the week

I decided that I have to record last week, if anything, just to remind myself that I survived it.
It was a good week in so many ways.  It was an absolutely crazy week in so many ways.  It was a hard week, it was a fun week, it was a neat week, it was....the mother of all weeks.

Allow me...

Monday:
Wake up at 4:40am.  Drink some zipfizz...because lets face it, it is 4 freaking 40 in the morning, and I am about to do an 8 mile tempo run on the treadmill. 
Have an awesome tempo run.  Feelin the zipfizz buzz.  Head home.

Kids wake up.  I start getting everyone breakfast.  Molly's eyes are stuck shut with boogers, and totally read.  Pink eye.  She went to the clinic two days before and I have drops.  I put them in her eyes.

Get everyone off to school.

9:00  I teach an hour of piano lessons. Molly cries on my lap most of the time.

10:00   Luke's friend Joey comes over for a playdate for the next couple hours.  Luke invites 3 other friends over as well???  Molly also has a friend join in.  House FULL of kids all morning. Molly cries a lot.

Molly, Beckham Sweat, Boston Sweat, Luke, Joey Goates

11:00 Molly starts grabbing her ear and screaming hysterically.  I totally panic.  I can't calm her down.  Molly is thrashing all over and screaming for me to help her.
I call every pediatrician in Heber, they are all full.

11:40  Molly is still screaming and holding her ear.  Blood and yellow goo start running down her face.  Her eardrum has ruptured.  Molly finally falls asleep.

Molly cries the rest of the afternoon.

2:30.  Everyone home from school. Feeding frenzy begins.
          Rush to store to buy a Birthday present.

3:30 Take William to a friends Birthday Party


5:00 pick William up from Party, pick up Laynee and Becca and take them, along with Mary to tumbling.

Come home, cook dinner, feed everyone, head back out to pick up Mary and girls from tumbling. Ben gets home.

Leave kids with Ben and take Molly to the insta care.  Her ear is infected, and the eardrum had ruptured.  Argh!  Poor, poor girl.  We get ear drops.  2 hours later, we are home.

9:00   Bed

Tuesday:
5:00 alarm goes off to go to gym.  Head is screaming, so is throat.  No gym today.

7:00 get up for real this time, along with everyone else.

Make Mary a lunch for her field trip.
Mary's ride to student council completely forgets her. 
Rush Mary to school, just in time for her student council field trip.

Molly and I feel like crap.  William stays home from school with a stomach ache!?!?
Luke is bored all morning.
 I make playdough.  It helps for a while.

I take William to school at 11:00.  He is fine.

Rush to store with Molly and Luke to get a few groceries and another Birthday present.

12:20 walk Luke to the bus

3:30  Pick up Luke and everyone from the bus stop.

4:00 Take Mary to tumbling, come home.

4:30 Pile everyone in the car and drive William to his first Soccer practice.
       
Drop William off, and rush to the other end of town to drop Sam off at his soccer practice.

       Drop Sam off at his practice, and drive to the gym to pick up Mary from tumbling.

      Pick up Mary, and drive back to William's practice to pick him up.  William's practice goes way over, but it is so fun to watch him.  He is having a blast!  He is laughing and running at the same time.  He scores a couple goals.  Molly has to pee twice in this time, and I have her pee right there in the parking lot.  Go me.

Take everyone home, hurry and make dinner. Ben gets home.

6:30 Drop Mary off at the church to help babysit for a Relief Society Activity.

8:30 Bed

Wednesday
4:40 wake up and head to gym.  zipfizz again!  Serious sweat sesh at the gym with 2 hours of intervals.  This workout is a killer, and I don't feel great, but I did it!

7:20  I get home, Ben leaves.  Breakfast, get everyone out the door.
        Mary's carpool for choir forgets to come.  what the???

Morning is pretty chill.  Hang out with Molly and Luke.  Molly still doesn't feel great, neither do I.

12:20 Walk Luke to the bus stop. Then get Molly down for a nap.  I actually get some down time!!!

3:30 pick up Luke and kids from Bus

4:00 Mary has tumbling

4:00 Teach Anna's piano lesson
4:30 Teach Macy's piano lesson

5:00 Make dinner

5:15 Head out to Sam's soccer game.  I am so thrilled with how great Sam does!  He has improved a ton since last season.  He was hustling, aggressive, and ran through the whole game.  Way to go Sam!

Thursday
7:20 everyone up
Breakfast, get everyone out the door, get Mary to Choir, etc.

8:30  Go to gym with Molly and Luke.  Do a solid hour and 20 minutes on the elliptical.

10:00 Go straight from gym to Kindergarten Registration for Luke. :)
         Luke loves registration.  They set it up so cute. He got a bingo card, and we would go around to "stations" where I would do paper work, while he got a square crossed off his card, and some kind of treat.  He and Molly were thrilled!  I can't believe my little Lukey starts kindergarten next year.  I am excited for him.  He is so stinking adorable!

12:20 get Luke on the bus, find out that Luke has a school program that night?!?!  What the??

2:00  Brittany comes for my "massage."  She scrapes and kneads my muscles until I can't take it anymore, then she does it again.  It is complete agony, and leaves me nauseous and exhausted, but dang, it helps soooo much.

3:30  pick up kids from bus

4:00 get Mary ready and out the door for a  trial class at a competitive cheerleading gym

5:00 I make dinner, Ben gets home, and we divide and conquer.

William and I go to Sam's pack meeting.
Sam earns his Bear and moves up to Weblos!!!  He also earned about 12 belt loops.
Way to go Sammy boy!
It was so cute how the boys welcomed him to the pack with a giant Bear hug.

 

Sam picking out his Weblo name

 

Sam's Weblo name is Sneaking Dog

I love the scouting program, because Sam loves it so much.  I know William and Luke with have a ton of fun with it to. 

While we are at the pack meeting, Ben and Molly went to Luke's program.  I heard it was absolutely adorable.  They sang songs in English and Spanish.

We all made it home just in time for Bed.

Friday
Usual morning routine getting kids breakfast and out the door.

I take Luke and Molly with me to put gas in the car, go grocery shopping for the week, run to the post office, go to the bank, etc.  It is crazy and tiring, but we did it.

We then go pick up Mary from school.

I get Luke on the bus at 12:20, and then start helping Mary get ready for the State Tumbling meet.

Ben gets home at 1:30, and Mary and I head to Salt Lake.

I meet my mom at the meet, and we spend the eveing there.
Mary had a pretty rough meet.
It was so hard to see her struggle with confidence.  She was shaky on her events, and I could tell that this new gym they are in is hindering her progress.  Her coach has also pretty much checked out from helping Mary. 
Mary did her best, and even though there were tears of disappointment and discouragement, she was able to pull herself together, enjoy dinner out with grandma and I, and re commit to try to do better at regionals next month.

While we were at the meet, Ben held down the fort here at home.

William had another Birthday party, and had a blast.

Saturday
6:00 I wake up and start getting ready for my long run.
       I have been feeling crappy all week, but I feel ok this morning, just kind of congested.
6:50 I head out the door.
        I have another beautiful long run.

 17 miles this time.  It feels so great to have my muscles working so well, and to be figuring out my running nutrition, so I don't have any gut bombs.  Around mile 8, my left ear popped, and it ached the rest of the time.  It didn't effect the run though.

9:00 William has his first soccer game.
        Ben and Molly go to the game.  Mary and Sam stay home.  I am still out running.

10:00 everyone gets home

The rest of the day is Ben going biking, the boys getting hair cuts, finding last minute Easter stuff, a post office run, a store run, etc.

Later that afternoon, Ben and Mary took Molly skiing for the first time!  Molly looked so, so cute in her ski clothes!  Molly loved it.  The video of her is adorable.  She is just laughing and smiling.  It's official.  All of the Maynards ski! 

That evening we dyed Easter eggs.  It was really fun!

We also did a FHE lesson (by Mary) about Easter and the resurrection. 

By bed time, my ear was KILLING me. 
I set up the Easter stuff, and then hit the sack.
I had to sleep sitting up that night to try to alleviate the pressure.


Sunday
7:00 Everyone is up.
The kids are so excited to see their Easter baskets!
Mary got a slack line.
Sam got a new skateboard
Luke and William got scooters
Molly got a pink tricycle.

Of course, there was lots of candy as well.

The kids hunted for 40 Easter eggs, and it was pretty cute to watch them run all over.

After breakfast, it was time to bath's and showers and getting into Easter outfits for our annual Easter pictures.

Mary was complaining of a stomach ache all morning.  I wasn't sure how seriously to take it, so I just had her lie down in between getting everyone ready.  She was a good sport and got her dress on, and curled her hair, but she did seem sick.

Getting 5 kids ready, and keeping them looking nice for pictures, is no small feat!  Especially when I am the one taking the pictures as well.

Right before we took our family picture, Mary ran to the bathroom and started throwing up!  The poor kid!  She puked, got up, got the family picture taken, and then threw up some more.

I had her go get her pajamas on, and lie down on the couch with a bowl.  She was definitely sick.

The kids did great, , and we got some great pictures.
I love my family so much.
These pictures melt my heart!

Wililam (6)

Luke (4)

Sam (10)

Mary (12)

My precious babies

sassy pants

Molly (2)

Molly was so excited about her tricycle, that we literally couldn't get her off of it.  She rode it all over the house...even to the bathroom.

Ben ended up walking to church with the boys, and Molly went with them, riding her tricycle the whole way in her cute Easter dress!

my adorable family...minus Mary

Molly on her pink bike, William looking through the fence, Sam talking with his dad, and Luke with a stick.....perfect.

I felt like my head was going to explode, so I drove.  Mary stayed home....throwing up.  :(

I came home after sacrament meeting to be with Mary.  The poor girl was so sick!  I made our ham and potatoes for dinner, and tried to rest a little myself.

When everyone got home, we had the best dinner!  It was my first time cooking a ham (weird huh!), and it was so good with the funeral potatoes (terrible name), deviled eggs,  and everything else.

After dinner, we all crashed for a little while.
I didn't know it, but Luke ended up throwing up while I was sleeping.
Ben was sweet enough to clean it up and take care of things, while letting me rest.  He's a good guy.
Luckily, that was the one and only throw up from Luke.  I think someone ate way too much Easter candy.

After I woke up, I couldn't take it anymore, my head was screaming, so I drove to a clinic in Park City to see a doctor.  Everything in Heber was closed.

Not only is my left ear infected, but the ear canal is infected too.  I have an inner AND an outer ear infection.  Good grief!  No wonder it sounds like I am under water, and feels like that ear is going to explode!  I can't believe Molly went through pain like this just a few days ago. That poor, poor girl.  ugh!

My left ear is infected, but the doctor pulled a HUGE chunk of wax out of my right ear.  It was so amazing, that he asked me if I wanted to keep it!  Of course I did, and yes, I took a picture.

 Disgusting, I know, but that is the size of it AFTER it shrunk.  It felt amazing when he pulled it out of my ear.  Instant relief to that ear.  Unfortunately, there was nothing but lots of infection in my left ear.

We ended our Easter Sunday with some of us playing outside, some of us throwing up, some of us with ear aches, some of us eating WAY to much carrot cake (ahem...me), some of us going off jumps on scooters and skateboards, and all of us somehow having a really good Easter Sunday together celebrating the resurrection of our Savior, despite it all.

And that folks, was last week.

The end.

she's definitely my kid

About a month ago, I heard Molly messing around in the pantry.  I was busy helping Luke with something, and also teaching piano lessons, so all I could do was listen and envision the huge mess I was going to find when I could finally see what she was doing.

After my piano lesson was over 30 minutes later, and Luke was settled, I made my way over to the pantry with a feeling of dread.

I was completely shocked to find this!

The bottom two shelves were completely organized.  The cans were stacked in neat rows, or on top of eachother.  Everything was grouped according to what was in it.  I seriously could not believe it!  I was totally shocked!  Molly had totally organized the pantry!  It was so awesome!

A few days later, Molly, Luke and I were having a picnic outside.  I threw some pink and white animal crackers and some goldfish into a Tupperware, and gave them to Molly to snack on.  She seemed pretty content looking through her container, so I laid back and soaked in the rare day of warm sun.

A while later, Molly went to go play with her friend Beckham, and I glanced down at the blanket.  She had done this.

She had separated the animal crackers from the fish, grouped everything by color, and then lined up the animal crackers in lines by color! 
I was stunned!  Completely stunned, and totally thrilled!  Did I have a kid that could possibly love order and organization as much as me!  Praise the heavens above!

Sure enough, just a week later, I gave Molly a container of assorted colored tic tacs. This is what I found just a few minutes later.

The tic tacs were out of the container, and grouped by color.

Molly also cleans up everything when she is doing playing with something.  She shuts doors and cupboards (just like me), she hates being sticky, and she lines up shoes in a row (just like me).

I am thrilled to have someone else in this house willing to straighten and organize...even if she is just two years old.

Go Molly Go!

Smartest two year old on the block...yup that's my kid!

st pattys day

 

Better late than never.

 

St. Patricks Day was a good one this year.

 

It was full of the usual visit from our leprechaun doing silly things in our house, putting shoes in the microwave, turning our milk green, putting a diaper on a toy dinosaur, bringing a big box of Lucky Charms cereal, and lots of other crazy things.

 

The kids had a great time getting their green on, and we had on overall goofy, green day.

 

Love it.

 

 

spring break

Spring Break here in Heber, ended up being a 10 day break, due to the kids getting out of school early the week before.

Not only was it a longer break, but it was even longer for Mary. 
Three days before spring break, and one day before we had company coming to our house, I got a call from the school nurse at Mary's school.

Mary, along with 5 other girls in her class, had lice. We found out later, that more than 11 kids had lice.

Rock on.

Mary had to come home immediately, and was not allowed back to school until after spring break.

I was right in the middle of trying to clean our house and get everything prepared for company when I got the call. It had been a huge week, and I was already on the edge of exhaustion and stress. (hard to admit, but it is true)

I drove to the school, and walked in on a dramatic scene of a bunch of 12 year old girls freaking out, some were bawling, others were screaming, and there was Mary.  Just sitting there looking at me like, "well, crap."

I drove her home, and then the madness began.

Lice sucks. Let me repeat....lice sucks.

I spent the next two days doing 1 hour hair treatments on three different people (Mary, Molly and William), and I did Mary's three times.  That would be 5 hours of lice hair treatment. I thought I found lice in Molly and Williams hair, but it could have been sand from the sandbox.  I wasn't about to take the change, so that is why they got the hair treatment too.

I SCRUBBED our entire house all over again.  Vacuumed over and over and over again.  I washed every.single. blanket, pillow case, bedding set, rug, coat, jacket, shirt, car seat, and anything I could think of that could have lice. I also had to sanitize all of our hair stuff...brushes, combs, hair clips, hair ties, curling irons, curlers, and the list goes on and on and on.  I did 2 dishwasher loads of just hair stuff!

I ended up doing 17 loads of laundry in two days.  I was waking up at night and changing laundry from the washer to the dryer.

I cleaned, and washed, and vacuumed, and shampooed, and disinfected, and scrubbed non-stop.  It was absolutely exhausting.

Add all of that to the meal planning, grocery shopping, and everything else that needs to be done to get ready for company, along with caring for 5 kids, and keeping up our normal busy spring schedule.

Two days later, when Spring Break officially began, and all of the kids got out of school, and Dan and Kristen and their kids showed up, I was literally still doing the last few loads of laundry.

I went to bed Friday night completely exhausted, and in tears from being so worn out and stressed. At one point I just hid in my closet and cried, and texted my mom asking her how to handle it all. While I was texting her, I learned that some spots my dad had tested on his had were cancerous, so he had to go in and have the cancer removed.  The procedure was WAY more that what anyone thought.

75 stitches

Needless to say, I was pretty concerned about my dad.  It was a rough day.
I decided just to go to bed, pray for my dad, and try my best to enjoy the time with our company, and try not to freak out about possibly giving them lice.

I woke up Saturday morning bright and early, and did my first long run outside.

It was absolute therapy for the soul!!!  It was a gorgeous spring morning.  It was peaceful, it was beautiful, it was full of endorphins, it was serene, and it was a good distance, 14 miles.

To top it off, I had my alarm set on my phone to remind me to register for the St. George Marathon at 9:00.  The marathon is first come first serve, and it normally fills up in about 5 minutes.  My friends Karli and Chelsea and I decided to register for the marathon together.  It will be their first marathon.
When my alarm went off, around mile 7, I stopped running, and started pulling up the website on my phone.  At that exact moment, a runner across the street also stopped running, and sat down on the side of the road.
It was Chelsea!!  We were both out for a long run, and we had both set our phone alarms to remind us to register.  We just happened to be on the same road, at the same time.  It was not planned at all!
We laughed about it for a long time as we sat in the bushes and registered for the marathon together.  I love coincidences like that. 

We got in the marathon and we were thrilled!  I honestly can't believe I will be running two full marathons this year.  Crazy!  But I think I can do it.

I came home from my run feeling a lot more refreshed and ready for the rest of the break.  It was General Conference weekend, so I came home and watched conference with my family and with Dan and Kristen's family.  The kids played and ate and played and ate, and basically did what kids do.  I admit, I was pretty tired of cooking, and cleaning, and my anxiety gets pretty high with lots of noise and commotion, but it was nice to have company in our home.

That afternoon, Ben and Dan headed to Salt Lake, to attend the General Priesthood Meeting in the conference center.  Dan was able to get tickets for them.  It was so neat for those brothers to be able to attend something like that together.  I was so happy they were able to go.

Kristen and I held the fort down here at home.  Libby, Kristen's little girl, ended up throwing up and being sick, so she was busy with her.  I tried to help out the other kiddos and keep them busy.  Kristen were able to talk a little here and there, and the kids had so much fun together.

It was a good day.  It was pretty exhausting, but it was good.

Sunday morning, Dan and Kristen and their kiddos headed home, and our family watched Conference, and hung out together as a family.  President Monson announced that Pocatello, Idaho will be getting a temple!  It was really cool to hear that my hometown will be blessed with such a wonderful thing.  It was a really neat moment.

Monday morning, I got up at 5:00, and got in my tempo run.  When I got home, Ben left to get in a bike ride, and I started packing for our trip to St George.

We decided to try out St. George for a few days for spring break.  A lot of people go there, and we wanted to see what it was all about.

That morning, as I was packing, and trying to once again get the house cleaned up, the laundry caught up, and pack for our trip, I decided to just call the girl that had cleaned our house in the past, and ask her to come while we would be in St. George.

I had some extra money that I was saving for some other things, but by this point, after lice, throw up, kids everywhere and in and out for days, company, and me being completely burned out, I decided it would be more than worth it to spend my money on having the house deep cleaned, while we were gone.
The idea of someone else scrubbing my house, and coming home to a squeaky clean house, made me smile from ear to ear.  yup, totally worth it.

After I set up the cleaning, I just stopped cleaning, and started packing.  It was awesome to just leave the house in whatever condition it was in, and know that I would come home to it being totally clean.  It took a lot of stress out of trying to leave for St. George.

We headed out Monday afternoon, and arrived in St. George 5 hours later.  It was a great trip!!!  It was exactly what we all needed.

Our hotel had an indoor and an outdoor pool.  The kids swam and swam and swam!

 

We went on a hike in snow canyon.  The kids found tons of lizards, played on the rocks, climbed, explored, and just enjoyed being out in the sun.  It was kind of cool for me to be in that canyon, because the marathon I will be running in October goes right down that canyon.

This picture completely melts my heart.  Luke put his arm around Molly all on his own.

 

 

After the hike, the kids swam a little more, then we went to the pizza factory for dinner.
I have not had pizza crust in about 7 months, and I tell you what, it was TOTALLY worth the splurge.  The pizza was soooo good!  The kids loved the breadsticks on the stick.

 That night we just hung out in the hotel room, watched TV and ate snacks from the food bin I packed and brought from home.

The next day, I got up at 5:00, found a gym, and got in a serious sweat sesh!  I did two hours of intervals, and killed it!  Great way to start the day.

Ben went biking up in the red rocks after I got back, and the kids swam, watched TV, and played at a park the hotel had.

That afternoon we went to the temple and walked around the temple grounds, went in the visitors center, watched some videos, looked around, and enjoyed feeling the spirit.  I love that temple.  I think it is so pretty and unique.

After the temple, we headed off to Judd's old fashion candy store.
It is the coolest store, with candy from my childhood, that I haven't seen since I was a little girl.  I walked in and was flooded with so many memories when I saw the different candies.  The kids loved picking out old fashion candy. It was serious business, and took quite a while.

We brought our candy and breadsticks over to a really cool park, and spent the rest of the afternoon there playing in the water, laying in the sun, and just hanging out.

There was a place where you could be a statue.  The kids got a kick out of it.

I about died when I saw Luke do this for his statue pose.  I have no idea where he got it from, but it still cracks me up every time I look at this picture!

Luke's other statue "pose." haha!

First time lying in the warm sun in months!

After the park we headed home.  The kids were completely wiped out, and the drive home was pretty quiet and peaceful.

We definitely plan on going back to St. George again in the fall and winter months.  It is an awesome place to get away, get some sun, and play together.

After we arrived home...to a clean house!!!! we had a couple days of just chillin,'  The kids played with friends, I taught piano lessons, Ben worked, and we just did our thing.

The next morning, I learned that my dad was having complications with his incision.  He was also getting a horrible cough and cold.  The coughing was splitting his stitches.  And the swelling was so bad, that his eyes were swollen shut, and his face was black and blue.

He ended up getting his stitches removed and put back in again.  He also had to have a bunch of check ups, due to excessive swelling.

The coughing turned in to pneumonia.  My dad was very sick.  I contemplated going to Pocatello, to try to help my mom out, who was exhausted, but I just couldn't get there alone, and bringing the whole family wouldn't allow me to help out much.

All I could really do was pray.

 (update: it has since been two weeks.  My dad is still very sick with pneumonia.  Our family fasted for him on Sunday.  I think he will be ok, but is has been a horribly sick man.  It has definitely been worrisome.  I keep waiting for the call that he is finally turning a corner and feeling better.  So far, it hasn't happened.)

By Saturday, we were tired of sitting around, so we headed to the Provo rec. center.  It is an awesome pool for all ages.  The kids had a blast!
William and Luke did the water slide for their first time.  I thought for sure they would cry, but they came flying down in fits of laughter, asking to do it again.  I should have known.  :)

Luke is completely thrilled!

William was all smiles.

Mary flying down the slide.

Luke laughing

Molly learned how to float around in her lifejacket, and was a little fish, just like the rest of them.

 

We grabbed dinner at three different drive through's (to appease everyone's taste buds), and headed home.  I made puppy chow, we turned on a movie, and called it a night.

I think spring break was a success this year!!