9 months old....yesterday!

Anna has now officially been outside of my body for as long as she was in it. What a difference a little girl makes. She is the free candy bar of my Halloween, the stocking of my Christmas morning, the cheese on my pizza, and the first Rose of spring after a long winter.

She is also the most feisty little girl I have ever known. She talks to her self almost as much as I talk to myself. She crawls laps around the kitchen table for exercise and she likes to touch the water in the toilet bowl (already caught her twice today)
She is a natural in front of the camera. I am sure if Nikon could have this picture, she would be signing endorsement deals right now.
She eats everything we have ever given her. She loves pretzels and apples and yogurt, but she also does not discriminate against wood chips, lint, stickers, books, cameras, remote controls, and grocery store advertisements-- they all go in her mouth.
Anna has no fear. IN fact, she thinks she is invincible (she shared this with me the other day). She tries to climb everything and so far she has shown zero "stranger danger." I am sure if anyone tried to attack her, she could bite the living daylights out of any of them.
The only time that Anna will cuddle is when she is "poor" (a code word for anything that makes Anna sad-- falling off a pew, having a book dropped on her head, eating cayenne pepper...) or when she is extremely tired. I cherish those moments when she actually lays her head on my shoulder-- probably 1% of her waking life.
We call her Anna the explorer. She wants to see and do everything. And as long as she can, she is supremely happy.
She is also quite limber (see photo above). She is working toward making the Olympic team in 2024.
This is her dramatic face pose. I tried a similar pose on my wedding day and I didn't carry it off quite as well.

This is one of the few pictures I have where Anna actually stayed where I put her down. She is too busy being Anna to make time for my little photo project. But I guess if my goal was to document what Anna was like at 9 months, then I have succeeded



She looks very much like Richard in this photo. The same face. Otherwise in personality, she is a mini-me.

Anna is growing so fast. From our calculations, she should top out somewhere around 6 feet 2 inches or so. She is already almost 3o inches tall and weighs 21 lbs.

Happy 9 months little one!

How to....bandit run a race!

I've decided I need a medium for dumping some of the random knowledge and experiences I have gained in the last few years. Lucky you!

Have you ever wanted to run a race, and then thought "I just can't afford the entry fee!"
Have you ever wanted to run a race, and then thought "I don't have any more room for one more race T-shirt!"
Have you ever wanted to go running but you just don't want to carry the gatorade with you?
Have you ever wanted to be the one to run down the straightway and cross the finish line and eat all the free food that is only available for the runners at the end, but you just don't care about having an official time or getting registered?
Do you like running, but you don't like running so much that you have to get an extra part time job just to fund your hobby?

Let me introduce you to the bandit run.

You just show up the morning of the race...blend in with the other thousands of runners who actually registered...and then just start running when they do. They are public streets after all. And if someone asks what you are doing, just say "Oh, is this a race? This is just the normal run I do every morning." By the end of the race when you are dripping with sweat just like every other runner, no one will care that you don't have an official number pinned to your chest.
This option is available for most races as long as there is not security checking to make sure you are registered (like the St. George marathon where you are bussed to the top of the race course and they I.D. you before you get on).

The last time I bandit ran a race was the Salt Lake half marathon two years ago. My friend and I hid behind some bushes about two miles in and when a group of runners went past, we jumped out and joined them. Although, we didn't time it very well because the group of runners were all keeping a pretty tight 7 minute mile pace and we obviously did not belong.
But it was fun. I figure that I have paid a lot of parking tickets to the city of Salt Lake in my life and I think it was worth the few cents of gatorade I drank that day.

longing

A few nights ago I dreampt that someone gave Richard and I their house. There was more than one floor, and so much room for Anna to play around. It was beautiful. I didn't want the dream to end. Eventually I had to wake up and content myself with the apartment that I love (most of the time).

Just before that, a friend had asked me if I was ready to settle down and put down some roots somewhere. I told her that it was still kind of fun to not know where we were going to end up and to always be meeting new people.

But when I woke up from my dream, I realized I that I had been neglecting a longing that had been growing for some time. A longing to belong somewhere, to have a house and a yard, to have a kitchen that admits more than one person, to be able to have neighbors that aren't just across the wall from me, and to gain a familiarity with a place and a community. Out of curiosity I counted the number of apartments I have lived in since graduating from high school, and in the last decade I have lived in 10 different apartments, and that doesn't include the almost two years I lived in Michigan serving a mission.

10 apartments in 10 years. It makes me feel tired.

Yet, I know that someday I will have a house and a home. So, until then, I will count the blessings of renting a small apartment:

1. It takes almost no time to clean
2. There are no stairs so there is less danger for Anna
3. There are only so many places Anna can hide from me.
4. We don't need a baby monitor.
5. The amount of furniture we have is just perfect for this space
6. It has a very warm, cozy feel to it.
7. This is Anna's first home, and her room is the best in the house.

A girls weekend!

This last weekend Richard had the opportunity to help chaperone a scouting trip to Mount St. Helen (which happens to share a birthday with mine-- May 18). Although I was originally quite bummed that Richard and I wouldn't get to spend a lot of time together, I quickly turned it into an opportunity for a "girl's night." Only this time, instead of my usual assortment of mommy friends, it was an opportunity for Anna and I to have some girl hang out time and for me to have a little time just to myself. First, I made an almost perfect buffalo chicken pizza from scratch..... (in fact, I couldn't help but send Richard a picture of my perfect pizza and ask him what he was having for dinner). After dinner I watched some T.V., ate ice cream, and read a really good book until after midnight.

In the morning, Anna and I went out for a five mile run together as part of my half marathon training. There is nothing cute about me either before or after a run (I just keep my pajamas on and add running shoes), so I will include a picture of Anna in the jogging stroller prior to our run.
Later in the morning we went to a sheep shearing festival at Kelsey Farm. I got to watch a demonstration on sheep herding. It was actually really cool! Did you know that the phrase "that'll do" is actually quite common in the sheep dog world? Even before Babe the pig made it famous.

And we got to watch some sheep get sheared. They called it the "Ba Ba shop"....
I actually got a parking ticket at the festival. It was for blocking a driveway...which I obviously did not deserve because the car that was in the driveway when I parked was no longer there when I left. I wouldn't call it "blocking," I would call it "partially obscuring."

Here are some bonus pictures of Anna and I at the park a few weeks ago. I have a good friend named Ruth who is teaching me to use my camera, and during one of our photograhy lessons she snapped these.






As much as I love my husband, it was really nice to have some time to myself, and to have some fun time with Anna. Almost all her waking time is spent with me, but I like to think that she still loves to spend time with me as much as I love to spend time with her!!

Thought provoking

One of the 6 magazines we subscribe to is Time magazine. Recently they had an article about a a recent research study implementing a radical idea to improve scholastic performance in children.

The idea...money!

Monetarily reward kids for their scholastic performance to improve standardized test scores. It was done in four different areas, under four different models.

The first model was just to straight up give the kids $2 for every book they read.
The second model was to pay them for their grades-- a certain amount for A's for B's and so on.
The third model was to pay them for a variety of factors-- class attendance, behavior, grades, participation, etc.
The fourth model was to pay them if they achieved 87% or higher on tests administered throughout the year.

Under the second and fourth model, although grades improved as did class attendance, standardized test scores did not budge.
Under the third model, test scores did improve moderately at the end of the year.
But the first model was a huge success and the improvement in the students reading comprehension was the equivalent of 5 extra months of school.

The opponents say that children should want to learn for the love of learning and using the wrong motivation will decrease the intrinsic value of education for them.
I thought the author of the study had a very good insight when he pointed out that if we want kids to love learning for the sake of learning (which, according to him, obviously wasn't working) than we are holding them to a higher standard than we are holding ourselves....because adults work for money and are motivated by money.

For the first time, I began to consider the unthinkable....what if our kids didn't like school??!!
What if learning didn't come naturally to them or if they struggled with academics

Richard dismissed the thought as completely preposterous-- they were OUR kids-- born to be nerds just like us!

But it could happen...and if it does, how will I deal with it and help them through it. Will I be willing to pay them for their academic performance?

Food for thought.

A tiptoe through the tulips...

Not only is this post a celebration of spring, it is a celebration of the end of busy season for Richard. This last Saturday marked the first Saturday since January 4 that Richard has been able to spend the day with his family (thats me and Anna in case you were wondering! Wahoo). So how did we celebrate? The entire weekend was like one great big, never-ending date, culminating in a trip to the tulip festival....excuse me, thats THE Tulip festival, in Mount Vernon, Washington.
We felt like we were in Holland (my only experience with Holland is limited to seeing it portrayed in movies, but I am sure this is similar).
It truly made me want to keep repeating "thank you Heavenly Father...thank you Heavenly Father..." because it was so beautiful. Normally, I would say the best things in life are free, but this one cost us $4 to park near the fields. Close enough.

The yellow ones were our favorite. The tulips were in such stark contrast with the stormy sky and dark mountains. It was like a sea of pure happy sunshine...or butter...whatever makes you happiest.

Anna is our ticket to get whatever we want out of people. She has a mesmerizing effect on even the most stoic soul. It was like we were carrying some rare creature...people just stopped to smile at her or they had to come closer and tell me (as if I didn't already know it) what a beautiful wonderful baby we had.
It was a fun day for Anna. She tried fudge and Kettle corn for the first time. No wonder the prunes I brought with us seemed a little lackluster after that
It is so good to have my husband back. He doesn't look too worse for the wear, Anna still knows he is her daddy, and surprisingly enough, he still seems to really enjoy his job.
The day was really windy...I spend most of the day trying not to swallow my own hair.
Anna has 4 teeth now. And her favorite face is the one in the bottom photo. She scrunches up everything she can and flashes her pearlys at anyone she can. Its her way of saying "I like you and life is good."
One last note. Anna has become increasingly verbal lately. She likes to make a gutteral, growling sound, which she then alternates with her highest pitch squeal. Also, she keeps saying the word "dewey" over and over again. Perhaps she is showing an early affinity for libraries...

she's just not ready yet!

Anna is getting to the point where she eats almost everything we do, which makes dinner time more fun, but can lead to some funny moments. Last night I made some spicy minestrone with a bunch of cayenne pepper thrown in. I was feeding her some of my fruit salad and I thought I would give her a noodle from my soup, thinking "she's had tomatoes, she's had pasta-- no problem." And then I saw her face go red and she started coughing and sputtering and making a sound that I am sure is the equivalent of "what the heck did you just give me to eat?!"
she swallowed and there was a little more crying and coughing. Richard asked me what happened and I told him I had just given her a noodle, and he said "YOU GAVE HER WHAT???FROM YOUR SOUP????" (you would have thought I had given her a knife to eat, with the way Richard looked...all panicky and everything)
...and then I remembered the cayenne pepper. The spiciest thing Anna has ever had is cinnamon. I just forgot.

whoops! She is just not ready yet.

Richard calmed down (because she obviously did not die) and then reasoned that it is probably good that we start preparing her for the heat. She is a Rose after all, and spicy food is our way!

Ordering my life

The past few days have been kind of hard.

I'm not complaining about being a mom. Believe me, I know that I am blessed, and I am sure that there are women all over who are thinking, "I would trade places with you in a heartbeat" or "all I want is to be able to stay at home with a little baby all day." Its just hard sometimes.

You know, the days where there is no specific plan except to just get through the day. When you feel like you have no new ideas on how to entertain an insatiable 8 month old. When the naps only last 45 minutes and there is no time to take a shower. When I wonder why I went to law school when the only person I see all day, every day doesn't appreciate my fine reasoning skills or use of the socratic method ("Anna...what did you just put in your mouth?")

Even though I have been recently reminded of the importance of great mothering...its sometimes hard to feel that its important.

I really appreciated the words of a talk in the recent General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Julie Beck stated that:

"Women should be women and not babies that need petting and correction all the time. I know we like to be appreciated but if we do not get all the appreciation which we think is our due, what matters? We know the Lord has laid high responsibility upon us, and there is not a wish or desire that the Lord has implanted in our hearts in righteousness but will be realized, and the greatest good we can do to ourselves and each other is to refine and cultivate ourselves in everything that is good and ennobling to qualify us for those responsibilities."

In law school I kind of got used to regularly receiving commendation and appreciation for the work I was doing. I felt important. My ego was regularly petted.

Now I have embarked on an exponentially more important work that is inversely proportional to the kind of respect the world gives it.

After feeling absolutely listless and lost for a couple of days, I realized that I needed to get my life in order. I needed to find self-purpose. I needed to start developing myself again, both for myself and my family. I realized that I still deeply believe that I have much to contribute to the world, personally and professionally, and that if I want to do great things I still need to progress toward becoming a great woman.

So I have started making lists and goals and agendas. I am going to dust off some talents that haven't been used in awhile and I am going to try to create purpose in each day. Only instead of an hourly schedule throughout the week, each day of my schedule is broken into Anna's "wake" periods and "sleep" periods, and the things I want to accomplish during each.

We'll see how it goes.

Either way, I felt God's love for me in the sunshine that peaked from behind the clouds as I walked with Anna today. I had a little talk with Him to let Him know how I was doing. I know He is aware of me and wants me to be happy.

And I am.

a good book!

For the past couple of days I have been knee deep in a great book!

"the Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins.

It was all I could do to meet Anna's basic needs.

the house, on the other hand, suffered greatly, as did my appearance. I didn't shower until I absolutely had to go out of the house, and I only made dinner because good food is right up there with a good book.

Luckily, I finished the book and reclaimed my house and good grooming.

and, there is a sequel....

"Catching fire"

ahh, how I love to get lost in literature!

April Fool's Day revisited

I am fairly gullible...to say the least!
During my senior year of high school, a friend of mine convinced me to meet him at the parking lot on top of our one story school building....
Our school didn't have a parking lot of top of the building!

So you would think that graduating from law school would have done a lot toward eradicating some of that foolishness and replacing it with a healthy dose of skepticism.

And you would further think that I would view any April 1 communications with a eye of distrust....NOT SO.

Our ward newsperson regularly circulates emails to all wardmembers to keep us apprised of all relevant news and information. On April first I checked my email to find a forwarded message from our bishop concerning the upcoming general conference and a rearrangement of the priesthood organization. The content of the message was thus:

Dear Ward Members:

Saturday and Sunday sessions of General Conference will begin at 9 am and 1 pm local time. I have received a letter from church leaders concerning a remarkable announcement to be made at the Saturday morning session. All church members are invited to witness this event. Until the formal public announcement, you are instructed not to share this information, except with church members.

On Saturday morning, the first presidency will announce a modification to priesthood quorum organization, to be effective June 8, 2010, twenty two years after the June 8, 1978, change of priesthood policy.

On Sunday, April 11, 2010, there will be a special Newport Ward sacrament meeting to effect some of these changes. I will remain as Bishop, but my counselors will change. They will not be traditionally ordained as High Priests, but rather Joyce **** and Vicki ***** will become the new counselors and ordained as provisional members of the new Relief Society Quorum. Other ward staffing changes will follow, carefully and with deliberate consideration.

While these changes are significant, male priesthood holders will continue in most historical priesthood leadership roles, and will not be required to participate in quilting or other craft activities traditionally reserved to the Relief Society.

I am happy to answer any questions about these changes.

So anyway, guess who called their mother to ask her if she was now in the bishopric? Yep, that would be me! Both my mom and I got really excited for about 5 minutes (yeah, she believed it too), and then she asked me when the email was sent. Even then, I thought that maybe it was just a coincidence that the email was sent on April 1st.

sigh...

you can take the girl out of the gullible, but not the gullible out of the girl!

Baby's First Easter

Easter was wonderful this year. I loved watching general conference and receiving guidance from the apostles and the prophet. I loved eating cinnamon rolls in the middle of the morning. I loved having my husband home with me the whole day. And I loved eating fish and honey for dinner because that is what Jesus ate on the day he was resurrected!

And, every holiday is better with a baby. First, there is the ritual egg tasting...

"nope...I thought I told you to get the cream filled variety!!"


then comes the decision of what to wear on Easter Sunday...

"I was thinking that the bed-head, touseled look has come back again this year, and I can't be wearing the same dress as the 9-month old show-off down the hall!"

then the comes the plea while she bats her blue eyes...

"I just need 10 minutes with the Easter Bunny!"

and come he did!! the Easter bunny brought Richard some hot sauce, Rachael some dark chocolate from Trader Joes, and Anna a stuffed frog (she has a thing for french food). I actually sent Richard on a scripture chase all over the house to find his basket which ended up in the dryer. Richard doesn't like eggs, but he will eat deviled eggs (ironically enough) on Easter. :) I think that's funny!

We got Anna a pink T-shirt like dress for Easter. She still does her army scoot (albeit much faster than before), so all her clothes get dragged around the floor throughout the day, necessitating lots of washing. There was no point to getting a frilly dress. Besides, I think Anna is more Punky Brewster than Shirley Temple. Here she is going after her frog.

Anna still likes to eat books. I asked her what she wanted for breakfast and this is what she chose!

Her hands are the most expressive part of her body. When she is excited, and really into something, she has to hold them out!
While Anna does chew everything she can sink her teeth into (including me), occasionally her taste buds and mine align. We found her this morning happily chopping on some reeses pieces and a cadbury cream egg.