Mud, Baby Shower, and Swimming

1. So remember how on Memorial Day it was supposed to be a "snow day" makeup, only we had worse weather than on the actual snow day. It had been raining all day when I posted on my blog last Monday, but by the afternoon there was a severe weather warning, flash flood warning, and tornado warnings.  Joy.  Leo and I didn't even notice till it was all over.  I'm glad the kids were home though because the schools went into "shelter-in-place" mode and my friend that picks up Elena didn't get home with her daughter till 5 PM that evening. Yuck.

2.  This was during a break in the massive rain on Tuesday.  I let the kids play in the mud and Ana convinced Elena and Sebastian to smear mud all over their faces. Err... Ah well, good times.
3. I went to mow our lawn today, because it had finally dried out (it rained on Wednesday too) and when I stepped outside it was like stepping into a hot steamy bathroom.  And then almost immediately it started to rain, and then to downpour.  A few hours later I let the kids ride bikes and went out to watch them in the front and it was 100% humidity.  Ugh.

4. On Friday Leo went to Elena's school for her 1st grade awards ceremony and picnic, only she has two teachers (one for English, one for Spanish) and he went to the wrong class and totally missed it.  Elena was sobbing hysterically when Leo figured it out and finally arrived, her teacher calmed her down by letting her redo her part.  She won a courtesy award.

5. Also on Friday, my visiting teacher, Chelsea, had a baby shower for me!  It was really fun, good company, good food, no silly games.  Loved it!  Below is the diaper cake another friend, Marea, made for me.  Anyway, I ate till I couldn't eat anymore and sat and chatted, and was given adorable baby clothes.  Ahh, I feel so lucky and loved!

6. This morning we were at a swim team meet.  Those things are chaos.  Leo volunteered to be a pit parent for the 7-8 yr olds (which was close to the 6 and under so he could keep an eye on Isabel and Sebastian).  I tried to keep Nicolas entertained, take a few pictures and hem the bottom of my dress.  I only managed the few pictures, although I never got a picture of Ana.  Next meet it will happen.  

7. Isabel's at the front of the bench with the orange swim cap and Sebastian is at the back. One race before Sebastian was up to swim, he told me he had to use the bathroom, we ran there and ran back, and it was just seconds before he started, but because he had to get on the goggles and the helper had to jump in the water and realize that Sebastian was swimming, he got a pretty late start.  That was the most exciting part of the meet.

Isabel ready to go.

Isabel swimming.  She can swim by herself but won't swim the whole length of the pool unassisted.

Sebastian swimming.  Only really he can't yet.

Elena ready to race.  She actually got several first place ribbons in her heats this time--in freestyle and backstroke.

Elena swimming.

More of Elena swimming.

Good times with Nicolas.

8. Nicolas was a bear by 11:30 (we were supposed to be there at 7:30 but we got there at 8) and the younger three kids were done their events so I took them home while Leo stayed with the 7-8 yr olds who were swimming butterfly and breast stroke, and with Ana.  Only by 2 PM (yes, still not over--see why I detest these things?!?!?) it started to rain and thunder again, so they cancelled the rest of the meet. That was the time I was going to mow the lawn.
9. I did finish my dress!  Here's a few pictures.  Only I didn't actually do my hair today, I just put on some lipstick and earrings for the pictures (I needed pictures to enter in the Vintage Sewing Contest), and so don't judge and remember it was literally 100% humidity at the time. It was Butterick 5589 and if you want to read my review, here's the link: Vintage Maternity Dress

10.  The kids are out of school this week!  I am so excited, I can't wait for summer! Although the unusual spring-like weather (the coolest spring they've ever experienced according to many of my long-term resident friends) has officially passed and it is hot and humid!!!  And the mosquitos are HORRENDOUS since it rained. So summer at the pool is what I foresee.
11.  We bought season passes to SeaWorld today (discounted for being Texas residents AND TWO FREE preschool season passes!) and so if anyone wants to come visit us and go to SeaWorld, we are totally game.
12.  Ana won an award in her science class (I think just in that class) for the girl with highest grade all year!  Yeah!!!
13. I'm really struggling here for a last item, but ummm....being this pregnant is good for my posture--I have to sit up straight to type, otherwise my ribs hurt.  The end.

News of this last couple weeks

1. A lady at my sewing class gave us a bike with no pedals, saying that our boys might use it as a balance bike.  Leo took the pedals from the bike with training wheels that I bought for $3 at a garage sale, and he put in on the other bike.  The new bike is the next smaller size than the bike with training wheels.  Anyway, Sebastian had tried to ride the bigger bike but wasn't strong enough.  He got on the smaller bike with no training wheels and away he went.  It was pretty amazing that he just could ride almost immediately. 
2. Nicolas saw Leo drop kick a ball and has since spent hours drop kicking balls.  I really, REALLY need to get it on film.
3.  I buzzed Nicolas and Sebastian's hair.  Sebastian went first and he was really good.  So Nicolas just followed suite and was doing great and I was half way done cutting it when Sebastian came back in the kitchen and he got SOOO mad at me.  He said he wasn't talking to me anymore and HOW could I cut off Nicolas's curls??!??!?!  He really was mad for the rest of the afternoon.  Then Isabel saw him and she was mad too!!!!!  I never knew the kids had such strong opinions about their brother's hair.  Leo liked it though.  I can't believe how grown up it makes him seem.  He went from being a baby to a toddler overnight.
4.  Isabel was sick and throwing up on Monday.  Not fun.  But at least it lasted only 12 hours. She was asleep when I buzzed Nicolas's hair. (Leo had spent two days home the week before with the same type of stomach bug that Elena had had.  Hopefully, we're passed all the illness in our house for a while.) 
5. I met a new lady in our ward who knew Kayli in Indiana.  I mentioned in the course of a conversation about babies and the number of kids your limited to depending on the age when you start, that I had a sister who was 30 with six kids but she got married when she was 17.  She immediately asked, "Is your sister Kayli?"  She said that before at the first playgroup where we met she had wanted to ask if I knew her because I reminded her so much of Kayli because of our mannerisms.  Funny, eh?
6.  Friday night we had a practice swim meet and a potluck pool party afterwards.  The swim meet was long and boring, but the pool party was fun.  I went swimming with Nicolas and he LOVED it.  It was a little chilly and I thought he'd be too cold, but he was as happy as could be.  I finally managed to drag Leo in too.  He didn't want to get in, because it really was quite nippy. 
7.  I bought a bunch of fabric online for my new maternity wardrobe.  When I got it, I almost cried.  What a waste of money.  I bought all clearance fabrics (mostly $3 a yard or so) trying to save money, but I really don't know knits that well, and some of them are SO ugly, they looked better online.  Luckily there's a few cute ones, and I guess it will be good practice for me for sewing on knits.  I don't know how well my sewing machine will handle knits anyway, and so I'd hate to spend a bunch of money only to have my sewing machine eat the material.
8.  Ana and Elena's Christmas shopping is practically finished as of this week.  And I know what I'm getting Isabel and Sebastian already too.  Love that.
9. Elena says she wants to have 20 kids and she tells everyone that.  She plans on getting two vans and she has it ALL planned out apparently.  It's funny to see people's expressions when she tells them that.
10.  Saturday Leo and I abandoned our kids and went to the temple and then to run some errands.  We were gone most of the day (we bought Ana mint oreos to say thank you for babysitting that whole time.)  Then we bought a groupon, called up our friends Truston and Brittney at the last minute and went to a churrascaria for dinner with them.  It was good.  But it was REALLY great spending all day with Leo.  Brittney's parents ending up coming too.  Good times.
11.  Today is Memorial Day and should be a holiday, but the school district is making up a "snow" day. We're keeping Ana and Elena home anyway.  Gosh, I feel like a rebel.
12.  Nicolas loves bubbles, and has learned to say bubbles, and he spends hours at the swim practices blowing bubbles.  It's really cute.
13. And this is how lame we are: the stake has a "Fun Run" 5k and 1 mile walk and then a carnival afterwards every year.  We went for the first time this year, but I hit snooze around 5x's so we just showed up for the carnival and totally missed the 1 mile walk I was going to do with the kids.  Yep, we're lazy.  But the kids had fun getting their face painted and eating snow cones and cotton candy anyway.

This was much later after their face painting had smeared all over.  

 And some cute photos of my handsome toddler.

 This is how Nicolas prays except for two seconds when he scrunches his eyes closed and his nose is all cute.

¡Ya está!

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A silly post for posterity

Okay, this is a completely and utterly random post.  But the other night I was looking at 1950's dresses on Pinterest (yes, I do that a lot, whatever).  And then just out of curiosity I looked up 1990's fashions to see what was on there for my high school years.  And all that I found was stuff like this:

It kind of bugged me, because while I remember my older brothers and sisters dressing like that, and like off of Friends (the other big result along with Fresh Prince of Bel Air styles), I didn't.  That was out before I hit high school.
This was more in style by the time I hit high school. (An extreme style, but I definitely saw it all the time.) Anyway, after searching a bit, styles popularized by Clueless came up.  But I didn't dress like that either.  Maybe Cher's clothing was simply too extremely girly/immodest of fashion for small town North Dakota?  Anyway, I did find an article discussing the forgotten years of 1998-2002, which made me laugh, because they pointed out in the article how nobody has a good name for those years but it definitely was a distinct style from the rest of the 90's and 2000's.  And yep, I graduated in 2000 from high school and that was what I remembered being in fashion.  So for posterity's sake, here's the anti-hipster/skinny jean style I grew up with.

Wide leg jeans.  Yes, I thought this was ridiculous even while I saw people wearing it, but I did see kids wearing it.

The ever present Airwalks and Doc Martens, as opposed to Toms?  

 Flair jeans and sweaters with stripes.  

 The perpetual problem of Kayli's and mine was finding at least mid rise pants (as opposed to what you see these girls wearing and longer shirts.  Derek and Megan would continually ask us to raise our arms to see if our stomachs remained covered.  Sigh.  I think the layering tees of the mid-2000s is the result of this.  Every girl trying to be modest had the same problem and then spaghetti strap tanks in the early 2000's just made the layering tees even more needed.

I pretty sure Kayli had a khaki skirt almost identical to the one above. 

 Yep, I had a choker or two as well.

I LOVED when capris came in style because then I had something modest to wear as opposed NO shorts that were long enough. I also loved that 3/4 length sleeves came in style.  

 I loved that shirt--except it was so short!!!

Kayli in 3/4 length sleeve.

 I think Kayli had running shoes extremely similar to the ones on the right. 

I had a pair of khakis from American Eagle really similar to those on the right too.

And I even found a picture of the exact pair of the boots I owned in high school.  I'm wearing them in the top picture.  I finally gave them away to some charity organization that was gathering shoes, just because they were so heavy I could only wear them for a little while before my feet started cramping and hurting like crazy.  In high school, I just lived with it to be in style.  ;)

Anyway, I know everyone probably has a soft spot for the fashion and music of their teen years (I even read an article once about research that showed that music imprints on teen's brains more than at any other time--so music of their teen years almost always remained their favorite, or at least had the most emotional connection too.) And I fall into that too, I guess, because I really overall like the styles of my teenage/college years, minus some of the extremes.  However, I am so grateful to be an adult now and not be so fenced in by the teenage styles, and also for the internet, because then you can find more of what you want instead of being boxed in by what's in your local stores.  

End random post.  Chao.