Dorisa forgets how to be a person

Ice cream on a hot and windy day.

And then it was July. Just a warning, this post is a mess. Hopefully the pretty pictures will distract you from the terrible writing.

The hardest week of the year recently came to a close. It's the week where Dan leaves on a youth trip and I'm left alone with the kids. Luckily this time they headed to grandpa and grandma's for a few days. I was a single lady without kids for 2 days and I gotta be honest with you, I kind of don't know how to be a person anymore. What do people do when they don't have kids? There are so many hours in the day! And I had so much energy! If I didn't have kids oh man I would get stuff done. Don't get me wrong, I do not regret any part of having children and I got pretty rocking kids too, but I do have hobbies and goals and I wish I had time for them too. Alas, they will have to wait.

Apparently neither of my kids eat chocolate chip cookies. Elena pulls out the chips and eats them, and Oskar hates chocolate. At least they have each other, together, they can eat a cookie. 

I love this picture.

I tried to have a productive weekend without the kids. Part of that productivity included me trying to Drylok our basement to actually get it suitable for visitors down there. I had good intentions, I really did, but all the spiders of the world have teamed up and apparently they don't like me in their lair. We've come to the understanding that I will stay upstairs and they will stay downstairs. That's how we're going to live now. That's it. They've won.

Oskar and Elena have been a little obsessed with Shrek the Musical. And "a little" isn't quite the right term. They are so cute singing it together in the car. I love it. One of my favorite things is when they learn something and apply it elsewhere. I took the kids to Pizza Ranch (this happens on Tuesdays when Dan is gone because kids are free) and Oskar looked at his food and said, "I'm gonna be on you like a fat kid on cake." Oskar knows this from Shrek. Pop nearly came out of my nose. He was just so serious. 

That's no camera trick. She is that white.

Easter Sunday, as always, was a bit sucky. I feel bad saying this because Easter is generally a fantastic holiday. But it is harder when you are a pastor's wife. It is harder when you have kids. It is harder when you have two (or was it three?) songs to play for bells during the service. It is harder when your daughter gets a new stuffed animal in her Easter basket, takes it to church and loses it before the service starts. It is weirder when this new stuffed animal is a mole because she is obsessed with the mole in the Bear Snores On series. Then Oskar found the mole during the silence before communion and Elena yelled out, "My MOLE!!!" and made everyone behind us crack up. This led to a discussion post service about why my daughter is so excited about an uncommon woodland creature. And no, it was not easy for the Easter bunny to find a stuffed mole. They are apparently not very popular.

In April, Oskar lost his first tooth. I had no idea how loose a tooth could be and still technically be attached. It was nasty. And he was not thrilled about it. It was hurting him so badly which led to him not eating much for a couple days so then not only was he in pain, but also hangry. This was one of the few times when his attitude was brought out in preschool and his teachers got to see some of his true colors. During an agonizing dinner it fell out and he was all smiles after that. The second one will fall out within the week and then we only have 18 more to go... this is going to be fun.

I'm sorry, but this is just too cute.

Some of you might be happy to hear that potty training is going better. She is trained in the day, but still wears diapers at night. The picture above might be one she is mad at me some day for putting online, but she is the cutest thing and she was so punchy that night it was hilarious.

I don't know what it is about her, but she gets so serious when eating ice cream.

We've been lucky to get up to the cabin a couple times so far this summer. Not sure if we'll make it up there again this year, but the kids LOVE being there. Especially if their cousins are there. We were up there for a beautiful memorial day weekend and then a couple weeks ago for my dad's birthday. Oskar said,"This is the best birthday party ever!" and his cousin was quick to say "Oskar must not have been to many birthday parties." I'm pretty sure that any time we are at the cabin is the best day ever according to him, so that easily translated into the best birthday party ever.

Yep, that is Oskar using a straw to get the ice cream out of his cone.

When packing for the cabin I've learned to just throw all of Elena's clothes in the suitcase. Between the forgetting she's potty trained while at the cabin and the sheer amount of dirt that girl gets into, we not only use all her clothes, but even have to do laundry while we are up there.

Skip to 0:29 or so. I love her reaction to seaweed in this video. "No. No.No"
That's nature, not nurture people. She has never seen my
reaction to seaweed, alas, she feels it in her heart.

The kids and I went up to Minot in April. It was a good trip, but 4 days in a row with 4+ hours in the car each day was trying even for my travel champions. Elena and Oskar loved running around the farm and Ellie got legitimately stuck in the mud. I picked her up and her shoes were left behind. Those shoes were NOT easy to get out of the mud. I love that the kids get to spend some time with their great-grandpa and aunts and uncle out there, but sometimes I wonder if they don't bring a little too much excitement to the farm. Children literally running in circles isn't exactly the norm at the farm.

I just started watching Supergirl. Not going to lie, I love it. I get what the hype is about. Favorite line so far, "If that pot sticker isn't in my mouth in 2 seconds I will melt your face." I also love that the newscaster is Perd Hapley, but a competent Perd.

When Elena was one, I did a temperament survey on her. I read it and put it on a pile in the closet and recently I rediscovered it. It is amusing, and crazy accurate:

"Emotional reactions for Elena may be loud and dramatic, even those reactions relating to minor concerns. Even though you may sometimes feel overwhelmed by the noise and energy generated by her, she needs you to react without emotional intensity of your own. The problem is not more important because it is loudly expressed. Consider what the problem is - not the volume at which it is communicated. When you feel overwhelmed, be sure to take a breather. Intense children often have a charm and charisma which makes them very appealing."

I'm thinking about putting it on a poster. Or maybe a tattoo on the back of my hand to give myself a reminder of how to deal with her. She is hard work, people.

Girl likes to fold, but apparently is not a fan of stacking.

That's all for now. I will try to be better and post more often, mostly for my sake because these take forever to write when I wait so long between them. But also for you. Thanks for reading!

Do you remember? The 23rd of ...

Pondering the universe. Literally- watching a show about space.

SEPTEMBER?!? I haven't posted since SEPTEMBER 23RD?!? I even wrote something in October but never actually posted it. Slacker. I really miss writing, if you can call my ramblings writing. But between working, kids, exercise and sheer exhaustion, it just hasn't been a priority. I feel bad because apparently people actually read what I write (blogger counts for me). Like, hundreds of you actually read this. Astounding. I didn't even know I knew that many people.

This post is going to feature my tiny baby Booga. Many of you have not met her, or see her very seldom. She is interesting. She is tiny- still only around 25 pounds. Pretty sure Oskar was 25 pounds at 6 months. Shortly after she learned to walk, when she was about 9 months old, she followed me around the house. I kicked up the corner of the rug and she bent down to fix it. For while she was really into pretzels and would leave them in places around the church. I think she was squirreling them away. There was one day when we were leaving the nursery and she said, "I get pretzel" and runs over to the toy kitchen and gets a pretzel out of the oven. Another time Dan texted me a picture of the baptismal font with a pretzel on it and asked if Ellie had been there. Apparently she had, but I had no idea. She LOVES basketball. There was a phase where she would line up EVERYTHING. This lasted for about a year and the habit still makes an appearance some times.

  

To understand her overall temperament, watch this clip from Guardians of the Galaxy 2 starting at min 1:45. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjPe9gcXtT4&t=17s  She is Baby Groot. She definitely has a rage problem and loves to dance and yell. Completely oblivious yet somehow simultaneously tuned in to everything around her. Her voice has always been deafening and remains so. This movie has great music and we listen to it on Pandora. We had it on tonight while we were getting ready for bed. Keep this in mind.

The tiniest helper of them all.

Dan and I had a meeting on Monday and the kids were in the nursery and we heard her yelling, "DAD! DAD! DAD!" Girl had climbed up on the counter and holding her arms victoriously in the air, said "I pooped!" Now that you know all about Booga, enjoy an adventure in potty training. 

Sometimes Ellie gets swallowed by furniture.

She was potty training really well last fall and then she just stopped. Super annoying and she has been uninterested ever since. UNTIL... tonight. No joke, I was cleaning up and the magical Mr. Blue Sky (the song from Guardians of the Galaxy) came on and I heard Ellie yelling from her room that she had to go potty. We've had so many failed attempts lately that I almost ignored her. Realizing this is impossible due to the volume of her voice, I went and helped her use her little potty. She asked for privacy, sat down, peed, waddled over with her pants around her ankles and got toilet paper, wiped, and went to get her potty and dumped the contents into the toilet, still with her pants around her ankles. What the hell? Where did she learn to do this? I'm thinking maybe daycare but holy crap that's initiative. I'm really hoping we are on the road to ridding ourselves of diapers. Knowing her, I guess I'n not surprised that she went all out, but still. Crazy.

Hiding redheads on the beach.

We went to Bonita Springs, Florida in February. Buying plane tickets was probably not the best use of our money, but we had free lodging and we needed a vacation badly. The kids had a lot of fun and it was fun to take them somewhere warm. We were even able to prevent Ellie from getting a sunburn! Both the kids loved spending time with their cousins and I got to go on a 1200' parasailing adventure with my sister-in-law which was fantastic. Although, our toe dip in the water toward the end of the excursion was most definitely a butt dip. The only bad hing about the trip is that between the one million stairs in the house, the stone floors and walking on the beach my lower legs hurt SO much the entire time we were there. I was prepared for it this time because it had happened before but MAN it hurt so much. And no, I was not alone in my suffering. Others felt it too.

This is a story from what I was going to post last October.

We were shopping for clothes for our family pictures when Oskar picked up a tiny dress and said it was a beautiful dress for Elena.

"Oskar, that is too small. It's for a baby."
"When we get another baby..."
"What?!?"
"When we get another ba-"
"WE ARE NEVER GETTING ANOTHER BABY. NEVER." I hope someone overheard it and found it amusing.

I'm very anti-additional baby do to my inability to exist as a self sufficient human while pregnant, much less do a job and care for children. But that got me thinking, would I want another kid if I had better pregnancies? I doubt it, I only ever wanted 2 kids- a boy and then a girl. I got what I ordered. But I honestly have no idea if I would want another kid or not. I just found that interesting. Sorry if you disagree.

Must sleep.

Bye guys! Thanks for reading!

We have not fallen off the earth

She slept through lunch after going to the zoo and
me holding her while we were moving her car
seat after lunch didn't please her, so this happened.

I have recently been informed on multiple occasions that I have not posted in a while. I apologize for my absence. As always I have been busy. Here comes a scattered update riddled with errors and way too many pictures because I doubt I'll have the time or energy to edit this like I normally like to do.

First day of school.

 

It has been a crazy, mostly good summer. I don't even know where to begin really. Oh wait, yes I do. We had a bad storm here a few days ago and when I woke, Dan asked if I heard the storm. I said I didn't. Want to know why I didn't hear it? BECAUSE WE GOT NEW WINDOWS!!! That's right- three years of windows that leak but don't open, rattle when the stupid truck with the subs goes by, shake obscenely when there is thunder and block absolutely no sound whatsoever. They. Are. Gone. FOREVER. We can get a massive breeze throughout the place now and it is absolutely glorious. They are also REALLY white. Every time I come home it's like my house is looking bug-eyed at me or like it's surprised. It is probably surprised. Like, "Holy crap my windows open! I'm so happy! I'm freeeeeeeeee!"

Because there is nothing else to do at Mt Rushmore except for dance.

We are also getting some lawn treatments done so hopefully next summer the grass to weeds ratio is more in our favor. Downside is that the lawn is going to look worse before it looks better. And boy oh boy does it suck. Luckily the worst of it is in back so we can mostly keep it a secret.

So, the sun is a spotlight and he couldn't stop dancing.. That is what is happening here.

My babies went to Mt. Rushmore! Oskar was way over tired when we got in the car and kept on saying that he didn't want to see the mountain with faces. He had a short nap in the car and when he saw it, he spoke a genuine, "Wow!" Elena was less amused. The 20 minute nap did not work well for her and she remained pretty crabby throughout the trip.

My babies also went to camp! Oskar was not a big fan at first and that made me laugh a bit. Could you just imagine if Dan's kid hated camp? That would be some seriously comical irony. So funny that I almost wish that sentiment remained, but alas Dan sent me a text saying Oskar said he wants to live at camp. Apparently he also picked out a new dad. I wasn't able to stay the whole time, but luckily we had some surrogate grandmas from church who were also at the camp and who were able to help Dan out.

Brother-sister first day of school.

Boating Booga.

Oskar started Pre-K this year and from what I can tell he is having a blast and doing pretty well. He came home from the first day and said it was the best day of his life. I was happy to hear this, but I was also a bit sad because in the preceding two weeks we had gone to the state fair, renaissance festival, mn zoo and the sea life aquarium. Yes, it was exhausting, but it was so much fun to watch them eat such.

Before

Before

Our upstairs bathroom has been remodeled. This was not an expected update. The little pull thing that turns the water from the spout to shower head broke, so obviously we had to remodel the bathroom. I know it seems extreme, but it really did make sense. It of course took a thousand times longer than we thought which wouldn't have been that big of a deal except we have just the one shower in our house right now. We had a couple weeks where we had kids bathing at friends' houses, in sinks or just wash cloths. Dan and I had more difficult time. One good thing to the whole having to shower at the gym was that it actually made us go to the gym, so although the whole thing was annoying I guess exercising is beneficial so that can be viewed as an upside. Oh my goodness it was so annoying. And tiling a shower? Never again!

After

After

Dorisa Gets a Job

Oh my goodness I'm such a blogging failure. Pretty sure on Facebook when I said "blog coming soon" that was like a month ago. Whoops. This might not be as well written as usual, if you consider the typical post well written. If you don't, keep it to yourself.

I was able to get one decent picture out of a billion attempts.

Okay, so here is the story of how I got a job.

First of all, it must be noted that in 2008-2009 I sent out about a billion resumes with almost no response.

Fast forward to a Friday in late March, 2017. I had had a cold and just returned from a MOPS meeting where we talked about organization. I was all gung ho about getting organized and getting stuff out of my house to sell at the rummage sale. Meanwhile, I'm was also trying to sell something on the Brandon Rummage page. I hadn't heard anything from this woman who said she was interested, so I decided to check my FB inbox because FB doesn't alert me when someone who isn't a friend contacts me. Lo and behold I find a week old message in there from a guy saying he needs help at his firm and he was talking to his neighbor (a congregation member) who said I had a degree in architecture. I texted him back (that's what he said to do) and while awaiting a reply, I took my sick self and climbed back into my pantry and kept cleaning. He texted me back and asked if I could come in for an interview THAT AFTERNOON. I pondered this option while hacking away and covered in dust in my pantry and asked if we could please do Monday instead. Went in Monday and had a job in about 30 minutes.

She knows exactly how cute she is.

I didn't commit to it right away because I had a few things to figure out:
Daycare
Another car
Car loan
Clothes that are appropriate to wear to work and FYI The Limited went out of business
Shoes that one can wear to work
Figuring out if the money will cover everything and be worth not seeing my kids as much
A part time job to quit

After realizing how lucky I was to have this job fall in my lap, I e-mailed him back later that day and said that I was going to do everything I can to make this opportunity work for me. I told him that if everything came together, I would be able to start on April 10. He said he really needed help soon and asked if I was able to move it up anymore. I said, okay I'll shoot for the 3rd. For those of you keeping track at home, that gave me 6 days to get my life in order. And I had a cold. And both my kids were sick. And Oskar wasn't in daycare yet, so I had the privilege of taking him all around to every little thing I had to do. I also want to add that this was a situation that I wanted to bounce off my parents a bit, especially going about the car loan bit (since the last car I bought, I didn't buy) but this was literally the one time in recent memory that they were more than an e-mail away. They were on a Caribbean cruise without internet service. Good timing.

I love this picture of my kid wearing a thermal while playing on the beach.

Luckily, my daycare provider had enough room to take Ellie 1 more day and add Oskar for 4 days. Dan still stays home with them on Friday. We know someone who runs a bank, so I texted him our credit scores and he set us up with one of his loan officers. We searched around the internet for a car, decided on a Honda Fit, got to the dealership and it had just sold. Got a Honda Insight- less expensive, better mileage and now I know a good salesman at Vern Eide Honda if anyone needs one.
Went shopping that Friday and figured out some clothes and shoes. FYI at this point the kids still had colds and it was waaaay past bed time. It was a crazy week and life has not calmed down since. I told my appraisals boss about my job opportunity and he was very excited for me. I continued doing a bit of work for him for a while so he could train in some new help but it soon became too much and I had to stop.

My tiny baby in her baggy swimming suit.

As far as I can tell, the job is going well. I like the people I work with and I like what I'm doing almost all the time. And my boss is even an NDSU grad. It was and at times continues to be a very hard adjustment but we're making it work. I think it was hardest for Oskar. And me. I don't think Ellie noticed anything changed except maybe that I get dressed in real clothes when I wake up now.

A brief moment of sibling cooperation.

I think that Oskar has grown an inch in the last 2 months. He's real big. He recently finished soccer. It wasn't the best. My conclusion is that either soccer won't be his thing or he was too young to start. Or both. He just wasn't interested. Or good. But it's over now and our Wednesdays are better.

Ellie is spunkier than ever and is finally talking and eating more. We found a hairstyle that suits her perfectly. Pikey pigtails. (Pikey is how Oskar used to say spikey.) I wish I had a picture, but I'm sure I'll get one sometime. She is now wearing the pajamas Oskar wore at a year old. She's 18 months. So cute.

Sometimes they are quiet and playing peacefully by themselves.
I try not to look at them when this happens, lest it throw the mood, but this a moment I had to capture.

Dorisa Returns!

Don't worry! I haven't forgotten about my beloved blog! It has been a long time though. I just got to thinking it would be a tragedy if the masses didn't have anything to read on a snow day (where applicable 😊). Warning: This post is heavy on photos and video, not so much with on words.

Elena got a chair for Christmas. It is very soft and she loves it.

Oh, where to even begin. Life, as always, is a bit crazy. I just went back and looked at my last post to see where we left of an oh my goodness am I behind. To make a long story short, the antibiotics did NOT work for our bronchitis (every other time I've had bronchitis, antibiotics have worked, so I was a bit annoyed) and I proceeded to not only pull muscles throughout my back and stomach from coughing so much and so hard, but to also tear a muscle that runs along my ribs in my back. I could actually feel it coming apart. It was disgusting and excruciatingly painful. I couldn't sit, stand, or lay down and it hurt to breathe and cough so I went to the ER. At 3:00 AM. With the whole family. Yea. We'll be paying for that for a while. I keep thinking that it was a stupid thing to go to the ER for, and it was, but I honestly didn't have another option. That's how bad it hurt. At least when I was in labor with my children there was a reprieve between contractions (I'm talking pre-epidural here). There is no reprieve with rib injuries if you are breathing, much less if you have bronchitis and are coughing all the time. When they discharged me I could not believe they were letting me go and I had no idea how I was going to get myself through the day, and that's without even considering taking care of children. Luckily, the body is tough and heals remarkably fast. I have now decided that I am not going to be sick any more this year. I quit illness. So far, it is working. Okay, so maybe that wasn't a short story, but the people have a right to know.

No one is as comfortable at the dentist as Oskar.

I decided to become an Usborne Books consultant because my kids absolutely love their books. Also, our MOPS group was looking for one and I thought 'Hey, I can do that.' I'm not going to badger my friends and family to have parties, but know that if you ever need an Usborne lady, I'm here. So far I've just done some fundraisers for some groups and individuals and they have been a lot of fun. Plus, free books, hooray! I'm always impressed with how much Oskar learns from these books, but it can come with a downside. For example:

"I need to go potty."
"Oskar, are you sure?" (I've been tricked before)
" 'When the bladder is full, it means the pee is ready to leave the body.' " Yep, that would be my 4 year old quoting a book, ladies and gentlemen. He also uses a different tone when he's quoting something, it is a bit amusing.

We are the proud owners of a brand new water heater! Hooray home-ownership! I think we got the best possible deal we could and at least it looks like a water heater from the future, so that's pretty neat. Also, still paying for that.

Oskar's school pictures. The coloring is better in real life.

Oskar's Ninja Zone pictures. Again- the coloring is better in real life.

We had Oskar's first school conferences today and I was pretty impressed. He can do all sorts of stuff that we didn't know about. He is also much better behaved for his teachers than he is for us. I'm not surprised, just frustrated. I know most parents have kids like that though so at least we can all suffer together. He has been obsessed with The Nutcracker since Christmas and to say that Dan and I are sick of it is putting it very mildly. One thing I have enjoyed is that before bed every night, both kids dance to Trepak in Oskar's bedroom. It is very sweet. Note: Not all Oskar's pajama pants are that small. These should probably go in the donation pile, but the technically still fit and that means I have to do laundry less often. And yes, he has little black ballet shoes. But really, they aren't very little.

Elena is... something else. She is 15 months old now, running full bore, eating all the pretzels and chocolate cake she can find and refusing to eat anything else. She will still eat baby food but this is getting ridiculous. She also won't drink from a cup. I gave Oskar a cup on his fist birthday and we never looked back. I finally thought I would trick Elena by putting water in her bottle and milk in the cup. She chugged the bottle of water and all she will do with the cup is carry it around all day. It's like when Phoebe got a bike on Friends.

I fashioned a device for holding our toys and for sitting on.
That's a touch lamp in the corner. Elena thinks it is pretty neat.

She's getting very good at puzzles and Duplos and likes to clean/tidy-up. For example. I walked over a rug the other day and the corner of it flipped up. She was following me, bent down and fixed it, then continued on her way. She's great. It's spit bubble time!

I've started occasionally taking both the kids to the open gym type thing at the gymnastics place where Oskar does his Ninja Zone class. They seem to like it. And I like not having them home all day in the house with me on Mondays. The downside is that it is at 9AM in Sioux Falls, so we kind of need to be on our game to get ready and get there. It doesn't always happen, but when it does, I can pretty much guarantee that everyone takes a nap that day. It is wonderful.

Explanation for the following video: That is my Barbie from when I was younger. He found it in a box downstairs. I figure if we have to listen to The Nutcracker nearly every day, you can listen to it too. I'm always impressed with how well Oskar sings. This is just mumbly singing too and you can still make out the song quite clearly. Dude loves his music and ballet. We limit the amount of screen time he gets, so I guess this was the next best thing.

Thanks for reading! Stay warm, local friends!