It's A Twista, It's A Twista

Things I learned last night:

• Tornado warnings are not fun
• Cooper would rather watch candles than sleep
• The floor is not comfortable to sleep on
• If the power comes back on I should shower, even if it's midnight, because the power might be off in the morning
• You can run the computer and the internet off the car battery
• It's hot indoors in Texas with no air conditioner
• Utah has at least one thing going for it: very few tornados

I hope the power comes back on before we leave for our return trip on Saturday.

But I Neeeeeed It

I'm following the "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery" route and using my friend Kayla's blog topic from last week:

What are some products I can't live without?

I'm including food and mom-stuff in this list, because those are the things that I use on a regular basis. This should be an interesting look into my soul.

1. Dove soap - I live in Utah, aka, the place that sucks moisture and life out of your skin, hair, and nails. Regular soap does not cut it. I need the fancy magic that Dove works to feel like I'm not shriveling.
2. Chapstick - I have to echo one of Kayla's picks. This goes back to the whole living-in-a-desert thing. My lips cry for moisture, and so I always have Chapstick in my pocket, the one with the blue wrapper and SPF 15.
3. Sunscreen - I'm pale. I burn. And yes, I do use baby sunscreen.
4. Fig Bars - I always keep a sleeve of the Wal-Mart brand Fig Bars in the car. They taste almost as good as Fig Newtons and they don't make a huge mess. Peter is almost always hungry while we're out running errands and I strongly dislike getting fast food, so I often hand him a few Fig Bars when he starts telling me he needs food. Also, I can't find a picture of them on Google Image and am too lazy to go take a picture myself, so you'll just have to trust me that they're real.
   
5. Baby Orajel - Cooper is cutting his twelfth tooth and his fourth molar. Orajel keeps the screaming and thrashing to a minimum. Seriously, as soon as I put the Orajel on him he calms down. I know it's because his mouth has just gone numb and it feels weird, but it still helps.

What are some products you can't live without?

Like Father, Like Son

Writing History

I've been thinking recently about keeping records. We have two small file boxes that Bryan and I periodically sit in front of to file the stacks of papers that have accumulated on our counter tops. We have an even smaller fireproof safe that holds important documents and a CD of our wedding pictures. Last year Bryan took it upon himself to organize and electronically file our thousands of pictures. I'm grateful for his project because it's made posting past pictures on here easier than it would have been if I had to sift through those pictures myself. Instead of baby books I write the boys significant milestones on our calendar. And then I make sure that we don't throw those calendars away. I can go back and look at when Cooper first ate green beans or when Peter took his first steps.

Specifically, I've thought about this blog as a place to keep a record. I've kept journals since I was in Primary, but none of them with any regularity. There was a span in my early teenage years when I wrote everyday, but they were short laundry lists of my day's activities. My hand would get tired before I got around to writing my thoughts or feelings with any depth. The exceptions are when Bryan and I got engaged and when the boys were born, but even those entries were dated after the fact, written when I had time to pull out my journal and sit and write uninterrupted.

Apparently I type much faster than I write. On this blog I let more of those thoughts that have been drifting through my head find a home. I write more of my feelings on motherhood. I doubt that I would remember to write all the funny or clever things that Peter says in my journal, yet they often end up here. Even if no one else reads what I write, it is helpful for me to be able to go back and look at where I've been and how far I've progressed as a mother, a wife, a friend, and a person. And it's gratifying to think that perhaps someday when the boys have children of their own they will be able to read about their childhood escapades and realize that if we could raise them without going completely insane, maybe they can do the same with their own kids.

I Keep On Fallin'

Peter, while leaning his whole body over the edge of the ottoman, fell.

Peter: Ah! I fell!

Me: Are you all right?

Peter: (from the floor behind the ottoman) I fell in love.

What?! Has someone secretly been showing my three-year-old romantic comedies?

As If I Wasn't Paranoid Enough

This happened last month, so it's probably old news to most of you, but I just saw the article last night. It's especially scary because both of my boys put all kinds of random stuff in their mouths. Even Peter, who has passed the magical third birthday when swallow-sized toys are deemed acceptable, puts stuff in his mouth.

Note to self: learn to use eyes independent of each other so I can watch both boys at all times.

But You Don't Have to Take My Word For It

I'm a proud bookworm and am excited to watch the boys follow suit. Peter loves to read and to be read to. Cooper loves books and gets mad when I take easily torn books from him in exchange for sturdier board books. Being the bibliophiles that we are, we were all happy to receive a special package in the mail yesterday.

My mom is a teacher and therefore has access to the Scholastic book sales. We are often the beneficiaries of this perk and have the home library to prove it. It's always fun to get a call from her that starts out, "We're at the Scholastic book sale, and I want to read you some titles to make sure you don't already have them." Yeah, I like those calls.

The package was the result of one of those phone calls. We opened it as soon as we got it and read all of the books, some of them twice. Then Peter read them again during quiet time. I wanted to share our two favorites from this batch.

Peter's favorite:

After reading this, Peter spent the remainder of the afternoon quoting the lines to himself as he played. I would throw one out every once in a while too. A small cat is getting ready for bed by reading his book. But his book disappears, which leads to a series of theories about where the book could have gone. Maybe a bear ate it? Maybe a stegosaurus stomped on it? Maybe a bat flew off with it? Peter enjoyed the silly hypotheses the cat came up with, and that it had a happy ending.

My favorite:
This is by Jane Yolen, who also wrote Owl Moon and the How Do Dinosaurs... series (we really love those dinosaur books). This is a sweet bedtime book that says good night to a different animal on each page. I won't say much more, but if you check this book out from the library pay close attention to the last illustration. I think Ms. Yolen is one of my favorite children's authors.

Thanks Mom!

Fame!

Take Two

Well, it's official, Peter has stage fright. I thought when he gave his talk he was just being stubborn or was unaccustomed to standing in front of a large group of people and was therefore thrown off his game. Nope, I think he was afraid.

He came home from church last week with a paper saying he had been assigned the scripture for Primary for the next Sunday, which was yesterday. I made a mental note of it and then forgot until Bryan picked the paper off the counter yesterday morning during breakfast. Ack! I forgot! I looked at the topic and quickly found a short scripture. Peter, Bryan, and I spent the next few hours repeating Moroni 10:5 to each other. By the time we walked into church Peter had it memorized.

I wanted to make sure he understood what was going to happen this time. We talked about when he was supposed to give a talk before. We reminded him that he would walk up to the podium and say his scripture. I told him I would be right there next to him the whole time in case he needed help remembering. He assured me he wouldn't need help.

He got as far as the the front of the room (which was only a few steps because he sits on the first row) and behind the podium when he stopped. He started saying he had changed his mind and couldn't go up, that he didn't want to do it, that he wanted to sit down. I didn't make as big a deal out of it this time. I tried for about half a minute (it felt much longer) to get him up the steps, but to no avail. I shrugged at the Primary Presidency and walked him back to his seat.

I don't get stage fright, so I can only imagine what he's feeling. To any of you that have stage fright or who have children that get stage fright, how do you overcome it? I'd like to start giving him tools to deal with it now so that when he's on his mission and is asked two minutes beforehand to speak for the next hour he won't try to crawl under his seat and hide. Are there any tricks? Any positive affirmations to help you get in front of an audience?

After church Peter was singing a song he had made-up. He had put the words of his scripture to music. So even if he didn't share the scripture with the whole Primary, at least he memorized it. That's something, right?

Disaster Warning

I have a question: Why is it embarrassing to admit that you have a clean house?

Last night while Visiting Teaching the sister that we visit apologized for the state of her house. Her fiance was moving his stuff into the house in preparation for their nuptials on Saturday. The TV cabinet was a work in progress and there were a few wedding gifts here and there, but otherwise it looked clean. My companion said that she had kids so her house was a disaster. I said that my house was much cleaner that it was before I had kids, but it was still a disaster. We all laughed and moved on with the visit.

But here's the thing, my house isn't really a disaster. It's lived in, yes. There is currently three days' worth of junk mail on the counter (next to the trashcan), a pile of waiting-to-be-folded laundry on my bedroom floor, and a scattering of Cooper's toys on the floor near his toy basket, but overall it's pretty clean. And it's true, my house is cleaner now that it was before the boys were born, mostly because they're into everything and I'm trying to keep them safe. From my experience lots of other houses look like mine.

So why do we want to out-do each other with who has the messiest house? Is this a competition you really want to win? Are we trying to prove that we're human and normal and not intimidating because of our many talents and skills? Or are we afraid someone will drop by unannounced and see dishes in the sink, the laundry half-folded on the couch, and the nest of blankets in the middle of the floor that your kids have been jumping in (are my kids the only ones that do this?) and judge us for it? So we have to prepare them in advance so that reality looks clean and tidy compared to the scenario of destruction we've painted in advance?

What are we afraid of?