Bad habits

Jake has been gnawing incessantly at his fingers lately. Who knew that developing a nail biting habit could occur at such a young age? At first, he only did it when he was nervous, but lately he's been doing it when he's nervous, bored, happy, just about any time! I've tried not to bring too much attention to it, but his nails are down to nubs now!

And what do you do when all your fingernails are gone? Bite your toenails, obviously.

And that's where I draw the line, folks!! This is so strange to me. At first I tried not to bring any attention to it, hoping that he would just outgrow it. But when he started going for his toes I decided we needed to put an end to this ASAP!

A few days ago I bought that stuff to put on your fingers that supposedly tastes bad enough to make you stop chewing on your nails. I'm not sure how well it's working, but I'm giving it my all right now. Any suggestions?

Celebrate!

I recently had the opportunity to go to St. Charles, MO and attend the retirement celebration of my dear dear Kindergarten teacher and friend, Mrs. Jill Aul. I was so excited to see her, especially since the last time we saw each other I was in my wedding dress! Let me tell you a little bit about this woman (I know she reads this blog so she'll be utterly embarrassed...) She truly is the epitome of what a teacher should be. One of my favorite memories of her (and favorite memories in general) is when I was in kindergarten and we were learning about the letter "E." It also happened to be show-and-tell, and according to the rules of show-and-tell, everyone had to bring something that started with the letter "E." Since "The Little Mermaid" had just been released, it seemed like every other person brought in an Eric figurine (I'm pretty sure they were giving them away in the McDonald's happy meals at the time). Anyway, I vividly remember her sitting on her chair in the circle and saying, "Wow, I think you all must love 'The Little Mermaid!' Do any of you know any songs from the movie?" Umm...YES!! I knew not only every single song in that movie by heart, but if she had asked I could have quoted the entire movie word-for-word. Can you tell I was obsessed? Then she asked if anyone would like to sing one of the songs for the class. Umm...YES!! My hand shot up in the air and she called on me to sing a song from the movie. So I sang, "Part of Your World" for the class for show-and-tell that day. Ever since then, Mrs. Aul called me Ariel. To this day, she still refers to me as "Ariel." I love it.

She is one of the kindest people on the face of the planet. When I moved from St. Charles in 2nd grade, Mrs. Aul came and got me out of Mrs. Holtmeyer's class (who was on the opposite end of the spectrum as Mrs. Aul was so you can imagine how appreciative I was for her getting me out of class!) She got down at my eye level and told me how much she was going to miss me. This was the kind of teacher she was. Over the years our families have stayed in contact, and my relationship has changed from "teacher/student" to just friends, and I am so lucky to have a friend like Jill.

Anyway, I was on the way to see my teacher for the first time in years, and I was so excited! Then I looked at the weather report - tornados. Yikes. I was a little concerned about driving in tornado weather, especially because of all the destruction that has happened recently in Alabama and Joplin. I know that tornados are nothing to mess with. But, I was so excited to go that I decided to brave the weather and hope for the best. For the first two hours of the four hour trip, it was smooth sailing. Then I stopped for gas. As I pulled into this gas station, I listened to the radio and the radio broadcaster said that anyone who was in the particular county that I was in needed to take shelter immediately because there was a huge storm coming with a tornado in it.

I felt lucky that I had stopped at that certain point and decided to go inside the gas station and wait for the storm to pass. I lugged the boys inside just as the rain started coming down. And then we watched this horrendous storm start wailing outside. It was crazy. Luckily, we were safe inside a concrete restaurant attached to the gas station, and even more luckily, they had this cool big rig for Jake to play on!

After waiting for about an hour for the storm to pass, we thought that we were in the clear and were about to get back in the car, but then, all of a sudden the manager of the gas station came running in telling everyone that we had to get into the bathrooms of the station and cover because there was a tornado coming right toward us!

About 15 of us piled into the bathrooms and we had the kids crawl under the vanity to make sure they were covered. Of course, we were all terrified, but I tried my best to make it a game for Jake so he didn't get too scared. Not only did I end up having the responsibility of calming Jake down, but I also had to calm down a woman next to me who was basically having an anxiety attack. I kept assuring her that we were in the safest place we could possibly be, and reminding her about how lucky we were that we weren't driving through the storm! She wasn't hearing much of it, though, and she since her cell phone wasn't working, she insisted that the lady next to her call her husband, kids, parents, etc. to tell them that she loved them and etc. etc. Needless to say, she wasn't helping calm the rest of our nerves very much...

Luckily, the tornado missed us and we ended up getting back on the road in about 20 minutes. I just prayed the whole way that we wouldn't get caught in any more tornados!! Finally we made it to St. Charles, and I went to the school for the celebration. When I got there, I was a little confused because there were no cars in the parking lot, and the doors were all locked. I had my mom check online to see what was going on, and sure enough, the party had been CANCELLED because of the tornados!!

And so, I turned around and drove back home. YEAH RIGHT! I wasn't braving tornados and storms just to turn around and go home without seeing my teacher!! So, I found the yellow pages and called her up! Amazingly, she lived just around the corner from the family friend's house where I was staying, so I piled the kids back up in the car and drove over to her beautiful home.

It was a wonderful reunion! I was almost glad that the celebration had been cancelled because I didn't have to share her with the other 500 guests that they were expecting that night!
Jake, our little photog, took this picture of us:I loved being able to chat and reunite with my teacher. It made braving the tornados and storms all worth it.

The next day, Jake, Eli, and I all went over to my brother Justin's gravesite and we put flowers on his grave.

It was actually a pretty emotional experience for me because Jake is the same age that Justin was when he died of meningitis. I feel so blessed to have my boys in my life.

I also felt blessed to be able to do this service for my parents who haven't been able to put flowers on Justin's gravesite since leaving St. Charles.

All in all, we had a fabulous, emotionally charged, whirlwind trip, and I left St. Louis feeling so grateful for the blessings of all the people in my life. Be they family, friends, or kindergarten teachers, as Jill said on our way out, "This is what life is all about, these relationships that we form with others." It was nice to be reminded of that.

Colorado bound

Joseph and I just found out that we're going to be doing his 4th year dental externship in Colorado! We're going to be living out of a suitcase for a month in an extended stay hotel in the Denver area, and we couldn't be more excited! I think Joseph is mostly excited for regular 9-5 hours. I'm excited for outings at the zoo, hikes (maybe?), museums, and all the other cool things that Denver has to offer. We leave the end of July and will be back in Iowa the end of August.

All this talk of 4th year externships means that (I'm about to state the obvious) we're almost 4th years (and yes, I do mean we.) It means that the end of our time in school is coming ever-closer and that light and the end of the tunnel is growing ever-brighter. It feels like the time has been going by so fast...but at the same time it seems like FOREVER ago that he was just starting dental school. I'm starting to get really excited for what the future has to offer.

Anyway, for those of you who may live/lived in/visited Denver, let me know the absolute MUSTS that should be on our list to do while we're there. We could use some pointers and insider tips. Yeehaw!! (Does Denver have cowboys? Probably not...)

For the Birds

A couple of weeks ago we found a bird's nest on top of our deck lights in the backyard. Call me crazy, but I was a little bit flattered. That mother bird thought that my house would be a perfect place to build a perfect little nest for her perfect little babies. *Sigh* A few days later it was filled with two little blue eggs. A little bit later, those eggs had hatched and there were two teeny tiny birds in the nest! I'm not gonna lie, they were pretty gross looking and I sort of wanted to throw up when saw them, but after that initial reaction I thought they were pretty cute (sort of like seeing your own baby for the first time...sort of.) Anyway, Jake was fascinated with the birds, and I thought this might be a good opportunity for him to get over his seemingly irrational fear of birds. I'm not sure it worked, but he liked seeing the mangled little things regardless.

Here he is holding part of the egg that had fallen out of the nest.

This, of course, means that spring is officially here, and we have LOVED the warmer weather. A friend of mine once noted that after going through an Iowa winter, you feel like you can go through anything. Instead of just appreciating the spring, you have a feeling of triumph. We did it! And we only have to do it ONE MORE TIME!!

Easter festivities...or lack thereof

Jake woke up with a fever on Saturday morning, so that put the kaibosh on our Easter festivities that were planned for the day. Instead of going to our church's Easter activity, we held our own activity at home.

We decided to decorate hard-boiled eggs (albeit without using dye...probably one of the smartest decisions I've made in a while) and commenced in one of our favorite Easter traditions introduced to us by the Andersons: Easter Wars. I know, it sounds like an oxy-moron, and the actual activity is much less brutal than it sounds. All that happens is that each person decorates their own hard-boiled egg and then you make a bracket. Two people hit their eggs against each other and whichever one doesn't crack advances to the next round. Since we had a grand total of three people competing in our egg wars, it lasted a total of 5 seconds and Joseph won. It was a little anti-climactic.

After our egg wars, Jake wanted to eat his egg, so we let him peel it. He kept telling us he was hatching his egg!

The next morning, Jake found his Easter basket (as well as Eli's for that matter) and enjoyed the goodies he got.

Even though Jake was sick, we still had a nice Easter spent as a family and are especially grateful for the meaning behind the festivities - the resurrection of our Savior. What a wonderful day!

P.S. Did you notice that Joseph got his braces off?? I often catch myself staring at his perfect smile. He is so handsome!!!

The dandelions in my life

Jake gave me a flower today for the first time. It was a dandelion. When he saw it, he ran into the middle of the yard and excitedly picked up just the head. "Look at this flower!" he exclaimed, "It's so beautiful!" Then he instructed me to smell it and, in so doing, also appreciate it's beauty. Then he sweetly handed it to me and said, "Here you go, mommy." It made my little heart melt. What was once an ugly weed that marred an otherwise perfectly green lawn suddenly became a beautiful flower that was worthy of appreciation. It will always be remembered as the first "flower" given to me by my child.

I'm not going to wax too philosophical on you, but this experience did make me stop and think about the "dandelions" in my life. I thought about things that at first glance may be weeds, but if looked at from another angle are actually beautiful flowers. I thought about the lack of sleep that I've been getting thanks to Eli's frequent night wakings. I've been pretty tired lately, and have been looking at this as a "weed." But if looked at another way, it is a beautiful flower in my life. Even though Eli wakes me up, I love that I am able to nurse him and have that time to hold my baby without any other distractions.

I also thought about how sometimes I get frustrated that I don't get to see Joseph very often between school, his job that makes him leave before I wake up, plasma donations (his other job) and did I mention school? Sometimes this "weed" can be pretty frustrating. But I'm so grateful for his willingness to work hard for our family. I wouldn't have it any other way. This "weed" in my life is actually a beautiful flower in that I have a husband who is a hard worker and does all he can to help our family.

So, in short, I guess you could say I've stopped and smelled the dandelions. (Ok, I guess I did wax a little philosophical on you.)

Conversations

These two boys are absolutely adorable these days. Eli's very favorite person in the world is Jake. You can tell because his face lights up big time whenever Jake is around! Eli coos and talks to Jake more than he does to anyone else.

The two boys have started having "conversations." Eli will often coo something at Jake, then Jake turns to me and asks, "Mommy, what did he say?" And then I make something up such as, "He said you have big muscles, Jake." Then Jake turns back to Eli and says, "I know, Eli," or something of the sort. And it goes back and forth like that for some time, with me making up all kinds of stories. I'm not sure if Jake actually thinks that I know "infantese" or if he knows that I just make it all up, but it's fun either way!

Cute baby!

When Jake saw that I was taking pictures of Eli he promptly decided he needed to be a part of it!

These pictures reminded me of this picture I took almost three years ago of Jake right when we moved to Iowa. Time is flying!!