Mom Remembers

We woke up on December 19th to a light and lovely snowfall for Soren's 6th birthday.  I couldn't help but wonder if it was snowing on the day he was born.  Six years is a long time and I find my memories of that "unforgettable" day are getting rather dim.  This year, it really struck me that Soren's birthday (while on the surface is all about him) was for me the "anniversary" of me becoming a mother.  As our family has grown, so have I but it all began on that (possibly snowy) morning: December 19, 2007. This is what we did to celebrate: 1. Scott has been talking for a long time about purchasing the computer game Minecraft for Soren's birthday.  So, the morning of, we downloaded it onto our computer so Soren could play.  He didn't figure it out right away so we invited our neighbors up to help him get the hang of the game.  But it didn't take long for them to realize that his problem was not in playing the game but because he has absol

SOREN:  You know who is the best? ME:  Who? SOREN:  Me!  I do all the things that you are too lazy to do.

Sven can crawl!  He is doing real bonafide crawling! Up until last night, he would get where he wanted to go using an army crawl.  It looked to me like someone trying to swim the breaststroke on the floor.  Sometimes he would get up on his hands and knees, rock back and forth, and look just about ready to go ... then he would drop his belly to the floor and slither off.  What a tease. But then, all of a sudden, he was crawling .  I saw this (amazing!) feat just yesterday for the first time.  I was laying down on the couch, talking on the phone to my mom, and he was doing his usual hands and knees tease, eyes fixed firmly on a toy a few feet away.  But rather than floor-swimming to get it, he stayed up on his hands and knees and crawled  there.  He was using real cross lateral movement!  (Full disclosure: he was only picking up one knee and kind-of scooting the other.)  He looked almost as proud as I was! I'm afraid I may have gotten ridiculously excited:   Look at you!  You

1. For date night last weekend, Scott and I went to see "Thor: The Dark World".  There are no words to describe how incredible  it was.  Well, maybe WOW! 2. On Monday, I made up a new "circle" for Kindergarten, similar to the one we did for Michaelmas but all of my own creation.  It was really fun to see how much the kids enjoyed it and to watch them immediately incorporate it into their play.  (It didn't really involve any circular movements or organization so I might call it more of a "pantomime".  It was just a series of songs and rhymes that told a story about St. Nicholas.) 3. I cleaned out my pantry this week.  I have been procrastinating it for a very long time.  We have a problem with our dryer (which is in the pantry) so that area of our house is overly moist.  As a result, all our food cans had rusted and some of our food was at risk for spoiling.  Since we have lots  of food storage, this was a very bad thing.  But I have still been putt

Dear Sven, You were given a name and a blessing on May 5th, 2013.  It was a perfect day and you were a perfect angel, happy and sweet.  You wore the family dress, the same dress your father wore thirty years earlier when his  father (your Poppy) blessed him.  You were held in a circle of men who love you and hold the Priesthood: your father, your grandfathers, and your great-grandfather.  And the pews were filled with others who love you as well: your brothers, your grandmothers, your great-grandmother, your uncles and aunts, great-uncles and great-aunts, and your mother.  You were our sweet shining angel, bravely come down from heaven to share this life with us. Remembering you on that day, reminds me of the poem by Thomas Traherne: How like an angel came I down! How bright are all things here! When first among His works I did appear Oh, how their glory did me crown! It does seem like all the world was your crown that day.  All God's creations leaned close to hear the