An unusual family.

Anyone sensitive to poop, please stop reading....Consider yourself warned.

Mya was going to the bathroom today. On the toilet, thankfully.

After a good 10 minutes she called me in to wipe. A glorious job parents get to do for far too long. Better that than let her do it herself. Anyway...

She climbed off the toilet, feet asleep, big marks on her legs and peered back into the bowl.

"Look, mom, it's a family. A poop family."

Sure enough, her individual poops looked like what a 3 year old would determine as a poop family all clustered together at the bottome of the bowl. And then she continued...

"But the dad died. He's still in my tummy."

Chapters.

I don't bounce back well from babies. I call it my "baby funk". And it takes a while to come out of it. I'm still working on it.

It's tough to juggle 3 kids, while running a small business, maintaining a household, and being a wife. I feel like I'm mediocre at all of them as my focus is pulled in many different directions.

Last night I was reading from a book (Creating a Charmed Life), and found one of the segments that resonated with me. So I will share:

"Somehow the notion cropped up that we'd better do everything today. The idea took hold, and now almost everybody believes it. This is why so many women are running nonstop just to keep up. In a frantic attempt to realize their dreams, the dreams retreat and the frantic feeling takes hold.

A charmed life is different, because you live it in chapters, the way you would read a long novel. When you're engrossed in a story, nothing exists except what is happening now. Even though chapter 10 is laying the foundation for chapter 11, the book only makes sense one chapter at a time.

When you live your life this way--focusing on one chapter now, another later--you can devote more unfettered attention to what is yours to do at this time of your life, a time that will never come again. Look at the chapter you're now living. You may be in the college chapter, the crummy-first-job chapter, the home-with-small-kids chapter, or the second-career chapter. Circumstances can certainly make things more complicated and less clear-cut than these examples, but if you can keep in mind the main point of your present life chapter, you can give it priority.

Chapter living is the rational way to "have it all", because when you live this way you're not expecting to have it all at once. Its essence is paying close attention to the current chapter and not worrying about what you may be missing from prior or future ones. Their times are past, or yet to come.

The key is letting go of the compulsion to pursue every possible opportunity right now--even if pursuing it means a crowded life, an alienated family, or a hospital stay for exhaustion. That old saying about opportunity only knocking once is archaic as the flat-earth theory and as patently untrue. Opportunity knocks all the time--and it rings your doorbell, calls you up, and send you e-mails.

Ignore the message the keeps repeating "You aren't getting any younger." It's true, of course, in the literal sense, but the unspoken rest of the sentence--"and therefore you'd better do everything now"--is hogwash.....maturity helps, rather than hinders, any dream or aspiration you have....

Decide what chapters you want in your life story. Accept that fate may insert a few others. Give yourself without reservation to the chapter you're on. Trust that living this chapter fully will prepare you for what will next unfold. Don't worry that a choice like putting off college to volunteer overseas or taking tine from your career to be with your children is foolhardy. Such an experience will make you richer as a person and more valuable to the world.

It could also be the finest chapter in your biography."

Happy Father's Day.

Happy Father's day to the two most amazing Father's I know.

Love you both. More than words can express.

Lemonade and Tithing.

The girls talked their dad into a lemonade stand this morning (thanks to the idea being planted in their head by a friend of ours--paybacks, Brian, paybacks). I tried to protest, but was over-ruled by the 3 of them and the "life lessons" they were supposedly learning. So Mike helped them get it all set up. Put out a table. Staked a sign in the lawn. Made the lemonade. And got a jar to collect their coins.

And then Mya kept coming in the house saying "I need more cents so I can buy more lemonade." She was buying lemonade at her own lemonade stand. Not sure what lesson she was learning there....

Mike was confused at my protesting. I just don't dig lemonade stands and begging your neighbors for money. He argued that it was only 5 cents. Still...I protested. And then took pictures.

It lasted for 2 hours. And they made $1.95. Most of which came from our money jar in the house. But they had fun. And I guess that's what counts.

Then we had a little lesson on tithing. Our explanation: the money wasn't ours anyway, but we get to keep most of it. We're only asked to give 10% of it back. And here's the conversation that followed.

Me: Who do we give our tithing to?

Mya: Jesus

Jaida: The bishop

Me: Yep, the bishop. And what does he do with it?

Mya: He sells it to Jesus.

Here's to our first, and hopefully last, lemonade stand. And definitely future lessons on tithing and what the bishop really does with it.

Mr. C

It's almost criminal how cute he is.

And why not...

...it's a perfectly reasonable place to take a rest. And yes, that's Carter's binky from the hospital (which he never used). That's how we roll around here.

Perfecting the oven smores

On my mind

**I've had one or more kids sick for the past 2 weeks. It's June. Why are my kids getting sick?

**Mya has suddenly decided bedtime isn't cool. And she wants to sleep in MY room. She usually wanders in around 3am, makes all sorts of noise so she wakes up Carter, and then tries to kick Mike out of his side of the bed. This needs to be rectified immediately.

**Carter is still waking up every 2 to 3 hours. It's like I still have a newborn 6 months later. Not cool, Carter. Not cool.

**Carter is also refusing to let other people hold him. As in he screams when other people hold him. Again, not cool.

**Currently my lips are tingling and partially numb. No idea why. Is that something that should concern me?

**When I wake up in the morning, it usually feels like I never went to bed. Not diggin' that.

**I have a lot of really amazing friends. I got really lucky.

**I wonder what life would be like if I didn't live close to family. Very different (not in a good way). I definitely prefer to have family close by.

**I wish we could travel more. I love to travel. Even with a baby.

** Jaida already thinks I don't know anything. She doubts pretty much everything that comes out of my mouth. One day I'll tell her my grade point average in high school and that I graduated Magna Cum Laude from BYU. And she'll probably still think I'm dumb.

**It's late and though I have a boat load of things to work on, I'm going to bed. Because sleep is rare and precious around here. Goodnight.

so fast.

How can he possibly already be this big??

Life.

Phew. That was an interesting two weeks.
I shot 2 weddings, one of which included my brother Jeremy.
One family shoot in a wind storm.
And one newborn shoot that was unexpected and perspective changing and which I will remember for the rest of my life.
I attended Jeremy's medical school graduation.
Jaida got sick and ran a fever of 103 for 5 days. She missed the entire last week of Kindergarten. She lost 5 pounds (which is a lot for someone her size) and the doctor wanted to give her an IV. We respectfully declined and forced her to drink lots of gatorade.
Mya also got sick.
All amidst an already crazy week preparing for Jeremy's wedding.
We went on a trip to Vegas and Carter got sick on the way down. We left after Jer's reception at 10pm. We had to stop in Mesquite where we rented a hotel at 2:30 in the morning. I held Carter the rest of the night. He cried. Alot. He's still recovering from a very nasty chesty cold and has thrush. Sick babies are a nightmare. I've been holding him for a week now. And my back hurts.
We got home from Vegas late Wednesday night and it feels like we never left.
And now that I'm back from a "vacation", I need another one. Preferably somewhere tropical and warm. And maybe without kids. :)