Halloween

Evelyn was really excited about Halloween this year (what kid isn't excited to have their parents take them around to fill a bucket with candy?). She told me many times yesterday, "You HAVE to take me trick or treating tonight." :) I made a cat tail and cat ears for her, but this past week she kept changing her mind, and I finally gave in and made some wings last minute so she could be a fairy. (We'll use the cat ears and tail at her cat-themed birthday party this weekend.) So, I took our fairy Evelyn and our little missionary Edison to the ward trunk or treat. Edison wasn't too sure about all of it, but Evelyn had a blast and got pretty comfortable going up to people to say "Trick or Treat" after a few minutes. I forgot my camera at the actual event, but luckily we got a few pictures before leaving home. After we got home, Evelyn quickly organized her candy according to color, shape, etc., and Edison just enjoyed dumping out Evelyn's candy and putting it back in the bucket.

Breeba, Moosa and Little Lamb, oh my!

hooray for choosing my own clothes!

Hmm. Where to start? Here's an update on Evelyn and what she's up to. She's about to turn 4, but she reminds us that she loves being 3 and "I'm good at being 3!" Some things that she enjoys are cats, dancing, learning how to read and playing with her "guys" (aka-stuffed animals). Her favorite "guys" these days are Breeba (a large, purple My Little Pony), Moosa (a white kitty) and Little Lamb (a stuffed sheep, as you may have guessed). She's also a good helper--when she wants to be--and likes doing things for Edison, like finding and giving him his blankie when he's sad.

watching the rain

These days she keeps asking for a pet cat. I keep hoping that the requests will die down, but there aren't any signs yet that she'll change her mind. Maybe I shouldn't be so anti-pet, but I just have no desire to have and take care of a cat. Perhaps Evelyn will wear me down at some point, but not right now. She's being pacified a little bit by having a cat-themed birthday party in a couple of weeks, so I'm trying to come up with some good cat related games, making cat shaped brownies and cat ears for all of the party crowd to wear during the party. Oh, and perhaps you can guess what Evelyn's going to be for Halloween....

copying Edison's peek-a-boo; the big bandage on her head is from when she ran into the wall and split her head open (which healed on its own w/o stitches)

Evelyn is doing well learning how to read. She's venturing out on her own a bit more and trying to read words here and there, like at the grocery store or looking at food labels during lunch. And speaking of venturing out, she's starting to "come out of her shell." She has always been pretty shy around new people, but in the past few weeks she's played with new kids at the park, talked to someone at the post office ("Can I tell him the name of my sheep?"), and told a librarian about the new movie she was checking out, while dancing around with excitement.

finger painting, but not too sure about it

The other day she said something that just made me laugh. A few weeks ago we talked about acorns in preschool, and while we were out getting the mail the ground under a tree was covered with acorns. Here was our conversation:

Marie: What do acorns grow up to be?

Evelyn: Trees. I wish I was a tree.

Marie: Why do you wish you were a tree?

Evelyn: 'Cause then I wouldn't have to eat the dinners you make.

Gee, thanks. At least I know she was listening in preschool. :P

Personality

Here's an update on what Edison is like these days. Edison will be 14 months next week, and it is so fun to watch his personality come out more every day. While he mostly crawls to get around, he ventures out with walking a little more each day. He gets so proud of himself when he does something new, like taking more steps or the other day when he got some of his sandwich on a fork and to his mouth.
Some of his favorite things are doors, light switches, trying to grab the window blinds before Mom raises them out of reach, his blankie (he looks so cute when he snuggles with it), throwing things (usually food and cups, but sometimes balls) and climbing. I can only imagine what he'll be climbing on in the upcoming weeks and months, but so far he loves climbing on Evelyn's small table and chairs in their room, the couch and chairs in the living room and stairs. Since we live in an apartment, there aren't any stairs inside, but any time he sees the front door open he races as fast as he can to try to get out the door and up the stairs outside. The other day he practically jumped off the couch to get outside. He also tries to walk up the stairs sometimes, which is a little interesting with his short little legs and so-so balance. :)

In the past month or two his language has really taken off. He probably has between 15 and 20 words, such as door, ball, bath, uh-oh, bye-bye, stuck and help. Of course the words come out at varying degrees of clarity, but it sure helps that he's learning how to communicate with more than just yelling/screaming.

One of the things I love best about this little boy is his smile. I think it will save him in the future when he gets into things and then flashes his dimpled grin, but it sure melts my heart when he gives me that big toothy smile.

Updates

I don't know how a month can pass by so quickly. It usually feels like I've recently posted, but when I turn around, it's been about a month. Oh, well. Here is a quick update of the happenings in the Hinckley household:

The new preschool year has been going on for about 1 1/2 months, and I'm enjoying it. The curriculum I use is great, and the kids seem to be enjoying it. I still need to work on how to keep Edison engaged and not into their stuff, but that's a different story.

David started his job at match.com a few weeks ago, and he's really enjoying it. He is on their email team, so he gets to answer a lot of questions, help fix problems, and help keep customers happy. He enjoys the challenge of needing to say (write) the right thing to help the customer feel better about their problem/situation. He also likes the people that he works with, and the atmosphere at match is pretty laid back (or so it seems to me). It's kind of weird to have him go to work in jeans....

As for the kids, I'll do individual posts on them, with pictures. But suffice it to say that they keep me busy, and I am so glad I'm able to be at home with them.

In other news, it's birthday season in our home: Edison turned 1 at the end of August, my birthday was last month, Evelyn turns 4 (!) in a few weeks, and then David's birthday is 2 weeks after that. And then we jump right into the holiday season, so I'm trying to be on top of things this year so that I'm not scrambling (like last year). Hopefully all of my projects and homemade gifts will work out alright....

Fun (and free!) date night

David and I had an in-home date night last night (like most of our date nights), that we both really enjoyed. [Warning! It's kind of cheesy, so stop now if you're not alright with cheesy stuff.] Before our date night we put together a list of "favorites" for each of us to fill out beforehand. Some of the things we used were: favorite physical feature (of the other person), favorite movie we've watched together, favorite date we've done, favorite character trait (of the other) and the biggest way the other has changed since we've been married. It was fun thinking of answers (some of which were easier to answer than others) and being reminded of things that we love about each other and fun memories we have together. Then, after the kids were in bed, we got out our lists and took turns sharing our answers. I could have predicted some of David's answers, but others were a surprise to me.
We had talked about also checking a movie out from the library (like one of the first movies we watched together), but we didn't end up having time. Oh, and since dessert is almost always part of our dates, we also had some ice cream. :)
So, while it wasn't the most glamorous evening, it was a lot of fun and just a good reminder of why we love being married to each other. (Yes, you may groan now if you want to.)

Duh!

Edison has recently had an explosion (for a 12-month-old) of new words. He's now up to about 10. One of the words he uses most often is "duh," meaning "yuck." He loves putting things in his mouth (mostly for the reaction these days), and his favorite thing is shoes. He loves chewing on shoes, so I'm always telling him "yuck, yuck!" and then taking them away. Well, the other night at dinner we had some roasted vegetables, so I put a piece of red bell pepper on his tray. He picked it up, put it in his mouth, and then immediately took it out, threw it back on his tray and said "Duh!!" I thought it was pretty funny, even though he was telling me that dinner was yucky. But it is fun to see his language develop and watch him become more of a little person and less of a baby.

Sewing

A few months ago I got a sewing machine, and I've had a lot of fun doing a few little sewing projects. I haven't been brave enough to do anything very big, but some of my accomplishments so far include a headband, a cover for my sewing machine, hemming some pajama pants, adding straps to Edison's hat (which he still pulls off in about 5 seconds) and making a pair of shorts for Edison. I made the shorts with a lot of help and guidance from my mom while I was out in Utah, but she made sure that I was actually doing it and she was just advising (at least mostly). It feels great to be gaining confidence and seeing progress with each little thing I do. I'm hoping that this will become a lifetime hobby as I work on it a little at a time. Some of my next projects are altering some of David's work clothes and eventually finishing the living room curtains that I started awhile ago....

Effects of an Older Sister

Evelyn definitely has a girly influence (go figure) on Edison, especially since he's still so young. I know his mind will change about some things as he gets older, but right now he loves handing me one of Evelyn's headbands so I'll put it on his head. He also enjoys brushing his hair (although that isn't just a girl thing), wearing Evelyn's pink sunglasses, and the other day he seemed to like Evelyn pushing him around in her doll stroller (per request of big sister). These could be potential blackmail pictures when he's a teenager, but right now it's just cute.

Random stuff

Wow, it's been a long time since I've written anything. While I can't think of anything big that has happened in our family the past month or so, here are a few random happenings from the Hinckley household.

Edison has been cutting teeth, which is no fun for either him or us, but he sure looks cute with his toothy grins. :) He now has two teeth up top and two on the bottom.

A few weekends ago we went on a "family outing." We were originally going to go to the pool here at our apartment complex, but it happened to be closed for cleaning. So we decided to go to a park to let the kids play. Evelyn and I had made apple juice popsicles, so we brought them along in the cooler. It's a good thing that we had the popsicles, because after being inside all day, it didn't even cross my mind that it was, oh, 102 degrees outside. Luckily part of the park was in the shade and we had the popsicles and some water, but next time I'll think about the weather.

Edison enjoyed trying the popsicle, although he wasn't too sure about it at first...

...but then he decided that he liked it.

And Evelyn and I finished the summer preschool class I've been doing. I think it went pretty well, and Evelyn is excited to start back up next month.

Words of a child

We've gotten kind of lax the past few months with holding regular family home evenings. I'd like to blame it on David's work schedule, but really we just haven't made it a priority. Well, last week during Evelyn's bedtime prayer she said something like, "And thank you for family night, when we get to have it sometimes." Talk about a wake up call! That was on a Friday evening, so I talked with David that night and we made a point to have family home evening on Saturday. Then on Monday we found out that David's tutoring sessions were cancelled, so we jumped on the opportunity to have another family night, even though Evelyn thought it was silly that we were having it so soon again. We talked about and drew Lehi's Dream together, which Evelyn really enjoyed. Needless to say, we are making regular family home evenings more of a priority now. It is too important a thing to just let happen when it's convenient.

On the Move

Edison has gotten pretty good at the "army crawl" and uses it to get all over the place. Some of his favorite things these days that draw his attention are wheels, open doors and whatever he knows I will take away from him (kids have quite a knack for knowing just what you don't want them to get into). I know this is just the beginning, since he's only been really mobile for the past week or two, so right now it's still novel when he gets into things or crawls across the room to get something he wants.
I'd also like to point out just how much he enjoys playing with and sticking out his tongue. Sometimes he reminds me of a little puppy. :)

Summer!

We've been enjoying the weather the past few weeks with visits to fun parks (Plano has some great parks!) and going to the pool. There's a pool and a kiddie pool about a building away from us in our apartment complex, and yesterday afternoon we finally went swimming.Evelyn was SOOOO excited and had a blast playing in the kiddie pool. We had it to ourselves most of the time, so both Evelyn and Edison got to splash around a lot and have fun. Evelyn liked watching the kids play in the bigger pool and kept yelling "Look what they're doing!!" while pointing at them. We didn't take our camera to the pool (maybe next time), but here's a pre-swimming shot:

For whatever reason, Evelyn was set on taking this duck bath toy to the pool, and she carried it like this the whole way there.

And after the pool David gave the kids a bath in their swimsuits. Evelyn thought it was pretty cool that they were all in the bath, but she refused to smile for the camera. :P

Kid pics

I've had comments from various family members that they want to see more pictures of Edison and Evelyn, so be forewarned that these are just a few random pictures of the kids. Enjoy!

Evelyn trying to fit in her toy wagon, along with some "guys"

Edison shortly after Evelyn stuffed his mouth full of
crackers (I didn't have the camera in time for the
"my mouth is so full" look)

family home evening with some of the "guys"

the joys of the bathroom mirror

looking quite handsome in his Sunday clothes

It's all about perspective

I don't love doing laundry, and I probably never will. It is a neverending cycle of washing, drying, folding, putting away, getting clothes dirty and starting all over again. But after a month or so of not having a working washing machine, I was actually excited to do a couple of loads of laundry today. David was able to pick up a washing machine that I found on craigslist yesterday, thanks to his mom driving him in their truck and his dad helping to unload it.
Now, things really weren't as bad as I sometimes felt they were, since we have a laundromat here in the apartment complex and David did a lot of our laundry over at his parents' house as he worked there. But getting a washing machine after being without one for a little while makes me appreciate it all over again. It may not take long before I look at laundry as just another chore again, but right now I'm simply grateful. It's one of those things that's all about the way you look at it.

On the web

While David explains all of this much better than I do, I wanted to write a little about what he's doing these days. During the day, he spends most of his time working on his business, which is a series of websites that currently focus on local policy and news. He started http://www.planopolicy.com/ about a month and a half ago, although his time lately has been more or less all spent on http://www.planopronto.com/. Plano Pronto is a site that puts links out to all of the important and interesting news stories about Plano. Since there isn't one primary news source for Plano, David's site collects news stories from places like the Dallas Morning News, the Plano Star-Courier, and other websites that run stories about Plano. They're both still works in progress, but check 'em out. David's pretty excited about these websites and other ideas he plans to implement in the coming months. And I enjoy seeing him love the work he is doing so much.

Temple Trip

A week or so ago we took a family outing--something I often want to do but rarely follow through on. We drove to the Dallas Temple and walked around the grounds with the kids. Evelyn was excited to point out the angel Moroni, look at the flowers, see the water (of a fountain that wasn't turned on) and watch a few wedding parties taking pictures. I enjoyed just getting out together as a family, which we don't do too much these days. It was also great to talk a little about the purpose of temples and how our family is eternal because David and I were married in the temple. Evelyn's favorite part, though, was discovering the white rocks next to the temple, which she promptly collected and carried around for a bit before I had her put them back. Then we went to Moon's LDS Bookstore nearby and let Evelyn pick something out; she chose a CTR ring.All in all it was a fun little outing, and I'm hoping to plan and carry out some sort of family outing each month.

As a side note, Edison likes scrunching up his nose like this, along with little snorts, especially if I do it to him so he can mimick it back. :P

Our Budding Starlet

We went to a ward activity on Saturday with the theme "Dancing with the Stars" of Plano 1st Ward. Several different dance numbers were performed, like "synchronized swimming" by members of the Elder's Quorum and a spoof on the California Raisins by the Scout leaders. The girls from Primary got to do a number, which Evelyn enjoyed. They did a dance routine to "Broadway Baby" and got to dress in whatever pretty clothes they wanted to. And that night they gave the girls dress-up gloves and tiaras, which Evelyn liked, but she didn't know quite what to do with the gloves, since they were big and likely to fall off. [As a disclaimer for the video, I was standing at the back of the Cultural Hall holding Edison in one arm and the camera in the other hand, so it isn't the highest quality.] Anyway, I hope you enjoy watching our "Broadway Baby"! [front row in the white dress and bright pink pants] :)

Someone commented to me afterward that Evelyn and Calli (the girl on her right) are little Shirley Temples, and we'd better watch out when they're old enough to go to stake dances. Oh, and we're thinking about signing Evelyn up for a little dance class through the city this summer--something we think she would really enjoy.

Strong legs

It seems like Edison has always had strong legs; he started wanting to put weight on his legs when he was only a few weeks old. (Maybe most boys are like that, but it's certainly new for me.) Now he's discovered that he can hold himself up when leaning against furniture. And he loves it! At first he could do it for about 10-15 seconds at a time, but today he did it several different times for at least 5 minutes. So I won't be surprised if he's an early walker....

Latest Adventure

It's been a long time since I've posted anything, so most of you (the few who may read this blog, anyway) know about this, but I'm starting a preschool. I got the idea from my sister, Suzanne, who is doing a preschool co-op with some friends, and I am really excited about it. Occasionally I wonder what I'm getting myself into, but for the most part I'm just pumped about classes starting. I'm going to do one class during the summer (June and July) and then two classes starting September (assuming I can find enough students...). I think it will be a really good thing for several reasons:

1) Since Evelyn will be there, too, she'll be able to do preschool, something I don't think we'd be able to do otherwise. And I'm excited for her to learn new things and interact with other kids on a regular basis.

2) While I'm not in it for the money, it certainly will be nice to add a little bit to our pocketbook.

3) I'm looking forward to having something for me to consistently work on. I have a hard time getting and staying motivated with some things, but doing preschool, where others are paying me to teach, will more or less force me to stick with it and do my best.

4) I also know that I'm going to learn a lot. Right now I'm reading a book about classroom management and discipline that is opening my eyes to a number of things, most of which can also be applied to parenting. (The book is called Teaching With Love & Logic, and there's also a book called Parenting With Love and Logic by the same author.)

David is excited, too, and is the "business manager" (and technically the owner since it's registered under his name with the county). In other words, he takes care of the things that I'm either intimidated by or don't want to do, like marketing and keeping the books. And Evelyn can't wait for it to start. Several times she's asked me if preschool is starting tomorrow, or talks about "when I go to preschool."

Now I just have to figure out what to do with Edison while I'm teaching....