On having 9 AM church...

There was a time in my life that I didn't really care what time church started.

Then I had a baby.

At that time, church started at 1:00 pm. For the first few months (maybe it was only weeks?) it was great. We could sleep in, leisurely eat breakfast and get ourselves ready. At church, Thomas would sleep in our arms or the car seat. Life was good. Then he started not sleeping in our arms or the car seat. Life (at church, anyway) became very complicated. Seasoned parents all around is said, "Ohhhh...1:00 church is really hard on the little guys. 9:00 AM is SO much better!". I was excited to finally experience the wonderment of 9 AM church.

Then we moved.

And guess what?

Our new church started at 1:00 pm.

After another year of enduring a cranky, nap-deprived child at 1:00 church, it was finally our turn for the coveted 9 AM time slot.

And guess what?

I've had nearly a year of 9 AM church....and I still don't think it's any better. Granted, I now have a baby that takes morning naps and (obviously) cannot take her morning nap very well on Sunday. If it were just Thomas, we'd be spreading the good news about how wonderful 9 AM church is.

Truth be told, there probably never is a good time for church when you have a napping child. Church is always going to interfere with someone's nap, whether it's your child, or the child that is antagonizing your child in nursery because they are sleep-deprived. Somebody is going to get the short end of the stick. If you have a baby that no longer naps peacefully in your arms or in the car seat, you will probably spend a good deal of church pacing the hallways, so as to limit the amount of noise your fussy child will inflict upon other churchgoers.

When my mom was a young mom, she was once out in the foyer with my oldest brother (he was barely one year old) and my sister (she was a newborn) and a man asked her, "Why do even bother coming to church when you end up sitting out here for most of it?". This upset my mom so much, she vowed right then and there to never let any excuse keep her from attending church - even if it meant spending the majority of it out in the hall with her children.

I thought about this every Sunday when Thomas was a baby, as I walked the halls with him in my arms. I think about it now when I walk with Abigail.

Did I get to sit through an entire class at all today? Nope. But I did make it to the last 5 minutes of Sunday school. I might have missed the entire lesson, but I did deduce that the class had been discussing the Book of James. I left the class thinking, "Hmmm...I should really study James when I get home". I would have missed out on that inspiration if I had chosen to just stay home today.

After Sunday school, I ended up back in the hall again with Abby. I saw her point at a picture of Jesus on the wall and smile. Shortly after, we went to pick up Thomas from nursery and he came running to me with a picture in his hand And said, "It's Jesus, Mommy!"

This is why I go to church. Never mind that Kenta was sick today and I had the kids by myself and we had three epic cheerio spills all over the pew and aisle within the span of about 30 seconds. I was where I needed to be. And even though Kenta was sick, he was super helpful getting the kids ready......even if he didn't exactly know how a cardigan is supposed to be worn. And Thomas looked dapper, as usual, because his daddy always ties his ties with the utmost care:
I thought we'd try and get a group shot, but things got out of hand(don't know what's with the creepy baby cataracts...maybe my lens is dirty?)
really quickly
Maybe next Sunday?

Tough decisions

After an epic battle between Thomas and I over sitting on the potty, I was trying to decide whether or not to a) skip Thomas's nap so he would go poop in the potty or b) take a risk and put Thomas down without him pooping first. (sorry about the poop talk - if you've potty trained a kid, you know it can be a huge obstacle in pt-ing, if you haven't potty trained a kid....just you wait! MWHAHAHAHAHA). Anyway, I couldn't make up my mind what I wanted to do because what I REALLY wanted him to do was just go poop in the dang potty, but obviously, I couldn't force that. So while I was stewing in the kitchen and Thomas was stewing in the living room, I noticed that it had become eerily quiet from his end of the house. Uh, oh. Alarm bells were ringing. Silent children are never up to any good. I dropped what I was doing and ran into the living room and this is what I found:

I immediately forgot how frustrated I was with him and remembered the last time Thomas fell asleep like this:

Thomas, July 2010

Coincidentally, this also occurred after a tantrum.

So, thank you to my adorable son for making a tough decision easier for me today by making the decision himself.

That said, my fingers, toes, and eyes are crossed that I won't find any unpleasant surprises in his bed when he wakes up.

It's only taken him 8 months...

...but Thomas has FINALLY figured out how to get his little digits properly arranged in response to the oft asked question, "How old are you?"



It seems like a very small accomplishment, but we're all about celebrating the little things around here. We've endured months and months and months of guiding his little fingers into their proper position...only to have him let his thumb go loose and straighten out his ring finger and pinky. It always looked like he was telling people he was five years old (instead of two).



His little fingers are getting tired of me trying to take a good picture.

To save ourselves the trouble of having to explain that Thomas really isn't five (or two, since we FINALLY got that one figured out), we've been thinking ahead to the next birthday:



You'd think he'd be happy to mug for the cameras and show off his new skillz. Ha! Do something that I request him to do? NEVER! Luckily, I'm not opposed to marshmallow bribes.

I might have stuffed this in his mouth while he was throwing a fit. Also, please enjoy the sticker that he had Kenta tape to his left hand.

I suppose I'd be a little resistant, too, if my mom kept letting the flash go off in my face.

Conversations with Thomas

This morning while I was getting the kids dressed, I paused what I was doing to rub my eyes a bit (you'd rub your eyes a lot too, if your baby was waking up at 5:00 a.m.). Apparently this concerned Thomas and the following conversation ensued:

T - Mommy, are you sad?

K - Nope. Just rubbing my eyes.

T - Are you happy?

K - Yes, I am. Are you happy?

T - Yeah!

K - Why are you happy?

T-Because I'm not sad!

Ahhhh....the joys of a simple life. To need nothing more than the absence of sadness to declare oneself to be happy! No wonder Christ told us to become more like little children.

It was a good weekend

I know it's been a few days, but in case you haven't heard, we beat Texas again. It was a happy day here en la casa de Hood. This was Abby's first OU/TX. She may not have been "Sooner born" but she is definitely "Sooner bred":

If her onesie looks familiar, it might be because Thomas wore it two years ago (when the Sooners, unfortunately, did not fare as well):

Yay for awesome hand-me-downs....and BOOMER SOONER!!!!!

Neglect

Three years ago, I would have wept at this sight.

In case you can't see what is so gut-wrenching: there, my friends, lies not one, but TWO broken harps strings. I'm not even going to out myself by mentioning how long they have been this way.

In my BC life (or "Before Children" life) these strings would have most likely broken while I was a) practicing or b) getting ready to practice. The broken strings would then have been promptly replaced, and a record of it would have been kept in my "string replacement journal" (yeah - I used to keep track of which strings would break, so I knew which ones were needing replacement most often so I could always have spares handy). In short, broken strings would NOT have gone unreplaced for more than a few hours.

Unfortunately, this beautiful creature currently isn't getting the love and attention she deserves. I look at her and long to spend time with her, but my attention is pretty divided these days. My goal is to change the strings tomorrow. And if I change them, I have to tune them. And if my harp is tuned up, I might as well strum a few chords. And if I'm strumming some chords, I could mix it up and play some arpeggios...and as long as I'm doing that, I could just go ahead and play some real music, right? Right.

I'm already feeling better about forgoing my Sunday afternoon game of fruit ninja scripture study for a little quality time with the old gal. I've missed her.

Conference: a review

I am always grateful for the advances of modern technology, but perhaps the time I am most grateful for this is during General Conference. In my pre-kid life (or, as another mother once told me "my B.C. or 'before children' life"), I was a diligent, get-dressed-in-my-Sunday-clothes-and-go-to-the-church-with-notebook-in-hand-for-all-four-sessions-of-Conference type of attendee. I think I started attending all four sessions when I was about 14 or 15 and with very few exceptions (a few Saturday sessions on my mission and Saturday morning during my race), I haven't missed watching a session of Conference live. Since having kids, we have only watched Conference at home (either our home or someone else's). In some ways, it's nice being able to watch Conference while the kids nap upstairs. In other ways, it makes it sooooo much easier to get distracted and not pay attention (or fall asleep on your couch). And when the kids are awake? I'll just let the picture speak for itself:

Kenta, trying to calm Abby (who was having a major meltdown) with a round of "Ito maki maki" while Thomas drives trains in the buff (he apparently likes to get REALLY comfortable while watching Conference). So...yeah. Bits and pieces were definitely gleaned, but my first thought at the end of Conference was, "Wow. I really need to listen to all of that again. And again. And again."

All of this to say, I am very grateful for the speediness at which Conference talks are available for reviewing after a session has ended. On Saturday while Kenta was at his Priesthood meeting, I watched part of the Saturday morning session that I had missed. When I was growing up (well...the pre-internet years of my growing up) we had to wait a few weeks for the Conference talks to come via the Ensign. Now, you can almost immediately access them on the internet. And as I've started listening to Conference again, I can't help but thinking, "where much is given, much is required". We have all of these inspiring messages, readily available to review and share. What am I doing with them? Am I reviewing them? Am I applying them? Am I sharing the messages with others?

While there were so many good talks (as there always are at Conference), there was one in particular that touched me. Boyd K. Packer specifically addressed the "rising generation" (and I still include myself in this group) with some very wise counsel. He spoke of personal experiences, such as his reaction to the news of Pearl Harbor when he was a senior in high school. He was very unsure of his future, if he would live through the war, or if it was "the beginning of the end", as far as the world was concerned. Hearing him speak about his concerns and uncertainty during this time, I was reminded of my own concerns and uncertainty right after 9/11 - when I was a senior in high school. And here he was, 87 years old, having lived (and still living) a long, full life, despite living through troubling times. With all the uncertainty and turmoil in the world today, it was a good reminder to me that I need to look forward with faith. I do not know what tomorrow or next year or the next decade brings for me, my family, my country, or the world, but I know in Whom I trust and Whose side I am on. What a beautiful message of hope that is for all of us.