May

This was May . . .

Love the frequent hand-under-the-chin pose:

Wren started smiling right around six weeks. So fun.

One day Ever was trying to make Wren smile, and Wren wasn't cooperating. Ever said angrily, "She ran out of smiles! Why did she run out of smiles?" Another day Ever was again trying to get Wren to smile, and she kept saying, in her sing-song sweet voice, "Do you want to give out some more smiles?"

Mother's Day was on our anniversary, May 10. Jim took Friday off so we could have a special long weekend. We couldn't really go away together because of the chillens, so we thought maybe we'd do a nice hike and enjoy some quality family time. Unfortunately the Mother's Day brunch at church got in the way of things again. We spent a lot of time shopping at Costco and Smart and Final, setting up the tables and chairs, baking cinnamon rolls, etc. We did go out for breakfast on Friday, May 8 at Al's Cafe, a place in Carlsbad we'd been curious about. The food was OK; service was terrible. It took forever. After breakfast we went to a laundromat to wash a couple sleeping bags and big pillows that wouldn't fit in our home washer, and then we went for a walk. Ever got to play at a park for a bit. She enjoyed the swings:

Saturday afternoon we made it out to Guajome State Park. We took Ever's bike, and she rode the whole time. We explored a trail that veered off from Guajome, and we ended up at a park on the outskirts of a little community. Ever had fun there before we headed back.

Crossing the street from our parking spot to Guajome:

The little lake:

There was cotton-like stuff flying all over the place. I loved it. We came upon the trees that were the source of the stuff:

It almost looked like snow on the ground:

The bush-like thing shaped like a beehive on the lowest branch of this tree is a parasite plant of some sort:

Jim thought of the nicest thing he could do for me that whole long weekend - sleep downstairs on the couch with Wrenzo in the pack n' play so I could have three uninterrupted nights' sleep. Best husband ever. The sad part was a) I was sick (again), so one night I couldn't sleep well because of the sore throat and the congestion, and b) one of those nights Ever inexplicably got up about three times while Wren slept the entire night through. One night went pretty well for me, though, and I was so grateful. That truly was the nicest thing he could do for me for our anniversary/Mother's Day. For our anniversary I gave him nothing but three bad nights of sleep on the couch. I'm the worst.

I spoke in sacrament meeting on Mother's Day. That also added to the stress of that weekend. I used a talk I had given on Mother's Day a few years ago, but I spent a good amount of time revising it. The talk went fine, and to my knowledge nobody noticed that I was recycling some material.

Wrenzo had pretty normal hair when she was born. I remember being pleased that she had hair. Then all the front stuff fell out, and the hair at the crown of her head grew and grew. She looked like a ridiculous, old, balding man. If you blow up this picture, you can see that the hair at the crown of her head is so long that it extends past the edge of the pillow:

Jim had suggested we shave it. Then at church, Holly Silverstein told me her sister (who happened to be visiting at the time) shaved her kids' heads. I got some deets from her about how she did it, and we finally went for it. We used the clippers and the no. 1 guard. I would have liked to buzz completely but didn't want to cut her. Before:

After:

Evenly bald was definitely an improvement over the hair insanity she had going on. 

One morning she was extra cuddly, and it was glorious:

Sisters:

Despite my best intentions, we were a little late to Wren's two-month check-up. We arrived a few minutes after her appointment time, and they want you there 15 minutes before. I know how awful that is for doctors, and I apologized to everyone. We ended up having to wait a really long time for Dr. Villar (Wren's pediatrician) to come into the room. I wondered if she skipped us because of our tardiness and then came back to us. In any case, it was really late morning, and I busted out the snacks I had brought for Ever while we waited. She was eating cashews when Dr. Villar entered. In the nicest way possible, Dr. Villar asked me never to bring nuts into a doctor's office because of the potential danger to kids with peanut allergies. I said, "They're cashews if that makes it any better." She assured me it didn't and went on to say, in the nicest way possible, that in fact she'd really appreciate it if I would never bring any food to the doctor's office because you never know what people might be allergic to. Between the tardiness and the nut incident, I was totally mortified. I told Jim we might need to find another pediatrician because I never want to show my face to Dr. Villar again. 

As for two-month stats, Wrenzo weighed in at 10 lbs, 10 oz. I think that was around the 50th percentile. Her head circumference was about the 85th percentile, which was down (thank goodness) from when she was born. She's growing just dandily. 

The best thing about her doctor's appointment was when Wren got the rotavirus vaccine, which is administered orally via a syringe. Wren would not stop smiling. The nurse kept rubbing the syringe along her lip, trying to get Wren to close her mouth a little bit, and Wren just kept smiling so happily. It went on for a long time, and the nurse was laughing and eating it up. It was the cutest thing.  

One day Susan Oddou had Lauren Foulger and me over with our kids for a play date. Ever ate an apple while she swung. I taught her how to eat as much of the apple as possible, down to the seeds and the very center. For a long time, I thought I bought smaller apples than other people because my core was always so tiny compared to everyone else's. Then one day I realized I just eat way more of the apple. It's a special gift of mine. Ever made me proud:

Back inside, the kids put on Luc's old Halloween costumes. Ever wore the firefighter outfit Luc used the last two years:

Right on schedule, around eight weeks, Wren started laughing. I spend a lot of time each day squishing my cheek against hers over and over again. I don't know why it's so enjoyable. It's something to do with the Lenny in me. Wren likes it, too:

 

She also enjoys doing her Jane Fonda:

John Rushton, one of Jim's med school roommates, got married over Memorial Day weekend in Vegas. Jim rented a condo for us at a place called Lake Las Vegas. Where we stayed was basically like a hotel but with individually-owned suites. Lake Las Vegas is a big development with shops, restaurants, etc. But it's a ghost town. We were so confused. Most of the spaces are vacant. The casino is closed. It's kind of eerie. According to the guy working in one of the few open establishments (a bagel shop), the development boomed for a while, and then when the economy tanked, so did Lake Las Vegas. It's been through a bunch of different owners, bankruptcy, and all sorts of trauma.

We arrived Thursday afternoon. Our place was on the ground floor. To the interior of the building was the fitness center; outside was the pool. It was a pretty ideal location. The high vacancy rates meant we had the fitness center to ourselves. Jim and I both got a workout in while we were there. I also spent quite a bit of time inside with a napping Wrenzo while Jim took Ever in the pool. At night, Ever got the bed, and Wrenzo slept in the pack n' play in the bedroom; Jim and I slept on the pull-out sofa in the living room so we could watch T.V. after the girlies went to bed. The place was great except for the animal hair all over the place. The blue bedspread was covered in hair, but the girls didn't notice:

We went for a brief stroll around the deserted central area:

The first night we got a ridiculously over-priced dinner from one of the three restaurants still open at Lake Las Vegas. The second night we drove to a yummy place called Cafe Zupa. We ordered too much food:

Ever couldn't get enough of the chocolate sauce drizzle (Pod much?):

We took Wrenzo in the pool very briefly on Saturday:

Saturday evening was the wedding at Legends Ranch. I had contacted Nicole Beck to see if Avenlee might want to babysit the girls while we went to the wedding. At first Nicole thought she could help Avenlee babysit, but then she realized they had a conflict. After some last-minute scrambling, Nicole made arrangements with her babysitter (Melissa) and her babysitter's teenage daughter (Bryndee). Nicole took Ever and Wren for a couple hours and then dropped them at Melissa's for the rest of the night. I felt really bad that I ended up totally putting Nicole out. She was so nice about the whole thing. I had hoped to spend some time with her, but they had a number of things going on while we were there. We ended up just having a few minutes to chat while we dropped off the girls. I love Nicole and hope someday we can get back to Vegas and have some quality time with her.

The girls did fine. Nicole texted this picture to Courtney, who passed it on to me:

Jim and I were worried that the wedding would be really awkward for us because we didn't know anyone. We actually really enjoyed ourselves. The heat was the only bad part. It was pretty painful in the beginning. When I sat, every inch of me that touched the chair was soaked with sweat. We sat in the back row for the ceremony, and this was our view:

Somebody else took this one:

John's brother, Michael, performed the ceremony. He was incredible. He spoke for a long time, and it was entertaining and moving. He told hilarious and wonderful stories. It was almost as much a roast of John as it was a wedding ceremony. John had a really hard time getting himself to the altar. His brother told stories about all the crazy things John has done, including getting lost recently while hiking and having to spend the night with his dogs on the mountain. Michael said apparently the only thing John is afraid of is getting married. (John's mom told us later that John had planned at one point to propose to Jennifer on a trip but chickened out. Jen found out about it and was devastated.) John and Jen wrote their own vows, and they were beautiful, touching, and funny. Jen, for instance, said she would watch all seasons of So You Think You Can Dance with John and pretend it was her idea. It was all incredibly personal and wonderful. 

We had a chance to talk with John for a little while after the ceremony. He said Jen went to a doctor to check into her fertility since she was getting older. She was told she'd have a hard time, so she wanted to take precautions and get going. They told her it was better to freeze embryos than eggs, so she talked to John about it. Even though he couldn't commit to marriage, he didn't have a problem committing to having kids with her. They did IVF. Then he figured if he could have kids with her, he could marry her. That was the back door he took to the altar, and now they've got babies on ice.

For dinner we were assigned to a table with one of John's old mission companions and one of his friends from med school and their wives. We thoroughly enjoyed both couples. The mission companion told us about the time John got held up in Guatemala right outside the mission office. The mission companion also told us about when he was back living there with his wife for work and he got shot by some hoodlums because he wouldn't give them his wedding ring. Other great stories were told. The med school guy and his wife live in Phoenix, and we pretended that we'd get together with them when we go for Pat's Run. Jim and I discussed later whether they would think it was weird if we really looked them up, as we truly want to be friends. They were great. 

This was during the first dance, from our table. You can see Jen's arm up in the air in the distance:

Later, during the garter ritual:

Just before we left, people started doing some group dancing (like where they all know the steps and dance in sync):

I was loving it and wanted to join in or at least observe and enjoy. Unfortunately it was getting late, and we had to get back to pick up the girls. 

Sunday morning we headed home. We wanted to make sure we didn't get stuck in leaving-Vegas traffic, so we took off as early as we could. Once we got back to California and were closer to home, we tried to find a sacrament meeting to attend. There was no way we could get back in time to make it to any ward in Oceanside, so we looked for churches along the way that might have meetings starting when we could get there. We finally found one that was perfect. We got to the church 15 or 20 minutes before the website said sacrament meeting would start. Nobody was in the chapel. We went to the bathroom. Still, nobody around. Turns out the website lied, and the sacrament meeting for that ward had already happened. We made a valiant effort.

Thus ended May.