Peter's Epiphany

Peter had a major realization last week. I asked if he would write about it for the blog. He said he would dictate his story to me while I typed. Here it is, in his words.

One night I had a bad dream. It was about a tornado. After I had the dream I was scared of the wind and sounds that sounded like the wind. I would freak out and say, "Mommy, I'm scared! Is that a tornado?" A few days later, I realized that the day before I had the dream my brother had been really naughty. Then I thought, "Maybe it was contention that caused my bad dream." After that, I tried to get everybody in my family to stop contention from coming and be obedient instead. After that, I tried to be as obedient as I could and my mom said that there has been a different feeling in our house.

Since that day Peter has been a different boy. For several years he has been prone to argue and talk back. And by prone, I mean he fought with us almost everyday of his life since he was four. This has been a huge source of contention in our home and family, and it has gotten him in trouble many many times at school and church. Bryan and I were pretty much at the end of our rope and didn't know what else to do to stop the arguing. When Peter discovered the link between contention and bad dreams (which I believe is quite real), he went from being an antagonist to a peacemaker. And it's true, the feeling in our home is drastically different and such a wonderful and refreshing change.

It's only been a few days, and I have no idea if it will last, but I really hope it does.

Movie Night Snuggling

Nine!

During the Christmas break Peter turned nine. It was kind of a low-key celebration due to the illness many of us had experienced just a few days prior, but I think he still had a good day. 

I put up the traditional streamers (and then forgot to take a picture, so you'll just have to believe me) and made sure all the presents were wrapped and ready the night before. Instead of a cake, we ate a decadent brunch of double-chocolate pancakes. Our fun activity was seeing Big Hero 6 as a family, which Peter totally loved. Then we enjoyed eating out with my parents and Grandma (it was their last night in town). Poor Peter had to wait aaaaallll day before he could finally open his presents.

Legos and Scrabble won the day. He got to stay up late that night and tried out his new Scrabble game against Nana Cris. The next two days he was completely consumed with building Legos, which made for a very happy Peter.

I forgot about his birthday interview until a few days later, but I'm fairly confident that his answers are still viable. As a nine-year-old here are Peter's favorites:

FAVORITE FOOD: cheese pizza

FAVORITE ANIMAL: cheetah

FAVORITE CANDY: Milky Way

FAVORITE BOOK: Percy Jackson Lightening Thief

FAVORITE COLOR: red

FAVORITE SHOW: Good Eats

FAVORITE MOVIE: Big Hero 6
FAVORITE SONG: Eidelwiess
FAVORITE BOARD GAME: Clue

FAVORITE CARD GAME: Uno
FAVORITE VIDEO GAME: Minecraft
FAVORITE THING TO DO: Play Minecraft
FAVORITE MEMORY FROM BEING 8: Me teaching Sophie how to crawl
FAVORITE PLACE: Where ever you are (That sound you hear? That's my heart melting.)
FAVORITE SUBJECT IN SCHOOL: Computers

FRIENDS: Quinten, Grant, Kaigen, Oscar, Cooper, Phoebe, Sophie, Mom, Dad

Happy birthday Peter!

Question One

One of my good friends invited me (and several others, I assume) to write a personal history this year. This history consists of fifty-two questions, one for each week of the year. She emails the questions out to those participating and it is up to the individual to decide how and where they want to answer. I think this is a marvelous way to break down the seemingly daunting task of writing one's own history.

I'll be posting some of these questions here. I probably won't share all of them, but maybe I will, I haven't really decided yet. For this week I will share, at least part of my answer. Since I don't include middle or last names here on the blog, I'm only going to answer this question for my first name.

What is your full name?  Why did your parents give you that name?

I remember my mom telling me she always liked the name Margot. It means pearl; I was named after the parable from the New Testament about the man who sells all he has so he can buy one precious pearl of great price. I credit my strong sense of self worth, at least in part, to knowing that I was named after something of so much value. My dad's name is Marc, and, according to nameberry.com, that is the French variation of Mark. My name is spelled the French way as well. The silent t at the end of Margot is important to me. My name doesn't look complete without it.

Heat Wave

It's a balmy 9 degrees outside right now. That's up from the 4 degree weather we had last night when I went to sleep. Both of those numbers don't take the wind chill into account. It was so cold this morning that the beginning of school was delayed by ninety minutes, because it was dangerous for all those little fingers and noses and ears to be outside.

Our heater has been on almost constantly and it can't get the main floor of our house warmer than 67 degrees. That might be warm enough for some of you, but for this continuously-cold-California girl, that's uncomfortable. I've been rocking my big warm sweatshirt and faux UGGs all day.

And on that note, I'm going to go burrow under my blankets.

Sugar and Spice

We discovered that Sophie really likes gingerbread cookies. The one she is enjoying in the picture is sweetened with honey and molasses. They weren't particularly sweet, but they were nice and crunchy.

Christmas... Finally

Bryan was the official Christmas morning photographer. I've been trying to pick out the best pictures to use for a Christmas post but there are 138 photos to sift through! He stopped taking pictures about halfway through the present unwrapping, so I imagine we would have at least twice as many if he had continued.

And then we have no other pictures from the rest of the day.

Here is our Christmas, told (mostly) through pictures.

 Christmas Eve. I love our stockings!

 Christmas morning.

Sophie, enjoying the spoils of her stocking. 

I love the look on Cooper's face. He's watching Phoebe open the gift that he gave her.

Here I am showing off the ring that Cooper picked out from the Holiday Shop at school. He enjoyed the giving part of Christmas this year. Also, Phoebe picked out my Christmas PJs. That's why I'm wearing color!

Phoebe, wearing her very fancy hair accessory from Peter.

Cooper, just as he unwrapped his gift from Peter. Peter was nervous. He was afraid he hadn't gotten things that people would want. Before we started opening presents we reviewed how to be gracious. The kids all did beautifully. No one announced that they hated the gift (which happened last year and brought all gifting to a halt for a few minutes while we made it clear that that was NOT okay), but rather said thank you and found nice things to say instead. 

Sophie spent most of Christmas morning sitting calmly on Bryan's lap. That means that we have a lot of Sophie closeups.

She did finally get to crawl around. This required us to guard all of our gifts as she is now highly mobile and very curious.

The rest of the day was spent enjoying our gifts, eating delicious food, and staying in our Christmas pajamas. It was a good, calm Christmas.

On the Docket

On Sunday after church I was looking at my calendar and marveling at how I didn't have anything pressing coming up. There were no big projects or meetings, no plans with friends or family. I wondered what I would do with all that extra time.

Dangerous thoughts, I know.

Shortly after my calendar gazing I was asked to teach Phoebe's preschool for the next two weeks, starting tomorrow. And I'm now in charge of a preschool hibernation party that will also take place this month. I've spent most of today planning my lesson for the three-hour chunk of time during which eight three and four-year-olds will be at my house.

The moral of this cautionary tale? Never think that you have free time, because something will come to fill it up.

Too Short

Today was the last weekday of the Christmas break. My kids didn't have a full two weeks off and the time feels too short.

You know that song It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas? There 's a line that I've seen quoted by some people on Facebook during the last few days. "And mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again." I don't feel that way. I like having the kids home, even if it means I can't go grocery shopping. I like not worrying about making lunches or insisting that the boys do homework.

I think a three week break sounds good. I wonder how I could make that happen...

Resolute

A new year starts today. You know what that means, right? Time for resolutions!

Are you ready? Here they are.

• Sleep, during the night preferably.
• Respond to text messages the same day I get them. I am ridiculously bad at this.
• Respond to emails within a week of receiving of them. That might sound like a long time to some of you, but I have a friend that emailed me in September that I still haven't properly written to. I know, that's awful. I should be writing to her instead of posting this.
• Post something on ye olde blog every week day. I've done this in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, and 2014. It's a lot of work and a big time commitment, but I'm still sad that I couldn't make it happen in 2012, and that regret spurns me forward into 2015. Also, this resolution and the one about sleep are in conflict, so I'll need to figure out how to make both work.
• Put Bryan higher on my priority list. I'm afraid that four little people often get my attention first, and that's just not fair. I'm brainstorming ways to catapult him to the top of the list more often.
• Listen. Listen to Bryan. Listen to the kids. Listen to the Holy Ghost. I need to be a better listener. This means limiting electronic distractions even more and looking at people when they talk to me. It also means not talking all the time myself.
• Follow the example of the Savior in everything I do. This is not a new goal, but it's one that I'm bringing to the forefront. It's also something we're working on as a family, so I need to work on it on my own as well.

That seems like a really long list. Some years I make resolutions, some years I don't, I feel like this needs to be a year of deliberate purpose.