Family Photos

"Come on, Rusty" I said.

"It'll be easy.  Just all of us piled up on our beanbags in front of that blank white wall."  Currently, almost all of all walls are blank and they are all white, but I digress.  

"It'll just take a few minutes."

Poor Rusty.

Our girls

Fun stuff about our girls:

Naomi is 18 months now and has mastered the art of "adorable".  And uses it to her advantage.  She charms everyone she meets, with her curly hair and huge grin.  She has never been afraid of strangers.  I took her on a couple airplane trips the other week, and she grinned and flirted and toddled everywhere she went...one gentleman from Japan fell in love with her.  He stopped us and gestured that he would like to take her picture.  I said he could and then he spent the next five minutes grinning and snapping her picture as she ran up and down the terminal.  He dragged over his wife to see the cute baby, too.  Fun.

Two days ago she had a little too much fun in mud puddles (and plain old mud).  I carried her inside and stripped off her muddy/gravely clothes, and got her all cleaned up.  Then I went out the sliding door to hose her clothes off.  I didn't want Naomi to follow, so I closed the door--and the wooden bar slid down and locked me out.  Naomi was trapped inside alone, and I was outside, barefoot.  All the doors and windows were locked.  I prayed for ideas as I went around and around the house, looking for a way in.  It's a long walk (barefoot on gravel roads, no less) to our neighbors, and I didn't want to leave Naomi.  I tried to show Naomi how to pick up the wooden bar, but she didn't get it.  I was getting ready to break a glass panel on our front door, but I was afraid Naomi would get hurt, when she simply reached up and turned the lock.  She's never done that before, but I think someone whispered the idea in her ear for me!!  So very grateful.

Hannah is certainly growing up!  She just turned nine.  She told me that turning nine made her feel so much older than when she was just eight.  ;o)  She got a bunch of seashell / beach themed items for her half bathroom, plus a dollhouse kit for her birthday.  She loved it.  She got a couple birthday cards in the mail, too- she still LOVES mail!  Thanks, Sis. McDonald and Gramma and Grandpa Earl!  She was also thrilled to add her birthday money to her piggy bank- that girl loves saving money and planning what to do with it.

Hannah is all-girl.  She had a math assignment recently, in which she was to make up story problems.  Her problems were about baskets of kittens, flowers with butterflies on them, and doughnuts.  Oh, yes.  ;o)

Random pictures/ Silly Captions

So Michelle said I had to post something this week. I said, "I don't know what to write about since I am usually writing brag blog stuff about filming adventures." She said, "Just post some pictures with silly captions."

I can so do that :)

The kids enjoy pulling ticks off the cat.  Patient cat. 

Nate the Great, enjoying a break from the cannula.

Hyrums 11th birthday!  With a kiwi bird cake.

He's on a Star Wars kick right now. 

That's my Michelley, I'm so lucky :) 

Poor Michelly, she gets to see this mug everyday. 

"I told you Hyrum, it's my turn on the swing!"

Target practice.

Like mother, like daughter. Our little Naomi likes to get cozy with a good book :)

Nate snores loudly.   

(Just kidding!)

Hammock time is a special time, it's the time we beat each other up.

We love the hammock.

Really.

Da girlz.

Hyrums favorite picture of himself . . look familiar?

My girls!

Once more.

I wish I had a picture!!

Sorry!  The camera is in Ecuador with Rusty...check his video blog in the sidebar for more details there.  ;o)

On Saturday, we (Hannah, Hyrum, Naomi and I) went out during one of Nate's naps to harvest some mulberries off of our cute little mulberry tree.

This tree is our entire garden right now, so Hannah and I dote on it.  I even ripped out a whole bunch of poison ivy, by hand, from around the trunk this winter.  That rash was worth it, man!  Anyway, we get about two or three weeks of berry crops, harvesting a couple gallons every three days or so.  They don't taste of much, but they make smoothies a really cool purple, and the pies are quite nice.

We spread out old sheets under the tree, then I had Hannah climb up in the tree and shake the branches.  I shook the outer limbs and used a long pole to reach the upper branches.  All the berries rained down on the sheets, as well as Naomi and Hyrum.  ;o)  Hyrum wasn't too keen on the idea and bailed, but Naomi loved it!  She picked up berry after berry, squishing them one by one.  Purple hands, purple feet, so much fun!  Then, when I moved her so I could gather up the sheets and pour the berries in the bowls, she took off down the driveway- straight for the mud!  And giggling all the way.  When I brought her inside, her top half was blotches of deep purple, and her bottom half was mud monster.  And she was grinning ear to ear!  Such a cutie.  She and Hannah went straight to the tub- mud soup, people.  Proof of a fun day!

Idioms

Hyrum had an English unit on idioms at school a while back.  These lessons really are important for kids who struggle with understanding language that is not literal, so of course they worked doubly hard with Hyrum to help him understand what idioms are all about and how people use them- as well as the translation of common idioms.

Hyrum's teachers did a fantastic job!  Hyrum really grasped the concept!  Then he applied it...

All of the sudden, Hyrum started yelling, "I HAVEN'T ANY MAMA!!" and whining in a very specific manner.  He would sometimes do it randomly, but usually when he was frustrated.  We (teachers and parents) were perplexed.  I had spent a week in the hospital with Nate lately- was Hyrum feeling abandoned?

We asked Hyrum what it means, but all he would say in explanation is "that is a tantrum idiom!"

Finally, while watching one of his current favorite movies, "The Little Princess" (awesome, right?) we discovered the "translation."  Lottie, the four-year-old girl at school, yells "I HAVEN'T ANY MAMA!" while throwing a huge tantrum.  That was Hyrum's favorite scene in the whole show.  He played it over and over again, laughing his head off.

What a kid.  How do you explain that it is only an idiom if everyone knows what it means?

Hyrum is funny about language.  He will not allow anyone, even movies or songs, say the word "it" in his presence.  Or "sorry", or "accident", or most contractions (hey, just like Baljeet!)  He will stop the conversation, make a little screeeecch/crash sound, and say "donotsaytheword_____!"  Then the conversation may continue.  Do it (oops) too many times in a single conversation and he will be in a really bad mood for the next five minutes.

It is great that he is progressing so well with his language skills that we can now have conversations (especially on his favorite topics) and he can understand what we want.   But I do miss a few things: his "Jubba Jubba" language and accompanying lectures, his curiously-chosen replacement words, and of course, childhood mispronunciations: "cali-pill-iter" was my favorite- he said that (instead of caterpillar) clear up until he was ten.  Maybe I encouraged it a little.  ;o)

                                                 (last November behind Grandma's house)

We're Alive!

Yeah, it's been a long time since we've posted anything.  Why?  Computer illiteracy (and a small dose of apathy).  We have more than one google account and when they changed their login format, we couldn't figure out how to get into this particular account.  For a long time.  Then I was too lazy to figure it out- I usually only have 10 minutes of time to spare for anything lately, so it got shoved to the back burner.

But we are alive and well!  Had a good winter, overall.  I think we are the only ones we know who didn't mind the extra snow one bit.  Even if we did get snowed in a lot.

Nate has started two new treatments, one of which is really helping him avoid infections.  He went from 50% attendance at school to more like 80%.  Yea!  The other one is still in the works- hopefully we will see progress (fewer seizures) soon.  He's doing really well in his goals at school-learning to make choices by pushing buttons, spending time in a stander, etc.  He loves to listen to rhyming books and rhythmic songs!

Naomi was really worrying us by not progressing in her gross motor skills, but in January and February something finally "clicked" and she seemed to discover that she has legs for a reason!  She sat independently, learned to get in a sitting position all by herself, army crawled, really crawled, pulled to a stand and cruised along furniture all in a whirlwind eight weeks.  Yea!  She turned 1 in March and now just needs to learn how to eat anything other than formula in a bottle.  She's still the calmest, happiest baby you'll ever meet, and we love her to pieces.

Hannah is the live wire around the house!  She loves being eight and is trying so hard to do everything just right- and gets really, really frustrated when it doesn't work the first time.  She loves Naomi a bit TOO much- we often have to remind her (i.e. demand) to "back off!" and "be more gentle!"  She is always looking for jobs to do around the house...for the right price, of course.  Sigh.  ;o)  She's getting really insightful about the world around her and asks some pretty good questions.  I'll have to remember one for a post.

Hyrum has his ups and downs- he's getting more anxiety as he gets into the pre-teen years.  He is getting much better at communicating things, though, and that helps tremendously.  We have some pretty insightful conversations now and again.  He adores cats and I figure that if we ever move, we will have to bring Joyce (the outside cat that won't leave) along or Hyrum will mourn her forever.  Hyrum still loves to be a class clown and loves inventing dramatic statements to see what people's reactions will be.  That can get interesting!  Once again, a future post...

Rusty still loves his job, and Michelle still loves her kids, and we are doing well.  It's a tricky stage in our family where there is hardly enough time to meet everyone's basic needs, but we know it will get easier as they get older.  Life is good.