Friday, March 27, 2015

Friday Update #12 (3/27/15)

On Saturday, Seth's friend Kevin invited Seth to join him in a 3-on-3 basketball tournament to benefit Eastside Academy. With the exception of one basketball game during MBR every year, Seth hasn't played basketball since college (at least seven years ago!). But after coaching this winter, Seth has been shooting hoops at the Y quite a bit and probably just thinking about basketball quite a bit more than usual.

There were probably about ten teams of three and, after determining seeding, the tournament began. Seth and Kevin and Mike played pretty well for never playing together and for being, um, old? Two of them started cramping up pretty badly during the last game and that was probably the reason they lost. By three points.


The church hosting the tournament was huge and allowed for a lot of room to run around and explore, plus it had such a cool park! (Too bad it rained all of two minutes after we started playing.)


We had pizza with Kevin and Mike and then went to a park in the middle of Bellevue (totally a perk of Seth's familiarity with the general area and perhaps the East side in particular: he knows where everything is!). Seth had to make phone calls for a while but got to play with us for the most part. While it was still daylight. On a Saturday. Hooray!!


We were supposed to host a family from church for lunch after church, but they had to cancel and though we asked a few more people, it was actually really nice that no one could come over. We lazed around all afternoon.

The week was slow for work, but since Seth had lots to do at TBS and for the upcoming mission trip it was nice that he got some extra time.

Usually the TV is in our bedroom, but especially when I have a lot of laundry to fold, etc, we move it out to the living room. Monday morning the TV was still out in the living room (from the night before) AND the boys even got to watch a show before we headed off for the day. Isaac is sometimes interested in shows, probably just because Ezra is, but we just thought it was so cute that they sat bundled up together and gave us a few minutes to get some things done.


I don't exactly know why we decided to go to Jamba Juice, but we did and had so much fun. The boys have mentioned it several times this week. Ezra even listed it first when he was telling us about the stories he will someday tell his own children.


We try really hard not to tell Ezra that someday he will get married and have kids, because we don't know if he will and don't want to assume or set him up with false expectations. But when he brings the subject up we will sometimes ask him questions. This week he told us, as we were driving in the car that he thinks his wife (established weeks ago as "Smoofy Girl"?) will have twins. A boy and a girl, but he doesn't know their names yet because his wife is going to pick them out. I asked him if he would let me hold his twins after they're born and he thought about it for a few minutes and said "well, you're going to have to ask my wife". But he said that Isaac would be a good uncle to them and that Isaac could hold them.

Tuesday I taught all afternoon and then, as I was on my way to pick up the boys, Seth called to ask if I could go buy 30 waters and bananas and $1 hamburgers and bring them to Chief Leshi. It took me an hour to get everything he needed and grab the kids, but we got to the field before the second game started and handed out the food. In the 2B league there are a number of teams who really struggle to play... competently? And as such their seven inning games take quite a while. Since they have mostly double headers on the schedule, the second game that's supposed to start at 5pm sometimes doesn't start til closer to 7pm, but by then, of course, it's nearly dark and none of the fields so far have lights. So the second Chief Leshi game was called after an inning and will have to be replayed at some point. There are a number of issues (such as the exclusivity of double headers and the very league we're in) that are problematic and the result of a previous Athletic Director's decisions.

There was a football field across from the baseball field (with lights) and Isaac watched football players trickle in, carrying their helmets and kept asking and asking to go see "at-ball" (it sounds like "apple" but really means "football") all night, so once the baseball game finished we went over and watched football practice. Isaac did watch pretty intently, but he also ran around in excitement:


Most nights Seth and I try to watch a show together, but we both get up so early and are so busy throughout the day that by the time the boys are asleep, we crash into bed and quickly fall asleep ourselves. We're watching "The Killing" right now, on Netflix, and it usually takes two nights to watch a 40 minute episode, haha. We're also finishing up the last seasons of "The Office" (even though it's Seth's favorite show, we stopped watching once Michael left and only recently decided to give season 8-9 a try... so far it's not as bad as we feared) and "Parks and Rec" right now too.

I've been listening to a lot more music lately, though. Mostly the BSF hymns Ezra is learning and a playlist of Bible songs I made the boys, but some of my old music too. On the way home from the game, two of the boys fell asleep and the other fell asleep as soon as we got home and, of course, I couldn't fall asleep so I laid in bed listening to Band of Horses. It was so blissful.


Every week Ezra's BSF class sings four hymns (out of the 12? 16? in their "hymnal" for that year) and I try to work on those hymns with him during the week. He knows the majority of them now, as the school year draws to a close.


About a week after they began building the new playground outside the Y, it was finally finished and open for business! We may just get to play at this park every time we're at the Y.



These two sometimes get into these surprisingly lengthy conversations. Apparently sometimes while sitting on my dining room table.


Isaac is pretty hard to get down for a nap. I'd guess he's down to two naps a week? But when he does nap it's pretty great.


Our dryer broke so we spent a month or two going to the laundromat down the street, perhaps mostly out of laziness rather than fixing the old one or buying a new one. When I stop to think about it, I'm really annoyed with myself that I left two months stretch by without just getting a new dryer for goodness sakes, but that's the way it goes sometimes. I'm either busy or tired and too often justify relaxing when the boys are finally asleep instead of catching up on non-urgent tasks. Meanwhile the washed-but-not-dry laundry piles up, since almost always every item of clothing each of us wears needs washed after we wear it once because of the sweatiness/dirt/snot accumulation. Every few days I'm occasionally able to salvage a shirt or pair of pants that I've worn and kept clean (ie, away from the boys), but such is life with little boys.


However, we just bought a new dryer and my dad picked it up and took it to his house because I wasn't ready for it, but I sure needed to get ready! Getting ready means, however, going through everything in the garage - both to make room to bring in the dryer AND because the garage definitely needs to be cleaned up anyway. I've been working pretty hard to purge our house and clothes this winter, but everything I've discarded has gone straight into the garage. So yes, my house has become cleaner and more organized but at the garage's expense. I'm relieved to report, though, that after spending at least an hour out there every day this week, I'm now pleased with the results and will shortly be arranging to bring the new dryer home!

We also set up our old tent in the backyard for the boys to play in. The zipper broke last summer while we were camping, so it's useless except as a play tent.


Every time we leave our house I have to pack a bag with diapers and a change of clothes, some snacks and some books. But lately Ezra has been packing his own bag with his snakes and Superheroes or whatever it is he wants to take along. Well, in typical monkey-see-monkey-do fashion, Isaac has been insisting on packing a bag too. It adds quite a bit of time to our morning preparations, but they're thrilled. And it makes for cute photos:


Friday, March 20, 2015

Friday Update #11 (3/20/15)

After a few days of sickness, by Saturday afternoon we decided to get up and out of the house, but separately, with one kid each. Seth and Ezra went shopping for Isaac's birthday present (and found the best Duplo Batman set ever! Who knew such a thing existed?!) and Isaac and I went to Barnes and Noble and found a few fun picture books and sat in the cafe and ate a cookie. I couldn't stop thinking about how old and wise and mature Isaac is now, and it was just fun to spend a few hours with him and him alone.


Sunday, after church, all the kids came over to Mom and Dad's for a dinner of taco salad and a party for Mom and Isaac's birthday. It was raining so we couldn't play kickball as planned, but we had fun playing with the kids and chatting. With so many very different schedules we don't actually get to spend much time together, all together, so it's really nice when we finally get the opportunity.

Ezra spent a good half hour setting the table. It was so cute to watch him carefully fold napkins and line them up on the table. But then Isaac came along and tried to "help" and of course really just messed up Ezra's napkins, frustrating Ezra.


Ruth made the best cake ever. Ezra talks about his "George cake for his two birthday" and his "snake cake for his three birthday" all of the time, so several months ago he decided Isaac needed a Batman cake for his "two birthday" (and that he would have a Superman cake for his "four birthday") and Ruth sure delivered.

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On Monday our new six week session of classes at the YMCA and Ezra is taking a baseball skills class, so Monday afternoon we got to go to the Y and he learned how to field grounders and run from base to base. It was so adorable and I am so excited to someday get to watch my boys play baseball.



Tuesday was a full, full day of swimming at the Y, piano lessons, and then making it to the second game of TBS v. Life Christian's double header at Cirque. Whew! It was very cold, but so fun to watch a real game of baseball.

Wednesday morning we skipped BSF and Dad took Isaac for a few hours so that Ezra and I (and Joel and Tiffany) could visit the Tacoma CC community's open house. It was really good to finally get to see CC in action. I've been doing so much reading and talking about it, but nothing beats actually visiting a class.

After learning their new material for the week and reviewing the material from the last week(s), each of the kids got to stand up in front of the class and give a presentation. For these little kids, it's really just show and tell (but the older kids have assigned presentation topics), and one by one they stood up and said "Hello, my name is ____ and I will be presenting on ____" and after presenting they asked the class if they had any questions. It was adorable and about halfway through Ezra got really concerned about what his presentation would be on. I kept trying to hush him and tell him he wouldn't be presenting, but he found a Batman book in my purse and made his desire to present known to the teacher ("tutor") so after everyone else was done, she offered Ezra the chance to present.

I was so surprised that he wanted to, and then so surprised and proud with his presentation. He was perfectly self-assured and spoke clearly and confidently. It was amazing.


I had a bunch of piano lessons that afternoon, plus some of my students had to stay extra long after lessons until their mom could pick them up, and another boy, Drew, came over and played for a while. Ezra definitely got lots of social interaction this week. I was needlessly a bit worried for him and how he would handle this, because he definitely needs time to recharge, alone, anyway but especially so when he's around a lot of people. Sometimes he just rises to the occasion and makes me so grateful for his ability to adapt.

Wednesday was my grandpa's birthday, and even though I had to work, my parents offered to take the boys up to Shoreline with them so they could celebrate with Great Grandpa. I was sorry to miss the party, but it did allow Seth and I the opportunity to go out to dinner and talk without interruption for a long time. We've been having a difficult time of it lately and have really needed extra time to talk.

On Friday I was laying on the couch, writing invoices for Seth (and therefore focusing on the computer screen) while Seth was laying on the ground playing with the kids. Isaac has these wooden stacking toys and one of the pieces is a wooded sphere that definitely has some heft to it. Even though he knows he isn't to throw anything (besides his soft balls) in the house, I guess he thought it was a ball and chucked it. Right into my eye. I didn't see it coming and he threw it hard! It hurt and I was really surprised, so I was crying (probably too dramatically) and the boys freaked out. Poor Isaac felt terrible.

The next few days I couldn't believe how much my cheek hurt. The kid is two! It legitimately did hurt, but it was probably more the shock of it that I couldn't get over.


Ezra kept praying for me, which was really sweet. After a few days of telling him that, yes, my "eye" still hurt, when I finally said it was feeling better he was so excited. He came running across the room and hugged me and said: "Oh, Mommy! I just knew our Holy God would heal you! I was praying and praying and He healed you!"

It was one of those sweet moments I'll never forget, both because he is so transparent with his great love for me and because he so unquestionably believes God is Holy and that He Heals.

Seth is about to take over the drama class at TBS, as the current drama teacher (who goes to our church, actually) is going on maternity leave. The class is performing the second of their two big plays on March 27th and then Seth takes over. He has a big event to plan for (on April 30th) and is going to give them a big final project, but at least doesn't have to direct a play. Anyway, on Thursday we went to dinner at the Meyers' house so that Seth and Jennifer could discuss his lesson plans and learn more about what the class has done. The Meyers have a ten year old son, Calvin, who is so gracious to play with my kids anyway, but as we were at their house this week, he and Ezra discovered that they both love Superheroes and they happily spent three hours playing with all of Calvin's superhero action figures and Legos.

We had to meet Seth at TBS, though, before we all drove up to Federal Way together, and since the boys and I had time to kill, we went to the park across the street and admired the "flower trees" and played at the park.






Friday we had two gymnastics classes at the Y and then went grocery shopping. It's getting easier and easier to take the boys shopping (well, anywhere, really). Perhaps it's even getting to be an enjoyable prospect. They then got to watch a show while I super cleaned the bathroom and generally tidied up. I have been working really hard to keep the house well-cleaned. A clean house has always been very important to me, but it's been hard to meet my most minimal standards these last few years. And a dirty house just makes everything worse (to me).

I've done a good deal of purging these last few months, though, and a lot of reorganizing, so it's been easier to put things in their correct places, but I've also made myself wash all of the dishes every night before tumbling into bed. For a while I tried to justify washing dishes in the morning, because I had more energy (so weird, but true... thanks a lot for those 6:30am wake ups, Isaac), but even though I do feel more up to it in the morning these days, it's demoralizing to wake up to a counter full of dirty dishes.

All of that is to say that, on Friday, it didn't take too long to whip the house into shape. It took the length of a twenty minute TV show, actually. And then I gave Isaac a butter knife and, after much convincing on his part, I gave Ezra a paring knife and he helped me chop zucchini and  green onions and peppers for my lasanga and lemons for iced tea (well, he also added a slice of zucchini and proudly announced it was zucchini lemonade). Isaac was so happy to "do knifing" and Ezra was a legitimate help, so before I knew it I had most of dinner ready. It was amazing!

Seth got home to play with them (and distract them) while I finished cleaning up our mess and then my Mom came and whisked the boys away for an evening of grocery shopping and dinner at Farelli's. It just was a great few hours, but that six people were about to come to dinner (for our monthly dinner of eight we participate in with people from church) and I had to have a clean house and dinner ready? It really wasn't stressful or overwhelming. And that is a significant enough occurrence to write about, paragraph after paragraph.

Friday, March 13, 2015

Friday Update #10 (3/13/15)

On Monday we got to watch Aurora one last time, before her grandparents returned home, so we played at home all morning and then went to play at Cirque Park while Seth had practice. I left right after practice ended and raced to go pick up my friend so we could go to an informational meeting for a homeschool co-op we're considering. This particular co-op meets in Lacey, but is part of a nation-wide co-op called Classical Conversations.

It was good to hear more about CC and meet the people involved in this particular community, but it was also really nice to spend some time talking with Tiffany about our educational goals for our four year olds. I think we'll be doing a lot of lesson planning and generally encouraging one another throughout this summer and coming school year.

And then I dropped Tiffany off and got to go out to coffee with my friend Ali. It was so late when we met up and then we stayed in the coffee shop til it closed and then sat in my car in the parking lot until we were both yawning more than we were talking! I do know I miss Ali, but when we actually spend time together I realize how much I miss her. Moscow is too far away. And I'm not very good about staying in touch with people that I don't see.

The next morning I actually took the boys to Ali's mom's house so the kids could all play together. Ezra loves Effie and just couldn't wait to see her (and hold her). And Sam and Isaac played together quite a bit too. It's so fun to see my friends' kids in person, because seeing photos on Facebook or whatever just doesn't really give a full picture of their personalities and so on.



After Ali's we went to Fred Meyer and did a bit of shopping for my Mom's birthday. Ezra gets really excited about getting people presents but if you take him too early then he has a hard time waiting to give the birthday person their present. So it usually works best to go the day before or day of. Anyway, we got Mom some bulbs and a "flower cake" and then went to my parents' house and I dropped the boys off with Dad so I could teach. Dad and the boys wrapped the presents and made the cutest "Happy Birthday" sign. I actually finished teaching earlier than expected and got home just minutes before Mom did, so I got to hide with Dad and the boys and jump out and surprise her when she walked in the door. I think she was sufficiently surprised and thrilled with the attention.

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Last week Seth had a basketball banquet with the players and other coaches to celebrate the end of the season and the players' accomplishments, but this week the head coach (who is actually our pastor) took all of the coaches and their wives out to dinner at The Old Spaghetti Factory. It was a bit difficult to find babysitting, but I was able to convince my friend Tiffany to watch my boys for a few hours while Seth and I went to the restaurant. The food was so good and it was just so nice to go out with other adults. I also like to see other people appreciate my husband, so that didn't hurt either. ;)

Wednesday Isaac was a bit fussy and clingy, but not ridiculously so. But that night he woke up throwing up on Ezra (so that was a fun thing to clean up at 2am). Fortunately Isaac woke up Thursday morning perfectly cheerful and didn't throw up again, so we just thought it was a weird fluke?

Seth worked early, so he was home early enough to let me slip away to another informational meeting for a different CC community. He took the boys to Cirque where they played in the sunshine some more, before I came and met them. It's nice that practices (and eventually games) are outside and at a park. It's not a great park, but it's still more fun than a tiny gym (like we had at basketball).



Seth and I had a hard time not acknowledging to Isaac that it was his birthday, but we didn't want to confuse him or Ezra since we were going to have a party for him a few days later. I was definitely a bit weepy leading up to Isaac's birthday and Seth kinda teased me for it, but Seth was feeling pretty sentimental and nostalgic on Isaac's birthday too.

Sadly, Thursday night Seth started throwing up so we finally had to acknowledge that we had probably succumbed to the stomach flu going around. Seth was miserable all night and then spent Friday trying to recover. The boys and I skipped gymnastics and playgroup to stay home to take care of him, which was initially disappointing but also providential because by afternoon I was starting to feel sick too. I only ever felt nauseated and took like three naps, and Ezra never got sick, but it was still a rough couple of days. I was so glad for the TV, because Seth and I were not up for playing with the kids!!

Friday, March 6, 2015

Friday Update #9 (3/6/15)

The first Sunday of every month a group of us meet after church to discuss how our church does and should minister to the youth in particular. This month my parents took the kids home from church so we could go to the meeting AND so we could go out to lunch. We recently got a few gift cards (a perk of coaching so much basketball) and so it was fun to use one of those at Red Robin.

Seth was again asked to help coach a Tacoma Baptist School sport and took Monday afternoon off work to make sure he could make it to the very first baseball practice of the season. He finished his morning job early, though, and took the boys and I down to Chambers Bay to enjoy some sunshine before practice.





The walk back to the car, from the beach, took an extra long time because two little boys kept stopping and rolling around in the green grass and sunshine.


Since the boys obeyed so cheerfully when we told them it was time to go, we treated them to ice cream cones on the way to practice. I can't remember the last time we had ice cream cones, but it was worth the mess.


There is this ridiculous Jimmy Fallon (spinoff from SNL) comedy skit where he and another actor sing about their tight pants... somehow Ezra saw it and just thought it was the funniest song. Perhaps since he himself is determined to only wear "tight pants"? But when Seth put on his baseball pants Ezra asked Seth to sing "the tight pants song" and Seth obliged. There's even a video, but I promised Seth I wouldn't put it online.


Otto gave Isaac a small set of Duplos for his first birthday and while we did play with them sometimes, Isaac just rediscovered them this week and is obsessed with them!! He sits so happily for about a half hour at a time, building "my house" and then is so proud of himself when he shows us what he's built. I always keep the boys' toys categorized by type in small plastic containers (with lids) on a shelf in their room so that we can pull down one box at a time to play with and (theoretically, at least) keep the mess contained. It also helps keep the toys fresh and exciting, since they're not always accessible. Anyway, the Duplos have their own box and as soon as Isaac is done playing with them I clean them up and hide them so that they're still really exciting when I pull them out again. It's only been a few days but I very much look forward to the half hour when Isaac can play Duplos by himself. I know he's still young, but it is often a struggle to keep Isaac occupied on his own and we are very much working on that.


We got to babysit Aurora again this week, Wednesday-Friday. We had intended to bring her along with us to BSF and all our Y classes, but it was harder to trot out three kids and Seth accidentally took my keys on Wednesday so we missed BSF and then on Friday I was just too tired to go to gymnastics with three kids by myself.

They played together pretty well and it was fun to read through the books Aurora brought and to build a big fort (since we moved our couch, at least for now). And I even got to braid some hair!




On Thursday we went to Cirque Park with Seth to play (and watch) while he coached baseball. The fields at Cirque are quite nice, so it's fun that Cirque is TBS' home field (since they don't have a field of their own at the school). I don't know when games start, as he hasn't received a schedule yet, but they have practice Monday-Friday, 3-6pm. He has already missed some practices and will likely miss many more, when work interferes, but he's going to try to go to as many as he can. Cirque Park has a big volleyball court, with sand, that the boys think is their personal sandbox, and a very small play structure with a slide. As far as play structures go it's one of the most minimal in the area, but we will still have fun there. The boys will also really just enjoy running around in the sunshine. It will be much easier and therefore more enjoyable to take them to baseball games (than it was to take them to basketball games).

We're pretty excited for the sunny weather, around here!