I knew it!

Doesn't this look like the face of a girl who knows what she's talking about?

I mean, back at the beginning of February, when we were suspecting expecting but hadn't confirmed those suspicions, Elodie started throwing some pretty sweet little requests into her prayers, "please bless our family with a new baby girl" and things of that nature--always a girl baby. It somehow seemed like she knew; not only that a baby was coming, but that it was going to be a little girl. And so, even though I've never had very strong inclinations about whether I was carrying a girl or a boy, this time, I've felt like it's probably a girl, and told people as much when they've asked me my guess. And I think I was just persuaded by Elodie's unwavering conviction that "it's going to be a girl baby." She just seems to know.

Well, this morning, we had the whole family together at the ultrasound, and when the technician identified the girl parts, Elodie said confidently, "I knew it." Now Elodie is going on to predict hair and eye color. She says yellow hair like her, but brown eyes like Daddy. When I asked, "you don't think she'll have brown hair like dad?" She said, "No, that would be weird!" Hey, what do I know? She's the girl who knows what she's talking about.

We are so excited to welcome another daughter this fall. Wouldn't it be fun if she came on my birthday? She's due right around then (October 12th)!

Like Father, Like Son

These guys have a lot in common. Xander got dressed after Aaron had left for school, but they were somehow in sync with the simple jeans a a T-shirt look that day. And take a look at their shoes.

Somehow, Aaron and Xander manage to completely wear out shoes in a couple of months. But I can wear shoes for years and still not have a single hole in the toe or bare spot on the sole. Take my work-in-the-yard shoes, for example. They ran a half marathon (not with me in them, but with the cousin who kindly handed her stinky tennis shoes down to me) before I was even married and they are still going strong. They're dirty and shabby and fully functional. But with Aaron and Xander? Their shoes have to be thrown away--they're not even good enough to function as work-in-the-yard shoes. What do those guys do to their shoes?

So it was getting to the point where Aaron and Xander's shoes should have been thrown away a month or two ago, but living by my favorite depression motto, "Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without," I stalled as long as I could. Finally, we saw a sale and found Aaron this great pair of running shoes for a great deal. Unfortunately, the store didn't carry Xander's size, so he went home empty-handed (or empty-footed, as the case may be). Well, Xander thought that Dad's new shoes were pretty much the coolest shoes ever made. In fact, the next day, when he was requesting a specific cup color, he informed me that his new favorite colors were orange and gray. Luckily we have an orange cup. Even more luckily, as we were walking through the store a week or so later, Xander reminded me to go to the shoe section, and what did he find? His very own pair of orange and gray shoes. He was ecstatic!

Being Polite Could Save Your Life

For our FHE activity Monday night, we played Doctor to help Aaron prepare for the practical portion of his Entrance to Third Year Exam the following morning, where he would have pretend patients and pretend to get their medical histories, do physicals, diagnose them, counsel them, and such. So we got out the kids' medical kit and were having fun faking catastrophes and quickly being restored to health by the amazing Doctors.

When it was Aaron's turn to be the patient and Xander was the Doctor, Aaron was doing quite a dramatic rendition of a heart attack. When he fell upon the floor, Dr. Xander auscultated (that's Aaron's fancy word for listened) with his stethoscope and announced that his heart wasn't even beating. After several vigorous shocks with the blood pressure cuff, Xander auscultated once again and declared excitedly that his heart was beating again--he was better! Like a thorough physician, Dr. Xander proceeded to counsel his patient. "You need to be more polite and take smaller bites. When you swallowed the whole hamburger, it got stuck in your heart and gave you a heart attack. So you just need to take smaller bites, OK?"

What perfect advice. The laughter that ensued certainly helped reduce Aaron's risk of heart attack due to exceeding levels of stress that night! It was just what the doctor (or midlevel provider, as the case may be) ordered.

Our Mountain Getaway: Togetherness

One year ago today, I entitled my post "Families Can Be Together Forever." We spent a couple days of Aaron's Spring Break celebrating that truth with some togetherness time in the beautiful Rocky Mountains. (Courtesy of the thoughtful generosity of his PA School classmates--we can't thank you enough!) We had so much fun sledding together, drinking hot chocolate together, swimming together, eating out together, eating in together, trudging through the snow together, roasting marshmallows together, reading stories by the fire together, playing crazy eights together, building a snowman and snowdog together, snuggling up in our cozy cabin together, reading the scriptures together, singing songs together, and enjoying the gorgeous mountain scenery together.

It was the perfect time to share something worth celebrating with our kiddos. I decided I'd give them a big clue and let them guess.

Me: "Have you noticed anything about my tummy lately?"
Xander: "It's getting bigger because there's a baby growing in there."
Elodie: "It's just getting fat like Daddy's."

Who do you think was right on the money?

(This picture was taken on Apr. 8, when I was 13 weeks along.)

Good Clean(ish) Fun

Elodie is quite a well-rounded young lady, thanks to the influence of her big brother. She is quite opinionated and doesn't usually appreciate my suggestions about what she should wear. She does not like to wear jeans and LOVES to wear skirts with fun tights. Some days her outfits even almost match, like her purple day above. So that part of her is pretty obviously girlie. Yet she tells me she wants to play football when she grows up, even though she sees the amount of tackling it involves when she watches Nolan and Xander play football in the family room. Do you think she's got the build for it?

She also enjoys shooting bow and arrows with her brother, who was kind enough to insist that I make a bow for Elodie after he finally got me to help him make one for himself. The hanger with tied-together rubber bands ended up working out pretty well; much better than the splintery shards of wood Xander was bringing in from the garage when he was trying to make a bow all on his own. And the quick drawing of a target was a good substitute for me and Elodie as the prime targets. If only dad wasn't gone studying all the time, he'd make a pretty good target...

And when I was distracted, she found a highlighter and out came some more girliness. "Mom, it's just eyeliner!"

Yes, she is wearing a Princess Cinderella dress, but she just "launched a missile" complete with sound effects. For the record, I always call them rockets, not missiles. Where does she learn these things?

Oh, yeah, from my little space engineer. He currently hoards toilet paper rolls and the like so he'll have the materials when an idea strikes him. I think his favorite thing I bought him lately was a roll of masking tape. I believe this was a rocket that morphed into a jet that has the capacity to scoop up water to put out forest fires. Yes, these projects do result in a trail of paper, cardstock, and tape scraps, but it is so fun to see his creativity blossom! And he's not too bad at cleaning up after himself, either! This stage of life is just good, clean(ish) fun! Do I have to send him to all-day kindergarten in the fall?

Olympic Celebration

Some of our fun friends came over for dinner last night. They happen to be Canadians. And the other fun friends who came thought it would be fun to bring a Canadian dessert in honor of said friends (and the Olympics, of course). This friend is a trained pastry chef, so I knew it would be a winner. If any of you are looking for a fun Canadian treat to munch while you watch the Olympics, try Nanaimo Bars! Yum, yum! Warning: the recipe does sound a bit involved--you may feel like a pastry chef as you make them!
And since we ate them after a heaping serving of vegetable & lentil curry over brown rice, I really didn't feel too bad about enjoying these little beauties!

You're toast!

Elodie and Xander are both pretty into cardboard swords these days. It started a few weeks ago when Xander's primary teacher gave him a CTR shield made of cardstock with some yarn attached to it. He didn't think a necklace shield was too cool, so he asked me to put a handle on it. And once I showed him my armor-making skills, the requests for new swords and shields have just kept coming. Because cardboard swords bend and break, you see. And Xander has no tolerance for a floppy sword. Or sometimes, you're at Aunt Melayna's and you both forgot your swords, so you both have to beg and beg to have new ones made right then and there. And gratefully, Aunt Melayna's a softie. When we were gone in Florida for 4 days, Xander came home with a new cardboard sword made by Uncle Milan. And, call me silly, but the fact that he had written "Ctr" on it made me feel much better about the sword fetish.