Weekly update 5/20

This week was a nice break with no big “have to’s”.

 

HIKE UP BATTLE CREEK – My kids are so happy play with rocks, sticks and water. I like this picture of Jackson because he’s strutting like he owns the mountain. And he does.

 

 

SATURDAY BIKE RIDE – We wanted to bike from the southern most point near Utah lake on the Jordan River Parkway all the way north to one of our favorite parks – Olympic parks. About two miles from the car, it was clear I had a flat tire and I wasn’t going to make it the 3+ miles left to the park. When you say you are going to the park to your kids, you have to try your very hardest to make it happen. So, Colin walked my bike back to the car, and I biked with the kids to the park. Colin then drove Rocky to the park to pick us up. Colin is a sweetheart to walk the bike back for me. The day was cool and sunny and perfect and smelled of yummy russian olive trees.

 

HARDCORE PLAYING – While we were waiting for Colin to pick us up at the park, I saw these boys playing across the street. Every once and a while, they would yell, “bang bang bang bang!” then “you’re hit! you’re dead!” Eventually, when the round was over, about seven other boys came out from their hiding spots. This struck me as pretty intense playing for 10 year olds. Guess what 3 year old really wanted to go play with them.

(In Jackson’s defense, I told him to make his meanest fighting guy face.)

 

BEFORE AND AFTER – If it seems like I take a lot of pictures of my kids half-naked and covered in food, that’s because that’s how they are 85% of the time. Annie has been delightful lately. She is sleeping so good right now and only gets up once or twice a night. If I wait long enough, she goes back to sleep on her own sometimes. It only took 11.5 months, but she finally has a predicable nap schedule: 9:45-11:00 and 2:00-3:15, give or take 15 minutes. This is the week she has gotten serious about walking. She squats to stands a lot now. Her  record number of steps she’s taken at a time is five.

 

 

HULK SMASH – Jackson has been a monster lately. I really feel like a lot of his problem is because he isn’t sleeping well at night. I can’t figure out why. It isn’t necessarily the heat (this has been going on for a month or so). You can see in the picture on the left he’s drawn all over his body with marker. That’s no so bad, but it’s the whining, constant picking on his sister, talking back, destructive/mess making, jump on you when you aren’t paying attention, and contrariness stuff. I sure hope he outgrows this phase quick.

 

MINUS THE VAMPIRES – This picture was taken an hour before the peak of the eclipse today, then the clouds moved in and I couldn’t see it. Oh, well. I will look at pictures by real photographers.

 

 

ITALIAN THIEF – Some animal ate my basil plant. Not happy. The culprit is probably a cat. I’m more of a dog person.

 

CLEARANCE FUSCHIAS – I bought these fuschias on clearance a while back. I was suspicious of why they were on clearance so I am pleasantly surprised that they have done very well. This week they started to bloom. It seems like hanging plants of fuscias are very expensive ($20+) so I think I did pretty good with my $.75 cent plant.