Chaos and Cupcakes

Taylor said to his brothers today, “Let’s turn into our alternate entities.”

…you don’t get to finish your cereal until it is completely soggy and gross- every single morning.

OnStar has got to be one of the greatest automotive inventions. Yesterday, I was out shopping with Cameron, Olivia, and Sawyer while the other boys were at school. After putting Olivia and Sawyer in the car, somehow the keys got locked in. One quick call to OnStar and they instantly unlocked my doors remotely. No waiting for the police to come, no jimmying the windows, no worrying that the babies were broiling in the car while we tried to get in. Gotta love OnStar.

Sawyer has 2 teeth on the bottom breaking through. That is absolutely crazy! In 3 days he’ll be only 3 months and is getting teeth already?! The earliest any of the other kids have had teeth start coming in is about 6 months. It is kind of weird to see teeth in a baby who still looks very much like a tiny newborn!

Jared and I have taken to calling Sawyer “Little Mike.” He looks just like my dad, especially when he looks at you this one particular way that is just like an expression my dad has. He is such an adorable baby. Taylor loves to ask me if he can “babysit” Sawyer, meaning he wants to hold him and play with him for a few minutes. Sawyer loves the kids and breaks into a huge grin when he sees one of them.

Olivia is such a big talker. At her 15 month check-up, her doctor said her verbal skills are ahead by at least a year. On Saturday she told me, “I wanna watch t.v.” So I told her ok and she replied, “I need remote!” I told her I was busy and I asked her where Daddy was. She said, “In the basement.” I guess it helps when she has 3 verbose, loquacious older brothers! My mom and grandma always made it a point to talk to us kids as if we were adults and they taught us to have large vocabularies. That, combined with my English degree background, has made it important for me to teach my children to expand their verbal horizons. This is something that is important to Jared, as well.

I was so proud of Taylor last Sunday. His class did the sharing time presentation. He had a rather lengthy paragraph as his part and he decided that he wanted to memorize it. He was the only kid in the class that had his part memorized. He has the most amazing memory, not just when it comes to memorizing things like the Articles of Faith and such, but also when it comes to remembering details of events, people and places, and facts.

Taylor’s finger is so much better. It healed much more fully than the surgeon thought it would. I am so happy about that. I was worried that it would look disfigured and cause Taylor to feel insecure about it for the rest of his life. Now he is just left with a cool battle scar that he likes to brag about and show everyone.

Soccer practice for Taylor and Andrew started this past week. They practice at 8am and then have summer preschool at 9am. It makes for quite a busy morning for them. They enjoy playing soccer. We got a goal and some cones so that we could play soccer in the backyard with them. It is interesting to watch Andrew play because he is left-handed and so he favors his left foot for kicking. Oddly enough, it looks like Olivia might be left-handed, too. It is still way to early to know for sure, though.

Cameron’s favorite thing to do lately is ride his scooter. He loves that thing. He also likes to lay down and ride Jared’s skateboard down the sloped driveway. That totally freaks me out and so I make him wear his bike helmet to do it.

Olivia is totally into dolls. She has to have at least one of her dolls in her arms at all times no matter where we are. She also likes to carry around her blankets, especially her “silkie.” We have to go through an elaborate ritual with her for naptime and bedtime where we put her in her crib and then tell all her dolls and stuffed animals good night as we lay them all around her and then cover her with her silkie and her blankets. She won’t go to sleep unless it’s done just right.

Sawyer is a smiley angel. He actually gained a decent amount of weight these past 2 weeks. He is 7 1/2 pounds now. So now at just about 3 months he is the size of an average newborn. He is getting long, though, and so he still looks like he’s just skin and bones. He is a happy guy and he brings us all so much joy. We all dote on him and can’t imagine our family without him.

I am getting baby fever again. I can’t help it! I love being pregnant. But since I had a c-section I have to wait a year so that my incisions can fully knit back together and heal. Also, since I am at very high risk for a uterine rupture since I had to have horizontal and vertical incisions another pregnancy will have to be very carefully monitored and will not be an easy one. I’d have to do complete bedrest and meds again. Then after rounds of steriods the baby would have to be taken 4-5 weeks early by c-section because I can’t have any contractions as that might rupture my uterus. So I guess it is good that I have to wait. It makes me sad to know that the next one has to be the last one.