Good Medicine (an honest post)

I've been yelling a lot lately, mainly on nights when Ryan is at work late. It's the hardest time of day because the kids are hungry, I'm hungry, I'm ready for some adult conversation, I'm tired of being the referee, the house is trashed, and the kids are generally in the mood for playing with things I don't want them to have or else fighting.

On one such night this week, I stopped and said, "You know what, guys? Let's be quiet from now on instead of loud." And that was when things got silly. I yelled, "Is this quiet? IS THIS QUIET? IS THIS QUIET?" Hysterical giggles ensued. Then I said, "Is this loud? Is this loud? Is this loud?" while quieting down to a whisper. More hysterical giggles. It didn't take too long before the kids tried to join in the game and it really did get way too loud, but fortunately I got the idea to do faces instead of volumes. I would make an angry face and say, "Is this a nice face?" Then I would make a silly face and say, "Is this a nice face?" Then a sad face, and so on. The result was more giggles. It was amazing how the nasty feelings dissipated as soon as I started making it my goal to make them laugh. Laughter is good medicine.

Happy Halloween.

I hosted Heidi's playgroup the week of Halloween, so we made jack-o-lanterns. I cut out the pumpkins and the mouths and shapes, and then I put glue on sponges. The kids dipped the black pieces on the sponge and then glued them on the paper. Most of the kids needed a lot of help, but I heard later from the parents that the kids were apparently very proud of their creations. That evening Kevin saw what we had done and wanted to make his own. (I had actually gotten the idea from Kevin's preschool, so he knew what to do.) He probably made five jack-o-lanterns. This was the extent of our pumpkin carving.

(The last one is Heidi's.)

Kevin was the Cat in the Hat and Heidi was Thing 1. I made the hat using this tutorial and it turned out great. The bow is just red felt that I cut into the general shape and pinned on his shirt. Heidi's sign is the inside circle from the brim of Kevin's hat with "Thing 1" written with a Sharpie. It was enough work for me to get my sewing fix and feel like they had decent costumes, but it wasn't way too much work for me. I was initially planning to make a cat body and everything, but then a friend pointed out that really a black shirt and pants would work just fine because all you really need is the hat, so that made things much more manageable.

The kids had a lot of fun trick or treating in our apartment complex. We ended up going around with some friends from our ward (the Larsens) who were in the hall as we came out. This was the first year that Kevin really understood what was going on. Heidi got the idea pretty quickly. They were both really cute. Heidi did an adorable happy dance at one of the first doors because she was so excited.

We had a tri-ward Halloween party this year. I suspect that the young men and young women thought it would be fun to do Halloween games for the kids, but since the three wards are combined for youth activities, that meant all three wards got combined for the party. The games in the classrooms were pretty well done, and the trunk or treating actually wasn't too bad. There were just way too many people crammed into the gym for dinner.