A child's prayer

After we finished our family prayer the other night, Nate decided he wanted to say one of his own. It went a little something like this:

Heavenly Father, please help us to have another Haloween party so I can get LOTS of candy, please help my muscles to get really big, please help my dad to get home safely even though he didn't go to work today, and please help me not to have the scary dream where I am in the lake with the crocodiles, ...Amen.

I think that about covers it.

Legend Nate

We use the gospel art kit to teach Nate scripture stories.  We tell him the stories then review them by letting him show them to us and ask the questions about them.  Tonight he showed this picture:

Nate: Emma!  Who is this?

Emma: Jesus

Nate: And what is he wearing?

Emma: A robe.

Nate: No, Dad what is he wearing?

Dad: Its a robe.

Nate: No...

Dad: What do you think it is?

Nate: A flight suit.



Toddler Woes

Nate is such a toddler.

     Opinionated, stubborn, moody, mischievious, active, and clever.  I have more trouble with him because he is more certain of what he wants.  He has become a very picky eater--he will hardly eat any meat.  He loves cereal and any crackers, fruits, and snack foods.  He won't eat veggies.  What does a mother do about that?

     He loves to swim.  He has started telling me, with his best pout, "Mom!  House is boring!  I want to go to the pool!"

     Today I took away a cd he found in the car and he threw a little fit, crying and carrying on.  I sat down and snuggled him for a minute and he cried into my shoulder.  I asked, "Aw, what's wrong?" and he said, "I'm mad at mom!"  Then he seemed to realize who was snuggling him because he wiggled away and told me, "Mom! You're a bad boy!"

     He learned last week to climb out of his bed, and I had a fleeting glimpse of the rest of my life when I won't be swarmed with kids every minute.  I'm not ready to put him in a big boy bed, but he is almost three!

     He gets into the pantry every day and helps himself to whatever he needs, then usually brings his snack to the couch and makes a mess there.

     He and Justin have slow motion boxing matches at church, and Justin laughs when Nate hits too hard.  I don't think it's so funny!  But you have to see Nate fall over into my lap in slowmo, it makes us all irreverent!  I'll have to record him saying his name when we ask, "Nathan James Wisonbee." 

Proud Parenting Moments

Anyone with kids knows the feeling of pride when they see their kid do something great by their own choice. For example, a month or so ago Emma asked, "Why do you read your scriptures at breakfast?" I responded, "Because it is usually quiet then and it gets my day off to a good start." The very next morning I came down the stairs and there she was reading her scriptures with her cereal. She has been fairly consistent with it since then too. What a cutie!

Though Katie disagrees with it being a proud parenting moment, this next example was priceless! We were at Emma's soccer game and Camille, Ashley and Nathan were not in to it. They asked if they could go play on the bleachers about 20 yards behind us. There were a couple of boys playing over there (one 7 and the other 4.) After a minute or two I glanced over to see how everything was going. Just then the older boy takes a swing at Nate with this toy sword looking thing and stops just shy of his head. I know the older kid and he is usually really nice to our kids so I decide to let it play out for a minute before I go over to separate them. Then, the younger kid (about 4 and a head taller than Bubba) runs up to Nathan, growls and makes clawing gestures right up in his grill. (According to Camille he was pretending to be a dinosaur) Nate has a curious/scared look on his face and at this point I have just about seen enough of this. As I stand up to walk over there, Nathan clinches both fists, puts his head down and starts rapid firing punches to the kid's gut. After a few seconds both kids take off running. So fast in fact that they left their sword behind. Nathan quickly picked it up and started chasing them with it. A teary-eyed moment for sure.

Keeping up

I'm shooting for about a post per week, so far I'm doing pretty good--if only I could keep up as well with my house keeping.

Ash was well for two days and then Camille started throwing up. Luckily she has it under control and i haven't had to clean up messes. I really hope Nate doesn't get it.

Justin has a work dinner tonight, so we are having eggs for dinner and then I promised Ashley I would take her to Toys R Us to spend the gift card Nana sent for her birthday. IF she gets her room cleaned in time, of course. A tedious process of tattletelling, screaming, bossing, and whining. I'm going up to split up the jobs now so she and Camille can finish their work at their own pace. Snail's pace.

Did you know...

That it snows in Dallas? I heard it did, but in two years I'd never seen it and didn't quite believe it. Who knew that a state that melts me at least 6 months out of 12 could also look like this:
We got about 7 or 8 inches total, but (don't laugh CO) school was cancelled.Today was supposed to be my day to catch up, clean, finish laundy, organize. Instead:

Each of the girls had a friend over (in an attempt to keep them away from my immediate area) but my diabolical plan failed and I spent the entire morning at the beck and call of seven little children who wanted to play in the snow. I hunted mittens and hats, tried to mediate fights over the two pair of boots we have, answered unending knocks at the door, put Nate on the tramp, took Nate off the tramp, got snacks, provided dry pants and socks, refit wet mittens, answered more knocks at the door, tried to keep wet boots off the carpet, made slushies, wiped up spilled juice, answered calls for Emma on MY cell phone, etc. etc. etc. They were so loud coming and going that Nate never took a nap. I took a picture of each girl with her friend.

Ashley and Meghan

Camille and Mackenzie

Emma and Abby

Now all the friends are gone, and it is still a disaster, and I'm out of here. I called a sitter and I'm going out to dinner. I'll worry about the rest tomorrow.

For those who have been watching...

Some random daily life:After a holiday of road tripping and watching lots of movies, I can't tear Nate away from the TV. He loves to watch Dora the Explorer, Handy Manny, Max and Ruby, Spongebob, and most especially Disney's Cars. If Lightning (pictured above) was not lost, Bubb would be have him in his hand still. Nate doesn't like to run errands with me, he would rather stay home and watch TV and play around the coffee table with his cars. If I do entice him to go with promises of watching Lightning McQueen in the car, he is mad when I turn off the car to run in a store and throws tantrums. He carries on and on in a very dramatic (older three sisters) kind of way and tells me "I'm crying!" When I try to talk to him reasonably.



Nate and Ashley are such good buddies. They play all day happily with each other and unless Ashley mothers Nate too much things go pretty smoothly. He is always looking for her when she isn't around, and he runs to hug her when she has been at school. She helps him with things (like getting snacks) and wants to be the one to wake him up from his nap. All the kids like to do that, they fight over who's turn it is to get him up.



Emma is growing so big. She acts like she is 16 and not 9 going on 10. She is so responsible, I never have to ask her to do her homework or shower and get ready for school. In fact--she often wakes me up for the day telling me what time it is and giving me a report on what the other kids are doing. She has choir practice every Wednesday, and it makes Justin crazy when she reminds him every Tuesday night. He has told her he can remember, he is the one who drives her to school those mornings, but she reminds him every week anyway. I have a little trouble with her because she is so grown up and responsible, she doesn't like it when I say no to her and always wants to know why or tries to change my mind with reasoning.


Camille is Camille. Mornings are not her thing. She has so many tardies now that if we get any more we get in trouble. Last week she was sick, and stayed home Monday and Tuesday. Then I sent her back to school Wednesday, and she did just fine. Thursday I had just driven 25 minutes from home with four small children in my car, marched them all into the mall and we had just met my SIL at a play place when I got a call from the school nurse. I had to march the four kids back out to the car and drive all the way back home to pick her up. It was not my best day, the little four weren't happy either! But Camille bopped her way out of the school with a big smile on her face and happily settled into the lazy boy to watch TV. I didn't even bother to send her Friday.

Favorite Baby

I have three examples of why I am wrapped around Nate's finger.

#1 I curled my hair the other day and he put his chubby baby hands in the curls and said, "I like you haiw mom!"

#2 This morning when I came down in my Sunday clothes he said, "are you cute mom?" Justin called him a brown noser.

#3 Tonight when I put him to bed, I kissed his little passy mouth and planted a few on each cheek. I was getting ready to let go and he grabbed my face and planted one on me, and then one on each of my cheeks. Then when I turned to go to the door, he said, "Hug! Hug!" And gave me a big squeeze.

Now what woman can resist that? Boy am I glad I got my little boy!

Nate and the Spider

Nate is pretty funny about bugs. He likes them, but is also afraid sometimes. Tonight we got out the Halloween decorations for f.h.e. and there was a big plastic spider in there. I put in on a lamp shade, and then it turned up on the ground where Nate noticed it and started to smash it with a ball.

Then it flipped over and he squatted down beside it and hit the ground nearby trying to get the spider to move. When nothing happened he hit the ground again saying, "come on, dude!" Ah la la la la. Justin and I cracked up.

Then Justin took the spider and pretended to get Nate with it, but Nate jumped back and said, "Hey! Stop it Dad!" Such a funny age. That kid is endless entertainment.

Sorry about my poor cinematography.

Day to day business

Nate fell on the sidewalk and split his poor lip open. It is pretty much completely healed now, one week later but he looked pretty sad last week.

I love these twinkly eyes, the wavy gold hair, and the little mole on her cheek. She lost a tooth Sunday, she came up to me and I pulled it right out with a paper towel. She lost it the first night so then she wrote a cute note to the tooth fairy to put under her pillow but we found the tooth in her bed. She got her dollar this morning.

Good Example

We often let Nate stay up after we put the girls to bed. We get one on one time with him, and he plays around while we sit or watch TV. He was so cute tonight! He put Ashley's soccer shin guards on his hands and did a funny one legged skip around dancing to the music on commercials. He was sitting on my lap looking at pictures of his cousin Rosie on her mom's blog when Ashley yelled downstairs for something. We had sent the girls to bed half an hour ago. Before Justin or I could do anything Nate yelled out, "GO TO BED!" "GO SLEEP!" in his little baby voice. If you ask us where he learned that, we'll say, "I have no recollection of that, senator."

Soccer Saturday

After nearly two weeks of rain, cancelled practices and games, we finally had our first soccer games today. I think Ash likes her new uniform. She was so cute, and had a great time. She scored a goal! She was at the front of the bumblebee pack and took it to the net. When we cheered for her she got a shy look on her face like she felt bad about it. Later in the game she had a great assist. She put if right on the line and a teammate tipped it in.
Ashy's coach is fantastic. At first I was worried because he is a little die hard--he wanted to have two practices a week. (For 4 year olds I think it's a little aggressive.) But I will say he runs a great practice, and despite multiple cancelled practices he had the girls ready for their game. The best part about him is his talent with interacting with the girls. He is able to motivate them without threats or anger, and is great about being sympathetic without encouraging drama. He gave one girl some extra play time today because she really wanted a goal.

Nate was good during the first game: there was a baby behind us he played with. He also spent some time shooting on a free goal with Emma and eating snacks I brought.
Smack in the middle of the other girls games Emma had pictures, of course. I had to leave Ash and truck clear across the fields, lugging the chubby kid who refused to walk. On the plus side I was able to steal a great team photo so I don't have to pay 30 bones for it. Cha Ching. There is one girl with her eyes closed, but it's not my kid!

Then we hoofed it back over to pick up Ashley and catch the end of Camille's game. It was getting pretty hot by then, and Nate still wouldn't walk. Not sure why. He had a harder time during Cam's game because he always tries to go for Justin when he can see him across the field. He made a couple escape attempts, and made it to midfield one time but luckily the play was at the other end.
Camille played well in her game. Ironically enough, she is not aggressive at all on the soccer field. She hangs back and follows the play from a distance. She did get a foot on the ball a few times and loves to do throw ins. Three out of seven players on her team no showed, so the four played the whole game with no subs. They were beat by the end.


Notice Emma's cute flower clip, the latest outlet for my craftiness.


This is Nate showing me his "truck." He loves to bite one corner of a cracker and then say, "Mom, truck" and drive it around with sound effects. He even says, "beep, beep, beep" when he backs it up. All in all a good soccer day.

Family Dynamics

This video shows each child's personality in a small clip. It also happens to be some of Nate Dog's first steps! Justin requested I post it. My favorite part is the look he gives me at the end. Think Jim from The Office.

No babies were harmed in the making of this movie.

WARNING hibernating bear!

Camille is tough in the morning. From the minute I get her up, she folds her arms, stomps her feet, and screams at anyone who talks to her. This morning for example, I woke her up to get in a nice warm bath. The bath was too hot, and she refused to get in and said she hated school. It was the worst day of her life. (She said that yesterday too. I considered pointing it out to her but held back.) Then she was mad because she couldn't get her nightgown off by herself. She was upset because she couldn't get out of the tub first (Ashley was almost finished with her bath by now.) Then because she had to wash with soap. When I asked her to get out she moaned with frustration, and after she had complained about getting in. Then she was furious because she had nothing to wear. Emma's clothes didn't fit, they were too long. When I produced a perfectly clean pair of capris from the dryer, she didn't want to wear that outfit and refused to go to school. I said it was against the law for her to stay home and she said she hated the police, with her arms folded. But she finally did get dressed, and started playing with her dollhouse. At this point we have ten minutes before we are supposed to leave.
Downstairs, she got mad at me because there was nothing she wanted to eat. I made a few suggestions which were vhemently refused, so I told her to figure it out on her own or go hungry to school. She found some cereal. She obstinately put on her shoes trying to wiggle as much as possible while I combed her hair, and I told her she would have to go to bed at 7:00 tonight if she didn't start cooperating. We stomped our way to the car. After I started it up Ashley told me Camille wasn't buckled so I told her to buckle up. She screamed at Ashley for tattling but put her seatbelt on. Then she said she hated little sisters and I told her to keep her mouth shut, she hadn't said one nice thing all morning. Thankfully she did. I'd like to tell you it was an unusually rough morning, but it wasn't. It's all completely routine.

Nate is thankfully less abrasive when he wakes up. He usually snuggles who ever gets him out of bed for a minute or so, and then eats what the girls are eating for breakfast. This morning he needed more cereal and nobody was there to help so he helped himself. He laughed with us when we laughed at him and posed for me when I got the camera.

Nathan

Man, we love this kid. These are really old, but I just found them and thought he was unbelieveably adorable. He can say his name now. When we ask him what his "real" name is, he points to his chest and says "Na-san." His other name is Bubba, you have to specify which one you want.

time for updates

Happy Birthday Billy!

Camillly is the cutest little seven-year-old you ever saw. She has a fun smile and a great sense of humor. She loves Tom and Jerry, Spongebob, and all things High School Musical. She is a sensitive thoughtful girl, and I worry sometimes about her fragile self confidence. One of her latest things is wanting me to pick out her clothes for her. (Perhaps it stems from her getting dressed inappropriately for the weather and me telling her to change--she hates that.) She will make some man so happy some day: for her birthday she asked for BBQ brisket, sausage, and bacon. So we had them all.

She has turned into a great little reader, it is cute the way she shows me the pictures and reads me the books she brings home from school. She also is doing so well with reading the scriptures, I'm amazed sometimes at the words she figures out. She is a great little organizer. She likes to put her own clothes away, and organize the barbies in Ashley's doll house. She loves to write notes and leaves us little love notes almost daily. She is a great kid.

I love this smile.

And our little Bubb is starting to talk! Oh my, nothing gets my heart like little baby words. It is so hard to catch him on video, but I'm trying. In his vocabulary:

Mom

Daddy

Emma

Ashy (poor Camilly, he hasn't figured out how to say her name yet and it breaks her heart)

bird

doggie

woof

ba ba, passy, blanket (those three all sound pretty much the same)

mine

here you go (more like "eh go!")

please

thank you

bye bye

stuck

stinky Oh!

all gone

uh oh

and of course, ball

He also blows kisses, one of our favorite tricks.
It is my absolute favorite stage of babyhood, the learning to talk part. I finally get a little hint of what goes on in their minds and see the intelligence working, it just melts my heart.
He is such a lovey little man, he gives us lots of hugs and snuggles and pats. It is impossible not to adore him.

Bye Bye Fro

I gave the Bubb a little trim. Justin doesn't like it so much, but it's grown on me. I miss his blonde highlights, but its starting to warm up so we could get those back without too much trouble. Such a cute kid.

Kid update

Our boy loves balls. It is one of the only words he can say. He plays with the exercise ball, with bouncy balls, big and small, golf balls, nerf balls, soccer balls, deflated basketballs, beach balls, pretty much any thing round he can get his hands on. It makes Justin so proud.

He also likes to play rough. He hits Justin for fun, and cracks himself up. Tonight we were all kneeling down to say bedtime prayers, and he came up behind me with a half pool noodle and hit me on the head with it saying, "OW! Ah ha ha ha!" We all laughed so hard and he was so proud of himself that he did it again, and then wacked Justin a few times, too.

now what?

I sprained my ankle, it's really cramping my style. I was putting some heavy boxes in my car and it rolled out from under me. I fell down (luckily the box didn't fall on me) half underneath my car and then sat there for a while because it HURT really bad and also because I wasn't sure what to do next. I'm supposed to go get a boot to wear, but I haven't been able to get to one of the few pharmacies that carry it during hours. I'm going to have to break down and take a million kids with me, because it's getting sore from me lumbering around on it all day. I think this qualifies me for a vacation. P.S. Nate weighs a ton!

Halloween 2008

Nate's costume was the hit of this year's Halloween festivities. Thanks Laurel, I'm glad I hung onto that one!