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....

Mmm ... solids

Edison is a good little eater and gets pretty excited when it's time to eat cereal or veggies (especially peas). What would life be like if we all got so excited about something as simple as mushy barley cereal?

Daddy Daughter Date

Last Friday David took Evelyn out on a Daddy-Daughter Date, and they both had a great time.

pre-date excitement

Evelyn was so excited about it and kept asking "Is Daddy home yet?" throughout the day. And even though the anticipation of getting a treat may have been one big reason for her excitement, I know that she just adores David and loves spending time with him, especially one-on-one. Their date consisted of getting doughnuts

and then going to a mall with a great play area. Pretty simple, but just what a three-year-old likes.

Extreme Makeover: Hinckley Edition

I've never had much of an eye for decorating things, but a month or two ago I really got an itch to start rearranging furniture. The first room we did was our bedroom, so now there's room for a table with my sewing machine. :) Then we moved Edison's bed into Evelyn's room (now dubbed the "kids' room") instead of having it in the dining room. I was at a loss for what to do in the living room, though, so I enlisted the help of Suzanne (my older sister). She lives in Utah, though, so it's taken many emails, pictures and phonecalls, but I now love our living room. I didn't realize before how bad it used to be, but looking back at pictures I can see how many interior design no-no's I had committed. So thank you, Suzanne, for all of your help! David and I both like the room a whole lot better now. And even though it's not completely finished (I'm still going to make some long, gold curtain panels to frame the window, as well as put some words up on the wall next to the picture of Christ) I don't want to wait to share it. So here are some before and after pictures of the living room.

BEFORE

(the pictures were like this because I always meant to hang the quilt up on the wall but never actually did it)

AFTER

This my favorite part of the room--it's what you first see when you walk in the front door and when you enter the room from the hallway.

I know it's difficult to really get a feel for the room without being able to see it 360, but it looks good in real life!

Love that mouth

Edison loves his mouth. Whether he's chewing on his fingers, thumb, a toy, someone else's finger, or the recently discovered rice cereal, he loves having things in his mouth.I can't tell if he's going to actually be a thumb-sucker, like Evelyn, because he doesn't seem to favor his thumb over anything else. But we'll see. Another new thing is that we finally decided to sleep train Edison so that he could put himself to sleep. After one night several weeks ago when he was inconsolable and cried for about 2 hours, finally falling asleep around 1 a.m., I was nervous about how he would do once we actually stopped walking, bouncing, pacing, swinging, etc. with him to put him to sleep. (Yes, it was getting pretty ridiculous.) Well, to my surprise he has done great! He only had one or two difficult times falling asleep and since then it has been pretty easy. I wish we'd done it long ago! And I've found that one thing that helps him go to sleep with little to no crying is ... giving him something to chew on. Go figure.

Melt my heart

Evelyn (like most toddlers, I think) likes to draw out bedtime and will usually come out of her room--often multiple times--after we have tucked her in and turned off the light. Most times I can tell she's really fishing for a reason to be out of bed, but tonight she came into my room, smiled, and said, "I just came out to smile at you," and then turned around to go back to her room. Talk about a great mommy moment! :)

Quick overview

It'll probably take a few posts to catch up on the past few weeks, but here's a quick overview of what we've been doing--there's more to come in the future.

We had quite a road trip over the Christmas holiday. We rented a minivan with David's parents and left for San Diego early, early on the 18th. We got to CA in the mid-afternoon of the 19th and were able to go to Patrick (David's youngest brother) and Michelle's wedding and all of the festivities on the 20th.Then we drove from San Diego to Springville, UT on the 21st and got to my parents' house around 9:00 that night. We spent the next few days there and had a lot of fun visiting with my parents, Suzanne and family, Christine and Jeff, grandparents up in Ogden, friends, and so on. It was a packed few days but very enjoyable. Then we packed up yet again and took off for TX the day after Christmas. When all was said and done I think we spent around 70 hours in that van. 70 hours! Thankfully, Evelyn was a marvelous traveller. Edison, on the other hand, was not such a fan of being in his carseat, so there were some less-than-pleasant stretches with him crying. He got better at falling asleep on his own by the end of our trip, though.

As always after a long trip, though, it was good to get home. We wish we could have visited longer with family and friends, but we're glad to at least not have any more road trips planned for the near future. :)