Parentheticals

We had lots of warm weather this week. The kids have been loving being outside for long periods. Inside, though, they have been argumentative and grumpy. It got so bad that when they finally started playing nicely together on Thursday, we canceled everything we had planned and just let them play as a reward. But we eventually decided that everyone needs more sleep in order for things to go well, so we're overhauling our bedtime routine. We're going to try to put each child to bed separately, so bedtime will take at least four times as long as it does now. If it means that everyone gets enough sleep to be reasonable during the day, it will be worth it. The kids thought this was an excellent week because we saw the Dalyais every day except Sunday. Monday they came to our house for a Carnival party; Tuesday we all went to nature group; Wednesday we have the Dalyais' nature group and Thursday is ballet taught by one of the older Dalyai girls; Friday Faith Dalyai had a birthda...

Today when we were walking to church, Timmy came up with a new retirement plan for us: Mike  would become the president of the US for two years, and then retire from it (since we told him that after someone becomes the president they keep paying them for the rest of their life, and so after being president for four years you could retire, and he decided that since we are "half way" to retirement, I only would have to be president for two years.) So, if you haven't voted in the primaries yet. Mike for president. This week we realized that no-one in the family has been sick for  3 weeks and one day. This is quite surprising, since ordinarily during winter we get sick more often than that. This week has also been unseasonably warm. It has been nice after that snowstorm. The kids have not whined at play group much at all. We even skipped going to the library (gasp) to play outside more. (The last three pictures were taken by Rea.) Rea and Sara got up at 5:00 am t...

Most of this blog post was dictated by the kids. See if you can guess which parts: On Monday and Tuesday there was a lot of snow here in Utah. It snowed all night, and when we woke up we had 10+ inches. It continued to snow until we had about 16 inches. We had a lot of fun in the snow, and it is still around a bit. On Monday we played outside in the snow in the yard. Shoveling the driveway took hours! We made Samoan cocoa afterward. Tuesday we went to nature group in the snow, which was fun. We found big icicles (as tall as Gideon!) and played in the snow. Gideon and Elizabeth were whiny, but the other kids had fun. Wednesday we went sledding at the Dalyai's nature group and it was very fun. There was a sled run named Potato Burglars' Run, which was fast and very fun and a little scary. Sara went down it twice even though she didn't like it. On Friday at nature group, Timmy and Sara sledded in Mommy's big sled and it was very fast. Mom bought this new s...

Rea's favorite thing this week was going to the Dalyais' nature group on Wednesday. There was water in the normally-dry streambed, and the kids had a great time playing with it and collecting beautiful rocks. They started to build a boat. They're looking forward to continuing the boat next week. Sara's favorite thing about this week was her Carnival party on Thursday. She wanted a ballet themed party, but she also wanted worms in dirt as her treat. We ended up not doing much with the theme. We had the Nutcracker music playing and some of the kids dressed up and danced. The worms in dirt became dancing gummy bears in dirt. She invited our best friends the Dalyais and our new best friends the Birds. The kids loved playing together and the moms had a great conversation. We hope this group will continue getting together after Carnival. Timmy's favorite thing this week was playing LEGO. He made a LEGO Ewok and an Ewok forest for it to live in. He even found a spear f...