California: Last Day

For our last day in California, it was fitting that we spend part of it at the beach. We watched the sun go down, and then ate hot dogs and smores, and even roasted some Starburst! We had a great time in California and I just have to say again how thankful I am to my sister Melanie for hooking me up with tickets to come see them so I could be a part of so many family events and see people I love.

The Towheads

Here are two other pictures from the trip I love:

There's nothing like the 'naughty stump' to humble you

California: Day 6

Today was also a momentous day because Melanie and Spencer were blessing their 3rd baby boy Nolan Carter Evans. He is so little, and I can't even believe that Andrew was that small less than 5 months ago.



It was great to spend time with all the sisters together with our parents. We have so many boys in this family!!! Who would've thought?! The boys had a lot of fun playing together when Clark wasn't busy beating everyone up. We have been trying to teach him that there is a time and a place for roughhousing and 24/7 and everywhere are neither the correct time nor the correct place. He loves his cousins and every night when we would return to my aunts house for bed, he would talk all about Carter, Jonah, Truman, and Elliot. He loves them I promise!

California: Day 5

Today was a momentous and busy day! It began with the sealing of my Uncle John and Aunt Joy in the Newport Beach temple. I love attending sealing ceremonies, and it was particularly special to be there with family.


Later on, we celebrated my Grandma Barbara's 80th birthday. It was a lot of fun seeing Aunts and Uncles and cousins that I haven't seen in years. My mother's family can be pretty funny and there were lots of fun and yet sweet and poignant moments as each family took their turn to talk about how my grandma has influenced and blessed each of our lives. I especially loved when we went and released 80 balloons outside in celebration of her 80 years! My grandma is such a sweet person and just as my grandparents on my dad's side that I mentioned in my previous blog, she has also blessed and influenced my life in so many ways, and I will forever be grateful
to her for the woman, mother, grandmother, and great grandmother she is!

My grandma with her daughters

Clark was just there for the food

California: Day 4

Thanks to the Evans parents, I was able to take Clark and Andrew as well as Brianna and my Workinger cousins to Sea World! You might think me crazy for going as the only adult with all those kids, but all of them were super helpful with my little guys. Andrew was the get along kid as usual, and Clark just soaked up every fun moment. Brianna and my cousins took Clark on some rides in the Sesame Street part of the park. We also had a lot of fun going to see Shamu and the Dolphin shows. Clark got a little bit antsy during them, but we just kept trying to keep him entertained. My cousins were really excited that they got to go on the Atlantis ride, and they even watched my boys so I could go too! It tells you something about how my Aunt has raised her children when we were trying to decide what to do next, and they all said "we just did something fun for us, let's go do a ride with Clark." We ended up being there for almost 8 hours, and we all had a good time and we were all pretty tired at the end...especially Clark and Andrew.

California: Day 3

Today, I followed my parents and we drove up to see my grandparents Bruce and Pat Carter. My grandma Pat is in the last stages of Alzheimer's and my grandfather's health isn't very good either. They currently are living together in an Alzheimer's assisted facility, and I really wanted to see them, but I also knew she probably would not recognize me. I wanted my sons to meet them, and I have to say it was one of the highlights of my trip. My grandmother immediately fell in love with Andrew and although I know she has forgotten how she is related to me and to him, she just loved holding him and playing with him. Andrew was all smiles for her, and it touched my heart to see them together. There is something about seeing the oldest generation and the youngest generation of a family together. It really brought life into perspective for me in the sense that I owe a lot of the blessings I enjoy now are in large part due to the faithfulness of my Grandparents and the great life that they have lived. I really sensed the importance of my role now in rearing up the next generation to carry on the traditions of family and faith in the gospel that they successfully established with their sons. I had a wonderful time talking with my grandma in particular because although at times she doesn't remember things from one moment to the next, we could talk extensively about motherhood and about children. I realized those are things that cannot be erased from her memory because it is ingrained in every fiber of her being. I asked her how she did it with 5 boys because I feel like 2 is hard! She laughed and shook her head and said it was hard because boys are active! I love my grandparents and I will always be so grateful for them.
(I couldn't decide which picture to post, so I figured all three were good)

California: Day 1 and 2

Melanie received free airline tickets a year ago from allowing herself and her kids to be bumped to a later flight, but she never used them and originally thought they were non transferable until she checked as a last ditch effort before they expired. It turns out they were, and she called and offered them to me! Thank you Mel and Spencer! As a result, I was able to go to California with my two boys and attend a number of family events that happened this week.

The first day was mostly spent on the airplane literally wrestling with Clark while holding Andrew. I felt I earned the mommy of the year award when I found myself squeezing into the airplane lavatory holding Andrew in one arm while hoisting an unwilling Clark (my 35+ pound child) onto the ridiculously high itty bitty changing table. I changed his poopy diaper with one hand while he kicked and screamed. Don't know how I did it, but we practically fell out of the lavatory when it was all over with (NOTE: why do those stupid doors open inward...there isn't enough room as it is! And why do we call bathrooms lavatories only on airplanes?) Anyway, the good part was that people were really nice and no crusties were shot my way (that I saw anyway). We survived the trip and actually got to the San Diego airport at the same time as my parents and Bonna. We all met up with Mel curbside, and headed back to her house. The rest of the day was spent chilling (read: recovering), and my dad and I could hardly wait to get ourselves to IN-N-OUT for some Double Doubles, fries, and shakes. We almost didn't make it though because we got directions from Melanie, and while that may sound mean, she actually provided me with one of my first "I love being with my family" moments of the trip. It was just classic Melanie and for better or worse, classic our family to make fun of her for her bad sense of direction. We all had our 'moments' during this trip, and it just reminded me of the good, the bad, and the funny that IS family.
The next day, we hung out together as a family and later on, everyone met over at my aunt Rachel's house for a BBQ and swimming. I stayed at Rachel's the whole trip, and she is awesome. Her house is a party, and that's the way she likes it...and we all like it too!!

Great Grandma Barbara with Andrew

Rachel and Craig grilling up the burgers!

My dad getting in some boy time with my cousin Ethan

Clark swimming with Bonna

I just love this picture of my nephew Truman...there is no way that kid is drowning!

A Toilet of a Day

Somehow my life has turned into one comic tragedy (albeit small ones) after another. Get comfortable.

This morning Tanner went to get his Ipod out of our Saturn and somehow noticed that the car had no battery. He came back in and told me, and asked me if anything weird was going on with the car yesterday when I drove it. I said no, but I did remember the car beeping at me when I got out of the car after returning home at 2pm from Visiting Teaching. I thought that the key hadn't been turned all the way back the right spot in the ignition, so I reinserted it and turn it, and shut the door and everything seemed fine. Apparently it was not. Apparently, I had my lights on when I was driving around during the middle of the day and forgot to turn them off when I got home. Of course, I didn't think that I needed to turn my lights off because who drives around with their lights on in the middle of the day? Apparently, I do.

I called my sister and told her that I thought it was going to be a doozy of a day or as you will soon find out...A toilet of a day.

So, I was cleaning up around the house (shocker, I know) and Clark was helping me by putting things away and loading things into the washer and dryer for me. Everything was going well until I came across a large round beach shell (think a tennis ball cut in half size) in the living room. I have a glass bowl that I keep on top of the toilet that has a bunch of shells from beaches we have been to. Clark plays with them a lot, but has never (as far as we know) ever attempted to flush them down the toilet. I asked Clark if he would "Go and put the shell back on top of the toilet." Now, I am not sure whether he didn't understand me or he understood me perfectly but decided to be a two year old, but the next thing I heard was the toilet flushing. I jumped up and raced to the bathroom where Clark was looking curiously into the toilet bowl. I looked in the toilet and then looked at him frantically and said "Did you flush the shell down the toilet?" I got the immediate reply with great confidence "Uh-huh YEAH!"

I spent the next 5 minutes trying to decide what to do next, and then spent the next 5 minutes psyching myself up to stick my hand down into the toilet to see if the shell was immediately accessible. It wasn't. Why do I never have kitchen gloves when I need them? Eww is right.

I couldn't get a hold of Tanner at work, so my next call was to my Daddio. I have to tell you he sounded a little bemused on the phone after hearing my plight. But he did what any good father would do and gave me detailed instructions on how to disassemble the toilet...when Tanner gets home of course. I was pretty impressed with his knowledge of all things toilets, and I then called Tricia back and told her my day was going exactly as I predicted. She suggested trying to plunger it out before we disassemble the toilet. Good idea right? IF YOU HAVE A PLUNGER IN THE HOUSE...which I suddenly realized I do not. We threw ours out when we moved from Florida, and since we have not had a need for one since we moved here, it wasn't exactly high priority on the shopping list. Great, I'll just load the kids up and go get one...EXCEPT MY CAR IS DEAD. So here I am stranded with no car and no usable toilet.

I called my friend who lives down the street and left a message on her answering machine describing my 'issues'. I told her at the beginning of the message she is going to regret being my friend because I can't seem to go for a week without having issues. She called me back 30 minutes later laughing. I am glad we can all find this very humorous. It keeps the stress at a manageable level for me. She came over to let me borrow her plunger, and it was the strangest looking plunger I have ever seen. I am used to the wood handle ones with the black or pooh colored rubber on the end, but this one was a bright green and purple plastic one. She was showing me how to use it when a black rubber seal fell off of it. She thought it was a worm and freaked out, so we had a good laugh and I took the thing, hoping and praying it would work although I wasn't convinced it would. It didn't really work very well as far as plungers go, and the chances were slim to begin with that I was going to be able to dislodge the shell via plunger. So I gave up and waited for Tanner to come home to save me.

You can imagine how excited Tanner was to come home from work to find out that we had PROJECTS planned for the evening. First on the list, get the Saturn started. We hooked everything up and let the Monte run for a while before starting the Saturn up, but when we tried the first few times, it wouldn't start. I was convinced Tanner was doing something wrong, but he just repositioned the cables on the battery and we waited a little longer, and voila! The Saturn is back up and running! I guess he DOES know what he's doing! I am always impressed with how methodical Tanner is when doing a project!

Next on the list was to take the toilet apart. Our friends had let us borrow their snake (a metal thingy that will slide through turns to clear clogs is the official name). Tanner hit something very hard with it pretty quickly and we knew it was the shell and it was still in the toilet pipe. We followed the instructions just as my dad had relayed them to me on the phone although I think Tanner also knew what to do since apparently it is ingrained in every guy (okay SOME guys) how to be 'handy'. When we got the toilet apart and upside down in the shower, we couldn't see the shell. We got worried about how we were going to get the shell out because it was in the worst possible spot. Enter handy dandy snake again from the other end of the toilet and suddenly we heard the shell clanging through the toilet and out through the bowl. It was awesome. I would have kissed Tanner right there and then if he wasn't covered in toilet funk. We called Clark in to show him the shell and explain that it was a no-no again. He came in and freaked out when he saw "THE HOLE!" in the ground where the toilet used to be. It was priceless.

Somehow we decided I would go to the store to get wax and caulk to replace the toilet. Tanner told me just to ask someone and it shouldn't be difficult to get the right supplies. When I arrived at Home Depot, I of course tried to find everything myself and failed miserably. I must have had a look of confusion because someone asked me if I needed help. This is how the conversation went:

Handy Man: "Ma'am, do you need help?"

Me: "Yes. I need to caulk around the base of my toilet, and there is this little squeeze tube that looks like it would work just as well, but my husband said to get a caulking gun. Do I need the gun or can I just use this little squeeze tube instead. "

Handy Man (looking at the little squeeze tube with disdain as any REAL handy man would): "Get the gun, Ma'am."

Okie dokie. I was in line to check out when ANOTHER man (a patron in the store no less) asked me why I was buying two plungers. I told him one for me and one for my friend who let me borrow her broken one. He looked at the wax I was holding (that I picked out myself thank you very much), and said:

"Ma'am, you are going to want a different type of wax than that. Are you installing your toilet on tile?"

Me: "Yes."

2nd Handy Man: "Come with me, I will show you what to get."

He GOT out of line and walked back with me to the Bathroom section of the Depot and when we got there a worker asked us if we needed help. The men quickly consulted together and resolutely handed me a different more souped up version of the wax ring I had originally picked out. Are we noticing a pattern here? But I can't complain because when I returned home, everything reinstalled perfectly, and we now have a working toilet once again...and as a bonus, Tanner got to practice his caulking skills (they are a little rusty he said). Thank you to my hubby who not only performed all the tasks at hand with perfect precision, but with a happy disposition as well (which is just as important to any woman helping a man). And thank you to my Handy Men in the Home Depot. I was clearly lost without them. So it turns out our toilet of a day was finally flushed away! Are you in awe of my poetry skills or what?

P.S. I'll try to make my post longer next time. :-)

(that is not poop around the base of the toilet...it's that gunky old wax stuff...we think.)

Andrew: A Week in Pictures

Andrew at 4 1/2 months

VS.


Clark at 4 months
Look closely at those index fingers...now I know why I have Deja Vu so often...

I like this picture because you can tell he is smiling under the blanket just by looking at his big blue eyes.

When Andrew started rolling over, he apparently also decided to become a side sleeper...who cares? As long as he SLEEPS! :-)

I found this picture on the camera today...apparently Tanner was playing dress up with Andrew yesterday!

Alexandria Waterfront Festival

There are too many fun things to do in this area to only just sit around lazy at home every weekend. We like doing the lazy thing, but it was getting a little old so I started looking into things we could do together as a family on the weekends. This weekend happened to be the Waterfront Festival in Alexandria, and we decided to go and check it out. If you ever come up to the DC area and want something to do outside of downtown DC, I would highly recommend a walk through Old Town Alexandria and down to the waterfront. We ended up walking 17 blocks down King Street to the waterfront where the festival was being held. We had a really good time looking at paintings, arts and crafts, and of course, going on some rides! It was a pretty warm day, but Clark had a great time, except on the big slide he went on with me. When we got to the bottom, he said "No more SLIDE!" He also wasn't a huge fan of the Ferris Wheel. Andrew was the get along kid, although he definitely does not like a bumpy ride in the stroller. At first, every time we would go over a bump in the sidewalk, he would give a "yelp!" before settling back down...but he finally got used to it. We were exhausted by the end of the day mostly from the heat, but we really enjoyed ourselves. I think I am going to have to channel my inner Debbie more often so we can have more "get up and go!" days like today.

tired much?

My Friend Preston

We have this great setup with another family in our ward where we take turns watching each other's children on the weekend so we can each have nights out with our spouses. Our friends have a little boy named Preston who is about 6 months younger than Clark. He is a calm and quiet little boy...the exact opposite of Clark...but it works out great because his parents want him to be a little more outgoing like Clark, and we want Clark to be a little more calm like Preston. They balance each other out pretty well.

We took care of Preston all day today, and they just had a blast together. They both love cars and trains and it is so nice now that they are at an age where they can play well together for most of the time. It was such a nice day so I got them both in their swim trunks and let them go out onto the deck to play in the water. I had bought this frog sprinkler thing because I thought it would be more fun if the water sprayed out like a sprinkler...but neither one of them was a huge fan of it. Finally I just decided to disconnect it and let the hose run. They loved playing with the hose. They filled up trucks and buckets and were scooping water everywhere. Their little giggles and laughs were priceless to hear. I also went and filled up some water balloons for them to play with. I don't know what I expected them to do with them except throw them on the ground in front of them, but of course, they were MUCH more creative than that. Preston took his and walked right over to the railing and threw his right over the top...they went crazy excited when they saw it land on the grass down below. I couldn't fill up balloons fast enough for them! I am glad that Clark has a good buddy that he enjoys hanging out with. Since he left, Clark decides he needs Preston every once in a while for something and he runs to the door and shouts "Preston, WHERE ARE YOU?"

Cuppy Cakes

Clark loves cupcakes. Well, I must clarify. He loves anything that has massive amounts of sugar in it. I decided to be a good mom today and bake some with him. I got him all excited for it, and he was up on a chair by the counter and I was pulling all of my ingredients out to make them i.e. betty crocker cake mix box, vegetable oil, water, and eggs...

WHAT! NO EGGS??!!! I looked at Clark and he got the sadest sweetest look on his face when I said we had no eggs so we couldn't make his cuppy cakes. I felt so bad that I decided to go wake up poor Andrew who had just gone down for a nap not 20 minutes previous and load my kids into the car just to go to the store to get some eggs. Going out shopping with two little kids by myself can be kind of an ordeal so I try to lump all my errands into one or two days a week so that I can get it all done at once...so this was a big deal for me to do this JUST for some eggs...but apparently Clark knows how to work THE FACE so that he gets what he wants.

But, I have to say...it was totally worth it.