Savvy's fascination and some of her lunch-time delights

Kyle brought in the mail a few evenings ago and a catalog magazine caught Savannah's eye. She grabbed it and immediately began perusing the magazine very excitedly, jumping up to show us each page that she loved, which was about every single page in the magazine.

She later sprawled herself on the carpeted family room floor to examine the pages more closely. In a whisper to herself she exclaimed,  "This is the most beautiful magazine," and sighed contentedly.

The magazine?  

Pottery Barn Kids.

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While preparing lunch today, Savannah exclaimed cheerfully, "When I grow up, I'm going to be the NICEST mommy in the world."

"You're not going to be mean like me?" I asked, thinking she'd surely correct me and tell me I'm not mean.

In a very pleasant, matter-of-fact way she responded, "No, not like you. I'm going to buy my kids lots of toys and whatever they want."

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While munching on her favorite post-lunch treat, pop-corn, Savannah initiated a very important discussion:

"Mommy, when you and Daddy get old, can you move to another house?"

"Why?" 

"Cuz I wanna live here when I grow up. And there can't be two mommies in this house."

Photog Potpourri

Every time I plug in my phone to charge it, I find a lot of photos I forgot about, or discover some new artistic gems my kids have captured.  For instance, this is the road trip from Orem to Boise from Cade's point of view:

Almost makes you think we don't need a van with all that sibling happiness and serenity going on in the back, huh? 

I did get a new set of wheels come to think of it. SO WONDERFUL!!!  Totally transformed my life:

Mary sent me home with this beauty after our visit there for Thanksgiving. While I was on crutches it made getting around the main level of the house SO MUCH EASIER. It now provides us with portable seating when Cade's friends come over and they all want to crowd at the dinner table together to assemble Legos. 

It also made it possible for me to join my sister at the special Nordstrom VIP event.  She pushed me around as we got facials, ate gourmet burgers, sipped Italian Soda, shopped for my mother's birthday present and tried on shoes. Or shoe, rather. 

Notice the very cute maternity top she's wearing. It almost makes me excited about getting pregnant again. Almost.

There's no clever segue into these two pictures I found.  Simply said, this girl makes me laugh!

Welcome to the "Ask Michelle" segment. 

You've got delimmas? I've got answers. :)

Delimma:  You are wearing a cast and can't get it wet. Washing your hair is a pain.

Solution: Spend 15 bucks at Fantastick Sam's and let them wash and style your hair better than you ever could. The problem with this is the next time your hair needs a-washin' you don't want to do it yourself.

Delimma: Husband is out of town. Still wearing the cast. How do you get the baby from your room to hers?

Solution: Crawl on your knees and drag baby on blanket. Does the job and does not traumatize baby.

Delimma:  Want Oreos, but out of milk.  Can't drive to store to get milk. Aforementioned husband is still out of town.

Solution:  Cry. And then up the order for your next milk delivery by a gallon so this NEVER happens again.

Oh, and in case you were wondering what I did on New Year's Day--- I left the girls with a wonderful babysitter and Kyle, Cade and I joined my parents as we watched BYU's men's basketball team cream some team from California. Cade was mostly grumpy. He wanted to stay with the babysitter. And here we thought we were being fun parents by letting him stay up late and come with us. Go figure.

Happy Wednesday to you all!!!

Voice Lessons

The last week I have been pretty much voiceless. I don't know what exactly has ailed me, but I have been unable to speak much higher than a whisper this entire week. In the mean time I have also been struggling with my dear 3 year-old and his antics. He has been in the most defiant of moods these last several weeks. Anything I tell him, he plainly tells me the contrary. Example #1:

We are in the kitchen making pancakes. Cade is standing on a chair so he can oversee the action taking place on the counter.

"Careful of the griddle, Cade. It's hot," I warn him.

He responded matter of factly,"No, it's not hot. It's berry, berry cold."

Example #2:
We were in the airport waiting in line to get our boarding passes.

"Cade, be a good boy and listen to Mommy," Dad says as Cade is swirving in and out of line and under the railings.

"I'm not a boy. I'm a girl!"

That was news to me.

I swear, one day someone went inside his control panel and reprogrammed him. I have had a difficult time remaining patient during this new phase. Patience is difficult to have when you are living on little sleep. I've read and heard that it is helpful to whisper when you are really upset with your children, as that keeps you from losing your cool and raising your voice to them when it's not a life or death situation (ie. STOP!!!! Get out of the road!!!!). I kind of laughed at that thinking Cade just wouldn't take me seriously if I was whispering and he'd just ignore me.

I was wrong.

I haven't been able to discipline him in anything more than a whisper and it is amazing. He listens BETTER when I am talking softly than if I were to use my normal, end-of-the-day, exhausted, hungry, don't cross me again voice. He minds me and he himself has been found whispering throughout the house.

This has been a fine lesson of how much my attitude, tone of voice and body language impacts the spirit of our home.