Tuesday, February 28, 2017

I Wrote a Poem

Because it's still snowing and I want to cry; instead I wrote a poem using the magnetic poetry kit I bought myself for my birthday. I like to think of magnetic poetry as a creative challenge. You have an idea you want to convey, but you only have a very limited pool of words from which you can use so you have to get creative. You have to stretch the meanings of words; rely on their connotation, or their juxtaposition rather than their definition alone. It's fun. :) I've had this kit up on the fridge for a few days now, and I'm not the only one enjoying it. My kids have been loving it too. And hey, we can call it free-writing, right?

So here's my poem, just pretend there isn't an 's' on the end of 'throws' and that there IS an 'of' between 'the roof' and 'my house'.

Magnetic Poetry on a Snowy Day by Krystal Swan

Monday, February 27, 2017

4


For four years now, this one has been my sunshine. He is my buddy, my snuggler, a toy car lover, a bike rider, a question asker, a tease bucket, and a sweetheart. Happy Birthday Olliewog, love you so!

He wanted a chocolate racecar cake with chocolate frosting and sprinkles. I thought it turned out really cute, and it was SO easy. Yay for cakes you can bake in a 9x13 pan. :)


Ollie chose haystacks for dinner. Grandma and Grandpa Swan brought cousins Zac, Luke, and Eliza over for the party. The kids played well together after dinner. Then we opened presents and had cake and ice cream.




Winter Days and an Oscar's Night




"...O! thoughtless Dandelion, to be misled
By a few warm days to leave thy natural bed,
Was folly growth and blooming over soon.
And yet, thou blasted yellow-coated gem,
Full many a heart has but a common boon
With thee, now freezing on they slender stem..."
-George Marion McClellan

I know...it's still February and technically winter...but we got a taste, just a little sip of spring, and now I'm craving it BIG TIME! I've given up on winter. I refuse to shovel my driveway another time this year. From now on it's put the Burb in 4-wheel drive and force our way out, come hell or high water.

This is how I know that I'm stir crazy: I volunteered to coach cub soccer in the spring. Ha! It'll be Ollie's team. He's super duper excited. He's been waiting around to be old enough to play soccer ever since he could walk. No one else was coaching, I asked. So I'm it, I guess. Soccer's not my favorite, nor my most knowledgeable sport...but it's Cub, so I'll be ok. :)

We went to one of our favorite Nature Journaling places (the Bean Museum on BYU campus) with Aaron's sister and her kids and Aaron's parents. My kids usually do a pretty good job of working on their journals while we're there, but this time they stayed super focused because it's more fun to natural journal if your cousins are doing it too! :) They also just randomly happened to have a live animal show while we were there, so we got to sit in on that too. The kids always love when they get to touch the animals.





Lincoln and Ivan are chugging away on their book lists. I actually think Ivan is about half way done. Lincoln has read some, but got distracted by the Percy Jackson series. I wouldn't let him put all of those on his list, because I feel like he needs to branch out. He's reading them anyways, which is fine, it just doesn't count towards his goal of 20 books.

I mentioned that we are going a form of Notebooking for book reports this go around. They don't love that I require book reports but are fighting this method MUCH less than they fought giving me oral book reports last year, so that's good. (It's also confusing, because in my mind an oral book report seems like so much less work, but whatever.) We've never done Notebooking before, so I tried to keep it simple. Basically, each book they read takes up one page in their notebook. The cut out and glue a picture of the book in the top corner. Then they put the date, title of the book, the author, list the main characters, describe the setting, tell the plot, and then pick one paragraph out of the book that they liked for whatever reason to copy. At the bottom they draw a picture of something that happened in the story. It's going well I think. Both boys could definitely use a lesson on writing neatly...but that's another battle for another day. ;)






Speaking of battles, let's talk about the one I have daily with Miss Stubborn Independence *rolls eyes*. I love this kid dearly, but some days she kills me. Nothing is hidden well enough, or placed high enough to be out of her reach if she wants it. She is forever into my make up, the hair spray the lotion, the water dispenser on the fridge, the other kids bedroom closets (she steals and eats all their candy they have hidden away), the cupboards, etc. The other day she kept getting into the fridge and unwrapping the little individual cheeses and taking one bite out and then crumbling the rest on the floor. She also got into the pantry and pulled down a bag of corn chips, and pulled chips out  and stomped on them one by one. Hand her a pink bowl with cereal in it when she wanted the yellow one? She'll chuck the bowl across the room, with cereal flying all over the place. "MY DO IT!!" is her battle cry from morning until night. And by night, I mean the middle of the night and sometimes into the early hours of the morning. Sure, we PUT her to bed at 8:00...but that doesn't mean she goes to sleep, oh no! She's in there singing at the top of her lungs until after Aaron and I go to bed. I almost feel bad for Adelia, with whom Ruby shares a room, except that it's sort of like payback because Del used to do the exact same thing. :)

Adelia "stayed home from school sick" the other day, except I think it was more like she just didn't want to go. Anyways, I had her lay down in her bed, with books and crayons and paper, etc, and listen to Where the Red Fern Grows on audiobook so she could rest and get well. She drew this funny little critter, among other things. I thought it was cute. And I was amazed at how long Del kept herself entertained with the audiobook going. Usually she can't be alone more than five seconds without needed to find someone to talk to. :) I love Adelia's art. It's fun an imaginative. I wish I could hear the stories she tells herself in her head about the fun things she draws.




Aaron and I got invited to an Oscars party that our neighbor was throwing. I've never watched the Oscars in my life, nor had I seen any of the movies being nominated to win. But the party was SO MUCH FUN! Technically it was a "pre" Oscars party, because the party was Saturday night, and the actual Oscars weren't until Sunday. But I think that just made it more fun because we didn't actually have to watch the Oscars. Haha! Instead we did awesome things.

The theme of the party was "Musicals" so each couple had to pick a musical to dress up as. Aaron and I went as Frank Butler and Annie Oakley from Annie Get Your Gun. Other couples did La La Land, Phantom of the Opera, Sound of Music, Pitch Perfect, Newsies, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, My Fair Lady, Singin' in the Rain, Chicago, Grease, Little Shop of Horrors, and Anastasia. Each couple brought a snack food that went along with their musical. Aaron and I brought "Better Than...You" Cake. (Instead of Better Than S Cake...get it, because our theme song is Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better, I Can Do Anything Better Than You." I thought it was clever.)

A week before the party, our hostess passed around ballots, and each person filled out who they wanted to win the awards. Our hostess tallied everything up, and the night of each couple took turns announcing which movies would be the winners if our group were "The Academy". We had to announce the awards in character. So for example I got up and said: Anything you can announce I can announce better.
Aaron: No you can't
Me: Yes I can
Aaron: No you can't
Me: Yes I can, yes I can! And I'll prove it! The nominees for best ________ are _______
Aaron: And the winner is _________!

Each couple also put together a 45-60 second skit from their musical. We had dances from La La Land and Newsies, a waltz from Sound of Music, Phantom of the Opera sang Music of the Night, Pitch Perfect sang Cups. Aaron and I didn't want to sing or dance, so we put together the shooting scene from the end of Annie Get Your Gun, complete with Nerf Guns and a stuffed penguin acting as a clay pigeon. It was so fun! I loved everyone's skits, and I loved preforming ours. I thought I might be nervous, or shy, or embarrassed, but I wasn't. Not even one bit. It was actually really invigorating. It's been such a long time since I've done anything like this. I'd forgotten how much I love it. I'll be riding this high for awhile. :)

Sunday, February 26, 2017

Zipline





"Mom, mom! You have to come see what we did!" Lincoln calls to me from up the stairs.

It was Sunday after church, and the kids had been up in quiet time for about an hour. Aaron was still at the church counting tithing, and I'll admit, I was hesitant to go up stairs to see what sort of disaster I was going to have to clean up.

But I was pleasantly surprised. The kids had spent the last hour building a zipline with K'nex and crochet thread. They'd set up Ollie's mini basketball hoop on the closet door at one end of the hall, and ran the line to a stool in the bathroom at the other end. They were ziplining all sorts of things, Barbies, Lego men, Ivan even built a ship out of paper and K'nex and used two pullies to zip lots of cargo down the line at the same time. I was so impressed with it all, especially because they played with it happily for hours. And didn't fight.

STEM education, done and done.


Wednesday, February 22, 2017

31



My kids are cute....this snow isn't.

I did not order 6 inches of snow for my birthday. *sigh*

Oh well, backtracking... Tonight was the Cub Scout Blue and Gold Banquet, which means we weren't going to be able to go out to birthday dinner. So Aaron took us out Monday night instead. We went to Hu Hot, one of my favorite restaurants. It was a kick off for "Birthday Week" which is what I always call this last week in February because mine and Ollie's birthdays are only five days apart. I love sharing my birthday month with this goof. :)



Today, on actual birthday, my mom came down and we went shopping for a new temple dress for me. Yippee!! I got a skirt and shirt combo with a cardigan to go over top. No zippers, and SO much more comfortable.

Then Mom took us to lunch at Sizzler, because steak is my most favorite food. I love when my mom comes down and we get to hang out.

Ollie, Rue, Cal, Gramma Tam, and Krystal
Aaron is putting up the beadboard in our living room as my birthday present. I am in love with it. It's all up, now it just needs to be caulked and painted. I'll post finished pics when it's all done.


Monday, February 20, 2017

President's Day 2016


Oh Beautiful Weather!

All of Aaron's siblings are in town, which means there were quite a lot of us wanting to get together and hang out. A  picnic lunch at the park was the perfect solution. Above are all 23 grandkids except Jordan who is on a mission, and newborn Ilo.

Ollie and Eli

Rue

Jeremiah, Adelia, Ruby, Ollie, Bennett, Grandma Swan and Silas

Eli and Rue.

Sunday, February 19, 2017

Update

We are so close to some Spring relief. I feel like we're all holding our breath waiting for it and just trying to push through the last little bit of winter any way that we can. Ruby in particular is just plain sick of being cooped up. The other day she was taking out her frustrations on Ollie, so in an attempt to redirect her energy, I put some boots and a coat on her and sent her outside to demolish the last remaining bits of the snow fort. Whatever it takes, right? 




My little Rue. She's been such a handful lately. The other morning she got up at 4:30am for no reason whatsoever. She kept coming in and out of our room, we'd put her back to bed, only to hear her five seconds later playing in the school room at full volume. After everyone else was up, and I'd finished feeding Cal, I noticed that I hadn't heard her for awhile. After looking around for a bit, and worrying slightly that she'd snuck out and run away, I finally found her sound asleep in her bed. 

I couldn't be too mad though. At the beginning of February a family in our ward lost their 4-year-old son unexpectedly. Everyone in our neighborhood's hearts are breaking as we mourn with this family. And I'll tell you what, it sure puts things into perspective. So what if I haven't gotten much sleep in the last 10 years. I'm tired, but I can still walk into Ruby's room and watch her peacefully sleeping like an angel at 9 o'clock in the morning. Even though she tears through our house like a Tasmanian Devil, leaving all our possessions scattered in her wake.....she's still here to follow me around and be my shadow and my buddy. I still get to hear her cute little voice practicing new words, and asking "What's that? What's that?" This week particularly, the messes and the crazy are taking a back seat, and blending in as part of the wonderful whole, that is my healthy, happy, living child. I wish it didn't take a tragedy to remind me. But I am glad that we live in an amazing ward where people come together and lean on each other and care for each other. Since I'm in the Relief Society, we got to be involved in some the details of the funeral and luncheon. There was such and outpouring of love and support from the beginning to the end. And even though it was such a sad, sad day; the Spirit was in the room and the feelings of peach and comfort were the most dominant. We were all uplifted, even as we cried with the family. And I just remember thinking, "This is it, right here. This is the gospel in it's purest and truest form."  







Switching topics:  Cal is five months old! I love this cute little baldy-head. He has been such a light. I finally caved, and he is eating solids now. Wolfing them down and begging for more, would really be a more accurate description. He's rolling all over the place now, back to front and front to back, he's pretty mobile. He loves to watch his siblings. He's always been wide-eyed alert, but now he's starting to be social, making eye contact and smiling; jabbering at you to try and get your attention. Giggling. No predictable schedule yet. He doesn't nap super well, or super long, but he is usually happy anyway. He loves to go places, and is very happy and well behaved out in public. He doesn't seem to mind strangers, and will let anyone hold him.  I'm REALLY leaning more and more towards the Type 1 every day. But I hesitate to say that for 100% sure. Lincoln was a really happy, social baby, and he's a Type 4. But time will tell, and I'm content to watch it develop and makes notes as I go, until I'm positive of one Type or another.

We have had a couple warm days where the sun has come out. And those days have been so wonderful. I've been letting the chickens run free in the yard when it's warm. I figure they can eat any bugs that have wandered into my garden, and they can fertilize the lawn while they're at it. Right now is the perfect time to let them have a little vacation from their coop and run, because I haven't planted anything yet. As soon as I plant, they'll be banished so that they don't eat my baby plants.

I've been inspecting things around the yard while we're out playing. It's almost time to prune my trees, probably next weekend, if the weather stays nice. I discovered a bunch of blackish reddish sap around the base of our peach tree. After doing some research, I figured out that it's Peach Borer, a moth that lays its eggs at the base of a tree, and when the eggs hatch and turn into grubs they eat underneath the bark of the tree and it kills the tree. Aaron and I had to wash the sap away and dig around the tree, we found 5-7 grubs and fed them to the chickens. We'll need to spray to kill the moths a little later in the year. I'm hoping we've caught it soon enough to save the tree. Because I will probably cry if my peach tree dies.


Since we've had such cabin fever, on the days when it's not warm enough to spend time in the backyard, I have been making a real effort to leave the house, and it has had such a positive impact on my mental state. Mondays we've been going to the grocery store, Tuesdays we hit up Springville Library story time, Wednesday Ollie usually plays with a friend, Thursdays we go to Provo library story time, and Fridays we go to the indoor playground with our homeschool group. This is all very loose. Last week we changed it up and swapped out one of the days and went to the BYU Paleontology Museum instead, because Ollie wanted to see a T-Rex. :) I love where we live, because there are so many options of free things to go and do nearby.

"Mom, today is a great day for me to fly!" -Ollie

Lincoln shooting a layup at his basketball game
 
Adelia, Krystal, Ruby

Adelia and cousin Eliza playing dress-ups and Grandma Swan's.



Wednesday, February 15, 2017

Real Life With Ruby

Sometimes isn't it just nice to know that you aren't the only one out there who is the victim of a 2 year old? Here are a few images from a-day-in-the-life-of-Ruby, while Mom was feeding Baby Cal.....


Hard to see in the pic, but this is about a 1/4 inch of water all over the entire kitchen floor.