NOT a day of rest

Oh my goodness, that's a lot of posts. I think this is my last for the day. So, Jeff decided to go somewhere with his brother which left me to take the three kids to church by myself. Not a big deal, except Addi was extra "opinionated" this morning. We got off to church a little late, but all together. Sacrament meeting involved Addi yelling at her brothers if they touching any of her things, talking very loudly, giving "raspberries" to the people behind her, and being pretty disruptive. The boys were pretty good, with Nathan even reading scriptures for part of it. At one point, Addi was being horrible so I told Nathan he was in charge and took her into the hallway for a moment. I almost had her calmed down, when Nathan came out to give me a couple of pieces to her quiet book. I went back in and didn't see Zach. Of course, Zach as hiding in the very back, in the little area between the wall and the accordian style wall. It is a great hiding spot. I made him sit back in our seats, and we stayed there for a little bit. Addi started acting up again, and I took her out in the hall and made Zach come with me. Nathan wanted to stay in the chapel and was really good while I wasn't there. Thank goodness!
Addi eventually calmed down after lots of screaming, and when it was time to go to nursery she was fabulous. It sounds like they didn't have any issues with her.
We thankfully made it through church and home, where I got to put her down for a nap. We had our home teachers come over, and the kids were relatively good, even though I had a couple of foam bullets that were shot and go stuck on the ceiling. We have awesome home teachers who know our chaos well and handle it fabulously. He gave a lesson that the boys sat through and listen to quietly and got a lot out of.
Please know, I love church, and the boys are really enjoying it as well. In fact, Addi loves nursery and has a great time. Sacrament meeting is usually not this challenging for us. I just want to write it down to remember. Thankfully, Addi is much happier after her nap, and I have been able to recover my sanity, for now.

BBQ at my parents

Last night, I went to a bbq at my parents house. It was enteraining as always. It included me shooting foam bullets at my brother Chris, who retaliated, and shot them at me, and a struggle with me trying to put them down his shirt. I know, I'm a bad example. While there, the boys had a puppet show with some of the monster puppets my mom has. they hid behind the couch, and performed a show with the puppets and some stuff animals. I couldn't catch all of it, but it involved one puppet dropping his puppet into hot lava, the other puppet falling into the hot lava, and a giant baby showing up, causing the puppets to run away screaming. It was entertaining. I wish I would have videotaped it.
Addi also had fun, doing her typical hiding behind the couch, and then popping up and saying "Boo". She would then say "bye-bye", hide, and pop up and say "Boo" again. She did this over and over. It's one of her other favorite things to do.
It was a fun night. Good food, good family. and lots of fun. Sadly, Jason and family couldn't come because of a sick kid, and Jacob couldn't come since he has a newborn, who is just a couple days old. The kids did have fun visting Uncle Jacob, Pei-Ling, and Charlie. This also involved running through Uncle Jacob's big field, finding a garden snake, and holding it by the tail while it spun around like crazy. I didn't witness this and learned about it after the fact. Nathan wanted to find a box to take the snake home. In case you were wondering, we did not take the snake home, much to my relief.
Needless to say, my kids are very enterianing.

Mom, Jumpy!!!!

Addison's favorite thing to do right now is jump on the trampoline. Every chance she gets, she wants to jump on the tramp. She used to call it "dump, dump", but it has now changed to "jumpy". Whenever we're outside, I head "jumpy mom, jumpy". I let her jump on the tramp, but it's not always the best time. The other day, we had a friend over that was playing with Zach. The friend's mom, Julane, came over to get him and I was talking to her for just a minute. Jeff says my minutes are really hours, but it really was for just a short time. Addi came over and kept saying to me "jumpy Mom, jumpy.". She got louder and louder, "Jumpy Mom, Jumpy", "Mom, JUMPY, JUMPY MOM, JUMPY". Needless to say, she loves to jump on the tramp. Julane said she needs to put "Jumpy" on her ringtone. Julane is also my hero because she found a shirt the other day that we are going to give Addison for her birthday. It says 'little firecracker'. It fits perfectly.

Cleaning the church

So, the kids and I went to clean the church yesterday morning. Jeff had to work, so it was just me and the kids, with other members of the ward. The boys were really good helpers, and it was entertaining as always. Addi had to bring her two teddy bears with her, and joined us for the entire duration of cleaning the church. The kids and I were checking on the classrooms, emptying garbage, and wiping off chalkboards. I had given them dusters to help give them something to do. By the the time we got to the relief society room, they decided they needed to dust the ceiling as well. This involved throwing the dusters in the air to "dust" the ceiling. One of the dusters got stuck on the overhang where the lighting is. Needless to say, the dusters were put away for a while after that. However, if you are in the relief society room, please note how well dusted the ceiling is.
In case you were wondering, I really do try to control my kids. I really do.

helping

I'm proud of Nathan a lot, but there were two occasions this week that really stuck out. The first was when I asked him to watch Addi while she was jumping on the trampoline while I was inside doing something. He was a good big brother for doing that, but in the process of doing that, he also saw a stack of weeds, and started pulling them up without being asked, or even suggested. I was so proud of him!
The other instance was last night when I was at the store. He saw a girl pick up a couple of cans of Pringles chips. As she was doing that, the box they were in fell to the floor and a few cans of Pringles fell down. It was a little bit of a mess, and the next thing I knew, Nathan ran over to help her without being asked, or even suggested. I was so proud of him! We talked about it later, and he said he didn't know why he did it, he just did it without being asked. Both boys are very sweet, and also open the doors for people at church, all on their own. I hope they continue to use these awesome manners as they get older!