Goodnight, moon. Good morning, Kimberly.

So I think it's been a while since I complained about not getting enough sleep, so it's probably about time. You know you missed it. The culprit of the hour is everyone's favorite munchkin: Kimberly "The Escapee" Warner! Don't get me wrong. The other two contribute, of course. We would not want to rob them of their glory. Spencer has reverted back to a four AM feeding, which isn't too bad except he'd been sleeping twelve hours so he had lulled me into a false sense of security. And Madeline, naturally, has random bouts of yelling where she will wake up every five minutes screaming from nightmares. But Kimberly, oh Kimberly. Part of the problem is that she has been sick a lot. She had two ear infections back to back, and then this week she kept waking up for an hour or two every night puking for some random reason. But even when she's not sick, she's giving us a run for our money. She figured out a few months ago that her toddler bed has no bars, and she can exit the premises anytime she wants to. This results in her visiting us a lot at night, and me occasionally freaking out when I can't find her in the morning because she has fallen asleep under my bed, or some such random uncomfortable place. Although usually that's not a problem, because she'll wake up before six and come roust us for our morning judo lessons. Also, her ability to escape means she doesn't ever want to go down for naps or bedtime unless you close the door and entrap her. Except naturally, her roommate can't sleep unless the door is open at exactly an 83 degree angle. This caused several weeks of bedtime pain and anguish until we got wise and spaced their bedtimes. But really, Kimberly can find a way to turn any perfectly good sleeping schedule into an all night party. I'm thinking of trying sedatives. For me, not her. She'd probably gain immunity and wake up every hour anyway. Last night she slept on the floor next to our bed because we got tired of trying to take her back to her room every five minutes. We put up a gate on her door to fulfill Madeline's need to see out, but then she just stands kicking the gate and talking loudly until you come get her. If anyone has a broken alarm clock, we're renting her out from 9pm-8am, M-Sat, holidays included, excluding Christmas and Columbus Day. 5 cents an hour, and we'll pay you in pennies. Did I mention she also wakes babies and other children? Usually by sitting on them. A girl of many talents. I really feel bad hoarding her gifts.

A short hello

Hello sports fans. Just checking in. Summer time is keeping us busy. I know you are surprised. But really, it's been a little crazy. In case you don't believe me, in the past few weeks we: -went to visit our new cousin in Logan -blew out two tires on a rock on the way to Logan -experienced our first towing adventure -went to our first splash pad -went to Idaho Falls on vacation -drove through a bunch of bears -went to a family reunion -returned home to no air conditioning -fixed the air conditioning ...and other stuff, probably. My brain has not been still working capacity for some time, so I can't remember anything before last week. Oh well. What can you do? I'll go make up some stuff and write it in my journal and in twenty years I'll never know he difference. Hmm. I was going somewhere with this post. Probably somewhere very deep and philosophical and amazing and Nobel prize worthy. Now we'll never know. I think instead I'll just let you all know that Soencer now has two teeth and it's making me pretty depressed. I don't like babies growing up. And that's about all I have to say today. Don't melt.

There are no words

 So I don't really have a lot to say today. My silver tongue fails me. Blame it on some unruly children and long days. But hey, it's Wednesday, and let's face it, you're clamoring for some attention. If this is untrue, keep it to yourselves. So I hereby give to you an exceptionally rare treat: Photos sans commentary. For your visual viewing pleasure only. Silencio with the smart aleck remarks. Enjoy. And don't say I don't ever do anything for you.

Choose your own blog adventure.

So. Busy week. Busy busy busy. I could try to catch up on all the goings on over here, or I could not. Because let's face it, I would never have the stamina for catchup posts. That arena belongs to more dedicated folks than I. So let's play, Cami writes mini-blog-posts and blows your mind in three sentences or less. Go.

Blog #1- In which I run to Logan for the afternoon
My sister-in-law is having a baby, so baby shower, treats, cuteness! Driving to Logan with my mom and debating how one actually pronounces Mantua! Cranky sick babies who sleep through the whole thing!

Blog #2- In which Madeline pretends to be a pro athlete
Madeline started soccer, because our neighborhood organized a league. She is considerably more psyched about her pink soccer shoes and shorts than actually kicking the ball. She is pretty much terrified of the opposing team.

Blog #3- In which we attend a wedding
Jessie's brother got married, and we all rejoiced and ate food. Madeline wore her wedding shoes and Spencer pooped in his tuxedo. Successful night.

Blog #4- In which there is a lot of poop.
That pretty much covers it, you don't want to know more.

Blog #5- In which Jessie and Cami go to a movie theater
The third time this year, which is some kind of record for us. We saw Avengers and missed the final scene because they cheated and put in two bonus scenes. Spencer came with and loved it so much he pooped.

Blog #6- In which we camp in our backyard
We setup our tent and enjoyed nature, hot dogs, and watching Muppets on our laptop, because we're not into nature that much. We all even slept for part of the night. And now we are ready to camp for real, if someone makes us.

Blog #7- In which we shoplift at yard sales
We supported our neighborhood yard sale by giving the children nickels and setting them loose. We came home with a swing, a plastic car, a small chair, a few princesses, some cookies, a onesie, and some other junk we didn't need. Mission accomplished.

Blog #8- In which Jessie's father is venerable
Jessie's dad turned 80, which is apparently quite the accompishment- go Dad! They threw a party and we were all proud. Eighty is the new 63.

Blog #9- In which Kimberly is a human petry dish
Kimberly and I missed the amazing birthday party because she has a ruptured ear drum and hand, foot, and mouth. This is as awesome a combination as it sounds, and involves a lot of crying and very little sleep.

There you go. Like a whole month of posts condensed into the cliff's notes version for your convenience. We're just trying to recover from being awesome and sick and busy and awesome. Try not to be jealous.

Holidays and so forth.

Aren't you ridiculously sad that you only hear from me once a week? If only Jessie was gone every night instead of just Wednesday. Sad day. Things here are going swimmingly. We had a great Memorial Day and took the girls down to check out City Creek. They got McDonalds, ice cream, new shoes, and played in the fancy fountain, so they gave the place a pretty good review. That will comfort the builders, I know, who were waiting for the okay from my kids to consider their work done. We also visited some graves, which was nice, although I'd forgotten how tiny cemetery roads are. We ended up hiking in with the stroller, which made me grateful we have one that can contain three children. Best Mother's Day gift ever. Jessie was so thoughtful when he said okay and let me order it. (In a girlie color, even. He is a saint.) All together, everything a holiday should be. And today was everything the day after a holiday should be-that is, lazy. To recover from the holiday.

Also new since our last report: I have a new calling. Before you place your guess, let me give you these stimulating and obscure clues: 1) The relief society president is my next door neighbor. 2) The relief society president is my visiting teacher. 3) Jessie got to know my calling before I did. (That may or may not be relevant, but I felt like that was a little unfair.) Back to the facts: Yes, my calling is in the relief society! How did you know? I am the new Visiting Teaching Coordinator in my ward. This should be comforting to my mother, who worries that I don't "get" relief society. Think of it as special training for the relief society challenged, Mom! I'm actually really excited about it. A lot of it is on the computer recording stuff. Is it nerdy that I'm kind of excited to do some work that is more brain work than repetitive cleaning work? It'll be good for me. Let me know if you have any tips for me on how to coordinate. I'm still working on coordinating schedules. And outfits. And other coordinating things.

I am a young mother. Or so they tell me.

   So I have some kids. A few of them. Not a ton. I know a lot of women with a ton of children, all a year apart, whom they dress in homemade designer clothing and feed homegrown jam and read to five hours a day. I am not one of those women. But I feel like I can safely say that we're in the throes of what some might call "young motherhood", and thoughts on the subject have been percolating in my brain. (You see how I used the word percolating there? That was totally gratuitous. Just to remind myself I know some big words. One of those young motherhood things, probably.) Sometimes young motherhood is awesome. Take today. When it took my daughter four hours to pick up a dozen toys. Reminded me of the time my mother wouldn't let us come out of our closet until we cleaned it. We were in there all day. Mom brought us dinosaur macaroni and cheese to eat in the closet. Best day of my young life. I wonder now if my mother was relieved to have us so happily contained. Probably. Smart lady.

   Today I went to a relief society meeting. That was a smart move, because Jessie sits with the bishop Wednesday nights, so we got to bring all the kids, and they love field trips. Madeline terrorized the nursery. Spencer terrorized Daddy's lap. And Kimberly spent three minutes in nursery, thirty minutes in the hall climbing all over the stroller with dad, thirty minutes in the relief society meeting driving trucks on seats and flipping the lights, and five minutes stealing pudding from the treat table. I got her down the hall by confiscating her pudding and using it as bait to lure her. She cried the whole way and people looked at us funny. I gave them my "young motherhood is glamorous and I know you are jealous" look, which is a great look for me. It should not be confused with the "I feel like a circus freak show and probably should not be in charge of multiple small children" look, which is what it looks like on most other women, but not me, because I'm cool like that. Then I dragged several small children out the door crying loudly for their father. Home to their beds where they thanked me profusely for getting them to bed at a decent hour and feeding them vegetables and washing their laundry.

   Sometimes we are a circus when we walk out the door. Sometimes we're loud and unruly. Sometimes I feel like dishing out a round of spankings or hiding in the closet and eating macaroni and cheese. Sometimes when there's a lot of kicking and screaming and the kids are kicking and screaming even louder than me, I think to myself, "Wow! This is making me really passionate about having lots more babies! 500 of them!" Young motherhood rocks. But seriously. It does rock. Because sometimes a pudding faced kid is the last straw, and sometimes they are the perfect photo op.

In honor of Mother's Day...the kids.

Welcome back to the mad house. The kids alternate between running me ragged and making life amazing, so we're staying busy enough. In honor of Mother's Day, which was appropriately celebrated with extra sleep and treats, let us indulge the mother in me and check in on the little munchkins and their latest award winning escapades.

Spencer is three months today, although we didn't have any cake, so I'll probably convince him to stay two months for a while to compensate. At the risk of totally screwing myself, I will admit that he is a dream. He sleeps anywhere from 8-11 hours a night, usually more on the 10-11 hour end, and therefore is my favorite child. He's getting more vocal about not being alone and responds to attention by hyperventilating. Clearly he needs to be adored by the public, and you'll see him on some reality television very soon. He is also laughing a lot, which is quite the drug high for my mama brain, so I spend a lot of time acting like a loon to get my fix. Madeline enjoys it too, but Spencer tends to clam up when she grabs his face and demands he laugh. I don't know why.

Kimberly has taken another one of those inexplicable leaps forward where she wakes up ten years older and I don't know how it happened. She weathered her second ear infection last week and takes her medicine with enthusiasm. She enjoys waking up at six in the morning and climbing into bed with Mom and Dad in order to make sure we don't sleep through our alarm, because she is thoughtful. Mostly she talks to Jessie and kicks me, which shows you how much gratitude I get for giving her life. Kimberly also enjoys sneaking suckers and Warheads out of the pantry, although the joke was on her with the Warheads. Hee hee. She talks a lot, mostly to Daddy on her play phone, and pretty much just spends all day hanging on the outskirts of the chaos picking up whatever food, treats and toys she can scavenge. She loves the new stroller I got for Mother's Day and spends a lot of time begging to sit in it. Happy Mother's Day to Kimberly.

Madeline continues to be the most interactive, the funnest, and the most exasperating of our children. Hazards of the firstborn. She has memorized the first two Articles of Faith and likes to bear her testimony in church. She is convinced one of the men in our ward is President Monson, but amazingly, this does little to convince her to be reverent in sacrament meeting. She pretty much spends all day either playing with friends outside, or with nose pressed up against the windows begging to be outside with her friends. I think she has a more active social life than I did in high school. Although that may not be saying much. Madeline loves to throw tantrums and whine, and then tell Dad how good she was all day. She has about 389 best friends. You are probably one of them. Congratulations. She spends a lot of time pretending, which is adorable, unless she is pretending to listen. She also spends a lot of time loudly referring to people as "that old man" or "that old lady", whether they look 20 or 90. They are always uniformly flattered and amused. She also likes to ask loudly about the baby in people's tummies, which also makes us a lot of friends.

Jessie was good to me for Mother's Day, and as I mentioned, I got to sleep in several times, try out my new stroller, go out for dinner, and hear how impressed Jessie was that I don't turn into a homicidal maniac listening to all the whining and crying all day every day. So nice to be appreciated for my accomplishments. Good weekend with my little family, living motherhood in all its bittersweet and wonderful glory. Hope you all enjoyed it too.