Violin Concerts

Owen had his first group Suzuki concert this last Saturday. He played Variation B of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. Click here to view.

Ryanna broke away from the typical Suzuki songs and played Mosquito Dance by Ludwig Mendelssohn. Click here. They both did a great job!

It's Not Always Clear...

When your vocabulary and the picture don't always fit...

Owen was looking through our reverence book at church and came to this picture by Carl Bloch. He leaned over to me and whispered, "Mom, isn't this the picture of Jesus healing the leprechauns?"

Scenario #2

After looking at my blog post pictures of our trip to Las Vegas to see BYU play, Owen said, "Mom, I love that picture of you and dad! Isn't that where you saw everyone wearing Jiminy Cricket T-shirts?"

And who says our kids aren't listening?

What He Wants Us To Be

Last week was hard.

REALLY hard.

I don't know what happened to my sweet, little three year old, but he morphed into a monster last week.

He tromped around the house as loudly as he could with his arms set in 90 degree angles and his face smooshed up into a grimace. He was angry about EVERYTHING.

No! He did not want to go to the toilet!

No! He did not want to wash his hands after he used the toilet and how dare I ask him!

No! He did not want to eat those grapes that he'd asked for!

No! He did not want to say the prayer!

All of this and it was only 7:00 am...

And on and on and on.

On Wednesday I remembered that I could drop any child under the age of 18 off at any police department or fire station and they wouldn't ask any questions.

I wondered if they would just keep him for a few hours.

The tantrums, the hands firmly pressed over each ear to block out my instructions and reprimands, the hateful yelling, it all seemed to be too much.

I had tried all of my tricks--diversion, positive feedback for good actions, calm responses to meltdowns, more one on one attention, but none of it seemed to change him or me. Did I also mention Eli was throwing up multiple times a day from Wednesday through Saturday and yuckiness wasn't just coming out of his mouth. It all felt to be too much.

I don't know what changed, but yesterday he was back to himself.

By that I mean my little boy who loves to impress me.

My little man who is sensitive to everyone in our family and reminds me that he is not just mine, but also daddy's and Ryanna's and Eli's.

My friend who tells me that he loves me when he gives me kisses and tight hugs.

My little boy who is so passionate and trying to learn who he is while dealing with the frustration of not being able to communicate what he wants in all situations.

My three year old who sees his limitless potential at being a "rock star and a dancing rock star who plays the guitar" (his words this morning about his future career) but still has to deal with living under the house rules.

I'm thrilled that he's back to being sweet. He still has meltdowns, but it's under control. The whole situation helped me to remember that I too am still a work in progress. I still throw fits when Owen gets out of control. Granted, I don't throw my fits in a physical way, but I do express my frustration at night to my husband. I bemoan my terrible day and how grating it was. But, I all the while, am being taught and instructed on patience. While I may not like it, I need it. I need to take more time to stop and enjoy what's going on around me and less time worrying about the to dos. I need to spend more time in awe of children's stories and less time checking my email. While Owen is learning exactly who he is and what he needs to do to improve, I too am going through the same process. I hope that I can be as patient with Owen as I want God and my friends and family to be with me.

The words of this song touch me and fit the situation so perfectly:

God gave us families to help us become what he wants us to be.

This is how He shares His love. For the family is of God.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Intensity

I can't take credit for these photos. They are the product of another great mom from Owen's soccer team. She emailed them to me and I was thrilled. Not only were the colors intense, but so was the subject:
my child--Owen--
the soccer beast.
I loved seeing his focus and drive out on the field. If this is age 3, what's age 4, 7, 12, 17?

Owen the Soccer Mobster

In a rare and never before published interview, this reporter gets inside the head of the star player for the Gilbert Thunder Soccer Team.


Reporter: Owen how has being on this team changed your perception of the game of soccer?


Owen: You know, it used to be so innocent. Me and my dad would kick the ball around in our backyard. It was good times. Life was so uncomplicated, but the field, that's different. Those kids are trying to take the ball away from me!


Reporter: So, when everyone comes to the center of the field to kick the ball, how do you get in the zone?


Owen: Well, I enjoy kicking the ball and then standing there frozen in my kicking stance. Why would I chase after the ball? I'm a star not a rookie. I've proven myself at my "home" field.


Reporter: And what about your critics who say you play a dirty game finding kids who are shorter than you (there are actually kids shorter than him), and pushing them or shaking your fist in their faces? (All of this did occur.)


Owen: I guess those kids should know that I came to kick the ball and if they are going to attempt to kick the ball too, they are going to have to pay.


So, the verdict is left to the people. Is Owen merely the shortest bully you've ever seen on a soccer field or is he pure, uncontrolled talent? His shorts may touch his ankles and his x-small shirt may be large enough to fit his older sister, but he is a threat nonetheless. With no yellow or red cards to be handed out, will this star continue his reign of terror or will his coach finally have to bench his ego for the sake of the whole team?

Owen conferencing with his coach about their strategy.

***This interviewer reserves the right to interpret all actions on the field as actual dialogue.

Friday's Lessons

I learned the following things this Friday. None of which I wanted to learn.

1. Our house is apparently built on a bit of a slope. At least I gathered that from the water running out from under the bathroom door, into the hallway and on its way to the laundry room. But, wait, I forgot my first lesson.

.5 A scream coming from a three year old located in your bathroom is probably not going to end well. Now we're back on track.

2. Though I thought that my three year old would know not to use half a roll of toilet paper in one bathroom session, this information is not intuitive as I supposed.

3. There is a valve located to the left of your toilet that you should immediately turn off when you see water spilling out of the toilet bowl.

4. You may be grateful for several things in your life and these items may change hourly. But, at least once in your life, you're going to be grateful for a plunger.

5. You may also be grateful to own a Hoover WetVac mop.

6. It's not easy to move your washing machine all by yourself (even if it is empty).

7. In your attempt to not immediately harm your child, should you send him upstairs, you will probably learn that the child was traumatized enough to not do as instructed which is to say put on underwear and pants.

8. This naked child will crawl on his bed for comfort.

9. That naked bum will probably not be clean even though half a roll was used in that very cleaning procedure.

10. You will now be washing a comforter from your child's bed.

Lessons learned. Really. All learned. Glad my New Year's resolution wasn't patience!

Little Sayings to Record

These are all courtesy of Owen--the resident 3 year old.

Two weeks ago driving in the car, from the back seat I hear:

Owen: "That makes Jesus really mad."

Me: "What makes Jesus mad?"

Owen: "When you cut down his plants it makes him really mad."

A little too much exposure to Al Gore or too many "green" commericals on Disney? Who's to know?

Last week while he and Eli are bathing in the tub, Eli starts crying:

Me: Why is Eli crying? (I can tell you that it's because Owen dumped a bucket of water on his head, but it's good to allow a child to confess right?)

Owen: I don't know. I think it's because he wants those things.

Me: What things?

Owen: Your things mom. Pointing to his chest, "Those big things you have here."

Me: Why do you think he wants those?

Owen: Because that's what you do, you give him those and he's happy.

Me: Well, Eli's too old to do that now. He just gets food now.

I could sense Owen's disappointment for Eli's loss. What a caring brother.

Interview with a two year old

This is just funny. He is so clever and has such a great sense of humor. It must be genetic huh?

Our Song...

I love to sing in the car and apparently I play some songs my kids even like. There are requests that come from the back portions of the vehicle and I try to accomodate them. One of our favorite songs is by Taylor Swift. I thought I'd give you a sample of another great singer in our family. She loosens up a lot after the first minute. In fact, perhaps she loosens up a bit too much. I'm not sure what all the fancy footwork is about, but hey, the music gets in you and you can't fight it. And, well, you all know, "Nobody puts Baby in a corner!"

Of course Owen wanted to sing a bit himself. I had him do a solo, but decided it was a bit more fun to see the interaction of the two. Witness video number two which is just the first verse of the song.

Happy Birthday Owen!

Yesterday Owen turned two. I should've posted yesterday, but it seems that anymore our Saturdays are jammed full of activities.

Instead of cake, we had homemade apple pies made by my grandma and we gave him ice cream with chocolate sauce on top--yum! He remembered the hat from nursery last Sunday and ran to get it when we told him we were going to sing "Happy Birthday" to him.

For his birthday, his great-grandparents bought him a Radio Flyer Hot Wheels type car which he loves. (So does his sister.)

He also got lots of clothes from his other grandparents. Lots of cute, cute, much needed clothing. In fact, I was thinking about how wonderful my mom and dad are to buy my kids (and even me and my husband) clothes. I think that we would own about five pieces of clothing between all of us without their clothing us--so thanks!

And, we got him two shirts. Not just any two shirts, but BYU T-shirts! About a month ago Owen decided he only wanted to wear BYU clothing. This was a tricky proposition because he only owns three BYU T-shirts. I started to have to convince him that different clothing was paying homage to BYU with its color scheme. Luckily, little boy clothing has lots and lots of dark blue. He was excited to wear one of his BYU shirts yesterday (they won by the way!) and he even slept in it.

Happy Birthday to my sweet, sweet, growing too quickly, little boy!

Owen's Ka-Choo Book

About three weeks ago Owen asked me to read this favorite story of his called, Because a Little Bug Went Ka-Choo! I thought it would be fun to read little parts of the sentences to him and leave out missing words just to see if he would remember them. I was shocked!!! He kept filling in word after word. Finally, we decided to capture it on camera. Here it is for you to view (you'll need to go to the bottom of the blog and stop the music first!). You'll notice he still has a ball in his hands even while reading.

I Wear My Sunglasses at Night and More...

A couple weeks ago, we decided to capture the ball obsession (soccer & basketball) for you all to see. Glad we did 'cause now it's too hot to be outside doing this.

This stuff arrived in the mail the other day courtesy of Granpa/ma Torres. The lighting is purposely a bit dark, so the glasses stand out.

This is how we do March Madness

So, it has already begun and some of my upsets have been awesome in the first round. There's always those that don't work out either though. This is by far my worst year only getting 23 correct in the first round. Oh well. I just love March Madness. It's great to see a close game where the leads change and you're rooting your heart out. Derek and I fill out brackets every year and I've beat him all but last year. I don't know if I'm going to do it again though. Even Owen has gotten into the excitement.

Yesterday he would watch the games with me and then run outside and grab a ball and stand under his hoop and throw it up as hard as he could--which isn't far considering his short legs. He sure loves to shoot it though.

(I know, I know, it's sideways--I tried to save it turned and blogger won't let me. Oh brother.)

Thanks Martha!

A million years ago I visited Martha Stewart's website looking for a craft project to do with my daughter. I found a really fun idea that involved melting down old, broken pieces of crayons to make new, fun crayons. It sounded really easy--my specialty. It also sounded really practical since we have about a thousand broken pieces that never get used.

In addition to being St. Patrick's Day today (we're all wearing green--how about you?) it also marks the first day of Spring Break for the schools around here. Last night as I was tucking Ryanna in, I mentioned that she wouldn't have any violin lessons or pre-school this week because of Spring Break. I don't know if she heard wonderful things about Spring Break while she was at church, but she said, "Oh, that's okay, we'll just take naps and relax and stuff." Uh, take naps? From the child that hasn't napped in years? From the child that will fight sleep so hard that the sleeping medicine the dentist gave her had no effect? I was, of course, thrilled to hear that a nap sounded like a good idea.

Well, I thought that I should also plan some fun activities for this week since she can't do her usual stuff, so today we tried the above-mentioned project. It was a lot of fun!!! She really loves the new crayons and so does Owen. AND, although she didn't nap today, Owen and I did, so I call it a success!

Owen played with the regular, undamaged crayons while we peeled the broken ones.

Hard at work getting those wrappers off. I thought violet offered the most resistance.

Our hard work.

I love to do crafts with mom! (She was thinking this--promise!)

Sorry it's a bit blurry, but I love the colors.

After they are all peeled, you chop them into pea-sized pieces. You can group them however you want to. I learned it's better to have approximately the same amount per muffin tin, so they bake at the same rate.

The finished product. If you had muffin tins in fun shapes, you could do hearts or something else more creative than just circles, but either way, it was fun!

Mom, you're the greatest!!!!!

This last week in pictures...

Not a lot to say, so I thought I'd let you view the latest...

Crazy hair day at pre-school...
It was as crazy as I could come up with okay!
New swimming suit for this season--she'll be five in two weeks & wears a size 3!I want to offer this as proof that a belly is only cute before about age 4.
Ahhhh, so happy!
A real smile which is near impossible to get from my four year old. I have no clue what's coming out of her mouth...When expectations and reality don't match up.
This is what's growing in front of my house right now. Isn't it gorgeous? They are from last summer. Winter here is very kind to flowers.

Yeah!

Owen's favorite new word is "Yeah!" It's actually quite nice to hear this come out of his mouth as he has been saying "no" to eveything this last week while he's been sick.

Hope you have a great weekend!

Two New Family Members

Our family grew by two members this week. On Tuesday, we got a bunny. His name is Hopper (or Hoppy if you prefer--he doesn't answer to either). I realize the name is extremely original for a bunny--he's a second-hand pet, so don't look at me.

(Owen loves how soft the bunny feels.)

Then, today I got a little boy. Yes, I used to have a baby. His name was Owen and his dimples were the cutest things ever made (just like his sister's). He was such a sweet little baby, but his dad decided that he looked too girlish with his curls in the back, so he got his first haircut today and now I have a little boy. He looks so grown-up and everytime I see him I can't quite believe it's him.

I also didn't realize this, but apparently he can feel every cut the scissors make and he was not a fan. He screamed and flailed the entire time. He's lucky it turned out so good. Even chocolate didn't calm him down and that always works (he's a little bit like me in that respect).

So, you think YOU'RE tired?

Just watch it, it's only like 24 seconds long. My voice is quiet, so you'll have to turn up the volume.

Coming down

We had quite a fun Christmas visiting family in Colorado and then we were lucky enough to have my sister-in-law Kjirsti (pronounced Chair-stee for all of you thinking "what the heck?") and her husband Tom (pronounced Tom) visit for a few days. It's always great for me to visit with everyone because it usually means:

1. My husband is not working!!!


2. My husband is helping me with the chores and children.


3. I am spending time with other humans who don't want to watch a movie in the middle of the day or fall apart mid afternoon because they refuse to ever take a nap.

Not that I don't love being a SAHM, but it's nice to get a break from my full-time job too!

The downside to all of this wonderful family togetherness is the time period directly following. After we have left or everyone has left us, my kids forget how to function a bit. My daughter is pretty independent and will play by herself or with Owen for very long time periods. Upon the departure of family, my children look at me with sad eyes reminiscent of Puss in Boots from the Shrek movies as if to say, "Dear woman, we received constant stimulation and attention from family for the last x days and now it is your turn to be a one-woman entertainment center."

Unfortunately for them, I never fall for this and instead have to spend several days convincing them that it is okay to read a book by youself or color or paint a picture, etc. It's always a hard knock life until they discover that I will spend time with them, but not every waking moment as they have quickly grown accustomed to.

Boy, I wish we lived closer to family, so they could get more interaction like this. I think it would be so good for them--them being my children--in so many ways. If I could convince family to come down at this time of year, they may just move here. It's the months of May-September/October that I've got to prevent them from seeing the furnace we live in. So, if you're feeling like you need a break from the cold and snow, I have a place for you!

On the Road Again, I Can't Wait To Get on the Road Again...

Well, I most certainly CAN wait to get on the road again. When I was a teenager, I actually really enjoyed my various drives from Provo back to Montrose where I would crank up the volume on the radio and sing as loudly and as badly as I wanted to. In fact, most drives I arrived almost hoarse from those nearly six hour drives. I even thought, from time to time, how I would love to be a trucker just chugging down the road listening to my tunes, singing and chatting on my CV radio to other truckers...
How scenarios change when you add a four year old and a barely one year old. I knew the drive from Gilbert to Montrose would be long (it's 11 hours if things go well), but I couldn't imagine how poorly it would really go.
We started off by finding ourselves on major icy roads--in Arizona!!! I realize that northern Arizona gets snow, but I never really take it all that seriously since I don't live there. Well, just before we reached Holbrook (the town with all the dinosaur replicas for you who have driven this path) the roads were really bad. I was driving--I like to drive okay. Like I said, I was driving and we were last in a line of about six cars. We were all going about 25-30 miles an hour. All of a sudden, I see the car in front start to spin off the road. I gently applied my brakes and watched as our car started to fall off the road as well.
It was really a little bit surreal as I didn't panic and neither did Derek. It was like one of those action scenes from the Mission Impossible movies where everything is in slow motion. In fact, during the car sliding off the road, Derek looked at me and calmly said, "Audrey? Blah, blah, blah" (I don't remember) I said, "Derek, I am putting on the brakes." So lovingly spoken to each other--must be the Christmas holiday spirit or something.
When we finally stopped, I was glad to see no one was hurt although it did wake Owen up from his nap, which is plenty enough damage in my book. Out from the car that originally slid off the road emerges three of the skinniest teenage boys you'll ever see. I promptly employed these boys as well as Derek to try and push the car back on the road. Given that the total weight of the four combined was probably about 450 pounds, I wasn't giving much hope to this activity and sadly, they couldn't do it. We had to wait until the highway patrol came and towed us back on the road.
The fun doesn't stop there as we slowly wove our way to Cortez, Colorado. Upon our arrival there, we called my grandma only to find out that there was a crazy snowstorm by Telluride and they were requiring chains and possibly closing the whole pass, so we needed to turn around and go to Utah and venture through that way. Well, Moab was clear as the reports promised, but Monticello was a nightmare. Derek was about to fall asleep, so we switched driving again and I drove the rest of the 14 hour drive home. Yes, 14 hours in the car with the kids. In the first two hours Ryanna asked that terrible question, "Are we almost there yet?" at least five times until we mentioned Santa's route may be flying directly past our house if she didn't desist. Owen was actually an angel and cried a tiny bit on and off and slept a lot. This is quite an improvement since the last time this drive was made he screamed for two hours straight without stopping.
After all of this driving, I can most definitely attest to the fact that Willie Nelson did not drive in snow-packed roads nor did he travel with small children or his lyrics would be greatly altered. I would also like to offer my greatest thanks to the creators of the portable DVD player. Bless you.