Poetry Hour

Updated with pictures!

Kaylyn's first grade put on a Poetry Hour last night.  The kids who wanted to participate got to read 2 poems each.  The audience snapped after each poem instead of clapping - which Morgan loved since she loves to show everyone that she can snap.

Kaylyn's first poem is very cute but I was surprised that she doesn't like football.

I like Silver
I don't like gray.
I like hot dogs.
I don't like brocklie.
I like computers.
I don't like PE,
I like cats.
I don't like frogs.
I like basbase ball.
I don't like football.

This second poem brought tears to my eyes.  It's a biographical poem.

Kaylyn

Girl, green eyes, sister

Daughter of Eden and Adam

Lover of my mom and dad and my sister

Who feels loved, happy, learning

Who fears spiders, snakes, and dogs

Who gives mom and dad hugs

Who would like to see Washington D.C.,

Pennsylvania and the woods

Resident of Springfield, MO

Allison

For those who don't know, we're heading to DC for vacation this summer.  The reference to Pennsylvania and the woods is from the Magic Tree House books.

Morgan's Day continued

So after I typed the last blog post this morning, Morgan and I headed off to gymnastics.  And no, nothing happened at gymnastics other than Morgan being the spectacular gymnast that she is :)

After gymnastics, we decided to go visit Nana (and pick up coupons - 6-8 sets, thank you very much!).  While I visited with Nana, Morgan decided to do some donkey kicks.  I asked her to stop but she continued.  And the next thing we knew, one sandal was flying through the air at a high velocity.  It crashed against the wall right beside Nana's head, barely missing her face and the lamp beside her!  So apparently, we need to ask for protection for Nana from Morgan's adventures.

Morgan's Adventures - Who will survive?

Morgan is a very adventurous child.  We have said for many years (and she's only 3!) that her mentor is Curious George.  It's so true!  We've also teasingly said that we'll be lucky if all of us survive Morgan's adventures before she starts kindergarten.  So for those many years, many of my prayers have included the request "Please protect Morgan in her many adventures" or something similar.

Monday was a hard day.  Kaylyn was really struggling, a build up of too many nights going to bed too late.  And when she has a lack of sleep, she loses any self-confidence.  We've also hit a lying phase apparently.  So Monday I discovered that she'd been hiding homework - telling me that her teacher wasn't sending home math homework because they were taking Unit 9 slower.  What kind of Mom am I that I didn't check the weekly newsletter that would have told me this wasn't the case?  So Kaylyn got caught on Monday and she ended up having a long talk with her Daddy, after bedtime.  After their discussion, Kaylyn and Adam decided she needed a Priesthood blessing.  So we all gathered in the living room about 9 pm (yes, sadly, Morgan was also still awake) for Kaylyn to get a blessing.  It was very sweet.

And yes, this post is supposed to be about Morgan.  So as soon as Kaylyn's blessing was finished, Morgan hopped up and sat down in the blessing chair and said "My turn." with a big grin on her face.  It made my heart swell to see her excitement about a blessing and the Priesthood.  Adam hesitated and then proceeded to give her a blessing.  In the Priesthood blessing, Morgan was blessed to be safe in her many adventures.  I immediately thought "Oh thank you!" and that my prayers were right on target.  Little did I know.

Tuesday morning, on the way to school, the low tire pressure light came on in the van.  Since we'd had a flat tire on Sunday, I assumed the light was accurate so as soon as we dropped off Kaylyn, I stopped at a gas station and put air in the tire.  Talking with Adam, we decided I'd drive the car for a few days while he researches new tires for the van (why spend $20 to repair a flat when they need to be replaced).  Why do you need to know all this?  You needed to know because I normally drive the van with the girls.

Today is Wednesday.  The 3 of us climbed in the car to school.  On the way home, I started thinking about a story from my 3rd/4th grade teacher (Hi Mrs. Garroutte!).  The story - one day she was driving her car with her daughters in the back seat (in Spfd) when one of them opened the door and fell out.  As I thought of this story, I thought it was a good thing my daughters are good about wearing their seatbelts.  Then I looked behind me along the doors and saw Morgan unlocking her door.  I told her No!  And relocked the door.  I had the thought to wonder if the child lock was engaged on her side of the car.  I decided that as soon as we got home, I'd make sure it was engaged.  As I pulled onto Republic Rd off of Golden, I looked back again and Morgan was holding onto her window with the door open!!!!!!!

So instead of waiting until I got home, I immediately pulled onto the shoulder, pulled open her door, engaged the child lock, and locked the door (again).  Once home, she was sent to the corner for being disobedient and endangering herself. 

I expressed my gratitude to Heavenly Father.  I'm grateful for answered prayers.  I'm grateful for guided prayers (I'm going to give credit to the Spirit for telling me to pray for Morgan's safety in her adventures- I have never felt the need to pray for this for Kaylyn).  I'm grateful for Priesthood blessings!  I'm grateful for having a worthy Priesthood holder in our home!  I'm grateful for promptings of the Spirit that put that story in my head at the right moment!  I'm grateful for child safety locks on back doors of cars!  I'm grateful for seat belts that keep children in the car even when their door is open and they are holding on to it!  I'm grateful that Kaylyn was already at school when this happened because she totally would have freaked out.  I'm grateful for a teacher and parent who even though we were young shared a story of child falling out of a vehicle so that it would help me when I was a parent.  I'm thankful that I normally drive a van that has door handles out of the reach of a 3 year old who is buckled in.

I love seeing Heavenly Father's hand in my life!  Isn't it amazing that He can use something from about 30 years ago to bless my life today?!  He definitely cares about each of us, knows us and has His hand in our lives!  And my prayers for safety in Morgan's adventures will continue.

Adam's finally home!

Adam was sent to beautiful Columbus OH this week for a failover cluster training class.  He left Monday afternoon to return Friday evening.  The girls did really well but missed their Daddy VERY much!  I spent much of the week trying to sell some of our excess items on Craigslist.

So yesterday, I headed off to meet someone for a sale.  We got home about 5:45 and shortly thereafter Adam called wanting to know if I was watching the computer (http://www.flightstats.com/ lets you track a plane live and we really enjoyed keeping track of Daddy).  Since we had just returned home, I said No.  Well, the plane left Columbus and about halfway to Memphis, passengers and flight attendants noticed a burning rubber smell.  The plane was diverted to Louisville.

So that's where Adam was calling from.  After waiting to hear if the plane would be continuing on its way or not (not), Adam was booked on a flight from Louisville to Dallas to catch the last flight from Dallas into Springfield.  After that flight took off, I looked up the flights on Flightstats and immediately noticed a problem.

Have you ever flown into Dallas?  You need a good layover if your flights are in different terminals and Adam was arriving in one terminal with his flight to Springfield at another terminal.  The problem - his flight from Louisville would be arriving a few minutes AFTER the flight to Springfield was scheduled to take off.  I kept a close on both flights.  The Springfield flight said it was going to take off a few minutes late.  Maybe....  So I took a chance and sent the girls to bed since it was their bedtime.  If he did make the flight, maybe I could get them in their carseats without waking them up?  if he didn't make the flight, they'd be much happier girls on Saturday having gotten their sleep.

Adam's flight arrived, finally, in Dallas.  He called as they ran to try to catch the flight to Springfield.  He promised to call once he was on the plane or knew they missed it.  He didn't call.  He didn't answer his cell phone.  Maybe he made the flight at the last second and didn't get a chance to call?  Did you know that the American Airlines website does not have any phone number listed to check if a passenger made a flight?  I really didn't want to get the girls up at 10:30 pm to go to the airport and discover he didn't make the flight.

As I dialed the general reservations number for American, my cell phone rang - Adam was calling.  He didn't make the flight.  They were booking him on the first flight for Saturday morning and he was heading to a hotel.

This morning, we got up and got ready for the day, slowly.  Enjoying a slow morning.  Then off we headed to the airport to meet Adam's flight.  His flight arrived early and we ran a few minutes behind (I apparently didn't allow enough time to get there).  But we got inside before he made it out of the secured area.  As I saw him coming, I told the girls to help unroll the sign they'd made - instead, they took off running at Daddy to tackle him.  I love getting to hold a great big sign by myself in the airport!

We're all really happy to have Daddy home.  Just in time to head out for Stake Conference meetings.

And I'm sure Adam is "glad" to have experienced so many new airports on this trip - Memphis, Columbus, Louisville, Dallas and the new terminal at Springfield.

Tooth #7

Yesterday morning at breakfast, Kaylyn complained that her cereal was making her tooth loose.  "Uh oh" was her statement.  This is because she knows I can't handle a loose tooth.  That's her Daddy's job and Daddy's out of town for failover cluster training until Friday night.  I can handle the tooth once it's out but don't ask me to see it wiggle or to wiggle it for you.  Not going to happen.

Then Kaylyn mentioned that if you lose a tooth at school, you get a special tooth box necklace.  She thought they were pretty cool.  So I encouraged her that she might lose her tooth at school.

So off she went to school.  While the teacher was teaching the class something (so not during centers or quiet times), Kaylyn decided to play with her tooth and out it came!   Accordingly to Kaylyn, everyone in her class wanted to come over and see it (nice class disruption).  And one friend even wanted to hold her tooth!

Kaylyn came home with her tooth in a cute little tooth box with plastic string tied to it.  She was totally excited!  Off it went with us to piano lessons to show her teacher (I'm sure Miss Heather was absolutely thrilled - I really hope our family doesn't discourage her thoughts for having children).  I made it stay in the van for piano lessons and eating dinner at Wendy's.  When we got home, it lasted 30 seconds before "Morgan" (I didn't witness so Morgan allegedly did this) opened the box and dropped the tooth.  I had to sweep the entire kitchen floor and then dig through all the dirt to find the tooth (I tried sweeping just the area where they said it fell but couldn't find it).

The tooth box was put under Kaylyn's bed to await the tooth fairy.  Sadly, the tooth fairy was very tired last night and forgot to grab the tooth and leave $1.  But fortunately, when I was cleaning yesterday, I found $1 and set it on the little table in their room.  When Kaylyn woke up this morning, she came into my room and told me how the Tooth Fairy had been sneaky and left the money on the table.

After Kaylyn heads off to school, the Tooth Fairy will sneak in and grab the tooth.

Kaylyn's Shoes

I know I'm way behind - but here's a story from this morning.

Kaylyn and Morgan each have a "box" for all their shoes.  They've always struggled to remember to put their shoes away.  But I've really been pushing it the last few days before they go to bed to make sure their shoes are in the box.  Last night, after they were in bed, I noticed that Kaylyn had a pair of tennis shoes, sandals and flip flops in the box, plus her new church shoes we bought on Saturday.

This morning Kaylyn got dressed for school, except shoes, and ate breakfast.  I then sent her to her room to get her shoes on.  She came back out with her new church shoes.  I told her that she couldn't wear those to school, especially since she has PE on Tuesday.  She responded that there were no other shoes in her shoe box.

So we started searching through the whole house for her shoes - none!  Finally, the light came on for me.  I looked at Kaylyn and said "I think you know where your shoes are.  You have a choice.  You either find your shoes or you'll be going to school without shoes."  She grinned and pointed to her bookcase.  If you haven't seen her room, there is a bookcase in the corner at an angle, creating a space behind it.  Kaylyn had thrown all her shoes over the bookcase so they were hiding behind it.

I think she really likes her new shoes.

Joseph and the Twain Tempos

So Nana's birthday party was on Saturday.  Tuesday Dec 8th was her birthday but it was also the day my Dad went to the ER.  He died the next morning.  We spent much of that day and the next gathered as a family.  On Thursday, my niece, Regan, asked if she could stay the night with us.  She'd asked to stay with us after Nana's birthday party but we didn't think the family would be gathering again until Christmas and everyone thought Regan would eventually miss her family.  Since we knew we'd be all gathering again on Friday, we thought that would be fine.  So Robin and Mom headed to the farm.

On our calendar for Thursday evening was my nephew Joseph's Christmas concert.  We hadn't decided if we were going with all that was going on.  But after dinner, I decided that it was a good thing - more family time and hopefully a small distraction for everyone.  Adam elected to stay home.  So off I trotted to the performance with 3 girls on my own.

We would have been fine, except we were running behind, the APR (All Purpose Room) was full, and Morgan fell asleep on the way to Joseph's school.  We made it, I handed a sleeping Morgan off to her Aunt Jo, and found seats for Kaylyn, Regan and me.

Joseph did awesome.  Here he is with the whole choir...

And a closeup of Joseph (and the choir) thinking they look cool...

Morgan slept through most of the concert.  Notice the electronics in Sandy's hand?  Jo's dad videotaped EVERYTHING!  When he passed a few years ago, the torch passed to Sandy.

For one of their numbers, Joseph came and stood in the aisle beside his family.

And for one number, Joseph got to play a drum.

And as we left, I got a shot of two best friends who are also cousins playing in the dark school yard (Morgan had finally woke up) while I was trying to get them to the van to go home.