked pretty cool, but it was kind of thick and looked weird on Heidi's little lightly-haired head. So I tried making the headband by braiding it, but that was pretty thick too. So I went back to plan A, which was to cut a long strip of fabric about 1 1/2 inches wide, fold it hot dog style, stitch it, turn it inside out, and sew the ends together. Once that was done I sewed one of the embellishments onto it. Success! It turned out to be very cute!

Project #2 was to make personalized Christmas stockings. I was sort of looking for stockings in stores, but I kept feeling like they weren't our stockings, and finally I realized that what I wanted was to have stockings that were truly our family's stockings and that had a story behind them. So we went to Joann's and picked up a couple of yards of felt (about three times as much as we needed, as it turns out) and some iron-on appliques. I used my old stocking, the one I used growing up, as a pattern for the stocking parts and made the cuff part myself. I really like how they turned out, and I had a good time making them. We asked Santa to come to our house last because I didn't start making them until Christmas Eve after the kids were in bed.

in which I talk a lot about my son

Yesterday Kevin got a chair and moved it to the wall shelf by the bathroom, then got the door key off the shelf and used it to pick the lock on the bathroom door. I came around the corner just in time to see it with my own eyes. Then today he got up on a chair again and was playing with the ornaments on the same wall shelf. So I showed him some of the little bells and showed him how they jingle, and he started shaking them and saying, "Jingle, jingle, jingle!" (I know you think your kids are just as cute as mine, but I still need to share the cute things they say.)

I just love how magical some things are to him, the way he can be delighted about such simple things. A few days ago we were at Target, and I helped him get a drink from the drinking fountain, and then he started running towards Ryan and saying, "I got a drink of water!!" He has such a short attention span, but at the same time he can be entertained for hours by a balloon or bubbles or the same story read over and over again.

He also said a complete prayer, all by himself, yesterday. I have no idea what he said, other than a whispered, "Heavenly Fa-ther, . . . this daayy" with some other stuff in between and then "Amen," but it was very nice, and he was so pleased with himself. He's never really been interested in having us help him by saying things that he can copy, so maybe we'll just skip straight to him saying his own prayers. I am glad that he notices our prayers, even if it doesn't always look like he's paying attention.

I have been working with him on learning to stop and look before crossing the street. It's a lot more complex than you would think. It's not enough to say, "Do you see any cars?" because there are lots of cars that are parked, so he says that yes, he does see some cars. So then I started trying to point out that some cars are driving and some are parked, and he's getting better but doesn't really understand it yet. I knew that it would probably take him a long time to figure it out, but we had to do something because he just loves to run out into the road and make me freak out. So sometimes we go for walks and practice being safe by holding Mom's hand and watching for cars.

What throws us off about Kevin is that it's not just that he gets into things and makes messes, but it's with things you wouldn't think about. This morning I found him with a fascinated look pouring corn syrup into the garbage can. Where did that idea come from? (At least he wasn't pouring it on the floor, though!)

He has grown up so fast. In the past year he's gone through three or four sets of pants, but he's still wearing most of the same shirts, so mainly he's gained height in his legs. We were looking at pictures of him from a year ago, and it was so weird because his cheeks were so chubby! He's tall and lean now. It's amazing to see how much he has learned to do. His fine motor skills and his language skills have especially developed a lot in the past year. I look at him sometimes lately and don't know whether to cry or smile because I know I'll never have him back as my baby again. It's hard to explain how I can be thinking, "If I can just get through this phase" at the same time as "It's all going by too fast."

Charity for the poor and needy

There's an attitude about people in poverty that is becoming more and more prevalent lately. It is the attitude that poor people are lazy bums who don't work because it's easier to just live off of government welfare or charity than to support themselves. It's the attitude that they are in that position because of their own carelessness, lack of self-discipline, and poor money management.

I don't think this opinion is held by a lot of the people, but the idea is spreading and becoming more prevalent, and I find it very disturbing. While I do believe in the importance of hard work, I also believe in the importance of having charity for the poor and needy, as well as the importance of being careful with our judgment and recognizing that we do not know what God knows about a person. The scriptures make it very clear that Christ loves the poor and the needy and that we cannot be saved if we do not love and help them.

Ruby K. Payne wrote a book called A Framework for Understanding Poverty that I would highly recommend to those who wish to understand poverty. I read it a couple of years ago as part of an education class, and it changed my view of what poverty is. One of the main ideas is that poverty is not so much a lack of money, but rather a lack of resources. Here are the resources she is referring to (quoting from page 16 of the book):

1. Financial--Having the money to purchase goods and services.
2. Emotional--Being able to choose and control emotional responses, particularly to negative situations, without engaging in self-destructive behavior. This is an internal resource and shows itself through stamina, perseverance, and choices.
3. Mental--Having the mental abilities and acquired skills (reading, writing, computing) to deal with daily life.
4. Spiritual--Believing in divine purpose and guidance.
5. Physical--having physical health and mobility.
6. Support Systems--Having friends, family, and backup resources available to access in times of need. These are external resources.
7. Relationships/Role Models--Having frequent access to adult(s) who are appropriate, who are nurturing to the child, and who do not engage in self-destructive behavior.
8. Knowledge of Hidden Rules--Knowing the unspoken cues and habits of a group. (i.e. The culture of the lower class is different from the middle class and the upper class, and if a person wants to move from the lower class to the middle class they have to learn to act like other people in the middle class.)

Most of the people in poverty are not just doing without money, but are also doing without some of those other resources. A person who has those other resources but doesn't have much money has a good chance of getting out of poverty if he works hard, but people who are doing without those resources have a much more difficult time getting out of poverty and staying out of poverty. If you can't read or do simple math, your job opportunities are very limited. If you lose your job and your house and you don't have any family or friends to help you out until you can support yourself again, there aren't a lot of places you can turn. A person with emotional and mental handicaps and no support system would have a very hard time finding and keeping a decent job to support himself.

Many of these problems are not immediately apparent if you don't know the person very well. I used to see the homeless people sitting by the stop lights with signs asking for money and food and think, "That person looks perfectly capable of getting a job--why doesn't she use this time to go apply instead of just sitting on a dirty bucket begging for money?" Then my sister pointed out to me that a good portion of homeless people are schizophrenic. Things like that can make it really hard to have a successful job interview, and even after a successful job interview it could be hard to do well in a job.

There is a lot in the culture of the lower class that makes it difficult for them to dig themselves out of it. Payne said that one of the things is a tendency to think in the present without planning for the future. As an example, if I had an extra $100 at the end of the month, for me it would be perfectly natural to just leave it in the bank to save for some time in the future when I need it. But a person who hasn't been taught to think that way might use the money to go get drunk or buy a new TV, and then get mad a couple months later when the car needs a new radiator and there's no money to pay for it. For some people, the concept of saving money has never occurred to them--let alone the concept of saving up and working hard to go to college in order to be able to get a good job. For a person who doesn't think much beyond the present, the idea of going to school or saving up or working hard in order to get a promotion or a pay raise doesn't occur to them. So to overcome poverty, it's not just that the person has to work hard, the person has to overcome years of habits and learn new behaviors and thought processes that will make him more successful. The person has to learn to think differently. That's an even more difficult hurdle to jump than the financial struggles.

There are a couple of implications from all this. One is that if we want to help the poor and the needy, we need to recognize that it's not enough to just throw them money and food. Yes, that helps, but if we want to help them come out of poverty permanently, they need help to overcome habits and thought processes that are keeping them down. They may also need help to deal with mental, emotional, and physical challenges that are holding them down. And, importantly, they need loyal and understanding long-term friends to support, encourage, and guide them. Without those other resources, they can't become self-reliant. The church has some great welfare programs that help people in these ways.

Another implication is that we need to be very careful about being judgmental of the poor and the needy. We do not know what they are going through. Many of the poor and the needy are in that position because they have challenges that are preventing them from getting out of it, through no fault of their own. God understands, and He knows which ones have righteous desires, even if we can't tell. And for that reason, we must treat the poor and the needy like children of God, like brothers and sisters, because that's who they are.

Heidi inchworm

Heidi is somewhat mobile now and knows how to reach for things and hold them. Guess what that means! The frustrating phase where she wants to play and get to things but it takes so much effort to get to that one thing that she wants! The phase where she wants to be held but she wants to play on the floor but the floor is boring because she's already licked all of those toys! The phase where she wants so badly to lick the foot bars on the chairs but she can't quite get her head high enough to reach them! The phase where paper is the most glorious thing to have in her mouth but Mom always takes it away just as it's starting to get mushy enough to swallow! The result is a lot of frustrated crying. Don't get me wrong, I'm so excited that she is learning so much, and it's fun to see all the things she can do, but I had forgotten how hard this stage is for babies.

We've also sort of been giving her rice cereal and some other foods for a few weeks now. For her it's more of a social need than a caloric need. She just wants to be sitting at the table doing what we do. So she doesn't eat a lot of solid food yet, just enough that she feels involved. I think it might be helping with her food retention problem too (she's a spit-up-er). She's so funny when she eats because sometimes she will say, "Bleh. Bleh. Bleh." to get the food to the back of her mouth to swallow.

Here's a video of Heidi doing her inchworm crawl. Pretty impressive, huh?

December pictures

Here is our decorated "Christmas tree." The one we didn't bother to get because Kevin would just knock it down or drink the water or something.

The next two are some pictures from when Ryan's parents were here. For some reason we didn't get a lot of pictures. There's a picture of Kevin at Duke chapel here on James' blog, though.

Kevin looking at the snakes at
the Natural History Museum.

 

Ryan and Kevin

Angels Singing of Christ's Birth

This year I have been thinking a lot about the angels that came to the shepherds to declare the wonderful news of Christ's birth. We sang a beautiful arrangement of Hark the Herald Angels Sing this year in our Christmas program, and it gave me a sense of the way the angels must have felt as they sang to express their joy that the Savior was born and that he had come to save us all. It must have been a glorious and exciting time! I am so grateful that Christ came and saved us from our sins and from death. I am grateful for the hope and peace He has brought to my life over and over again.

Here are a couple of videos of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. I think these songs do a good job of capturing the joy and excitement that I have felt this year for Christ's birth and life.

Before the Marvel of This Night

Here are the lyrics to one of the pieces we sang in the Christmas program this year:

Before the Marvel of This Night

Before the marvel of this night, adoring, fold your wings and bow,
Then tear the sky apart with light, and with your news the world endow.
Proclaim the birth of Christ and peace, that fear and death and sorrow cease:
Sing peace, sing peace, sing gift of peace, sing peace, sing gift of peace!

Awake the sleeping world with song, this is the day the Lord has made.
Assemble here, celestial throng, in royal splendor come arrayed.
Give earth a glimpse of heav’nly bliss, a teasing taste of what they miss:
Sing bliss, sing bliss, sing endless bliss, sing bliss, sing endless bliss!

The love that we have always known, our constant joy and endless light,
Now to the loveless world be shown, now break upon its deathly night.
Into one song compress the love that rules our universe above:
Sing love, sing love, sing god is love, sing love, sing God is love!

visit from Ryan's parents

(Read this one--the other one wasn't finished yet.)

Last Sunday Ryan's parents came to visit us. They stayed until Thursday morning.

On Monday I did homework in the morning, and then we went and looked at the Duke gardens and walked around Duke campus. Ryan's dad took a lot of pictures. Kevin liked seeing the fish, the geese, the turtle, and the blue Heron. We enjoyed looking around the Duke chapel. There was someone in there practicing The Messiah  on the organ, and I just loved it. The organ had a really beautiful sound. Kevin really enjoyed it too. When we went back outside he kept running back inside and saying, "Song? Song?" There were a couple of students nearby who tossed their football around with Kevin for a while. One of them even told Kevin he should go vegan. (We are politely disregarding that advice, as milk is currently one of Kevin's few sources of protein.)

On Tuesday I had class in the morning and Ryan had to help administer a final all afternoon. The rest of us spent the afternoon at Kidzu, a children's museum. The favorite activity was definitely the Gravitron. (You can see a picture of it halfway down this page.) It had a magnetic wall to which you could attach various pipes to make a winding tunnel for balls to roll down. Kevin couldn't get enough of it.

On Wednesday we went to Raleigh and saw the Capitol and the war monuments all around it. Then we went to the Natural History museum. We saw dinosaurs, turtles, snakes, spiders, beetles, fish, crabs, and butterflies. Kevin's favorite exhibit? The escalators, of course. He just wanted to ride them the whole time. After the museum we went to Chick-fil-A and then drove home in a lot of traffic and even more rain. Ryan's parents babysat Heidi and Kevin so Ryan and I could go out for ice cream alone. We had such a nice time just sitting and talking after we finished our ice cream, and I realized we really need to go on dates alone more often.

Ryan's parents left early Thursday morning. It was so nice to have family here to visit! Kevin loved his grandma and grandpa.

On Saturday evening Ryan and I got a babysitter and went to a party held by one of Ryan's advisers. That was the first time I've left Heidi with a babysitter that wasn't family, but she did great, even if I worried the whole time. We had a nice time and it was fun to get to know some of the other people Ryan works with.

Yesterday we had our ward Christmas program in Sacrament meeting. It went really well. We had some really beautiful pieces and the Spirit was very strong. Playing the piano and singing in the ward choir has really strengthened my testimony of Christ this Christmas. Kevin was coughing and had a runny nose, so I ended up bringing him and Heidi home after Sacrament meeting while Ryan stayed and taught in his Primary class.

We've had quite the series of illnesses this fall. I'm definitely getting tired of it. There was the cold I got at the beginning of the semester that spread to my eyes, then a few weeks later the kids had colds, then I got swollen lymph nodes, then Ryan and Kevin had sore throats and fevers, then Kevin had stomach cramps and threw up a couple of times (in the grocery store and the doctor's office--lovely!!), and now the kids have colds again. I am being very consistent about washing hands as soon as we get home, but somehow the germs are still sneaking in. Maybe we should just never leave the house until February? That being said, we have loved the extended fall weather this year! Up until this week it's been the perfect temperature. (Anybody want to move closer?)

ward Christmas party, 2011

Last Saturday (the one over a week ago) we had our ward Christmas party. The bishop wanted to make it really special and focused on service this year, and the whole ward got involved. There were men chopping wood in the morning and families singing carols at nursing homes throughout the day. We adopted several families for Christmas and worked together to get them some gifts.

I am on the Relief Society activities committee, and we were in charge of coordinating the food for the dinner in the evening. To minimize waste, we asked the Young Women to serve the food to people as they went through the line, because usually there are a lot of little kids who take too much food and throw a lot of it away. We asked people to prepare hams and green beans that the ward purchased, and also potato dishes and desserts. I volunteered to be in charge of keeping food warm and taking food out as the servers ran out, so things were pretty crazy for a while. There were a couple of women in the kitchen chopping up hams. One of them stayed after that to cut up all the desserts into small pieces (again, to minimize waste). I think the dinner went really well!

On the stage in the gym there were two Christmas trees with all the gifts people brought for the families we adopted for Christmas. It was an amazing sight, and I felt so blessed that our family had participated. I think God was very pleased with what our ward had done.

After the dinner we sang carols and had dessert. Our family ended up staying to help clean up all the food and dishes, which was actually a lot of work! The kids were good sports about it.

I enjoy hearing the conversations Kevin has with himself. For example: Kevin likes to eat bites of bread dough. One day I had just started some bread mixing in the bread maker, and he stood up on a chair to look in. Then he said to himself, "A-bite? No, a-mix." (Can I have a bite? No, it's still mixing.)

Since I decided to give up sweets except on the weekends, I've started making fruit smoothies almost every day--they satisfy my cravings, and I don't have to feel guilty about it because fruit is great for you! Kevin has come to expect smoothies for lunch and will go get a bag of frozen peaches out if he sees me making his sandwich. He likes to push the buttons on the blender for me.

Lately Kevin blows my mind with the things he's saying. It's like a switch flipped in his brain and he figured out all sorts of things about speech. He will say words, then listen for us to repeat the word, and then he will say the word again trying to make it sound more like the way we said it. A few days ago he was asking for some applesauce by saying, "Saw? Saw?" and then when I said "Applesauce" he said, "Applesauce" back to me quite clearly, and he has continued to pronounce it correctly. He's figured out how to say his own name, and he can count in the right order from one to nine. In the past week or so he has started to copy things that we say, which he hasn't really done before. And he's comprehending more things. Recently we went to the post office, and before we walked in I told him he needed to stay next to me, and he did stay next to me the entire time. Then we went to get some things at Target, and after I thought I had everything, I said out loud, "Let's see, did we get everything?" And Kevin responded with, "No. Milk." I was pretty impressed. I'm just not used to him participating in conversations with me. It's fun to see him starting to have conversations with other kids or with Heidi.

Christmas goals, 2011

This will be our fourth Christmas as a family, and also our fourth Christmas away from home. I'm trying to be better about planning this year than I have been in the past. Last year I still had lots to do a few days before Christmas, and then Kevin got croup and we were just happy the house got clean before Christmas! Here are some of the things I want to do this year:

• Tell the kids a story about the Savior every day using the Gospel Art Book (a tradition we started last year).
• Act out the nativity with a group (I wanted to this last year, but I didn't plan it soon enough, and like I said, Kevin got croup)
• Make a cheeseball
• Have a family testimony meeting--either on Christmas Eve or before opening presents (a new tradition I want to start).
• Finish buying Christmas presents.
• Make stockings for Ryan, Kevin, and Heidi (also a project that didn't work out last year).
• Make a headband for Heidi out of one of my old shirts (a Shopko purchase that fell apart after two washes).

We probably won't get a Christmas tree this year. I love Christmas trees, but I just don't think I can handle the stress of constantly keeping Kevin from messing with the ornaments and trying to knock it over. To decorate, I've set up the nativity sets, put out my porcelain dolls, and set a lot of the Christmas ornaments on my wall shelves.