We took Ella Rondo with us, and she, Ever, and Wren set really bad examples by climbing up the outside of the play equipment. This is Wren:
Wren and and Ever chose to match that day.
I caught Tiny playing "Away in a Manger." When she saw me and I complimented her, she ran back to the piano and played it again.
I promised the girls a trip to Boomers for mini golf during Christmas break and invited the Karners to join us. We also took Leela. It ended up being an unseasonably hot day - really uncomfortably hot. Boomers was more expensive than I remembered. There was frustration on the part of some children because of the slowness of others. All in all, it was pretty much a bust, but Mel and I talked about maybe trying again when we can find a Groupon deal or something.
After mini golf, we ended up hanging out inside the building for a long time. Mel and I talked while the kids pretended to play video games. Tiny kept wandering off, so we spent a good amount of time looking for her. Repeatedly.
On Friday, January 3, I took the girls to Trader Joe's. Ever asked to push a kiddie cart. Then of course the others wanted one, too. I allowed each little person to push a cart. While they are probably better drivers than many children, it was still very annoying. In the frozen-food section, Tiny somehow made her cart fall down toward her, and her hand was stuck around the handle. She cried and cried, which was unusual because she is pretty tough. She indicated that her thumb hurt, and she just could not calm down for quite a while. I suggested we go see Daddy at work so he could look at her hand. She liked that idea. I was hoping to do it after naps, but she wanted to go right away. So we went to Jim's office, where the girls can't help but climb on the boulders out front.
I thought Jim would say it was fine, but he looked at her swollen thumb and said we needed to get an x-ray. He put in the order, and we got it done.
On Monday, we got the results - probable fracture. I worked on Tuesday. Wednesday Jim said I really should take her in to get it splinted. We went to San Marcos and, after some confusion about where we should be and who should help us, we got s splint put on. The guy who did it looked at the x-ray and said it was definitely fractured lengthwise along the bone at the base of her thumb (below the joint). He got a big kick out of the makeshift splint Jim had put on her using a popsicle stick.
The splint:
Back at home, Tiny made a big book mess. Her attention span is amazing; she can "read" books by herself for hours. I just wish she'd look at one, put it back, and then pull out the next.
The first available ortho appointment was on Friday, January 10. The PA said Tiny needed to be a in cast for a couple of weeks and that we should keep her feet on the ground - no jumping, climbing, playground equipment, etc. I was like, "So the trampoline jumping this week was a bad idea?" Before the cast and during the cast, Tiny continued life as usual. It's pretty hard to get a kid not to jump or climb. Tiny chose purple for her cast. She was really good at keeping it out of the bath. Her not being able to wash her hands on her own was the most annoying part.
Anna took Ever and Naomie to Legoland with Leela. The girls wore their matching jumpsuits, and the Subrebosts' tween family friend from Orange, Brooke, did their hair. Leela, Ever, and Naomie love buying and wearing matching outfits, which I didn't really have a problem with until Jim pointed out that it's cliquish. Anyway, they had a very fun day.
Wrenzy is a monkey. If Jim is anywhere near furniture or a counter or anything else she can use as a jumping-off point, Wren scrambles up quickly and jumps onto his back or shoulders. Then she just rides around while he lives his life.
They came up with a routine where if she had both legs around his neck and her hands around his head, it was "hat." If she slid down and sort of draped herself over him, with only one leg around his neck and at least one arm around his neck, it was "shawl." Then they added "mount up" and "dismount." This demonstration was inhibited by Wrenzy's full-length dress.
These moves were refined so that "shawl" became either "full shawl," where one arm was draped down Jim's front," or "full full shawl," where both arms were draped down his front.
Our friend Amber took this pic of Jim (sporting headdress Wren) talking to Derrick after church.
We went for a nice walk in Hosp Grove.
Tiny climbed stumps in her purple cast, which matched her purple dress.
Wrenzy hung from the railing while Tiny ran ahead.
A family monopolized the tree swing for a while, but we were able to stop and enjoy it for a minute on our way back.
Then we picked up Grandpa and took him to Panera for dinner.
Wren and Ever showed Nathan how to climb all over his playground equipment in unorthodox ways that his parents don't allow. Tiny played nicely with Noah at the sandbox.
We went for a bike/scooter ride. Tiny always insists on taking a scooter. She does better on the scooter than either of the other girls did at her age, but she always tires out before the jaunt is over.
We displayed the Christmas crafts the girls made with Tutu.
A babysitter gave Wren cute hair.
She later tried to recreate the look herself.
Kristen Plumb, who is in the Ivey Ranch ward and was introduced to me by Stephanie Hand, organized a group to attend SeaWorld's annual preschool day . It's such a bargain, I couldn't resist; I pulled the littles out of Little Bugs that day so we could go. As was always the case with Ever at such places, their interest in the animals was minimal. Tiny did pay some attention to these guys:
We saw the orca show. Before it started, Tiny pointed at the picture of the mountains and said, "Beautiful, Mama." I love her appreciation of nature.
I have to say, the movie Blackfish has hampered my enjoyment of the orcas. I would have liked to see the dolphin show, which I believe involves high-diving acrobats, but we had to get back to meet Ever after school and timing didn't work out.
Dottie Murray and the littles tried not to step on cracks.
These monkeys always have to climb.
They loved the rides.
After the rides, we went to the play area that features a soft pit, an unimaginably giant net structure for climbing, and other things. The girls would have been happy to play there for hours. They threw giant fits when I dragged them away, but I had to make sure we were home before Ever.
Ever's Girl Scout troop did a field trip to Point Loma on Saturday the 25th. They learned about whales and did some cleanup. Anna and I got out of chaperoning by volunteering instead to pick up the troop's initial batch of Girl Scout cookies. (Saturday was pickup day, and cookies sales started on Sunday.) The adults who went on the field trip took and posted plenty of pictures.
Apparently Ever is quite serious and aloof at her Girl Scout meetings. Miss Marin told me once that she gets the sense Ever is so bright that she sort of just looks at the other girls in a slightly amused way. She rarely cracks a full smile and is hard to impress. I have to say, I have seen for myself that the other girls in the troop are really hyper and silly and immature in comparison. Marin once posted a slew of photos in which Ever made herself nearly or entirely impossible to see (like she hid behind a post or moved out of the frame) and/or refused to smile. Generally the most you get is a Mona Lisa smile.
I told Marin that Ever really enjoyed a science activity they did once, and she said she could tell and sent me this pic.
That is the face of an excited Ever at Girl Scouts
Back to January. On the 27th, we took Tiny back to ortho to get her cast removed.
These two snuggled up as we waited to get another x-ray.
They said they were ...
Unfortunately Tiny's thumb had not healed sufficiently, so we had to put another cast on for two more weeks. I was very surprised when Tiny chose red. I think she was mainly trying to impress Tutu from afar.
In other news, Ever had started taking a tap class on Tuesday afternoons while I was at work. Anna was doing Palmquist pickup at 3:00 P.M. and keeping Ever at her place until about 4:30, when she drove Ever and Leela to tap. Before I got home on the night of Tuesday the 28th, Jim texted and said Ever had fallen from the rings in Subrebosts' garage and cut her head. When I got home late that night, I saw this on the dryer:
Elaine Shuman taught me that you can put blood-drenched clothes in the washer, fill the washer with cold water, and leave it for days. Then add soap, close the lid to run the cycle, and all the blood will magically disappear. Totally worked. Shirt saved.
The details I got later were these: Subrebosts' stand-up punching bag had been placed near the rings, and the girls were doing backbends on top of the punching bag while holding onto the rings. Ever slipped, cracked her head, and bled a lot. Anna was amazingly calm about the whole thing. Ever wasn't up for dance class after the head injury (obviously), so Anna dropped her at Cikaneks' house before taking Leela to class. Scott and Rebecca fed Ever pizza, and Rebecca tried to wash her hair to get the blood out. It's so nice to have neighbor friends who take good care of us. Ever didn't have a concussion or any other serious injury; she's just got a scar on the crown of her head.
We set up Ever's Digital Cookie platform the next day and hit Jim's office that afternoon right after school to try to sell some cookies.
It's super lame that cookie sales start on a Sunday so Ever can't sell on day one. (Leela sold 100 boxes that Sunday.) But she's a motivated cookie seller, and she made up for lost time later.
Tiny made a bed in the middle of the hard floor in the playroom and went to sleep. It was bizarre.
The littles did some wonderful dancing. I cut this video right before Tiny hugged Wren and Wren got mean and yelled at her to stop and then bossed her around a little bit.
Wrenzy's fast-dance moves are my personal flave.
The girls love to sleep together, but this view on the monitor confirmed to me that there is seriously not enough room in their beds for all three of them.
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