Little Addie and Surviving Sunday

First off, here are some pics of our growing Addie. Her top 2 teeth have cut through so she is now at 4 teeth, and she is now trying to pull herself up on things and crawl. She has gotten pretty good at crawling/scooting backwards, and is trying to get the forward direction down. However, she is very pleased with her new found mobility and ability to get into whatever the kids have out. Yesterday I looked over at her in her high chair eating her apples and found her asleep instead of eating. It's her first time falling asleep at the table and she looked so cute (and uncomfortable). And this morning she decided to feed herself. She was quite proud of that accomplishment.



I am proud to say I have survived my 3rd Sunday in a row--solo!! (well almost, I still have kids getting out of bed!) Somehow Chris's schedule ended up with him working 3 in a row which I don't love especially going to church alone--kids were meant to have 2 parents in sacrament meeting! I think anyone sitting near me in church today would probably agree, because these are just a few highlights of our hour and 10 minutes:

*Arriving at church and noticing that even though we had brushed teeth and washed faces before leaving the house, 2 of 3 children now have filthy faces.
*I made the mistake of saying outloud, "oh Kennedy, we forgot to use your inhaler before we left the house." After that all of a sudden K was very "sick" and needed to go to the drinking fountain several times--and not through the door closest to where we were sitting.
*Spencer saying quite loudly and more than once: "Mom, I don't like church" and "I am soooooooooo hungry." We haven't taken snacks to church in about 2 years but since I had cheerios today for Addie, the breakfast that he had eaten 1/2 an hour later just wasn't cutting it today.
*Spencer taking not just one piece of bread, but a small "handful" and then being very unhappy when I took them away. (no we did not put the fingered bread back on the tray!)
*Addie nearly dumping the water tray, and then Spencer dumping the remainder of his water into another cup for someone else to drink. Luckily the guy next to me removed that one for me!
*My older 2 children thought it would be a great idea to keep stealing Addie's books and toys--they do have their own books for church, but stealing Addie's and getting a loud reaction seemed to be a better idea today.
*Kennedy thinking it was a great idea to hold onto the back of my skirt when I stood up for the intermediate hymn---luckily my shirt was pretty long so as far as I know nobody got flashed--or they just don't want to tell me they did.
And those, my friends, are just the highlights. Good thing we won't be in our ward next week, maybe everyone will block this special "Foster memory" out of their minds!!
Lucky for me though, I have lots of people willing to watch Addie for me so I can teach primary!! I am so grateful for that because typically I like to just do things on my own and not ask for help, but I really can't teach primary with Addie, so I am so so very grateful for the many people who volunteer to watch our sweet baby!!

Now I also like to have projects to do on the Sunday's Chris is gone because it makes the afternoon go faster--today's project: Valentines for the kid's classes. And it really did take us forever. We are leaving on Valentine's day to go to California and Spencer has only asked me I am not kidding 30 times today, what day is today, and how many more days until we leave. By 6:45 tonight if I heard the word valentine's one more time, I thought I might just lose it. I know that doesn't sound very nurturing or motherly but seriously I thought I might lose it!! We also generally discover on Sunday night that K has some sort of homework assignment that we have forgotten about or procrastinated. Every week I say we need to do homework on Friday, but every Friday I say, oh we'll do it tomorrow. I guess I need to follow through because Sunday night homework can be somewhat painful!! And now that my kids are all tucked safely and quitely in their beds I finally have time to sit down!! I love peeking in on them while they are sleeping because even though we have crazy days, I am reminded of their sweet and tender spirits and how much I love each one of them (and how much I also love just a few minutes to myself!!)