seven minutes

I have seven minutes before the kids get home, so let's see how far I get, shall we?

We are finishing up our kitchen renovation--I keep putting off taking pictures because there are so many things left to do, but today I was like oh well let's just snap some quick iPhone photos, so here they are: unedited, unstyled, but dang I love my kitchen. And I will love it more when we finish it, but for now, still loving it.

I painted all the cabinets myself--started when Neil was traveling and surprised him when he got home! He travels so much now and it was nice to have something to do while he's gone (note to self: as he's gone the next 2 weeks I should come up with something else to do...). But this does have the side effect of me getting a project started but then having to wait for him to finish it, so the projects are really piling up for my poor husband!

Anyway, the island is navy, we put in quartz countertops, subway tile backsplash, all new appliances (did I ever blog about my JennAir gas cooktop that I love to pieces and bought on Craigslist brand-new for $1500?) and we need to finish the woodwork stuff on the support column (which we had to basically shred to get the old counters out at 10 pm the night before the new ones were installed). The wrapping paper was from when we hosted a giant pie party early in November and my friend was in my kitchen at 6 am the day of the party before we went running and was like--you should just put wrapping paper on it!--and so I did.

Are you liking this mega stream of consciousness??

We (Neil) still need to finish the range hood (framing it out in wood) and building the trash drawer in the island, plus painting the ceiling where we had to rip into it for a leaky bathtub, but man I'm loving it.

also can't remember if I blogged about redoing the living room so I should post about that at some point--basically I tore out the builtins (yes by myself--Neil was not on board with that one although he finally came around), then we put up new drywall and I painted the fireplace (another time when Neil was out of town bc he didn't like that idea either). Basically through this whole process he is learning to trust my vision. ;-) I think while he's gone this time I will finish the mantel.

So life is just good. We spent Thanksgiving with friends and Fakesgiving with family, and even though Neil is not around as much as we'd like we are chugging along pretty well. Abigail is my trusty right hand and I don't know what I'd do without that awesome gem of a daughter. And the boys are home and now Luke is sitting on my lap, so it's time to go read stories and do homework and pick Juliet up from French club and sneak out for a run in the gorgeous snow that's been drifting down all day.

oh P.S. decorating this house for Christmas is AWESOME and I love it so much. also i originally just wrote that as ps and Luke went back and fixed it for me. ;-)

Carmel Arts Festival 2018

One weekend (when Neil was in Germany, I think) the kids joined me for my run and we decided to go to the Carmel Arts Festival and hit up the farmer's market for some snacks. We bought ourselves a few pounds of insanely juicy and delicious plums, then had a great time checking out all the stalls and participating in the arts activities! (The piece above now hangs in the art wing at the high school, which is fun.)

One of the many (permanent) sculptures that lines the sidewalks in the Arts & Design district. I love that this is so close to our home!

The Moon Cake festival the previous weekend had been postponed due to an awful thunderstorm  (there are usually festivals every weekend during the summer), so we got to enjoy some dragon dancers during the arts festival! 

Seriously the prettiest little downtown. I try to loop through here on my runs at least once a week because it's beautiful in every season. 

I pushed Matty in the jogging stroller--at that point (2 years ago as I'm writing this) it was the perfect pace for the kids to keep up on bikes when I was pushing the stroller. (Now Matthew weighs like a million pounds and I don't think I could keep up with the bikes!)

Scootering up to the bike valet at the farmers' market because #carmellife

Such a fun morning! If I recall correctly, we went home & I showered and then we spent the afternoon at the Museum of Miniature Houses, which is this darling little museum where we had SO much fun exploring all the tiny houses and their intricate furniture (and I probably had zero pictures because I was holding on to Matthew, hah!)

 

Matthew is two!!

Oh this guy. How we love him!! He is the sunshine around which our whole family revolves. Can't imagine life without him--the first thing Luke does every day when he gets home is to ask if he can go get Matthew up from his nap, and then I hear him go in and say, "Hi Matthew sweetie, it's your Lukey! Did you miss me?" and then Matthew comes running in with his arms full of stuffed cats and everyone generally erupts into adoration. Just like we've been doing ever since he was born.

He's not spoiled AT ALL.

(He got a toy kitchen for his birthday.)

(He is very spoiled.)

But he is the sweetest happiest little guy, just full of cheeriness and love. Sometimes this is a little tricky--like when he is super upset about anyone ever leaving because he wants all his people RIGHT THERE WITH HIM (this includes extended family as well, and we have a lot of times where he will hopefully call out "Grandma! Grandpa! Iris! Pierce!" But he's adjusted to the kids going off on the bus (as long as we go on a walk right away--he LOVES walks).

He's convinced that he's a big boy and likes to sit at a barstool at the counter with everyone else. He refuses sippy cups because obviously no other big boys are drinking out of them! (He will, however, drink out of a "botterwattle.") He still mostly talks in one or maybe two-word chunks, but he has a very big vocabulary and repeats back just about anything we say to him (my favorite is how he calls himself "Matt-me").

He loves tools and figured out how to operate Neil's drills and drivers about six months ago, including snapping in the battery pack. Right now he likes to push a stool over to the counter, climb up, lie down on the counter, and open the drawers where we keep all the goodies like screwdrivers, flashlights, batteries, etc. Then he goes around the house with his screwdrivers and batteries to see what he can do.

He's absolutely fearless and books it up into the 13-foot treehouse whenever he gets a chance. He loves, loves, loves cats and dogs (for his birthday one of my friends texted him photos of her dog and he could not possibly have been happier!). He loves to eat "pampates and eggies" for breakfast, climbs up to the pantry all day long to get himself apples, and is a huge fan of Indian food (the last time we took him to an Indian restaurant, he walked through the door and said, "Oh yummies!!"). He loves going to storytime at the "wibrerry," sings himself to sleep every night with "This Old Man,"  and loooooooves to snuggle so dang much that we almost always end up back in bed with him halfway through the morning because it just makes him so happy (on the weekends he likes to go climb into bed with the girls because they're often still asleep, and he will announce "cold cold!" and go bury himself under their sheets wrapped in their arms.

He loves reading books, especially if they are about construction equipment, and he has Nathan's eye for excavators, bulldozers, and fire trucks. He often brings us toys that he wants us to snap together and asks, "Open?"

As I've been watching him run around today, I've gotten pretty misty-eyed thinking about how blessed we are to have Matthew in our family. He is so sweet and we just love him so much. Today we checked Abigail out of school and took her to lunch, and the way the two of them lit up when they saw each other in the main office, and seeing him run to her laughing in delight and the way she picked him up and cuddled him close to her...man alive, we are so lucky. 

It's autumn!!

Today Matthew and I ran through our first crunchy leaves and I thought hip hip hurray, best time of the year!!! We had a weekend of nonstop rain (like 8 inches) and cool temps, so you better believe we fried scones and mulled cider and got ourselves some apple-cinnamon candle-burning going on (and pulled out the fall decorations!).

I went to New York a couple weeks ago to help my sister Ruth & her family through her fourth round of chemo--hopefully it was the last really terrible one. It was, quite frankly, so hard to see her in so much pain. But conversely, really good to be there and be able to talk with her when she was feeling well enough and make food and take care of kiddos when she wasn't. (And I had some pretty glorious alone time which NEVER happens in my regular life--one afternoon I went to the 9/11 museum, one afternoon I walked the Brooklyn Bridge, and another day I ran 14 miles around the city from Battery Park to Central Park.)

This weekend I'm going to Michigan with Matthew to see my parents and Elise's family (they're visiting from Utah). I'm sad to leave the rest of my kiddos behind, but they just have too much going on to leave, and Neil is so darn busy that he needs the work time at home. Hopefully Matthew doesn't miss everyone too much and enjoys the cousin time! I'm looking forward to apple cider mills and donuts and family.

Matthew and I have settled into somewhat of a schedule with the older kids gone all day--if he's slept through the older kids leaving we go back to my bed and snuggle for a few minutes after he first wakes up (then he starts saying things like "PAMPANKS MOLK DOWN!") and we go downstairs to feed him breakfast, then we do some housework, then we read stories, then we head outside for a run, then we do whatever event we have planned that day (grocery shopping, library storytime, playdate with friends, etc.). And then once he goes down for a nap I either do a house project or grading or--and this feels SOOOO wonderfully indulgent!!--I read a book and take a quick nap. It is AWESOME. And totally helps me gear up for the crazy pace when the older kids get home, especially since Neil is often out of town or working late or something like that. Today as I walked upstairs with my giant stack of books (this morning our run was to the library!) and thought, "Surely I could be doing something more productive with my time..." and then I thought, you know, it's okay to love reading so dang much and not feel guilty about it. And honestly, if I cleaned out one of the downstairs coat closets (which was what I felt like I should be doing) nobody would notice or care! Plus I've been doing Apartment Therapy's September Sweep and I know it's going to have me clean that closet out anyway. ;-) And last week during naptime I remortared the fireplace and painted the back door and refinished the laundry room sink so quite frankly I'm doing pretty well on projects, hah!

**This post brought to you by the brief lull in the storm after Juliet's cross-country meet while we wait for dinner to cook before we go to Isaac's classroom playdate at the park and hopefully get everyone in bed in a timely manner and maybe I will still be awake when Neil gets home??**

***ps no pics because I always used to steal them from facebook, but I quit facebook awhile back so if you want to see pics, just follow me on IG. It's private but I'll approve you. ;-)

Another school year

Finding myself with a brief window of time to do some quick typing and updates on the kiddos, since we started school last week.

Abigail is in eighth grade this year. She has a great group of friends that I just adore, and I love all their parents too so that's nice as well. :-)  Even though they mostly don't have classes together, there's still lots of weekend hangouts so we parents are doing our best to keep these friendships going strong into high school (gasp!!) next year. Our high school is HUGE (5000 students) so we really want to make sure they've got a core group of support! It's crazy to me to think about high school already but when I signed the paper acknowledging that yes I understood that her advanced math classes would be counted on her high school transcript...yeah, suddenly felt very real.



Abigail is taking a lot of engineering electives this year--STEM, robotics, and coding. She's also taking Spanish and advanced ceramics--she absolutely loved her art classes last year and had a real struggle over whether she should stick with art or take the position she was offered by the journalism teacher as an editor on either the school paper or the yearbook. I'm glad she went with art--I did journalism in high school and loved it (did I ever mention that I was accepted into a mass communications graduate program?) but as an adult I find artistic expression much more enjoyable (plus she made some AMAZING stuff last year and I'm really looking forward to what she does this year! She auditioned for the school musical this week and is planning to join the space & rocketry club again, as well as MathCounts. Prepping for her planned career as an aerospace engineer! Abigail is focusing on swimming this fall/winter and doing club swimming to prep for swim team next summer (swimming is a BIG DEAL here with 32 state championships in a row for the high school women's team). And we're on year 8 (!!) of piano lessons!

Juliet is in sixth grade, and she's done so well with the transition to middle school! The poor kid has zero classes with her best friends from last year, but she assured me that she's good at making new friends, and so far, so good. Fingers crossed. :-)



Jules is taking orchestra (violin) as one of her electives, and mixed media, digital learning, STEM, and French as her others. She's also running cross country, which has been exhausting and exhilarating for her! Juliet has by far been the busiest of the kids this summer with orchestra camp for three weeks in June and cross-country beginning in early August. She's also continuing with piano and looking ahead to what extracurricular clubs she'd like to join (coding? Star Wars? Makers?). So many fun choices! And continuing with piano, of course!

Isaac is loving scouts (can you tell?) and having a great time so far in 4th grade--ten of his classmates from last year are in his class, so that was pretty exciting! He had a great time all summer swimming at the pool with his pals, and zips right through his homework, piano, and lunch-packing after school so that he can hop on his bike and go out with his friends (I love our neighborhood so so so much). He's also focusing on swimming this fall (thank heavens because those long baseball games last spring about did me in) and is joining the coding and robotics club, the international music ensemble, and the math club (oh my gosh our school has the best clubs!!). He's doing fifth grade math this year and totally inherited his dad's math brain which is good for us all!



Lukey is in 2nd grade (which is when high ability starts, hurray!) and 3rd grade math. Sadly this little sheep was shorn not too long after the picture was taken, but man did we have fun with Luke's luscious locks this summer, especially since he spent every spare minute in the pool! He's playing soccer this fall and doing the watercolors club and math club. He was also super super excited to find so many friends in his classroom, and is adjusting to piano practice (it's always hard once the initial excitement passes!). Luke thrives with physical activity so soccer, swimming, and ridiculous amounts of scooter-riding keep him happy!




Nathan is one very happy kindergartener--my first one to go full day! I initially approached the school about doing half-day but they were very firm about only doing full day, and honestly, Nathan is SO dang ready for it--he just has endless amounts of energy and never slows down or stops talking. So he has been loving kindergarten! He's the first one up and ready and always has his lunch packed for the next day within five minutes of getting home from school.

Nathan is playing soccer this fall and doing the kindergarten engineering club--lucky boy! He was a little sad that two of his really good friends weren't in his class, but fortunately he DID have one good friend in there, and they all reunited on the playground, so all was well...and being Nathan he knew everyone's first and last names in his class by the end of the week!

And Matthew and I are hanging out all day together! We're finding our groove--lots of stories and snuggling and organizing and tromping around town doing errands. (And lots of home projects and running for me!)

Cheers to another great school year!

Toasted Coconut Muesli with Cardamom, Ginger, and Dried Fruit

things I could be blogging about: I turned 35, we went on a ten-day spur-of-the-moment camping trip to Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, and Utah, Isaac turned 9, the kids start school in less than 2 weeks and the summer is almost over, Isaac started orthodontia, my sister started chemo, our garden is crazy huge, I've been doing tons of home projects, my tumors were benign.

things I'm going to blog about: the recipe for this muesli, because I wrote it up for a friend today and people are always asking for it.

so here it is. 

Toasted Coconut Muesli with Cardamom, Ginger, and Dried Fruit
6 c. old-fashioned oats

1 c. shredded coconut

1 c. pepitas

1 c. sunflower seeds

1/4 c. flax seeds (honestly for this part I just throw in all the seed varieties I have on hand). 

optional: chopped nuts (we like slivered almonds)

Combine that list of ingredients, and then boil together scant cup of sugar, 1/4 c. oil (I like to use coconut oil) and 1/4 c. water. Or you could just do 3/4 c. honey and 1/4 c. oil but I usually end up using sugar because I'd rather save my honey for other things where I notice it more. Then I add a teaspoon each of ground cinnamon, ginger, and cardomom (sometimes I throw in fennel or nutmeg or whatever seems good), boil everything until the sugar has dissolved, and stir it into the oats mixture.

Grease 2 rimmed baking sheets, divide the mixture in half, spread evenly on sheets, and bake at 300 for 22 minutes, stopping halfway through to stir/swap sheets' places if your oven doesn't accommodate them side by side. Remove immediately from baking sheets when done so they don't continue to cook.

Then I like to add dried fruit--my kids' favorites are slivered apricots, Craisins, raisins, dates, prunes, etc. 

And voila! Should keep in an airtight container until you've eaten it up (which is about 3 days in my house so I don't know how long it would last otherwise!)

ps I like to buy my spice's from Penzey's. They are awesome. 

Utah 2018

After we left the Tetons, we drove south to Logan and Neil's family reunion. I admit, I was LOUDLY complaining as we watched the temperature climb...by the time we got to our tent site for the reunion it was at 104! I absolutely absolutely absolutely LOATHE the heat, so I was pretty miserable. Thankfully it cooled down (slightly) while we were there and we had some good water sports days! (The picture above was taken one morning right after I'd showered after a run up the canyon with Neil, Caleb, and Juli--Caleb & Juli totally took off straight up the mountain and Neil & I were like guys guys help elevation help why. Then Neil fell into some sort of stinging bug nest...it was a whole thing.)

Anyway about five minutes after we'd arrived at the campsite I looked over at the water pump and saw this, so yes it was really hot, I hope everyone enjoyed their first introduction to Matthew. Please to meet you. 

Neil's sister Monica was in charge that year and she did a great job! We were at a girls' camp (there was a stake camping there but we barely saw them) and they had these cool handcarts to transport luggage to the girls' tents that we found out later were not for transporting children, but...the kids had a really great time with them until we found out. Hah! 

Neil's sister Tina had a really fun bead craft going one day that our kids just LOVED. Like they were there for hours long after everyone else was done and Tina was so patient with them! (Neil: "I made like a finity of those at scout camp.)



Matthew had a great time with Grandpa Steve! 

So many little Baileys!

One morning we drove into town and went to this teeny little zoo. It was really cute but it was so hot that our kids basically wilted into sad little puddles and were panting in every patch of shade. 

I can't remember who--Luke maybe?--almost collapsed and so the two of us just sat under a tree for a long time drinking water until Neil caught up with us and we went to sit in the car with the blessed holy AC. Then all the Utah folk went to go do something else fun, I forget what, but the AC-loving wimps (us) drove around Logan and looked at the temple and basically hid in the car until the sun started to go down. (You guys, I cannot possibly underscore what a complete mess I become in the heat and apparently I have passed this on to my kids, whether through nature or nurture or both.) 



Thankfully since it's the desert it cooled off enough that night that when Neil & I whipped up five dutch ovens' worth of Dr. Pepper and cherry cobbler it actually sounded good to eat! (You guys, that stuff is the BEST.)



Neil, Nathan, our niece Emma, and our nephew Eli (craaaazy we used to babysit Emma all the time when she was two or three). 

The next day, thankfully, was a water day!! Not that Matthew needed it or anything...



Matthew fell asleep in the car so I sat there for an hour with him watching everyone else...so tantalizing...

This was such a fun day!! I paddleboarded and canoed a lot (I couldn't submerge my head because I'd had a 5-cm tumor removed the week before and I had to keep it dry...that was so not fun) but the kids and Neil had a fantastic time cliff-jumping. 

The paddleboards were so fun!! Probably the best part of the day was when all of the adults sat on the beach and watched Chad try over and over again to stand up on his paddleboard (at one point someone was like should we tell him you have to pop the fin out so it doesn't flip and I was like nah let's watch him fall a few more times first). 

Nathan and his One True Love--kayaking!!



Seriously--this kid was five and he was continually crossing the reservoir--probably paddled for four or five hours straight. 



And Jooj on the paddleboard!



The next morning the reunion wound up, so we drove down to Lehi to spend a few days with Elise and her family. When I was looking through my phone camera roll there were like...200 pictures of me & Iris. We go way back. 

Elise's car got a flat tire on the way to Provo, Iris got fussy, so I had to show her my 6-babies-tried-and-tested method of settling kids down (works like a charm every time). 



Matty and Iris wheeling around the Bean Museum (look how fluffy his cat is! It does NOT look like that now). 



Such a fun museum!

We stopped at the Creamery for the requisite BYU ice cream--Nathan suggested that Pierce get superman ice cream and Pierce wasn't so sure...

And back to Elise's for more Iris cuddle time!

Iris is an equal opportunity cuddler. 


Out of order, but the day we arrived at Elise's was my birthday and she made me feel so loved!!!



Also--I was SO hammered after a couple of weeks of camping (and those last few days of 100+ temps!). 



Cuddling cousins!




I don't remember the circumstances of this photo, but this is basically Elise in a nutshell. So fun, always the best laugh, and one of my very best friends in the entire world (if I go a day without talking to her it feels sooooo off and weird!).