Monkey See, Monkey Do, Monkey Get In Trouble Too

I had to go shopping today to get Chad some new pants. That kid wears the knees out of his pants before they are even dirty enough to be washed. I know that some of you are anti-Sears out there -- but you have to love their Kid-Advantage Club. I just showed them the jeans and got replacement jeans for free no questions or information asked. That is the kind of shopping I like. Fast and free.

While I was out I found this T-shirt (see picture above) that I had to buy Sean. It seemed the perfect fit. Sometimes I think I should rename my blog to "Sean's Blog of Sean-isms" because that seems like all I blog about. But since cleaning up after him, taking care of him, and trying to prevent him from getting into trouble take up about 80% of my life, I guess I can't help but talk about him. So, while I am on the subject, let me share some more about Sean this week.

What Sean tried to get himself for breakfast.

Chad took this picture. Got to love that wild boy hair and Halle's bright color non-coordinating fashion sense.

Today I found Sean with an apple he had been stabbing with a steak knife.

I'm just glad I didn't find any blood or missing appendages.

Enjoying the rain and his umbrella after walking with me to get Chad at the bus stop.

That is all the time I have for now. I really need to write about my other two kids. I really loved Lucy's Valentine blog with the ten things she liked about her husband and kids. I am going to have to steel her idea for one of my blogs another time. Now it is time to go because I am down stairs and Sean is upstairs and it is very quiet - so I am sure you all know what that means. Wish me luck.

Jenny's Baptism

Saturday, February 10th, 2007

This weekend was an exciting one for the Caviness family. The big news and reason for celebration was that Jenny got baptized and confirmed a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

Jenny Josephine Paz is my niece (my brother-in-law, Jeff's, step-daughter). She loves the church. Jenny was introduced to the church mostly by her grandma, Jeraldine Caviness, and also various missionaries who had been invited into the home now and then. Every time Jeraldine and Herm would go to Arizona and visit with Jeff and his family they would have FHE with them, read scriptures with them and have family prayers with them. Jenny is just one of those special spirits that is so teachable and just hungering for spiritual food. She loved going to church any chance she got and loved reading the scripture readers. She practically has all the stories memorized. Jenny is a fun person to know. She is always smiling and always pleasant.

We are all so glad that she had a desire to be baptized and that her mother allowed her to do so. I know her baptism is a blessing and a result of many prayers for her and her family. She is a great example for her family.

Jenny with her uncle Chris

Jenny with a very proud Grandma and Bompa

Sean helps himself to some of Jenny's cake

Two future missionaries, Jackson and Chad, being trained by Elder Tolman

Footprints In the Sugar

In one of my previous postings I wrote how much I like having 8:30am church. Part of the reason I like church that early is that my kids usually don't find time to get in trouble while they are being continuously hounded to get ready for church. This last Sunday we attended Jeff and Linda's ward out in the Valley so we could be there for Jenny's conformation. Their sacrament meeting didn't start until 11:00am which meant we didn't have to leave until 10:15am. This obviously was too much extra time for my little one to deal with and he spent it planning and scheming something to do.

I thought I knew where Sean had been all morning. I have no idea when he had time to do this. And it wasn't until 5 minutes before we were leaving, and I went to grab a few snacks to stick in the diaper bag, that I discovered it. I guess he got bored with laundry powder and decided to move onto sugar.

Yes, the cupboard does have two locks on it - but they have been mere child's play for Sean since he was about a one year old.

Hum, I wonder who could have done this?

This time when I confronted him and asked who did it he replied, "I don't know." So then I said, "Well, whose foot prints are these?" The answer was, "What footprints. I don't see footprints."

I may not have been able to coax the truth out of him but using my skilled CSI talents I quickly deducted that the size and pattern of the footprints matched perfectly to the shoes being worn by a stubborn and curious two year old named Sean Thomas Caviness.

Oh my gosh - I am a complete wimp!

I am a complete wimp!!!

I've never been obsessed with exercising, but I have usually kept in pretty good shape. My peak of fitness came when I married Chris. I went running with him a few times - but he is more into long distance (and enjoys the process of running) and I am more into sprinting (I like to get it over and done with fast).

During the summers we lived in Utah we would go to the Spanish Fork High School weight room and work out together. I did it enough that you could see some muscle definition (at least it didn't sag). And I was proud I could finally put some weights on the bar (instead of just using the bar as a weight).

The summer that I had my first pregnancy I religiously attended a water aerobic class, walked every day and weight lifted every other day. Then I had my first baby and everything pretty much went down hill from there.

Now my only exercise is going up and down the stairs with laundry, hauling groceries into the house and chasing my kids. Needless to say my muscle definition is a little different than is used to be (now it does sag!).

My lack of fitness really hit me a few weeks ago. I woke up one morning feeling so stiff. My arms hurt and my stomach muscles ached like I had just done a bunch of push-ups and sit-ups. This aching continued for a few days. I was really puzzled because I just could not figure out what I had done to work out my muscles. And then it hit me - I am a complete wimp! I was aching from stapling kindergarten workbooks together from my volunteer time at Chad's school. It is very, very, very sad that stapling books together would cause your muscles to hurt because that was the only time they had been used in several years.

This story was in my mind the last few days because I had the muscle pain again. Yes, I had been stapling books again. Maybe by the end of the school year my muscles will finally be used to it and I can show off my stapling formed muscles for you all.

SEAN -- what more can I say?

Our tragic story about Sean is that when he was born we bought a new digital camera. We used the camera a lot during his first year. I didn't want him to be the typical 3rd child with no pictures. Unfortunately Chris and I are not only domestically challenged, we are also technically challenged. So before we could figure out how to save our pictures or get them printed, the scan disk got corrupted and we lost all of our pictures of Sean's first year of life. (I still get physically sick thinking about it). But we have discovered that even though he may have fewer baby pictures than the other kids (he did turn out to be the typical 3rd child) his journal is a lot, lot thicker!!!!!! So this blog is dedicated to the Sean stories that took place just this last week.

One of my previous blogs was about Sean and broken eggs. This is something that occurs on a pretty regular basis (any time he is not in my sight). Another regular occurrence is the random distribution of laundry powder. When I am downstairs and Sean is upstairs he gets into the eggs. When I am upstairs and he is downstairs he gets into the laundry powder. I keep it up high, but that means nothing to a determined 2 year old. So when I go to do laundry and I open up the laundry room I am usually greeted with a floor covered in powder. I shake it out of anything lying around and sweep up as much as I can from the floor and recycle the powder back to the box and put it back on the shelf. The other day, my husband took some dirty clothes down to the laundry room and was greeted by the laundry powder all over the floor. And being the fantastic husband that he is, he cleaned up the mess. He told me about the incident later that evening and we both just did the usual nodding of the heads and soft curses about Sean being a pickle boy.

The next day, I went into the laundry room to actually do some loads. I was remembering how sweet it was that I didn't have to clean up the last mess, when I saw something that made me scream. No, it wasn't a spider, it wasn't a rat. It was laundry powder poured all over my sewing machine. All into the motor and gears and everything and everywhere around my sewing machine!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sean must have known that my screaming was about him because he wouldn't come when I called to him. After finally getting a hold of him I took him to the laundry room and showed him the mess. I said, "Who did this?" And Sean looked me right in the eye and said, "Chad did it." I said, "No, Sean did this." And then he bowed his little head, lowered his eyes and puckered his lips and softly said, "I sorry."

I'm still too scared to see what kind of damage was actually done and if I will be able to get all the powder out or not. So maybe when I am finally feeling brave I will try it out. If you can hear a faint screaming coming from the location of my house, that will just be me. I am sure I will recover eventually.

Another thing Sean is into lately is getting himself dressed. I am all for my kids doing more for themselves and having less work for me, but Sean still seems to make it more work for me. Sean has plenty of nice pajamas. I try to let him pick what he would like to wear for bed, but he never picks any of my choices for him. He always wants to wear one of Chad's T-shirts for bed. Just a diaper and a shirt. His most favorite shirt is a Halloween one dubbed "spooky." Sean loves the spooky shirt. The other day that is all he wore for 24 hours straight. He had worn it the night before and refused to change out of it the next day. Thank goodness I didn't have to go anywhere.

Yesterday he scared me pretty bad. I had finally put him down for a nap and was looking forward to some quiet time. Only 10 or 15 minutes had transpired when I heard a loud and frantic crying coming from his room. I ran down the stairs with all the worst case scenarios running around in my head. Had he climbed up to the top bunk and fallen off, had he climbed up his furniture and it had fallen on him, did he try to escape through the window but got stuck? I quickly opened the door to see him on the floor trying to get his leg through his spider man pajamas. I guess after I had left him peacefully in his bed that some wild idea formed in his little head. He climbed up the dresser to get his pajamas from the very top drawer of his chest, climbed back down, took off all his clothes, took off his diaper, put a new diaper on and was trying to get his pajamas on when his plan was thwarted by a stuck toe and he had to succumb to asking for help in the most obnoxious way he knew how. Of course I was relieved that he had come to no harm. I helped him with his pajamas and put him back in bed. And at least when it was bed time later that night, he already had his pajamas on.

This morning, Sean was out of bed before me. He came to wake me up and ask for his usual morning hot chocolate. But it seemed to him that I was just taking too long to get out of bed and see to his demanding needs right then and there. So he took it upon himself to get everything ready. He pushed a chair over to where the cupboard is with his sippy cups. He opened up the microwave, got the hot chocolate out, and had a spoon ready. And all of this in the one minute it took me to get out of bed, go to the bathroom, and run into the kitchen. I'm glad I didn't have to find out what else would have taken place if I had not hurried as quickly as I did.

Sean, I love you! And I can't wait to tell your future wife all about you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Super Bowl Sunday

Well, I never thought "Super Bowl Sunday" would ever be a title in my life or words spoken in my vocabulary. But today is the day it happened.

Sunday started innocently enough. The usual routine of going to church, enjoying the testimonies that were shared, being relieved that I didn't have to conduct or teach in Relief Society. Then after church coming home and fixing the kids lunch (and trying to avoid licking my fingers or drooling too much until it was time to break my fast), relaxing for a while and then going down for a nap.

While I had been waiting for a nap all day (I've been sick this weekend) the kids had other ideas today. I guess another title for today would have been "Mutiny of the Bunk Beds." Sean wouldn't go to sleep so Chad decided not to sleep and to wake up Halle. So the kids had their own little party downstairs while mom and dad slept. They were at least smart enough to know that their lives might end if they had woken us up. After a nice nap and a lot of mental battles I finally dragged myself out of bed.

To back track a little, the first Monday of every month has been designated as a Super Caviness Family Home Evening night where we get together with Chris' mom and dad and his brother, Jeff, and his family. We take turns hosting the FHE. This month was Jeff and Linda's turn to host. Jeff had a business dinner Monday night, Chris had High Council Meeting on Tuesday, I have a baby shower on Wednesday night, Thursday night is girl's night out, and Friday the boys are going to the monster truck show. So, Sunday was the decided day to have our combined FHE.

So after waking up and coming to, I asked Chris what the plan was, if FHE was still on tonight, especially since I finally realized that it was Super Bowl Sunday. Chris didn't know, so I called Jeff to see what the plans were and he invited us to come over immediately for food, the super bowl and FHE. I think Jeff had this all planed out to begin with!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The food sounded extremely enticing (especially after fasting). And after all - it was family home evening. So we decided to head out to Jeff's house. I prepared for the worst by bringing a book to read and my journal and planned on having my kids to entertain me.

After arriving at Jeff's my kids abandoned me for fun with their cousins (even Sean stayed downstairs most of the time). I grabbed up some munchies and sat down, prepared to be bored out of my mind, and to excuse myself a little while later to read or do something else. But as the game got started I actually started to enjoy watching (can you believe me watching football and enjoying it?). Maybe it was finally getting some food in my belly, maybe I was still whacked out on cold medicine, or maybe after all these years of living with a sporty husband my intolerance for football had been broken down, I don't know!

So we watched football and laughed at the commercials. Then around half time dinner was served! Delicious BBQ steak and ribs. Jeff and Linda know how to throw a party and keep quests happy!!!!

When the game finally ended we then had our official FHE activity of making Valentine cards for some family members. The kids had a great time with glitter glue, heart stickers, and doilies. The boys seemed to get the task done quickly while the girls put a little more time and energy into the projects.

So thank you Jeff and Linda for a great day, and a day for the record books. Who knows, maybe I'll throw the super bowl party next year. (Ha, ha, ha.)

Halle the Gymnast

Halle posing for her official Mini-Olympic gymnastics picture

Halle lives for Thursdays. Thursdays are the days she goes to gymnastics. She just started doing gymnastics this year and really, really, really loves it. Not only does she enjoy the different activities in gymnastics (like walking on the beam, swinging on the bars, doing somersaults and stretches on the ground, jumping on the trampoline, and swinging on the rope), but she also loves showing off and getting plenty of attention. Yes, she is a diva girl.

On January 20th, 2007 her gym sponsored a mini-olympics where they could perform a small routine on the floor, the bars, and the beam in front of all the moms and dads. Halle was in diva heaven with about 50 or so spectators watching and clapping. I think her most favorite part was to stand on the podium at the end, say her name into the microphone, and receive an award for participating. When all was done her only question was, "When do I get to do this again?"

Halle with her teacher, Katie


Halle receives her award


Halle swings on the bar