A (Bath) Room of Her Own

Anna sleeps in the bathroom that is attached to our bedroom here at Kristen's house (yes, it is a good sized bathroom). While there isn't a ton I can do with regards to decorating it, I have been able to do a couple of things.


We got a shower curtain and folded it a few times to help keep the light out and hung it with hooks that stick to the walls. We chose a shower curtain so that it wouldn't get funky with all the moisture in the room and folded it so it would be extra thick. A while ago, the hooks fell and wouldn't stay up. We found a cool bar that we could hang the curtain from that stays up by magnets (there is metal in the corner of the window). So it is effective and pretty. Plus, this one makes the room all purple in the afternoons.


On the day after Thanksgiving, I got Anna a purple plush blanket. When I was choosing which one to get, I remembered that I want to do her bedroom in purple and yellow. Anna loved it instantly and it helps her sleep better. She did have a blanket but it's kind of small and it turned more into a security blanket type and less of a sleep under type.

So now she has a big blanket that she can sleep under and I think she moves around less at night under it. I was worried that she moves around too much at night for it to do her any good (which is why we are just barely getting to a blanket) but it stays on her better than I thought it would.

Mother of Eight

We had an exciting week last week. Kristen and Nathan and Luke went to Kentucky to be with Nathan's sister's family whose husband/dad has just been diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer. Nathan actually went out the week before and was there for two weeks. Kristen joined him for Tuesday through Saturday of the second week and they came home together. So, Jason and I got to be the parents for that time.

There was some question as to if she would go or not. Before she left, the whole family was sick (see her blog about it) including Luke. We were concerned about taking Luke, with his having just been sick, to the house of a man whose cancer is in his bone marrow and is probably a touch immuno-suppressed. After talking to them, they thought it would be ok. We weren't as concerned about leaving sick kids because they were all pretty much better and going back to school by then.


Understandably, I was a bit nervous about the whole thing. Although we have been here a while and I know the workings of the household and the kids are used to having us around, they can sometimes be too used to us being around (as in no longer listening when I try to tell them to do things, I have become background noise at times).

Surprisingly, the week went really well. The kids had off school on Wednesday for Veterans' Day so we took them to the park. We find they are a lot easier to watch outside of the house (and less messy). They also had a half day on Friday because it was the end of the term. We decided to just play at home rather than try to do something. Then on Saturday we went to the beach to play at the dunes again.

Since it has been so long now since it happened (sometimes I think that I shouldn't start blogs unless I can finish them then, this whole getting back to it seems to not work) I can't remember too many particulars of the week. What I do remember is right before Kristen left, I prayed to have things go well. Then, on Thursday while making dinner it occurred to me how well it was going. That night, during my prayers, I was thanking for how well the week was going and the thought came to my head that this was a direct answer to my earlier prayer. I love it when the answers to my prayers are pointed out to me. It helps me remember just how much the Lord is watching over me and helping me in my life, even in the little things which can make a huge difference.

Candy! Candy! Candy!

Anna has discovered the wonderfulness of candy. Monday after Halloween, there was some candy on the coffee table in the family room when she woke up. Needless to say, that was way more interesting than breakfast. I went with the 'no candy before breakfast' rule but she was quite loud before I was able to get her away from the table. At least she can be distracted and momentarily forget about the candy.

Then, after breakfast, she rediscovered the candy. Unfortunately, it was not her candy so some of the other kids were trying to keep her from eating it. We soon learned that simply telling her no or pushing it into the middle of the table would not do it. The high-pitched, ear-piercing scream let us know. So I put that candy in a bag and put some of her candy in her own bag. She happily carried it around and got the bag and herself completely sticky.

I was beginning to think I would have to bathe her every day since she was getting totally sticky all the time. Some of the candy I have to open for her but the lollipops she can get into all by herself. Since she doesn't have the patience for a whole lollipop at once, she often puts them back in the bag (without the wrapper) or just on the floor where she is. I keep picking wrappers and half-eaten candy out of the carpet.

Fortunately, we didn't get too much candy so it is almost gone and it will all be over soon.

Sand Dunes

A few weeks ago, Kristen, Nathan and Jonathan went down to the temple with the youth from church. They left freakishly early in the morning (before 6) and got home late (after 10). So Jason and I were in charge of the rest of the boys. We knew we had to schedule an activity so we wouldn't all drive each other crazy and decided on playing in the sand dunes at the beach.

Christopher (the oldest) stayed home to work on homework and we were able to leave Luke (the youngest) home with him. I'm not sure if they had been to this particular place before but how do you not love giant hills of sand? We were even able to keep them away from the water with tales of the strong riptide.

We found a place where they could jump from the hill and into the sand.


Sadly, our camera is kind of slow so I missed a number of the shots. Oh well, I did get a few good ones.


Then Jason dug holes for them all to sit in.

They made little castles in front of themselves which morphed into a mansion for the caterpillar they found and named Bob. I don't know if he fully appreciated the amenities of his home but they sure enjoyed making it for him.

It was a great way to pass the time while parents were away.

Halloween Night

After we got back from our trip, it was time to get ready for Halloween. Kristen had an old Bumblebee costume that we decided to use for Anna and I just wore my Indian clothes but got some bangles and stick- on jewels for my forehead. Jason opted against dressing up.

We went to a party at the church first. They had dinner and a bunch of games. Most of them were too old for Anna. The ones that she could have done, she was too scared to try or wasn't willing to wait in line. I did a lot of throwing things for her. We still had fun walking around, talking to people and checking out all of the other costumes.

Everyone in their costumes (left to right): Back - Braden as a tourist, Kristen with a sparkly boa, Anna as a bee, Jacob as an Indian, Jonathan as a kid from the 80s, Christopher as an accident victim Front - Luke as a dragon, Peter as a mad scientist, Eric as a knight, and Alec as a spelunker

Then they had something called trunk-or-treating which is where cars in the parking lot pass out candy from their decorated trunks. Someone even set up a little haunted walk. Then we did a little bit of trick-or-treating in our neighborhood. Anna thought it was pretty cool. It was her first time trick-or-treating since we were in London last year and they don't do it there (over there, Halloween is basically a holiday for parties and drinking as far as I could tell, not for kids). She couldn't quite say 'trick or treat' so it came out more like 'tree' and she figured out pretty quickly to hold out her bucket (a cleaned out gallon ice cream container). We let her have a lollipop while we were going and I think it helped her not try to eat it as it came.

Anna watching as Luke got into his costume.

When we got home we opened some m&ms for her but put her to bed before she could really figure out that she has a whole bucket of candy at her disposal. She has since learned what is in the bucket and doesn't let a little thing like a wrapper get between her and her candy. I don't look forward to the day when she misses the things that Jason and I eat out. By then, we should have another little kid's candy to eat.

I think it got her in the spirit of dressing up. This morning, she was in the dragon costume that Luke (9 months) wore last night. I was a little surprised it fit but was glad it did because dang was she cute.

The back complete with tail.

Kristen said that when she was putting Anna in it, Luke started getting upset like he knew that it was his costume. So she gave him the pants for a while to appease him before putting them on Anna.

Pinnacles

Shimmying through the rocks.

For Jason's birthday (last Sunday) we went to a place called the Pinnacles. It's a national park where we can hike and go through caves. He's been wanting to go there since the summer but we couldn't find a good time to go and it was dang hot so we decided to wait and go for his birthday. It proved to be a good call because the weather was perfect.


Unfortunately, Nathan wasn't able to go but we went with the rest of Kristen's family along with us and Jason's sister Ann. We were a little bit worried about how much time we had (since we had to be back in time to get into costumes before a Halloween party at 6) since we heard it could take as much as three hours to get there and back. We meant to get going nice and early but, as is often the case with us, it took us longer than we intended to get out of the house. Fortunately, it only took about an hour and a half each way so we had plenty of time to be there.

Anna on my back for hiking. Talk about a versatile moby wrap.

We hiked about a half a mile to where the caves were. It was a good easy hike and even Eric (3) was able to do it.

There were some cool huge pinecones. We thought they made Jacob look like Carmen Miranda.

Then came the caves. They weren't too long but it was enough to need flashlights and to have to kind of climb down then up. Kristen and I both had babies strapped to us so it was a little bit exciting but we made it. Anna was pretty good about keeping her head down when I told her to.

Anna following Eric up the rocks.

At the end of the caves, we sat on some rocks and had snacks while some of the kids went back into the rocks to explore more before going back.

Ann at snack time.

Kristen and Luke enjoying their graham crackers.

Once we got back to the car, we had lunch and went home. Most everyone slept in the car on the way there and back so we had peaceful drives and got back in plenty of time to get into/figure out costumes. I'll talk about that in my next post.

Job Hunt

I was thinking about how I haven't blogged in a long time (sorry about that) and was thinking of why. There are several reasons but one that I realized today is that the major thing going on in our lives right now is looking for a job (and Anna but I don't feel like I can just talk about her all the time). While naturally it may seem like there is nothing to report on that end since we don't have one yet, there is actually quite a bit going on that I can talk about. The reason that I haven't wanted to talk about it is that it is a very personal and spiritual process and I wasn't sure if I wanted to put it out to the world like this. Then I realized today that I actually want my friends and family to know what we are up to and how we are making our choices. (Besides, if I waited until the process was over, imagine how long that post would be to try to explain in all.) I don't really want to have to explain things to each person individually, make sure I have informed everyone when things change or have them think we just couldn't find what we really wanted and just settled for anything we could get out of desperation. We're not really that desperate but our criteria have significantly changed. Let me bring you up to speed.

On the look out

When Jason graduated, he was looking for a top firm in a cool city, preferably abroad. He noticed that there were a lot of firms in Amsterdam that did work that he liked so we were kind of looking there. I knew the thought of us moving to Amsterdam (the Vegas of Europe where everything is legal) would freak out certain members of my family so I kind of kept that choice under wraps until we had something so they wouldn't have to worry about us longer than they had to. I figured while it would be hard to raise a righteous family in that setting it wouldn't be impossible.

Then in August, we had our school blessings. In my family, every year before school started, my dad would give us each a priesthood blessing. We've been doing it since before I was born and we don't stop just because we have graduated. This year, we were quite interested to see what was coming. To our great surprise it said, in essence, that we shouldn't look for a job in a prestigious firm or a prestigious city but should look somewhere small and out of the way instead. The analogy was that we should look for Nazareth and when the Lord needed Jason to rise up and be a leader, He would know where to find him. It pointed out that he could get a job where he was looking but that a job like that would basically suck him dry and he wouldn't be happy. What would make him happy would be a job where he had the time for his family, his church callings, community work or even designing his own house (which, oddly, Jason has had no real interest in but he would have the time for it if he wanted).

Well, after council like that, what could we do? We started thinking about big cities that are kind of off the architectural radar so to speak. We decided to stay in the States and from our list of a few places, decided to look into Boston. Jason found a web site that listed all of the firms in any given city and he started looking into them. Some of the firms were actually hiring and he applied to them. Others weren't but he liked what they did so he contacted them anyway. I, in the meantime was investigating Boston so that we would be ready to go when the job came.

Things didn't seem to be going anywhere and Jason was getting discouraged and kind of sequestering himself into our room and playing games on his work breaks. One day, not that long ago, he left our room and was talking to Kristen. I came in kind of in the middle of the conversation so I don't know what prompted it. They were talking about Jason's school blessing. Kristen had been there when he got it and was pointing out that maybe we were looking in the wrong place and that is why things weren't going so well. She thought, from the Nazareth description, we were looking at places that were too big and needed to look at smalled towns. She pointed out that we could get what we wanted in a place to live (things like museums, culture and general things to do) without living in a big city and we would probably be able to actually afford to do them. Which was a good point. When we lived in Salt Lake City we really enjoyed going to the symphony even a few operas. We had wanted to do it in Philadelphia too but they were just too expensive, even when I was working. She also pointed out that there are a lot of things about Boston that will be hard on Anna. Things like legalized gay marriage, longer school days (3 hours longer, there was an article in the paper) and universal health care (although that last one would affect our taxes mostly). She pointed out that if the Lord wanted us to go to Boston, then she wouldn't worry but based on the blessing, it didn't really sound like it.

We conceded that she had a point. Since then we have been looking for firms and towns that are around the size of San Luis. Needless to say, this had been a tough adjustment for us. Jason is having a hard time getting excited about the work that they do and I am having a hard time knowing how to help him feel better and get excited. We went to the temple the day after talking to Kristen. It was a good trip. I was worried about how long it would take to essentially start over and had the prompting that once we were able to kind of wrap our heads around the change, it wouldn't take long. That was a huge comfort to me because as much as I like being here, I don't really want to be here forever.

So we have made a list of what exactly we want in wherever we go. As I was reading the list to Kristen, she said it sounded like Fort Collins, Colorado. They have 9 architecture firms there. We are also thinking of the eastern Midwest, a place that looks like the East but isn't as uptight. I'm looking online at things like lists of Top Small Towns for Families and things like that. We are trying to find people we know anywhere who might know architects. That is one nice thing about being friends with people while we are all students, as we graduate and scatter, I now have friends all over. So, if anyone knows someone who is an architect (not necessarily an architect who is hiring, just an architect) anywhere, let us know. We need all the help we can get.

Although the life of a beach bum is appealing. j/k -Jason