Yesterday, I was really feeling like this baby wanted to come on Leap Year Day. Without going into too much detail, there was the nausea/ lack of appetite that I’ve had with other babies on delivery day and the gotta-go feeling if you know what I mean. Aaron came home from work early. We both canceled our evening commitments at Church and broke the bad news to Xander that he’d have to miss hockey. By the kids' bedtime, contractions were 5-6 minutes apart. I kept waking up once I went to bed. I was a little bummed when I woke up at 12:03 and realized I had missed my chance for a leap year baby. Then around 3:30am, just after Xander came into our room to inform us he had a stomachache, contractions seemed to stop and I slept fine.
And today? Xander woke up this morning disappointed that there was no baby to meet; he said he thought he heard something going on last night. Sorry, bud, that was just me going to the bathroom. Gratefully the nausea has mostly left and my appetite partially returned, still the gotta-go feeling, but only the occasional contraction. Pretty much, it feels like nothin' is really going anywhere. Although I am having a mild contraction as I write this. Just enough to make us keep wondering if it'll turn into the "real thing" sooner than later. Aaron can hardly stand being at work since my track record for noticing when my labor is going somewhere isn’t very good. (With Hazel, he said we should probably go to the hospital. My reply was, “we can if you feel like we should, but I’m just tired—I wanna sleep.” We went and the baby came 13 minutes later. It makes the poor guy a bit concerned. And I have to admit that I don’t exactly want to have this baby at home with just me and the kids. Elodie is a super helpful 5-year-old, but she might be in a bit over her head with that one.)
Since we've been wondering all day yesterday and today, I guess you could say we've had a wonderful couple of days!
In January, the average temperature was 30 below, I think. Word in town has it that it was the fifth coldest month on record, ever. In February, it has been above zero everyday, generally getting up to about 20 something and at least 3 times, getting above freezing! The weekend before Elodie’s birthday, the last Sunday in January, our thermometer on the deck said it was 44 below. We still went to Church that day (only sacrament meeting was held) and some people said the thermometers at their houses read 55 or even 60 below! In other words, January was SERIOUSLY COLD! Just a couple of days later, on Elodie’s birthday, it was exactly 80 degrees warmer at 36 above; as I played with her outside and enjoyed the sunshine on my face, I think I felt every single one of those 80 degrees (not 80 above zero, but 80 above the weekend temps!). February has felt like a heat wave. I am loving it!
In January, it seemed like everything was at a standstill due to extreme cold—no hockey practice, no outdoor recess, no Sunday School, no library story time, no playing outside. And there was one self-imposed “no.” After the treat fest of the holidays, we had decided to have a no-sugar January to start the new year off on a healthier note. It seemed like a great idea in December. When January hit, it seemed like a terrible idea! During a month that cold and dark, saying no to my favorite hobby of baking (and eating) cookies, brownies, muffins, granola, etc. is not healthy!
In January, we started off the month with only 4 hours of daylight per day. At this point in February, we’re enjoying about 9 1/2 hours of daylight. Huge difference! Oh, February, I love you!
And speaking of February lovin’, on Valentine’s Day, we got Xander’s “substitute uncle,” as he calls him, to babysit and actually went out for a night on the town. We tried out Delta Junction’s Asian joint, The Hard Wok Café, and it was rather tasty. Since there were no crowds at all, just one other table even occupied, we were done with dinner and we’d only been gone about an hour. We actually had a babysitter; we didn’t want to just go home at 7:15! But what to do in our little town after we were totally stuffed…? All we could think of was to get some ice cream at the IGA and sit at the tables by the fire that they have in there. Yeah, going to the grocery store. But lucky for us, as we got out of the car at IGA, we looked up and saw the Northern Lights!
They usually only come out in the middle of the night, not early evening! In fact, in our 8 months here in Alaska, we had seen them only once before when Aaron was on call and dragged me out of bed at 2am so I wouldn’t miss out. This Aurora Borealis show was bright enough that we could see it even with the streetlights in the IGA parking lot! So we bought some ice cream and drove to a field where we could see the sky better (since there are towering trees everywhere here) and were about ready to just enjoy the romantic Valentine’s light show—who says there’s nothing to do in the country—when the babysitter called wondering if we were on our way home. Apparently, after Xander and Elodie were in bed, Hazel noticed that mom wasn’t there and was getting a bit concerned. We marveled—briefly—at the dancing bands of green light all across the sky and headed home.
Last Saturday as we were coming home from a party at the Church, the Northern Lights were out again and the kids got to see them. They were highly impressed. I tell ya, what’s not to love about February?
I think the only thing that could top February off for me is to have a healthy baby boy born on the last day of the month—Leap Day! Wouldn’t that be fun? Not too likely, though, I generally hold off until right around my due date. But I’ll be 38 weeks, it could happen…
Saturday morning, as we were cleaning the house so we’d be able to go to the fireworks that evening, Xander asked, “Mom, is it Independence Day?” We could pretend it was since fireworks were quite obviously missing from our 4th of July celebration last year. I had never really thought of it, but it made sense that you don’t do a fireworks show when it’s light all night long.
To make up for it, I guess, our town hosts an annual Festival of Lights on the weekend of the HS basketball tournament, with ice sculpting,
a polar bear plunge, and fireworks at 7:00pm. We just parked our car facing the town park where they were launching the fireworks, squished all five of us into the front seat (I love the Beast), whipped out a fresh batch of Puppy Chow, and had a perfect view of the fireworks. My favorite part was listening to Hazel’s response, her darling little voice saying “Wow!” with genuine wonder at all of her favorite fireworks. Priceless. It was actually a really good fireworks show, too; way to go Delta!
On the real Independence Day, we spent the morning unpacking since our moving truck had arrived just the Friday before.
We wanted to do something 4th of Julyish besides wear our patriotic best, so we went to town looking for fun. There was no town celebration like they’d had in previous years (based on the 2009 Delta Junction Visitor's Guide that Aaron picked up on his first trip to Alaska), but we were able to find the town park and played some baseball, which made Xander’s day, at least.
Besides the all-American fun of family baseball, we discovered our first wild strawberry—exciting and tasty.
Then we dropped by the IGA (the only grocery store in town) and Aaron and the kids convinced me to buy some hot dogs (yuck) in another attempt to make the day seem like it was actually the 4th of July. There would be no fireworks, but we could have a fire. Aaron made a fire right in our front yard for roasting the hot dogs—gotta love living in the country. And Elodie chose to wear knickerbockers in honor of our founding fathers, I presume. (Funny how tights under capris change the whole look—it wasn’t quite warm enough for bare legs. Notice Aaron’s long sleeves. Yeah, in July.)
It was a beautiful day and we had a great time together, with just our fun little family. And it almost felt like Independence Day. Minus the critical component of fireworks. Better late than never. Happy 11th of February, everybody!
One of my favorite things is watching a child’s excitement over the small things, like a few balloons and streamers that you discover when you get up on your birthday morning. I treasure it so much that I consciously try to limit the huge exciting fun type things (like going to the zoo, an amusement park, Disneyland) so that the small things still seem really exciting. I like being able to just enjoy the simple things in life, like a birthday at home with lavender balloons and streamers.
Look at how excited she was all day to open the few small little birthday presents that were there on the counter when she woke up. I think anticipation is half the fun, so I told her she had to wait until at least after dinner, but she could choose if she wanted to do cake first or presents first. She chose presents.
For Elodie, I think being in charge of things on her birthday is a huge part of the fun. Around here, you get to pick what we eat for every meal on your birthday. (With Mom guiding those choices towards reasonable ones.) Chocolate chip waffles and smoothies for breakfast, mac ‘n’ cheese with mixed vegetables and ice cream for lunch, and tater tot casserole (which I think I’ve made one other time in my life, per Aaron’s birthday request) and red peppers for dinner. (Well, most of us had salad with red peppers and lots of other veggies in it, but Elodie just wanted the red peppers with ranch. All right, you’re the queen. For today.)
Here’s a sure sign that she’s growing up—she picked her birthday cake based on taste rather than looks for the first time. Instead of a butterfly cake or a princess cake or a castle cake, she chose a berry cheesecake. Yum! Made sense to me—last year she was super excited about her giant castle cake, but ate only one bite of it on her birthday because she’s not really that into cake and there was ice cream competing with it so the choice was clear. (I did have to inform her this year that ice cream doesn’t go with cheesecake, which is why we had to squeeze the ice cream in after lunch instead of with the “cake.”) The girl loves cheesecake and enjoyed every bite of her first and second piece. Such mature taste, don’t you think?
Since she is getting so grown up, for the first time in her life, I let her invite a bunch of girls over for a friend party the Saturday after her birthday. We hosted a fancy “tea” party with all the girls in their favorite party dresses. Elodie was so excited to be the hostess and serve the food and the hot cocoa. Like I said, she kinda likes being in charge. She even practiced pouring hot water from the teapot so she’d be ready for the big day. She chose the menu of mini-pizzas, olives, red peppers, pineapple, and oranges, followed by hot cocoa or pink lemonade with lemon bars, sugar cookies, and mini cupcakes. I had to convince her that we didn’t need to have cheesecake both days.
I haven’t done much in the way of friend parties so I’m learning as I go (in Colorado, we had aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents to make it plenty of fun). I made the mistake of inviting whoever Elodie wanted, figuring that people are busy and maybe half would come. Somewhere I heard the wise advice of having no more than one friend for every year old the kid is. I thought 5 girls would be a lovely-sized group. But everyone we invited was able to come, so we had 10 girls and not all of them would even fit around our table! I felt bad for the ones exiled to the stools at the counter! It may have been a bit livelier than I had anticipated, and my giant belly and I may have been a bit exhausted by the end of that day, but I think fun was had by all, especially by the birthday girl herself. I just adore my helpful, happy, smart, funny, graceful, girly, tough little five-year-old! I’m going to miss her so much when I send her off to kindergarten in the fall!
But I can’t just keep my little Rapunzel locked up in her tower forever, so off she’ll go and I’ll just have a young toddler and little baby like I did 5 years ago. Elodie was SO excited when she got this present in a package in the mail; she just loves Tangled. Far cooler than any of the simple presents her parents got her. (One of which was a hand-me-down dress that was in great condition and I saved for a couple years while she grew into it, and the other ones things that I had ordered online for Christmas but they didn’t get here in time. Shhhhh.)
Hazel finally learned to walk! Following in her brother and sister’s “footsteps,” she learned to walk at 15 months. But with the other two, I don’t remember being quite as eager for them to reach this milestone. I knew they’d walk eventually and that they were easier to catch when they were less mobile. Plus, walking late means being old enough to understand a lot and follow basic directions, further helping them stay out of trouble. This time around, with another baby coming so soon, I was really eager for Hazel to hit this big milestone and move from babyhood into toddlerhood so I would feel like it really was time for a new baby. Thank you, Hazel, for pulling through for me. Just in the nick of time—I have just a month and a half left! My tiny girl is now officially a toddler. I love watching her toddle around in that darling, wide-legged, shaky on her feet stance.
For a few weeks, she had been able to take 3 or 4 steps at a time if she really felt like it, but she didn’t usually feel like it. Her favorite time for walking practice was family scripture study or family home evening, when she had a good, supportive audience gathered together. We’d say the opening prayer and start to read, and Hazel would completely divert our attention away from reverently sitting and focusing on the scriptures over to her while she practiced standing and walking amid excited cheers. January 17 was the big breakthrough night for her, when she picked up her favorite blanket (also following her siblings footsteps, she is a total blanket baby and showed clear favoritism months ago for one Aunt Nancy knitted) for security, I guess, and started to walk all around the room. Despite how much the blanket kept tripping her up, she insisted on dragging it around with her. I really try to keep the blanket in her bed, but her siblings are such softies when she wants it!
Hazel can walk if she gets LOADS of attention for it!
The next morning, Hazel was scooting around as usual (for the record, she could do a normal crawl, but she is somehow faster at the Elodie scoot and normally used that as her means of transportation) and I said, “Hazel, can you stand up and walk?!” She looked right at me and did her all done sign. I guess I wasn’t enough of an audience for her. Gradually, every day since then, she’s walked around more and more and now walking is her main way of getting around. Except for stairs, when the feet first, belly slide is by far the fastest (and safest) way to go.
Since Christmas, we’ve only had the full three hour block of Church once. Here’s our stake’s policy for extreme cold temps: if it’s between 30 below and 40 below, you only have two hour church, consisting of sacrament meeting and Relief Society/Priesthood; if it’s 40 below or colder, you only have sacrament meeting and you are encouraged to use wisdom in making the decision about leaving your house. Yesterday we just had sacrament meeting. About half of the people left their cars running, including us. Yes, we just left our car idling in the parking lot for an hour and a half. It seems so weird to me. Xander was pretty worried that we would run out of gas by doing that, but Aaron was more concerned about the car not starting after sitting at 40 below for an hour and a half, even if it was plugged in. When I said something about the waste of gas, Aaron said it was merely using gas, not wasting gas, all in the name of protecting our car from various parts freezing and cracking and costing us loads of money.
I must say, his concerns were valid. Just the day before, Aaron was stuck in Fairbanks where it was 45 below (and yes, these are just straight temps, wind chill not factored in) and although the car was plugged in and we winterized our car by installing heaters on everything that can be heated, the Beast would not start. Apparently it didn’t like sitting outside in longterm parking at the airport for 3 days. Gratefully, he was blessed with an angel of mercy who gave a jumpstart, and gratefully, the Beast came to life with the jumpstart which means the gas hadn’t frozen yet. Phew. And hooray for our heated garage so this is not normally an issue!
We came up to the Last Frontier for adventure, and I guess this is the adventure of surviving an Alaskan winter!
We watched a show on Netflix called Extreme Alaska about Denali National Park. The tidbit I found the most fascinating was the one animal that can survive living in a glacier. It’s called the ice worm, and it thrives at below zero temps. In fact, it actually melts if it ever gets to 40 degrees. To that little worm, 40 above is extreme heat! Pretty wild! Alaska is definitely extreme, but hey, so is my husband. It’s a match made in heaven.
Christmas felt absolutely perfect this year. Just full of that unique joy and peace and excitement and love and fun that is Christmas. I was a little dubious Christmas Eve morning, when my mom called to ask for a recipe and I teared up thinking about how EVERYBODY (except Morgan and wife) were together there in Colorado and we were missing out completely. But as any grown woman does, I dried my tears and got busy cleaning and baking and preparing for our own Christmas Eve Celebration. As I’ve mentioned, I love my traditions, so I invited two families over to our Christmas Eve dinner and program--that way I get to be in charge, and I feel in my element.
Although it seemed that the Ruiz family was doomed not to make it, with lost keys (which they found over an hour later in the dumpster!) and a car that wouldn’t start once they finally did find the keys, the evening bounced back once they arrived and the party really started. Since I babysit their kids, it wasn’t too hard to get them prepped in advance for the Nativity program.
For weeks they had been excited about their roles, and whenever we sang a Christmas carol that mentioned an angel or a shepherd, they would say, “Alex, that’s you,” or “Elodie—the angel, you’re the angel!” And little three-year-old Lanna would have to add that she and Hazel were going to be the sheep! Xander was at school for most of this excitement, but Joseph doesn’t actually have any lines to memorize, so xander seemed willing to fill the role. Until it came time to put on the costume. I don’t know if he took issue with the fact that it resembled a dress or just wasn’t in the mood to be in front of a crowd, but he was not feeling the role of Joseph. At all. After a little conversation about how silly it would look if I had to play Joseph with my big belly and reminding him that sometimes, we do things not because we want to but because it makes other people happy, namely me, the show went on. Luckily, the donkey was hilarious and helped Xander snap out of his funk and into the giggles pretty quickly. That and Hazel the sheep who just wanted to grab the “Baby!” (her favorite and best-enunciated word) right out of his manger, causing Joseph and Mary to switch seamlessly from their role as adoring new parents to vigilant manger guards. Everyone had a great time with it and I don’t think I was the only one who felt the resounding peace and joy as we read the real story of Christmas from the scriptures.
After regaining our strength by heavily sampling the treat platter, it was chime time. Ah, it felt like home. Did I mention how much I appreciated Aaron’s Christmas present this year? I love seeing the excitement on the chimers faces as the tune is really coming together and we finish the song and they just want to do it again! Christmas music is the best!
We ended the night by reading “Twas the Night Before Christmas” and leaving Santa his plate of cookies before saying goodbye to our friends and tucking the little ones all snug in their beds. I just love how excited our kids get! For me, the anticipation of Christmas morning is about as much fun as the real thing!
I think that’s why the Christmas morning breakfast in the bedroom before discovering the stockings and presents is a must for me. It draws out the anticipation of the morning! This year, we enjoyed Alaskan-grown, Alaskan-made reindeer sausage in addition to our usual fare of orange rolls and hash brown breakfast bake. Do you think eating reindeer for Christmas is festively fitting or atrociously appalling? Xander and Elodie were obviously savoring every bite!
The anticipation of lining up on the stairs…
I am so glad that Xander hasn’t grown out of his excitement. His reaction was perfect—“Ahh! Toy Story Train Lego Set—this is what I wanted all year!”
Elodie’s gratitude and excitement were equally endearing. Man, is there anything better than watching your kids enjoy Christmas morning so thoroughly?
Hazel enjoyed her cell phone from Santa and opening presents, too, but not as much as she enjoyed the contents of Xander’s stocking that he left on the floor! I loved watching Xander and Elodie open the presents they had gotten for each other. “Wow, a tank, I love it!” “I thought you would like it!” “Elodie, you are the best sister. I really wanted this!!” “It’s beautiful, Xander! I wanted a ring just like this!” And so on. Aw, absolutely adorable. In every way, it was just what Christmas morning should be.
Then we all put on our Christmas best and headed to Church. A young man who had just returned from a mission to South Africa spoke, and then we had a wonderful Christmas program. Perhaps it felt especially wonderful because I was up singing with the choir while Gine Kirk juggled Hazel and the other two! The chapel was packed, and as I looked out over the crowd, I just felt such love for the wonderful members of the branch up here. After sacrament meeting was over, it was like no one wanted to leave yet, even though we were only having the one hour of Church (and it had gone over by at least a half an hour). Everyone just milled around, exchanging Christmas greetings and presents and cards and treats. I felt so at home and so loved. Aaron’s home teaching companion, who is about to leave on a mission, has been like an uncle to the kids and brought each of them the perfect present. I think he gave Xander his 7th Lego set of the day, and he was no less grateful than with the first. He had that Toy Story Army guy jeep built before our dinner guests even arrived. The Davis family, with their 6 children, 4 of them Lego-loving boys, spent the afternoon with us. The kids played and played and we munched appetizers and prepped dinner and chatted and everyone enjoyed a perfect Christmas afternoon. We are so grateful for the friends we’ve made in Alaska and for this, the most wonderful time of year.
