Onward and Upward... and downward too I guess

Well, I got released from my calling tonight(for those who didn't remember/know, I was the 1st counselor in the Primary Presidency). Bro. B came by and talked to us this evening about us moving and he went ahead and released me. Kind of mixed feelings. Nice to feel the burden lifted, sad to realize that I love love LOVE those kids and I will miss them like crazy. We really only have one more Sunday in our old ward- the Sunday after that is Stake Conference.

Good news on our house- they FINALLY started drilling the well today. The Wahlquists called and said they could see them doing it from their house. You can actually see our house that we are buying from their back doorstep. Kind of neat- we are excited to live near(er) to them and to be in their ward!

Ethan is learning to take a bottle. I have mixed feelings about this... My problem is that every month when Mother Nature sends her gifts to me my milk supply basically disappears, and it keeps getting worse as Ethan gets older and requires more to subsist upon. It usually comes back just fine, but it takes about a week. Finally decided we needed to suck it up and supplement for that week. I am so relieved in that I know that now he is actually getting enough to eat. He is SO happy because he LOVES food and eating and anything like that. He was so delighted when I gave him the bottle and once he figured it out, I could see in his eyes saying "WOW! This thing has FOOD! LOTS OF FOOD!" But I am a little sad that I can't provide ALL of his milk for him. That bond is really special to me- something that I felt went WAY too fast for me this time around. So that adventure began today. I hope that means he won't wean for good... but I would be ok with that if that's what he chose. Thomas and I were talking about it today and he made the comment that maybe that would be for the best- maybe that is just how my body works, maybe I start producing less milk after 6 months or so postpartum. It helps to have him tell me its ok- part of me feels like I'm obligated to never feed my baby formula ever.

Ethan is mostly sitting up now, and he can scoot himself around on the floor. He sits until he falls over, and then he scoots around on his back. It's way cool. Audrey is so talkative. Phrases you will probably hear her say:
- "I just..."
- "Hey Mommy! Hey Daddy! (then nothing, or random things like '...arm!')"
- "No want it!!!"
- "Iya needa sanck" (I need a snack)
- "Yeah!"
- "I wuv it, a-Toy Story! (or whatever the thing is)"
She is doing so well with sentences. She's started to babble again, kind of like when she was first learning to talk in sentences. She just spews out tons of sounds and I can't decide if she's really saying things and I just can't understand it or if she is just trying to make herself sound like she's saying paragraphs instead of sentences. Every few sentences will make sense when she does this. But she really communicates very well when I take the time to really listen and decode what she says. Her favorite movies are Toy Story and Monsers Inc (Monsters Inc). She has such a good memory and she remembers parts of the movies and can quote them to you. I have such adorable children. :)

I can't believe I haven't written about this yet... My sister is getting MARRIED!!! She is marrying Josh Stoker on Dec 22nd. I have no idea how I haven't talked about this on here yet. !!! Yay marriage! :D We are excited for them and for Josh to be part of our family.

I should post pictures of the blizzard and of my adorable children, but I'm really tired and I have to get up to play for a lesson tomorrow, so I won't. Sorry. :)

Teeth!

Well, tooth actually. I forgot to write in myt last post that I discovered Ethan's very first tooth yesterday evening! It's his bottom front left tooth. The right one is still super close. I'm glad he at least got one of them... :D

I also wanted to write quickly about a phone call I got today. It was a lady calling with a survey about breastfeeding. It was really short, probably only a minute and a half. This is the third time she'd called me, because I always seemed to miss the phone call and she left a message and I never bothered calling back. But it was just a few questions about how long I'd breastfed Ethan and why I decided to do so and a few things like that. At the end she told me that I was doing a great job and that I was a great mom, and then she said goodbye and that was the end. I guess it was just really good to hear someone tell me that I was doing a great job and that I was a good mom today. It made me feel good.

I also feel good that I finally got to the bottom of my laundry pile. :)

Blizzard and Blessings

The last time we went to Dairy Queen to get a blizzard it was awful. The line inside was forever long so we went through the drive-through. The person was really nice but made a couple mistakes on our order sizing and then got confused about the coupon we had and tried to charge us double. Then what I ordered was missing half the things that were supposed to be in it, and Thomas' was the completely wrong thing. Next time, I'm just going to Arctic Circle. They are way better anyway.

But we had a real blizzard today- the first one I was aware of. Thomas claims that we had one last year but I don't know how I could have missed it... My car is covered in like 2 feet of snow. I park right across from the park's park... haha... I park my car right across from the mobile home park's little park thing with the swings and all, so I got a lot of blown snow across it. I tried to go out and dig it out earlier today and it was really hard. I got Thomas' car uncovered but mine was more than I was willing to sweat over just then. It was kind of fun I guess. It's sort of unreal to me that I can take a hot shower in a blizzard and be perfectly warm all I want and not have to worry about a thing, just stay inside and all is well. I think of the settlers of this town years and years ago who thought Rexburg would be a swell place to live (they must have gotten here in the summer) who didn't have modern conveniences to endure the long winters with. I am grateful to live in this day where I have so many blessings to make my life easier: refrigerators, dishwashers, breadmakers, crockpots, washing machines, cars, grocery stores, freezers, furnaces, water heaters, indoor plumbing, the INTERNET... the list could go on forever. I am so blessed!

I have a wonderful family who loves me and wants to be with me in the Gospel. I have the most amazing husband anyone could ask for and he is perfect for me in every way. He holds the priesthood in our home and is worthy to go to the temple with me. He gives so much to me and to our family without even questioning, even if he doesn't want to do it. I am so blessed to have such a wonderful ward who loves my family almost as much as I do. I have a beautiful warm home to live in. I have an amazingly comfortable bed to sleep in. My children are fed and warm and happy when they go to bed at night. I don't think I could want for anything more in life- my needs and beyond are met so fantastically.

My Savior loves me and has sacrificed beyond what I can imagine so I can live with my Father again. I have the knowledge of His Plan for His children. I have the privilege and responsibility of raising two of his precious, choice spirits and teaching them about this Plan. Thomas and I get to lead them through life and help them to choose what God would want us to choose. They are so beautiful and wonderful. I cannot imagine my life without them as a part of it forever.

Winter Work and Chocolate Chip Cookies

We are supposed to get a blizzard tonight/tomorrow. SO, I just took an amazing hot bath to warm up (since my dear husband is distracted playing a computer game instead of getting more firewood or lighting the furnace). I LOVE my jacuzzi tub. I am going to MISS it SO much when we move.

Speaking of which, I guess some people didn't know we are moving! We are buying a house out in Hibbard, just a few minutes away from where we live right now, and right around the corner from the Wahlquists! It is a foreclosure, so it's taken a little longer to close than we originally planned (which we expected). Last I heard they had started drilling our new well and we are just waiting for them to finish any repairs they need to make and for an appraiser to come out and tell us if there is anything else we need to fix on it before we can close on the house. We are hoping to close in the next week or two so we can get everything moved and done before we leave for AZ for Christmas. Thomas and Audrey are headed to the Valley on the 13th of December, and Ethan and I are coming on the 17th. I have to stay a little longer to finish up playing for juries up on campus.

I've been going through old boxes of papers and filing cabinets and de-junking everything so we don't have so much stuff to move. It's been kind of fun going through all this old stuff and remembering high school and friends and elementary school teachers. It's been fun to go through some of it with Thomas too, and share that part of my life with him. I feel like I've always known him, and it's sometimes almost surprising when I realize there's only a small part of my life he's been in it, and a large part he didn't know a lot about. It's fun to get to know him more every day.

Thomas is still crazy busy but is learning to balance work at home with family time. He really likes his new job but is struggling learning to manage his own working time, like setting his own hours. Really a lot of his stress (and my stress) is that he isn't done working at Allstate yet. His boss just had surgery and he's on the phone or headed into the office almost every day to help the newbies manage things. I don't mind that so much, but when you add it to trying to balance that, working for Auto & Art at home, MissionShoe stuff, and trying to fit it all into a schedule it gets kind of crazy. Not to mention trying to get some face time with his adorable children... if I do say so myself.

Speaking of them, Audrey and Ethan are getting so big. Audrey's favorite thing ever is Toy Story- we borrowed and rented Toy Story 2 and 3 this weekend and had a marathon. She loved it! We also loved getting to finally see the third one since we hadn't yet. She is talking so much better every day and she is so wonderful. She has definitely entered the "terrible twos". I was beginning to wonder if she would at all, she was doing so well. And even still, she is a good girl. Things are just so dramatic! :) Audrey loves being a big sister and is already picking on Ethan to show her love. Ethan is amazingly tolerant of her, but he has his limits. He is ALMOST ready to pop his first tooth out, but not quite. He is going through a growth spurt I think, because last night he slept for 13 hours STRAIGHT (no waking up to eat at ALL) and then he took a 4 hour nap today. And went to bed on time so tired. I haven't slept that well since he was born! He is starting to eat more foods now, he likes green beans ok but he isn't such a huge fan of peas. The funny part is that even though he doesn't like the food, he keeps eating it. Today I was feeding him peas, and he makes awful faces and was actually crying because he didn't like the taste, but he kept eating it didn't spit it out. Silly boy! I guess he loves his food! He is still doing pretty well nursing, which is more than ok by me. Audrey didn't make it this far nursing- she was pretty much done by 6 months. It's interesting learning to nurse another baby- Ethan has been very different in a lot of ways. I love my kids so much!

I am enjoying accompanying up on campus. I am grateful to have had such wonderful accompanists in my college experience. I still keep up with Tiffany (I worked with her for most semesters and my recital). She is still struggling with cystic fibrosis. Go here to read her blog. I try to keep her and her family in my prayers. I am also grateful for professors who taught me how to treat my pianists. I feel like there are so many students on campus up here (and teachers who don't think to teach them how) who don't really appreciate their accompanists enough to show them courtesies they should. Again, sometimes their teachers just don't stress how important a good accompanist is or how to keep one. I've only run into a couple who are actually *rude*; for the most part people are at least decent. But they are cheap. They don't want to pay for anything they can get away with not paying. I actually had one girl last week who was challenging me, to the dollar, over her $27 bill for November. Sheesh! I miss ASU sometimes. More serious musicians ready to go places and work hard, willing to pay for quality and appreciate it, taught to appreciate and REHEARSE with their pianists... *sigh*.

I love to cook. I am going to try and share more of my favorite recipes that I find. Here is my favorite for today...

"The Chewy" (chocolate chip cookie) by Alton Brown

These are SO good. I think they might be the best chocolate chip cookie I've ever made. I have a problem keeping these in the house. I might need extra Pilates and Zumba to make up for it. The recipe calls for scooping dough with a #20 disher, which I didn't have, but I looked up how much that is, and it's just under 1/4 cup (about 3.2 T). I just used a 1/4 cup scoop not filled all the way. Please, use real butter, and don't forget to chill the dough thoroughly.