Art

Clara is really into drawing. Sometimes it's just nonsense and scribbles, but sometimes she creates these well thought out drawings. Her skill doesn't intrigue me nearly as much as the concepts behind her pictures. This is the one I mentioned a few days ago. It was to say sorry for waking Hazel up. Notice the "I lov you Ana"? In addition to that, I love how we are all relatively proportional to each other.She handed me this one on 11.22.11 and through a giant grin said, "This is a picture of you from when you were fat and Hazel was still inside you." Pointing to the blue stuff she said, "This is the water."
Sure, I might resemble a giant snail, but I absolutely love this drawing. I smile every time I look at it.

Empty House, Full Heart

My family has Thanksgiving dinner on Wednesday night so we can go with our in-law families on Thanksgiving. (Isn't my mom a genius?) This year we had it at our house, which is why it was absolutely necessary and responsible to stay up until after 1:30 am the night before creating my banner.

After saying goodbye to the last of our 17 guests, I walked into my house filled with gratitude. I have so much to be grateful for. Tonight, I was especially grateful for our house. Specifically, for our awkward living room that previously kind of bothered me. You see, I love parties. I was so anxious for a bigger house so I could host get togethers with lots of people. I'm realizing this "living room" is ideal for just that. The aesthetic things that bother me about my house, the ugly floors that will most likely stick around for a while and the possibility that this unusual room will never be furnished are all worth it knowing this one room allows me to combine some of my favorite things in life (friends, family and food) while satisfying one of my simple wishes.

One Thing Leads to Another

My mind wanders like crazy and I often laugh at where my thinking begins compared to where it ends. The night we bid farewell to our renter (the end of September), I got a few e-mails from one of my clients that made me think things aren't exactly going to pan out for his business (he paid me for 3 months of work, so I think it's okay for now). Anyway, of course when these happened my mind began to wander...

I first panicked and looked for jobs on Craigslist.

From there I saw a posting for an education instructor.

I've always wanted to teach accounting (certain I could make it exciting, fun and understandable, which is super easy, ha ha), so I started looking up requirements to be a college teacher.

I confirmed what I already knew, I need my Masters!

I googled best online Masters programs.

I found some, they range from $20k-50k. (Wow, that would take an awful lot of working to recoup that cost).

Is tuition really that much?? I wonder what undergrad tuition at ASU is now.

I search and find something showing tuition in Fall 2004 (when I graduated ASU) was just over $2000. That is several hundred more than when I started four years earlier. Now, it's over $4,000 a semester. Holy cow!

And now you know how I learned how much ASU tuition is.

59 Months

It seems so easy to recognize and document the milestones and progress of a baby and easy to forget updates on the older kid. Poor Clara. Next month Clara turns 5 and it seems like she was born not long ago, yet I feel like we've been hanging out forever. She is my sidekick. She is the best helper. She keeps an eye on Hazel for me, if I'm busy/working and Hazel wakes up from a nap, Clara always offers to "go and talk to Hazel". She puts toys in her crib and talks to her to keep her entertained until I can get her. She picks her up and brings her to me and can barely hold her up, but hasn't dropped her. (Dare I say yet?) She can make her laugh like no one else and loves her little sister like crazy. One time I asked her to watch Hazel while I left the room for a few minutes. She came running in and said, "Mom! Hazel put something in her mouth!" Flustered and running to Hazel I said, "I thought I told you to watch her!" Clara innocently shot back, "I did. I watched her put that thing in her mouth!"

When she's not busy being my helper, she still utilizes that wild imagination of hers. We pretend pretty much all the time. It's probably safe to say we are pretending more than we are living reality. Witches, cheetahs, fairies, heroes, sonic and after seeing an Indian dance at the balloon festival, we have been Indians full time. The funny thing is she can't remember the word 'Indian'. She has asked at least 30 times, "What are we again?" She even sat for an hour outside Saturday night while Jason and I worked in the yard and beat her "drum". On the way to tithing settlement we were discussing why I didn't want her to wear her headband on her forehead and be an Indian at the church.

C: Why don't you like the way Indians look?
M: I don't have a problem with the way Indians look, it's just not appropriate to pretend to be an Indian at tithing settlement.

C: We're not pretending. (Totally serious.)

Later that evening we were discussing possibly making Indian feather headbands to wear at Thanksgiving...

C: Where do real Indians get their feathers?

J: From eagles and other birds.

C: Ewwwwww! That's disgusting!

J: Why?
C: Because they are full of diseases!

Sometimes, she pretends she's in college and has a boyfriend and talks like she's 21 on her phone. That pretending gives me anxiety, but humors me at the same time.

She plays so well independently but loves to socialize and have friends over or go to a friend's house. Planning her birthday party is becoming a bit difficult since she seems to want to invite everyone in her preschool class.

She loves her preschool and amazes me with the things she learns and remembers. I think she gets nervous when she's asked questions because sometimes she freezes up and can't answer so she'll make something up. But really, she knows the answer and will expound on anything I say. Last week was the second parent program to finish up the earth module. They had an ocean and submarine to play in. Clara must be acclimated to her new schedule of school three days a week because she didn't yawn every 2 minutes during the program like last time. She just sang nice and loud and listened when she was supposed to be listening. I noticed other than one girl that is close to a year older than her and one or two boys, she is the tallest person out of the other 15 kids. I don't think she's short, but being the tallest girl and taller than all but a few boys did surprise me.

I think she's going to be a good little reader based on some of the things she does. We have bells that she practices for music and she can read the solfage notes on the bells. We just finished reading Charlotte's Web and she loved it. She loves to be read to and to read. She will "read" for over an hour on her bed.

The other day she woke Hazel up from her nap. It wasn't intentional but I got upset because she wasn't even supposed to be in my room (I was in the shower). I scolded her and a few minutes later, she came back with an apology note. I need to scan it in, but she wrote, all by herself, "I love you." She missed some letters, but still. Not only was it so sweet, but also very impressive that she wrote the message so well.

She is quick to compliment, but also quick to speak her mind. She told the little girl we carpool with that her shirt was pretty... but "it looks like pajamas." In our house we speak our mind and try not to take offense. She does that well, but I need to work on teaching her about being sensitive to other's feelings.

She is still super curious and asks why, what words mean and for explanations constantly. For the most part, she is well behaved, eats well, sleeps well and plays well. Every now and then she will still come in our room at night. One night a few weeks ago she came in while I was still awake. She laid with me for a little bit. I asked her if she was ready to go back to her room. She said she wanted to lay with me for a few minutes longer. A few minutes later, she sat up, slid off my bed and went back to her own bed.

We have double sliding mirror doors on our closet. Every time Clara walks past them, she smiles at herself in the mirror.

One night we knelt down for family prayer and she came over to kneel to my right. Then she said she wanted to be by Jason and then got in between us and said, "Actually, I'll be in the middle so I can be by both of you. Wooooo!"

I could go on and on with the funny things she says and does. Like when Jason ran over the curb pulling out of our neighborhood and she screeched, "Dad! You just ran over the curb!" or when she found out Dan and Karen were driving behind us and she said, "So it's like we're the horses and they are the trailer." Before tithing settlement I was prepping her since often Bishops will ask questions about tithing. I asked her if she knows where tithing goes, obviously looking for something along the lines of to help pay for churches or temples. Clara is much more logical than that. Her answer? The bank.

Sunday was our primary program. Clara said her part perfectly and about twice as fast as she normally talks. They had her class, the CTR 4's, stand up to the front of the platform/stage (what is that thing called?) for the songs. During the entire first song, Clara held her hand straight up and jumped up and down over and over and over. Apparently she wanted to make sure Grandma and Grandpa Melzer knew where she was. It was really, really funny. And really, really irreverant. Of course she sang as loud as she could too so that even if someone couldn't see her, they could hear her. Someone told Jason she sang the wrong word in a song and said, "ooops, I mean ______" and corrected herself. She also let her friend (who's a bit bigger than her) sit on her lap for some of it. I've had about a dozen people tell me how entertaining she was to watch. I was sitting with my class, close enough to see everything she did but far enough away that I couldn't do a single thing about it. I love that she smiles and is so spunky and fun... even if she's still learning that there is a time and place for everything.

Hazel Basil

10 months has come and gone for Hazel. (And 3+ weeks have passed since I first started this post! No worries, anything time sensitive has been updated accordingly. I know you were worried.)

On the 22nd of October, Hazel pulled herself up all by herself. Considering this was only about a week after she pulled herself onto her knees for her first time, I was proud of my mellow little I'm-not-going-to-move-anymore-than-I-have-to baby. Plus, she made it before 1o months.

On November 1st, I noticed her 7th tooth coming in. She was pretty crabby on Saturday and Sunday but happier on Monday. I forgot to check it then, but I'm assuming it broke through on the 31st and I just noticed it the 1st.

She loves making noise with her mouth. Brbrbrbrbr, vbbbbbbbbbbbbbbt - I even got a picture of it. How do you people expect me not to squeeze and kiss these cheeks 100 times a day?

She acts super shy and pushes her head back into my chest when someone tries to get her to smile.

She's not a fan of guys. Sometimes she likes them, but usually, she's not into them. Especially if she's never seen them before.

Keeping her full is tiring. She eats so much, which means I've had to be extra diligent about making sure I have things to feed her. Example dinner: 1/3 cup beans, 1 cup steamed veggies about 1/3 of an apple (I ate the skin off and she ate gnawed away until there was about an inch of the core left). She'll eat two whole pancakes for breakfast with about 12 giant grapes. You see why I have a hard time keeping up. I don't usually buy baby food and while we almost always have fresh fruits and vegetables, that doesn't mean they are steamed and infant ready.

This week she has been crawling more than she "limps". It's so cute watching her long skinny body. She is very, very slow and cautious.

She waves (with a lot of coaxing), says da da, ma ma and dog (much to Jason's dismay). It makes me laugh to see how much my kids love animals. They don't just tolerate them, they LOVE them.

Hazel loves going outside and if I go open the door in preparation for Clara getting home from school but don't actually go outside, she cries.

She also cries every time I lay her down to change her diaper.

Her new trick is to throw her little blankie over her crib before nap time and cry until I come get it for her. She's only done it a few times, so hopefully that phase is over. Because she's not into crying herself to sleep. She'll cry for 2 hours if I let her. (She only did this twice and then luckily, the excitement of it wore off).

She throws fits when she doesn't get what she want or when I take something away. Today she bit a hole in the bag of cheese crackers (in about .5 seconds) and started crying the biggest tears ever when I took it away.

She can hold her own bottle and sippy cup, but usually loses interest much quicker when it's not held for her.

She shakes her head back and forth a lot when I'm playing with her. Then she waits for me to do something back, even if it's just laughing. She also does this and moves her body when she hears music.

She adores Clara and always wants to follow her, smiles when she sees her and laughs when Clara kisses her goodnight.

I'm not really sure how to describe her personality. She is super mellow, calm and quiet, unless she wants something. When she wants something, she's very determined, strong-willed and fiesty. She is curious, but also content. This means she didn't bother opening a kitchen cupboard until a few weeks ago. Now every time we're in the kitchen that's all she wants to do.

When she gets excited, she kicks her legs super fast and super hard. In the bathtub she splashes like crazy from kicking so hard. Of course she makes noises to go along with it.

She dug in the trash for the first time a few nights ago. I left the kitchen for just a few seconds and when I came back, she'd already crawled from the table to the trash can, pulled herself up and was helping herself to a cucumber. She doesn't normally move fast, but I suppose if anything gets her moving, it'd be food. I never had to worry about this with Clara because we had a tall garbage can with a lid.

She is getting less and less cuddly, which is awful since she wasn't cuddly to begin with. For naps and night time, I used to be able to hold her in my arms and sing a song. Now, she pushes away after just a few seconds. I don't even really sing to her before bed anymore, I just hug her for a few seconds and lay her down.

She is super, super ticklish. Just rubbing my head on her belly gets her giggling hard. Which is extra funny since she has such a cheesy, toothy grin.

Q&A

Why is Hazel usually in a dress? Because I take a lot of pictures on Sundays since that's the only time she wears a headband.

Why is she wearing the same headband in all these pictures? Because I just made it and I think it's really cute.

Why is she so skinny even when she nurses 4 times a day and eats 3 meals? Good question, no answer.

Why is Hazel so cute? Because she looks just like I did when I was a baby.

Why is Hazel so mellow? Because she acts just like Jason did when he was a baby.

Did I miss anything?

Oh What A Beautiful Morning*

There's a fine line between adventurous and stupid. Waking up before 5am for the Arizona Balloon Classic rode on that line. Trying to get ready, get Clara ready, pump and leave by 5:20am to pick up Angela made me question my sanity once or twice. I don't wake up that early. Especially after I don't get to bed until almost 1am. It turned out pretty neat**.

*My dad LOVED to come in our room in the morning to wake us up for family scripture study singing this song at the top of his lungs. Nothing sounds worse to a teenager early in the morning. Even still, I now sing it all the time.

**Neat minus having to pay $1 for 5 minutes of jumping in the bouncy things. Really people? After you charge to park and charge for admission, you're going to charge us for that?

The Slow Life

Besides feeling sorry for myself, here's what else we have been busy doing...

Playing in water
Being weird
Learning why hair spray was invented
Gnawing carrots
Going on walks during the day
Going on walks at night (bundled up, of course) PS Doesn't Hazel look old in this picture? Her face looks really thin and not like a baby. No worries, she still has her edible chubby cheeks. And even if she didn't, don't you just want to bit her anyway? :)
And watching our oranges turn from green to, well, orange. Yay!

My {birth}Day

Getting older doesn't really bother me. 30 is a year older than 29 just like 29 is a year older than 28. We started celebrating my birthday a night early when Jason invited friends and family over for a little surprise party. When I opened the door, everyone was on the porch with a sign and balloons. Surprise! I was surprised. Normally I check the peephole. Not this time.

"I love parties! I also love pink sparkly princess hats and photoshopping pictures of me since I have nothing better to do with my time!"

Then came Saturday, my actual birthday. We went from one thing to the next. All day. It was good, but exhausting.

Wake up (very important)

Make breakfast

Shun the Sun race with Clara

Watch Clara, Lucy and Elsa eat cookies, frosting and sprinkles for breakfast

"These people don't care how many sprinkles we put on our cookies. Yay!! The more sugar we eat, the faster we'll run!"

Run race with Clara, Kathryn and her girls.

"Mmmm, that leftover frosting and on my mouth is just what I need to keep running!"

Face painting & bouncies (I think we'll definitely do this next year - the race was not long {thank goodness!} and the after party was super fun)

"Cheeez that sun is bright. But we are butterflies! I'm a tiger! With rainbow pants! Rar!"

Angela's for camera

Home to shower and change

Feed Hazel

Visit Jason's dad in hospital (he had a little heart scare earlier this week that ended with him being flown the Arizona Heart Hospital for an outpatient procedure - he's okay and we're all happy about that).

"Hello! I'm alive!"

Mason's birthday party

"Boing, boing, boing"

Dinner at Liberty Market

"I love Liberty Market! I'm so glad to be here!"

Home to change

Head to friend's reception and take some pictures

Home at last - after 10pm

Pass out on bed without washing face or brushing teeth

I had great plans of posting about what a great birthday I had. I promise it was a good day. It was busy and I thought that staying busy kept me from thinking of all the things you wish for on your birthday. Let's be honest, whether you are 3 or 30, everyone wants to feel special on their birthday. But really all I did was postpone my over thinking and pity party for a day. Sunday wasn't busy and I had a little meltdown when no one was around. I think sometimes I let myself pretend I'm a better person than I really am. I try to talk myself into thinking I am the kind of person I wish I was. The person that doesn't let little things bother them. The kind of person that everyone loves. The kind of person that doesn't feel sad or hurt because they only think positive thoughts. The kind of person that is happy despite their circumstances. Eventually, the truth comes out. And on top of having all the emotions I previously blocked come flooding in, I also felt like a bit of a failure for not being who I wish I was. Double fail. Apparently perfection doesn't happen in 30 years. Darn.

Destination: Utah

Purpose: Emma's baptism

Consequences: lunch at Pizzeria 712 (just me and Rachel - no kids {bonus #94 of traveling with Jason}), snow, learning (through his prayer) that Lucas is thankful "for our 206 bones", the baptism, seeing Daniel and Steven looking great (especially in white shirts and ties - so handsome), baptism dinner, the Levis, The Nobles and of course many, many laughs.

The drive: We decided to drive all night again. I didn't have a turn until after 5am. I love driving during sunrise. It gives me time to ponder on the sun. How it lights up the world before we can see it. So many parallels to the Son. Plus, I get to see Jason cuddle up with a flowered blanket.

Seeing Family: Steven loves, loves, loves kids and they love him. I loved visiting him and Daniel, talking with Rachel and laughing at Lucas. He does his hair over and over all the time, by himself. Anyone think his mohawk is inappropriate for church?
Snow: I was so excited to see a light dusting of snow Saturday morning when we woke up. I knew Clara would be so excited.
The baptism: What's not to love about baptisms?
The after party: What's not to love about good food and awesome people?
The Levis: Kiri and I think way too much alike - I wish I could convince her to move back to AZ.
Random: Lucas spends more time on his hair than Clara.
The Nobles: Always good, hearty conversations with Jen.
Cousins: Not only does Clara love her cousins, but some of them are boys! She doesn't spend much time with her boy cousins... since she's only got three and they all live out of state. Rachel's kids love and adore my kids and play so well with them.
Random: Cutest shows Hazel owns. I bought these when I was pregnant before Hazel.
iGenius: Rachel was showing Hazel her iPhone and Hazel would take her little ET finger and slide down on it.
Random: pretty temple
The trip home: I almost wanted to drive all night just so my kids would sleep and we wouldn't have to stop 3 times. We decided not to and although we did stop 3 times, making our trip over 12 hours, Clara and Hazel were great. Hazel didn't cry once. She squawked a few times when it was getting close to feeding time, but after a few Cheerios she stopped. We had snow most of the way home, so that was fun. Although, the roads weren't bad and if they were, it wouldn't have been fun. Clara is always a little wild in restaurants when we're traveling. She hops up and will just start dancing around. I don't blame her. Oh, and these thermals cracked me up. I bought them a while ago on clearance, but just opened the package in Utah. The pants were super short and fat - not exactly Clara's type. Hopefully they'll shrink a bit.

Why must my sisters live in different states? Visiting with them and hanging out never gets old. It seems so cruel that life allows siblings to be separated by state lines. These people that I can relate to so much, that I feel comfortable around and at home in their houses and that treat my kids like their own. I often wonder why can't we all live in the same neighborhood. Of course I know the answer, but that doesn't mean I don't wish for a different reality.