Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Say What #8 and #9

We went to the temple in St. Louis yesterday.  Sadie, as usual, had some great things to say.

At one point during the drive down, a car in front of us smelled bad.  After getting a whiff of their exhaust, Sadie said, “Something smells like penguins!”

At the park before coming home, Jeff and I had a bottle of water we were sharing.  Sadie wanted a drink but had just eaten a Hershey’s kiss.  We gave up all claims to the water when she back-washed a nice chocolatey mouthful.  Then we couldn’t help but laugh when she said, “Mmmm, It tastes like chocolate milk!”

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Ice Ice, Baby


No, we have not installed privacy glass in our dining room.  This is our ice coated window from this morning’s icy rain.  Brrrrr.

Last Tuesday, Sam came home from school informing us that his chorus/show choir holiday concert had been canceled for that evening due to icy conditions moving into the area.  The concert was moved to Wednesday night instead.

The next morning, we received an automated phone call at 6:15 am from the school superintendent informing us that school was cancelled that day due to the icy roads.  What kid doesn’t love a snow day?  Well, it turns out that my kids don’t — at least not when it means that they’ll be missing out on fun stuff at school during the winding down days before Christmas break.  But we made it through the day, a great violin recital that evening (the choir concert was again moved to the following evening), and then I ended up staying up until 11:30 that night getting the last of the teacher gifts wrapped so the kids could take them to school on Thursday.  After all, another ice storm was forecast for Thursday afternoon through Friday morning and there was talk that school might be cancelled again on Friday.

Thursday morning, 6:15, another phone call from the superintendent.  No school.  Once again, the kids were upset.  In talking to a few people later that day, there was some frustration that school had been canceled at all because the roads were not bad.  However, the roads were quite icy when my younger kids would have been catching the bus so I’m glad they didn’t take any chances and that my kids, however frustrated they were at missing class parties, were safe.  We went out later that evening for a meeting (no choir concert…again), and the neighborhood we were in was a total mess and it was difficult for Jeff to maneuver the van.   When you think “Snow Day” you picture piles of snow.  This was not the case.  We had maybe 1/4″ of snow.  But on top of that was about 1/2″ of ice.  My kids were sledding in our yard and we don’t have any hills.  By giving themselves a little push at the start of the very gradual slope from the side yard to the back, I was surprised with how far they were able to go.

Friday morning was a repeat of Wednesday and Thursday.  We had an ice storm Thursday evening, and although it warmed up through the night melting much of the ice, the roads were still too slick during those early morning bus riding hours.  If they could have called a one or two hour delay start to the school day they would have been fine, but it was another snow day and we got a very early – however unwelcome – start to our Christmas break.     We’ll be attending a “holiday” choir concert in January.

If that weren’t enough, temperatures plummeted Sunday evening and we woke up to 1º on Monday morning.  Wind chill took it to at least -17º.  The pipes to the kitchen sink were frozen which made me very happy that Jeff is on Christmas break, too!

Not at all deterred by the weather, Sadie informed us this morning (as she has a few times in the past couple of weeks) that she wanted to get out the waterslide and go swimming.  We tried to convince her that it was way too cold but she would have none of it so I finally gave in.  “Okay, go get your swimming suit on and go out to the garage to find the waterslide and I’ll meet you out there.” (You can scroll up to remember what our dining room window looked like about this time.)

Sadie headed straight for the bedroom and donned her suit.

She was headed for the back door when she announced, “It’s too cold.  I shouldn’t go.” Then she ran into the bedroom and got dressed.  Whew!  At least it was her idea.

Friday, December 19, 2008

Horton Hears a Who

We watched “Horton Hears a Who” tonight and were laughing through tears at the following twist of My Little Pony.  A cute show!

In my world -- everyone's a pony, and they all eat rainbows and poop butterflies!

Friday, December 12, 2008

What's in a Name? (Flashback: December 12, 2008)

Here is the latest installment from my memoir writing group.  I hope you enjoy learning how we ended up as a family of 8!

What’s in a Name?

Spencer is our third child and second son. At the time of his birth, Sam was three and Savannah was almost two. Spencer was only about 2 weeks old when the impression came. Sadie Jennifer. It was just a name that popped into my head, but it was more than that. I knew somehow that someday we would have a little girl named Sadie Jennifer.

A couple of years later, when we learned that baby #4 was on the way, we wondered if this would be our Sadie. An ultrasound showed otherwise. Having no boy names picked out, we embarked on a thorough name search and finally narrowed it down to 2 solid boy names: Sterling and Soren. I love the name Soren. While I have been accused of such, I didn’t make it up. It is Scandinavian. In Sweden, for example, if a man named Soren has a son, the son is literally “Soren’s Son” which is where the last name Sorenson comes from. It means “Warrior” or “God of War”. That was our first choice, but then there was 9/11 only 2 months before this little boy was due. Suddenly, “God of War” seemed so ominous in the face of these frightening times. I couldn’t do it.

And so Sterling (meaning “genuine”) made his debut mid-November. He is a delightful and very busy little boy. In fact, Sterling gives the word “busy” new meaning. As a toddler, he frequently achieved tornado status. While little Sadie was always in the back of our minds, we couldn’t imagine life without our little “Boog” as he’s come to be known.

A year later, baby #5 was on the way. But this pregnancy wasn’t as smooth as the others. At fourteen weeks along, on Christmas day, I seemed to be having one last bout with morning sickness. It was worse than usual and I felt crummy all day. But it didn’t go away and I was sick all night, too. It turns out I got appendicitis for Christmas. I had my appendix removed the following afternoon. The baby’s heartbeat was strong after surgery and we hoped for the best.

Two weeks later, on a Tuesday morning in January, our little family of 6 was stuffed into an ultrasound room at Sarah Bush. When the technician told us we were having a boy, big sister Savannah was very disappointed. But it was all put into perspective when I received a call from my doctor later that afternoon. There was a possible problem with the baby. Something about an abnormal fluid collection at the base of the skull. Suddenly it didn’t matter so much that we would have to wait a little longer for our Sadie. I just wanted this baby boy to be okay.

The Maternal Fetal Specialist told us that most likely the baby had Down Syndrome. He said there was a slight possibility that it could be a couple of other conditions, both of them much worse than Down Syndrome, and a very small chance it could end up being nothing. But while Down Syndrome babies often have heart problems, our baby’s heart looked strong. The limbs were also normal in appearance when frequently they are shorter than they should be. But still, “This baby has Down Syndrome” were the words we left with that day.

And then we knew. His name would be Soren. Warrior. God of War. He would have to be our little fighter. It was the perfect name.

A month later, the specialist said that he still thought the baby had Down Syndrome, but there was a much higher possibility – did he say 50%? – that there was nothing wrong. Another month and the chances of a healthy baby increased. And at our next visit we heard the words, “I can’t find anything wrong with your baby.”

Our little Soren was born, perfectly healthy, in mid-June. He’s a beautiful child. My friend calls him the Gerber baby because of his perfect skin and angelic face. He’s a total mamma’s boy, preferring me above all others. I still love his name. In today’s world, he’ll need to be a fighter for sure. And, like Sterling, what would I do without my little Soren? More than once I’ve wondered if Heavenly Father let me know about Sadie so that I wouldn’t stop having children before getting these boys here, too.

And what about Sadie? Two years after Soren was born, I was entering the last month of what felt like a very long pregnancy. I specifically chose to not find out the gender of this baby at our routine ultrasound. With Sterling and Soren, I’d gotten to 7 months pregnant – which is a very uncomfortable time for me – and wondered if I’d really be able to go through pregnancy again to try one more time for the little girl that already felt like a part of our family. This time around I needed to think, especially at 7 months, that this might be it. This really could be our little girl that we’d known about for 6 years.

And so it was, unknowing, that we left for the hospital late on that July night. And in the wee hours of the morning I heard the doctor say, “It’s a girl!” as he lay little Sadie on my chest. At that moment I knew. I knew that I had done the thing I was meant to do. I never imagined 6 years earlier that in that one name, Sadie Jennifer, I’d get three children. Sadie was meant to be a part of our family, but so were Sterling and Soren, every bit as much as Sam, Savannah, and Spencer. My family was complete.


 

Friday, December 5, 2008

Christmas Cookies


We have a basic chocolate cookie recipe that is made often (usually by Savannah) at our house.  The cookies are “delish”, as Sadie says, but especially so when we dress them up a bit for Christmas.  Here’s the basic recipe, followed by the extra Christmas treat:

Fudgy Chocolate Cookies

1 box Devil’s Food Cake Mix

1/2 c. oil

2 eggs

1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:  Combine dry cake mix, oil, and eggs.  Mix well.  Stir in chocolate chips.  Use a cookie scoop or drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet.  Bake at 350º for 8-11 minutes.  Do not overbake.  SO Easy!

And here’s how to dress them up for the holidays…

Minty Chocolate Christmas Cookies

Follow above recipe, but leave out the chocolate chips*.  Bake as directed, but as soon as you take them out of the oven, top each cookie with a Candy Cane flavored Hershey Kiss.  Bake for an additional 30 seconds, remove from oven and let stand for 2 minutes.  Then spread the kiss like frosting.  Allow to completely cool — if you can wait that long — before eating.  Yumm-o! 


[*August 2021 update: We are still making these, but we leave in the chocolate chips. The chocolate with peppermint is super delish! Also, instead of melting the kisses on top of the cookies, I open all the kisses (~30 kisses per batch) and microwave them in a small glass bowl, stirring after each 30 second increment, until completely melted. It should only take a minute or just barely longer. Pour into a ziplock bag and cut off a tiny corner then pipe the peppermint onto each cookie, back and forth in stripes or however you want to do it. These are a favorite of Soren and several of his friends. :)]

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Thanksgiving Break

I love Jeff’s job.  I mean, how great is it that he has 3 months off in the Summer?  And if that weren’t enough, he gets a full week for Thanksgiving, another week for Spring Break, and at least 3 weeks for Christmas.  It’s the best I tell ya!  So what does he do with all this time?  Pretty much whatever I want him to do.  Yep.  My wish is his command.  Talk about feeling like a Princess!

I will mention in passing that Jeff started this year’s Thanksgiving break by painting the toyroom, which went from Kermit-the-frog-green to a warm beige; and the family room, which went from a really pale yellow to a beautiful sage green.  Both rooms look awesome even though the family room turned out to be a bigger project than first anticipated!  But the project I’m most excited about is the dining room.  For a while now I’ve been frustrated by the state of our dining room.  I love our counter-height table and the huge window and especially the built in china hutch.  It has a lot of character.  But the dining room is also home to the main computer in our home.  I’m pretty adamant that the computer stay in a high-traffic area.  But it is usually an eye-sore with all the papers/clutter/stuff that accumulates on a daily basis.  Here’s what you used to see to the right upon entering the dining room (the table is behind Soren).


And here’s what was on the wall to the immediate left of the entrance:


Frightening, eh?

So here’s what we came up with instead.  Drumroll please…



Isn’t it great?  We made the computer “desk” counter-height so we could use the extra chairs from our table.  It’s also the perfect height for standing when we need to look up something quick.  I organized my files to make a place for the papers that always seemed to be lying around.  And it’s amazing how much of the “stuff” we were able to throw away.  Hooray!!!  Here it is an entire 5 days later and the room is still clean!

You might notice my Mother’s Day gift from Jeff on the desk.  Yes, it’s a pink laptop.  And Jeff had to take it to a conference shortly after it arrived.  You know a man really loves his wife when he’ll buy her a pink laptop even while knowing he might have to be seen with it in public!  This Jeff, he’s a keeper!

Christmas break?  Bring it on!