Yesterday was our anniversary. Five years. Mike was so thoughtful and made the day special for me. I have been sick for a few days now, so it was especially nice to be pampered for a day. I came out in the morning to a bouquet of incredible red roses, with a collection of love songs softly playing. Mike had already left for school, but I played the music most of the day, and it was like a day full of little love letters.
I had just gotten the girls down for naps and was sitting down to eat lunch, when Mike came home early!! He had stayed after on 3 different days (without my knowing) so he could come home a few hours early. Such a huge gift! My life is so much easier when Mike's here for the crazy time of post-nap kids and dinner preparation.
Last night after the kids were in bed, he pulled out vegan coconut milk ice-cream and fresh strawberries. We relaxed, watched a movie, and went to bed early!
I asked Mike if 5 years felt like a long time. We both decided it feels like much longer than 5 years ago that we walked out on the Dungeness Spit in Sequim Washington, one day married.
I never could have guessed what these first 5 years would hold for us. Wow. I'm so glad I know about eternity and get to spend it with Mike.
(We're celebrating again tomorrow with a night out. Mariah is doing her first overnighter at Lacy's, we're taking Elaine to another friend's house for the night, and we'll have a sitter for Sal. She gets to sleep here with us 'cause she's still nursing, but we'll only have 1 child until noon on Saturday. What a break!)
A couple weeks ago in primary, Mariah learned about the Gold Plates. Her teacher gave each child little paper gold plates and told them about how the scriptures are like a journal of lots of different people. She told them they could have their parents help them write in their gold plate journals. I go to primary with Mariah, so I heard all of this; I wasn't sure how much Mariah was absorbing.
The next day, Mariah surprised me by asking me to help her write on her gold plates. I was shocked when she said, "I want to write, 'I love my mom.'"
I pulled out her gold plates and asked her if she wanted me to write the words, and she could trace them. She said no. I was pretty much speechless when she produced this with no help at all:
I love Easter, and I'm so thankful for the knowledge I have of the Savior, His Atonement, and His resurrection. I love knowing I can be with Mike and our family forever.
Here are some photos of our Easter celebrations over the last couple of days:
On Friday, I saw a tutorial for tie-dyed easter eggs. So, I loaded the girls up and headed to goodwill, where I bought 8 silk ties for $8. Then we headed to the grocery store to buy eggs. I decided to do some of our weekly grocery shopping at the same time. We were quite the sight, I'm sure. I had Sal in the backpack and Mariah and Elaine in the stroller; I pulled the cart behind me. I'm pretty sure we didn't go unnoticed.
The girls were fascinated with the eggs; being vegan, we don't ever buy them . . . . In fact, Mariah accidentally broke one (Kudos to her: she very calmly said, "Oops. Sometimes we make mistakes.") while we were "tie-ing" them up, so I cracked it the rest of the way so the girls could see the inside of an egg. What a sheltered life they live.
Anyway, it was a fun activity to do with the girls. Elaine lasted for one egg (then she headed outside to take her monkey to the zoo), but Mariah stuck with me for the whole time. (Which, actually, shows amazing progress on her part. I used to try to do fun projects with her, and without fail, she would have a melt down, or destroy everything we made, or both.)
Wrapping an Egg
Sally Supervising
Elaine heading to the Zoo
Pleased with the Fruits of their Labors
Yesterday morning, we headed to a community egg hunt. The girls had a good time gathering lots of eggs, all filled with candy. (Last year, the eggs were all filled with little toys instead of candy. We were a little disappointed this time. Oh well.) As I should have expected, the crowd scene, etc., were too much for poor Mariah, who had a complete melt down on the way back to the car. She hasn't had a public melt down in so long, my brain froze, and I had no idea what to do. We just calmly continued to the 5-minute walk to the car with her screaming her little head off. Poor poor girlie. She did recover quickly once we were home, though. Phew.
There was a cute little bucket available to Elaine. She insisted on using her Halloween pumpkin. Whatever.
After the girls' naps, we did our own hunt in the backyard with "healthy" candy. The girls had a good time. We came in and sat up for dinner, only to realize I had forgotten to give Mike our tie-dyed eggs to hide. So, out we went again, for the third hunt of the day.
I've been wanting one of these for the girls for a long time, but they're always expensive, even used, and I thought such a luxury was far into our future. Not so! I found this at a consignment sale this morning for $10!
We went to the zoo this morning. The weather was absolutely perfect, and we had a nice relaxed time. (Until the very end, when I made the foolish decision to take the girls to the sea lion show. I loved it; they did not. The loud music freaked out both Mariah and Elaine.)
Elaine experienced her first burn yesterday. Sad. She got up on a stool to "help you make dinner" and put her fingers down on a hot burner. Two fingers blistered. I had her wash all the veggies for dinner, which kept her in cold water for a while. Then I put honey on her fingers for a few minutes, and then wrapped them in gauze with Noni juice on it. (I keep a bottle in the fridge just for burns.) Miracle burn healer! No pain after 10 minutes and no blisters today!
"Hold your fingers up for the camera."
She asked to see the pictures and was distraught that she looked so sad. I asked her if she wanted to take some happy pictures. Here they are:
Mariah does jobs as part of her therapy. Often, when Mariah's working, Elaine will come and ask me for a job too. This time I stripped her down, filled a bucket with water, gave her a rag, and told her to wash my shower. She went to work and was happy for a long time, just asking periodically for more water in her bucket.
Lacy started respite last week. We've done it twice now, and my life is forever changed! Last Thursday, while Mariah was at Lacy's, Elaine and I made cookies while Sally napped. Our house was so peaceful, and it was so nice to have some one-on-one time with Laney. Yesterday, when I dropped Mariah off again, Elaine asked, "Are we gonna make cookies?!" She went to play with Evan instead. I put Sal down for a nap and READ A BOOK! IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY!
Tomorrow Lacy's coming to get Elaine for a few hours so I can have some time with Mariah. I cannot even describe how amazing this woman is! Oh, and last night, she treated me to a yoga class. It felt so good.
During the Sunday afternoon session of conference, we decided rather than trying to watch at home while battling children, we'd instead take the kids to see the temple and watch the session after they were in bed. Wise decision.
Sally went exploring. She would crawl away for a minute or so, and then cruise back to me, cling to me for a few seconds, and then off she'd go again. (As I was watching her, I realized Mariah never did the return-to-Mom-to-regroup thing when she was a baby. She'd crawl away for as long and as far as I would allow; then I would have to go get her.)
We spread a quilt and ate popcorn. These two spent the majority of the time collecting sticks to defend themselves against "Big Cat" (from Angelina).
Sally ate puffed millet and raisins. She'd dig for the raisins and quickly discovered she could easily make the millet fly everywhere if she "splashed" in it. Just like water! I wish we had a video of the puffed millet fountain she had going.
Getting the girls to look at the camera and smile for pictures is basically a joke. I don't really try anymore. (I just noticed Mariah's dress is off the shoulder in these. Don't ask; I don't know.)
