tid-bits

Does 10 1/2 months qualify for 12ish months? Because I'm sure I read something very professional that said "Babies should start drinking cow's milk at 12ish months". I know, very loose language. But I went with it and am hoping I'm not jumping the gun. I wish you could have seen Kaia with her first bottle of whole milk. She took a few swigs, pulled the bottle out of her mouth, looked at it, and..... literally giggled. Capture that on film and you have a commercial that sells itself. But...I think it gave her the Diarrhea word so we're gonna hold off a bit longer.

Why is Deeter's talking so much fun right now? Well he's a great talker with a great vocabulary but....he's only 2 1/2. Which means context is usually off...which means we do a lot of laughing at/with him. Love that lately when I say, "deeeeter, I love you," he says, "Yea you do."

Porter's teacher told me that the other day he was drawing a stick figure on their discussion board. Porter got all excited and said, "I know what that is. That's a missionary......" No one knew what he was talking about...except the teacher. So he went ahead and drew on a name tag and let that little stick figure be a missionary.

So, I don't know if it is just me, but I am getting the hugest kick out of Dallin's upcoming winter performance. Take a sneak peek:

A proud day in the life of Adam Sandler. I can't imagine that when he was recording his spoof that he thought it would find it's way into mainstream public school music performances. But here it is- 2011- being sung by the masses {ok, well at least in my little town}, representing the Jewish nation. I would of never guessed that in a million years! So tell me I'm not alone....this is hi-larious, right?!!

Summation

Oh I think I survived. You know, sometimes nothing feels as good as alone. And tonight's one of those nights. We've been very much hour by hour here at the Hansen home today. Which implies that things could be a lot worse. So I'm not complaining. But I would like to thank Pandora's Christmas station and some beautifully decorated Christmas homes for giving us a peaceful and muy memorable 25 minutes. Deeter's commentaries added to the night, "Oh MOM, this is an adorable Christmas house." "Oh MOM, I lub the red balls."  Thankfully Yosh already got ours up this year and they look awesome as pictured below.

Totally kidding. We're still holding on to our one strand of pumpkin and ghost lights that never got plugged in and look absolutely ridiculous. But I would love if our house looked like this.

Dallin B was saying his prayers tonight and was going on and on about our friend- whose name I didn't catch- who came to visit and we're so happy bc we haven't seen him in so long and we've missed him etc etc. I finally had to stop him mid-prayer and ask him who the heck he was talking about. "Henry." Oh yea, by some miracle our elf on the shelf arrived this morning at 6:45 just as I heard the kids stretching. Yes, Henry we have missed you. In that same prayer, Dallin prayed that "mom can have help dealing with the kids". That he knows it's hard even though he's not a mom. And he prayed about Dad being strict. Even though moments before him and Porter both said they love me but they love daddy more. And then somehow came back with the consensus that they loved us the same. The charity tie didn't do much for me. But it's kind of funny being a mom and how protective we are of others' relationships- I was almost relieved to hear them say they loved their daddy more. Part of me hopes that's true. Is it because I have no control over that relationship? I don't know.

Anyways, my final thoughts on the funeral that I wanted to get down. At the beginning of last week, as it became apparent my aunt was in her final days and her family was literally gathered around her 24:7 waiting for the final good-bye, my mind kept drifting to a poem that I fell in love with as a young freshman at Ricks College. For the first time though, I felt the words of this poem as I was doing my normal day-to-day chores- making breakfast, shipping kids to school, giving baths, laughing with my husband, etc- and my close family was experiencing heartbreak and anguish deeper than they ever had before. I'm intrigued with the way life jigsaws together. 

I was also aware of the heightened feelings of love and togetherness and closeness at the funeral. How those things that mattered most in life were at the forefront. I was thinking how these were feelings that already existed; they weren't newly created because of the situation. How would it be if we could keep those feelings and thoughts and priorities at the top of the pile instead of letting them sit at the bottom of the stack collecting dust, being expedited to the front only in extreme situations? We'd probably all tweak quite a few decisions and be happier people.

Gretchen was never part of a one-time-world-changing event. So it was very satisfying to look at her life as a whole and see what 59 years of slow, steady, quiet work had produced. And very inspiring. I summed up the overriding message that I walked away with because of her example: DO GOOD. BE GOOD. INFUSE GOOD.

Have a fabulous weekend...I'm sure we all need it!

{Kaia Marie and her namesake. Taken 5/6/11 at Brandon and Kristen's wedding dinner.}

DeeDee Lukey

Wow someone hook me up with some professional grade earplugs because Deeter is L.O.U.D. loud. Now I'll admit that there are many times that I find this characteristic charming, endearing, and down-right funny, but 7 am is not one of those times. "Moooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmm where did my uh-oh  {binki} go?" "Mooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmm I can't find my uh-oh. You come help me?" And put this on repeat until I finally take the pillow off my head, surrender to the yells, and get my big booty out of bed and moving. Gone are the days when he hung out in his crib for a good hour after he woke up, allowing me to get many a things done. No, not just extra sleep. I'm talking dressed, breakfast made, lunches made, and then haul him out of the crib {unless Dallin had already beat me to it}. He has learned that loudness gets results. Which is why he's employed this tactic both in the mornings and after naps.

I must confess this isn't a foreign yell at all. It has an all-too familiar ring to it. I remember laying in my bed at a young 19-years-old just a hollering, "MOOOOOMMMMMMM." When AJ finally responded to my incessant calls, she was usually met with a, "Can you puh-lease bring me a glass of water?" It was endearing, ya'll. Worked like a charm every time as she gave me that smile and the exasperated, "GAbey." But every time she reappeared with some coldy water for me. Now admittedly 19 might be a bit old to be causing that kind of ruckus but I'd argue that 2 years old is too young. 

SIMMER DOWN, DEETZ. POR FAVOR. YOU HAVE THE REST OF YOUR LIFE TO BOSS ME AROUND.

Better Late than Never?

In one instant Deeter proclaims, "My butt hurts." And in the next I'm making a sickening discovery. I walk over to scrape the last bite of yogurt into his spoon. But I stop short as I look at the discolored remains on the bottom with a completely different texture than the yogurt I opened. "You have got to be kidding me." I stared in shock- to think what I have been depriving my kids of all these years. Ok ok, or maybe less dramatically, just all these months. It's like giving them macaroni without the cheese, PB without the J, Oreos without the milk. This Stonyfield Yo Baby brags their own product to be "Love on a Spoon." Well I'll tell you what....there ain't no love if mama ain't stirring and this mama hasn't been stirring. That's right, we're talking about the fruit-on-the-bottom variety. And it's hard to pinpoint the exact moment I lost that specific brain cell responsible for relaying memos of this kind- you know, "stir before eat"- but most likely it took it's death ride out the birthing canal {ironically} right alongside Kaia Marie. And these kids have been suffering ever since.

I pulled myself back into reality, went to fetch the subsequent yogurt Deeter was requesting, peeled back the top and before relinquishing ownership, I took his spoon and gave that yogurt the stir of a lifetime. "Here you go, Mr. Deetz. And stop saying 'butt'. Two-year-olds don't say 'butt'."

Happy Friday ya'll and stay tuned for a "reveal" on Monday {assuming I get the good pics, oh but I will!}....ahhh I've been dying to share!

In case you need a laugh....

......take your pick.


-I bent down to pick up Kaia's car seat, threw my arm under the bar, went to stand up........but somehow just got dropped. And went down. On my bum. And then kinda rolled back. All in slow motion. Oh why yes, thanks for asking.... of course I was in public.


-I took the kids for frozen yogurt. They yogurted and topped and we went to pay and I pulled my $20 $2 out of my pocket..........awkward.  I mean are they really going to throw away the yogurt that only we can consume? We had an uncomfortable 2 seconds of eye contact as we looked for the next step. {I don't know how that $3 hid itself in my stroller but thank you.}


-There's this crazy lady that walks around our town with a baby in a Bjorn, one in a stroller, and usually a couple more walking alongside. She gets quite a few "looks". Well, yesterday the smallest boy took off across the street at a semi-busy 4 way stop with no adult in tow. A policeman came out of the woodwork and swooped him up before a car could run him over.............. You already know where this is going. Imagine the death looks I was getting now that they thought the crazy lady couldn't even take care of all her dang kids. As if I wasn't already humiliated....


-Dallin came home from his friend's house telling me about a little tiff- how he got an interception, and how "Harrison was complaining like hell."  I had Dallin B on the phone with his dad in about 2.2.  "No no no, Dallin...verBAtim. You tell your Daddy VERBATIM how the story goes." {"Mom, Dad won't stop laughing...."}


And that's a wrap. Happy Friday!

Just three things.......

1) This is what Tuesday mornings at our house look like:

2) What is proper communication etiquette for blogging? Do I answer in my comment section? In theirs? Personal email? Do I not answer? I'm all about wanting to continue the conversation but don't know how.



3)The letter verification deals. Seriously? Can we make them any harder to read? To buy concert tickets, I need to solve an unreadable puzzle. To post a listing on craigslist, it's as if they're taunting me..."type this if you can." I mean, it's ridiculous the jumble they want me to turn into coherent letters. Killing me, killing me.