Sunday Marathon

This is a little thing that I want to make sure I remember.

We started our Sunday at 11:00 a.m. attending our own ward. We all stayed for Sacrament, then Gabriel and I left at 12:00 to head accross town to see Arianna's Primary Program. When Gabriel went to tell Arianna good luck, I noticed a lady I knew from the Deaf Branch. I chatted with her for a minute and saw the interpreter chair was empty. I asked if there was someone on the way, and she said someone was supposed to be there. As the meeting started the chair was still empty, so I ran up to check if she wanted a fill-in till the interpreter arrived. I had to remember all of my church signs quickly, it's amazing how fast you forget the signs you don't use regularly. I was lucky to get a copy of the program so I could follow along. Kids either talk really really fast, or really slow, or don't ennunciate clearly; all are difficult to interpret. It's funny I've been singing all the same songs in our own ward for the entire year, but today kept forgetting what the next line was. Gabriel was a really good boy for Nannie and Uncle Rob in the back, I was glad to not hear him the whole hour. He really wanted to go to Sunbeams with Arianna, so I stayed the whole block, and let him go. I hope he was good for the teacher. It was a guy teacher that was alone because his team-teacher (wife) just had a baby. Poor guy had a huge class, luckily only two of the kids were boys. Gabriel did well, and always has fun visiting other wards.

As we left I noticed a text message on my phone. Aunt Sassy needed a kid "fix"; she hadn't seen any of the kids for a couple of weeks. I was STARVING and today was Break the Fast at the Institute, soooo of course I stopped by. Gabriel was very excited to see Aunt Sassy, Nannie, and Papa. I was glad to see all, but one item, on the menu was soy free. That meant he got to eat too. I made a deal with him that he could talk with his voice as long as he didn't run at Sassy's Church. It was pretty successful, especially when he was given a kitchen assignment to "help" Sassy clean up. He was the dish dryer. I walked in to his fuzzy little head sticking up above the counter while he worked away. All went well till he got a BIG bowl and couldn't hold it, so he set it on the dirty floor to dry it. Nannie ended up having to wash that one again. After Break the Fast, Sassy was in the Chorale Concert Fireside. Gabriel really wanted to stay for that, and they needed an interpreter to cover a last minute cancellation, but I needed to get home and rescue Stephen from hometeaching with a 2 year old "companion". During our drive home Gabriel asked how Jesus talked to us. I tried my best to explain prompting by the spirit on a four year old level. I don't think I did it well because he asked if the Holy Ghost was inside Jesus. I wanted him to at least be clear that they are separate. So, lamely, I said, "no Jesus and the Holy Ghost are friends, not inside eachother". I told him that the Holy Ghost will bring feelings to our mind and heart FOR Jesus. Then as abruptly as he started down this path he changed it back to a normal four year old topic.

I got home with my two boys (7:15 p.m.), and the wrestling match was on. I wish I could have a tenth of their energy. I finally had to hog-tie Garrett so Gabriel could focus long enough to get his Sunday shirt unbuttoned and get changed. I asked if they wanted to watch a Sunday movie. They were pretty excited about that. Each boy got to pick one; Garrett picked The Brother of Jared and Gabriel picked The Kingdom of Heaven. They settled in and were calm for the whole Brother of Jared movie. As the movie depicted them traveling through the wilderness Gabriel looked at me and said, "I feel weird in my heart." I told him that's the Holy Ghost telling him that this is a true story. He corrected me and said, "No, It's Jesus in my heart." I just agreed with him and said that feeling means that it is true, and when you feel that you can believe it. He nodded his little head and settled back into watching the movie.

What a lesson for me, it doesn't matter how young, or wild, or seemingly oblivious they are, kids are close to the spirit, and DO recognize it, they just don't have the words to explain it all. I've seen other times I was pretty sure Gabriel could feel something, but this was the first time he expressed it. Oh, how I hope he can keep that weird feeling throughout his, and follow its guidance.

Do you want to be my "Friend"?

The other day Gabriel got bored during quiet time. He and Garrett got together and "found" something to do. They shredded every Friend Magazine in his room. Being the superbly calm, and laid back kinda Mom that I am (yeah right), I didn't yell. He was lucky about that. I decided, instead, to take away all of his toys, books, and fun stuff from his room. A short time later Gabriel looked down at one of the shreds and said, "Oh noooo, it's Jesus." I seized the opportunity, and reminded him that all the pages had Jesus on them; he tore up Jesus. He's getting the idea that if you don't take care of your things they're going to disappear. We'll see how it worked next week when he gets some of his toys back.

"Undecided"

So Stephen and I have lots of political conversations, but most of them are when the kids are in bed so that we can talk without interruption. It's been interesting watching what the boys pick up from those around them.

On the 11th we went to the Buckelew Farm Pumpkin Patch. (I have pictures somewhere in my digital mess) After they picked their pumpkins we went to play the games in all the little booths. One booth had a pumpkin painted to look McCain and one painted to look like Obama. The kids got to look at the painted faces and "vote" for who they wanted. Both chose Obama, we were good and didn't do ANY coaching on who to pick. I asked why they picked that one, pointing to the Obama pumpkin, and Garrett said, "Daddy!" When I looked again that pumpkin did have black hair and brown eyes just like Daddy. These boys LOVE their Dad.

We went on with life; and this morning Stephen was reading the headlines outloud during breakfast. One of the headlines said something about Obama, I don't remember what exactly. Garrett looked up from his cereal and said, "Obama scary me." Just two weeks ago he was voting for the pumpkin rendition of him. So, I guess he's one of those undecided voters out there.

Nap time

Stephen thinks he's funny, when he can catch me "sleeping on the job". Notice the kids are still wearing their bibs from dinner. At least I got them fed right?? This was a pretty exhausting day.



Gabriel rarely sleeps in the afternoons anymore, but he does do "quiet time". I can usually hear him in his room playing who knows what, but I can tell he's got quite the imagination. He recently went through a phase and refused to close the door. I told him he had to stay IN his room, I caught him doing this one day. When he looked up and noticed me there he said, "I'm still in my room." I wouldn't care if he would stay right there, but he doesn't, he sneaks farther and farther out. Garrett's door is close to Gabriel's and often Garrett wakes up. When that happens we have CRANKY evenings. I think we've come to an understanding..."quiet time" is in a room with a closed door now, but if you want to stay awake you can.

Can you change a tire??

Stephen has a fancy dancy phone that he takes pictures with often, then emails them to me. So, that's why I have a bunch of pictures to post today. I still haven't been able to figure out the ones from my camera...someday.

Stephen noticed something in the tire of his truck and took it in to get fixed. The tire guy took the tire back, then started calling other people over to look, then Stephen say him wrestling with the tire. Stephen couldn't figure out what the heck they were doing. When it was all finished they brought this rod out. It was pushed all the way into his tire, only the little silver end showed, it just looked like a nail. This is why he drives his truck on construction sites, and not the little car. I was impressed at his talent for finding such a winner to puncture his tire with.

Buckle up...

I don't remember where we were going for this, but I'll tell ya about it anyway. We got Gabriel buckled up first, then while I was wrestling with Garrett's seat (I detest Garrett's seat, I can't wait for it to expire in 2010 so I can get a new one) Gabriel buckled up his "baby". If you look closely at the chest clip you'll see his "baby" elephant.
He proudly annouced that his, "baby" was buckled too, and wouldn't fly out the window now.

For better or worse he got the message that we wear seatbelts so that you won't fly out the window and die if we crash.

He's since lost that baby and now has a "sister" lion that also gets buckled up every time we leave. They really do soak up everything that is said around them, even if it doesn't seem like they're listening.

My cheese stick broke!

You all have to promise to not look at the mess in the background of this picture. We took this right after a ceiling fan, toilet and furniture change, someday we'll figure out what to do with all the junk.

As for the picture look at Garrett's cheese stick. As he took it out of the wrapper it broke in two, and the world stopped spinning right then and there. He got mad and didn't want to eat it because it was ruined. He ended by putting his little head down on the table so pitifully, and looking soooo sad. Finally he decided to go ahead and eat it after Gabriel "broke" his too. This kid has perfected 2-year old drama! When he can get to the floor, he'll very carefully lay down, then proceed to kick his feet and finish his tantrum, all the while sticking his little pouty lip out.
DRAMA, DRAMA, DRAMA!

Summer time critters

We get geckos that come out every summer and eat all the nasty bugs that hang around outside. This summer there were lots of babies. That is Stephen's hand, this little guy was tiny. We caught him before he got into the house. I'm happy to report that there are still more bugs outside than inside. ;-)



These are all the big geckos that came out one night. They really come out when the Monsoon comes. We forgot to turn off the light on the fan, so all the bugs kept flying into the window and the geckos were waiting for them. Gabriel LOVED to watch the geckos stalk a bug and then catch it. It was one of the few times that he was quiet and still; he didn't want to scare the bugs.

Breaking the News

We broke the news to Gabriel that he has a brother on the way. He has the most expressive eyes I've seen in a kid. There are times that I can only tell what he's feeling by the look in his big brown eyes. His eyes had a deeply concerned, sad look come into them. He said, "No it's a sister." I went and got the sonogram pictures, thought I could maybe use them as a visual aid. He was impressed with the little profile pictures of his body and head. Then I showed the last one; the one with the profile of the "boy parts". I asked, "What is that?" He looked very deflated and said, "A weenie." (I don't know if that word is allowed on the internet, but that was his answer.)

He sat for just a second then asked, "Where is my sister?" How's a mom supposed to answer such a sincere question? I doubt that an explaination about Mommy is doing her X chromosome part, but Dad likes Y chromosomes is going to cut it. I answered, "Well right now I'm making a brother and maybe later Jesus will send a sister." He asked, "Can you start making my sister right now?" Stephen chuckled and took that one; he said, "Only one baby at time, we have to finish making your brother then let him grow up for awhile (15 months of grow is a minimum for me :) then maybe we can make a sister."

He thought for a couple of minutes and accepted another boy and announced his name will be Jo-phes. I think he got that name because his own name is "Ga-bi-el Maskey Joe-phes".

Since I'm on names Garrett has been working on learning his whole name. For several weeks now Garrett has thought his name was Garrett Maskey Joe-phes. I corrected him one day and said, "No, it's Garrett Charles Maskey." Garrett giggled and said, "Garrett Cha-es Maskey Joe-phes." As long as he realizes he only has three names before Kindergarten all will be well.

IT'S A.....

'nother boy. He really wasn't the most cooperative little thing (he gets it from his Daddy). He was curled up with his back facing the screen and stayed that way. I think he was probably hungry, I hadn't eaten since breakfast and it was 3 p.m. I can always feel a little bit of movement about 20 minutes after I eat something. I should have eaten on the way over to wake him up a bit. When it came time to see his "boy parts" this was the most clearly we've seen so far... it was a side profile and there was no mistaking that we have a little boy on the way. We both saw it even before the tech said anything.
I'm not sure how to break the news to Gabriel; he's getting another brother, not that sister he keeps talking about. It's gotten to the point that when I refer to the baby he corrects me and says no it's my sister. Poor little guy, I feel bad for him. We really were fine with either gender, but Gabriel has been so insistant, I almost hoped it was a girl so he'd be happy. I guess that's just how life goes. I'm excited to use all the cute little outfits that have been packed up for 2 years.

According to the myth...

So I had an appointment yesterday to check on the heartbeat of our little addition. The doctor asked if I had any idea about the gender. I told him that this time around I honestly have no idea. (With the first two I knew they were boys, because I had a weird, random dreams that didn't make sense; but I was pregnant with a boy in each of the dreams.) This time I've only had one weird dream and I was pregnant with boy/girl fraternal twins. We know there is only one in there, so that wacky dream didn't help me at all. The doctor said that the heartbeat is on the fast side, and according to the myth that means it's a girl. I know it's just an old wive's tale, but it's fun anyway.

Tomorrow is the sonogram to find out for real. It's kinda exciting not having any idea before we go, but not exciting enough to not find out till the birth. :-D

Follow up on the update

So, I did leave a lot of details out about the toilet incident. Now I'll share a little one. When we pulled the toilet up we discovered a mushroom thing growing under it. Yeah I know it made me want to puke. Since there was dirt, instead of foundation, and moisture due to the leak it was able to grow. This morning during breakfast Stephen said, "Last night I dreamed that there was a mushroom growing out from under the tub. So, before I left for basketball (he plays 6 days a week early morning) I had to go in and check to make sure there was nothing there." It made me laugh. That must have been a really traumatic experience for him to clean up and fix if he's dreaming about it now. Poor guy.

As for the stories behind my mom's comment. I'll share, because it should be on record for when I'm a Grandma and get my own revenge.

The make-up: I don't even use make-up except for weddings and family pictures. So it just sits in my little make-up bag. One afternoon Garrett got out of his room during nap time and then busted Gabriel out of his room. They were VERY quiet, so I didn't hear them from the family room. Later I got to thinking that they should be awake and went looking for them...empty dark rooms was all I found. I honestly thought they'd gotten out the windows somehow. Then I heard it....GIGGLES! I followed the sounds of joy to my bathroom. I opened the door to find Garrett standing in the sink and Gabriel on the floor in the middle of a puddle of foundation. Immediately Gabriel tattled that Garrett was getting into the medicine cabinet. HMMM There were layers of hair gel, hand sanitizer, and make-up everywhere. Then I noticed they were covered in a while film and saw the two empty deodorant containers. I'm weird about deodorant so they were two empty EXPENSIVE deodorant containers. Grrrr, off to the second bath of the day for them. I wanted to make sure anything else I couldn't identify was washed off of them too. As I washed Gabriel down there was a ton of brown coming off his arms and hands. Apparently foundation and lotion can be applied to the arms and hands the same way.

Gourmet omlette: Stephen makes fantastic breakfast burritos. When Stephen is making them he puts a bowl in the sink and breaks all the eggs right into that bowl. Early one morning Gabriel came and woke me up with, "Mommy it's terrible Garrett broke the eggs on the couch." Yep, this is often how I wake up in the mornings, to some kind of disaster. As I stumbled into the family room, very grateful that we have free, not nice, hand-me-down couches, I saw the egg carton sitting next to Garrett. I had bought that carton of eggs the previous evening. Next to Garrett was just one broken egg, and a whole egg in each hand. Lucky only one broke....I thought. The carton was empty. I asked Gabriel where the rest of the eggs were. He explained that they had been cooking like Daddy. I looked in the sink and there were the other 9 eggs smashed to pieces, NOT in a bowl. They were lucky that they were the normal store eggs and not the farmer's market expensive ones.

To all the psychologists out there that say we genderize boys to act like boys and girls to act like girls. I CAN ASSURE YOU I DIDN'T TRAIN THESE BOYS TO DESTROY EVERYTHING THEY CAN GET THEIR HANDS ON. Boys simply are boys from the moment they enter this world.

Watching these mobile wrecking balls brings a whole new meaning to the proclamation on the Family when it says that gender is an essential characteristic of premortal, mortal, and eternal existance. (not exact quote) I know not all boys are quite this destructive, and I have hope that we can harness the energy and flow of "ideas" coming from them into something productive someday. Until then, I'm sure I'll continue to live in my little anthill of chaos. These are the golden years right?? I heard during conference that someday I'll miss all the fingerprints. At this point I'd let them leave fingerprints on everything if it meant a reduction in the messes. Another note, a fingerprint is not good enough for boys they want the destruction to make NOISE (rip, crash, shatter, thud followed by a howling crying) you get the idea. I'm grateful the weather has cooled down enough that I can usually talk them into going outside for awhile.

Until the next note worthy disaster.....

Update...sort of

This is our old duct work....yeah it's supposed to be a tube coming out of there. That would be the reason it was all changed out

So I got the basics of a blog figured out, then this semester got CRAZY! I'm teaching a class on 2 days a week. Each class period is just under 3 hours, that's a lot of prep work. I'm interpreting 2 other days a week, and taking a 3 hour long class for myself Wednesday nights. The Wednesday night class has a ton of reading and 12 essay assignments invloved in it. I don't like writing for a grade, I'd rather give an oral presentation any day. It has to happen this semester though, so I'll be missing in action till December. The kids are still wild and crazy; Stephen is and has been awsome with them so far this semester. I am SOOO blessed to have him leading me when I'll follow, by my side when I need support, and behind me pushing me forward when I'm in a stubborn, exhausted, ready to throw in the towel kind of mood. Putting a pregnancy on top of it all is really not condusive to a functional, nice Mommy, good thing it's a temporary thing.

About that I have to write this down so I don't forget.
Gabriel loves to head-butt with that little boulder of a head he has. One night I finally told him that he can't head-butt Mommy anymore because there was a baby in my tummy. The head-butting has lessened. A couple nights later I asked if he was excited to have another brother. ( We haven't found out what it is yet, but history says it'll be a boy) The following conversation happened.

Gabriel (very serious tone and face): Mommy it's a sister.
Me: What if it's another brother?
Gabriel: I already have a brother, I don't need another one, I need a sister.
Me: Sometimes Jesus sends lots of brothers.
Gabriel: No, one brother and 5 sisters. (That many sisters scares Stephen)
Me: We don't have any girl stuff.
Gabriel: Go buy girl stuff.
Me: It'll all be pink.
Gabriel: Oh, I like pink mucho grande. (He has always loved pink, as soon as he could reach the racks at the store I had pink stuff getting thrown in the cart)

Funny boy. He's been talking about his sister since late last spring. We hadn't even started trying at that point. I got lots of funny looks, and confused congratulations because I wasn't even pregnant yet.

Garrett's funny new habit:
Garrett will eat everything he wants off his plate, then quickly switches everything he doesn't want to Gabriel's plate and announces that he's done. We'll call him on it and he holds his empty plate up so proudly, and says, "empy". How young they start. Yesterday he put all of his carrots on Gabriel's plate then stacked his empty one on top to "hide" the evidence. He's gonna be a scary teenager.

In addition to our cunning boys we have had the summer of home repairs.
Early summer we finally landscaped our front yard. It has been the UGLIEST unlandscaped piece of dirt for 6 years, I was ready for it to change. Stephen had drawn up a design with his pool software a while ago, and we finally installed it this summer. That was supposed to be the one big project of the summer. Wellll, we all know how plans go...

In July I noticed Gabriel's room smelled funny. I just explained it as sometimes boys smell funny, and I'm pregnant so my nose is on overdrive right now. Come to discover his carpet was wet, the toys on the carpet were wet, the books were wet, and the sheetrock was squishy. Grrr a leak in the wall. The pipe to the hose spigot outside had a weld let go. Stephen cut all the nasty, moldy, stinky sheetrock out, hired a plumber to re-weld the pipe, sanded and treated all the yucky wood studs in the wall, replaced the wet insulation with much better insulation, installed new sheetrock....and then realized there was no way he'd be able to match the texture over the patch. Luck would have it, he ran into a guy at Home Depot that had the machine needed to match the texture. He came and did a great job in Gabriel's room and on the large hole behind the front door. Garrett helped "create" that hole behind the front door. The texture guy said this was one of the few jobs that he didn't have to do over again. Good job Stephen...you did a fantastic job.

A couple days later I noticed moisture around the base of our front toilet. I was not excited about what this repair may lead to, Stephen wasn't excited either. It got worse and worse, so we couldn't ignore it anymore. Stephen pulled the toilet up and EW...I'll spare you the details. This repair would not be easy. After Stephen studied a how to build it book, a contractor, and the depths of his engineer mind, he came up with a plan. Our quality home's foundation didn't go all the way to the pipe that comes up from the sewer. Stephen had to pour additional concrete, install a new flange, while making sure that all the bolts were in place while it set up. However, I did get my new TOTO one piece, 10 out of 10 flush rating toilet. One piece was important with little boys potty training. Now there is no space between the tank and bowl for boys to pee in. :-)

Our last repair of the summer was a big one. All summer I thought I was going crazy because the house felt much hotter than in the past. I would check the vents and didn't feel any air coming out. Stephen climbed into the attic and discovered our duct work was fully detached from our cooler. Yeah, the cooler was blowing cold air into the attic, not my house. Grrrr! I knew I wasn't crazy. So a couple weeks ago, we hired someone to replace all the duct work in the entire house. This is one time I'm glad our house is small. My vents are now little mini wind tunnels. AHHH, cold air.

I hope that we can wait a while to save up and replace the leaking roof and finish our the block wall around the back yard. Both are crazy expensive and we want to have the money in hand first.

This was a super long post, I have pictures to accompany all the "fun". Those probably won't be posted for a long time...but someday I'll get them up. :-D