Things that make me smile

I like my kids. They do a lot of cute things.

Cadence spends most of her Mondays telling me that tonight is her night to teach the lesson for Family Home Evening. She does get an unfair amount of lesson assignments. The girl loves to be in charge and to have a captive audience. She gets up in front of us and speaks with great authority and poise.

Tonight she (we) taught the lesson on the scriptures and our family goal to read them every day this year. I tell her in her ear some things to say and she says them and then improvises, then I bring her back to the lesson with another whisper in her ear. Tonight after she taught us about the scriptures I said it was time for Dad to read to us from our "Book of Mormon Stories" book, and she stopped me and said sternly, "No, we'll take a volunteer. Is there anybody who will volunteer to read this? Uh, Dad, YOU. You get to be the one since you're the only one sitting over there."

During the reading, Cadence interrupted every single sentence to insert her incorrect commentary, such as, "See, that's Nephi" (Nope, Lehi.) etc. Here are some of my favorite comments:

Spencer: "Most of the people living in Jerusalem 600 yrs before the birth of Christ were wicked. God sent prophets to tell them to repent, but they would not listen."

Cadence:"But, how did they know? God wasn't even a grown up yet!"

After reading the whole story:

Cadence: "This all happened a long time before we came to the earth!"

Spencer: "Before there were even had T.V.s,"

Cadence: "And they didn't even have homes yet!"

Spencer: "Well, they had homes, but they didn't have..."

Cadence: "Chairs!"

Spencer: "Well, they had chairs, but not couches like this. They didn't have cars but they could get around on camels, or donkeys, or..."

Cadence: "YoYos!"

That's basically how any scripture reading goes with her. Or any conversation, for that matter.

Cadence and her "Prince Gabin"

Cadence has recently learned to read! She can read sight words like bob, dot, has, at, peg, Netflix, Disney, and Tangled. Today she read milk and number. We're so proud of her and she's so excited about it. The only struggle is that she is so excited that she tends to get a little ahead of herself. This is a common problem, I know. But any suggestions on this?

Campbell's communication has increased and improved quite a bit in the last few months. Oh, please bless that it stays just the way it is now. She has the cutest way of talking. The other day she kicked her foot into a baby-seat and hurt herself while dancing. She came to my lap and said, "Mommy, ah needa goda hosspidoh!" She often says things like, "Ah takita off!" (I take it off). Her "mank you" or "bake you" always delight Spencer and I. Along with that, she's such a parrot! She spends at least 75% of waking hours copying everything she hears. Cadence used to get really frustrated and annoyed with it, but I don't even think she notices anymore.

One thing that always cracks me up is that anytime she senses the threat of bedtime or naptime coming on, she blurts out, "ahmohning Mommy!" ("Good Morning, Mommy").

She still insists on a dress every day. She also insists I do her hair, which she pretty much always pulls out, anyway. She has learned from her sister to accessorize and I have found her several times with elastic head bands meant for babies double wrapped around her wrists and ankles, along with little hair bands on her fingers for rings. Every once in a while she gets her hands on a marker while my back is turned and she applies her eveningwear makeup.

Campbell dressed up

Layla is sick, bless her chubby little heart. The last couple of nights she's woken up quite upset. The first night I awoke to her screaming and ran upstairs expecting to see blood or a serious injury, but she was just sitting there, feeling very upset. I picked her up and noted a fever and an intense heart-rate. I sat down with her handing her a bottle.

She took the bottle but instead of drinking it, launched into a story. She was describing something with great enthusiasm, even gesturing with her hands from time to time. After story time I took her downstairs to find some medicine and I handed her off to Spencer while I searched for the thermometer. She told him a story, too. As soon as I lifted her to place her back in the crib she started shaking like crazy and talking up a storm again, clutching my robe tight. So we sat back down in the rocking chair and snuggled until she relaxed and fell asleep. It was a precious moment. A little more precious than when she barfed on me today.

You know, there are a lot of moments of guilt with the third child. I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels like that child is just getting ripped off. But on the other hand, those midnight moments when they need you so have never been sweeter for me than with the third, who hardly ever gets that kind of attention from me otherwise. And who appreciates it more, accepts it more.

Layla has added to her vocabulary the words "bottle" ("doe-doe") and "diaper", which sounds just like that, except it seems to always have a question mark at the end.

Oh, oh! And I feel like I can predict pretty acurately that she has inherited that funny, froggy little voice that Cadence once had. Yay!!!

I announced yesterday that the new rule of the family is that NOBODY CHANGES OR GROWS UP AT ALL ANYMORE! EXCEPT CAMPBELL CAN LOSE THE TWO-YEAR-OLD 'TUDE, BUT STAY THE SAME OTHERWISE! Everybody stopped what they were doing to look and listen to this proclamation. Then Cadence just said, "Okay." And they moved on. Good. I can smile about that thought.