March 23-30

One beautiful day last week, we decided to go to the playground.  It was, predictably, swarming with children (because who wants to be cooped up with their kids at 5:15 on a Friday that also happens to be the most spectacular day we've had since last fall?).  The last time Olivia went to the playground, she still required help climbing up things and coaxing to come down.  Not so anymore.  She was a whirlwind.  Her feet hit the ground running and she spent an hour racing from one slide to the next, climbing the plastic rock pile, and riding the dinosaur individual see-saw things.  She even tried hanging from the monkey bars for about a second and a half before deciding they weren't for her.  Bryan hung back a good six to ten feet (a distance that makes us all so proud, especially given that some parents were right up in the faces of their four-year-olds, narrating every move), just walking around and keeping Olivia in sight, and Gretchen and I sat off to the side and picked up all the grass and dirt that had the temerity to stick out from under our blanket.  Gretchen tried to sample the grass and dirt as well, but her mother took mean pills that morning and wouldn't let her eat the local flora.

Do all children sleep folded in half, or is it just mine?  Olivia slept flopped in half with her head next to her feet all the time.  I remember trying to get pictures, but being unsuccessful due to the darkness of her room.  Gretchen does not prefer this sleeping position nearly as much, but sometimes when she is sitting up and looking for her pacifier, she will just collapse forward (instead of laying back down) when said pacifier is reinserted.  It looks incredibly uncomfortable, but both girls seem to sleep fine...  (Side note: Olivia does not sleep like this anymore.  It must only be comfortable when your legs are short enough that your feet are pressed up against your cheeks.)

Gretchen has learned that the best way to convince me that she's really ready to get up is to hand me her pacifier.  What better proof than to voluntarily relinquish the plug?  Sometimes she'll just spit her pacifier into her crib as I get closer, but most of the time she takes it out of her mouth and holds it up to me when I reach down to pick her up.  If she's in an especially good mood, she'll wave it at me as I come through the doorway.

And speaking of waving, Gretchen does.  I guess we don't do a lot of waving in our house, because I hadn't noticed her doing it, but one of the ladies at church has been waving at her during the weekday services, and Gretchen waves back.  She has a very similar motion that we think is her version of crossing herself.  Waving is horizontal, crossing is more vertical.  :)

My choir is finally up and running!  I've been drafted (for lack of a better word) into the position of choir director at church.  Never mind that I have two small children or that we miss one Sunday a month, minimum (to visit my family).  They know I'm musically competent, they know I care enough to like having a choir, and they appear to only even attempt to organize one on the days that I'm at church.  So I finally took it upon myself to start making things better.  I reorganized the books so they're more intuitive, I found music that had printed notes instead of hand-scribbled ones, and I made sure all the books were fully equipped with English, Greek, and phonetics.  After several weeks of false starts (because we didn't have enough people, because the organist was late, because the sky wasn't quite the right shade of blue that day...), I finally got people to come stand in the front with me and tossed them in.  Baptism by fire, that's my method!  "Here are the new books, sing in English instead of Greek, and oh, by the way, it's Lent, so half your music is wrong anyway."  We struggled through the service and then had a rehearsal on Wednesday to iron some things out.  Now that I've got the choir going, I plan to be there one more Sunday and then abandon them for four weeks in a row...

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March 16-23

Last week's post finally made it up.  Check it out here.

Gretchen cut another tooth last week, bringing her total up to 7.  She would love to get some molars, if only so that she can better chew all the food that she eats.

Olivia has graduated to using a regular cup all the time (except for by her bed).  She only spills if she's not paying attention and drinks too fast.  She tries to drink one handed and/or while walking, but her mother usually spoils her fun and requires her to stop moving and use two hands.

Possession is apparently a verbally difficult concept.  Here are some Olivia sentences from this last week:

"Leeba will pick up my shoe and the girl will put it on."

"She wants she's blanket."

"We got to get in we car."

Olivia sings songs about her daily routine.  The other day, she came up with this one about the chapter books that she's supposed to leave on the shelf: "Don't touch the books, don't touch the books.  High ho the dairy-o, don't touch the books.  But I want to read a book, I want to read a book.  High ho the dairy-o, I want to read a book."  She also made up a song when Josef and Alison visited about how you have to say your prayer before you get up from the table.  It even had an Amen chorus.

I didn't know it at the time, but it turns out that I married Bryan for his Excel prowess.  I've been looking into buying some food in bulk and have been checking prices at various places.  I had a messily written, scribbled all over piece of paper with prices on it and decided to organize it into an Excel sheet.  I figured that I could manage the function that would calculate the price per pound of everything for me, but I wanted to have my sheet automatically tell me which store had the lowest price (and update itself if I changed anything).  Not knowing if this was even possible, I asked Bryan.  He told me it was incredibly quick and easy, sat down at the computer, typed in some complicated formulas like they were no more than the ABCs, and voila.  Then he decided to add colors, as well as an automatically generated shopping list off to the side, complete with a "Create Shopping List" button that I can click whenever I update something.  It's so cool.  :)

Our attic has been getting progressively more cluttered.  Part of the problem is that we keep getting more stuff, but most of the problem is that we just put new items in the first available spot instead of organizing them.  During Gretchen's nap on Friday, Olivia and I went upstairs to tackle the second part of the problem.  Our attic is now organized and open again.  :)

I recently convinced Bryan to join me in a wardrobe downsizing challenge (side note: it turns out that the way to improve your chances of getting Bryan on board with a project is to present it as a challenge).  We're keeping enough clothes to make it through at least a week, but no more than fit in half a dresser each.  The rest of the clothes are being boxed up and put in the attic for when we wear out what we have.  The extra dresser we free up by doing this will either go to the girls or up in the attic to be saved for the girls.  I'm also hoping that this exercise will enable us to share a closet so that we can use the remaining closet for other things.

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March 9-16

Last Friday, the girls and I piled into the van and abandoned Bryan for a week to visit my family.  We were feeling a little under the weather, but I was assured that James was also coughing out his lungs and that Justine's boys were similarly afflicted, so we decided to go share the germs.  Besides, I had plans!

Jacob and I spent the whole week working on getting the hymns for Holy Incarnation done.  They like to have musical accompaniment for the hymns they sing, but the availability of said accompaniment is spotty.  I had been manually transcribing hymns into Finale (a music writing program), emailing them to dad, and then waiting to hear back about any problems.  This project started out well, but I got behind when Gretchen was born and gave up instead of recovering.  :/  The last time I visited, I though of a plan: record the hymns on my viola.  I talked Jacob into donating his Spring Break to my cause, and we were in business.

Recording went well.  Jacob and I went to church every day, locked ourselves in our makeshift recording studio, and played.  Well, I played.  Jacob listened and manned the computer.  Justine was able to help with some of the recording at the end of the week in order to provide variation.  We did about 80 hymns completely from scratch and found the rest of the hymns on a website that specializes in providing canned music for small churches.  Now we just have to finish editing the ones we found online...

The girls survived my absence all week, although Olivia did shut herself in her room all day on Tuesday so that she could alternately look forlornly out the window and lie on the bed staring at the ceiling.  It didn't help that she wasn't feeling well AND woke up especially early that morning.  We finished recording a little sooner than planned and took Wednesday off so that everyone could recover.

Wednesday was a snow day for all the school-goers (which was especially upsetting since Tuesday was beautiful, run outside, all you need is a light jacket weather), and Justine and her boys had arrived the previous evening, so the house was a zoo.  Olivia appreciated having William and James to keep her company, Gretchen appreciated the fact that Edward is smaller than her, and both girls became confident enough in my continued presence that they finally let go of me and went off to play.

I disappeared again on Thursday, but not for nearly as long, and the presence of their cousins helped both girls cope.  Friday and Saturday went quickly as well, and Jacob and I declared the recording studio closed.  We took down the "Do Not Enter" sign and everything.

Sunday afternoon, we packed everything back into the van and retraced our steps.  We got home around 7:15 and Olivia and Gretchen were oh-so-happy to see their Daddy again.  :)

And speaking of Bryan, he was apparently bored after about 11 waking hours of "Bryan time."  Luckily, he worked all week, so that kept him busy while we were gone.  He claims that he also managed to get ridiculously good at his latest favorite computer game.

Pictures:

March 2-9

Early Monday morning (about 4 am, to be more precise), Bryan propped himself up in bed and said, "Olivia, go back to bed."  At first I thought he was talking in his sleep, but that's not really something Bryan does.  Then I heard some movement, and a small voice said, "I went potty in the potty."  I hopped out of bed and went to go convince Olivia that she was fabulously talented, but still needed more sleep.  When we got back to her room, she began talking in a borderline-hysterical voice about a "clouda pillow."  Noticing the abundance of stuffed animals on her bed, I assumed she meant "crowded pillow" and cleared some of them off.  She still refused to get into bed, continuing to carry on about the "clouda pillow and the blankets."  Maybe she was cold and needed another blanket?  No.  I finally convinced her to climb into her bed, but as soon as she got there, she started looking around on her pillow and under her blankets.  Maybe she was looking for a specific blanket (she's been switching up the blankets she uses recently)?  No.  Suddenly, it clicked.  "Clouda pillow" was "caterpillar."  She must have had a dream about a caterpillar on her blankets.  As soon as I verbalized this, she got noticeably calmer.  We finally came to the conclusion that the caterpillar was gone (that was my contribution), and that she would be safe if she put her pillow on the other end of the bed (that was Olivia's contribution).  Having flipped all of her bed parts around, she curled up under her blankets and went back to sleep.  I went to bed, amused that caterpillars were the stuff of nightmares.  I guess I can't talk much, though, because my parents used to have to chase chipmunks and dogs out of my room in the middle of the night.

Gretchen likes baths.  It happened gradually, but she now enjoys sitting in the tub and playing with toys, especially if Olivia is present also.  I'm not sure she'll ever like them as much as Olivia does, but she's content to be bathed several times a week.

Josef and Alison came to visit for our card club last week.  Alison and I took turns training on my treadmill while Bryan schooled Josef in old video games.  We also played cards, although it was a close thing.  The night before our card club was scheduled, one of our couples called in sick.  Since card club is dependent on a specific number of people, we began scrambling to find replacements.  As it turned out, everyone we knew was already busy and/or unable to make it.  Bryan finally found some people from work (who have been over for nerdier game nights before) who were willing to come even though they didn't know how to play euchre.  One crash course later, we successfully started and finished a card club.  :)

On Friday, the girls and I headed to MI for a week with my family.  Jacob and I have grand plans to work on a hymn project for the church.  I'm also hoping to get some psalm recording in with Justine and Josef.  Mom is babysitting all the little ones for us so that we can get lots done.  :)

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Bonus Post: 30 Before 30 Update

A record of my 30 Before 30 progress thus far.

1.  Genuinely surprise Bryan at least once.  February 15, 2014
2.  Record the psalms.  --I'm heading to MI next week to get a start on this.
3.  Run a sub-2:00 half marathon.  --Alison and I are training and it's going well.  Race day is April 6.
4.  Sell at least one thing I've made (at the Farmer's Market or on Etsy).
5.  Learn Spanish.  --I listen to Spanish CDs while I run on the treadmill, so I'm making progress here.
6.  Record all 6 cello suites.  --I'm hoping to start this one when I'm recording things with Jacob next week.
7.  Sew Christmas and/or Easter dresses for the girls.  --I have patterns!  I'm waiting until the girls are bigger to make them.
8.  Minimize (eliminate?) the need for disposable products in our house.
9.  Have a compost pile.
10.  Play with at least 2 professional orchestras.
11.  Go 7 days in a row without letting my temper get the better of me.  February 14-21, 2014  I'd gotten 6 days in a row a couple of times and then finally made it 7 (nine, actually).  I'm finding it easier to take deep breaths and move on, and I have a chart to keep track of my progress.  Next goal: three weeks.  That's how long it takes to form a habit, right?
12.  Make an honest attempt at clean eating/real food.  I've done some research and tried some substitutes and reached a comfortable point.  Do I care enough to use butter instead of margarine?  Yes.  Do I care enough to buy coconut oil regularly?  No.  Whole grain noodles and brown rice most of the time?  Yes.  Completely eliminate sugar?  No.  Homemade bread?  Yes.  Whole wheat bread?  Sometimes.  But often I appreciate the airiness that I can only achieve with a little bit of white flour.
13.  *Skipped because knowledge by some of my readers could skew the results.*  --Still a work in progress.
14.  Go on an overnight vacation with just our family.
15.  Grow a garden.
16.  Write a book.
17.  Sew a skirt that becomes my favorite.
18.  Volunteer to host campout.
19.  Go through RCIA.
20.  Attend Seekers' Group (similar to RCIA, offered by the Orthodox church in Lima).
21.  Complete at least 3 things on my (ever growing) Projects List.
22.  Start a soup kitchen.
23.  Make pectin-free jam.  Make up the recipe.
24.  Go on an overnight vacation with Bryan -- no kids.  --Scheduled for our 4th anniversary.
25.  Use up all the coupons Bryan gave me (I still have some from when we were dating).  --Slowly but surely coming along.
26.  Learn one of the 3 big concertos.  --I have music for two of these.  Now I just have to practice.
27.  Arrange a regularly recurring get-together with the Lima folk.
28.  Have a religious conversation with Bryan that doesn't end in tears.
29.  Make a new friend.
30.  Improve a stranger's day.
31.  (Because I thought of one more and it kind of fits in with several of the above goals)  Join a co-op.

February 23-March 2

Olivia has started using the word "friends" to refer to any group of dolls/stuffed animals/action figures that is too large to be named individually in a timely manner.  She talks about how she's going to put all her friends in her bed, or how first she needs to get her friends.  Then she walks by with her arms full to bursting and her friends spilling out over the edges.

Last Saturday, Olivia came to get us in our bedroom.  It was 8:05 am when she came to wake us up, and I immediately noticed 4 important things about this: 1. It was 8:05 and Gretchen had not woken up yet.  2. Olivia's clock turns green at 7:30 and remains that way until 8:30.  This means that she either slept until her clock was green, or she played quietly in her room until it was green.  I'll take it.  3. Olivia wasn't wearing pants, which means she stripped down before coming to get us, so she either stopped in the bathroom or was already wet and fixed the problem.  4. She WAS wearing the same underwear that she went to bed in, which means she wasn't wet.  She must have stopped in the bathroom before coming to get us, which implies that she discerned that she needed to go to the bathroom and took care of the problem all by herself.  Saturday was a good morning.  :)

Gretchen has a rash similar to the one Olivia used to get.  After consulting Steph and my mom, I decided a buildup of diaper cream on my diapers was at least part of the cause.  Gretchen ended up in disposables for a week in an attempt to clear her up, and I started stripping diapers.  Stripping diapers consists of soaking them in Dawn dish soap and then rinsing.  And rinsing.  And rinsing.  My washing machine has been doing nothing but rinsing all week.  :/  Gretchen is looking better, though, and I'm about done, so hopefully we'll be able to get back to normal soon.  :)

If you find the prospect of completely ignoring recipes uncomfortable, you may want to skip this next paragraph.  :-P  It turns out that I am not someone who is bothered my recipe alterations.  In fact, this week Bryan told me that if someone gave me a recipe for a singing football (we have one that plays music when you press a button), I'd produce a knife block (full of knives, of course) instead.  Equally good, but not what the recipe had in mind.  I'd argue that a fully loaded knife block is, in fact, infinitely better than a singing football, so I don't see me changing my recipe-altering ways anytime soon.  Anyway.  I found a recipe for some fabulous looking mint oreo brownies.  I actually did follow that recipe ...mostly.  They were every bit as delicious as we had hoped, but there was one problem: the frosting recipe makes 3-4 times more frosting than is really necessary.  The frosting layer was as thick as the brownie layer, and was pretty much all sugar (especially since I didn't have enough powdered sugar, so I made my own by blending regular sugar with cornstarch (it's a real thing, I promise), but my blender got tired before everything was powdered, so it was still kind of grainy), so Bryan and I started scraping it off before eating the brownies.  Not wanting to waste all of the mint flavored sugar, I decided to make a cake using the frosting as a substitute for sugar.  I pulled out my standard chocolate cake recipe and set to work.  One cup of frosting for one cup of sugar, no problem.  But then...  I was out of cocoa powder.  Turns out there's an alteration listed for those who want to make Devil's Food chocolate cake instead.  I started following that version because it called for baking squares instead.  Only my baking squares are from Aldi, and Aldi breaks their squares into 0.4 oz sections (even though all the recipes ever call for multiples of 0.5 oz squares), so I didn't use exactly the right amount.  I kept mixing stuff together, though, and the batter tasted fine.  I decided not to frost the finished product, but I did dust it with powdered sugar, which was immediately absorbed by the top of the cake.  It is delicious.  If it wasn't more time, effort, and ingredients than I care to dedicate, I'd make my chocolate cake this way all the time.

Bryan and I found a ballroom dance club nearby-ish, so on Wednesday we went to check it out.  With the exception of one other couple, we were the youngest ones there by about fifty years, but we had a blast.  There were more males than females, so I got to dance pretty much the whole time, even when it wasn't swing dancing.  All the old men asked Bryan's permission when they came to get me for a dance.  He felt very important.  :)  There was a live band, so when they found out that we knew predominantly swing dance, they modified their set to include more of those.  When they took a break, someone led a mini lesson on the Charleston, so now we're learning that.  This is apparently a weekly thing, so we'll definitely be going back.

I've been chipping away at my 30 Before 30 list.  I have a bonus post with an update scheduled for this Wednesday.

Josef and Alison came to visit for our Happy March card club this weekend.  More on that next week...

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