A house full of females

Kevin went to two conferences in October, and as my post implied, my brain was starting to suffer from the effects of taking care of 3 kids on my own. (I don't know how so many of you do this day in and day out just because of your husband's crazy work/school schedules. I have to remind myself to not compare because otherwise I feel so lame in comparison, especially when I complain haha.) So, it was good to have family come and help me out for a few days.

I picked up my mom, my sister Jennie, and nephew G from the airport Monday night, ate a late dinner, and chatted a bit before heading to bed. We were all exhausted!

Tuesday I decided to walk Joseph to school because good heavens there were two other adults in the house so I could leave the other two kids at home. Unfortunately, we made it out the door late enough that we didn't catch up to Joseph's friend, so he spent the whole way there grumping about how I was no fun to walk with compared with his friend or Daddy. I reminded him that I invented Chutes and Ladders and Cannerland so I was plenty fun, but he didn't agree. So, when I dropped him off and saw his friend's dad there, I took him up on the offer to pick Joseph up the rest of the week. It felt pretty funny to have him come every morning to our house which was so full of grown women who could walk Joseph to school if they weren't asleep on the couch, but I didn't care. (Well, a little.)

After I came back from walking Joseph to school, we made a shopping trip to fill the house with the food everyone liked. Then, my mom and I hurried to Joseph's school where she was a mystery reader who read a couple books to a very attentive and silent group of kindergarteners. The rest of the afternoon was pretty quiet. I was able to pick Joseph up without the other two boys in tow, which was magical. Jennie was so nice and played chess with Joseph. G and Matthew were cute with each other, and Jacob was of course incredibly sweet every single second ever.

I know it's a lot -- the hair, the bod!

What can I say except, you're welcome!

All my mom's grandsons, but not all their faces

It's a lot of work hosting people in a small space (especially a small space that's just awkwardly designed), but we made it work. My mom was so nice to recaulk the bathtub, go shopping multiple times, and help me clean, and she even would have made her delicious salsa for us had she found cilantro at Walmart. (As it turns out, we had some in the fridge, our neighbors have lots, and we recently discovered cilantro hiding in our flower garden, too. Oh well.)

The next day was beautiful and sunny. We headed to the ward playgroup so Matthew could sit on my lap and eat snacks and frown at the thought of playing. At least the rest of us had fun, I think. We grabbed some Chick-Fil-A for lunch, and eventually Kaylie and K showed up to join the party! When Matthew and K saw each other, they started laughing and laughing because that's what they do best (that and dancing).

When Joseph was home from school, we walked down to another park.

Progeny

All the grandkids in one picture. Jacob really is there behind the blanket. Also, we finally used both double strollers!

It's funny -- you sort of expect to do things like play games or watch shows together after kids go down. But I think we were all so tired that we mostly sat on the couch until our own bedtimes. I think I've gotten a bit used to alone time in the evenings so it was different being with people all the time. But it was nice, too. (I thought about it, and I'm pretty sure the last time my mom and sisters Kaylie and Jennie and I were together with just the three of us was probably when Jennie was a baby and Leslie was in school, so it was fun thinking about the three of us being the age of all our kids.)

Thursday morning was another beautiful morning, so off we went to Brooksvale park. We had considered going to the aquarium, but it was far enough and expensive enough that we opted for the park instead. When we saw how happy the kids were to see farm animals at zero cost, we definitely felt like we had made the right choice.

The trees looked a little prettier in person, but yeah. The foliage this year did not exceed expectations.

They loved the miniature horses. And the chickens, and sheep, and bunnies.

Something funny was that we all wore either reds or greens (not including jackets, which were mostly blue). I had been wearing red until Jacob spit up all over it, and then I changed into green without realizing I was still matching everyone.

Trying so hard for another grandkid shot.

After I got Joseph from school and gave Jennie a quick tour of Yale (quick because I forgot which direction some one-way streets went so we just skipped a few beautiful buildings altogether), we headed over to Edgerton Park. I had had such good luck planning enjoyable activities so far, but our luck ran out. I made the mistake of bringing the toddler's trikes along, figuring that they would like somewhere mostly flat to ride around. But everything about that was a bad idea, starting with getting the trikes in the car, trying to convince them to ride the trikes (Matthew doesn't even really ride his unless someone is pushing him, and my hope that seeing K riding hers would help completely backfired), and then having to carry the trikes along with lots of little kids. Oops.

But on the bright side, there were more chickens, and these ones didn't have a "do not feed" sign.

We were even able to make the chickens jump for the clover leaves, which was very entertaining.

I love these two sweet boys together!

From here, we headed over to the elementary school for the art gallery I'd heard about for weeks. I had gotten so many reminders about it that I was sure it was going to be epic.

But my luck had run out as you remember, so it was just us wandering around an empty school seeing a few "All About Me" info pages in the hallways. They were colorful and somewhat poetic, but not quite what we were expecting. I had planned my whole day to make sure we could see these, so it was a bit of a letdown. Oh well! We had bread and soup waiting for us at home, so we bounced back pretty well.

The next morning I got some good playing in with the little kids, which was nice because I felt like I had been so busy doing dishes and nursing Jacob that I hadn't gotten the chance until then. Then everyone packed up, hunted more for a missing bottle (still haven't found it, so I'm guessing some toddler put it in the trash), ate, and then headed out the door. Kaylie left for New Jersey the same time I left to take people to the airport, so we all prayed for safe travels at the same time.

Those two are too cute together!

And we all traveled safely. Thanks for making the trip, everyone!