Seven plus a half

That's right.  

Nolen is seven and a half today.  I nearly missed it.  I have been stretched a little thin this May and I hate forgetting milestones.  My memory reminded my that something important was happening today at approximately 11 AM.  I thought about how I could fit in everything that needed to happen today and realized it wasn't possible.  So we skipped track and just went to swim team today then headed over to a friends house to eat dinner and play.  It was the perfect half birthday celebration!

We brought cupcakes and played and played.

Nolen is hilarious!

He loves to laugh. 

Nolen loves to be the center of attention.

He is kind.

He is silly.

He tells me the same poop and fart jokes over and over again.

Nolen is eating better food all the time.

Nolen is smart.

Nolen loves school.

Everyone around Nolen loves him.

He is the life of the party.

Nolen loves youtube.

He loves playing roblox and minecraft.

Nolen still plays the piano and will start the cello soon.

He is my best get out of the house buddy.

He loves going on little errands with me.

Nolen loves sugar.

He loves anything with sugar and chocolate.

Nolen is seriously the sweetest kid, ever. Period.

Nolen is still very literal.  

He takes a lot of things as fact when they are not.

If the time is 5:29 and I round up saying it's 5:30 he gets extremely upset with me and calls me a liar.

I laugh a little inside.  It's true.  I did lie. 

I love this kid.

I can not believe he will be baptized in 6 months.  Time just seems to continue pressing forward at full steam ahead.  I can not slow time down.  

I love this kid.  I love him more than I can express.

He loves running.  He puts his whole heart into running.  He wants to be the fastest runner in the world.  I have no doubt that he will try is very hardest to make this happen.

He still wants to be an astronaut when he grows up. He wants to be the first person on Mars. I wish I could make this come true for him.

I love you, sweet Nolen William!

Happy half birthday!

Saturday's are busy days

Happy Mother's Day to all women!  

My mom sent me chocolate covered strawberries and my sweet husband made breakfast and bought me some flowers and chocolates.  As I was heading out the door for church this morning, Edward said, "My ear really really hurts!"  I took his temp and decided it was best he stay home.  Nolen and I went to sacrament meeting together then came home.

I feel asleep as soon as I sat down after church.

Saturday's are busy days.

Yesterday, Melanie and I woke up before dawn to go on a nice 13.5 mile bike ride.  It was wonderful.  The sunset was beautiful to watch as we road out and back on the Bosque trail.

As soon I got home, I woke up the boys and got them ready for their track meet.  Track meets are long days.  The boys enjoy running and I really enjoy running with them.  It is wonderful to watch them grow each week and push themselves harder every single meet.  I sprayed the boys vigilantly with sunscreen all day.  I sprayed myself twice, but spent most the day away from my bottle of sunscreen.  My legs got the worst of it.  They look like lobster legs. HA!

The track meet ended around 3:00 so we headed home.  I took a quick shower and went straight to the church for my piano/voice recital.  I arrived just as a graduation party was ending.  The graduation party hosts kindly helped me set up 60 chairs and move the piano around.  I am so grateful to their kindness.  Everything worked out wonderfully!  The girls sang great and the pianists played brilliantly! I had so much help with the recital.  I am so grateful to good friends who help with every part of making music possible.  I think the kids really enjoyed listening to every one else perform.  It is such a good experience for them to get up in front of people.  I love every single one of my students.  They light up my days!

 (This is half of my students, the other half perform on Wednesday)
The recital ended just before 6:30.  I cleaned up the gym and kitchen then headed home.  We had planned the most magnificent date with the Iverson's.  We sat at the chef's table at Los Poblanos farm.  Stephen and I ate there for our anniversary back in March and our server mentioned we could eat with the chef.  I could not turn down  the opportunity.  

The food was DELICIOUS! It was so well prepared.  It was mesmerizing watching the kitchen work seamlessly.  We had a 10 course meal and every bite was different and delicious.   The food is all (mostly) locally grown and sourced.  The cheese we had was from Tennessee and I think that was the only thing that was from out of state.  The chef said he worked with many local farmers to provide the food for the restaurant.  I loved learning about how they prepared the sauces and vegetables.  I wish I could have the patience to prepare food that looked good and tasted good!

We were in such good company.  Although, I would have liked to face Melanie and Paul, we still had a great time talking the hours away as we were served different dishes.  We had trout, lamb, artichoke, duck, mole with veggies, Halibut, pork chop, blue cheese with raspberry sauce, and a taste of every dessert on the menu! 

If you live in Albuquerque, make a reservation for the chef's table at Los Poblanos farm.

(All photos of food taken by Melanie Iverson)

Owning a turtle

We have owned many amphibians and lizards as a family.  We did once have a dog; however, I was not in a place where I could take good care of the dog so we gave him away.  We have owned gekos that were sick so we had to put them down.  We have owned fish and red eared slider turtles.  I think the next pet will have to be a snake.  Both boys love snakes.  

Last week our turtle escaped.  Both boys were so sad.  We hunted around the yard but saw no sight of her.  The boys named her Sally last summer when we got her.  Yesterday, I was talking on the phone looking outside when I saw her!  I figured I had better snap a few photos of her so that I could prove that we do, in fact, own a pet!

You can run, but can you track?

Track season started a month ago and we are off to the races now.  Edward and Nolen are enjoying running the races, but both of them really miss cross country.  Track meets are long.  The meets are very involved and I feel like I have to pay attention to every single race that is happening.  The boys have had fun running around with their friends and playing games while they wait for their races.  The track meet yesterday was at Rio Rancho High School and was a blast!

Tying a shoe

There are certain things that parents neglect to tell new parents in an effort to not scare them.  Had I known that there were certain hard things I had to teach my children I would have approached them differently. 

Here you will find my compiled list of hard things parents MUST teach their children:

Please note, my oldest child is 9.  This list only reflects hard things I have taught my children up to the sweet age of 9.  I know there are MANY more hard things I am completely unaware of.  Feel free to add yours in the comments below so that I can plan accordingly.

1. Sleep

Teaching an infant to sleep is hard.  AH! You thought they did that all on their own? Wrong.  Sure, they can sleep ONE hour on their own, but teaching them to sleep longer periods of time takes patience.  I thought I had learned to be patient.  Oh how I was wrong.  I was tired.  I wanted nothing more than to get three consecutive hours of sleep; however, both my sweet boys had other plans.  I had to teach them to sleep. 

2. Eat

Ok, yeah, babies know how to suck.  Sure.  But they do now know how to hold a spoon and put it in their mouths.  This was extremely difficult for my sweet Nolen.  We are still teaching him to eat.  He is picky.  He will not eat meat.  He will not eat anything that looks funny.  I have read many books on teaching my child to eat.  I also try to teach them a healthy balance with food.  I want them to have a good relationship with food.  I want them to enjoy food.  This, I can see, is a life long lesson parents must teach.

3. Use the potty

Potty training is no easy feat.  I had no idea it was so complicated.  I just thought you show them the bathroom, then they use it. HA! I am laughing at my old self.  It takes months and months and months of constant patience.  I had to remind myself to remind my boys to use the potty.  I have a whole system for teaching children to use the bathroom.  This was especially hard for my sweet Nolen who struggled to understand what we were trying to teach him.  Edward had the hardest time learning to poop on the potty.  Also, don't forget to teach them to wipe properly! HA! I wish all future parents a good luck with this one.

4. Reading

Ah, yes.  This should be easy, right?  I started reading to Edward when he was an infant.  When he wouldn't sleep, I read a book about creating a night time routine.  It said to read to your infant as part of the routine.  I have been reading out loud to my children every single night for their entire lives.  Supposedly, this was also going to help them learn to read.  NOPE!  We have spent countless nights after school teaching these boys how to read.  It is frustrating to go over the same words again and again and again.  Then I am reminded that they are just as frustrated as I am.  Ah, I digress.  After many years of going over site words and reading simple phrases, I think both my boys are really reading now. 

5. Math

This goes hand in hand with reading.  Math is simple in the beginning.  I have three apples and Edward has three apples. If we put them together how many do we have?  If I take away one apple, how many do we have?  Simple.  Now lets take a step into memorizing multiplication facts.  Yes, another thing we must do nightly as parents.  (I can not imagine having real home work as reading and math has been all I can handle!) I have drilled 7 times 8 more times than I can count.  We say math facts in the car.  We say math facts at the breakfast table.  We say math facts at bed time.  We are always talking math.

6. Bathing
For boys, this is essential.  If it were up to them, they would just get in the water and get out.  They would not use soap.  They would not wash their hair.  I am still teaching them to wash their hair properly.  Most of the time, I still help them.  This is on going.  Tedious. I will also include self care in this like clipping finger nails, brushing teeth, and washing their face!  Also, teaching your children to button their own pants and shirts is just as nerve racking as teaching them to tie their shoes!

7. To tie your shoes

Ok, this has been so much more difficult than I thought it would be.  I bought tie shoes for both my boys back in December.  Truthfully, I have been avoiding this one because I knew it would slow us down getting out the door.  It is already hard enough to get out the door and adding tying shoes to our list was not something I was looking forward to doing; however, Edward was almost 9 when I just HAD to teach him.  This January, we set out to learn to tie shoes.  After four months of tying our shoes EVERY SINGLE MORNING, both my boys finally know how to tie shoes!

I know I have only named a few of the hard things and I know more had things are coming my way; however, I am so grateful for the patience each one of these things has taught me. I can be very impatient with my children.  I am changing that slowly.  Stephen suggested I be less patient with people who are not my family.  I think I agree.  I always present my very best self to others and then my sweet children see my ugly non patient self.  So, I am switching it up.  (Ok, really, I am just going to try to be much more mindful of being kind to my family.)

Just to show you how tedious learning to tie a shoe really is, here is a video. 

Enjoy!