Clara Turns 6

Other than dealing with a mom that had strep and laid on the couch and worked all day, I think Clara had a fun time turning six. I picked up donuts on my way home from the doctor and that afternoon my mom took her to ice cream and shopping, where she got to spend a little of her birthday money. That night she got to go to Jason's Christmas party and they all sang happy birthday to her. On Saturday, we had a small celebration at the park. It was a beautiful day and Clara loved getting to play outside. I'm especially grateful for everyone that made her birthday special since I was borderline useless. Not a day goes by that I don't look at Clara with a humble heart that she was sent to our home. I still get all tingly every night I check on her. When I see her precious face, sleeping peacefully, I can't stop my heart from swelling with joy and love.

Clara loves to be silly and make people laugh. She's really into telling jokes, but they don't usually make sense. She is very easily entertained and the simplest things often bring her big, bright smile to her face. She loves to talk like she's 18 and takes assignments and responsibility very seriously. She desperately needs one-on-one time with me and if I notice her misbehaving and focus on her, her behavior changes instantly. She loves wearing makeup and would wear it every day if I let her. She thinks every boy is handsome and told me someone was her boyfriend, "But not to tell him." She loves to organize and deep clean but could do without light, pick-up cleaning. She mostly could care less about her appearance but feels so special when I do her hair different, she gets new clothes or gets to wear makeup (if only even lip gloss). She is so thoughtful and a wonderful big sister. She usually likes to play with Hazel and usually likes to be a peacemaker instead of a pest. She loves to draw, play with play dough, pretend, use her imagination, dance and read/look at books. However, I think the one thing she could probably do all day long is listen to me read to her. She loves reading time and she usually begs for more no matter how long we read. I love it too, especially since it usually happens when Hazel is napping so it's just the two of us.

^This is serious, she is in deep concentration

^Mix and match day at school (I'm still proud of myself for letting her wear that outfit to school)

^There's a reason I asked Ryan to put the cheese and meat on the tray

It's been a really great six years.

The Worst Christmas Ever (According to Jason)

December is a crazy month. Add a few birthdays in and it is lots and lots of crazy. However, I love the month of December and was determined not to let our December be too crazy. I told one of my clients I wouldn't be in most of December to make sure I had time to enjoy my favorite time of year with my favorite people.

Well.

Joke's on me.

December was rough.

It started with our vacation. I'm not saying our vacation was rough. Our vacation was fun, the timing was not. I don't know that I will take another vacation in December as long as I'm working. From the day we got home from California, I felt like I couldn't catch up on work. It didn't matter how much I worked or how late I stayed up, I always felt a few days behind. Jason was also swamped at work so we didn't see him much for the few weeks after our trip. We came home from California Wednesday (5th) night and that weekend, we had our Ward Christmas party, an HOA party (that I was in charge of dessert for), a baptism, Clara's dance recital 

and we hosted our family dinner. So obviously I wasn't able to use the weekend to catch up. I was so busy the next week with work that I neglected finishing Christmas shopping, planning parties, cleaning the house and being any type of housewife. However, I actually felt like I gained some traction on my work to do's and figured I'd power through all my other responsibilities the following week. I had volunteered to help in the temple and then I had work on Wednesday. But other than that, I had a week of nothing but time to get things done and spend time with my girls.

Except things didn't really work out that way. (When will I learn?)

Monday night my mom got super sick so I had to scramble to find babysitters for Tuesday and Wednesday. Thanks to willing and able friends and family, I did it. Wednesday I woke up super sick and kept feeling worse and worse and worse. My mom had strep throat but I talked myself out of thinking I had it since she felt sick two days before me and I hadn't seen her since. I got the kids dinner, put them to bed and stayed up late trying to get work done on Wednesday night. Thursday morning I woke up feeling awful, but continued to pretend I wasn't that sick (Advil tricked me into thinking I felt better). I went to Target, Ross and Costco. I almost passed out multiple times in Costco. I had to sit down in the store until I could walk a decent amount without passing out. I never should have gone shopping. Oh, and remember, Jason is still working a ton so he's not around to help. I stayed up again Thursday working, even though I felt bad anytime the Advil wore off.

Friday morning I woke up feeling worse than ever so I went to the doctor and sure enough: strep. I went on anti-biotics for the first time in about 20 years and washed my hands a thousand times, at least, to hopefully keep my girls from getting sick. That Friday night I had to miss Jason's company Christmas party but I finally started feeling better after three days of feeling bad. I was more behind than ever since I'd been operating at about 25% capacity. Oh yes, and Friday (the 21st) was Clara's birthday. I worked on the couch while she watched movies. All morning long. Luckily my mom stopped by and let her go shopping with her and out to get ice cream so I didn't feel too bad. Saturday we celebrated Clara's birthday at the park with some family and friends. It was a beautiful day, I was no longer contagious and so far, the kids hadn't got sick. I went shopping that night and wore myself out.

Sunday morning Jason woke up and said, "I think I'm getting what you have." I might have had a hard time feeling bad for him at first because he didn't seem to grasp what I went through earlier that week and how much I had to do feeling that way. I felt very, very blessed to have a friend call in his prescription to avoid Urgent Care. I also was grateful he was able to get medication so early to reduce the risk of the kids getting it. He slept all day and all night. I took the kids to church by myself and my friend that sits behind us asked me if she could watch my girls while I sang in the Christmas program. I was just planning on sitting it out because I didn't want to have to ask someone to sit with my kids for the Christmas program. After offering a few times, I let her. I love singing in the Christmas program so it meant a lot to me and made me pretty emotional. I also had to say the closing prayer so she watched them for that too.

Monday, Christmas Eve, Jason helped me clean all day long (that was the one thing I asked for for Christmas). That night we went to my parent's for Christmas lights, hot chocolate and stories by Grandpa Melzer. Christmas morning we were all feeling a little better. We spent the morning at home and the afternoon at my parent's. Wednesday, the 26th, was Hazel's birthday. She wasn't feeling well and had a fever. I worked all day and scrambled to make dessert for a get together at Angela's to celebrate. Oh yeah, and Rachel and kids came. Yay!

Thursday (27th) Jason and I worked. Friday (28th) Jason decided to leave work early to drive to Taylor to see his Grandma Penrod before she passed away. Hospice had been in for a few days and said it'd be any time. That night he told me he thought he was getting sick again. Saturday (29th) morning he came home, with a fever and went straight to bed. That meant I had to clean the whole house (remember, I neglected it all month?) and prepare dinner for my friends and take care of the kids by myself. Instead of stressing, I called Lilly and Casey Anne to come help. That's when I realized money may not buy you happiness, but it can totally lower stress. :) They cleaned, set up the tables and chairs and helped me prepare the food. It was kind of awesome. So then I hosted a get together for my high school friends alone while Jason slept in our room.

I have always been so grateful for a good, solid group of friends. Their spouses are just as great and I love getting everyone together. We had dinner, had a gift exchange and talked and talked and talked. You know I love to talk, right? I do. Especially with awesome people.

Sunday (30th) Jason was still running a high fever (almost 103*) but he was feeling better. I took Hazel to church with Rachel and Lucas while Clara stayed home with Jason because she couldn't stop coughing for more than 5 minutes. That night we went to my mom's for dinner without Jason. Monday, New Year's Eve, Jason was feeling better and went to work. That's about when life started returning to a semi-normal state (minus that being the day his Grandma passed away).

And now you know why Jason thinks it was the worst Christmas ever. He was in bed most of the last two weeks of December and when he wasn't in bed, was wishing he was. I have never seen him this sick, let alone this sick back to back. I, on the other hand, enjoyed  Christmas and birthdays despite the chaos. We made lots of fun memories. More pictures and less words to come...

Disneyland Trip Part II: Disneyland

Sunday night we drove to Anaheim. We stayed at the Anaheim Islander Inn and Suites. It wasn't fantastic, but it was clean, inexpensive and walking distance from Disneyland. Monday was our first day at the park. It "rained" (I believe rain in southern California doesn't exactly exist, but is more so a drizzle) and I think that kept some of the crowds away. We stayed in Disneyland all day Monday and were able to ride many rides. We waited no more than 15-20 minutes a ride and several were 5 minutes or so.

We rode a lot of the "psychedelic" rides (Alice In Wonderland, Roger Rabit, Peter Pan) the first day and Hazel did not appreciate them. When we left the park that first night, she kept saying, "No Disneyland." I think Clara was just in awe at everything. Come to find out, she always thought Disneyland was where you got to go see the Disneyland castle. She didn't know it was full of rides. My favorite part was the lighting on the castle after the firework show. It was awesome, which is why you'll see lots and lots of pictures of it below.

 

 

Our second day, Tuesday, we started out in California Adventures. We went to the Little Mermaid ride first and the nice old man told us we might want to go to the Toy Story ride first. We did and pretty much walked on with no wait. I was so glad he told us that because I don't think the line was less than 30-45 minutes the rest of the day. We went to Disneyland in the afternoon for the parade and then came back to California Adventures for the laser show at night. We also walked through the new Cars Land. It's pretty amazing. Although the parks seemed much more crowded than Monday, we still didn't wait more than 20 minutes or so for a ride and many were less. We got just about everything done we wanted to and still had time to watch the Aladdin show, part of the parade and the laser show.

 

 

We had one goal for our third and final day: the Cars ride. Apparently none of us were in tune enough to know how insane the crowds are for the new attractions. On day two, we noticed the fast passes for Cars sold out before Noon. As soon as we got inside the park, Jason went to the line for the ride and I went to the line for the fast pass. My line was a 45 minute wait and even then, that didn't guarantee we'd get a fast pass nor did it guarantee we'd get a fast pass for a time that was before we needed to leave. So we took a gamble and went and stood in the line (with a posted wait of 110 minutes). Thankfully, the wait was only an hour and I got to take Clara on the ride first (we did the family switch on the rides with height limits and 9 times out of 10, it worked out awesome... plus, Clara often got to ride the rides multiple times). After that, we rode Tower of Terror (the first time Clara got scared from a ride, and even then, she wasn't that scared) and went over to Disneyland to ride the Monorail and Space Mountain and walk through the castle. Space Mountain was Clara's favorite and I think she ended up going on it 4 times. It is a pretty cool ride. We got to ride in the front on the Monorail which turned out to be pretty cool. Clara and Hazel loved it.

^Best family picture of the trip

^I loved the souvenir Clara picked

Here are my final thoughts on our trip:

||| One of my biggest concerns was the food. I didn't want to pay $15 for a meal that was nasty. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I could spend around $10 and get a very healthy, whole meal. Like the salad I got in California Adventures. For the most part, the food was not that expensive and there were plenty of healthy alternatives.

||| The girls did really, really good. They both fell asleep in the stroller every night by the time we got back to the hotel (well, Hazel usually fell asleep before we even left), but they never threw a fit. Clara had a moment where she cried because she couldn't eat with me (I had just gone to the bathroom), but other than that, I was so happy with how well behaved they were.

||| Clara was so brave! She tried every single ride she was tall enough to ride. I think the only rides she couldn't ride were California Screamin' and Indiana Jones, but Indiana Jones was closed. She loved the Matterhorn and Space Mountain and preferred rides over pictures with characters (didn't get a single one, but I always gave her a choice).

||| It was so nice having Dan and Karen with us. 

||| Jason was pretty grumpy most of the trip and he told me it's because he doesn't like people and he doesn't like it when I take pictures. Too bad those are usually two certainties of most vacations.

||| The family switch deal is pretty handy. We took full advantage of it.

||| I dropped my phone while we were there. I went to take it out of my pocket and in the motion of bringing it to my face to take a picture, it flew out of my hand onto the concrete. The first, direct impact was on the corner. Fortunately, I had just put a temporary case on it and it bounced like a bouncy ball. The case didn't even have a mark on it. I was so glad!

||| I think we picked a really good time to go. Even when the parks seemed somewhat crowded, the lines were never too bad. We got to ride everything we wanted to and never felt rushed or stressed that we were running out of time.

||| Buying Clara a neon shirt for the trip was a great idea. (Toot! Toot!)

||| We got an awesome deal on our tickets. I am really grateful to have found out about them when we did because it saved us over $200.

||| People wear the most bizarre shoes to theme parks. It can't possibly be comfortable to walk around in heals for 12 hours.

||| I brought my nice camera on the last day so we wouldn't have to lug it around and protect it for a full day (we left early afternoon on our last day). After threatening Jason that he better cooperate for a family picture in front of the flower Mickey, waiting in line so no one would be in our picture and having Karen take tons of pictures, I decided to go take pictures of my girls by the castle. That's when I realized there was no card in my camera. I've never done that before and Disneyland was not a good first for that. Nooooo! At least we had our cell phones. 

||| I love how colorful everything is.

||| 2 1/2 days was a good amount of time to be at the parks. I don't think 2 days would have been enough and 4 might have been too long. It would have been nice to spend the whole third day there and travel home on the next day. Maybe next time.

Oh, and I took just under 1,000 pictures on our trip. I pared that down to 199 to make a book for Clara and Hazel. I'm too lazy/busy/indecisive to go through them again, hence the collage overload.

Disneyland Trip Part I: Emily's & Anaheim

At the beginning of the year, I decided I really wanted to take the girls to Disneyland for the first time. As you know, it's not cheap. But I figured if I saved a little bit each month, it wouldn't be as big of a deal come vacation time. We also planned to do it for a combined Christmas/birthday surprise to justify the cost. And the final decision of my plan (and a brilliant one at that) was to invite Karen and Dan. So we planned and we went and it almost made me want to make it an annual tradition.

I waited to tell Clara and Hazel until the night before we left. I made a puzzle that said, "We're going to Disneyland!" with the castle in the background and cut it into six pieces. I put each piece into a balloon and had Clara and Hazel pop the balloons.

After the first balloon, I think Clara say the Disneyland "D" and said, "I know what it says - we're going to Disneyland." She finished popping and putting together and confirmed her early suspicion. She was excited, but since she's never been, she didn't really know what to expect. That night was the monthly cousin spend-the-night which gave me time to pack Saturday morning. And then we were off.

Within about 45 minutes of leaving, Hazel dumped a full water bottle in her seat, so we stopped to dry her off and try to get as much water out of the car as possible. We made several other stops within that first hour, surprisingly none of which were potty breaks. Once we all got settled, the rest of the drive was smooth and uneventful and we went straight to Emily's.

We said hello, stole Alexis, and then went to get dinner. That night and Sunday, we got to visit with Emily and her family. It's no surprise that I love my family and I cherish time I get to spend with my siblings and nieces and nephews that I don't see often enough.

Alexis painted her door with chalkboard paint and Clara created a masterpiece (our family with Alexis) on it. She kept making the funniest commentary about how everyone looked in it. The highlight might have been when she exclaimed to Alexis, "Uggggh! Sorry you look so ugly, I have to erase your whole face."

We left Emily's Sunday evening and knowing it was to Disneyland made it a little less painful, if only slightly.

Note: Random Rambling

So. I have lofty goals. But oft times, reality butts in and said lofty goals don't get accomplished. Going on vacation the first week of December was the beginning of my most recent downward spiral. Then came my incredible ability to over-commit to people and agree to things I don't have time to do, sick kids, Christmas parties, birthdays, cooking dinner, doing service and Christmas preparation. All of which is really nothing more than reality. But a reality that is so much more than I was ready for. I started making progress this week and then I got sick. It felt like I backtracked through all my progress and hard work. Again, that's life and even though my to do list is rather long, I feel like I can breath. Because of the holidays, no one is expecting any work from me before the 26th. Jason will have some time off and has agreed to help me good clean the house (my only Christmas wish). And most of the busyness in the next week is fun busyness.

Things I'd like to blog about: my thoughts on the tragedy in Connecticut and Mormon feminists

Things I'll definitely blog about, no matter how long it takes: our trip to California that was lots and lots of fun and Clara turning 6 (last night she told Jason: Dad, you better say goodbye to me as a 5 year old, because tomorrow I'll be six) and why I want to give her a redo

Today was comical. I was annoyed I have been sick and behind on work because I didn't get to make Clara's birthday special. Jason's old company hadn't done a Christmas party in years. I love company Christmas parties. His new company was doing one. But guess who was sick and didn't go? Yeah, me. I cried like a 10 year old. While we were getting the kids ready, Hazel went to my nightstand drawer where I was hiding one of Jason's gifts, took the gift out and went and gave it to Jason. Awesome. I laughed. Jason and I laughed hard. I love laughing with him. Obviously she didn't have a clue what was going on, she just found the wallet we bought for daddy and wanted to give it to him. Then Jason went to put the stroller in the back of my car where he found another one of his gifts. He brought it in, laughing, and said, "You should wrap this too." If only I'd known he was going to open the car.

Clara and Hazel got to go to the party with Jason and I stayed here. I decided to make the most of it, stop feeling sorry for myself and enjoy some downtime. I relaxed, actually sat down to eat and ate without interruption, tied bows on gifts and now I'm blogging. I think I'll go to bed early too. I can do everything tomorrow that I should do tonight.

Here are my girls ready to go to the party with Jason. I almost returned this cardigan that I got Clara for her birthday, but once she put it on, I was so glad I didn't. And Hazel smiled for a picture and then stared at me for about 30 seconds with this crazy face.

I Love Him

Vacation is always a little taxing, but I learned that over-committing my time to work and having a chaotic weekend (two Christmas parties, a baptism, a dance recital and hosting a family dinner) following a vacation creates the perfect storm. Hazel getting sick and waking up all night until 5am only compounded the situation. But after lots of stress, an average of 4 hours of sleep since Sunday night and sticking to my rigid schedule, I finally feel like I am catching up and am hopeful that the worst is over. So, moving on to him...

We had lunch with Jason at Pei Wei yesterday and I might have cried in the restaurant. A man sitting near us asked Jason if he could do a big favor: move Hazel's high chair out of the path so he could get by on his motorized scooter. Without hesitation, Jason got up, moved the high chair and then proceeded to clear the entire path from the man's table to the door, including a sign. He then waited for the man to saddle up on his scooter and slowly exit so he could replace the sign in its proper spot. It reminded me of our recent trip to California when we went out to eat and he very casually asked our server to put Alexis' food on our tab before it ever became awkward. He is so cognizant of the needs of those around him and I love that he steps up without complaint to help others. In both situations, I felt like the luckiest girl in the restaurant. Every time something like this happens, my heart swells with joy knowing that wonderful man is my husband. And when my heart can't swell anymore, I cry. Jason is one of the most thoughtful people I know and sometimes I get a teensy bit jealous that all his time helping others isn't spent helping me. But, it makes me so happy to watch him serving and helping those he loves and perfect strangers alike. I love him.

Angela took a few photos of us and this one turned out pretty great.