Swimming, Zoo Trips, Potty Training, and Car Seats in Church

This week the boys enjoyed their preschool class. Kolby and Eli love their classes, and on Friday I even got motivated and took all 4 boys and worked out during their classes. Camden and Isaac went to their kid care, and I used the elliptical machine for a while. Afterwards I picked up the boys and it was all I could do to keep Camden from joining in with Kolby and Eli in their gym class. That was a fun morning.

On Tuesday it was Camden’s night out with Daddy and they went to the YMCA in Menomonee Falls because it has a nice kid’s swimming area with a little wading pool and slide. Unfortunately there was a problem with their heating system in that room that evening, so they got moved into the lap pool. Camden wasn’t able to go down the baby slide anymore, but they still had a lot of fun. And then on Wednesday night Kolby and Eli had their swimming lessons, and they both did great. Kolby is now able to jump in from the side of the pool without anyone to catch him and he can walk out to the middle of the pool. Eli is still as brave as ever – dunking his entire head under the water over and over. It’s pretty fun to watch.

On Thursday we had an Enrichment activity at Catherine Call’s house sharing all of our favorite children’s books, which was nice to have a night away from the kids. I enjoyed remembering the books that we loved as children and thinking about which ones I would like to add to our collection for our kids. Then on Friday evening we had a ward dessert night at the Spencer’s house and Alicia and Steve Taylor were there too. That was nice to get together with some ‘new’ people, and it was fun to see all the little boys running around together too.

And then yesterday was fun. We went to the zoo in the morning because it was a free zoo day (our membership had expired on Friday). We told the boys that there was going to be a surprise at the zoo (Eli was sure that the surprise was going to be the animals, but Kolby was excited to find out what it would be). When we got there we met our friends, the Hedgecocks, and Kolby was excited that the surprise was his friends, Jordan and Carter, at the zoo with us. My favorite part of the Milwaukee zoo is always the big cat house, because the lions and the cheetahs are always right there in front of the glass and they are usually active and moving around so they are so interesting for the kids to watch. We stopped on our way home and picked up some tennis shoes for Michael since his were getting his feet all wet every time he went out in the snow because he had so many holes in the soles. Then, after naps we took the boys to Denny’s for their kids eat free night. After we got home, picked up around the house, and put the boys to bed, the Kearls joined us for some games.

And today started out with Michael waking me up to help with the other boys because he needed to take care of Eli, who had had an accident. We are working on the potty training with Eli, and he is doing pretty well most of the time. He still wears a diaper at naptime and bedtime, and we have been using pull-ups for school and church (just in case), but during the daytime when we are at home he is just in underwear, and he has only had two accidents since we started this week, so I guess that’s pretty good – we are using less diapers, anyways.

Today went pretty well. After getting the boys ready and making bread, we headed to church. (On the making bread, if anyone has any good suggestions for getting bread to rise well, I would be open to them! I have made bread now every Sunday for the last five weeks and am starting to get a little discouraged. The first time the bread barely rose at all and turned out very thick, the next time it took hours and didn’t rise much but was a little better, another time it rose pretty well and then sunk right before I put them in the oven, last week they rose nicely and then they sunk while they were cooking, and this week they rose ok but still not very high. I know the recipe is good because my mom’s bread turns out great. I have tried letting the bread rise in the oven on “warm,” letting it rise sitting on top of the stove while the oven is on warm, letting it rise on top the stove on a cooking rack, letting it rise while the oven is on higher, and letting it rise just sitting on the counter top. There are just so many things that could be affecting it, and I don’t know which thing it is I need to fix – is the yeast bad? (but it has risen somewhat), am I letting it get too hot or not hot enough while it rises?, am I letting it rise for too long or not long enough?, or is it something totally different that I haven’t even thought of? At least the bread tastes really good and it’s nutritious, but I sure wish that it looked good and it made bigger slices for sandwiches. So, any suggestions would be appreciated!)

Anyways, on the way to church Camden fell asleep in the car, and Michael and I spent the entire ride to church considering options of how we might keep him asleep (church is hard with a child who is too young for nursery, too old to sit still, and too tired because it is right in the middle of naptime). Various ideas were thrown around, including taking a playpen and setting it up in an empty room at church, leaving him in the car, or putting him in the shed out behind the church – but none of these seemed satisfactory (and some rather illegal), so we ended up deciding on carrying his entire car seat in and setting it on the bench next to us. Now, Camden has long outgrown the little infant car seats that are meant to be carried with a child in them, and he is in an upright, forward-facing seat. Michael huffed and puffed and lugged that big old seat into the church building, and Camden actually slept through a good portion of the first meeting. Michael also decided to take a separate container of snacks for each boy to eat, and that actually kept them all entertained for the entire first meeting, which is uncommon. So, other than the fact that Camden can now open doors and escape from the classrooms at church and so the second two hours of church were not the easiest, it was a good day so far. Camden has two more Sundays before he is old enough for nursery class – yeah!!!

Well, only 18 more days until Match Day when we find out where we will be going for the next four years. We are not-so-patiently awaiting that day. So, tonight we are heading over to Amy and Vicente Cortez’ house for dinner, which will be nice since we haven’t had a chance to visit them for a while. We’d better get ready to go to their place now.