A Rough Week for Deedle

My sweet Deedle is so feisty. Sometimes I just don't know what to do. I love her fire and her determination. I don't want to squelch it. But sometimes trying to channel it in the right direction can be a real challenge.A while ago we started an allowance chart. It has worked really well, mostly. The kids all start with $2 and if they break a rule or don't obey after being told to do something a few times then they will lose a quarter. At the end of the week we so how much money they have left and then we help them divide it up into their spending money, savings, and tithing. This new tool has completely eliminated any problems that we had with String Cheese getting ready for school in the morning or for dance (she likes both, she just doesn't like being told she has to have something done at a certain time). This wasn't her best week (last week she lost zero quarters), but it wasn't too bad. Loumy has done very well and is very proud of the money he is earning. Anyway...as you can see from this chart alone, Deedle had a rough week. I don't really know why I'm posting this or what else to say except that I love this child so much but sometimes I feel inadequate. I guess we all feel that way sometimes. Right? Right??

Thanksgiving 2008

Today was a lovely day spent in a very traditional way. We slept in. Chancho played football. We ate lots of food at his parent's house. We ate lots of pie at my parent's house. It was a relaxing and happy day.

Tonight before family prayers String Cheese suggested we write down some of the things we are grateful for to save for each Thanksgiving. Why didn't the blogger think of that?

Loumy: I'm thankful for water, baths (pronounced bath-ez for some reason), and grass.
Deedle: I'm thankful for my stuffed animals, art, my blankets, my bed, my house, and my family.
String Cheese: I'm thankful for God, this Earth, and my family.
Chancho: I'm thankful for our food, our health, our nice warm home, my family, our church, and the country we live in.

And here are some of the things that I am grateful for:

* A handsome, kind, good, loving husband.
* Beautiful, smart, healthy children.
* New baby boy growing in my tummy.
* Four awesome sisters.
* Six wonderful brothers.
* Really good in-laws (parents and siblings)
* That my parents are healthy.
* Scores of nieces and nephews.
* Our country.
* All that I have learned from having Alopecia.
* The Gospel of Jesus Christ.
* My love for Haiti.
* Friends.
* Electricity, roads, clean water, and plenty of food to eat.
* An education.
* The opportunity I had to serve a mission for my church.
* My new bed.
* Safe neighborhood to live in.
* Good school and preschool for my children to attend.
* The beginning of Christmas celebrations!!!

The Name Game

My friend, Patti, recently told me that her husband's parents did not give him a name until he was several months old. My own sister, Nancy, has spent a week or two before deciding on a name for her baby. For some reason I want to decide as soon as possible. I can understand the fun and excitement of waiting for the birth to discover the gender of the child. And I think I can also understand how it is good to see a baby and give it some time to decide what fits. I understand, I just don't believe that would be something I would like for myself at all. I want to know as soon as possible who the child is and as much about him/her as possible. I want to be completely prepared with the right clothes all washed in the drawers and a blanket with his name sewn on it long before I go to the hospital to give birth.

With String Cheese and Loumy, their names weren't necessarily what we felt we had chosen for them, rather they were names that were told to us and we were supposed to name them that. And that was fine. With Deedle, we didn't have a special feeling like that so we worked on choosing a name. Chancho came up with it and then we liked it. Seems the same thing is happening with this one. We definitely don't have a special feeling about what this child wants to be named or should be named. So, we are trying to decide. We've been playing a bit of a game this past week.

First Chancho bought us a book of "100,000+ Baby Names". That is a lot. Most of them are foreign names that I can't even pronounce. We went through ALL of the names. With what we each highlighted, we came up with a list of 45 names. Next I printed out a copy of the list for each of us and we each circled 20 names that we kind of liked. We then compared those lists to see which of the 20 names we had in common. Then we were down to 8 names. Some of the names that I liked but Chancho vetoed were: Atticus, Beck, Ezra, Franklin, Lewis, and Wells. Some of the names that Chancho liked but I vetoed were: David, Ian, Bill, Leon, Austin, and Colt. Of the names we both said we liked, he likes 4 of them best and I like the other 4 best. Here are our 8 names that we either like or would be willing to consider: Aiden, Adam, Cole, and Jonah (Chancho's 4); Cale, Jonas, Miles, and Mckinley (my 4).

So, do you all want to help us out? Maybe we'll take your suggestions, maybe not. Go ahead and vote for your favorite from Chancho's list and mine.

And for the record, we should note that String Cheese would like us to name the baby either Dallin or AJ. Not bad. Maybe if we decide on an A name we will give him a middle name starting with J, then she can call him AJ. Loumy wants us to name him Derek. Not our favorite. Deedle has no preference.

P.S. It appears that it will only allow me to do one poll at a time to have the voting done correctly. So, vote on mine this week and we'll do Chancho's next.

A Thanksgiving Song

Compliments of Deedle:

A Superficial Post

This is very superficial and probably very boring, so don't feel obligated to comment or anything. I just wanted to record this for my own journaling.

My mother is the epitome of the word charity. Look it up in Webster's and you will find her picture. Because of her I am not as superficial and materialistic as I'm sure I would otherwise be. I'm sure she wishes that I cared even less and less about the things of this world and I am slowly getting there. Because of my upbringing, then, I am slightly ashamed to admit how excited I am for my late-birthday, early-Christmas present I bought for myself with extra money I made by translating a website. We have a bed!

Now, the truth is, we have had a very wonderful and comfortable bed for 4 years. Chancho came into our marriage with an old queen sized-bed and we were happy for it. It held on as long as it could but eventually gave up the ghost and we got an extremely comfortable and happy mattress and box springs. Chancho has seen no need for a bed frame or anything. It feels the same, doesn't it? Well, not to me. It feels totally different now. And I so love the RC Willey Outlet store where I could get my pretty mahogany bed for 80% off and a matching dresser!

So, sorry to be superficial but I really love my new bed and, as you can see, it does still feel the same to Chancho and the kids during the nightly dog-piling, wrestling session.P.S. For those of you who think I am such a Scrooge about Twilight, I will let you know that I saw the movie yesterday and I liked it and was so glad that nobody was screaming or clapping through it or I'm sure I wouldn't have liked it as much.

The News

Do you see these cute little things that I just couldn't resist buying, even though I've already had 2 little girls and have plenty of baby clothes and things? Do you see them?!
Well, they, too, will be packed away in storage for now because this little child in my womb will not be wearing any of them! Because HE is a HE!!!

My family keeps asking how I feel about this. I found out around 4 o' clock and I was first mostly in shock and then felt a bit of a loneliness. This isn't Sarah? Well where is Sarah? Please don't tell me she is in an orphanage somewhere with out me and I won't be able to find her until she is 3 or 4 or something. That breaks my heart. No. No worries. I have faith that God knows way more than He can tell us at one time. So, for now, I will not worry about my Sarah. I will find her some day. I have no doubt of that.

When I can stop worrying about her and why she isn't in my womb, then I start to feel really excited. This is just a very exciting and happy surprise. Who is this little man cub? I am feeling more and more excited to find out. I felt his little nudgings this morning for the first time. Chancho and I were just drifting in and out of sleep, knowing we needed to get up, when I suddenly shouted, "Our baby! I just felt it!" And that is a miracle. I am so blessed and feel very honored that we will have another son.

Loumy, who has been telling us all along that this is a boy, sat in his booster seat in the back and had the cutest little smug look on his face the entire way home as he said over and over, "I KNEW it was a baby bwutha! I knew it was a bwutha!"

Autumn

I can't say that autumn is my favorite season. I could probably go into the details of why that is, but I shan't. Of course autumn is a beautiful time with the changing leaves and all. But the best thing about autumn is that Christmas is on the way. I love Christmas oh so very much. And because Thanksgiving is happening so late this year (at least it seems to me), I am rebelling and am starting my Christmas-ing now. Look at me, I even changed my blog background!

Before I get too much into Christmas, though, I better share some of these photos from our leaf raking (not so much) last Saturday. I was feeling well and the sun was shining ever so nicely. Quick pregnancy tangent ~ I have discovered that when I can get out of bed at my leisure, I have felt well pretty much all the live long day. With my first pregnancy and all of the sickness I remember many older women tell me, good naturedly, "I just had to get up and going and force myself out or I'd be sick all day." Nay! Pretty much the only really good days I've had have been when I stayed in my bed until I felt like getting out. Regrettably that can ever only happen on Saturday or Sunday (and with babies it was never so I'm not complaining, I'm just saying...) The kids still wake me constantly to fix a broken transformer or zip up a pair of pants or whatever the request, but they are big enough that usually their needs don't force me out of bed (and they also know not to turn on the light with their requests and to shut my door when they go back out). So, I love my weekends now more than ever.

Back to Autumn. It had been very rainy and gloomy for quite some time, but Saturday was brilliant so the kids and I took advantage to clean up some leaves. There was a little bit of raking and then lots of...
...leaf fights...
...requests for mom to bury kids in the piles so that they could jump out and leaf fight some more......leaf angels......and plenty of all around happy cuteness!