Moira's thumb & Brayden's fall

Tomorrow Moira is going to Primary Children's Medical Center in SLC to have her thumb fixed. She is very excited! She has a congenital trigger thumb. In English it means she has a burr or bump on the tendon that keeps getting stuck making it difficult and painful for her to extend her thumb fully. As a result she won't use her right hand for anything--coloring, eating, opening doors, etc. She has learned to compensate slightly but it's obvious that she's not left-handed. The procedure should be fairly quick and simple. I hope to not spend the whole day in the hospital!

Quick follow up on Brayden standing. Monday morning Adam and I were awoken by the sound of a loud "thump" followed by Brayden screaming. Adam went and picked him up off his bedroom floor where he had apparently launched himself after standing up in his crib. Since all of our kids have done this we weren't terribly concerned. But we did lower the crib that morning since Brayden can obviously stand on his own now. They grow up so fast!

Standing for the first time

Brayden started his army crawl on 4 September 2008 and on 27 September 2008 he stood up in his crib for the first time. We were fortunate enough to be taking a video of him crawling when he stood for the first time.

Today, we went outside for just about a minute to find Sabrina and when we had returned we found Brayden half-way down the stairs clinging on for dear life. That little boy has gone from bump on a log to fully mobile in about a month. He is adding to his "battle scars" daily.

We finding out that we need to baby proof our house more with Brayden than we ever had to with his sisters. The other day we found him munching on the leaves of a house plant. Not that he was hungry, it was just there so he started munching. This might be an example of what is meant when they say, "Boys will be boys."

Brayden

Brayden has broken his first tooth. Yeah! (or not, depending on which perspective you take). I'm still a yeah since it hasn't occurred to him to use me as a human teething ring. It is just barely through on the bottom front. I love this age because all their pictures look so cute/goofy. He has no idea the delights that await him with functioning teeth. Corn on the cob, a juicy steak, chocolate bars, etc. Wow, I'm making myself hungry!

This last weekend we bought a second booster seat for Moira and moved Brayden into her seat--a convertible carseat. He is now sandwiched in between his two sisters facing the back window. He loves it currently but give him 10 years and he will cringe at the mere thought of such a seating arrangement. Good thing those teeth are sheathed, huh!

Millions of Peaches, Peaches for me. . .

Speaking of canning, Sunday evening after dinner the girls wanted to go for a walk over to a friends house so we pulled out the double stroller and set off. On our way we passed by a home with a peach tree out front just loaded with peaches. Some had already fallen to the ground and had been mowed over. When we arrived at our friends I asked her about the neighbor's tree and she came with me to ask if I could have them. He readily offered them to whoever would take them and so we cleaned the tree off, only leaving the small and bird eaten ones. Once the kids were in bed we set to work bottling them. After two days of working on peaches we had 35 quarts! So excited about it I could barely sleep. I had wanted to do more peaches but couldn't afford the price to can them myself. However, free is always affordable! It is such a testimony builder to see that when we are committed to following the commandments the way is opened up for us to accomplish them. We are contributing to our food storage in earnest now. But even more important than that is that Adam and I are being good stewards of the abundance we've been blessed with. It always bugged me to see some of the stuff in our garden go to waste, but now I can say that we are preserving as much as possible.

Monday, just as I finished cleaning up my kitchen from the peaches, my neighbor called and offered a sackful of peppers to use to do salsa. Wow more food! I already have the tomatoes and onions in my garden, now I just need to add garlic, cilantro, and jalapenos. I love this time of year! Food everywhere. I do love food. If only there was a way to hurry up the tomato ripening process, but no. Fortunately, the weather is optimal for ripening, a blissful 84 degrees. Perfect.

I also need to harvest all my basil and make pesto sauce. Mom said that you can freeze pesto. Great! Now I can have pesto all winter long.

Green Beans, Peaches, Tomatoes, and Rhubarb

It has been a busy past couple weeks as we have been trying to cram as much fresh produce into canning bottles as we have time for. Today we processed a few jars of green beans (4 pints), stewed tomatoes (5 pints), spaghetti sauce (12 pints), and rhubarb (17 quarts); all from our own garden. We didn't set out to do so much today. We got started and thought, "While we are doing this, let's see if we can do that." And the result was a warm house, hungry kids, and two worn out 30-somethings.

A couple weeks ago a neighbor friend of ours called up and said, "My peaches are falling off the tree. Come get as many as you want." We loaded up the kids, as many grocery bags as we had, a box or two and headed over to glean. We took every last peach off of her tree. They had not been thinned this year because of various reasons and as such the fruit looked more like large apricots than peaches. We didn't mind, the last price we saw for fresh peaches was $21/half bushel. Talk about your price increases! Four years ago you could get the same peaches for $8/half bushel.

We brought home about the peaches and set right to work on canning the first batch. After it was all done we ended up with about 20 pints of yummy peaches. Now, you might be thinking, "I can go buy these things for less effort than what it takes to can them myself." You are probably right. However, there is a sense of pride in knowing you have accomplished something most won't even attempt anymore, no matter how small the deed.

Adam

36 Minutes 12 Seconds

We are so proud of Wendy! She completed her first 5K run in over 10 years. (probably closer to 15) It was a good experience for her. She was able to start the race with a bunch of friends. Of course, as with any race it doesn't take long to get separated by a stride or two. By the time I was able to get the kids to the race she had finished already. So much for taking 45 minutes!! So we missed the big finish, but we were there to help congratulate all of our friends as they handed out awards.

She finished in a time of 36 minutes 12 seconds. Considering that the course was uphill for the last mile and a quarter and that her treadmill time is closer to 45 minutes that is really good. Her only complaint was that some of the other racers (one in particular) had such an irregular pace and their breathing sounded like a semi-truck gearing down that Wendy had to focus hard to keep her own rhythm. Wendy was undaunted and insists that since she can beat a male police officer "semi-truck" she will keep training for more races. Good for her!! She is setting a great example for her kids.

Adam

It's official

It's official. I have paid my dues and am now registered for my first 5K race. I'm nervous to say the least! I have been working out consistently for 6 weeks now and would like to say that I can run 3.1 miles in twenty minutes or less. But, no. Try doubling that number. My friend Joanie convinced me to do it (easy for her to say she ran a marathon when her twins were 6 months old!) I figured it's now or never. And I really want to run a half-marathon before the year is over so I have to start somewhere. I do have a goal for myself: I have to finish in 45 minutes or less because Brayden wakes up at 8:00 a.m. for breakfast, which is me. Race starts at 7:00 a.m. Finish by 7:45 a.m. Rush home to nurse baby at 8:00 a.m. A mother's work is never done. I would like to have Adam there to watch me, but unless we can convince someone to watch our kids on a Saturday morning at 7 a.m. it's not happening. Who knows, maybe by the time I'm ready to try a half-Ironman my kids will be old enough to watch themselves and Adam can come cheer me on. One can always dream, right?

Other news: Brayden had his 6 month checkup two weeks ago. He is 19.5 pounds and 28 inches long. BIG KID!! We attended my mother's family's reunion (Sampson family) and compared him to my cousins children that were around the same age. He dwarfed them all. And not by a little bit, either. We are proud, but our arms are sore from hauling him around. Brayden has also discovered his voice and YELLS and SCREAMS a lot. It makes my throat sore just listening to him.

Sabrina is learning to read and write. My mom started us on the program that she teaches: The Writing Road to Reading. It's a phonics-based program which I'm totally impressed with. My little 4 year old can read simple books and is learning to identify more complex combined sounds and recite the rule for each one. I'm enrolling her in Pre-school this fall.

Moira is the great middle child. Happy, funny, sweet, content. She's delightful and wonderful. Currently she enjoys chasing Sabrina around the house and playing with Brayden. Her third birthday is coming up in August and as per our tradition we're going to do a huge party for her. She is so excited and talks about it constantly: "pink cake with pink fwosting and white letters and white frowers". Maybe she'll be an event planner someday. I'm thinking a super-hero theme, that would be fun! Then we could have a slip-n-slide in the backyard and have them practice their super hero flying on it! OOOOH, good idea!

Right now Adam and I are losing weight. I, because I burn a ton of calories every day through exercise and nursing and still eat light; Adam, because he eats watermelon for breakfast, cucumbers for lunch, sensible dinner, and no snacking after 8 o'clock. We both have goals that we're shooting for, he will probably meet his before I meet mine because he has less to lose AND men lose weight more easily than women. GRRRRR. But he's very encouraging, especially with my gym membership and getting out of bed in the morning at 6 a.m., which has proven to be more difficult than I thought. Will update the blog on this topic as noteworthy milestones are achieved.