I love kids right when they wake up from their naps. Orrin wasn’t so happy this time.
But then he warmed up a bit. Oh, this face! I love.
This was our fort. It was pretty good-sized.
Jethro and Hazel reading Calvin and Hobbes.
Orrin did this when I pointed the camera at him. HA HAH HA!!! What a smart kid!!
And this is from today- we got some more snow.
1. There are these chocolate-mint things that we get at Aldi that taste JUST like junior mints and I LOOOOVE them. I can’t stop eating them.
2. This is Hazel and her bff Jamina.
3. Yesterday we built a blanket fort in the front room and the kids slept in it. Talmage kept saying, “This is the best bort ebba!”
4. Today I was punching Brett, okay, just his palms (I used to do that a lot when I was in high school/college), and I looked down at my fist and thought, ‘wow- I am awesome enough that I split my knuckle punching so hard!’ Then I remembered that I cut my finger when I was cutting Talmage’s hair. Then Brett picked up a couch cushion and I was punching that, and it was all fun and games until Hazel accidentally got whammo-ed on the head by my elbow. But it reminded me of the fun times Kami, Andrea, and I had in our kick-boxing class that we took together at USU, and how we were the only ones who actually kicked/punched really hard because it was our SISTER holding the cushion-thingee. Good times.
5. I love love LOVE Jethro’s face in the picture below. And Brett is so hot. And all my children are cute. And we have fun.
6. This was the day Ethne’s kindergarten class went in the wald on a rainy, muddy day (as I’m sure you can guess).
7. I went to a second-hand store the other day that was having it’s season-end 50% off sale, and I got FOUR Calvin and Hobbes' books for 2 francs each. Awesome!! (What were English Calvin and Hobbes books doing there? I don’t know but AWESOME!) Jethro and Hazel have been reading them a bunch, which is funny because I don’t think Hazel really understands too much of them. And Talmage likes to look at the pictures too.
8. I am getting so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so SOOOOOOO excited for February 20th!!!!!!
This is my adorable son. Sheesh he’s cute. And he was in a really good mood when he woke up from his nap the other day.
Talmage makes Orrin laugh.
He’s a happy-maker.
So, here are a few funny things.
1- So, Hazel has this really good friend Jamina, and earlier this month Jamina’s parents invited us over to have dinner with them. We had fondue and it was a very nice time. While we were there they asked me what job I had before I had kids, and I told them that I studied to become a speech pathologist, though I didn’t finish the program. They exclaimed, “Oh we knew you weren’t what Hazel told us!” and I said, “What did Hazel tell you I did?” and they said, “Sold icecream.” (It’s a bit funny because here in Switzerland not everyone just assumes you went to college since a lot of people here have apprenticeships for many jobs, so I guess when they asked Hazel what job I had, she just remembered what she considered the most exciting one- working at Dairy Queen, which, I must admit, was a pretty sweet deal.)
2- On Sunday Hazel and I went to my bed so I could read to her without being interrupted, but gradually everyone came in and Brett laid down by me and I was hugging him and then some kids hopped on and then Talmage came over and jumped on top and yelled, “GOOP HUG!”
3- There are people that Brett works with who thought for quite a long time (over a year) that we had lived in India. One time for some reason it came up, and they asked Brett, “Wasn’t it hard living in India with all your kids?” And Brett was confused for a while, since after all, we have never even been to India, let alone lived there, and figured out that they had heard INDIANA as India. Ha ha, just a bit different.
4- Tonight we went to visit an elderly woman in our ward. She is very nice and her name is Hedwig. …That’s the whole story.
5. Tonight, after visiting Hedwig (yes, we told her about Harry’s owl), Brett was helping to get Talmage buckled into his car seat, except Talmage and Ethne had switched seats for the night and so Talmage was in the backseat and as Brett was trying to reach around the front seat to buckle him, Brett said, “If you had just sat in your normal seat this would be a lot easier.” And Talmage replied, “Well, it would be a lot easier if you weren’t mad at me.” (Brett wasn’t really mad. Talmage is sure getting the hang of arguing now that he can speak.)
And the following (except number 14) are status updates from Facebook of late, so you can skip over them if you’ve already seen them.
6- Tokens of love from a 3-year-old boy: Lego creations left on your pillow.
7- Talmage looked out the window this morning and saw snow and said, “Look ebbybody! [S]No! It’s Chimis!”
8- I took a little afternoon ‘nap’ on the floor the other day, in a beautiful, delicious stream of sunshine coming in through the window, and Talmage covered me up with his blanket, and came and laid down by me and sang a song with lyrics like, “Jesus guides me to play legos ebby day.”
9- The other night I actually woke up screaming, which to my remembrance I have never done before. The dream was about… snakes. Of course. I wasn’t even getting attacked, it was someone else’s little boy getting attacked and his mother and I were trying to beat off the snake. I hate snakes.
10- You know it’s time to do laundry when Talmage has to borrow underwear from Ethne.
11- So I was showing something to Talmage on the computer, but then it froze. I said, “Sorry bud, but it’s frozen.” And Talmage said, “I warm it up,” and proceeded to rub the sides of the computer monitor and breathe on it.
12- Dora (the Explorer): Will you help me sing the right words?
Talmage: No.
Dora: GREAT! Thank you for helping sing the right words.
Talmage: I said "No!"
13- Whenever Talmage gets a hold of the flashlight, he turns off the light in his room and tells the other kids to "come to Halloween!"
14- (This story is from my sister Amy- the one who’s beautiful wedding I just went to.)
This is a funny story about shaving. On my wedding day I got my hair and makeup done
in the morning but I had a shower cap and wanted to shower and shave right before I
left to go to the wedding. So I am in the shower and started freaking out because NO
RAZOR!!! And then I realized that I had given it to Ethan because he "forgot his and
really needed one." So on my wedding day I had hairy legs......... but the good news is
my 21 year old brother had nice clean shaven ones. just in case anyone was
wondering. and I dont know if anyone finds that as crazy and super funny as me. ;)
The end.
I love this boy!!
He learned to do a killer cheese grin. LOVE it!
And here he is with the bestest sisters who were the ones that were getting such great smiles from him.
Today we went outside for a little walk to get out of the house (it’s been dreary, wet, gray weather, yuck!), and Talmage and Ethne got their bikes and as we turned the corner out of tree-lined little driveway, the wind started hitting Talmage (who had just gotten up from a nap) and he got really cross and said, “It’s too windy!” And Brett said something like, “It’s refreshing.” And Talmage said, in the growliest voice, “You want our bamily to blow away?!” Ha ha ha. Brett and I were cracking up.
Later we had stopped for a couple minutes at the tree and bench, and then when we started walking back, Talmage asked if I would get his bike for him. His bike is a PUKY, and it says PUKY right on the handlebars, so I said, “Is your bike’s name PUKY?” And he said, “No.” (He was still kind of grumpy.) So I said, “Well, should we give your bike a name?” And he said in this funny, low, cranky voice that was so funny, “No! Bikes don’t talk you know what.” Ha ha ha. He has this hilarious thing- I don’t know where he picked it up- where he says whatever he wants to say followed by “you know what.”
Then I started pushing Brett, trying to get him to go off the road into the wet grass, but he’s bigger and heavier and stronger than me, so then he was beating me, and so I had to resort to more devious shenanigans, so then he went ahead of me a ways. So I started running really fast up to him, and he of course saw me coming, so he turned his hat around and started sprinting down the hill, pumping his arms really good and lifting his legs kinda high. It was so funny I couldn’t run because I was laughing so hard. Good times.
And, finally, Gigi was wondering what I got for Christmas. Well, I got a trip to the States and I got another trip which you will hear all about in about a month and a week when I get back. My flights and hotels are all booked and I AM SOOOOO EXCITED!!!! I will not say to where, but if you follow me on pinterest, you should probably have a pretty good guess. :)
