My Drama Queen

I'm starting to think that Grace is very advanced. Let me explain. Although she will not be 2
until November, Grace has already advanced to the "terrible twos." This child has become my FIT QUEEN. You never know what's going to set her off. Here are a few examples...

A couple of weeks ago, after a WIC appointment, we still had a little time before Scott was going to be getting home, so I decided to run to the mall to see if I could get a price adjustment on any of the clothes I had bought at the Gap 2 weeks previously. I knew we were cutting it close on time, but I didn't think it would be a big deal. And of course, being the good mom that I am, I figured dangling the bribe of an ice cream cone in front of my kids if they behaved would help to make the trip smoother. And of course, with my luck, I was stuck with the most incompetent sales clerk I've ever encountered in my life. Seriously, what is so difficult about a price adjustment? She had to leave us twice to go and ask her manager how to do something and I swear she was gone for like 10 minutes each time. As the minutes were ticking by, I was realizing there was no way we were going to make it home in time to try and make something for dinner. Especially if we were going to get those ice cream cones. Fortunately, Ethan provided me with the opportunity to yank that bribe out from under them as he was running all around the store, in and out of clothes while we waited for the sales clerk to get back. When he finally ran into another little girl and pushed at her as he did so, I was able to tell them no more ice cream cones when we were done (incidentally, in reference to the previously posted endeavors to teach kindness, when I asked Ethan if he had pushed that little girl, he looked at me for a second with his head tilted to the side and then said, "no mom, I said 'Hi!'" Apparently the next lessons we will be working on are honesty). Anyway, back to the story at hand. When we were finally done at the Gap, I felt really bad about not letting them have any treat, because after all, we were there forever, and they were relatively well-behaved, so we went to Cold Stone and I let them get a sample spoon of ice cream. Nice.

So, here's where we get to the Grace part. Once I pushed the stroller to our car, I took her sample spoon from her so I could unbuckle her and get her in the car seat, and I made the mistake of eating some of her ice cream to keep it from melting off the side. WOW. She was NOT happy about that. Did it matter that I pretended to put the ice cream back on the spoon? No. Did it matter that I gave it right back and tried to put it in her mouth to shut her up? No. In fact, nothing I did helped as she proceeded to throw a fit at the top of her lungs till she was red in the face and hardly breathing and her lips were turning blue all the while I'm trying to get her and Ethan buckled in their carseats so we can hurry and get home and try to scrounge something up for dinner. Well, as I was driving, I made the split-second executive decision to go to Wendy's on the way home, and by the time we got to the drive-thru, Grace had quieted down. At this point, I turned around and patted her little leg and told her I was sorry and that I loved her and this set her off anew. She KICKED my hand away from her legs and wouldn't let me touch her or look at her as she picked right back up where she left off with her screaming fit. Which continued pretty much the rest of the car ride home. Lesson #1 learned -- DO NOT TAKE GRACE'S FOOD WITHOUT ASKING HER FIRST. And also, don't try to comfort her before she's ready to be comforted.

The next incident will be a little shorter. On Friday, I took the kids to the library (where we haven't gone pretty much at all this summer) and I gave Ethan and Grace some crackers to eat for a snack in the car on our way there. Well, once we got to the library, I took the crackers away explaining that we can't eat in the library and Grace geared herself up for another rant and rave. For the first 15 minutes we were there, you would have thought I had her straitjacketed in her stroller or something for all the fuss she was putting up. She snapped out of it in like a split-second as soon as she saw a giant stuffed Elmo perched in a window sill by the story circle. Then for the rest of the outing she was happy as a clam dragging this Elmo everywhere she went. Lesson #2 learned -- DO NOT TAKE GRACE'S FOOD BEFORE SHE IS FINISHED. I'm beginning to notice a pattern here.

For, the last story, I have an actual picture of the fit. Before lunch today, Grace remembered that there was a bag of tootsie rolls hidden in the cabinet and decided she wanted one instead of lunch. So, after I told her she had to wait until she ate her sandwich, she proceeded to throw an all-out fit for the next 15 minutes straight, until finally I snapped it out of her by taking a bite of her sandwich (I guess I didn't learn the first lesson very well) and she then switched her fit to wanting that bite of food back from me. After I gave it back, and she unsuccessfully tried to re-attach to her sandwich, she must have realized that she really was hungry and she stopped crying and started eating. Lesson #3 learned -- WHEN IT COMES TO FOOD, DON'T MESS WITH GRACE.

(watch the fit unfold)


(aren't I a mean mom to try and take pictures when she's so unhappy?)

Alright, enough of these anecdotes. I'm sure you all have your own stories of children throwing fits and you don't want to hear anymore of mine!

We had a lovely 4th of July. Mostly because Scott didn't have to work Monday either, and he's finally done with those independent study classes, so all of a sudden we feel like we have so much more time! Scott decided to take the kids on an outing one of the mornings at the crack of dawn to see the hot air balloons that were part of the city's freedom festival. The kids really loved it, and I really loved sleeping in while he took them. Here are some pictures of their fun.

(something a little more interesting than balloons)

On the 4th of July itself, we went up to Rock Canyon Park for a family gathering on Scott's grandma's side, and the kids enjoyed themselves immensely -- mostly because they found a bucket of water to play with. I'll post a few pictures of that as well.








Well, I don't really have anything much else to report right now. This Scott's last week of work and my mom and youngest brother and sister are coming in town this week, so hopefully this will provide many more stories for me to share.

On a side note, does anyone else think LC is pathetic for sticking around with Jason? And is anyone else as excited as we are for this summer's All-Star season of Big Brother? Until next time...

My Twinsies

The older Grace gets, the more I feel like I'm raising twins! These 2 are partners in crime and have to do almost everything together. At Ethan's 3 year check-up, they BOTH got to pick out a "prize" from the doctor's office. Ethan picked out his sunglasses and Grace wanted some, too. So here's a picture of my little twinsies.

I'm including another picture -- potentially very sad for those of you who mentored over at good old Joaquin Elementary School. Joaquin is no longer. They've taken over Farrer Junior High and turned it into Farrer Elementary School. The old building was empty for a while, and the day I noticed they had bulldozed it to the ground I was shocked! It made me kind of sad for a split second. I spent a lot of time over in that building mentoring in Ms. Heileson's class -- not to mention lots of time playing on Joaquin's field and playground. Here's a shot of the now leveled site of the former Joaquin Elementary School. The orange fence kind of obscures the view, but there's really nothing to see there anymore. *sniff*


On a final note, a friend of mine who has moved wants to keep up a food and book club of sorts in a blogspot fashion (see the link on the left). So, if you're interested in contributing to it, let me know and I'll email you the username and password. For all those of you who "don't read" -- Emily and Sarah -- it is also a site to post up new recipes or things you've tried that you love. So, everyone please check it out! I think it will be lots of fun if we have a lot of contributors.

Okay, I have a really funny story about Grace, but it will have to wait for another day. I'm tired of typing. Peace out.

On Being Kind

Being kind is a big subject in our house. Having a 3 and a 1 1/2 year old, I try and stress the importance of being kind. It all started a couple of months ago...

You see, Ethan had a few run-ins with other children at the park. He's an active kid with semi-bully -ish tendencies and was having a really hard time remembering that it is not okay to hit or to push or to throw woodchips at other kids while we're playing at the park. So, in incident number 1, Ethan threw woodchips right in a little girl's face as she was coming down the slide. Now, I saw this happen and I jumped right in and grabbed Ethan, reprimanded him, made him apologize and gave him a time-out in the stroller. The mom of this kid apparently didn't think enough ado was made over the incident because she continued to brush woodchips out of her daughter's hair and face for the next 5 minutes as she sat down right next to us on the curb consoling her daughter that she was going to be okay. Now, I know my kid was in the wrong. Its not okay to throw woodchips at people, but hello?! Has her kid never done anything to hurt another child? They're just kids!

Now on to incident number 2. A few days later, we were at a different park, and this time as Ethan was sliding down the slide he rammed right into a little boy who was probably about 1 year old. Now, in Ethan's defense, I'm not sure if this was done on purpose (although it wouldn't surprise me), because I was busy helping Grace up the ladder and I didn't want her to fall. Once again, I got a semi-fussing from another parent that I needed to watch my kid to make sure he didn't hurt her little boy again because he was only 1. I think her exact words were "he needs to be careful."

So, finally we get to incident number 3, which was the straw that broke the camel's back. A couple of weeks later we were at the first park again, when the same lady and her kids were there. Now, I was just sitting on the side talking to some friends when one of them said, "uh oh, I think Ethan is pushing that little girl." So, I look up to see Ethan sitting at the top of one of the baby slides and pushing a little girl. Now, seeing as to how it was the same little girl from the woodchips incident and seeing as to how her mom was again right there, I jumped up to run over and stop Ethan, and I was half-way there when this other mom YELLS at the top of her voice right at Ethan saying (and I will use all caps because thats how loud she was yelling): "HEY! STOP PUSHING HER! YOU DON'T EVER PUSH SOMEONE WHEN THEY'RE AT THE TOP OF THE SLIDE!" What I don't get, however (and maybe you'll disagree), is that she was standing literally 2 feet from where her daughter was at the top of the slide. Two steps and she could have easily grabbed her daughter if she was in any real danger. Ethan was, once again, in the wrong, and shouldn't have been pushing. But I can't imagine yelling the way she did at someone else's child that you don't even know. The whole park literally fell silent and was staring at the incident. Needless to say I just grabbed the kids and after apologizing we just left the park.

But, I digress. The point of these stories is to show that we've been working very hard on kindness since these incidents. I have now insitituted a zero tolerance policy for the park. Ethan now knows that if he pushes or hits or throws woodchips or hurts anyone, he has to sit in the stroller until its time to go home. I'm happy to say that he has only had to endure this punishment once, and since then he has been remarkably well-behaved at the park.

Now that we've gotten that under-control, we're trying to work on our words. Specifically on eradicating the phrase "Go away" from both Ethan and Grace's vocabulary. This has become they're favorite thing to yell at people and its driving me nuts. At first I tried threatening with hot sauce -- but that didn't work. Then I tried supplying them with substitute phrases that are kind such as "hi," or "how are you?" or "do you want to be my friend?" And while that kind of works sometimes, more often than not what I hear from the kids is "go away!" followed immediately (after a quick look at me) by "Hi!" Yes my children are very charming. Its funny to hear what they're absorbing though, because the other day when they were sitting at the table, Grace yelled at Ethan to go away, he looked at her very sternly and said "Gracie, you need to be kind." Grace's new response is "go away, friend!"

Well, I thought I was going somewhere with these stories, but apparently I'm not. So, on that note I'll end for tonight. I hope everyone has a fun 4th of July. Hopefully we'll have some fun pictures to post after the weekend.

Happy, Happy Birthday, Ethan Dear!

I contemplated posting a long and detailed account of the day Ethan was born, but I thought I'd spare everyone the traumatizing details and suffice it to say that 3 years ago yesterday, Ethan entered our world! This weekend was turned into one long birthday celebration, seeing as to how the birthday itself fell on a Sunday.

To start it off, Friday evening we went to Toys R' Us to let him pick out a toy for his birthday. After being distracted by the train table for about half an hour, I finally pried him away and made him pick something out. I guess the train table inspired him, because the toy he picked out was a little Thomas the train engine. Having procured the birthday present and pulled Grace away from the Care Bears, we successfully left Toys R' Us with the train and only 2 treats from the checkout! Ethan was so absorbed in his peanut M&Ms that he didn't notice when I took the train out of the bag to hide and wrap for later. (which by the way never happened -- he ended up opening it up on Saturday to play with it before I had ever gotten around to wrapping it).

So, on Saturday we spent the morning at Grandma and Grandpa's where Ethan got an awesome watergun for his birthday, and in the afternoon we ventured back to the water park. It was the only thing that he has been asking for for his birthday for the last several weeks. So, as much as Scott and I hate the water park, we took him and he had a FABULOUS time.

We had decided that we would do the cake and singing of the birthday song on his actual birthday, so on Sunday when we got home from church, Ethan helped me make his pink cake. Yes, you heard me right. For the last couple of weeks whenever I have asked Ethan what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday, all he said was a pink cake. I couldn't get him to change his mind as much as I tried, so using a white cake mix as the base, I let Ethan add a ton of red food coloring and voila! A pink cake. (And in case you were wondering, Grace wants a green cake for her birthday, according to Ethan. I'm so glad that he can read her mind).

However, with Grace still taking a nap and Scott having to go back to Church to do his calling and stuff, Ethan was forced to postpone the joy of blowing out the candles until everyone was here. Fast forward to 7:30 PM, and we finally managed to get outside to the backyard to tape the ceremony! After not being able to light the matches for several minutes, we finally managed to light the candles and sing the song and eat the cake. I've posted several pictures of the goodness that followed (keep in mind that this is the very end of a very long day in which Ethan never took a nap). Enjoy!

Here's Ethan sharing his bounty (he helped me make the chocolate frosting for the cake).


Waiting for those darn matches to light

Still waiting

Yay!

Ta da! The pink cake

Here's Grace doing a pretty good job with a fork...

And here she is finally just digging in with her hands.


The beginning of the end...

Whew! What a day. I'll close with one last picture of my little lamb.

This weekend must have really worn him out! Here he is today where he actually fell asleep at naptime (surrounded by his treasures) for the first time in about a month.

Rize, that's the hook

Okay, is anyone else watching So You Think You Can Dance? This could be my new favorite show. Mia Michaels (judge and choreagrapher, left) is insane. Please somebody back me up on this one. Have you heard her talk about dance? She makes up words all the time. She's uber-intense. Here's a picture so y'all can see what I'm talking about. As for tonight's episode, me and Scott were so excited when we saw the first choreagrapher for Krumping -- Lil C. We literally just checked out the documentary Rize this weekend for the second time. I will issue a disclaimer for any of you who might go and check it out that not everybody's gonna like this one. BUT, I thought this documentary was AMAZING. It was so well done and gave such insight into the lives of these inner-city, underprivileged teens who have found a way to overcome the poverty and oppression of their world. I loved it, and the dancing is AMAZING as well. So, if you want to see real krumping (because what they did on So You Think You Can Dance was amateur compared to the real deal) and clown dancing, you need to watch Rize. Again, this is a potentially offensive documentary to some of you out there, but these kids' stories are heart-wrenching.



Now onto the really important things. So, its summer time. And for some reason, each summer I get the irresistible urge to perform hair experiments with Ethan. What? Yeah, hair experiments. The summer he turned one, we postponed his first haircut for so long that he was starting to look like a girl, but I just couldn't part with his little golden locks right away. Last summer, Ethan sported a mohawk for a whole week before Scott made me buzz it off. I have to say though that I missed the mohawk once it was buzzed because I did NOT like how Ethan looked with a buzzed head. I actually really hated it, and it took forever for it to grow back into a normal haircut. So, for this summer I though we'd do the opposite of a buzz. What's the opposite of a buzz you might be wondering. Well, for this summer, Ethan's hair experiment is going to be not cutting his hair at all to see how long we can get it before Labor Day. Since today is the first day of summer, I thought I'd post a Before picture, and don't worry, I'll keep you posted throughout the experiment.

(before)

Scott hasn't approved yet, but I'm already thinking forward to next summer, where I'm considering a mullet. Yes, I'm serious. Do I realize that mullets are ugly? Yes. Do I realize they're outdated? Yes. Do I realize that he will look ridiculous with one? Absolutely. But that's what makes it so fun. And funny.



Now, for a moment of nostalgia for my old roommates, Ethan, Grace and I went to DT pool this afternoon to celebrate the first day of summer. Memories. I didn't try to bring UNO, but I definitely see it in our distant future. Ethan and Grace both LOVED the pool and I think we'll happily spend many days this summer soaking up the sun. When we bought our pool pass they gave us 3 coupons for a free scoop of ice cream at the Creamery, so after we swam we went and got our free ice cream. Needless to say, the kids loved it. Here are the pictures to prove it. (Notice how they start off sitting on the bench, but by the end they've migrated to the top of the table?)









Just in case anyone is wondering, I'm still working on the quilt. Lets just say its a slow-moving process. The kids have adapted (as kids always do) and now just set up camp under the quilt whenever they need to watch TV. Here you can see them watching their favorite show -- Little Einstein's. I'm starting to get a little worried because whenever I ask Ethan who he played with in nursery, he almost always adds Annie and Leo and sometimes Quincy and June. I guess the show is really hitting their target audience with him. Oh and have I mentioned before that Grace is the world's messiest eater? Here is a picture of her after lunch yesterday. And while it looks like she's a member of the Donner-Reed Party, in actuality its just blackberry jam.





Well, to close, I'll just invite any and all comments on the Britney Spears interview with Matt Lauer on Dateline last week. Unfortunately (or fortunately) I missed it the first time around, but thank goodness for TiVo and I was able to catch it when it re-aired the next night.

Alright, peace out.

I'm Ba-aaack!

And I have so much to post!

First things first. On Saturday we attempted a family outing to the movies. Now for those of you who don't know, this weekend was the opening weekend for Pixar's latest project, Cars. So, in a spur of the moment decision, we decided to go right after lunch to try and make the 12:20 showing. Already we realized we were probably pushing it because Grace's naptime is right at that time. By the time we got there, we were too late and had to get tickets for the 12:50 showing, so 20 minutes and 20 dollars in snack food later, the four of us were sitting in the theater waiting for the movie to start. I had even brought along the camera to document this momentous occasion, seeing as to how Grace has never been to a movie in a movie theater, and the last time Ethan was in one is was for Seabiscuit when he was 3 weeks old. I wish we would have taken a picture before the movie started because the kids looked so cute sitting on their little booster seats with their popcorn snack trays in their laps and I knew deep down inside that there was no way we were going to make it through a 2 hour movie!

So, to sum it up, Grace was hilarious throughout the previews. As she was munching on her snacks, she managed to interject such exclamations of excitement as "Whoa!" and "Wooooo!" and "Yay!" (accompanied by hand clapping). However, by the time the 20 or 30 minutes of previews were over, the snacks were gone and Grace was ready to get up and play. So, I walked the aisles with her for about 15 minutes or so before Ethan and Scott joined us, because Ethan was so distracted by us leaving. Luckily we got our money back for the movie, and at least it was still a fun (kind of) experience. From what I saw of the movie, though, it looked pretty entertaining.

Whew! Okay, done with that commentary, on to the next! Oh and the above pictures were taken before we left for the movie on Saturday. Ethan found their hats in the living room and wanted to put them on along with one of my hairbands. Then he wanted to take pictures. He actually took the one of Grace.

Okay, so Saturday I finally decided I just had to bite the bullet and get the quilt frame set up. Wow, what a project. I've decided I should never start potentially frustrating projects after 10 o'clock at night because its really not fair to Scott. He usually bears the brunt of it and then I feel really guilty on top of being really frustrated. As you can see from the picture, this quilt is BIG and our apartment -- not so big. The quilt frame basically takes up our whole living room. The kids kind of think its fun. Kind of like a big tent to crawl under over and over each day. Hope they get used to it, 'cause it looks like this baby's gonna take me at least two weeks to finish the quilting! Yeah, this is a pretty big project. Luckily I'll be able to work on it every night this week for a few hours at a time seeing as to how this is crunch time for Scott. He has to finish up his two classes by the end of next week, so he's been at the library studying and doing assignments every night. Do you ever wish you could just fast forward a couple of weeks?

And now for my final update (sorry this is so long!)...

Those of you who keep up with the tabloids will have seen by now the pictures of little baby Shiloh Jolie-Pitt who supposedly has her famous mother's lips. Well, here in the Creer household we've got our own little baby Jolie-Pitt. I tried to get a picture of it (above), but you can't really make it out in the photo. Poor little Grace fell down the concrete steps outside our apartment yesterday and busted her top lip. It swelled up right away, and bled quite a bit, but our little firecracker was up and ready to play again within a few minutes. This morning, however, her upper lip is still swolen and the result is a ridiculously huge mouth for the time being. (Grace accident count -- 1).

I'm beginning to wonder if we'll have to take out a separate insurance policy for our little girl these days because she's so active (read out-of-control). This morning, we woke up to go get the kids out of bed and found the following picture(s) ready for the taking:


Yes, Grace can now climb out of the crib over the foot rail and onto the dresser. Apparently Ethan thought it was a good idea too. Oh and did I mention that Grace can also climb out of her pack 'n play? Yeah, well she can, and today during naptime she managed to somehow knock the full length mirror off the wall in my room thus hurting and scaring herself in the process (Grace accident count -- 2). This afternoon, Grace got clobbered by Ethan (and then the sidewalk) in a scuffle over the cell phone while we were outside playing (Grace accident count -- 3) and as we were coming inside, she managed to smash her big toe in the door as she was closing it (Grace accident count -- 4). The paparazzi might have more on me than Brittney Spears! Where's a manny when you need one? You may be wondering, curiously, why there are no tales of Ethan today. I have to say, my number one son has been awfully good and helpful the past few days. We drew a hopscotch on the sidewalk outside with chalk the other day, and it has become one of his favorite new things to do. And with a quilt taking up practically our whole apartment these days, we've been spending an awful lot of time outside. I think it agrees with him.

Okay, so I'm sure you're past the point of bored by now, so I won't even start on a My Life Monday...

I almost forgot the best thing of all! I ran into one of my best friends in the whole world from college randomly at the University Mall on Thursday afternoon (wow, if that isn't a run-on sentence I don't know what is). Me and Ethan and Grace were meandering through Deseret Book on our way into the mall when who should we see but Ms. Heidi Simpson and her mom. Talk about good times. The best part of all was that my kids didn't even destroy the whole place (that much) while I was chatting it up. Of course it helped that I had some loose jelly beans that I found in my purse to bribe them with... Needless to say it was so much fun to see such a good friend (and her cute little sleeping boy). I was just sad I didn't have my camera with me to take a picture for the blog.

Until next time.

Patchwork Party

My Life Monday: Week 5 -- Take a picture of something (not somebody) that represents part of who you are. Share that object and tell why it is significant to you.

Here above you will see my latest "project" phase. I love to do crafts and crafty things. I've gone through knitting phases, crocheting phases, scrapbooking phases, quilting phases, sewing phases, embroidery phases, etc., etc., etc. My problem is, I usually undertake huge projects when I've first entered a phase and get really excited about working on it for a few days at least (sometimes even a few weeks) but before I've finished what I've started, I'm usually bored of the project and ready to move on to something else.

For instance, last July I got into a really big quilting phase and decided I wanted to hand-make a brand-new quilt for our bed. So, fast forward almost a year and have I finished yet? No. I've got front and back all pieced together and batting waiting to go inside, but I just can't work up the energy to get out the quilting boards and frame and set it all up. Because I like the quilting part, I just don't feel like doing the setting up just yet.

And just a couple of months ago, I was in a big scrapbooking phase. A friend of mine hosted a scrapbooking party for one of those scrapbook companies and I got all excited about finishing up the scrapbook I started for my college years. I bought a bunch of new paper, new glue and some other embellishments and finished exactly one layout before I got bored with it and moved on (and all I have left to do is my senior year!).

So, I posted this particular project to show that, for once, I finished a project before I got bored and moved on! I decided to make this baby quilt to hone up on my quilting skills before starting on the aformentioned queen-size quilt. I saw all these pretty fabric squares already cut and ready to go at my favorite quilting store and I couldn't resist. It only took about a week from start to finish and I have to say it was very fun. I find quilting to be very therapeutic for me (not to mention it gives me an excuse to watch whatever junk I want to on TV, because at least I'm doing something productive while I'm watching, right?).

There you have it. A representation of a part of me. Now all I need is the baby girl to go with the baby quilt...