Easter Eggs and Cookies

We had gorgeous weather for Easter weekend, but we also had a TON of work to do...of the nesting variety, and I wish I meant nesting for our baby, but it was more like the kind of nesting you do for your young chickens...ahem. Anyway, that evening, we finally got around to doing some easter stuff. We dyed eggs and the kids decorated cookies with frosting for the Bishop and their primary teachers. It was fun!

Betsey is three years old!

My Bets, Bay-ets, Munch, Little Munch. I love her. Sometimes I think that I love her so much someone is going to take her away from me, and it scares me. This may be due to recent tragedies I've been close to...but I can't help it. I just eat her up and think she is so fantastic (as I do all of my kids at this age, and all of them in general of course, but this age is something special for me every time) that it worries me she will disappear somehow and I will be left without her. Sorry for the sad start to this post, but it does cross my mind all the time in moments when I can't take my eyes off of her or when she is welcomed into our bed almost every night or when she tells me she loves me or flashes me the sign language for I love you with her fingers after using one hand to push down and pull up the fingers to get them in the right position. (She did this at church on Sunday to Chris, who was sitting up on the stand...waving around her little I love you sign.) Anyway, this is a post about who my Betsey is!

Betsey is very independent. She rarely becomes frustrated when she is doing hard things that I am standing by to help her with. She gets dressed on her own and gets into the car by herself and puts most of her buckle on in her car seat. She doesn't like to walk anywhere though, and always asks, "I wanna hold you" to be carried everywhere...which being pregnant, I don't ever do. Nope. We hold hands though. I am impressed by her young ability to do so much by herself...she definitely potty trained herself EARLY and she will wake in the night and come into our bathroom and go to the bathroom by herself and then come get in bed with us.

 

For her birthday breakfast, she asked for green "panpakes"...but she also went for some string cheese, which is a staple for this girl.

Betsey wears "lightgowns" everyday, all day. She is NEVER dressed five minutes in our house. She gets dressed (by herself, in clothing she approves of) before leaving the house and literally she doesn't take fifteen steps in our house before she is stripping down and hunting for her lightgown. Great.

 

Ruby got Betsey a Dora doll. She recently discovered Dora, which is the first time she was ever shown anything other than Sesame Street (she will only watch the Elmo's World part) that was geared for her age. She LOVES Dora now. She is my first kiddo to like the mind numbing shows...now she's ventured into Wonder Pets and Super Why.

Betsey is tricky. For example, when she is getting dressed, she will ask, "This way mommy?" to be sure she isn't putting her clothing on backward. I'll agree or correct her as the case may be, and she'll get her feet for example in her undie leg holes just right and then she'll say, "Wait" and reverse the progress, turn them the other way and say, "Is this the right way?" Repeat that for every article of clothing and you'll understand why I mostly encourage dresses.

Betsey sometimes breaks into a southern drawl. I don't know where it comes from. I think it is hilarious, and I worry I'll never capture it on video (bideo). Usually this comes about when she's exclaiming something, she'll say, "He that hurt may (me)!"It happens pretty often, and it's really random and cute.

 

Betsey's actual birthday was on a Monday and we opened gifts just as a family and had the Wilcox family come over for another special reason, so they joined us for presents and cake and ice cream. Alice randomly decided she would be Betsey's gift opening table. Huh. Sounds uncomfortable and weird...but that's my quirky girl!

Betsey has a major lisp. She can't say her "s", "ch" or "sh" sounds for starters. It all comes out "th". I love it when she says essential oils, "ethenthial oilth." Watch this=wath thith. It's pretty significant and we don't try to correct her...yet. It's too cute!

She was thrilled with opening presents. She got a cloth house with 5 little kitties that live in the house (below) from us.

She got a fancy new lightgown from Sage and Mike's fam and another from Pam and Matt's fam. The theory was that she needed some new lightgowns since she wears them so much and since hers have been through her sisters before her.

This is her "couldn't be more pleased" face. I love this face!

 

Two lightgowns!!

Betsey is a bag lady. She wants to be able to carry all of her beloved things with her at the same time. Here she is attempting to carry our gift, the lightgowns and some great new bath toys from Grandma and Grandpa Pierce (the frilly dress is what she got the day before from my folks).

She had an especially large cupcake, but the guests had a few smaller ones to devour each.

 

Betsey is often to a fault obsessed with my mama. She tends to get clingy and whiny around my mom, trying to manipulate her into doing whatever she wants her to do. It can be really annoying! Recently, she began saying her own prayers from start to finish, and she pretty much insists on being the one to do all the family praying. She prays every single time, "Bless (bleth) that Oma will come to my house (houth)." or "Bless that we can go to Oma's house." She prays almost as often "Please that daddy will come home soon." or "Bless mama to be safe." I love her prayers. She frequently wants to call my mom and she gets super chatty and long winded and scattered train of thought...like even I have no idea half the time where she's headed or where she is coming from. It's super cute.

This is a Betsey expression. She is very expressive.

She got Dora bath toys from Alice and a few other bath toys in addition to what Grandma and Grandpa Pierce gave her from us...including bath water color tablets and bubble bath. Of course before going to bed, she had to use her new toys in a big sister filled bubble bath!

If you ever ask Betsey if she wants this or that and she doesn't, she'll say, "No, I'm good."

 

Betsey loves to spell her name, "B-E-T-S-E-E-Y" is as good as it gets. It's super cute. She calls the letter "B", a Betsey. She loves doing her school when her sisters are at the table working on theirs. She has dry erase letter pages and she mostly likes the letters "T" and "O".

 

She loves to pretend to read books to me. She especially and almost exclusively likes the books of animal pictures that are simply animals with their labels below. She calls them "Aminal bookth" and because of those books she knows many animal specifics...like Chimpanzee and Parrot. It's super cute.

Betsey is three...she is such fun...she has had a few opportunities this year to comfort me when she finds me crying. She will come in and ask, "are you sad, mom?" I will confess, "yes." Then she will say, "Do you want cuddles?" and I of course do. Then she will ask, "Are you still sad?" A few seconds later. When we discuss why I am sad, she will say, "I'm not sad!" I know we are supposed to be like children, and I think in the whole grieving process, she's a pretty good example of how I should be. She will say, "Stoney is in heaven, I'm not sad!" I love that.

 

Betsey has a blue blankie that my mom made her before she was born. It is her most treasured belonging and it is that minky-ish fabric with a thicker pile. She always takes a section and rubs it lightly over her lips. This is something she does for comfort, and she calls it a "yip". She started offering me "yips" when I am sad. "Do you need a yip?" So sweet and simple.

Betsey Zoo Birthday...

Birthdays just keep getting lower and lower key. :) I was grateful that so much of the family could join us on our trip to Woodland Park Zoo for Betsey's birthday. She didn't know what a zoo was, so I tried to get her excited by looking at the zoo website where they have several webcams that show you live footage of what is happening in various exhibits. She decided she really wanted to see the owls. :) So my folks, Robb's fam and Braden's family joined us on what was supposed to be a really wet Saturday. It was chilly and overcast, but the rain didn't stop until we were all done with the zoo tour and just in the cafeteria eating lunch together. The walk to the car was a little wet, but not bad! We had a great time!

I feel like we had a lot of cool animals doing things for us to enjoy, they weren't all hiding and sleeping!

There are two new lion cubs and they were out playing and wrestling and we had a great time watching them!

Oh these boys. So darn cute. Carson and Mason. BFFs!

The super happy birthday girl!

All the cousins who were with us. We were missing Jeff's four...but still quite a big group!

60th in Hawaii...

My dad turned 60 in Hawaii and my folks were there for two weeks, on Kawaii. It was a last mintue thing, but using buddy passes from Leisha, my brother and I headed out there for three days at the last minute. They had a condo with a couch and a murphy bed and so we just joined in the fun with my folks. I am posting this two and a half years after the fact, so I don't remember much. I just know that it was a great time to be with my bro and my folks in paradise. We snorkled, swam, ate Tropical Dreams Ice Cream (not so much me because I was diagnosed with Gestational Diabetes right before this), watched sunsets and saw beautiful places.

Poipu Beach

Making sixty look amazing.

Mom and I and 32 week Leo in there...

Robb and Dad

Did I mention we relaxed?

This is at a beach called either Ke'e Beach or Anahole Beach. I think we went to one in the morning and one at night. It was heavenly. We discovered Chicken in a Barrell on day one and we ate there twice. In three days. It was just chicken but cooked amazing. So we went to the morning beach, then packed up and ate and then to the afternoon beach until sunset.

There is something so rare and wonderful about traveling with siblings and parents with no kids. I think we need to consider an adult trip of some kind soon, it is just really wonderful.

Junior Festival round one and four...

Junior Festival. I have a love/hate relationship with this annual event because preparing for it takes almost all year of the same two songs. I think the girls could learn more during the year if they didn't have to be performance ready in March with two songs. This has mostly to do with their teacher, who won't move on until after Junior Festival. Sometimes they have their pieces memorized for months before March and they make no forward progress because she doesn't want to botch their Junior Festival pieces.

Anyway, they have this trophy incentive program, for every 15 points you earn, you get a larger trophy. You get 5 points per year if you get superior scores. Ruby got her trophy after three superior years. Alice's first superior was this year, and let's just say it required some creativity on the part of the judges to give her that superior. She was one of the youngest kids in the festival and I think she demonstrated eventually that she knew her songs well and had all the dynamics all figured out...but here is how it went down.

She was second (they have different groups of five or six players that play at a certain time, so you only hear the people assigned to your time and your room). She sat down and they told her to play her first piece. She played, "Monkies in the Trees." So she played exactly the first half of the song. Then she did her rainbow hands to her lap and respectfully waited for the judges to write their comments and scores. Mama Bear was having an internal cow...so I said, "Alice, can you finish the song, play the whole song?" She said, "yes." Then she repeated the same section and stopped again in the same place. I was baffled. Didn't know what more to do, after all, this was supposed to be a polished performance, not a practice session, so I just left it.

So then they said to play her second piece. She was to play "Little Playmates". She literally started playing 'Monkies' RIGHT where she left off. Played the rest of the song and happily finished and waited. I was DYING...you see, this is a one shot opportunity to show what Alice and I have been working on ALL YEAR and she was ready for MONTHS, could play these pieces in her sleep...AHHHHH! So I was glad she had shown her whole first piece by now, but she would be DQ'd if I didn't get her to play her required piece. So I said, "Alice, can you play "Little Playmates" now?" Unruffled and unaffected, my girl was like, "oh yeah" and she played her second song perfectly.

After it was done, she bowed and collected her music from the judges and came to sit on my lap. I was worried that she was going to be aware of the major botching, but no. On the way to the festival, she asked, "Mom, what is the lowest score you can get?" I said, "A one". She said, "If I get a 1, it's okay because I'll just keep playing at home." She isn't competitive, she's like me that way. I was relieved that the judges were forgiving on my little seven year old who did know her songs and did spend all year preparing.

When it was Ruby's turn, she played her pieces perfectly. Ruby is competitive and she performs really well under pressure...the under pressure part is like me. She didn't know one of her songs until the day before the festival...but she pulled it off well! I was proud of them both.

Losing Stoney...

This has been an intense five month period of time for my kids to learn about losing loved ones. Stone was a member of our family for longer than our family existed...Chris got him a year or so before we got married. He was sixteen and holding his own until the very end when he stopped eating and drinking. Chris and I knew it was time to take him in and say goodbye. I left for Hawaii the morning he ended up being put down, so I landed in Kauaii and my folks picked Robb and I up and I got a call from Chris that he was going to go get the girls (who were being watched by a friend of ours) and have them say goodbye. The pictures tell it all...

Chris held Stone until his final breath and we had his body cremated so his ashes could come home. My mom bought us a forsythia bush that blooms in early spring each year to remind us of Stone. We put his ashes in the dirt around the plant as the girls planted the bush in a container so we can take it with us if we move.

Things we love and miss about Stone:

• How when you pet him, he would gradually pile more of himself on top of you until he was all the way on you. 
• Throwing the ball for him...a green tennis ball, always.
• Taking him to the river or to the lake.
• Having him in the back of the truck.
• His wagging tail.
• Having him lay around in the yard on Saturdays while Chris does yard work.
• Taking him to get baths at the Wash Your Dog place in town.
• Giving him treats.

It will be hard to find another animal so loved by our family!