Its been months!

Another working title for this post could be: Ashley doesn't want to pay for cloud storage for the rest of her life OR it's 2024 and time to bite the bullet and start paying for cloud storage. All I know is that in order to put more photos on this seventeen year old blog, it would start to cost me. I love free and it really kills me to think that something that's really nothing more than a journal would begin to need monetary backing.

Since May, when I posted last, I've had many thoughts. We've done some cool new things. The kids are growing and still being clever and saying hilarious things. Jess and I celebrated 20 years of marriage! When I started this blog, we lived back east and he was going to school and I was working full time. Times have changed. Life continues to make us learn, adapt, grow, joke, smile, and give hugs. It's great to have this platform. I can see what we were doing in November 2015 without much more than a click. Looking back on memories along with some stories is something special.

Now, what about November 2024? I don't want it to be forgotten or only saved in square photos with short captions. Why couldn't everyone else have jumped and stayed on the blog bandwagon?

Still deciding on what to do next. Stay tuned...

A group you wouldn't usually put together

For the past year, every Wednesday from 10:30am-12pm, Elsie has attended tumbling and dance. Since she started out a bit nervous, I'd stay at the studio during the class. It wasn't convenient, and I could have thought of a lot of things I could do for one and a half hours, but I was there. Come to find out, I really enjoyed it. 

Now the music was good and the kids dancing was just about the cutest thing around. However, it was the other parents (or grandparents) who had to stay with nervous kiddos who made it extra special. There was a group of us, usually three, and sometimes four, who really got to know each other well. Heck, we had 1.5 hours to talk, so we really had some good conversations. In all truth, I looked forward to my visits with these individuals on a weekly basis.

In this group, there were two grandmothers, a younger dad, and me. We talked about everything from the desire to drive fast, the problem with social media, how much food I should order for the PTA meeting I was bringing lunch to, how old to let your kids walk with friends to the 7-11, how the culture around mental health has changed, planning vacations, remodeling houses, getting along with new family members, what snacks are good for teens, what restaurants are worthy of five stars, the grieving process, the real estate market, extracurricular reading programs. I really came to know these individuals, their life situations, their sorrows, their joys. As I came to know each of them, I was in awe of what they had done, what they were going through, how they flexed, adapted, survived. I really got to know these people. We really listened to each other. We gave advice, we laughed. 

Dance just finished. On the last day, I said goodbye to these individuals, each amazing in their own way. I was going to miss them, dang it! It was hard to say goodbye. I was sad there wasn't a way to keep us together, having weekly conversations. I pictured a lunch group, a text string, a Marco Polo. Truth is, they have their own busy lives with lots of moving parts and I fear we wouldn't be able to keep up. Still, I was so very thankful for the time I got to spend with them and the 90 minute snippets where we got to connect. It was cool, especially since each of us could have looked at our phones every week but instead, we chose to notice one another and make connections.

Maybe I'll send a yearly Christmas card. 

Ian gets a sling, then a cast, then a recast

On Mothers Day, Ian was riding a cardboard box down the stairs, when it caught the last stair and sent Ian flying. When he caught himself after the fall, he broke his radius causing a simple, transverse factor. I had suggested he ride down the stairs in the box, so yep, I was feeling like a really good mother on Mothers Day.

Due to the type of break he had, he had to be sedated and his arm had to be realigned. A week later, after the swelling had gone down, he had to get a cast. Turns out, his cast was too tight (think so much pain you can't sleep and purple fingers), so in the wee hours of the morning, we had to head to the ER and get his cast cut to loosen it. A week after that, he had to get more casting material wrapped around his cut cast. Now he's healing with a return check-up at 3 weeks.

During this adventure while going back and forth to appointments, I had a lot of one on one time with Ian, which is rare seeing as Ian is moving all of the time and never one to sit for more than a few minutes. On one such car ride, we had a great conversation.

Ian: Mom, I don't want to go on a lot of trips this summer. I'd just like to play with my friends. Please, no long trips!

Mom: Okay, we won't do any long trips, but we are going to go on some short ones.

Ian: Who are we going with? I hope we go with some other families.

Mom: We will go with cousins and some friends, but what's so wrong with just going with our own little family? I used to do that all of the time when I was a kid and it was great!

Ian: That's because your siblings played with you. That's why the trips were fun. My brothers and sister don't play with me.

Mom: Really?

Ian: Yes, I am more of an action, fighter type guy. Elsie only likes to play with Barbies. Ansel is like a video game, chill guy. And Oliver just reads and does nothing.

Mom: Oh, I see. Still, I feel like you guys have fun sometimes.

Ian: Yes, its fun when they can play action, fighter type games. 

Now we know what Ian thinks of his siblings. Ha! Ian is such a fun personality. He is the best conversationalist. And even though he has a broken arm, it hasn't stopped him from swimming or going down some very big slides at the pool this weekend! 

March happenings, no wait let's talk about Jan and Feb first

March has come and gone and I haven't mentioned anything about such a great month. Let's do a quick sum up.

Oh, but before I go to to March, I just have to mention that in February there were some neat things too. Ansel had a birthday, and he won the Spelling Bee at school, and then he won an award for Reflections, had goals in indoor soccer, and then he won the child's trophy at our family bowling tournament. Whew! The kid had a great month. Ansel loves to ski, enjoys Book Blitz, playing Minecraft and flag football, and loves a hug. He's very cerebral. He's thinking a lot about a lot of things.

I don't mention all of the things all of my kids are doing all of the time, but it doesn't mean I'm not cheering for them every second of each day. My life is not an open book. Nor are my kids' lives. But now I feel like I'm going to mention a thing or two about each of them. 

Ian is such a fun kid. He's thinking a lot and has really good questions. He tends to worry like I used to worry when I was a kid. He likes to hang out with mom, but he is always playing with friends, always. He's been fun to watch at basketball. He's the class jokester but does well on his school work and has really taken to reading good books. Still, he loves to be moving and doing all of the time. He loves four square and Legos. He won a Reflections award too!

Oliver likes school (not so much homework) because he is genuinely interested in everything in the world. His habits of doing homework and getting things done are top notch.  He has great taste in music and is always forming a sweet playlist. He's great at piano and tuba. He's very clever and funny and he loves to hang out with friends. He's a lover of all the cool different foods, which I am totally surprised at seeing as his kid palette was not very exotic. He's a counselor at the Special Needs Activity Program and he is seeing the value of trying new things.

Elsie is totally into letters right now. She tell me when a word ends with a "T" and she loves the "K" sound. She'll write out letters, and man, I love little kid handwriting. Her favorite activity in the morning is  to color and cut with scissors. She loves to play with friends and she wants to play everyday. She enjoys preschool and tumbling and dance and soccer. Moving, doing, she's like Ian. And she thinks she's Ian's age. 

And with that, we'll move onto February. For Presidents Day we went to Capitol Reef. Time with cousins and family is priceless! We spent time hiking, playing games, and staying in the coolest AirBnb.

And while we're discussing trips, let me mention our Disneyland trip with friends in January. It was a bit cooler but less busy, and it's always better to go when things are less busy. We had a great time! I lost my phone but it was found in the Indiana Jones ride and sent back to me within a week. Who the heck cares? I was at one of the happiest spots on earth.

Each of those stops above could be a post of it's own, but I probably won't get to writing about them seeing as it's May and I'm writing about January. Suffice it to say, we had great times spent with people we love.

This post was supposed to be a post about March. Ha! I'll have to get to that later. But I'll whet your whistle with this photo of Elsie with her friends in all their 4-year-old glory. Celebrating her birthday in March was a great start to the month.

Elsie and her love for le sucre

When wondering whose house we were going to for the Super Bowl, Elsie asked, "Mom, where are we going for the Sugar Spoon again?"

After leaving In-N-Out where she had had mostly a shake for dinner, "I needed sugar because it's almost my birthday." Makes complete sense to me. Plus, she calls shakes, "sugar shakes."

At 10:30am, "Can I have lunch and then a treat?"

When she gets asked to get tucked into bed, she says, "Will you snuggle me up?"