"My, you have your hands full!"

As I received this comment this week from Alyssa’s new dance teacher, and as it wasn’t the first time I have received this particular comment, I began to wonder: What exactly do people mean when they say this? Do they realize that it’s actually kind of rude? Do they not have anything more insightful to say? Maybe they never had kids and the thought of my three little darlings overwhelms them. Or maybe they forgot what constitutes “normal kid behavior”. Maybe she was annoyed that Jantzy tried to join in on the fun a few times. I thought he was pretty darn cute, bouncing to the beat, and none of the other moms seemed to mind either. Anyway, when receiving this comment I usually respond with: “Yep, all full of good stuff! These kids are great!” And they really are. Here are some fun tidbits from our week:



- Ashtyn had her picture on the front page of the newspaper! She was shown hugging her principal, Mr. Seegmiller, who was just named principal for the new elementary school that will be in Severance (to our direct east) in 2010. The other kid in the picture is our neighbor down the street. I am excited for the new opportunity for him, because he is awesome! We are sad that he is leaving Tozer Primary because….he is awesome!



- Alyssa hasn’t yet realized that most of her clothes are hand-me-downs from Ashtyn. This week she said: It’s not fair that Ashtyn has the pink coat and I have the purple coat. They should make pink coats in my size too! This little bubble will burst soon enough and then we’ll have to have more discussions on fairness and frugality, I’m sure.

- I tried my hand at making gnocchi this week, that wonderful Italian potato pasta we enjoy at Maggiano’s. Well, mine was so far from Maggiano’s it was not even funny! Luckily the sauce was quite good, so we ate it anyway with lots of extra garlic bread and side vegetables. I was happy to try, though, and my little chef-helper, Alyssa, was rolling and cutting little gnocchis at my side for the whole hour that afternoon. For an hour’s worth of work, it’s work the $5 package at SuperTarget, I told Jason! I later found a few different recipes online (more complicated ones) and we may try again…….but not this month.

- Jason was gone most nights this week due to basketball games, youth night, and a trip to California. I think we made the best of it, but I wonder how I did all of those 10 – 14 day trips last year! Things are good for him, busy, with the usual fires to put out. He just keeps plugging along and hoping that things stay stable at Avago through the year.

- The girls each put up their respective forts in the living room on Thursday night and they got to keep them up until cleaning time on Saturday. They slept out there (well, they STARTED out there and ended up in my bed for a while) and really enjoyed “camping” and playing with their animals. We even had a quiche picnic in the forts on Thursday night! (I’m so glad I won the kids over to quiche, finally! What a great food!)

- Ashtyn had Friday off of school (and tomorrow too, YAY!) and we had great plans to go swimming in the morning with some friends, and then ride horses in the afternoon with some other friends. Well, Jantzen spent a lot of Thursday night up with a croupy cough, so I decided that swimming wasn’t going to be his best activity. At least we still had horse riding…..that is, until a nasty windstorm came up in the afternoon and wouldn’t quit! Poor Ashtyn was so bummed. (I was too!) We tried to play some games and stuff, but sometimes you just feel chinched in life.

- Friday was pizza and movie night, of course. We ordered our pizza this time instead of making it as we were out of most of the ingredients. We had to jaunt out in the nasty, cold windstorm, and then we hurried home to hunker down with our pizza picnic.

- Jason made it home late on Friday and then enjoyed doing youth baptisms at the Denver Temple yesterday. He is great in this calling with the boys and is excited to do lots of camping and scouting this summer.

- Last night we had some awesome cheese and chocolate fondue (not simultaneously, mind you) with some good friends with two girls our kid’s ages. They came despite Jantzy’s cough, as he didn’t mingle with the girls much anyway. It was really fun and something we’re trying to do monthly again………get together with our OWN friends for a playdate!

- We almost didn’t make church today, but made a little minute rally of the troops as I had to substitute on the piano for Primary and Jason had to teach a lesson. It was a bit of rough going, but we made it and then crashed at home while we “let’ the girls watch a scripture movie. Poor little Jantzy slept for four hours and he still isn’t a happy baby. We’ll see if our rescheduled horse riding works out for tomorrow.