Spice Up Your Life

This morning I was putting on makeup and getting ready for the day all alone in my bathroom.  A rare occurrence.  Annie was still sleeping, and the boys were being blissfully quiet.  I was so grateful to have a few minutes to myself.  And then it hit me.  Quiet like that should inspire fear, not happiness.  I found Ty playing nicely by himself, not surprisingly.  And then I found McKay in the kitchen, with a chair pushed up to the counter, like this:

I asked him what he thought he was doing.  "I wanted a chocolate-chip cookie," was his response.  Apparently those shiny spice jars were just too tempting and waylaid him on his way to the cookies.  In one way, I was thankful.  He would have been in trouble for eating a cookie at 8:30 AM!  On the other hand, the cookie probably wouldn't have created quite the mess his spicy concoction did.

Perhaps he knew that my blog posts have been Ty- and Annie-heavy lately?  That he needed to pull a stunt like this to get face time on the blog?  Then again, this is just typical McKay.  And I love him for it.

Ty's Talk

Ty gave a talk last week in primary.  He dictated to me (more or less) what he wanted to say, and I typed it for him.  When it was time to give the talk, he went up to the primary pulpit with all the confidence in the world and read it all by himself!  It was a proud parent moment to be sure.

The Little Lady

Here are some pictures from the last week or so of the little lady. Because I like her.

Someone asked me recently if she wears a dress everyday, and the answer is yes.  Or at least 9 days out of 10 she does.  The way I see it, she is likely the only little girl I will ever have, and I am going to fully enjoy it!

Living the Good Life

I think we have turned a corner with Annie.  Things have gotten easier lately, and it's due in large part to this:

She puts her index finger and thumb together and sucks on them when she starts getting fussy.  Now when I put her down, instead of screaming uncontrollably, we just hear the little smacking sound of her mouth on her hand.  And it's making my quality of life much, much greater.  I remember hitting this point with McKay, too.

It was grand.  Actually, Ty sucked his thumb for a while, too.
In addition to learning how to self-soothe, Annie has been sleeping through the night. WAHOO!!  She is sleeping 7-8 hours pretty consistently now, usually from about 10PM - 5 or 6AM.  I had almost forgotten how good it feels to sleep 7 hours in a row!  So that means since I am getting a full night of sleep again, I have started working out again.  And it's really incredible how much better I feel after getting a good run in each morning.
I feel like I have found my new "normal."  We are settling into a routine, and things are looking up!
Little Lady was two months old as of yesterday.  Here are the one- and two-month-old comparison shots:

1 Month

2 Months

And while she may not look so much different than she did a month ago, the changes that have occurred in the last month have been phenomenal.

First Day of School

Ty started kindergarten on Tuesday.  I will admit it...I have at times looked forward to this day for the last five years, but when it actually came, it was kind of tough.  Ty was SO excited, though, so that helped things.

On Monday, we went in to his classroom for an assessment day.  He wowed his teacher by whizzing through all the upper- and lower-case letters that she tested him on.  He went on to read every single word on the word list that she gave to him, too.  She asked me if we had put him in reading camp at the school over the summer, and when I responded negatively, she just shook her head.  Her response:  "I have nearly 50 students between my two classes this year, and he is only the second kid all day to have read everything without any mistakes." 

Yeah, he's a smarty.  And yeah, I am pretty proud of him.  

So when we dropped him off at school on Tuesday, I wasn't really worried about him, either academically or socially.  He will do fine.  In fact, he will probably do far better than just fine.  But still, it was hard to send my oldest boy off without me.  And I realized that for the next 18 or 20 years, I will probably always have at least one kid in public school.  I feel like I have entered an entirely new stage of life.

So it's a forgivable offense, I think, that I waited until Ty went into his classroom, and I had walked around the side of the school out of sight, before the tears started falling freely down my face.  It was hard to leave my baby (even if he's not a baby anymore).

The past two days have been easier, thankfully.  The bad news is that McKay has not napped at all in the last three days.  He's almost 3 1/2, and I knew that naps wouldn't be lasting all that much longer, but it's still terribly ironic that the EXACT day Ty started afternoon kindergarten and I was anticipating a good, long, uninterrupted nap, that he decided to be done.  Of course, right?

A Blessed Baby

Yesterday was a special day for our family.  Adam was able to bless our little Annie Jane in Sacrament meeting.  She looked like an absolute angel.

Her whole outfit was really special, too.  She wore the same dress that I was blessed in 28 years ago!

My sister was blessed in it, too, and her little girl, Alexsi, also wore it on her blessing day just a few months ago.  So Annie was the fourth little girl to wear this dress on her special day!

Her lacy, frilly socks were bought for her by Grandma Marchant, and her little satin shoes I bought when I was pregnant with McKay, thinking he was a girl.  When I found out he was a boy, I tucked them away, hoping that one day I would be able to put them on a little daughter on her blessing day.

The blanket that we wrapped Annie in was crocheted for her by a woman in our ward who used to live across the street from Adam in Salt Lake when he was a little boy.  She was the first person outside of Adam and me to know that I was pregnant, and she crocheted this little blanket for our baby before anyone else even knew I was carrying a baby!  So head to toe, it was a very special outfit.

The big brothers were proud of their little princess, too!

The Whole Family

Mom, Dad, & Annie

Annie with G&G Marchant

It was a truly beautiful blessing.  I was amazed at this little person who I am blessed to call my own.  She is going to be a really great woman someday.  Among other things, one of the blessings that was mentioned was her strong sense of agency.  I loved that.  I think children today need strong personalities to be a force for good in this world.  

Another of my favorite parts of her blessings was when Adam described the relationship that she and I will have, and how she will learn at my side.  It was so very tender.

And, just for fun, here are comparison pictures of all three kids on their blessing days:

Ty

McKay

Annie

Definitely all siblings, right?  Gosh, I love them.