Wallflowers

So no one picked up the swine flu this weekend at the Wall family reunion. I wish I would have taken more pictures, but I was too busy eating yummy food. I don't remember having a family reunion with this many people on my mom's side since I was in the fourth grade and we all got hotels in Saint Louis and our family stayed at the lovely Knights Inn. Now all my cousins are grown up with kids.
Rick is very sick, but I was impressed with how he has his life in order and his loose ends mostly tied up. He said goodbye to all of his sisters. I wish my mom had it more together--she still has loads of loose ends--although a friend pointed out to me that I will probably always feel like my mom is not ready because I will not ever want her to go.
I'm battling kids, so I want to jot down items of note before I have to run: Sue's living room decor is awesome, Heather is a darling little pregnant lady but I can't picture her as a mom (I'm going to have to see it to believe it), Debby's kids crack me up and I am going to have to see Hayden's SloMo skillz again, I hope Josh Berrett made it to South Africa with enough cash to keep him out of jail, Josh Troyer's baby Opal is a beautiful little tiny baby, and Avery is in LOVE with Sue's dog Kiera Knightly. It was fun to meet spouses of cousins and see everyone's kids. I'm grateful for my family :)

Possibly the last time these guys will all be pictured together: Leslie, Debbie, Patty, Tanna, Rick, Terry, and Sue...

...and Dusty. How thoughtful. Someone brought her a cookie.

If I had a dollar for every egg hunt this year...

Attending multiple egg hunts is not a bad thing...except when mom is eating all the candy. And reading a book about the evils of high-fructose corn syrup while downing those jellybeans.

Our church grass is rockin'.

Preschool?

The burning question on my mind tonight is this...send Ella to preschool this fall or no? The girl still has two full years yet until she starts kindergarten. Is it necessary to educate your child for the two years preceeding public school? Is it valuable?
I lean against it because it's pricey and because social interaction comes free. No need to pay to make friends when there are plenty running around outside our front door. Also, she already knows her letters, colors, and numbers. I think she's on track for where she needs to be.
I lean towards it because she's smart and it would give her new academic challenges. I'd like to get her used to the dynamics of a classroom. And I'd hate to hold her back from reaching her full potential. Plus, it just looked fun. We dropped by Kinder Kids this week to check out their program and Ella was ready to jump right in and participate. She was confused when we were leaving.
Mommas out there, what do you think? Is preschool your babysitter (which also has value--I'm not gonna lie) or do you feel your child would have been behind in school without it? I'm not interested in EVER homeschooling my kids when there are paid professionals nearby; I'm just wondering, is it necessary at age 3?

On the Go

Avery has discovered the go button and she is off. She crawled for the first time about two weeks ago and her first shot took her across the living room. Now she is pulling herself up to standing and has even ventured a few steps. Time to baby-proof our life again!

We have been on such an emotional roller coaster this past month and a half. My mom had a major surgery a little over a month ago to remove a second cancer tumor. Then she was back in and out of the hospital for various complications over the ensuing weeks. We have been so worried, then relieved, then worried, then relieved, and now just tired. We're just glad she's making it out of this OK. Also, we're grateful for family and friends that will drop everything and fly out there to take care of her and that call and email every day when things get scary and that fast as a group to give support and that buy her a ticket to come out to see us. Thank you everyone. We truly appreciate it. I know there is power in fasting and prayer. Thank you.

I'd Like to Blame this on Scouts

Last night we had Little Philmont for Scouts, which for me was a 4-hour meeting. Towards the end, I started thinking that I hoped my kids were faring OK with just Bry...so I texted him the following: "Are things going OK at home?" And I was surprised when I looked down and a friend had responded that yes, they were, except their little boy was not interested in brushing his teeth. What??? Oh no!!! I sent it to my whole address book.
A seemingly simple inquiry suddenly became an intrusive little bombshell. Open mouth, insert foot. Or phone.

Hold the Wild Things, Please!

Last night I was tucking Ella into bed a little earlier than usual because I wanted to fully enjoy the season premier of Lost all to myself. So I was reading her a stack of books, the last one being Where the Wild Things Are. We just checked this out from the library this week and she's a big fan so she's been asking me to read it to her multiple times each night. After about 5 times through, I looked her straight in the eye and said (very seriously), "Now tonight when mommy goes away, the stars on your ceiling will be like the stars outside and your bed will grow into a big forest and a private boat will take you to where the wild things are. And they'll all look at you with their terrible yellow eyes and chomp their terrible teeth and show you their terrible claws but you won't be afraid because you're the most wild thing of all. And you'll tell the wild things to run and play and you'll have so much fun! But then you'll miss your mom and dad and where you're loved best of all. So you'll hop back in your boat and sail home for a year and when you get home breakfast will be waiting nice and hot."
Ella was silent the entire time. I thought she was digging it. But after I finished the last word she burst into sobbing tears and jumped in my lap shaking with grief. I will just stick to the text from now on. And let's just say, she was up till 11 with me.
Also yesterday she had me cracking up because she told me she really needed to write a letter to her cousin Becca. When I looked down at her paper, she wrote a big "E" and taped her picture on top.

Diego & DNA

This is chapter four of my ongoing book, How to Vacation without Spending a Dime. Not true. How to Vacation without Spending Your Dime. That's more accurate.
While Bryson was attending his work-related lyophilization conference, the girls and I walked down to Old Town, played at Coronado Beach, and visited Balboa Park.

So Ella has been watching a lot of Sesame Street lately because I LOVE it. My favorite skits include Scram-a-Lot, Meal or no Meal, and A's Anatomy. It's great stuff.

It's teaching her Spanish too. Well, not actual words. Just that Spanish is another language and it sounds different than English. And she's pretty confident with her new skills. As we were walking to Old Town, she started up several conversations with cooks at the little authentic Mexican restaurants that line the streets in that area. Rolling out their homemade tortillas, they were greeted with singsong syllables of nonsense by a silly 3-year-old.

Hi, we are from out of town.

Princess Belle liked Old Town, I think. This is her last glory shot before the trip home and her last hurrah. Live it up.

Balboa Park, and Avery giving me her grumpy old man look.

Coronado Island, Hotel del Coronado. Bryson's conference was at this hotel and we are playing on the beach. The big rocks behind Aves are perfect for testing out if indeed Ella will be "part of your world..."

California has twisty turny roads...better safe than sorry! Princess Belle: sorry.

So many pictures, so little time...

Just for the record, there is nothing wrong with having an 80 degree Christmas. It's quite a treat. Apparently we missed a big snowstorm at home, but we are not heartbroken. Here is us at the beach and yes, the kids are swimming. Also Bryson discovered a latent talent for bird training.

The Hunters, a nice family in our ward, invited anyone who wanted to come pick the extra oranges from their orchard. Yum! We made orange peel candy and had fresh-squeezed orange juice every day.

Thanks to my Aunt Jacki we were able to make a Sea World trip. They've really upped the ante at the kiddie playground. All I remember were the huge nets, but now there are little roller coasters and teacups and a carousel--all kinds of fun stuff. We still spent most of the time on the nets though :)
Ella was pretty tickled about Shamu himself. She thought it was hilarious when he got the audience wet. "He's being really naughty. He needs a time out, mom!"
They turned the Wild Arctic ride into a Polar Express ride for the holidays and we had just read the book the night before so the girls were pretty stoked. Actually I think Becca knows it word for word. I think I saw her mouth moving as she was quoting it during the ride.

Kristen's dog Snickers just LOVED the babies. It was pretty gross when he would come running because someone had spit up. And by "gross" I mean extremely practical, since it saved me a trip to get a burp cloth.
Nana made us all matching jammies!!!
And since Santa brought us Guitar Hero, consider this an open invitation to rock.

Sometime in the past four years that I've missed, I graduated to the big kids team at Christmas Eve football. That was a little jarring for me. I'm that old?!

Addison had a fetish for electrical cords and plugs, which is kind of funny since her dad is an electrician. Here she is underneath Avery after having crawled across the room to attain said item.

Until next time...