A blog update.

Hello, friends!

Guess who's updating the blog.... finally. That would be me. Thanks to my mother's persistent questioning. 

Once again, my children deleted the first half of January's pictures, so I really procrastinated an update. I figured everyone would enjoy pictures more than just reading a journal-like blog where I complain about frustrations of life. I figured there would be a unanimous agreement to that, therefore there was no blog update until today. 

And now, without further ado, here are some pictures.

We had some beautiful weather here, and then some not so beautiful weather (if you think dreary rain is beautiful, go ahead and disagree with me here). Evelynn broke the zipper on her favorite jacket and I remembered I had bought her this cute little coat.... which she didn't wear a single time all winter. 

What was I thinking?! She loves it. And I think it's quite cute on her! 

 Also in the past month we were sick.... AGAIN. First the kids, then me, then Caleb. 

He stayed home from work and slept it off and then ventured out to the couch where he so kindly played Mario Kart with his children who were so excited to have him home! They didn't seem to understand that dad was home because he wasn't feeling well, which is NOT exciting, but he gave them lots of extra time and attention which they really seemed to love. 

Last week I took my first official baby bump picture! This was at a little over 16 weeks.

It's rare that I change out of pajamas when I'm home doing homework all day with no one except my children and husband to see me. But Thursday Connor had a dentist appointment so I actually got ready enough to feel like I could snap a picture without dying of embarrassment!

And on a side note, if anyone has suggestions for how to help really, REALLY bad sciatica pain, feel free to give them. It's always a problem when I'm pregnant and hit a certain weight, and unfortunately I cant seem to keep the weight off this pregnancy. That means it's hitting hard and early, and it's really starting to interfere with normal life. But on the bright side, the morning sickness is starting to let up! As long as I don't try to put off eating... Or try to eat something that my tummy doesn't want.

On Saturday, the last day of January, I had the chance to go to the Gilbert, AZ temple. The Mesa temple has been closed for cleaning and I badly wanted to go to the temple. My sweet and extremely kind cousin Holly (yes family, I'm talking about dad's cousin. I'm not making up imaginary 1st cousins! Don't worry. ) suggested that we could go together so I didn't have to go alone without Caleb. I was so grateful that she would be willing to go just so that I could have someone to go with.

I decided I needed to document my trip to the temple since we live so close to Mesa that there is really no reason to drive over to Gilbert on a regular basis. I have my doubts that it will happen again any time soon, so pictures were a must! And just so you know, Mom, I took them with your voice in my head saying "Did you take pictures for the blog?!?!" So here you go. I took them! 

 Since the start of February I have been trying to get back into the swing of taking little snapshots of the kids and their funny/ cute things they do. 

 Yesterday before church Evelynn insisted on trying on a new shirt, wearing a crown, and singing and dancing to music. I tried to get a video but she just stared at me, so I figured a picture was better than nothing. This girl loves to sing, she loves to dance (and I'm talking like she twirls in circles, leaps around, and will sporadically stop and point her toes. I have no idea where she learned it but she's done it since she was walking. 

 Yesterday I dressed the kids matchy-matchy for church. I had to get pictures of them looking all cute and sweet. I'm glad I did because they were not NEAR as sweet while they were at church with me..... 

I will now apologize for the fact that there's a million more pictures of Evelynn than there are of Connor. He seems to think if he smiles nice for one picture, he doesn't need to even look at me afterwards. We've come to a silent agreement about it. I take advantage of his one cute grin at me, and then I don't dare complain or attempt to get more. 

Evelynn, on the other hand, is a camera lover. Sometimes I can't help but bust up laughing at her smirks, grins, giggles, and scowls at the camera. 

 And yeah, she's biting her tablet... but it's because it's a stretchy soft cover and she seems to think it's a chew toy. 

And here, well, I tried to break the rules and get more pictures of Connor. And what was his response, you may ask? Well, it was to pretend he couldn't hear me. Over and over and over again. He wouldn't even respond to me. But hey, atleast I tried!  

Evelynn always wants to hear how pretty she is from her daddy... and that's what is going in this next picture: flirting with her daddy. 

Then of course she realizes I'm still taking pictures, and she breaks out the grins! 

Seriously, can't get enough of this kid. She's too much! 

And here in this picture I wanted to show her sweet little curls. 

Her hair is always poofing out everywhere, but we love it. And I'm not really accustomed to taming curls.... I really should learn some more about that. Sometimes I still have to pinch myself to remember that my child really does have curls and I'm not just imagining it! (I'll say it again, thanks Grandma Anderson!!! and thanks to this little one's Daddy for passing it down. ) 

Now, I'll tell you why these sweet kids lost their sweetness yesterday. 

I was overly emotional all weekend, but Sunday I woke up and just knew it was going to be one of those days. The kids were so well behaved for the first half of sacrament meeting, but it didn't last as long as I would have liked.  They both got upset at me, refused to use their words, and started SCREAMING. I tried to comfort them, but it only just seemed to aggravate the situation. Quickly there were people turning around and glancing at me, and I couldn't stop the panic. If you know me, you know that having people look at me stresses me out A LOT. I like to blend into a crowd because that is where I am comfortable. 

But anyways, when I realized they weren't going to stop yelling, I told them we were going out. I figured that would help, but I was wrong. VERY WRONG. It made it worse. I was dragging Connor by his arm, carrying Evelynn and the diaper bag, and trying not to let the tears escape down my face. Unfortunately, it didn't work. I felt angry that I had to be at church by myself, and wished I could just pass the kids off to their dad while I ran away to hide. But, unfortunately for me, it's kinda hard to do that when he's not there. Thinking about it made me even more emotional, so I just stood there with people were staring at me, tears dripping down my face, and me begging Connor to stop his screaming and whining and just go out with me. It was kind of one of those moments were you want to hide under a rock and forget that people just witnessed your emotional breakdown.

 My sweet visiting teacher came to my rescue and grabbed Evelynn from me so I could get Connor out. From that point on, I wasn't thinking clearly at all. It is my worse nightmare to have people looking at me, and to be crying in front of people during it just makes it a million times worse. I planned to make a beeline straight to an empty foyer, but to my dismay, I opened the door to a ton of people standing and sitting around. And of course, everyone turns to look whats happening when a door opens, so there were TOO MANY eyes looking straight at the tears streaming down my face. In a panic, I figured I would head to the closest exit and go outside, but half way to the door saw that there were people out there too. I couldn't stop the tears at that point and didn't want to pass a million other people as I ran to the bathroom, so I just stood as close to a corner as I possibly could and wished really, really hard to become invisible. Half of me really just wanted to leave, but thankfully my visiting teacher sat with the kids and me the rest of the time and helped distract them. 

And a sweet sister in the ward came out and hugged me and told me all mom's have those days so I shouldn't feel bad. I definitely appreciated that comment too, but I will admit that I still wished I could erase my little breakdown from everyone's memories or even erase the fact that it actually happened. That would have been ideal-- to just erase that it happened. 

BUT, I can't. So, instead of dwelling on it, I will just move on to the next topic of interest.

 Today, right before this blog update, I went in search of my kids and found them snuggled up on our bed playing with tablets and watching Daniel Tiger. Aren't they the cutest?!

I know that this update to the blog is a very meager offering, but I can assure you that I will do my best to update more often and with better quality! 

Until then, try to enjoy what little I have for you all. Pretty please, and a big thanks.