On the home stretch

Mr. Wiedz is just about finished with this term's work load. He's taking 16 credits which is a lot of work to juggle between his other responsibilities.


He gets help from everyone!

The Sandbox

When I was pregnant with #1 my parents got her one of those covered turtle sandboxes as a baby shower present. For the past seven years we've used the turtle more as a swimming pool, filling it with water or letting the rain fill it up. The kids have filled it with dirt and mud.

I have a vivid memory of #2 sitting in the murky water that the turtle was filled with a couple years ago. My cousin, Scary, and I walked up to see what he was up to. He reached his hands out of the water to show Scary his pool buddies, worms.

This spring I've wanted to get sand for the turtle so my last visit to Walmart I picked up a couple of bags.

The turtle sandbox has become a favorite hangout of all the boys. The socks, shoes, pant cuffs and my floors and laundry will never be the same.

My big embroidery project

When I finished the quilt for the school I started a new project for our mother's day presents.

A few months ago I followed links from one of my favorite blogs to an article in, Mothering Magazine, highlighting her new book with a link to a sneak peak at a project from the book, family portrait bookmarks. I showed the kids and suggested these would make a nice present for the grandmas for mother's day. Back then they decided first we needed to make on for Uncle Bill first since he was going to Iraq. (I posted about that here.)

So after the school quilt I got to work on the kid's drawings of their grandmothers. I got finished the day we left for Mother's Day weekend. The grandmothers enjoyed their gifts and the kids thought that their drawings turned out good too.

The instructions called for using ribbon as the tab but my supply of ribbon is limited so I crafted tabs from fabric scraps I had and I loved the result. Don't tell the kids but #2's are my favorite, how he filled the whole square and all the details of the hair and the fingers. #4 doesn't write or draw so I did his with just the grandma's names. #1's were smaller and therefore embroidered really quickly which I loved and she was very specific about the color of each element, I can't wait for her to lose her fear of needles so she can do her own embroidery. I helped #3 draw his figures which were simple stick figures with big smiles and lots of spiky hair.

A fun project. And a great gift!

A fun time and meeting goals

We went to Rhody Days in Florence this past weekend.

I have many memories of attending Rhody Days myself as a child and I've always wanted to make a tradition of Rhody Days for my kids.

Mr. Wiedz isn't really a parade and carnival kind of guy. So Rhody Days isn't on his list of must dos for a year. Neither is the Independence Day parade or Dallas' Summerfest. I drag him to the Polk County Fair every year and we don't even discuss the State Fair.

This year I made a goal to run the 5K at Rhody Days, called of course the Rhody Run.

When a carnival and parade include some exercise Mr. Wiedz changes his mind.

We had a great time in Florence for Rhody Days. #1 and #2 didn't have school on Friday so we tried to get out of the house early. 8:00 stretched to 9:30 but eventually we were on the road and made it to Florence in the early afternoon. My cousin, Scary, took #1 and got her daughter out of school for the rest of the afternoon. After some hanging out and enjoying being out of the car Scary and her husband, C$, treated our family to a trip to the carnival. The kids had so much fun riding the rides and enjoying some cotton candy.

After a pizza dinner, some Wii and old-school-Mike-Tyson-punch-out-Nintendo everyone was in bed.

Saturday morning Mr. Wiedz and I headed out for the Rhody Run while Scary and C$ watched all 6 kids.

Awhile back I started running/walking on my treadmill and using a 12 week walk/run program to increase my ability to run. I abandoned the run/walk program awhile back because I just wanted to run. After I stopped using the program I would just run for 15 minutes. Then I noticed I was really close to a mile so I ran a mile, then I went a little faster and noticed I was close to running for 20 minutes so I changed my plan and ran for 20 minutes. I kept doing that until I was consistently running 2 miles. During that time I decided it is always nice to have a goal so I figured I could find a 5K to walk this spring then maybe by the end of the summer I would find one to run. When I shared the plan with Mr. Wiedz he thought I should just set the goal of running one this spring. I googled 5K Oregon and found the Rhody Run. So started my training with a date of May 16th.

My fabulous neighbor happens to be a runner so she and I started running on weekends near our homes. We found a place we could park on a not-so-busy-road. From where we parked to the end of the road is 1.5 miles so there and back to the car equals 3 miles, the length of a 5K. For all of March and much of April we ran those 3 miles every Saturday.

May 16th came and my goal became finishing the Rhody Run without stopping.

I finished without stopping in 37 minutes 13 seconds.

To finish out the weekend, Mr. Wiedz and I returned to Scary's house, showered and got ready for the day. We made a picnic lunch and went to the park. After lunch we watched A in the kids parade. It was a perfect parade to attend, lasted about 15 minutes, 1 handful of candy and we were out of there. We returned to the house and laid #4 down for his nap. When he woke up we went to a lake just south of Florence and played in the water, dug in the sand, played Frisbee and relaxed. BBQ dinner when we got back. And peaceful sleep after a full and fabulous day.

I think we have a new tradition.

Where did May go?

According to Blogger I've only posted twice this month. At that rate I'm going to loose my faithful blogging audience. It is on my list today, along with:

clean house
read my Bible
make a sample quilt square for Mr. Wiedz's opinion
find my glasses
finish an application I've had on my desk for over a month(!)
go through #1's clothes
LAUNDRY
get dressed
upload photos to memory manager
post

I'll be back later. We'll see how the list goes by the end of the day...now that I'm done with my computer/planning my day time the breaky dishes are calling.

Toilet Paper Man

Toilet Paper Man is a super hero that comes to our house.

When wrestling starts around our house every so often Toilet Paper Man sneaks out too. There is a lot of screaming and excitement. Some chasing and trying to unmask this super hero. Toilet Paper Man, it is said, lives between the toilets in our house so you never know when or where he'll appear and there is always a flushing sound as he leaves.

A couple times Toilet Paper Man has brought a sidekick with him, Toilet Paper Boy.

Training who?

I decided this weekend I would work on re-training #4's sleep pattern. He had been waking a number of times in the night. Like 12:30, 2:00, 3:30 and 6:30. I was tired!


Oh. So. Tired.


So this weekend I figured with Mr. Wiedz out of town I could let the older boys sleep in my room and the re-training wouldn't disturb them.


#4 woke at 3ish that first night. And cried and fussed for a little while. He was just settling down and it had been quiet for a bit...I got comfortable again in hopes of that being the only protest and I could get back to sleep. Until #4 was standing next to me.


Disoriented I put him back in his crib and everyone slept the rest of the night. The next morning #1 came to my room to let me know it was morning...#4 was right behind her. I scooped him up, took him back to his crib and explained that he was supposed to stay in bed and call for me to come get him. He needed to stay in his crib!


Nap time had the same result. When he woke up he climbed out and came out to find me.


Saturday night when I laid him down I was clear that he was to stay in his crib. And he did. He slept well all night (a full nights sleep) and I got him out of his crib when he woke up in the morning, I heard him talking. Sunday, while I was enjoying the Kit Kittredge movie with the older kids I heard the obvious thud that is the sound of a baby climbing out of his crib...and falling to the floor.


Last night I took the mattress out of the crib and put it on the floor until Mr. Wiedz can convert the crib to the toddler bed. #4 is not sleeping in a crib anymore!

What!


How'd that happen? When did my baby get so big?


We've never converted the crib since 1) the older kids were, well, older when they stopped sleeping in the crib and 2) by the time the older kids were out of the crib I was pregnant with the next one and we'd be needing it as a crib.


#4 is doing pretty well with his mattress and hopefully this afternoon's project will be trying to convert the crib without an instruction manual for a 7 year old crib.

An interesting training session, indeed. I think we both got a little bit of training this weekend.