"They Would Put Me in the Zoo..."

Tanya, Burke, Ivan, Lincoln, Adelia, Graham, Emree 

My brother Jackson called me up the first week in April to see if the kids and I wanted to go to the zoo with him and Emree and his girlfriend Bri. I wanted to, but the weather was bad, so we decided to go the next week, then the weather was bad again, then again, until finally today (the last day of April) we were able to go. My mom and my step-sister Tanya and her boys came with us.

First stop, elephants. Lincoln was quick to point out, "Look Mom! That elephant feeds her baby just like you do!" Yeesh. It's probably a good thing Oliver is not the size of a baby elephant.

 Jackson and Bri

Emree and Mom

 Ivan and Linc chillin' at the elephant statue

My favorite part of the zoo was watching the sea lions. They were cool to see and swam all over the place, so we got a good look.

 Graham, Emree, Bri, Jackson, Lincoln, Ivan, Oliver, Krystal, Adelia

The giraffes were pretty cool too. I was glad they were out, because they are what Adelia really wanted to see the most. She's been talking about seeing the giraffes all month.

Lincoln took this picture of Adelia, Oliver, Krystal, Gramma Tam, Graham, Tanya, and Burke

Gramma Tam taking a pic of the grandkids: Ivan, Graham, Linc, Del, and Burke

Ivan, Burke, Graham, Linc, Del

The thing Ivan wanted to see most was "a real life polar bear." And the polar bear did not disappoint. He paced back and forth the whole time we stood looking at him. Lincoln took this picture:

Tanya and I thought the zoo carousel was too expensive to ride, but Gramma Tam had other ideas, and bought all the kids a ticket. They were thrilled...all except Adelia to had the death grip on my neck and shouted in my ear, "I don't like this! I don't like this!" for the duration of the ride.

 I thought the giant turtles were cool:

I have to admit, that although we had a lot of fun at the zoo, it really isn't our "thing". As in, I'd probably never buy a zoo pass. Once every three years, or so, is enough for our family. But this trip, our "thing" did happen to be at the zoo...there was some sort of lego exhibit going on, so at different parts of the zoo, they had animals made out of legos. And right before we left, we stopped at the lego tent, where the kids could play with giant legos. Mine were in heaven...this is our thing. :) We need a pass to Lego Land or something. I had a hard time getting them out of here.

Because We Needed One More Project...

My husband is a do-it-yourselfer. I love this about him. Most of the time. :) But just now we have at least three unfinished outdoor projects. So when Aaron mentioned that he wanted to start building a shed as well, I started thinking up a plan to convince him, just this one time, to buy one instead of trying to design and build one himself. Costco came to my rescue with their coupon for $300 off this pre-made shed. All the pieces are there, you just have to put it together. And since it was on sale, Aaron was in. :)

The shed was delivered this afternoon. And of course by the time Aaron got off work, we ate dinner, and put kids to bed, it was dark out. Thus began yet another night time outdoor project. Yes ladies and gentleman, the Swans dig sprinkler trenches, plant trees, build fire pits, lay sod, and now build sheds in the middle of the night. I'm positive our neighbors think we're the strangest family on the block. But hey, we get 'er done...err almost. :)

*FYI our shed was not a one night project, even with Ryan and Melissa's help. So that makes at least 4 unfinished projects going on simultaneously in our yard. You'd think we'd figure out how to finish one thing and move on to the next, but no. 

Yard Workin'

The weather was nice today, so it shouldn't be too surprising that the Swans were out working in the yard. We had the best of intentions of finishing up our garden and fire pit and planting some plants. Aaron borrowed the trailer from his dad, and went and got some nice compost to mix into the dirt and everything.

Everything was going according to plan until one of our neighbors offered us some free sod.

Scratch the fire pit. We started clearing out weeds and leveling off the park strip in front of our house. It took the entire day.

But now we have grass! About a third of a park strip's worth. Hey, that's enough to have a picnic on. :)

Two Months for Ollie

We've reached the two month mark with this little munchkin. We've kissed the newborn sized clothes good-bye. At his check-up, Oliver weighed 11 pounds 11 ounces and was 24 inches long. 70th percentile for weight, 90th for height. And apparently he has a small head, since he was in the 15th percentile for head size.  But I've never really paid much attention to head size, so I don't know how he compares to my other kids in that area.

Ollie is the best sleeper I've ever had. (That last sentence could be read: Ollie is my favorite child. Haha! j/k but the sleeping thing is awesome!) He's slept through the night four times now. And almost from day one, he only wakes up once in the night. He gets up at 3:00am to eat, then he burps and generally goes right back to sleep until some time in the 7:00am hour. He's also a great napper so far. He usually takes one long morning nap, and one long afternoon nap. Winner, winner, chicken dinner! If I could guarantee I'd have babies like Oliver, I could have a few more.

He's chunking up a bit too. Double chin, here we come. I don't think he'll be as chubby as Lincoln or Adelia though. I'm betting he'll be more slender like Ivan was.

But the best part about the last week or so is the adorable baby smiles and cooing. I love it when they start being responsive. Super cute little grinner. And isn't he so handsome in stripes? (Picture is blurry, but I had to post it anyway.)

Yay for being two months old!

"Fish in a Tree? How Can That Be?"

At one of our favorite parks there is a swordfish stuck up in the branches of a tall tree. My kids always love to point it out and laugh at it. They think it's the greatest thing. On our last visit to the park, we had a conversation:

Ivan: "Mom, how did that swordfish get up in that tree anyways?"
Me: "I don't know Ivan, I guess someone just put it up there for fun."
Lincoln, whispering solemnly: "You know Ivan, a long time ago there was a great flood. The whole Earth was covered up with water. Then the water went down, down, down, and when it came down the swordfish was just stuck in the tree. And it's been there ever since."

I got a kick out it. :)

The Swing

How do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
River and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside--

Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown--
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!

-Robert Louis Stevenson

Letter R is for Rainbow

We have gotten really far behind on our letter of the week since just before Oliver was born. I realize we've had more important things to do, so I haven't been worrying about it. But this week I felt like we could give it a go. We did our letter R craft. I decided to do rainbows, because one of the boys was asking Aaron some questions about light and prisms the other day, so it seemed appropriate. :)

 I bought a cheap prism and let the kids play with it. The shined flashlights through it, used it to magnify things, and held it up to the window. Even though I was a little bit disappointed with the quality of rainbow this particular prism created, the kids had a blast with it, so I'll chalk it up to a success. I might even think about purchasing a little bit of a higher quality one.

We read the book All the Colors of the Rainbow by Allan Fowler. I actually wouldn't recommend this book. I thought it did a poor job of describing why rainbows are the way that they are. There were a lot of points that I had to have Aaron clarify for us later. BUT, this book did bring up the idea of the color wheel, and Lincoln got REALLY into it. I probably wouldn't have given the color wheel a passing glance, but Linc insisted that we make one, that it be able to spin, and that the colors on the one he made match the one out of the book exactly.

So we did. We strayed from rainbows a bit, but ended up talking about the color wheel, and how mixing certain colors together will make other colors. The kids also really liked the concept that white is made up of a mixture of all colors. (You can test this out by making a color wheel and then spinning it quickly, all the colors blur together and look white. It's really cool.)

Lincoln pretty much took the reins with this project, and I was very proud of him. He decided he wanted a color wheel that would spin, so it was his idea to use a brass fastener to hook the wheel (made out of a paper plate with the edges cut off) to a piece of card stock. He was also very particular about the order of the colors on the wheel, and the order of the colors in the rainbow he drew underneath his wheel. He had to make sure that red was on top and that violet was on the bottom, because that's how it goes in real rainbows.

Ivan was happy to follow Lincoln's lead. He wasn't as intense about it, but he did color his wheel to match Lincoln's. And he did come ask me how to spell color wheel because he wanted to write it on his paper. I am really pleased with how his hand writing is coming along. It's like one day it just clicked for him. He decided he wanted to write something and bam, suddenly his letters were legible and he was willingly making them correctly.

And Adelia, she was just happy to be participating. She was as proud of her color wheel as the boys were of theirs. :)

To finish up our letter R unit, we watched the Magic School Bus Makes a Rainbow episode.

Swimming Lesson Wrap Up

Today Lincoln had his last swimming lesson of the session. He did really well, and more importantly, I think he enjoyed himself and made a lots of improvements. He passed level 2 and is good to move on to level 3.

Instagram's Envy Effect

My sister-in-law shared this article on Facebook. I thought it was awesome and wanted to share it here.

Instagram's Envy Effect
by: Shauna Niequist

Everyone's life looks better on social media. And that's the problem.

I keep having the same conversation over and over. It starts like this: “I gave up Facebook for Lent, and I realized I’m a lot happier without it.” Or like this, “Pinterest makes me hate my house.” Or like this: “I stopped following a friend on Instagram, and now that I don’t see nonstop snapshots of her perfect life, I like her better.”

Yikes. This is a thing. This is coming up in conversation after conversation. The danger of the internet is that it’s very very easy to tell partial truths—to show the fabulous meal but not the mess to clean up afterward. To display the smiling couple-shot, but not the fight you had three days ago. To offer up the sparkly milestones but not the spiraling meltdowns.

I’m not anti-technology or anti-Internet, certainly, but I do think it’s important for us to remind ourselves from time to time that watching other peoples’ post-worthy moments on Facebook is always going to yield a prettier version of life than the one you’re living right now. That’s how it works.

My life looks better on the Internet than it does in real life. Everyone’s life looks better on the internet than it does in real life. The Internet is partial truths—we get to decide what people see and what they don’t. That’s why it’s safer short term. And that’s why it’s much, much more dangerous long term.
Because community—the rich kind, the transforming kind, the valuable and difficult kind—doesn’t happen in partial truths and well-edited photo collections on Instagram. Community happens when we hear each other’s actual voices, when we enter one another’s actual homes, with actual messes, around actual tables telling stories that ramble on beyond 140 pithy characters.

But seeing the best possible, often-unrealistic, half-truth version of other peoples’ lives isn’t the only danger of the Internet. Our envy buttons also get pushed because we rarely check Facebook when we’re having our own peak experiences. We check it when we’re bored and when we’re lonely, and it intensifies that boredom and loneliness.

When you’re laughing at a meal with friends, are you scrolling through Pinterest? When you’re in labor with your much-prayed-for-deeply-loved child, are you checking to see what’s happening on Instagram? Of course not. We check in with our phones when it seems like nothing fun is happening in our own lives—when we’re getting our oil changed or waiting for the coffee to brew.

It makes sense, then, that anyone else’s fun or beauty or sparkle gets under our skin. It magnifies our own dissatisfaction with that moment. When you’re waiting for your coffee to brew, the majority of your friends probably aren’t doing anything any more special.

But it only takes one friend at the Eiffel Tower to make you feel like a loser.

I’m a writer. I use Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and Pinterest and my blog as part of my professional life—as a way to connect with readers and be part of a conversation that we’re creating together, a conversation about creativity and faith and writing and parenting and community and life around the table. It’s a lovely conversation, and part of my work involves reading many blogs and commenting on lots of photos and scrolling through status after status.

Some days it feels rich and multi-faceted. I learn and I’m inspired. I find recipes I want to try and stories I want to live. I feel connected and thankful to be part of such an intelligent and creative internet community.

And then on some days, I feel like I have nothing to offer, like I must be the only one who isn’t a graphic designer and hasn’t yet managed to display her entire darling life online with lots of chevron and mint accents. I feel so certain that my life is a lot less darling than other peoples’ lives.

But that’s the Internet. The nature of it. I so easily fall prey to the seduction of other people’s partial truths and heavily filtered photos, making everything look amazing. And their amazing looking lives make me feel not amazing at all.

Let’s choose community. Let’s stop comparing. Let’s start connecting.

Some days when I sit down at my laptop, instead of choosing to be an observer via Facebook, I choose to be a friend via email. Instead of scrolling through someone else’s carefully curated images, I use those few seconds to send a text to a person I really know and really love and really want to be connected to.

It’s not about technology or not. I’m not suggesting you get all old-school-pen-and-paper about it (unless that’s your thing.) It’s about connecting instead of comparing. Instead of using the computer to watch someone else’s perfectly crafted life, enter into someone’s less-than-perfect life. You can use Facebook if you want, but you might find email, Skype and phone calls work better.

The distinction I’m making is public vs. private, not in person vs. long distance. I have very close, very honest friendships that depend on phone calls and Skype dates and long wandering emails, and I’m thankful that technology allows for those connections. But I don’t think you can build transforming friendships that take place only in a public sphere like Facebook or Instagram.
For many of us, walking away from the Internet isn’t an option. But using it to connect instead of compare is an option, and a life-changing one. Using technology to build community instead of building carefully-curated images of ourselves is an option, and a worthwhile one.

And on the days when you peer into the screen of your laptop and all you see are other people’s peak experiences that highlight your lack in that moment, remember that life isn’t about the story you tell about yourself on the Internet. It’s about a million more beautiful and complex things than that, like love and faith and really listening. It’s about using what you’ve been given to craft a life of gratitude and passion and grace.

Remember that the very best things in life can’t be captured in status updates.

Just One Example of Why My Family is Awesome!

Last night around 9:30pm or so, I got a group text to me, Kyle, and Jackson from my mom...

Mom: "Just if anyone wants to know there is supposed to be a huge meteor shower tonight and the best time to see it is 10."

Me: "But we have a waxing gibbous moon, will we still be able to see it?"

Mom: "What the crap?"

Me: "A moon that is almost a full moon but not quite. It gives off a lot of light and can overpower the light of other things in the sky."

Mom: "Okay, if you say so."

Me: "I'm not making it up, Mother Dear...the moon is an astronomer's worst nemesis. :)"

Mom: "I believe you."

Jackson: "I don't. I'm watching anyways."

Kyle: "Also werewolves. Bad news with a full moon."

Me: "Haha Kyle, that made my night."

Kyle: "It's what I'm here for. Not to mention I just watched the Wolfman."

Me: "Aaron and I freezing our bums off under the waxing gibbous. :) I think we may have seen a satellite. Anyone else having luck?"

Jackson: "Me and Bri have seen 2 :-P nee ner nee ner."

Mom: "We've seen a couple stars."

Me: "Take a pic, it'll be fun. Almost like we're all together. :)"

Kyle: "Here I am beneath the waxing giblet. Kyle Skywalker, Jedi Master."

Kyle: "And apparently gibbous auto-corrects to giblet."

Me: "Kyle, Aaron says you kind of look like you're from the dark side."

Mom: "Master Jedi Lemmon with his young padeones."

Mom and Kerry

Mom and Tanner

Kyle: "Padawan* :) Darth Lemmon, Emperor, or my Master are all suitable names. I shall respond to none but these."

Jackson: "A tragic day when Kyle Skywalker became Darth Gayder."

Kyle: "Pipe down Darth Juicius, my young apprentice."

Jackson: "Juicy the Box takes no prisoners!"

Me: "Enter Yoda stage left."

Mom: "Just saying good night to all from Master Today and Princess Leah. Oops Master Yoda."

Kyle: "Young, he is. Much to learn, he has."

Me: "Soiled he has become."

Me: "Welp, we're going to bed. But we'll check the sky again at first feeding and let ya know if we see anything."

And that, in a nut-shell, is why my family is awesome. :) At least I think we're funny, if no one else does.

What Did We Do This Weekend?

For date night Friday night, Aaron and I rented the movie Lincoln, and watched it for the first time. I've been wanting to see it since it came out. It's fantastic! Seriously, such a well done movie. It's probably one of my all-time favorites. And apparently it's fairly historically accurate as well. (More details here.) We named our son Lincoln, after Abraham Lincoln, and this movie captures President Lincoln's character so well that I am happy to have a son with his name-sake. I love the stories he tells at random times to ease the tension, or prove a point. And I love the scene where he talks about Euclid to the engineer at the telegraph. And the scene where he's trying to get his cabinet members to support him and get the votes they need. And Tommy Lee Jones is awesome. The movie is just so well done. I loved it. So, if you haven't seen this movie...see it! I will definitely be buying it first chance I get.

Aaron spent most of Saturday working on our fire pit and garden wall. He finished the wall. Now, he just has the front edge of the fire pit to cut out the stones for. Then we need to fill the rest of our garden with dirt, and plant plants! Hooray for gardening!

I spent most of my weekend inside with the kidlets. Well, minus Linc, he stayed outside with Aaron for a lot of the day. I love this picture of Oliver snuggled up on Aaron's shoulder sound asleep. Precious baby.

And, I made Tapioca pudding. While I was stirring it, I happened to pick up the package and read the back. I had no idea that tapioca came from the cassava plant. I guess you learn something new every day. 

BYU Baseball Stadium Tour

Boys playing on the pitcher's mound

Today our preschool group took a tour of the BYU Baseball Stadium. It was awesome! When I was a freshman in college, we used to climb over the center field fence at midnight and spread a blanket out in the outfield and have picnics and play catch (yes, in the dark, not a bright idea), but I'd never been inside the actual building until today.

First we got to see the equipment and uniform room. They showed us the huge washing machines that wash the uniforms after every game. (How cool is that, the players don't even have to wash their own laundry!) Then we went across the hall and saw the weight room.

The kids were really impressed with the weight room. They tried out all the bikes. Asked questions about the hot and cold tubs, and wanted to hold each different size of medicine ball and try throwing it against the vertical trampoline. (Players use the medicine balls and trampoline to loosen up their shoulders.) After the weight room, we got to take a peek into the coaches' office. On of the kids found a miniature bat, and our tour guide explained that it was the kind of bat players used to practice top-hand or bottom-hand drills. (Basically you bat soft-toss or off of a tee one handed to work your arm strength and to practice having one arm swing through the strike zone.)

Next we went out onto the field. Most of the little boys headed straight to the pitcher's mound. Some ran to second base and then continued out to the center field fence. Adelia enjoyed using the third base-line dirt as a mini sandbox. :)

There were a couple pitchers in the bull-pen throwing to a catcher. So, our tour guide took us over to meet them. They were really nice, and talked with the kids for a bit.

Then we went back inside to the batting cages. This was all three of my older kids' favorite part. Our guide let them take turns hitting balls off of a tee. When everyone had had a turn, he asked the kids to help him gather up the balls, and then told them each the could keep one. My kids were in heaven.

Lastly, we got to check out the clubhouse. Del immediately walked over and sat on the couch with a member of the team and said, "Hi, I'm Adelia. These are my new shoes, see? I'm two. " and continued to chat with him until we left. I guess I've got a little flirt on my hands. At least she's got good taste?

The little boys sat on the smaller couch and talked with the players. Over all I was really impressed with the players. They were patient with the kids, and answered all their questions, and listened to each one of them tell how old they were, and on and on. It was really cute. 

And that was that, the tour was over. Adelia jumped down off the couch and turned around to wave good bye to her new friend at least four times on the way out. Then she said to me, "Mom, those guys like me. They're my friends."  Too funny. 

Mom's Night Out - Saudi Arabia

We had an awesome Mom's Night Out last night. My friend Danielle, invited her in-laws to come and speak to us and tell us about the nine years they spent living in Saudi Arabia working for the US government. It was really informative and interesting.

I've done a little bit of reading about Iran, so the Saudi culture wasn't shockingly new to me. But hearing again about they way their culture treats women, and how few rights women have over there, made me grateful all over again for the freedoms and opportunities I have in the United States.

While I was there, I got to try on the burka (a loose garment covering the entire body and having a veiled opening for the eyes, worn by Muslim women.) and a hijab (a traditional scarf worn by Muslim women to cover the hair and neck and sometimes the face.) If I were really a Saudi woman, only my eyes and the tips of my fingers would be allowed to show. I don't know how women do it. It was really hot with all that on, and my breath on the veil part made it really humid and muggy around my face. And I wasn't even trying to wear it in the sun or 120 degree heat. And it was really hard to move or do anything with only my finger tips showing. I can't imagine trying to cook of hold a baby that way.

It was an awesome MNO, I feel like I learned a lot. And it was interesting to hear the perspectives of LDS-Americans living in Saudi. We also got to eat really great Arabic food. And now I have about a dozen books I want to read about Saudi Arabia, beginning with In the Land of Invisible Women: A Female Doctor's Journey in the Saudi Kingdom.