Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day! It has been a fabulous Mother's Day so far! Carter slept well and didn't have a fever last night so I slept well! This morning he gave me a bunch of cards and pictures that he had made for me. It was very sweet. That's the nice part about him having preschool (my work), kindergarten, primary, and Matt. I got cards that he had made with Matt and at all those places. Very cute! We all ate breakfast in bed and read the newspaper. Carter goes CRAZY about the funny pages and since it was Mother's Day there were some really funny applicable ones today. In fact there was one comic strip set to the tune of "I will survive" which Carter asked Matt to sing so that was memorable! I've been holding Carter on my lap most of the day (except right now because he is watering all the plants with Matt at the moment). He's been super clingy since he doesn't feel well and I love having all the extra snuggle time. In fact, I was so happy to watch Music and the Spoken Word with him this morning! It was fantastic! Imagine how happy I was to be cuddling with Carter and have the opening musical number be my absolute favorite of all time! For the Beauty of the Earth the John Rutter arrangement! I could have died I was so happy to hear it! It was out of this world gorgeous and Carter and I had a fun time naming all the in instruments in the orchestra and talking about them. He decided he wants to play the organ and the french horn. We'll see though because he changes his mind about instruments a couple times a week. I need to start setting aside money for Yamaha Music School I guess. :-) For Mother's Day Matt has done an awesome job of planting beautiful flowers on the rock wall and cleaning the house really well. He had to weed the rock wall and and planter and it literally took hours. Then he planted and then put new bark down. I love how it looks. He did weed and feed on the lawn but the dandelions are like super resilient so it looks like he'll need to get spray to kill them. I love love love my aspens right now. The leaves are tiny and gorgeous and shake in the breeze making the most delightful sound ever! I love to have the windows open and just watch and listen to them. It's so nice! I missed them all winter long! Anyway, I am having a wonderful Mother's Day and I hope you are too! I was telling Matt how excited I am for this week! It's just a wonderful week with Mother's Day and my birthday and Carter's fieldtrip etc etc etc. It's going to be great! I am really looking forward to wearing my new clothes my mom sent for my birthday! I opened the package early because I seriously can't handle waiting. The clothes are SO nice and new and I am SO excited to wear them! Thanks Mom!!!! Happy Mother's Day!

Today

Well today certainly has turned out to be strange. Carter came down with a very high fever this afternoon. Our thermometer was registering it at 104.3. We called his doctor's office which had an on-call affiliation and they of course asked us to bring him in. I was very scared as the tylenol and motrin had not brought down the fever. Carter hadn't complained of any symptoms and the other thing I had noticed was a night-time cough and a clear nose so I was thinking it was possibly allergies or the beginning of a cold. Anyway, the doctor examined him and when he looked in his ears said "ah-ha we've found the cause, he has fluid in his ears". Then he looked at Carter's throat and said "well now we have the cause, it looks like strep." So the doctor took a culture which of course was positive for strep. While we were waiting for the results Carter said with a duh type of tone that his throat hurt when he swallowed. Matt and I had to roll our eyes at this one. Um...as a famous Adam Sandler quote "that information would have been helpful to me yesterday!" Carter's just too mellow to openly complain even when I had specifically asked him if anything was hurting. So he's on antibiotics now and I really hope he didn't infect anyone before we knew that he had strep. The good news is that we caught it early and that he is on antibiotics so by Monday he'll be well for school. He really freaks out when there is no school or when he has to miss school. He's freaking out about missing church tomorrow but we are definitely keeping him home because I want him to not be contagious before we let him leave the house.

On that missing church note I have to say I'm focusing on the positive aspects. First, that I can enjoy Mother's Day without having to stress about dressing up, helping Carter get ready, or deal with any of the other church morning routine. Second, I'm really happy to miss it because I don't want to hear Mother's Day talks that will make me cry because I miss my mom so much. Third, I'm happy to miss it because when I asked Matt if he ordered me a corsage from that young men fundraiser he looked at me with a look that said "what are you talking about?" I explained it and it was obvious that yet again people who serve in nursery continue to not get sign ups or current information. I guess I shouldn't speak for everyone in that calling but Matt certainly seems to never know anything that is going on. Anyway, I don't want to go to church corsage-less and have people think my husband didn't spring for a corsage for his pregnant wife when in truth he didn't know about it. So yes, I'm looking forward to my breakfast in bed and mother's day, my way. My way. Doesn't that sound like that tyrannical queen from Alice in Wonderland? haha. My way meaning I'm going to ask Carter to sing me a song and I'll read the card he made for me probably a dozen times, and I'll cry about how happy I am to be a mother and to be welcoming another child into our family, and I'll wear comfy clothes, and curl up with my sweet, adorable, sick little boy and try to make him as comfy (he says comfty) and happy as possible. We already stocked up on jello, otter pops, gatorade, and cookies so with all that and lots of hugs and cuddles we should be set.

Whoa!

The picture says it all doesn't it? I gasped in horror on the way home from work today when I saw that gas prices went up another 10 cents OVER NIGHT! I have half a tank so I wasn't planning on filling up yet. Now I am kicking myself for not topping off yesterday when I could have saved myself 10 cents/gallon. Saying as it's probably going to keep going up maybe I should run out tonight and fill up before it goes up another 10 cents! In fact I should probably fill up at 3/4 tank just so that in the long run I'm paying less. We are at $3.49 for regular here at the station closest to us. For all you California readers please comment on what you're paying. Last I heard my mom was paying $4.05 for premium. So this is just my posting lamenting about fuel costs. Crazy crazy! We definitely won't be driving as many places this summer and I've already changed my garage sale route. I just can't justify driving long distances hoping for a killer deal. I'll be staying more local from now until the gas prices come down a bit!

Carter didn't wake up until 11 o'clock today. He had gone to bed very late. I normally would have had to wake him up to take him to piano today but Carter's teacher needed to re-schedule his lesson. I figured since he didn't have piano I might as well let him sleep. He was still asleep when Beckett (one of our friend's little boys) got dropped off for me to tend for a little while. I knew that Carter was going to be so excited when he saw him and sure enough as soon as he came downstairs to "surprise" me he got the surprise! He was very excited but asked where Beckett's "baby friend" was. That would be Beckett's twin but we were just watching Beckett for a little bit. Anyway, Carter wanted a turn to read so I handed him over and loved watching how gentle and kind Carter was to him. It was so sweet to hear him read stories to the baby. They really enjoyed the story time and I thought about how amazing it was that Carter was holding a baby on his lap and reading him a storybook that I had bought when I was pregnant with Carter. I had read this book "Baby Beluga" everyday while I was pregnant as soon as I learned that Carter could hear my voice. It stayed one of our favorites for years. After book time Carter went to Cricket's room and got a bunch of toys out of the toy box and we had fun playing with Carter's old toys and seeing Beckett enjoy them. So today I got a glimpse of how things will be once Cricket is born. Fun day!

Carter's Question of the Day

Several times a week I am reminded of how much Carter's personality is like my brother's personality. Things are very black and white in his mind and he is ultra conservative as far as church goes. Growing up, my brother could be found standing at the front door on Sunday mornings completely dressed and ready to go and yelling for the rest of us to hurry up because we were going to be late. He woke up extra early for early morning seminary and made sure we were on time no matter what. Once, when I tried to get a few extra minutes of sleep he yelled my name so loudly from my doorway that I jerked up and my back hurt for the rest of the morning. So there's the background info for today's story.

Carter was given a handout at church for a primary activity next Saturday. He read it right away and was of course very excited about it. Matt looked at the handout and told Carter it was the same time as his baseball game so he'd miss the primary activity. After all, we've paid for baseball and he missed this Saturday's game because he woke up puking in the middle of the night. We'd hate for him to miss 2 games in a row, especially when there are only like 10 games of the season. We tried explaining that he could come to the activity after the game if it was still going on and we offered to get the materials so that he could do the activity at home after the game if the activity was already over. Carter's response you might ask? It was this.... "What's more important, church or baseball?" Ugh. Help please, I'm raising my brother!

It's A Girl!

It's official! I had my ultrasound today and Cricket is a girl! Matt and Carter were able to come to the ultrasound with me and so it was a neat family experience! Carter told the technician that he knew it was a girl! He's been saying all along that he wants a baby sister. He was so excited that Matt had a bit of a time trying to get him to not run around the office. The baby wasn't cooperating (fetal position with legs crossed though and back towards the front) so the ultrasound took awhile as the tech slowly made sure each organ and part of the baby was measured and reviewed for any problems. She and the doctor said that everything looks good. We are so excited to be welcoming a new addition to our family! After the ultrasound we waited to see the doctor. As we waited the name wars began. I had suggested Katharine awhile back and Carter had stubbornly said that we couldn't because that is grandma's name. I explained that grandma's name is Kathleen and not Katharine but that Katharine would be a nice name because it is kind of like grandma's name. Then, Carter decided that Cricket's name should rhyme with grandma's name and he's been holding fast to the name he thought of "Baleen" as in the stuff that some whales have to help them keep their food in their mouths. Hysterical but it's not happening. So in the packed waiting room we have Carter talking loudly that the baby should be named Baleen, me mentioning that right now I am leaning more towards Katharine Cecilia, and Matt saying hey that's not fair I thought we had settled on Katharine Lucille (more fair because it's a name from each family not just my side). It was surreal. Once Carter remembered the name Katharine Lucille he said he changed his mind and wants Cricket's name to be Katharine Lucia after his friend Lucia. At this point I'm thinking I'll either stick with the original name or we'll stick with the name Cricket which is what we've been calling her for weeks! Just kidding :-) So anyway, we are all very happy and excited (though I must say I am a bit nervous because of the curse my mother and uncle have put on me that all my mischief and drama will come back to get me in the form of me having a girl just like me). Well, I've very tired and tomorrow we have baseball pictures, baseball game, enrichment, and Carter's award ceremony so we are off to bed!

Utah County Essay Contest

I just got a call this morning from the Utah County office to let me know that Carter won 3rd place for the Utah County "Why My Booster Seat is Cool" essay contest! The awards ceremony where they give away the prizes and take pictures will take place Saturday at 12:30 at the RC Willey in Orem! We are so excited for Carter! I wish I had made a copy of his essay to post. Hopefully we'll get a copy so I can post it. I love 6 year old logic. I know he mentioned that his booster is cool because it has lights so he can read or play games in the dark but the essay was submitted in early March so I can't really remember what else he wrote about. I remember thinking it was adorable and the lady on the phone said it was "so cute." Anyway, we just wanted to share the good news with family and friends in case you can come on Saturday. Here's the picture of him in his booster. It had to be submitted with the essay. :-)