Tea Party

Yesterday, Julia set up her tea set.

We bought it for her for her 5th birthday and she still loves to have tea parties.

Tongue out when concentrating is the norm around here:

May you have tea party worthy day today.

7 Quick Takes

Taking another stab at joining Conversion Diary for Friday's 7 Quick Takes. I seem to always remember that I want to participate in 7 Quick Takes on like the Sunday or Monday afterwards. 

So typical.

1)

It is supposed to be in the 90s for the foreseeable future. We've just had such nice actual spring time weather that having it jump up to the 90s so fast is disheartening. I love temps in the high 70s and low 80s, which is what it's been until this week. This is when it occurs to me that, ugh, I still live in Texas.

2)

Vivian is really into being a super hero. Here she is in what I can only assume is some sort of French Superhero costume...

3)

It is almost the end of April and I have not read that many books this month. Between being super busy with the girls' dance classes and tball/softball schedule, I just haven't had a chance to read as much. Plus, I have been into non-fiction literature lately, which takes WAY longer to get through. So, while I still have been reading daily, I'm not flying through them like I normally do. I guess what I'm trying to say is, I need my family to leave me for a huge chunk of the day so I can poor some coffee and snuggle on the couch with my books and read for hours on end. Think that'll happen anytime soon?  Yeah, me neither.

4)

Speaking of  books, I was telling Evan that my upstairs book was really good and I was going to be sad when it was over. He started laughing and said, "You are such a nerd. You have an upstairs book and a downstairs book?! Hahahahaha." Uh...yeah. Is that not normal? I also have a purse book because I keep my kindle in there. It's not just me, right? You understand having multiple location books, right?

5)

I love roses. I don't care how cliche that statement is, I truly love having roses in my garden. I know I've talked about my roses before, but I need to share some of these pictures with you all because one of the rose bushes in our front garden has not flowered at all since we've lived here. There were three rose bushes that we inherited and it was obvious that the family before us had not tried to take care of them. So, I have been determinedly trying to save them and after the first season two of them started budding and flowering (cause roses bloom all year here), but the smallest one just was so puny and in the worst shape. I refused to give up and after over 2.5 years, that little rose bush actually bloomed!!!! See:

How pretty are its blooms?!  I had no idea what color it would be, but am so glad it's a different color than the other original two (which bloom yellow and an almost neon orange). It had 11 roses that opened last week!!!

Here is my orange one that is thriving:

6)

So, I have been a very loyal Walgreens photo customer since forever and a day. I have used their site, printed to their stores, and never strayed. But, with their newest website update, it is darn near impossible to upload pictures quickly and I have moved on to Shutterfly. Added bonus: Shutterfly types the date the picture was taken on the back of the pictures. You guys, if I had known that I would have switched to them YEARS ago!!!!  Plus, I do like having them delivered to my house instead of making a trip to Walgreens to pick them up because I always end up finding other crap I "need" while I am there. It's really just a winning situation all around.

7) 

It's that time of year when the ducks that live at the Quadrangle come and visit our homes. Well, mainly they come and hang out in our trees and on our rooftops. It's very bizarre and hilarious. Julia saw these two in our neighbor's tree and ran inside yelling, "Mommy! Get your camera, quick! You're going to be so excited!" My children truly know their mother.

15

On the 26th of this month is our 15th dating anniversary.

That means that we will have been dating for the same amount of years that Evan was alive when we actually started dating.

That means next year, at 16 years of dating, Evan will have had me in his life longer than he was without me in his life.

Mind boggling.

Elisabeth has been very curious about how Evan and I met lately. She asks about when we met, our first few dates, etc. She thinks it's funny that Evan and my sister were in 4th grade and that I may have seen Evan and not known even known it. "Mom, what if you did see him! Wouldn't that be weird to see him and know that you were going to marry him?!"

I told Evan that I might write down our story for the kids. He asked why, "it's not really that exciting". And, to be honest, it's not exciting in a romantic movie type of way. There's no "love at first sight" moment, no huge dramatic break up scene, no old boyfriends or girlfriends to bicker over. But, when we are introducing ourselves to new people (which happens all the stinking time in the military), we often get asked how long we've been married or when we met. People always are impressed to find out we're high school sweethearts. They become amazed when they find out how young we were when we started dating (15 and 17, respectively) and that we never broke up. I had one spouse of Evan's co-worker tell me that Evan and I were a rarity. "You don't hear about hometown high school sweethearts too often anymore."

I'm not sure how true it is that we're a rarity, but I do understand wanting to hear more about how we met and ended up staying together. I love hearing how people met; I think it's a great way to learn more about them. There are usually funny stories or inside jokes that the couple has told so often they have it down to a finely tuned art when they tell the story to new friends. There's that history of a couple that shapes and develops them into who they are today as individuals, but more importantly, who they are as a couple. Those are the stories that Elisabeth is looking for, the stories that made her parents from being just Evan and Virginia into Evan&Virginia.

So, I think I will write down our story. It may not be interesting to others, but I think our kids will appreciate having it someday when we aren't there to tell it anymore. Plus, I need to write it down before I forget parts. Isn't that sad to think that someday I may not remember all the details as well as I do right now? Like the first time I ever heard Evan's voice. Or the first time I went to his house. Or the first time we held hands.

But, I really feel that the part of our story that I like best is that because we decided to start dating, because we decided to really commit to our relationship forever, we have three beautiful people in our house that are here because of us deciding to be boyfriend and girlfriend 15 years ago.

So Very Two

I realize that I just recently posted to tell you all how Vivian is a menace trying to torture me to death by being two years old, but, you guys, seriously...the child is insanely exhausting. 

Let me think about where to begin...

Today I bribed her into letting me put her hair into a ponytail by giving her a piece of gum. Later in the day, I bribed her to stop chewing on rocks she'd put in a cup by giving her a piece of gum. (I buy a lot of gum)

Yesterday, I was cooking dinner (Pioneer Woman's Chicken Pot Pie, in case you were curious) (and, yes, it was delicious!) and it was just me and Vivian because Evan had taken the other two to their respected tball/softball practices. I was getting ready to make the pie crust for the top of the pot pie (Pioneer Woman's Pie Crust recipe, of course!) and went to grab the butter I needed except I couldn't find the half stick I'd left out. Now, I am naturally forgetful so I started looking in the places I might leave the butter--refrigerator, by the mixer, all the counter space. I was starting to get frustrated when it occurred to me who was home with me. Not looking, but hearing her making noises from the living room, I asked: "Vivian, do you have my butter?"

"Umm...."

I walk in and she is sitting in Evan's recliner with butter she'd dug out with her grubby little toddler fingers smeared all over his chair.

 She is never still. Never. She still sleeps with us half the night and even in her sleep she is just such a wiggle worm. She needs gross motor activities on daily basis or she is a beast. I am so, so thankful for our trampoline and large yard. Sometimes she will wrestle with Evan or run laps around the inside of the house on days when we can't get outside. I am always so relieved when they go to the YLand at the Y because it's like the playlands in restaurants and she can climb and slide while I'm working out.

 She is just so contrary. I will ask her to throw away the banana peel she just carelessly flung onto the couch and she will manically laugh as she tells me no. But, I tell her, "No, Mommy wants to throw it away," and she will scream, "NO! YINYIN (translation: Vivian) DO IT!". Sometimes trying to trying to use reverse psychology to get her to comply from the get-go backfires, though. You just never know!

 She's really cute when she's sleeping though. Or when she's restrained in a car seat.

 

 Taking her in public is like setting my pet tornado loose on mankind. Today at the library, I was in line to check out books. Again, we were alone (having the older two around is a HUGE HELP when anywhere with Vivian because they are fabulous older sisters who are fully aware that the youngest one is insane in the membrane), so every time I would try to corral her I'd end up losing my place in line. Finally, I gave up and just prayed she wouldn't tear the ding dong place down. After she tipped over the two gaming chairs in the video game area and yelled at me while sitting upside down in one and pointing to the second chair, "MOMMY! THIS-A ONE FOR YOU!", she proceeded to bring me every recycling and garbage can in the library. You'd think there wouldn't be that many cans in a somewhat small library, but you'd be wrong. She managed to bring me 5 before I was finished. How lucky am I that the librarians found her cute and were so sweet about her wreaking havoc?! I reassured them that she trashes my home as well.

 Don't get me wrong, the kid is a hoot! She likes to have us tie pieces of fabric around her neck so she can be Super Bunny and then she yells out, "SUPER BUNNY, AWAY!!!" and runs laps around the house.

Her love of dump trucks is so sweet. She asks every morning to dress up (translation: get dressed) so she can go get her pal Mac and go play trucks. We have a book with little poems in them and one is called Dump Truck. She has the whole thing memorized.

She is really stingy with her hugs, kisses, and I love yous, so we all feel honored when she actually consents to being kissed and hugged or actually tells you she loves you too after you tell her.

 Sometimes I weigh the pros and cons to taking her places because we have a very small window of what we all refer to as "Vivian Time", which means we have about X amount of time on any given errand day before she loses her mind in public and goes into full destruction/tantrum mode. If you were visiting us you would often hear us say, "If we go both of those places, we may be pushing our luck with Vivian Time" or "We are wasting precious Vivian Time!" or "We're almost out of Vivian Time, let's just go home after this."

There is a lot of stress when using Daylight Vivian Time.

We're going to keep her, I promise. I just...need reassured that I am going to survive this child being two.

And wine. I need you all to tell the Wine Fairy that my house needs stocked ASAP.

It's tball/softball season around these here parts

Once I fill out the forms in March for the girls to play tball and softball, I hoard the rest of the free Saturdays like the precious gems that they are, because once the tball/softball season starts, our evenings and Saturdays belong to the baseball fields.

This year, Julia is in the oldest of the tball groups--the 5 & 6 year olds. Evan is an assistant coach, which Julia was super pumped about.

 For some weird reason, all of Julia's games are at 9am. She only plays the 3 other tball teams from Ft Sam, but there are no 10am games at all for 2 whole months! At first I was a bit grumbily (she and Evan have to be there by 8:30ish), but now I kind of like that it's a set time and we just have to work around Elisabeth's softball schedule.

 Let me tell you how great it is having Evan around this season. Not only does he help out at all of Julia's practices during the week, but he helps drive the girls to practices and is here to take one girl to one game while I take the other to an away game if need be. It really, really sucked last year doing all of that solo when he was gone to Ohio for training for a month. Plus, he's been wanting to help coach for the past two seasons and now he is able to!

 I love watching Julia play tball because she adds her own little Juju twist to the game. She still wears skirts and dresses to practice and bright neon pink shoes to games.

Elisabeth is on a girls softball team this year. Last year there wasn't enough girls for a softball team, so she was on a co-ed baseball team. She transitioned seamlessly back into softball. Her softball coach from two years ago is back and keeps telling us how much Ebeth has grown as a player. He's all proud of her and she's all proud that he's proud. Actually, both girls have coaches from previous seasons, which is kind of rare for being on military teams; there is so much moving that the odds of having a coach be there for consecutive years is not common.

  Elisabeth plays either second or third base. She has proved to be very good at covering bases, so her coach rotates her from those two bases the whole game. Elisabeth loves not having to sit out.

 She is also hilarious at bat. Since the age range is 11-12 year olds, most of the girls are still learning how to develop their pitching skills, so there are a lot of balls thrown instead of strikes. Ebeth is like a freaking statue, staring down the pitcher, refusing to budge if it not a perfect strike. We realized that she might be psyching out the pitchers by her stone solid stance and her coach agreed. It's pretty amusing at how stubborn she is about it all.

 When we signed her up two years ago to play, I didn't think she'd love it so much. She asks Evan to help her play catch, she never complains about her 1.5 hour long practices (2 days a week). She's excited about games and is very loud about cheering on her teammates. I'm curious to see if she keeps up playing through junior high and high school.

And then, there's Vivian, who is pretty ticked that she is not allowed to play tball. She invades Julia's dugout and insists on stealing batting helmets and baseball caps.

 She has a little friend who is the little sister of one of Julia's good friends who she hangs out with in the dugout. She tries to encourage her little friend to also steal bats and helmets, but so far, it's just Vivian who is the thief.

 Vivian also insists on warming up with Evan. She wears Julia's little glove and throws the ball with the glove and absolutely refuses to accept that she needs to throw with the non-gloved hand.

 If I bring her snacks and her dump truck, she will generally stay near by and not try to run onto the fields to interrupt the games. Usually.

 After the tball games, Evan helps her run the bases, which she thinks is the most fun thing ever.

 You guys, the cuteness here is too much:

This will be our life until the end of May. It is completely exhausting but so very fun to watch them play a game they love.