500 square feet

When six people are living in 500 square feet, it only takes a small change to really change things up and get people excited.  Today I shifted furniture around again for, oh, probably the 20th time since living here.  When you have six people living in 500 square feet the quest for space solutions is never and I mean never ending.  Moving the couch to a different wall never fails to remind my kids what couches are for:  jumping and flipping for hours on end.  But I am okay with couch jumping because, in the case that you missed it, there are six of us living in a very very small apartment in the middle of winter...

rain and monsters

Today we got caught in the rain.  It was a lovely moment when we finally felt raindrops.  The anticipation had been there for quite some time.  Phin was clad in his monster footies for no particular reason.  He rediscovered them this morning after a summer hiatus and insisted putting them on mid-day. Maybe he sensed the heaviness in the clouds and knew that maybe, just maybe the fuzzy warmness that those monsters provided would come in handy.  

island girls (and boy)

Jacob assures me that it is safe for children to play in rivers where ducks live, and for that matter excrete waste.  So I am going to trust him on this because it

 provides hours of entertainment in the form of a game called "island girls".  Let's just hope the BYU police don't come by and cite me for allowing my children to play in their creek.   Me and the BYU police....reminds me that I need to go pay my most recent fifty dollar fine.

my little tomatoe

 

I think Skye is upset with me.  She is mad that I always forget to put sunscreen on her.  Apparently babies can still get sunburned in the shade.  Without fail Skye always ends up looking like a little tomatoe.  But it makes her that much more edible, I suppose.  Happy summer to you all!

It's official

It is officially my birthday.  And I am officially not starting out my new year right by going to bed before midnight.  My new year, because to me, a birthday is much more significant than any "new years" celebration.  I have always felt that a birthday signifies a new chance to start over again in one's life.  To make the coming year better than the last.  And in my case, this is coupled with spring time.  Not until recent years have I come to appreciate this gift and see how fitting it is that my birthday falls during this time of year.  I don't get along very well with winter.  Oh, maybe that has something to do with the fact that I am the primary caregiver to four small children in a very small space.  about 550 square feet to be exact.  But that is a subject for another day.

The fact is, I am now looking at my clock on the wall that is accurate again since the daylight savings time change.  This is exciting for a few reasons:  more daylight, and I don't have to mentally subtract an hour from the time that I see on the clock everyday.  Don't ask me why we never changed it the last time around...maybe I was in denial that dark afternoons would be my lot for the next 5 months.  But in the end neglecting that small detail made my life easier on Sunday when I didn't have to manually get my clock off the wall and change it, like most other people in the country had to do.  I like the few occasions in life when things like this happen.  Like the other night, I fell asleep in my day clothing.  This neglect actually served me well the next morning as I was able to avoid the usual two (okay, sometimes ranging to seven) hour chunk of time when I have too many mouths to feed, dirty diapers to change, and tears to kiss away, to get out of my pajamas.  I was dressed and ready to go.  It really was such a simple solution that I might take up sleeping in my clothes every night.  So the next time you think you're avoiding a task, consider the fact that you very well might be setting yourself up for success.  But let's be honest, I should probably work on being proactive about tasks at hand this upcoming year.  I'll let you know how it goes :)
 

forget the european mullet

Although this happened a few months back, it still fills me with pride that Gracie produced such a work of art on Ellie.  Even with all of my training, I don't know if I could reproduce this.  I mean, look at that disconnection.  

                                           

So if you want to ensure a great haircut, look for a stylist who uses crayola scissors.  And consider throwing on your bathing suit for the occasion.

I cried when I read this. Cried because even though the logistics of changing a diaper and knowing how to clean up a crib full of throw-up like what greeted me this morning, are much easier than when I was new to it all, the emotional adjustment that accompanies a complete change in one's identity is still ongoing for me. There are days when I long to feel that feigned importance of having classes to attend and a job to report to. When, simply put, everything in my life revolved around...me. And since "me" is not a very high maintenance person, not much energy was expended in keeping care of myself :) I could slide by with grocery shopping maybe a couple times a month, and live off oatmeal and peanut butter. I could put off doing laundry for as long as I dared. I could be with myself and my own thoughts without being interrupted. Yes, I know that you're probably thinking that not much has changed. And that is part of the problem, I will admit.

But what has changed is the presence of JPEG in my life. Oh how I love them. And maybe that is the other reason why I cried. Because try as I might to take mental photographs of every little moment that fills me with wonder, I know these days are fleeting. That Phineas will soon be running instead of displaying his tentative bow-legged waddle. That Ellie will soon be proficient at pronouncing "tr" instead of substituting the sound with an "f" (although, that will be less of a shock to my ears when she relentlessly yells at me to look at the "truck"). And that Gracie will not constantly be at my side gifting complements to every stranger she sees; the very compliments that I think of but have lost the child-like purity and fearlessness to voice. And even our days of living on love, with absolutely no money, might one day be a thing of the past.

And so the next time I bemoan to Jacob that my youthfulness and prime of life is wasting away in this basement apartment of ours, I will stop. Because when I am completely honest with myself, I know now that I really didn't have anything of huge importance to do before all this. I think I thought I did. And it was easy to convince myself that I was good at whatever I was doing. But now I'm engulfed in the real thing. I am not just pretending to be someone important anymore. And sometimes this scares me. But most of the time it has me laughing, crying, teaching, playing, sometimes cleaning, but mostly loving.