Generally I would try to avoid travel on a Sunday.  I would prefer to keep the sabbath day in other ways.  We especially didn’t want to miss church, as our friend John Henry Jorgensen was giving a 5th Sunday talk to the youth that I wanted to sneak in and hear.  However, our current trip to California began early Sunday morning.  Darryl needed to be at work on Monday, and the early flight Monday was full, and there were no evening flights on Sunday to San Jose.  So I got up at 2:30 Sunday morning in order to get a shower and feed Amelia before the shuttle to the airport came at 3:25.  I was saying to Darryl the other day that I miss getting up early, but I didn’t mean that early.

Since we survived a road trip, I guess we needed to experiment with flight as well.  This is all in preparation for a 12 hour (give or take) flight to Kiev in the near future.  When we were checking in, our boarding passes gave us 3 random seats (we had a seat for Kathryn because I would already be holding Amelia and we figured Kathryn would want to climb between the 2 of us, and also KPMG was paying for it).  We had booked 3 seats together, of course, and we weren’t about to let Kathryn sit by herself on an airplane!  So we talked to the attendant at the gate and she (being a mother herself) was very helpful and switched things around so we could be together.  She even got an extra seat next to us so Amelia could sit there in her carseat, no extra charge.

Since we were travelling with young children, we got to pre-board.  When we found row 24, there were people already sitting there.  The flight attendant checked a few things and soon we were settled in.  Amelia was asleep in the carseat, and Kathryn was very tired and melow in her seat.  I was between them, and Darryl was across the aisle.  The only problem with pre-boarding is that you are sitting on the plane for an extra 20 minutes.  Before we took off, Kathryn decided to get whiney and climb around.  But when they are taking off, they want everyone seated with seatbelts on.  Kathryn would not sit in her seat, and since she is still under 2, I figured it would be okay to hold her in my lap.  But she was being quite loud.  Many of you know she has quite a soft voice when speaking, but that same voice becomes much louder when she wants to cry and whine.  I’m not sure what the problem was, but I know she was extremely tired (having been awakened at 3:15 that morning, and it was now 6 something).  It wasn’t really that big a deal, she calmed down after a few minutes and sat in her seat, and even fell asleep.  But Darryl and I looked at each other and wondered what we are getting ourselves into with a long flight to Kiev.

We all got some sleep in the flight, as well as cookies and cranberry juice.  Kathryn woke up towards the end and did her whiney-crying thing again after we landed and were taxiing.  Maybe her ears hurt.  She did have her “nap” (pacifier), but she seems to have sensitive ears.  Anyway, no major mishap, and Amelia slept the whole time. 

After getting luggage we took a shuttle to the rental car place, where we got a car and also a carseat for Kathryn.  By now it was about 9:30.  We had planned to go to a ward in San Jose that started at 9:45 but now we didn’t think we would make that one.  We still needed to get checked into our hotel and change into church clothes.  We figured we could find a ward that met later, even if it was a little further away from the hotel.

Because it was so early, however, there was no room available at the hotel until 2 pm.  At least Darryl was able to get some of the free breakfast food for us.  We still wanted to go to church (it was now 10am), so Darryl looked up on his handy-dandy hi-tech treo and found a ward 20 minutes away that started at 11.  Perfect.  We changed our clothes in the car, and also changed Kathryn’s diaper.  I became a pro at that during our road trip.

We found the church building and went inside to Sacrament Meeting.  We enjoyed going to church there, and the people were very welcoming, and wished we were moving into their ward.  It makes you feel good to be needed!  After Sacrment meeting I wasn’t sure if we could make it through the rest of church.  Kathryn was so active, and I wasn’t sure if she would go to nursery. 

She did!  Dolls and toys and the promise of a snack are strong motivation, I guess!  Off Darryl, Amelia, and I went to Sunday School.  What a treat!  There was a very good and very well prepared teacher.  We also enjoyed their 5th Sunday meeting (although I missed part to feed Amelia).  On the drive back to the hotel we were so glad we made the effort to go to church, and also to stay for all 3 hours.  It is not always easy when travelling, and also with little kids.  But Darryl and I agree that it is worth it.  We felt so good at church and afterwards, and even learned some things.  I think that is one way we can show our commitment to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ, and I know that we were blessed.

We got back to the hotel after 2pm, so our place was ready!  It is a nice little apartment – 2 bedrooms, a living room and a small kitchen.  It was nice to get settled in, and nice to have air conditioning. 

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So I got released as Primary President the Sunday before we left for Utah (two weeks ago).  I guess the title of this post is inaccurate, because I am leaving primary so I shouldn’t be inviting others to come with me to primary.  But I love that song, and I sing it to Kathryn a lot.  My good friend Erika Matson is the new primary president!  She and the new presidency will be fabulous.  The children are very lucky.

I am quite sad to leave primary.  I had just gotten the hang of it and wanted to do everything better this coming year.   Hopefully I will get another chance at the calling.  What I would really love is to be a primary teacher.  Then you can really focus on a small group of kids.  A primary teacher can have such a great influence on a child. 

I don’t know if I had much of an influence on any children, but they sure influenced me.  I will miss seeing their smiling faces, their comments, and especially their singing.  When I sit in front and the children are singing it almost always brings a tear to my eye.  I will miss having the kids know me.  Some called me “Sister Watermelanchuk”.  One girl gave me a big hug when I came back from being gone after having Amelia. 

One day we played “Follow the Leader” before talking about following Jesus Christ.  I had a couple of kids be the leader and we all followed.  One girl got up and stood very still and quiet, so we all did that.  Then she started singing “I am a Child of God”, so we did, too.  It was such a sweet moment. 

One girl in our primary is in a wheelchair, and has many problems.  She can’t really speak and doesn’t have control of very much movement.  But she loves music and often tries to sing while the other children are singing.  She was sick in the hospital for a couple of weeks last month.  I realized how much I loved each child when I couldn’t hold back tears as my counselor told the children about her being in the hospital, and that we were making a card for her.

I’ve written in a family email about Sharing Time before.  It was the scariest thing about primary when I was first called.  Now I will really miss it!  I loved how the children continually amazed me at how well they knew the gospel.  They gave profound and accurate answers to the questions I posed.  I noticed that I felt the Spirit more in Sharing Time when I was better prepared, and I learned new things as I studied the scripture stories I would share.  It didn’t happen every time, but I loved the times when I could tell the children were really interested in what I was saying to them.  Mom gave me some great advice when I was first called into primary – forget about the other adults in the room and just talk to the children.  I’m not saying that is easy, or that I always did that, but it is great advice!

I learned many things, not the least of which was about Priesthood leaders.  I was able to observe two bishoprics, and work with one member of each closely.  I now have a much more profound respect for members of the bishopric.  They are working so hard and have so many things to do, next time I think I will be a little more patient when callings for new primary teachers are not made as quickly as I would hope.

Lastly, I have re-discovered Sunday School and Relief Society the past two weeks!  What a wonderful thing to go to church and have two lessons given to me!  There is always a lot of learning when one is teaching and serving.  But I have really enjoyed learning from Sunday School and RS teachers the past two weeks.  Its nice to have something focused more to my stage in life.  I’m still looking forward to being in primary again someday.

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We arrived home from a wonderful vacation last night.  I always love coming back to our home.  Even though we saw many homes much larger than ours, and homes with nicer things than ours, I always love our home more after I’ve been away.  I guess because it is home.  I also realized how much I have acclimated to the climate in Seattle.  It was so hot!  Darryl just had to laugh when I complained about the heat, since usually I am asking for more heat in Seattle.  Now I recognize a lot better the beauty of a Seattle summer.

Anyway, we had a sort of whirlwind of a trip to Idaho and Utah, and had great visits with great people.  We started driving the afternoon of Friday, July 20th (after Darryl drove to Canada to pick up his passport, as explained in the previous post).  We got to Boise, ID about midnight, which was 1am Boise time.  Congratulations to Amelia who slept the entire time!  Kathryn was also a good traveler.  I packed her a little bag of things to play with.  Then I had a bunch more things with me in the front seat to pass to her along the way.  She loves stickers, so we brought a lot of those.  She peels off the stickers and sticks them onto her hand.  I think its a riot.  On the drive home, she got the idea of putting them on my hand, so here is a picture of each hand.

We stayed that first night in a hotel (thanks to Darryl’s Marriott points) and were on the road again Saturday morning, arriving in Rexburg for a late lunch.  We stayed with Darryl’s mission president and his wife, the Schwartzes.  One of their daughters and her 4 children were also there, which was a lot of fun for Kathryn.  4-year-old Emily took Kathryn around, and the big boys (Josh and Andrew, 7 and 10) were very good with Kathryn and also Amelia.  It was fun for me to get to know the Schwartzes better.  Their backyard had a trampoline, as well as a swingset with a slide.  Kathryn thought it was a park.  We went around Ricks (BYU Idaho) campus, which is under a lot of construction.  Of course we visited the bookstore, Kathryn stocked up the stroller with General Conference DVD’s.  She is very spiritual.  The new Rexburg temple is almost finished and beautiful.  It overlooks the campus from a hill.  We also visited with the Gordons, another family that has influenced Darryl. 

Tuesday morning we drove down to Utah, meeting our friend Sarah Johnson for lunch in Murray.  She recently moved there from Seattle, and it was great to see her again.  Then it was off to see John at BYU.  We had fun talking to him and having dinner at a yummy restaurant called Carrabas.  Well, Amelia didn’t have too great a time at the restaurant.  I had to feed her in the restroom and change her clothes out of a dirty diaper and hold her while I stood up trying to eat.

We stayed the night in Springville at the home of the daughter of Darryl’s mission president, Christine, and her husband Steve.  We enjoyed talking to them in the evening, but I was so tired and fell asleep so quickly, I didn’t realize that Darryl was checking my email.  He apparently tried to tell me about MaryAnn’s blog and ultrasound pictures, and about new baby Peter, but I was fast asleep. 

Wednesday morning we drove to Vovo’s place at the Coventry.  I loved seeing lots of familiar things at her apartment.  She had 2 balloons and a cookie for Kathryn.  I was so happy to visit with Vovo, I hadn’t seen her since our wedding.We didn’t stay there long, as we were all going to the Bangerters for lunch.  We got directions, but there are so many new houses right near the Bangerter’s house, that it took 2 tries to find it.  I’m not sure I would have even recognized Michael and Daniel.  They are so tall and old!  Wow.  It was great fun to catch up.  We loved hearing about the pioneer trek they had just finished.  Howard was the trail master (Lissa was the trail master’s wife).  Ashley made a delicious lunch of pasta with shrimp and vegetables. 

That evening we had dinner with Christine and Steve, and a friend from Russia, Roma.  Darryl knew him in Russia and he is now at BYU doing a PhD in Chemistry.  John had told us that chemistry is physics that smells bad.  Kathryn had fun playing in Christine and Steve’s sandbox outside and pointing out the ants and bees and “e-spiders”.  After dinner we went to visit Holly and Wells Holmes.  Holly is the Gordon’s daughter (if you remember one of the people we visited in Rexburg), and a good friend of Darryl’s.  I had met her before, but neither of us knew her husband Wells.  It was really fun to see them and their new home.

Thursday we finally made it to BYU campus.  It was so much fun walking around!  I always wanted to walk around BYU with my husband and I finally did!  We saw the new Joseph F. Smith building.  It was so huge and beautiful!  Wow.  We tried to go into the new Hinckley Alumni building (since we are alumni), but it was closed – they are still finishing things inside.  It was very beautiful, though.  We had a great time, and of course stopped by the Tanner building, as well.  We shopped in the bookstore and found a good Russian dictionary for both of us, and a phrasebook for me.  It is the same kind that I used in China and was very helpful.  I was so excited I started reading it in the car on the way home. 

After BYU, we drove to Salt Lake to meet our friend Melissa for lunch.  She was one of my good friends in the accounting program at BYU, then lived in Seattle for about a year, then moved to Salt Lake almost 3 years ago.  She works for PwC there.  It was so much fun to see her and catch up.  We then drove to Layton to visit with Matt and Missy Schwartz, Darryl’s mission president’s son and family.  They just had a new baby, Anne, on July 16th.  She seemed so tiny compared to Amelia!  Matt and Missy’s 3 boys were with their grandparents (the mission president).

Finally, we drove to Clinton and stayed Thursday night with Josh and Andrea.  What a fun place!  All 4 kids seemed very excited for us to come.  Matthew was so cute, patting Kathryn on the back.  The older girls, especially Emma, loved watching Amelia and trying to get her to smile.  Julia played several songs on the piano – I was very impressed.  Katie wondered why Kathryn wanted to use all of her toys!  It was very cute watching them both watch “Cars” and “Mommy and Me”.  We watched all the kids ride bikes, and do tricks on the trampoline and swingset.  Kathryn also loved the swings and slides. 

We packed up and left around 9 on Friday  morning and made it back to Seattle by 10pm, with a one hour time change.  I am so glad we made the trip (and so glad that our girls travel so well in the car).  Darryl and I have been talking about visiting Utah and Idaho since we got married.  3 years later we finally made it there and it was so wonderful to see everyone before we move to Kiev for 2 years.

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Some of you have heard about Darryl’s passport adventures.  I can say adventures, because he now has the passport.  Here is a picture as proof.  Up until a few minutes ago, I would have said passport woes.  He was forced to apply 3 times.  The first time we applied by mail (since we live in the “land of the free” and “home of the brave”).  Three months later we got everything back saying they could not process his passport because his passport photo had a small shadow behind his ear. 

I wish we had kept those pictures, because I would post it to see if anyone else saw a shadow behind his ear.  I know Darryl quite well, and his ears are not on the large size.  In fact, we have the same size of ear (just different sized heads).  Of course I was worried when we didn’t have his passport after 3 months, and by this time I had renewed mine, and Kathryn and Amelia also had passports. 

We decided to drive to Canada (not that big of a deal when you live in Seattle) for Darryl to apply in person, as this should go much faster.  After some research, Darryl realized that he could apply online and then skip the line at Passport Canada if he was a Canadian resident.  He still has an Alberta drivers license with his address in Cold Lake.  But we didn’t feel good about that since Darryl hasn’t actually lived in Canada for several years.  Turns out that since he is a Canadian living in the United States, his passport would be ready in 2 weeks (though he has to pick it up in person).  If he were a Canadian resident, it would take 4 weeks, and then they mail it to you.  And thus we see that honesty is always the best policy.

However, I did say above that Darryl had to apply 3 times, and I have only mentioned 2 times.  We had a nice little day trip to Surrey, BC, just across the border.  A couple of days later someone called from Passport Canada.  In my heart of hearts I hoped they were calling to say it was ready early!  But no, they were calling to say that a resident doctor doesn’t qualify as a medical doctor.  Another part of the Canadian passport application process is having your photo (with no ear shadows, of course) signed by a professional that has known you for at least 2 years.  Medical doctors, dentists, pharmacists, lawyers, and veterinarians qualify.  Yes, we wondered about the vet, too.  We had our friend Derek the doctor sign Darryl’s photo.  Well, he is still a resident for a few more months.  He could be a “real” doctor already, but he is specializing so he has a longer residency. 

 So Darryl got to make another trip to Canada to apply once more for a passport, with his non-ear-shadowed photo signed by our friend Lincoln who is a real, bonafide pharmacist.  I told him I wasn’t going this time.  It was a good thing, because when Darryl was 15 minutes from the border I got a call that he had forgotten the precious passport pictures.  Sure enough, I saw them on the counter.  It was still early in the morning, before 7 in fact.  So as quickly as I could I got dressed, threw a few things in the diaper bag, and woke up the girls to put them in the car.  Off we drove an hour and a half to deliver the pictures to Darryl.  Now that is true love, if I do say so myself.  Then I turned around and drove back home (after feeding Amelia).  We were back a little after 10. 

The good news was that Darryl’s passport would be ready 2 weeks from the original day he applied in person.  That day is today!!!  We are another step closer to moving out of the country.

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This morning Amelia had her 2 month check-up at the doctor.  I didn’t even cry when she had shots!  She is doing well and growing a ton.  Amelia is now 23 inches long, which is the 75th percentile.  She weighs 12lbs, 5.5 oz, which is the 90th percentile!  I thought she seemed big – she is already growing out of some of her clothes.  Kathryn was a very good girl while we were at the doctor.  She put her little hippo on the scale, and spun her fish crackers around on the doctor’s chair.

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I just felt like I needed to write something about Amelia.  There is so much to say about Kathryn because she does a lot more than Amelia right now.  But we love Amelia just as much!  We had a hard time deciding on her name, didn’t decide until the day after she was born.  I had wanted to name our baby Adriana, but it just didn’t fit this baby.  Amelia is such a sweet girl, I love when she looks at me and smiles.  Yes, she is smiling!   The tired eyes, grumpy mornings, and never ending feedings of a newborn are all forgotten when she looks up at you and smiles.  She will be 2 months old on Monday.  I find myself enjoying Amelia perhaps a little more than Kathryn at this stage because 1) I know a little bit more what I am doing, and 2) I know how fast she will grow.  I am so glad she was born on May 16, which is also Vovo’s birthday.  It will always be nice to think of Vovo on Amelia’s birthday.  Plus, it is an even number, which goes a long way for me.  So in honor of Amelia, here are a couple of pictures.

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Kathryn has somehow developed the habit of dropping/throwing her cup after she is done drinking whatever is inside.  This of course is frustrating to me.  Tonight we gave her some water before saying family prayer and putting her to bed.  She drank and dropped the cup down, of course, which made Darryl and me a little upset.  Then she ran around a little and wouldn’t pick the cup back up.  I thought, there’s now way she will settle down for a prayer.  But then she sat down and folded her arms.  Right after Darryl started the prayer, Kathryn said, “Heavenly Father”, and started saying a prayer.  Most of it was mumbled, but she did say “amen” after Darryl closed the prayer.  Then she started again and said a lot of incomprehendable things, but we did hear “daddy come home” (he was gone this week), and she was able to say “Jesus Christ, amen”.   And she was totally calmed down for bed and we haven’t heard a peep.  So suddenly dropping her cup on the ground isn’t really a big deal!  If she can say her own prayers, we figure she can drop her cup all she wants (provided the contents have already been consumed)!

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One of Kathryn’s first words was “bob”.  No, this wasn’t in reference to a beloved relative or cuddly toy, but Bob the Tomato of VeggieTales.  Because at first the only thing Kathryn watched on the TV (or in our case the computer) was VeggieTales, soon anything she watched was called “bob”.  So when Kathryn said “bob”, we knew that meant she wanted to watch a video, and we’d tell her to choose a “bob”. 

The older she got, the more “bobs” we obtained.  As Kathryn learned more words, she would clarify which “bob” she wanted to watch.  A few months ago we bought the movie “Cars” for Darryl.  I didn’t want Kathryn playing with it, so I called it “Daddy’s Bob” and that seemed to keep her disinterested. 

After awhile, though, she wanted to watch “Daddy’s Bob”.  Soon it became her favorite thing to watch, and she watched it everyday at least once during the end of my pregnancy and the first few weeks after Amelia was born. This week I decided I wanted to start exercising again, so I got out the exercise video I used after Kathryn was born.  Without me saying anything, Kathryn said this was “Mommy’s Bob”.  I assumed she would think this was very boring – who would watch a workout video just for fun?  But Kathryn has requested “mommy’s bob” several times this week!  And she has sat and watched it for several minutes!  Once I saw her stepping up on the phone books I have taped together for my “step”. 

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