Fears

Last night I got sucked into reading all of the posts on Mom and Dad's blog (all written by Mom with one Dad asked her to include). I've read quite a few of them over the years as a way of reflecting on the past and always get a good laugh and cry depending on which ones I read. I especially like to read ones written at the beginning of our blogging times because it was started as I was getting ready to leave on my mission. When Ben asked what I was doing, I told him. He asked what it is like reading them now and if I could hear her voice as I read the words. I told him yes, it's like she is right here telling me the things I read herself.

Last Thursday marked seven years since I left for the MTC. I flew out the day before I entered the MTC and stayed with Emily and Preston the night before. All those who were in attendance can remember, I was a wreck. There were many tears shed over the two and a half days between when I was set apart and then entered the MTC. I wasn't necessarily nervous or scared of being a missionary and missionary work. I was nervous of being away from Mom (and Dad, too), and I feared that something would happen to one of them while I was away and I wouldn't be able to see them again. That has always been my biggest fear which was the reasoning behind crying every time I left home and wanting to always live with them even after I got married.

So, when Mom was diagnosed with cancer three and a half years ago, I realized that I would be facing my fear much sooner than I hoped. About a week or so after she was diagnosed, she came over to St. Paul to go to the temple. She then spent that night with us and left the next day.

Mom treated us to dinner that night and in the course of conversation she told us that she had two fears. The first was losing one of her children, which then as we grew older changed to having one of us lose a child. The second was being diagnosed with cancer.

Lots of people say that we picked the trials we face in this life before we were born. Lately, I have given thought to that. What if our fears are the trials we picked to have before we came here? Could they be a way that Heavenly Father shows us what we will face? Possibly, but not necessarily true for every fear.

On a side note, I fear that all of our children will be like Russell and Meghan for the first months of their lives. We've had some rough days in the past few weeks which have been jeopardizing the number of children we will be having. Good thing Mom had come to terms with not having 50 grandkids. I can barely handle these two ragamuffins we have!

Marriage is What Brings Us Together

Marriage is an interesting thing. It sticks two people together usually with different upbringings, ideas, and ways of doing things and then they are supposed to work things out. Ben has been pretty easy to work with as we have been establishing our marriage/family, and most things are easy for us to agree on.  Marriage also introduces new things to one spouse that are common to the other.

Ben introduced me to this:

It's just a spray bottle with diluted dish soap in it, but it is so great to have around! It makes cleaning up the table and counters easy without having to carry around a soaking wet dishcloth that might not be the cleanest and is dripping water all over. And, if we ever need just a squirt of soapy water we have it on hand.

I introduced Ben to lots of amazing things. One of his favorite is tomatoes in stir-fry. He thought it was weird at first, but when I made it recently without having any tomatoes on hand, he was disappointed that they weren't included.

What type of neat things have you picked up from your spouse?

Meghan's Blessing Day

Meghan was blessed yesterday in church. It was nice to have lots of family with us. It was a beautiful blessing that I hope will help guide her through her life.

Here we are :)

 I will admit, it was hard to not have Mom here. I'm thankful that she made and assembled a little blessing day outfit for our girls to wear long before we even had any kids so that we could have something physical to remind us of her love for all her little babies.

Russell Language

For a long time, Russell's doctor was worried about his language skills. I never was because I knew it was probably because he didn't hear lots of speaking being at home with me. And, I was right. Russell doesn't seem to have any problem at all now and at times won't shut his mouth.

If you want to talk with Russell it is important to know the following words/phrases:

digger-dump: construction machines in general, his John Deere digger tractor and dumper in particular
chaduh: tractor (good thing we live in the country so he can see lots of them)
chain: train, and he can tell you if it is a steamy or a diesel by the sound of its horns/whistles
woo wah: any vehicle that has a flashing light on top; specifically fire truck, ambulance, or police car
dumper: any large truck until we correct him and he identifies what type of truck it is--semi, tanker, pick-up, etc.

He is also a very good singer. I think singing songs helped him develop the confidence in saying words because he would always sing along with me when we sang songs before nap time or in the car. Here are some of his favorites:

Old MacDonald (with a digger-dump, train or tractor on the farm)
Happy Birthday
ABC Song
Twinkle, Twinkle

And, my most favorite part of his language development is when he says "I love you".  At first it was just a regular "I love you", then it turned into "I love you. Mommy." while pointing his finger a la Uncle Sam wants you poster. Now it is "I love you, Mommy, Daddy, baby Meggie, me (and any other person around like Aunt Janet and Brooke while we were with them the other week).

Now if only I could convince him to be quiet again.

August 1

We've survived a month of having Meghan here. She has decided to take after her brother and is turning into a little fussy baby. Luckily, she is still decent at sleeping.

not the best picture, but I have had this little dress since before Russell was Russell

Our garden has grown beautifully (including all the weeds), and we have gotten several good harvests from our zucchini and our green beans. Ben also got lots of radishes (more on that later), and there is promise of good beets and carrots in a little while.

We went and spent a week at Mom and Dad's. While we were there we did some canning. Ben pickled all his radishes he harvested and declared them nasty. I canned some peaches and raspberries. They will be delicious. Russell played with the tractors a lot. He also really enjoyed Macey, Sadie, and Holly's visits. They were fun for him to follow around and try and get them interested in his tractors and digger and dumper.

The week before we were at Mom and Dad's was Eyota Days. We enjoyed the $5 meal deal, a little petting zoo, a tour of the new ambulance building, and the parade. Russell really liked the kittens at the petting zoo and did not like having to step more than two steps away from his chair to get the candy during the parade. He made me get it. Lots of Ben's teacher buddies were excited to see Meghan.

We also have another baby in our house, too. Someone really enjoys doing tummy time, being swaddled, and using a pacifier (after refusing one when he really was a baby).

One last adventure

At the beginning of June we had one last big adventure as a family of three. Karen Clark invited us to her graduation party so we made a day trip out of it and did some fun things around the Twin Cities before we went to her party.

We started at Ikea. We didn't have any real reason to go except I wanted to check out their kid stuff to see what they had and if the prices were good enough to invest in some of their toys right now. They weren't. The price on the hot dog combo meal was right, though, so we enjoyed one of those. I really wanted an ice cream cone, but decided against it for some bizarre reason.

Next we headed across the street to the Mall of America. We wandered around looking at stores. They have a Star Trek exhibit, but tickets were over $15 dollars, and Ben wasn't that interested in seeing it. A trip to the MOA wouldn't be complete without seeing the rides or playing in Legoland.

Russell sweet-talked Ben into letting him ride a ride. Russell wanted some trucks, so he got to ride this one:

Ben got to join him because Russell was just a little too short to ride on his own. Ben was just a little too tall for the ride so he had to scrunch into the tiny little seat with Russell. I'm surprised I was able to take any pictures because I was laughing so hard.

That face!

After the MOA we went to Como Zoo which was busy (like it always is). It was getting pretty hot that day, and I was tired, and there was lots of walking around, so I didn't enjoy it as much. Luckily we had also bought a candy bar at Ikea that we shared while at the zoo. It gave me enough energy to keep walking.

I'm sure he was counting the animals.

We also had fun at Karen's party, but we took no pictures. Like always, it was nice to be back in the cities especially near where we lived for two years.

Big Brother

It is hard to believe that our little boy isn't our baby anymore. Everyone warned us that he would seem huge compared to Meghan, and he is! Though it was a rough week for him, he has bounced back with his usual resiliency. Everytime he would go into Meghan's room at the hospital he would look for baby and then run over to where I (usually) was holding her to look at her to and touch her head or give her kisses. Since coming home, he continually amazes us with the love that he already has for his little sister. Without any prompting he will look for her, come over to her, and then smile at her or give her kisses or pat her head or hold her hand. Meghan is one lucky little girl to have Russell as her big brother.

BABY!!!

 Poor thing was dragged all over, thrown off his usual routine, missed sleeping in his own bed, etc. The day Meghan was discharged from the hospital and we could all finally come home, Russell fell asleep in the van as Ben was coming back from taking care of somethings at the apartments. Ben carried him from the parking garage and through the hospital to her room without him waking up. Meghan was also sleeping so Ben carefully laid Russell down and he slept that way for another hour.

When we got home, Russell quickly ran over to his toys and got his tractor to show Meghan. He wanted to share one of his most favorite toys with her. I am thankful for the tender loving spirit Russell has about him.