Kiersten’s Blog

We went to a birthday party for one of London’s friends yesterday.  It took place in her parents’ lovely front yard.  It was so simple yet so elegant.  It was all girls (except for the 2 brothers of the birthday girl, and Ashton).  There were 11 little girls who had a wonderful time.  Since the hostess has 2 older sisters, they have quite a lot of dress up clothes.  The costumes were out and the girls had fun dressing up.  They got all dressed in their tea clothes and sat down for tea time.

London made sure to inform everybody that we don’t drink tea because it’s not good for you.  So she got milk instead.  I’m glad she doesn’t have a problem standing up for what she’s taught is right.  I guess sometimes that strong will isn’t all bad.  After tea, the girls played a little longer before presents and cake.  Ashton, being one of the only little boys around, got dressed up by a bunch of the little girls.  They thought it was so funny!  I’ll admit, it was funny.  London didn’t think so.  She kept yelling at the girls to leave him alone.  She’s sure a protective big sister.  It’s so funny to see the dynamics between these two.

I was planning on writing a blog about this, but Taylor beat me to it, so I’ll just refer you to his blog.

This morning London was playing on the PBS kids website.  She was watching Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood videos.  She turned one on where Mr. Rogers visits Yo-Yo Ma.  He played a bit on his cello and I asked London if she knew what instrument he was playing.  “Gamba,” was her response.  It was funny to me that so many people think that when Taylor plays his gamba, that he’s playing a cello, and my four-year-old knows what a gamba is, but not a cello.

My baby turned uno today.  It’s funny.  When London turned one, I felt like she was so grown up, but with Ashton, although he’s doing the same things she was,  he still feels very much like my baby.  Even so, he’s growing learning so much.  He weighs a whopping 26 pounds!  He’s come a long way in the last 6 or 7 months.  He started out so skinny!  Now he could be a sumo wrestler!  In fact, some days I think that’s what he’s trying to do.

He loves to wrestle.  If I’m lying down on the floor, he crawls to me as fast as possible and climbs back and forth over me, all the while screaming with delight.  He’s not much of a laugher in the traditional sense.  I get giggle sometimes, but usually his laughs come out more like squeals or screams.  He’s still not walking yet, but he gets closer every day.  He can balance on his own, but he gets nervous when he realizes he’s on his own.  He also loves going outside.  If a door is open, he’s out.  He knows that doorknobs open doors and he tries really hard to reach them.  He also really loves the bathroom.  He figured out how to flush the toilet and thinks that’s a pretty cool accomplishment.  Of course he loves his baths.  He gets pretty mad if he sees the water flowing into the tub and he’s not in it to play.  He now has 7 teeth (4 on the top and 3 on the bottom) and I think we’re getting close to the time he’ll need his first hair cut.  It’s finally growing in!

Ashton also started talking, kind of.  He says the obligatory “mama” and “dada” but I’m not sure if it’s just babbling.  I’m sure, though, when he says “nana” that he’s talking about bananas.  They’re his favorite food and whenever he sees one, he gets really excited and can’t stop saying “NANA!  NANA!”  I’m pretty sure I also heard him say “ball” today.  His first really noticeable and coherent word was “ma” which means more.  I taught him the sign for more so when he’s really excited and wanting more of something (mostly food) he claps his hands and yells, “MA! MA!”

To celebrate Ashton’s birthday, we planned on meeting Taylor’s parents and Denver at Peter Piper Pizza (kind of a smaller version of Chuck E. Cheeses) for lunch.

London was so excited about it that she announced it to her pre-school class and invited all of her friends.  A couple of them came, which I didn’t mind.  She had a great time, and I think Ashton did too.  They enjoyed the food and the games together.  Usually that place is not crowded at all, but today while we were there, three bus loads of kids showed up, making the experience not as enjoyable as it could have been.  After lunch, Taylor’s family came home with us, where we had cupcakes that I made to look like Uno cards.  Ashton, of course, enjoyed his grub.

Then he opened presents.  We still have one for him to open, since he lost interest in opening more.  Why would he want to open more things when he already had so many cool toys to play with?  It was a nice little celebration and I’m glad we didn’t plan anything extravagant.  Ashton was happy just the way things went.

“Super Girl to the rescue!” I heard as she came flying into my room, paper cape clothespinned to her shirt collar.  “Mom, I’m Super Girl.  Super Girl is my first name and Wonder Fairy is my last name.  That means I can do magic!  Oh, I’ll be right back.  I need to color my cape.”  Of course, Super Girl has a yellow cape.  I should have known.  I asked her if she wanted to take the wagon out for a ride to the recycle bin.  Magically, she opened the garage door with her magic powers.  Wonder Guy climbed into the wagon, after which Super Girl flew him around the neighborhood.  Unfortunately the “super car” ran out of gas and “Super Friend” (AKA Mom) had to pull the super heros home since Super Man (Dad) was at work.

After some wild playing, the super heros needed a lunch, and what’s better than grilled cheese sandwiches dipped in ketchup?  Sounds like super hero food to me.  Of course, Wonder Guy didn’t have that.  He chowed down on cheese, bread and applesauce.  Eventually Super Girl molded back into Cinderella (which seems to be the costume of choice lately) and Wonder Guy continued his life-long quest to completely empty the cabinet.

So long for now Super Girl and Wonder Guy.  We’ll play again another day.

We’ve been MIA for the last few days because we’ve been on spring break!  Miraculously, Taylor and London both had the week off.  Taylor took that opportunity to do some research for his dissertation.  We drove up to Hemet on Wednesday night.  We just got home tonight.  Taylor spent all day Thursday in Claremont working on his big project, while I stayed at his parents house with the kids.  London and Ashton love it at their house.  London loves playing on the treadmill and jumping on the trampoline and all sorts of other fun activities, while Ashton loves chasing around a golf ball.

His newest joy, however, is playing on the trampoline with his big sister.  These kids were so funny.

The trampoline happens to be right next to two tangerine trees.  Ashton thought that was very cool so he crawled over to the tree and tried to stuff one in his mouth.  He was surprised when the “ball” came off the tree and started rolling around on the trampoline.  Of course, then London had to go pick one.  She bounced Ashton and the fruit around and they both thought the whole process was just hilarious.

Later inside, Ashton decided to get some exercise on the treadmill while London moved the belt.  He couldn’t figure out why he wasn’t going anywhere, and she was just laughing hysterically.

We also did fun things like decorating eggs,

planting the garden,

making yummy treats,

and relaxing in the hammock.

This morning we woke up to a large array of treats from the Easter Bunny.  There were plenty of eggs to find in the living room.  London and Denver each found 34, while Ashton was completely happy with his 1.  That is, until he realized there was candy in the others.

He thought they were pretty fun to shake.  That bunny left us enough candy to last until next year.

My favorite egg, though, was the empty one; the one to remind us of the empty tomb.  I love Easter.

I don’t think there’s any better way to spend Easter than by watching General Conference with family.  I’m so thankful for the resurrection of my Savior and for that reminder today.

In light of my last blog, I think holding church at home is a great thing.  When a fit happens, I can send London off to her room.  Or when Ashton’s tired, he can sleep.  So nice!  We have a tradition while watching conference.  We set up the kids’ tent and let them watch from inside the tent.  We started that a couple of years ago and London still loves it.  I need to remind her why we do it.  It’s kind of like the people listening to King Benjamin’s address.  They all set up their tents and pointed the opening toward the temple to listen to the words of their prophet.  We just point our opening toward the TV or the computer, but it’s still the same idea.  We love to hear the words of our prophet.  I tried to help London pick up key messages from talks we heard.  I’m not sure if she got anything out of it, but I wonder that about a lot of things and she surprises me often.  Every conference, I find some sort of packet to print off that she can do to keep her occupied.  This time I found one with characatures of the prophet and apostles for her to color.  She would color each one while they were speaking.  By the time conference is over, she has her whole book colored.  Ashton spent the time sleeping or chasing around a golf ball.

I loved watching conference today, especially on this beautiful Easter Sunday.