I think I usually post things that the kids do.  So today I am writing some things that I am doing.  

First thing is, I’m going to the temple every week!  I am really excited about this.  Darryl said he would watch the kids for me to go early on Saturday mornings.  I only went twice and then our temple has been closed for a couple weeks.  So I’m not exactly in the swing of it yet.  But I am looking forward to it.  From past experience, I know it makes a big difference for me.

Second.  I am usually riled up about all the things I did not do during the day, how little I accomplish, etc.  So at the beginning of the year I decided to write down the things I did do that day.  Try to focus more on the positive.  Wow, it only took a few days of writing it down to feel a difference.  I don’t even write them down anymore, I can recognize the things I did.  Usually. 

Third.  I have written in my journal everyday (except one) since January 4.  I have wanted to for, like, a year.  So I decided to not look at Facebook until I had typed a journal entry.  I wasn’t sure if it would work, but it sure did!  I couldn’t consistently come up with a time to do it.  But I knew I looked at Facebook just about everyday.  So that is when I write – when I am about to look at Facebook.  Sometimes morning, sometimes afternoon, sometimes evening.  It is a great reminder!  And hopefully I have spent a little less time on Facebook, too.

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It has been one day shy of a month since I blogged anything.  I kept waiting for something worthy of blogging to happen.  And it did!  Two things, in fact.  Yesterday my dear Darryl informed me it was my lucky day!  I was 33 years, 3 months, and 3 days old, on March 3rd (3/3)!!!  I was so excited!  That is just the type of thing I would keep track of and would make me smile.  He knows me well.

The other thing is that on Tuesday we had our bedroom furniture delivered!  Oh, the joy.  We have never had bedroom furniture.  When we first got married we had a chest of drawers from my childhood, a shelf from a roommate, and a rolling nightstand.  All of those disappeared when we returned from Ukraine.  So for the past 9  months we have been living out of suitcases and boxes.  Literally.  I forgot to take a picture of it, but my brother Josh who was here recently can attest.  Our clothes were in actual suitcases and that is where they were kept.  And a few boxes.  And of course the closet, as much as we could cram in to it.

But now we have a whole matching set of bedroom furniture, including 15 drawers and 5 secret drawers.  It is glorious indeed.  Definitely worthy of a blog post.  

And this little guy.  There isn’t much he can’t reach now, with pushing chairs and climbing and such. 

 

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Kathryn was invited to a birthday party at the Seattle Children’s Museum last August.  We decided to take the whole family and ended up buying a membership.  Partly because getting in once as a family was almost half the cost of the membership!  After that, though, I was nervous to take all three kids by myself so we didn’t go for awhile.  That seems silly now!  I take three kids everywhere!  Anyway, I decided to make a goal to go at least once a month, and we have had so much fun.  With Amelia not taking naps, we can bring lunch and stay into the afternoon when it is less crowded.  Daniel falls asleep in the stroller.

So last week we went, for January.  I loved watching each one have so much fun in different areas.  Daniel really enjoyed it, being really mobile now and excited about everything.

Amelia doing the obstacle course.  In the afternoon it wasn’t crowded, so she could stay in as long as she wanted.  Here she is throwing herself over the “obstacle”.  Also going down a slide in another area.

Daniel’s favorite part was playing in the water.  He got soaking wet.

 

Kathryn loved the art room, of course.

  

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Kathryn has apparently been observing a lot from Darryl.  Last week she did some puzzles, then asked me to take a picture:

     Then she asked for one with her in it:

Then she said we needed more light, and so we opened the blinds:

Then she wanted a picture of her holding each puzzle:

We may have another photographer in the family.  Or maybe a model.

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Here are some things we’ve been up to lately.

Amelia stopped taking naps a couple months ago.  This is a big adjustment for me, because Kathryn is good with a quiet time and entertaining herself with art or computer games.  Amelia is not.  She doesn’t know the meaning of quiet unless she is putting her stuffed animals to sleep, which never happens during “quiet time”.  But every few days she gets so tired, she falls asleep for a nap to catch up.  Here she is in the pack-n-play. 

 

Kathryn loves drawing and cutting.  She will often draw something, then cut it out to play with.  We have a book of “masks” – the pages have holes for your eyes so you can put it up to your face as a mask.  One day Kathryn drew the monkey face from the book, then cut it out and made it into a mask.  Then she made little ones for her babies.

The girls have been catching butterflies a lot lately.  The colander is the butterfly net and magnets are the butterflies.  Oh yeah, and Amelia rotates between being Cinderella, Super Girl, and Diego.

Three kids in a box.  Sounds like something from a Dr. Seuss book.

And Kathryn came up with a pilgrim costume.  I think it looks great!

 

And not to forget Daniel.  He is just as cute and busy as ever.  Since his birthday he loves books, but he loves the camera more.  So I can never get a good picture of him with a book.  Also we recently took him to an allergist who declared that he does not have food allergies.  Just eczema.  Hallelujah!  We were suspecting a gluten allergy, and all the gluten free things I tried to make (bread and pizza crust) were gross and complicated.

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What can I say?  Amelia is so Amelia.  She just has such a different personality from Kathryn.  She is so adorable, but sometimes we just don’t know what to do with her.  She says great prayers and often sings her night personal prayer.  Sometimes I don’t think she can sit still or even just use a quiet voice.  But then she plays with Little People or nativity sets for a solid hour.  Anyway, she started a gymnastics class today.  Gymnastics seems to fit her personality.  Plus when we were in Canada last summer a gymnastics coach (friend of a friend who happened to be at dinner with us) said she has something they look for in a future gymnast.  Namely:  lack of fear.  She was jumping off a couch as far as she could and she was getting pretty far.

Anyway, here are a couple pictures from her class today.  Sorry about the blurry one – I was juggling Daniel at the time and Amelia was on the move.

 

 

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We started off the day frosting the cake.  I had two little helpers.

Then Grandma and Grandpa wished Daniel happy birthday on the webcam.

 

Soon it was on to the presents.

Daniel absolutely loved this book.  Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!  He made his excited noise, and continues to do so.  Whenever he sees the book he takes it to me (or Darryl) and wants to look at all the pages.  

 

 

We did the cake after lunch. 

   

It seems Daniel has a sensitivity to gluten.  So I tried to make a cake with rice flour.  I didn’t like the result, but Daniel did!

 

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I didn’t capture the best moment of Daniel.  When he gets excited he says something like, “whoo, whoo!”.  If you know Daniel, you know what I’m talking about.  It is soooo cute!  He was pretty excited about the blocks.

 

I asked the girls to make their “Grinch” faces.

Skating pictures.

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We flew on Christmas Day (afternoon) to California to visit Grandma and Grandpa and others.  It was such a great trip.  I have to say leaving on Christmas was the way to go.  We still did our own family things for Christmas Eve and Christmas morning, but we still got to do a lot of Christmas things with everyone else on the trip.

One thing the kids loved was Grandma and Grandpa’s backyard.  My mom planned for that when we moved into that house 16 years ago.  Thanks, mom!  On my other camera are some pictures of the girls learning to skate.  Neither had done it before and both did very well.

Another bonus was my grandpa was also visiting.  He said he enjoyed all the noise and commotion of the kids.  I believed it.

Darryl took some pictures of my sister’s family.  I like this one with Hannah and baby David.

 

And a highlight was playing with cousins.  Kathryn and Amelia love their cousin Hannah and you can see by the pictures that they had a great time together. 

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A brief recap of some Christmas presents.  I got a camera!  Its quite funny, because now I have really noticed how great the pictures turn out with Darryl’s camera.  Now if I could just figure out how to get them on the computer I would share some.  I think Darryl said we need a new/different cord for that.

I was clever enough to save several toys that we had packed up when we moved to Kyiv.  So that made for Daniel’s Christmas (and most of his birthday coming up), and most of Amelia’s Christmas.  And thanks to DI (second hand shop), both girls got a Little People house.  The girls had so much fun on Christmas morning.  Amelia didn’t want to stop playing with the Little People house, and Kathryn told Grandma that she got a half full stocking.  At least she seemed excited about it.

  

Kathryn got a doctor kit.  This was a spontaneous hug, she was just so excited about it!  We had one in Kyiv and she played with it just about everyday.  But it was so cheaply made and we just couldn’t take everything with us, so the doctor kit didn’t make it to Seattle.  She has asked about getting one for most of those 6 months.  She also got a new doll;  her old one wanted to be a kitty one day so Kathryn drew whiskers on the doll’s face.  But when the doll didn’t want to be a kitty, the pen wouldn’t come off.

Amelia had a favorite pair of blue socks that she wore out.  So she has been hoping for blue socks for a few weeks.  And she got what she calls a giant bear. 

Daniel was pretty much everywhere, but wouldn’t sit still for a picture.  He wasn’t interested in opening presents, we actually didn’t open most of his until we got home from our trip on New Year’s Eve!  But he did get some cars, puzzle, and a stacking toy.

Darryl got a new router, that isn’t really exciting enough for a picture.

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We had a nice Christmas Eve program, except when I almost lost it because Amelia dropped a chime on her toe and needed a bandaid, but I couldn’t find any because they always want bandaids when they don’t really need them, Daniel was running everywhere and eating chimes and sticks, and Kathryn was so excited she couldn’t really sit still for anything. 

Luckily we calmed down enough for this:

 

 

We also had fun decorating these gingerbread cookies.  Notice the one with a camera in his hand, and the hippie one, both courtesy of Darryl.

 

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Kathryn and Amelia sang in Church this past Sunday along with some other little girls.  It sure was cute!  They have matching Christmas dresses but of course chose to wear something else.  Since Amelia’s choice was also Christmas-y and the dresses were warm, I decided not to fight it.

 

Daniel doesn’t have a choice:  he only has one Sunday outfit.  Life sure must be easy as a boy…

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Donner and Blitzen are staying at a nursery near our home.  So yesterday we made a visit.  There was also a camel there (sorry Grandma, no pictures of him).  And a Christmas train.  But the girls’ favorite part was a little play house.  They are definitely girls.

 

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Santa Claus visited our church Christmas party last Saturday.  Kathryn was so excited the whole day and when she saw him she was about to burst.  But once she got on his lap she was a little nervous.  This is the first time she has even had the chance to see Santa.  What with being out of the country and not really worrying about it before that.  Kathryn thought the whole day about what she would ask Santa for, but in the end she couldn’t think of anything!  I think that’s part of why she was nervous, she didn’t know what to say to him!  Interesting that she asks me all the time for different toys and articles of clothing.

Amelia was too scared to go see Santa, but I did take Daniel up there.  He just stared at Santa, and it was really cute!

 

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Here are a few things we’ve done this week:

Some people came over to practice for a musical number.  It is one of those times when I get to play with exceptional musicians.  Wow.  Kathryn especially enjoyed the music, and stood on a chair pretending to play the violin while we were playing.

While Kathryn was in the bath, Daniel sleeping, and Amelia playing with Kathryn but not in the bathtub, I quickly started making cookie dough.  Unfortunately I noticed some drops of water coming through the ceiling .  I arrived to a flooded bathroom.  Soaking Amelia outside the tub.  They had poured most of the water out of the tub and there is almost an inch of water on the floor.  I sopped as much as I could with towels, running up and down the stairs a few times to check the ceiling.  When I called Darryl he said to drill some holes where the water was coming through.  So I did.  I think everything will be okay.  Good thing we didn’t paint the ceiling yet.

We decorated cookies. 

  

On Thursday I was spontaneous!  Our phone wasn’t working, so we missed the call that Joy School was cancelled.  So we all went out the door and drove there only to find out no preschool but we would do it Friday instead.  I decided to take everyone to the Children’s Museum.  We went straight there (we had left the house just after 9am) and didn’t get home until 5pm.   It was way less crowded than when we’ve been there before, so the girls and Daniel just played and played without waiting in lines or taking turns.  Just upstairs this whole month are Christmas concerts by school choirs and bands, etc.  So we went up there for awhile and the girls loved it.    Since it was a spontaneous trip, I didn’t bring the camera.  But in the future that won’t be a problem.  Santa is getting me my own very small and portable camera!

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We love the Seattle Christmas tradition of the Annual Great Figgy Pudding Street Corner Caroling Competition.  Of course it got really cold this week, and poured rain a couple hours before it started, but luckily it stopped raining and we bundled up to attend.

The event is held downtown, near my old office.  There were 40 caroling groups, singing along the street for about 3 blocks.  You just walk around and stop and listen.  Then there is judging and other activities.  We didn’t stay for that, since it was bedtime for the kids.  But we did enjoy some caroling.  Kathryn especially enjoyed it.  She just pushed her way to the front each time to watch.  It was so cute.  There was a high school choir that sang the Hallelujah Chorus beautifully.   I was so happy to see Kathryn loving it so much.  She has told me she would just love to sing in a choir sometime!  Daniel was a good boy, and Amelia got some time on both Mommy’s and Daddy’s shoulders.

 

A dog dressed up as a reindeer.

We thought these hats on a Vietnamese choir were clever. 

  

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 Maybe we are gluttons for punishment, but we tried again on Saturday.  I think we had more success overall.

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We tried to take a family picture last week.  What a joke!  I don’t know how everybody does it, but we could hardly get everyone to stay so they would actually be in the picture, let alone look at the camera or smile or stop putting their hands in their mouths.  I tried to have low expectations, but it was still rough.

 

 

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We had such a great Thanksgiving!  I was disappointed that we couldn’t be with family, and even the friends we invited weren’t able to come.  But our feast turned out so delicious, and we had a great day together as a family.

We had preschool at our house on Tuesday.  Here the kids are showing turkeys they made by threading toothpicks with marshmellows, raisins, and craisins, then sticking the toothpicks into an apple.

 

We also made pilgrim hats.  Kathryn wore hers most of the day and begged me to make her a pilgrim dress, too.

These are the lovely Thanksgiving/Birthday flowers I got from the Cold Lake Melanchuks!  I love them!

This is the picture of our table right before we ate.  One girl is hiding under the table cloth.   I asked everyone to mention something they were thankful forduring this year.  Darryl said our experience in Kyiv, especially the wonderful friends we had there.  I said Daniel!  Both of the girls were thankful for our feast. 

I am also thankful for a husband that loves to cook and is quite good at it!  We divided the cooking between us.  For dessert we each made a pie.  I made pumpkin and Darryl made chocolate pecan.  Kathryn had been saying the whole day she didn’t like pumpkin pie.  But we served her some and asked her to taste it.  She started eating it and when I asked her how it tasted, she put two thumbs up over her head!  Amelia and Daniel gobbled theirs up, too. 

Throughout the day Darryl was practicing for our family photo shoot today.

 

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