Changes, changes

Amazing how people (well, kids mostly) can change so much in one summer. Here's what we're all up to....


Bryce:

Bryce still loves trains (he asks to watch Polar Express about every day, which is so painful in July), but he has found a huge love for lots of other big machines that move, namely tractors ("trackers"). He points them out everywhere, similar to how Brynn used to point out the tiniest princess she found in, say, the soup aisle at the grocery store. It's cute and boy-ish.

He likes to pretend he's a little dare devil. One day I came up to the loft and he had filled up a cup of water and put it on the floor. He said, "Wah DIS, Mom!" (watch this) and tried over and over to jump over the top of the cup without spilling it. Random. Entertaining. So boy.

Bryce is...assertive...intense...decisive...lots of things I'm not. Add to it the fact that he is two, and he is a total and complete roller coaster of a child. Hot or cold. I'm either on the verge of tears because I can either answer to all of his (billions of) demands, or I can not. Either way it is NOT pretty. I'm trying so hard to either ignore the demanding orders he gives me, or insist he ask me nicely for what he needs. Either way he says it, I refuse to take him down the stairs 50 times a day (for NOTHING, I've found out once I get down there), and other such nonsense which results in tears. So we are back to Bryce 1.o. On the other hand, his payouts are the BEST. His belly laugh, his tight squeezes and kisses all over your face, his fun games he comes up with, his adorable high, squeaky voice, and the million of times a day he makes me laugh. That's the intense relationship we've always had together, but lately the ups and downs seem more pronounced. Oh well, he won't be two forever. Sometimes that statement makes me breath a sigh of relief, and at the same time makes me want to cry. You see, intense!


Brynn:

She's been changing probably more than anyone. She took a session of swim lessons at the beginning of the summer. It was survival swimming, so she was completely traumatized the first few times she went. But she started catching on and stopped crying, and I think started believing in herself a little bit. Then she made huge strides the very last day and I didn't want her progress to end there so I signed her and Bryce up for a second session. I am soooo proud of how far she came. She became this confident, brave girl and it was the most exciting thing in the world to celebrate her victories together.

A funny thing happened on the way home from Utah. In "Brynn world," she has quite a few imaginary friends, but that has been really dying off for some time. Well, when we were in the car she randomly started talking to herself saying, "Ok, Goodbye Moses, goodbye Joshua. It's time for me to go be with my real friends now. I'm not going to be able to see you guys again, ok? You have to go be with your friends, too." Marty and I just looked at each other shocked, but didn't want to say anything and get in the way of her...closure, I guess. Well, we haven't had any birthday parties for or weddings to any of them since then, so I think maybe it's done for good. We'll have to see....

Brynn is such a beautiful child inside and out. She has been feeling guilt so strongly. In Durango, Marty went outside to get Brynn and she ran away from him crying. When he finally caught her she said something like "I don't like the bad feeling, I don't want you to know about the bad feeling." I guess she had first put rocks in the car and then blamed it on her cousin and was totally beside herself. Then yesterday she lied about waking up a little girl we were watching. She told me she didn't feel good. I asked her what she felt like and she said she felt like there were icky things inside her feelings. Then she started to cry and told me that when she got in trouble it broke her heart. At that part I was tempted to laugh, but that wouldn't have been a good idea. She has always tried so hard to be good.

Her interests still lie with princessesses or anything else girly, but she has moved from puzzles to paper dolls.


Daddy:


Daddy starts school next week. He loves to play Plants V. Zombies. He is a total and complete saint every time I am pregnant, and this has been no exception. Something ironic happened in my life - a ridiculously big mistake I made turned out to be a marriage boost. I was buzzing his hair with a number 5 (which is pretty long), I took it off the clip to clean it out, and buzzed two big strokes on his head before I realized I hadn't put it back on and he was now bald on that side. First I screamed, then I cried, then I said, "What do I DO?" a thousand times while jumping up and down, then I told him I was never cutting his hair again. This is why Marty is a SAINT. He had a smile on his face the WHOLE TIME. He NEVER ONCE got mad at me, or even seemed frustrated. He stayed positive the whole time was just kind of like, "Alright, let's finish the job!" While I was a total raving mess buzzing off the rest of his (beautiful) hair, he kept cracking adorable jokes like, "Hey, better you do it to me, than me to you, right?" Ok, so I don't know what I ever did right to deserve a guy like that, but...sigh. It turns out, Marty has a very symmetrical head, and looks a little hard as a big bald guy. Like I could almost see him riding a motorcycle or something. Which is...comical. Every time Marty walked through the door at the end of the day my thought process was something like:

1. Oh yeah, remember that one time a couple days ago when I accidentally robbed my husband of his beautiful strawberry-blond locks? I am such a....(insert a myriad of insults here)

2. Awe, look at that big, beaming, loving smile on his face, a man with no guile...

3. I am so madly in love....

Sadly, we only have a cell-phone pic of bald Marty, I'll try to get it on there. But before I end this story I just have to say............ok, he was totally asking for it because he was SHAMELESSLY flirting with me the entire time and it's all his fault I got distracted!!!! The end. :)


Mommy:

I need to hurry and end this post so I won't go into too much detail on the pregnancy just yet. I have a Dr. app on Thursday and then I'll give a proper update on the whole thing. But I am half way through, feeling great, and giddy every time I feel the baby move.


I've recently become gluttonously addicted to Nutella. But there are worse addictions in the world, right?

I have a strong desire to decorate my house, which never happens to me. Decorating is one of my defective girl genes. Maybe it's a pregnancy thing?

We went on vacation, were gone for three Sundays, and I came back to find out that not only are we in a different stake now, but I was released AND already called to something else by the time I got back. That's what I get. I already miss my young women like craaaaazy, I got so attached to them all. Brynn drew a picture of me "to give to your young women, Mom!" and I thought I was going to cry! But I've been in for years, it's been complicated to have Marty in Young Mens also, and I got called to teach Brynn's primary class, which I am sooooo excited for!!!!

(abrupt ending)