missing out

I absolutely HATE missing out on things: friend get-togethers, family dinners, even free lunch and CE credit for Dental Hygiene! This is surely at least one of the reasons I get teased in my family about my socialiality (is that a word meaning: a need for social gatherings?), and why my brother and sister are convinced I am Cortney Cox in Friends and in Cougar Town.

That said, I have lately been obsessing over the fact that Sidney will likely be my last child and I can't stand the thought that I am missing out on time I could be better savoring my kids' childhood. Now that may seem dramatic, but a church lesson on "Enjoying the Journey", really got me thinking that this is the only time my kids are going to be kids. I mean I know these years are formative, but when I am focused on folding a pile of laundry right out of the dryer so the wrinkles wont set in and make me add more clothes to my ironing pile, I truly don't enjoy the time I have to take to clean up lotion (literally) all over my Sidney's hair (which if I were a good mom, I would make a whole blog entry about Sidney's first mischief like I did for Jane).

Nor do I normally stop scrubbing the dried on Apple Jacks that Sidney spilled the night before (yes they had cold cereal for dinner while Ben and I went out to Ruby River with friends) to take a picture of Jane's crazy black eye before it fades.

I am determined to turn over a new leaf! I am going to blog about my kids, play with them more, and make our Family nights a bigger priority once again, because I cannot stand missing out on this part of their lives!

Some stupid things I am now going to blog about:

1. Jane's constant need for food. "Mom, I'm so so so hungry!" With a very serious look on her face, "All I have had today is breakfast, a snack, lunch (which she called dinner) and dessert!" It's hard as I was just sitting down to write this blog, not to laugh. She is so unknowingly cute with her yellowing bruised eye and raised eyebrows to show the severity of her hunger.

Also, her fetish with dressing up to go to bed. Crowns, fluffy hair bows, layered matching clothes along with, of course, pajamas!

2. Sidney's potty trips and constant singing. She now wants to go potty in every store and neighbors house, whenever anyone else needs to go, or just when she is bored! She is extremely funny about doing everything herself! If I forget this, she has to undo then redo everything herself, when she is in a bad mood, she cries and gets very red in the face and tattles on me to Ben or whomever will listen, "Dad, mommy did it!" or "Daddy, mommy said no!"

3. Alex's creative Harry Potter playing at recess. No sports for him right now, no no!

Ben asked him what he has been playing at recess, and he shrugged his shoulders and said, "Harry Potter".

"Like reading the book at recess?" Ben asked alarmed.

"No, we play Harry Potter."

"How?" was all Ben could ask.

"We all get an un-sharpened pencil and run around the playground putting spells on each other."

"WHAT?!" Ben turns to me like I am going to explain more, but I suddenly remember when Alex was playing with Jane and Sidney, running around the family room yelling, "Stupify!" and then pushed Jane over when she didn't respond appropriately to the spell.

4. Finally, Ashlyn's funny stories of chasing boys at recess, and how upset she was when I said something to Ben about how she liked a boy in her class. I truly didn't think that was the bit of information she would be embarrassed about! I didn't say his name or use a teasing voice or anything, but when she stomped out of the room crying, I knew I was in BIG trouble!!!

(I will try and refrain from writing about our 12 year anniversary and how we spend most of the time in a very crowded Texas Roadhouse, finally giving up, we ate at Fuddruckers! 12 years! Really Fuddruckers!)

I am also going to write about the time Jane and I spend playing memory on the friend.lds.org website, and the time I spend with Sidney playing Polly Pockets and making up songs for everything we do: brushing her teeth, going to the bathroom, getting dressed, making her bed...everything! (Most songs have the words, "doodily doo" in them.) I will write about how fun Alex is with the girls, how well he plays made up games with his sisters and how he and Ashlyn are real-life best friends (which is a serious treat!) I will be writing about Ashlyn's want to do everything: student council, swim team, dance, piano, singing, gymnastics, sports.... And how I LOVE doing things with her. Last week we went shopping together with her cousin and an aunt. She and her cousin loved trying on clothes and just driving in the car with us! They said over and over, "This is so much fun! This is the best day ever!"

These are the important things in my life and I am committed more than ever to not miss out on anything they do!

Alex's birthday was a pretty big one! Not only did he get to have a birthday party with his friends, but he also got to get baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints the next month!

For his party, we went ice skating at The Peaks arena in Provo with a few of his closest friends! I was very impressed that it didn't take any of the kids very long to get the hang of things and start zooming around the rink and skate like champs!

Sidney and I chose to sit it out and keep an eye out for everyone! She especially enjoyed the stairs for some reason!
We had cupcakes and presents at the skating rink, and after a few hours, everyone was done getting cold and bruised from the ice!

A few weeks later, we had Alex's baptism. It just worked out that two of his friends have birthdays about the same time as his, and were baptized on the same day!

Both sets of Grandparents came and spent time with Alex on his special day!

At the end of the night, while we were all done eating, we sat around and talked. Sidney and her cousin Avery were entertaining us with some dancing!

Catch Up

When I try to play catch up, its never very pretty! Here are some special moments I wanted to still have documented:

First Annual Ugly Sweater Neighborhood Christmas Party!

Family Christmas time. We had a fun/funny night re-enacting the Baby Jesus' birth and later opening pajamas.

Aunt Cara had a little fun teasing Sidney!

December. We went sledding with friends when we stayed overnight in their cabin!

Halloween. This year, we went trick or treating at Ben's sister's house with cousins. I didn't get pictures of the older kids there, because they were literally running from house to house (there was even a house that gave out 1 dozen Krispy Kreme doughnuts to each kid).

Jane is the orange and black witch, Sidney is a ladybug, Alex is Harry Potter (ever since he got his glasses he has been talking about his costume), and Ashlyn is Hermione.
My camera was having problems at the school, so the pictures are pretty strange looking.

October Las Vegas Ragnar Relay.

Ben and I ran on the same team, but were in different vans (boys van/ girls van). We were the White Tigers of Siegfried and Roy (rar)!
The boys got shirts. They have a great story about how they went to Walmart wishing they'd get lucky enought to find some "sweet" tiger shirts. They were only a few minutes late to start running! No big thing for the White Tigers, we still made it in at 28 hours! That is a bit of a joke for competitive runners, but we were proud we finished. Three of us girls each took an extra leg since we had a last-minute drop out. So instead of stopping at the exchange point, we just kept running. Again, we are glad we finished!

Big deal

I am officially done with my hiatus from blogging!!!
Now, the smart thing to do after not blogging for SEVEN MONTHS would be to start where I am and move forward.
Unfortunately, I feel that after pouring my whole heart and soul into my last post, it would be a major let down to myself to move on in January and ignore this monumental (for me) entry. I am ready to update my life now, but I cannot ignore this post and had to put it in order (one of the many reasons I waited so long to blog)

So, after training and running my first 10k, feeling like a champ, I ran The Wasatch Back Ragnar Relay in June, 2009. We had a team made up of friends in our area, we each picked the "leg" we wanted back in January, just as I had started running on the treadmill and killing myself to run faster than 11 minute miles. I chose then to be runner 12, which had a 3.1 mile "very hard" 1st run, then a 5.2 mile "hard" 2nd run, and ended with a 5.1mile "easy". * When Ben ran this race the year before I did comment on the genius categorizing. Honestly,"easy" was a loosely used term.

The night before I ended up trading with another team member, so I was runner 11, running 3.8 "very hard", 7.3 "hard" and 7.3 "very hard." This is me with Jenn, Michelle, and Ceri (team members) right before I was to run my first leg. I started the run up to Snow Basin, the mountain looked daunting, but whether I was running 11 or 12, that run was going to be beastly! Embarrassing how white and weak I look, but I was running up a canyon, and I still feel like a champion for it! This is why I posted my last post about how I'd like to look when I run...
This is most of our team after our first run (at the top of Snow Basin) Ben and I at the top of Snow Basin. Ben ran as part of the team, "2 fats, 10 furious."

I am running my last leg. The snow was pelting down on my face, but at this point I felt fantastic, because the 30ish hour relay was almost done! About 2.0 miles from my finishing point, my left knee started to really hurt. More than my IT band injuries...later found it to be due to my patela tracking wrong and causing harm to the joint. All for the run. The finish line! The race was actually cancelled due to the awful storm. It was so rainy and windy, all the festivities were closed down. We were one of the last teams they let finish. It was a great, cold, wet, moment! I just want to give a shout out for the Mom Jeans ladies! We pushed, endured, and triumphed!

One treat: our team got an award (there are only about 6 awards given, out of 650ish teams). We got props for Best Costume! We all wore above-belly-button-waisted jeans and shirts that said, No More Mom Jeans.

If you are not familiar with "mom jeans" check out this SNL clip that gave us our idea! Just wish we would have worn applique vests as well!