Max: Mommy, check the news for tomorrow
Sammy: "Please bless that all the people in the world will have a good night except the people in China cuz their night's almost over"
Phoebe: I'm not a kid. I am Bebe Uh-cheli
Esther has started saying Blah-blah-blah and rocking back and forth on her knees and just getting all around the floor without quite crawling. She smiles and laughs and sleeps in my arms still always. We weed the garden together and cook dinner together. She is my little buddy and I feel like I'm missing my arm if someone else asks to hold her and generally she does too by the way she sobs when someone else holds her, although not always. She LOVES her uncles and aunts and her siblings and Grandma and Dadu. She has loved all the solid food I've given her, including salmon tonight. She loves to bob her head up and down in a very exaggerated way and it is so cute and funny! She is a delight in every way!
Grandma had to go to the hospital on Monday. She was fine but we were very worried in the beginning. I gathered all the kids around me to pray. Sammy offered it and said, " Please bless Grandma that she won't die and that she'll have the best day ever!" Then Javier came home and Esther and I went to hospital to be with Grandma. As soon as she saw Esther she perked right up. She kept saying, "just let me see Esther. I swear she is the best medicine!" And when I told her about Sammy's sweet prayer she laughed out loud and looked like her old self. I love my grandma! I was so glad she was okay!
Phoebe HATES it when Javier leaves for work! She will sometimes cry for an hour and get angry saying, "I DONT WANT DADDY TO LEAVE!!" She really wants to Marry Daddy and she doesn't like to be told she can't :) Phoebe is so funny right now! Everything she says is so incredibly cute. I wish I could remember more and just bottle up these moments.
Phoebe loves a show called Daniel Tiger where they teach these great little one line songs about emotions. Phoebe goes around all day singing, "You can be a good helper in your family" You can imagine when she sings that to me as I'm setting the table or making cookies or cleaning the bathroom it is so cute that no matter how inconvenient it may be to include my sweet three year old I always say yes :) My favorite is when I start to get Mad and Phoebe will quietly start singing, "When you feel so mad that you want to roar, take a deep breath and count to four" Or when I ask her to go get a diaper for Esther, she'll trundle up the stairs singing, "Everybody's job is Important! We all help...in different ways!" I love that girl! She is a good little coach for me and she's learning so much herself! Im so proud of her!
Sammy is such a sweetheart. He has been so helpful. Whenever I need something done I know if I ask him he will say yes and do it right away.
Max has become quite the incredible helper too! He has learned to do his and Sammy's laundry all by himself, start to finish. He has also made dinner all by himself a couple of times now, really good food too like homemade macaroni and cheese. I am so proud of him as I see him developing these skills for life!
Phoebe tells the best stories! They are super elaborate and go on for like a half hour. Max will sometimes roll his eyes when I'm listening to one of Phoebe's stories and say, "Mom, you know Phoebe's stories last forever!" But they are really fun. She will get wide eyes and whisper during the most intense parts and do fun voices. She finds little ways to build the suspense. I know she is a genius to have such a long attention span not to mention the elaborate plots :)
Max got his hands on a rubix cube the other day and worked on it for a good hour. He got one whole side and the first row of all the next sides done, then kept on working it, sometimes ruining his work to try a new combination. I was so proud of him. I would never have the courage to wreck something I had worked so hard on even if I wanted to try solving it further. He is such a creative and courageous boy! Also his attention span! Incredible!!
I have been taking the boys to a counselor the last couple months. First we were mainly talking about Anger and Sammy and how I could be a more effective parent when he gets angry. I learned so much and Sammy did too. My biggest takeaway was that when Sweet Sammy gets angry it is as unpleasant for him as it is for me. He wants so much to be the best son/brother/person in the world and sometimes that is just too much. The message that I need to send when he gets mad is," You feel angry. It doesn't feel good. I love you and I will be here for you. You can work through this and feel happy again. I believe in you." It is incredible how much this simple schema shift has changed our whole family dynamic. I wish someone had helped me understand that 7 years ago!
Now we are learning about Inattention and Max. I am excited to learn how to be a more effective parent here too so that he can feel more successful. As we were talking to the counselor I am always worried that the boys will feel picked on. On the one hand, I really believe we can improve our lives by learning better strategies. On the other hand, I am so worried about the kids feeling like there is something wrong with them. We got in the car after our last session and I asked the boys, specifically Max, if he felt picked on. I made sure to tell him that every single person has weaknesses and we all are trying to learn all we can so we can make our weaknesses strong and that if we trust in God he will help us. I am proud of him because he really understands this. He doesn't get down about it at least not that I can see. I think it helps that I really have the same problem and I told him that. I talked to Sammy about how proud I am of him for learning more effective ways to handle anger and how much he has improved. Hopefully my kids understand when I tell them that we will never expect them to be perfect and that weaknesses don't make them bad, just human. I am still learning this concept myself. I feel like it is important to write this story. It is different from what I usually put in here. For me at least this has been more of a worry than the fun things I usually write about but I am proud of the way my kids have responded to this test. They are such good kids.
Sammy cares for Esther so sweetly. I will set her down sometimes in her excersaucer and it never fails that the next time I turn around she'll be gone and Sammy will have her all snuggled up in his arms and he will be cooing to her and playing with her and making her laugh. He is so incredibly responsible with her. She loves it when he holds her because he really supports her perfectly and does it just right. He loves her so much! He is always telling me how much he loves his little sister. He is a sweetheart in so many ways. Today he told me that when he learns how to drive he will drive Phoebe to school for me :)
Sammy woke up with bedhead yesterday with hair sticking up on either side of his head. HE thought it looked like wolf ears and he was so excited he went around howling the rest of the day. It was so cute!
Phoebe:When my pet hyena died, I cried and cried about my hyena"
Max loves to talk like Jar Jar Binks like "Meesa hungry!" and after his little friends baptism, "Yousa Baptized!"
I've always felt that Max was a righteous little soul and it is certainly no different now. He is so well prepared for his baptism. He wanted to read the whole book of mormon before his baptism and we are about half way through Alma. He understands it and is really paying attention and following along. Sammy is too! They know so many stories and doctrines they just make me so proud! Even Phoebe has picked up on a few things. She is always talking saying, "Alma was a wicked priest and then he repented and turned into a missionary!" And the other day she was talking about a wicked witch but kept calling her a wicked priest. That was pretty cute!
Esther learned how to say, "Dadadadada!" and she is so proud of her little self. Whenever someone says, "Say Mama, Esther, " she will get a great big grin on her face and yell, "DADADADADADA!!" I love it! Also she loves to give us all the biggest two toothiest grin whenever we look her way.
Esther is independent! She let me feed her baby food for maybe a month before she decided to take over. One night she refused to eat if the spoon was in my hand but once she got it from me she eat the food off, then when I tried to take it from her to refill it she started screaming at the top of her voice until I gave it back. She makes a disastrous mess but she can feed herself like a big girl :) Now I just feed her chunks of soft food and she eats like a pro, almost anything!
Sammy told me, "Maybe Victoria invited me to her party because I'm in love with her." (Mommy's eyebrows get surprised) "I'm also in love with Peanut and Alexis" (Mommy' eyebrows get more surprised and I said, "I thought just yesterday you said you have a crush on Savannah?" ) "I do!
but a crush is different. Then today he told us he is also in love with Maya at church. What a cute little ladies man!
I made Sammy make thank you cards for all his friends who came to his birthday party. They were so sweet! While he was writing to his friends, "Phoebe sat down to make "invitations" for all her friends. Then without me even noticing se put them in her backpack and brought it with us when we went to see Sammys adorable kindergarten program. It was halfway through when I noticed Phoebe had been passing out her invitations to all the little kids and babies sitting around us. She is such a funny girl!
Phoebe: Whats your name
Mommy:Margie, whats your name?
Phoebe: Sheshe...WHats your baby name?
Mommy: Selena
Phoebe (whispering): Now ask me whats my baby name
Mommy: whats your baby name?
Phoebe: Little happy bomb bomb
Mommy:Little happy bomb bomb???
Phoebe( her voice getting all excited and gravelly and her face scrunched up): Her gets all the bombs and throws them at the bad guys!!! (Then running back to her game with her baby held high in the air, "I'm going to kill you to deff!!!!"
