I loved watching the choir at women's session in General Conference: those pure, young girls! I loved Sister Reeves’s 8 different “powers.” As she spoke I visualized super heroes with the power of prayer, scriptures, temple, covenants, repentance, virtue, Sabbath day, and prophet power. I hope our family can have those super powers. President Uchtdorf is always so tender and yet straight forward. I love our leaders. What a perfect way to begin General Conference. I’m excited about our new apostles and about the good men who have gone to their next assignment. I will really miss Elder Scott. I’ve listened to almost every talk he’s given. I love his connection with his wife. I love his perspective and ability to share spiritual experiences. He has taught me so much. I love him. I’m so excited for next weekend!

My body kind of crumpled this week. I hate when that happens. Most days I was a mess to look at, but decided to try in other ways. I prayed that we would be able to serve others. A new family moved into the area: the boys helped make dinner for them and deliver it. We shared dinner with the missionaries and the kids were polite. I finished All the Light We Cannot See (on the life favorites list) and loved it so much I had to e-mail the author—which I could do through his agent and publisher. Surprisingly, he and his publisher both responded! What generosity. I’m glad we could encourage each other. So: despite not being as put together as I prefer, I’m humbled that Heavenly Father will allow us to do small things to serve Him and His children.

An older woman has been sitting outside of the library asking people to sign a petition to get something on the ballot in November. I usually try to avoid her because it’s near a parking lot, I’m chasing four little kids, and usually have about 60 books in my arms as we go in and out of the building. I finally talked with her. When I told her I’d sign but not give my contact information, she yelled and cursed and scratched out things on her papers. We thanked her for her time and efforts then left. The boys brimmed with questions. Lincoln wanted to re-enact it. Keller wanted me to tell him all the bad words. When I told them that she had taken the Lord’s name in vain, Lincoln said, “But that’s a commandment!” and Levi quoted, “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.” So we laughed and hoped the lady doesn’t feel bad at the end of the day.

Levi started attending a second grade math class this week. He loves it. His teacher gave him the end of the year first grade math assessment and he zipped through it; bless her for encouraging him and helping provide a means of further growth. Kids from the second grade class have talked to him as we go home. Yay! We met with his teacher, the principal, and the GT teacher on Tuesday. Lincoln and Keller voted to come with us instead of meeting with a friend at a park. Bless that teacher again for letting them build with Legos and explore her classroom. They built robots and tools. Levi tried to help contain them. I’m so impressed at his desire to do and be good. He’s been self-directed and emotionally controlled (he even reminds me about my penny jar!). He even made a Cinderella slipper out of paper! Last week in Primary, his class discussed reverence. On his own, he chose to bring his scriptures and other things to help him be reverent in sacrament meeting today.

Lincoln loves to be home. He loves to build and destroy. He loves to create super-hero costumes and weapons and robots. Whenever we read a book he really likes, he takes it down to the art table, studies it, and starts to draw things out of the book and plot how to build them. We read a library book on Michelangelo and his creation of David in Florence. Lincoln loved the book, loved the sculpting. Both he and Keller were fascinated by David’s lack of clothing.  When Lincoln took it downstairs I was a little concerned about what he would bring back up as drawings. Instead Keller dashed up yelling, “He drew in the library book!” So he had: right over the one picture that showed David’s entire body—strategic drawings over his chest and pelvis. When I asked Lincoln about it he responded, “Well! Our boy parts are sacred, so I covered him up!” I’m glad he heard that message, even if we need to repair a library book.

Keller wants to live in his underpants. He told me he was swimming, stripped, and then chased squirrels and planted seeds he found with Lincoln. The boys disappeared when the missionaries were here—we found them in underpants building forts. Once I came upstairs to his room to find him in nothing but nine pairs of underpants. I don’t know how he got them all on top of each other! He has read, snuggled, and sang a lot this week. He constantly brings things to Venice and tries to comfort her.

Venice wants to climb and live her own life without interference. We traded her binkies for another soft blanket of her choice. She witnessed/helped me throw her binkies into the outside garbage without any fussing. She’s done okay at night, but naps are a struggle. Then she got a fever. She’s over it now, but it was a long weekend. Our friends gave us a ton of clothes they’d outgrown for her. She loves the poofy dresses and shiny shoes. She walks around showing everyone her “shoes!”

In between, we went on a little hike, played outside, invented dinners, and (drum roll!) Wes has officially switched to a full employee. This has been in process for months and we’re really grateful to have it solidified before the end of the fiscal year (just for stability). He sweeps in every evening and saves the day—playing with the kids, running out their energy, teaching them new games, teaching me to use a drill, and being so patient and kind with all of us. What an amazing man. I’m honored to be his wife and lead our little family together.

Cole Crew

This week I started a “stay calm” jar for myself. It seems that my patience has been rather thin: or perhaps I’m just explosive. So in my scripture study I prayed to remember/learn tactics to help me train these sweet children and become the person I’m supposed to be. Thankfully God is merciful. Thankfully the Savior helps us change day by day. I wrote my calming tactics on my jar (next to the kitchen sink) to remind me. Every time I lose it, though, I have to put a penny in the jar. At the beginning of the week I did okay. Thursday I had five pennies. Then I cried for the rest of the evening. Poor Wes. Bless these forgiving kids. Since then, I had a day without any pennies and then just one. Small improvement is still improvement I guess. Keller asked me about the jar and I told him it is to help me not lose my temper. When I put a penny in the jar he asked, “When will you get your temper back?”

We can officially remove the gates on the stairs! Venice thinks she can walk down the stairs, but she eventually takes speed over novelty. Her new favorite toys are hair products. She digs in our cupboards then hauls the hair spray, mousse, and gel all over the house. I tried tying her hair out of her face. She looked in the mirror, cooed happily, then yanked them out. She tried to put it back in, but after 5 yank-outs, we moved on. She says, “More cheese!” loves ketchup, and feels that whenever someone gets a treat she should get one too, even if her hands and mouth are full.

Keller wrapped in his blanket tonight and said, “I’m a banana. A taco! A banana taco! No, just Keller.” He wants to take off all his clothes at all times. I found him behind our shed just preparing to pee in my work bucket. Another time he pulled off his clothes in the yard, “But he [our neighbor behind us] doesn’t wear a shirt outside!” Lincoln piped up, “Yeah, and he’s already seen us without clothes on. See? We’re naked!” Somehow, this didn’t make me feel much better! Keller is learning to spell his name and goes around changing, “K-E-LL-E-RRRRR!”

Lincoln is even more exciting when tired. Tired = tormentor. I hear, “I’m going to eat you!” and “If you don’t ________, I’m going to _________ you!” We finished an audio book where the characters go into the fairy tale world. He loves the fairy godmother. He wanted to be the fairy godmother, but decided just to be her helper instead. He has been waving magic wands, turning people into pumpkins, battling dragons, and closing inter-world portals all week. “Where do we live? Where does Grandma live?” Pause. “Well! I am going to close the portal between Arvada and Logan and Kuna and we will never, NEVER see Grandma again!” Oh, dear. It’s devastating for all of us, especially the little actor. The fairy godmother’s helper is also well equipped with weapons. He found the box of cookies, took them and Keller to hide in another room and eat them. Then he found a popsicle while I was downstairs. He cut it open and let it melt all over the crack between the stove and the counter. He left it because he remembered that he was drawing a robot car powered by a missile…Let’s not forget my favorite moment of the week: I walked into Venice’s room to get her going for the day and there he was “reading” the Book of Mormon to her and explaining the pictures.

Levi impresses me so much in his self-control. It’s so nice to know what is going on during the day and how he feels. I love hearing his stories and inventions. I love his excitement about “short surprise math tests!” Monday he brought his homework folder home, sat at the table (without prompting), and finished the week’s worth of homework in fifteen minutes. “Explain to me exactly what “setting” means, Mom.” On Friday he school hosted a “fun run” for each grade. They set up an oval track, turned music on loud, and invited parents/family to come and cheer them on for forty minutes while they ran in a circle high-fiving a darling 6^th grader dressed as an eagle (their mascot) and their P.E. teacher. The principal jogged around all day with grades K-6. Levi loved showing me and Lincoln the people he knows. And he finally started playing with a boy in his class. He’s really excited about it. His Wednesday afternoon Nature Center class makes him so excited his face flushes. This week they learned about temperature and weather. He learned a lot after he realized that his friend was already there and he didn’t have to stop the teacher or the class to wait for Xander. Loyalty is one of Levi’s amazing qualities.

When we went to the library on Friday, Levi saw advertisements for a showing of the new Cinderella. He was so excited he took one of the bookmarks and made copies of it at home. So we went. Lincoln and Levi were entranced, (Levi woke this morning grinning, “Mom, I’ve decided I’m going to marry Cinderella…” in a dreamy voice. Lincoln: “How did she turn her staff into a ice-wand? I’m going to do that!”) After about an hour into the movie Keller wanted to know why the mice hadn’t sung, “Cinderelly!” We don’t often do movies; I think it was an overall enjoyable experience. They all sat on my lap for the majority of the film—that took a while to walk off! Wes stayed home and played with Venice while he worked.

During scripture study, Wes read about the hailstorms that will destroy the crops. This inspired us to recommit to our food storage (we used it all up in preparation to move). We’re not quite up to our three-month supply, but we’ll get there. I’m so glad he wants to follow the counsel of the prophets and the promptings he receives.

In other news, we invited a family over for apple crisp. We’ve never met them and they rarely come to church—so they came and we enjoyed each other. One afternoon I started a small fire in the oven—not huge, but enough to scare us and require a nice long cleaning of the oven. We went to the temple and have decided to take time with our kids there to teach so that they know that the temple is a place of learning. They loved touching the white temple. Today we attempted our first “Sunday devotional” as a family and are pleased to announce that it went better than anticipated: Wes shared something he learned during personal study, I gave a 5 minute devotional on prayer, we sang a song, and off we went. I requested a bunch of my ancestor’s patriarchal blessings; they came in the mail this week. I feel so privileged to read them and to be part of these wonderful people. I’ve been thinking and reading about some difficult challenges others face. I feel so grateful for our current blessings and time of peace. I know that our own trials will come, but I’ve decided to not be afraid and to take Jacob’s advice and not stumble because of “over-anxieties.” If God believes we’re capable of mortal experience, I’m very willing to trust Him and hold on tight.

Happy Easter! And Happy Conference! What a great way to celebrate the resurrection and Heavenly Father’s plan for us. All week we have studied Christ’s last week during the boys’ personal scripture time. Keller runs around pretending to wave palm leaves shouting “Hosanna!” Lincoln wants me to be the donkey. We dyed Easter eggs yesterday; they enjoyed the prospect of it, but the reality was only eh. Tomorrow our neighbors and friends are coming over for an FHE egg hunt in the yard.  

Don’t you love Conference? Levi was so excited he shivered. He kept comparing the speakers with the pictures on the wall of the apostles. They thought President Uchtdorf’s German conducting was hilarious. We missed hearing more from President Monson and Elder Scott. Levi concluded the day by informing us that he’s going to grow up to be an apostle and the prophet. “I’ll do a pretty good job.” Lincoln said maybe he’d work for Levi, but he still thinks “Satan has a nice face” (in the New Testament stories book)...The boys did awesome this Conference. We even heard some of it! As always we look forward to reading the talks over. I’m so grateful we have six months to study and digest it. It is like the Savior telling us to go to our homes and ponder His words, try to master them, then come back on the morrow for more. I love that “saints are sinners who keep trying.” Phew! I love my Savior.

Of course the rest of the week can’t compare to Easter and Conference.

Wesley was in Houston from Monday until late Wednesday for a conference on clean power plants. We missed him, but this was a really quick trip. I was almost surprised when he returned. I love having him around. He brought us home fruit twists from HEB (the Texas grocery store) because I love them. (Whenever I start feeling lonely for Texas I think of scorpions near my babies and big hissing cockroaches and no mountains…then I feel better). Wes is the best. I love that we see him so often. I love that he’ll work extra so I can volunteer in Levi’s class. I love that when he’s home, he’s 100% home. I love that he talks to me about work and that we counsel about everything. Perhaps this would drive other people nuts—but I learn more about him every day and I know in 10 years I’ll be even crazier about him than I am now. If that’s possible!

While he was gone, the inspection for our new house happened. The girl who was going to watch Keller and Lincoln slept through her alarm and doorbell, so my friend took Levi to school and kept Lincoln with her. As we drove out, Keller screamed, “I WANT TO STAY WITH CHERYL! I WANT TO STAY WITH CHERYL!” She’s completely won them over. Keller played very happily in the house and Venice was happy once I put her down. Thankfully: no major problems! Buying a house means buying a list of exciting projects. So…if anyone is interested in helping us knock down a wall or push out our fence in the next little while, we’ll feed and house you! I met the owner. He seemed really nice. He told us that the area has a ton of little kids and they’ve loved it for the last 20 years.

One of the best moments of the week happened when Levi woke then ran to give me a big hug and kiss. That night when I was in and out with screaming Keller, Levi rolled over and said, “Mom, I want to hug and kiss you!” Thank you, Levi! He struggled readjusting to school, but loved the weekend. He helped clean up and helped take care of Venice and just helped. He read a book then helped Keller pretend to read it. Super cute. Such a good, emotional boy.

Lincoln, oh Lincoln, how do you live? He left a wave of destruction behind him. Not that this is abnormal. This week the wave just felt huge. If we were characters in a picture book, he would be the one running through with scissors cutting the world apart. And then he smiles, and I think: Did he really just hit me with that shovel? Did he really just shove Keller over and beat him with a stick? Did he really just steal all the baby toys and hide them? “I’m not going on a mission. I’m going to marry Venice and kiss her on the mouth!” For his personal time he wanted to fold clothes and pack, though. That was awesome. He’s quite the help.

Keller has been gunky but happy. Screaming but “I okay.” Mischievous and dangerous. He climbs into Nissy’s crib and jumps. She’s not a fan. I’m not a fan. I swatted his bum so hard I almost cried. I hate doing that. I’ve given up keeping clothes on him except when we eat and when we go out. He comes out of a nap in only underpants when I put him down fully clothed. He willingly puts them on when he’s hungry—which is often lately. I think he’s growing. We spent three nights screaming that his legs and arms hurt. And when he’s tired he runs into things—so his toe bleeds, his knee bleeds, his back hurts. Oh yes, and Lincoln shut the door on him, which resulted in a huge black-yellow bruise.

Venice is also gunky but happy. She officially crawls! Forward! She started yesterday. Today she crawled out of the toy room, into the hall, and into the bathroom when she heard the tub going. I can’t keep her sitting because she needs to move. She can’t eat because she’s so distracted by the wonderful world around her. She joins the chorus of loud ruckus. I’m glad we’re moving so she can crawl more safely. She’s such a sweet little creature, and part of the crew!

We’re a circus over here: happy, sticky, and out there. Buy tickets to the show.

Picture Update

 Top Eagle Award

 Lincoln and Abby Squirrel

 Top View of Lincoln's TMNT cake

 Venice and Grandma Venice

Keller!

Yesterday Levi was up before six. Wes got up with him and they had all the boys out of the house before 7:30. They returned with happy yellow daisies and a large chocolate bare (which is now gone…). Wes basically gave me a day off—I don’t know that anything got done, but I really appreciated it. I’m spoiled. Levi has been cutting out hearts and writing Valentines.

Venice has two teeth to gnaw on the world. One had receded earlier, but it is completely out now. She seems to be working on a few more; how can she be so pleasant about this? We’re impressed. She figured out how to bounce-scoot herself to the bottom of her bouncy seat, roll over, then carefully and slowly lower herself to the floor where she spins, shuffles, and rolls to get whatever has her attention. She kicks with exuberance. I’m sure she’d be moving all over the place if I gave her opportunity to practice more; alas—I’m trying to keep her alive.  She showed us that she can get angry on Thursday when she didn’t nap for longer than 15 minutes at a time due to house hunting and school pick-up. When she went to bed, she rolled on to her side and sighed as if to say, “Please, just let me be!” Today during sacrament meeting she squealed, squealed, SQUEALED. Her happy squeal doesn’t actually sound happy, then you look at her face. It’s kind of hilarious.

Keller is a “scary monster” who cuddles, sits on his sister, and gets her a toy or binky if ever she can’t reach. During lunch we (I) sometimes sing and dance around. One day was the introduction to “Eye of the Tiger.” When I put him down for his rest he started belting it all out and pounding walls to the rhythm. Each repetition increased in volume. He’s also quite sneaky. He wears swimming goggles everywhere he can—so much that we have to take them away at night. I came in around 2 a.m. one night to find his goggles firmly on his face. He’d hidden them under his pillow! Even at that hour he had the energy to chuckle at his cool trick and that he’d been sleeping in them for hours. The next morning he had a mild black eye, even after I confiscated the goggles! He likes to read to himself. He discovered the alarm clock has a button that lights up and he pushed the button to look at a page during bedtime. Pushed it again. Turned the page. Pushed it again. When Wes took the clock, he looked up forlornly: “But I can’t read in dark, Daddy!” Oh yes, and we can’t keep clothes on him. Shoes and socks are a bother—no matter where we are. He even dropped his socks in the unflushed toilet then brought them to us. Thank you!

Lincoln explained to us that his name is Super Fire; he’s a donkey with a cape and wings who flies around with an axe and saves people from fire and shoots fire at the bad guys. Just so you know. One of the houses we saw had a ledge that came above my waist. We found Lincoln sitting on it. Of course he had pulled himself up/scaled the wall! He convinced Keller that firemen use port-a-potties and that Venice’s Bumbo is theirs. It’s hard to stop the firemen’s pretend flow. When my visiting teachers told him they’d see him Sunday, he grabbed his sword and responded menacingly, “No. No, you won’t!” Granted, he had the lesson for FHE and re-enacted a man falling in a hole then yelling for help. His friend (Levi) helps him out by lowering a ladder. The two of them explained that when we make mistakes we call for help and Jesus will help us out. Lincoln added that even when we’re muddy Jesus will still give us a hug and is happy to pull us out of the hole. He also requested his own copy of The Book of Mormon. This gives me a lot of hope.

Levi is currently singing, “Welcome, Welcome Sabbath Morning!” He insists every week that we attend choir. At parent-teacher conferences, Mrs. Games and I brainstormed how to challenge him more and help him move forward while balancing his perfectionist tendencies. She reports phenomenal behavior: which explains the extra need for decompression at home. Aiaiai—seven hours is too long. He and Lincoln had back-to-back dentist appointments on Monday. We prayed that it would all go well—and they both did great. Levi organized their prize bags and contents. He encourages us all to floss regularly. Yesterday he helped Keller up from falling, read books to us, and listened really well. When we went to Xander’s house, he was very respectful and they played joyfully. We’ve had some difficult moments, which we’ll figure out. He’s so aware. Once he concludes something is a problem, he changes it. I am grateful for that about him.

Wesley has been reading The One World School House by the creator of the Khan Academy. Between our concerns about education (spiritual, social, emotional, academic, etc.) this book, Robinson’s The Element, and other stuff we’re concluding that the traditional school model doesn’t work for us. We don’t feel like homeschooling is right, either. We trust the Lord to help us through this one. What an adventure. How do people go through mortality without prayer?

We love you!

Cole Crew

P.S. I’m reading a great book with a terrible title: These Is My Words by Nancy Turner. Highly recommended.