Let's dive right back into Winter 2019-2020! If you would like to read part 1, click here! This is a yearly event that the kids look forward to as soon as they see leaves start to gather on the ground. Jane says, "OOOOO can we make a leaf pile?!" Jane usually makes a small one herself to play around in but the main event is when Pappaw comes over after all the leaves have fallen and makes it into one huge leaf pile that they can all fit in and be covered by. They all take turns being thrown in the leaves by Pappaw too. I love those huge smiles. :D
In my line of work January is the busiest month of the whole year! A whole lot of end of the year accounting with lots of hard deadlines. All the rest of the year I have close to no deadlines at all. It wasn't really the ideal time of year to have a newborn... and a fussy one at that. It was most definitely a challenge but we made it work. As you can see Flynn caught some Zs on me while I worked and we got by! There were a lot of TV shows on for the older kids. ;) I am always so glad when January is over!! Especially for 2020, I wanted to get back to a normal flow of work and see how it worked with 4 kids. As soon as my 2 weeks of Maternity leave was up it was January already. So my first month alone with 4 kids was also super full of work! I am sooo grateful for my job and of course so grateful for little Flynn. Hard things can be good things too. :)
I think Jane's third Kinderstars meet of the season was our favorite one of all. She got to hang out with her gymnastics buddies on the bleachers before the meet. Then she got to be the line leader for the introduction of the teams and she was beaming the whole time she did it. Best of all she did really great on all her events probably the best ever even though she still got one ribbon less than perfect. Basically just one tiny wobble on the beam. The judges seem to get a little more picky with technique by this time in the season. SO so proud of her for all her hard work. It was my first time to take Flynn with me to a meet too and he did great as well. I think Jane's favorite part was that it was Candy Land themed and they gave out lollipops to all the athletes at the end. That last picture is one of my all time favorite pictures of Jane. Just chillin in the front seat while I nursed Flynn before we headed home. I can see the sense of accomplishment all over her face. I love it.
Near the end of January we were able to attend Jane's friend Brianna's 6th Birthday Party. I believe it was my first event with 4 kids on my own. We did pretty well! Thankfully it was at my friend's house so it was easy enough to keep up with everyone. Jane felt the need to wear her super fancy dress and shoes to the party. I decided not to talk her out of it and bring a change of clothes if she changed her mind later on. She decided she wanted to change when she realized she wouldn't be able to play one of the party games in her fancy things very well. It was a fun party and the perfect first event for me on my own. Do you think Xan enjoyed the cake?? ;)
Since I was feeling good enough to get back in to the regular swing of things, but not comfortable to go to public indoor spaces with a tiny newborn, I set up some house play dates with some of our favorite friends. First we went to see our sweet friends who used to be our wonderful next door neighbors. When I found out I was pregnant with Flynn I asked Lena to watch my kids so I could get my ultrasound done and surprise my mom. So I had to grab a picture of Flynn and Lena together. Whisper showed Jane and Atlas her video game and later on they enjoyed jumping on Whisper's new trampoline. That same week we had a playdate with Jane's bestie, Paige and got to enjoy their new playset! I'm pretty sure Paige's brother Parker has become Xan's bestie too. :) It was so good to see friends and get out and about again. We are so blessed to have such wonderful friends.
It had been more than 6 months since we had started potty training Atlas. He was pee trained pretty quickly, but going number 2 on the potty had been a huge struggle. We had tried everything. I’m not sure what started the aversion to it, but it didn’t come naturally for him. We kept trying different incentives to keep him interested in trying. (Toys, candy, special day with dad, gymnastics class) Still nothing. For months!! I kept reading everywhere to not force it and it would happen when he was ready. I even read to stop talking about it completely and not even offer incentives. I rejected the notion that nothing I could do would help and I had to leave it alone. So I kept searching articles to find something that would help! Finally I found one. It said to start by making sure pooping is happening in the right place. So start by having them poop in a diaper in the bathroom. Not even on the toilet just in the room. I told him pooping happens in the bathroom so we need to start doing it there even if it’s not on the potty. He said ok. The second step is to have them poop on the potty with a diaper on. I asked him if wanted to do that and he said yes! It worked like a charm! The third step is obviously to poop in the potty without a diaper after a few days of success with the diaper on. But after the first day of diaper pottying he was having trouble even with the diaper still. so I racked my brain as to what could be the problem. At night when he pooped in a diaper before it was when he was watching a show after dinner and wasn’t thinking about it. So I said if you go try to poop on the potty with a diaper I will give you the kindle to watch while you try. Worked perfectly! And it kept working!! after a week of successful diaper pottying I said he should try without the diaper and he did it! It took 10 minutes of him on his own with the kindle but it worked. Every time after got faster and easier for him. After a month or two of potty kindle time we weaned him off the kindle and now it's easy to forget it was ever even an issue for him. One of the incentives was going to the store with dad to pick out a toy. Well they came back with three nerf guns. They had a nerf war with Sam in the backyard, so fun! I was their reloader. :D Second incentive was a Chuck E. Cheese birthday party! He did it before his 4th birthday, so he earned it! More on that later!
Superbowl time!! Jane really looks forward to the Superbowl. She asks me, "When is the big party with all food??" I guess the food that I make is her favorite. Mostly it's just Pigs in the blanket, lots of chips and dip. I think she likes that we get to eat in the living room too. Makes it feel extra special. Once the kids got tired of watching football, which wasn't that long. I put Peppa Pig on my computer until bedtime. It worked out pretty well. I'm looking forward to the day they can watch the whole thing with us.
Another incentive Atlas earned after becoming completely potty trained was getting to start Gymnastics at Rowland Ballard! I wasn't sure how he'd do since he's sort of a goof ball when it comes to listening to instructions. But he did really well and seemed to enjoy it. When we got back in the car after the first class I asked him if it was fun and if he liked it. He replied, "Yes!" to both but then when I asked if he wanted to go again he said, "No." Haha! I was like wait... what now? Eventually I figured out he didn't want to go back because he didn't want the stamp on his hand that they give them at the end of class. I told him he was allowed to say no thank you to the stamp and he was all good to go again after that! Unfortunately we only had 1-2 months of classes before COVID shut the whole thing down. But he did enjoy it for those few weeks!
Our home school group held a Valentine's party for our Little Hearts. It was the cutest! So well done with tons of cute valentine themed activities for the littles to do. I was still getting used to having Flynn with me places but if I remember correctly he slept almost the whole time in the carrier for this event. Thank you Flynn! I believe this was our last Heart event before everything was cancelled. (other than park day) There was an Easter party we were looking forward to but that was at the height of the lockdowns.
I have mixed feelings looking back at this meet. Because it was Jane's last Kinderstars meet and I didn't even know it. Covid shut down the last two meets that were scheduled. It's kinda sad that the last meet was Jane's worst performance of all the meets that season. She was extremely distracted. Jane really loved the roses they sell at the events. But for me, they already get a medal and ribbons and usually a candy or treat at the end of the meet. They don't need a flower too! Plus I could buy a bouquet at HEB for the price they sell one rose at the meet. Jane had been trying to catch my eye during the meet and pointing at the roses for me to buy one and I kept shaking my head. There was no way for me to go over to her and explain that it wasn't happening! Then they had a person selling flowers in the middle of the crowd next to the vault event and Jane stopped right in the middle of her vault to stare at them. She still got a blue ribbon because when she paused it was after her jump and before her roll but her coach had to get her attention and tell her to continue. All the rest of her events were good but definitely not her best. Her coach noted her distraction overall afterwards as well. I hated feeling disappointed with her performance. I though to myself "Oh no. I don't want to be that parent!!" If she's happy I should be happy. So it was a bittersweet end to our Kinderstars meet experience. I think it was the right time. Looking back at it now, it showed me her passion and interest was waning for gymnastics and I didn't want to be the parent that makes it more about themselves than what their kid wants. Our decision to quit Kinderstars wasn't until much later but I know this meet experience helped us make that decision. The first time I saw the team picture from this meet I thought to myself, "Wait... where's Jane??" Then I realized I barely recognized her because she looked so darned grown up! The poise she's holding herself with was something I hadn't seen in her yet at that point. It makes me smile!
This is hard. These pictures are from the last time I saw Papa. I knew there was a possibility it could be the last time I saw him, but I was pretty determined to see him again if things took a turn for the worse. I will write about it more later but yeah, I didn't get the chance to see him again. At this point of his treatment he was still trying to be careful not to get sick. So we tried to keep our distance and didn't touch him. It was a wonderful visit though. I knew before we went I wanted to ask about his testimony since I didn't think I had ever heard it before. He told it beautifully and then my Grandma asked me to share mine. I realized when I was telling mine that our testimonies had a lot of similarities. It meant so much to me. I also wrote him a letter before we went because I knew I wouldn't be able to remember all the things I wanted to tell him and be able to fully convey how special he was to me and how much I loved him. I gave it to him before we left and later my mom told me just how touched he was by the letter. I really made him feel special. I'm so glad!! The only thing I regret is not being able to hug him one last time. But no matter how much I wish I had gotten that chance, I choose to believe it was for the best. I'm so grateful I got to express how much he meant to me, I know sooo many people don't get to do that with their loved ones. Don't wait!! Tell them now. <3
One of Jane's favorite friends, Cambrie, asked her over for a playdate. I really hadn't let Jane go play at a friend's house without me yet. I wasn't sure if I was ready! But when Cambrie's mom Christina asked me if they could come pick her up for a playdate I felt good enough about it to say yes! We had known them long enough and I trusted them. I also felt like Jane had matured enough to behave when I wasn't around. Christina sent me this picture during their playdate to tell me it was going great and they were having fun! It all went very well. I'm glad Jane's first playdate on her own was a success!
Near the middle of February we finally got back to Co-op! It was our first Co-op back with Flynn in toe! As you can see he was pretty popular with the whole class. :D I can't remember if this was our last co-op before Covid put an end to our meetings or if we got to do one more. Nevertheless it wasn't long after we got back to Co-op that we had to stop. It was one of the first things to go because we had been meeting in media room of a senior living center. And those places were the first ones to quarantine. Little did I know it was the first of ALL of our activities coming to a grinding halt. It was a wonderful Kindergarten/preschool co-op for the year. We love our group!!
The house next door to us is a rent house and from what I've heard from everyone who has lived there the landlords are a nightmare and never fix anything. Because of that, it's a never ending revolving door of new neighbors. We've had 6 different neighbors, some great ones and some not so great ones! During this season a family moved in with a 4 year old girl. Jane was excited! She came over to play in the front yard and before I knew it they had made it inside. I'm always surprised how fast people seem to trust me with their kids and feel kinda bad that I don't reciprocate those feelings. Like when Jane's neighbor friend would ask her over to her house on her own I would always say no. I just didn't know them well enough. But our little next door friend was over at our house allll the time. I was like, "oh, ok. This is how 5 kids would feel like. No thanks..." ;) Haha! It was fun but starting to get a little overwhelming for me. So I started saying no more often. Plus she kept coming over with a runny nose or say something like oh I had a fever this morning but it's gone now.... and of course then my kids would get sick. I was over it. I sent a long text telling them about my time restraints and how I couldn't have her over early in the day and how we don't see friends with symptoms of sickness and to please not send her over when that was the case. Well, I thought I had totally offended them because I didn't hear from them for a couple weeks. Maybe I did. but eventually they came to the front door to tell me that they weren't offended but just got busy. Anyway, things were a little better after that. When they moved out when their year lease was up I wasn't sad... It sounds terrible to say, she was a sweet girl and Jane had so much fun with her, but I hate saying no and I had to say it a lot when they were next door. It helped me figure out boundaries for neighbors though!
Near the end of February Scott and Anna came to town to see my grandfather since we knew time was getting shorter with him. Since they live farther away they might not have a chance to come on short notice when things neared the end. It wasn't a long visit but it was so good to see them and my super cute nieces. Anna and I took turns holding our 2019 babies. ;) Since my grandfather couldn't handle too many visitors at once anymore, Scott and his family went on their own. Scott told me he was pretty positive it was the last time he would see Papa and it was tearful and special time for them. I'm so glad they got that time! Papa was so so special to all of us. <3
This was not my first choice of birthday celebrations. Much too busy for my taste. But Atlas had been seeing all of the Chuck E. Cheese commercials on TV for so long that's all he wanted! Since he had worked sooo hard potty training to earn it I had to make it happen for him. We invited just a few of our closest friends and family members and had a great time! There were enough adults to help me keep up with everyone thankfully. A busy indoor place like that makes me so nervous if I'm by myself. Atlas chose to have Dad take him around to all the games. He loved seeing his friends, playing the games, being in the ticket blaster, opening his presents and eating cake. It was a successful party but I don't want to do it again. Haha! Flynn slept the whole time in the carrier despite the bright lights and loud noises but when we got home he had such a long crying fit I know he had become overstimulated by it all even in his sleep. I remember this being one of the last times we got to see some of our friends before the Covid quarantine happened. Oof my next blog post will be a doozy to go through. Spring 2020 was nothing like I expected.
Matthew 6:31-34
Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
