Chamna Chase

On Saturday, we had a wee family adventure. Most people around here went to the nifty Prosser balloon rally, but that started early enough in the morning to destroy my pregoself, so we made different plans: the Chamna Chase at Richland’s Chamna Natural Preserve. Jeff has been running faithfully for a solid month now so he decided to jump in the nearest 10k race for fun, and the kids and I can never stay away from a race. So off we went on Saturday morning in our trusty ever-dusty van.

I’m not entirely sure what the Chamna Natural Preserve is actually preserving… it looked a whole lot like the rest of the scabby prickly sage brushy landscapes around here. But there were some good rocks to play on and the entire race was on a dusty trail winding through the prickly bushes. Trail races are a rarity in this area. It was pleasant to spend an hour outside with my kids while Jeff sweated and poofed through the dust on the run.

The Big Rock was popular. The only problem with this area was in the parking lot behind it, the race folks had set up a hot dog stand of all things (at 9am) and it was wafting minced-meaty scents on us while we played at The Big Rock. Thankfully there were other attractions at the preserve too.

We hiked through some crunchy foliage to watch the race start, and found more rocks to climb. [In the background, Jeff is the second guy from the left in the white shirt and orange shorts]

Jeff: 4th from the left, just rarin’ to run.

And they’re off! The runners promptly disappeared into the bushes, leaving us to find what enjoyment we could in the prickles for the next 40 minutes.

We meandered through the shoulder-high sagebrush until we found the river. I was amused that Jay and Rose kept calling those dead-looking bushes a forest. They ran around for a while in the bushes saying “we’re in a forest! we’re in a forest!” Oh dear, we need to find these kids some trees!

There was this little opening in the foliage just big enough for two kids to stand and throw rocks into the water for half an hour:

It was very peaceful in the shade by the tranquil Yakima River. I stood there and watched my kids play—something I love to do. There was no place to sit down on the steep rocky slope, so I stood. Jay and Rose kept slipping and sliding down the slope. They got progressively dustier and dustier the longer we lingered.

I had my watch on the race, so I knew roughly when we should walk up the slope from the river to check on the runners. We timed it almost perfectly, and suddenly Jeff appeared from behind the sagebrush. He’s in this picture—can you spot him?

Woohooo!

 
THE FINISH: first of all, can you see the man dressed as a gorilla? He’s right behind the clock, wearing a blue shirt with a black gorilla mask. While we were down by the river, I happened to glance up towards the trail and was rather surprised to see gorilla-man walking up the trail. He had the full black hairy suit on—arms, legs, mask, and all. It was kind of creepy, but funny at the same time.

SO: Jeff got third place overall in the 10k, with a time of 40:11. After the race he said “I remember when I could run that distance a minute per mile faster.” But that was back in college when he was practically a full-time runner, so this was very admirable if you ask me—especially on a rocky dusty trail in the sun. Jeff was nice and worn out from his run, and I was nice and worn out from standing and walking carrying that 20 pound belly around for over an hour. I felt like I had run the race too! It made me realize just how lonnnng a ways to go I have before that can happen again.

Hurrah for the Chamna Chase! Dust all around!

As luck would have it…

…I’m still pregnant.

But I got a new niece today!

My sister Em was due 3 weeks before me with her fourth baby, and she’s never made it past 38 weeks. So I was expecting this, 5 or 6 weeks before my due date. AmyJane Broadbent was born this morning at 37wks 2days. Yay for Em! Yay for the family! Yay all around—she’s perfect and healthy and cute! But misery loves company, and now I’m flying solo in the awfulness that is pregnancy. At least that’s what it feels like. How come some people get to miss out on the last 3 endless weeks of pregnancy? As childish as this sounds, I’ll say it anyways: it’s not fair! Pardon my pathetic-ness. I love you Em! I love you baby B!

6 weeks from today, my own pregordeal will be over. It had better be!! Question: since when does the camera take away 100 pounds? I am WAY huger than this, I promise. At least I feel bigger, and that’s really all that matters to me at this point. I look down and see: HUGE. I try to bend over and feel: HUGE. I look in the mirror and see: HUGE. I take a picture and see: barely pregnant. WEIRD. Let’s blame all those cravings I’m NOT HAVING.

This week my appetite has taken another jump and therefore my nausea has jumped up along with it. Every time my appetite grows, my nausea keeps stride and right when it seems to be tapering off, I get another burst of appetite to keep me nauseous. Be reminded I’m still on double dosage of anti-nausea medicine, three times a day. I’ve tried taking it two times a day instead, but it brought back the dangerous morning feelings, so I gave up. After much risky experimentation, I’ve come to the for-sure conclusion at long last that I’ll be taking Zofran and Reglan 3 times a day for the next 42 days—all the way up to The End. I no longer hope I’ll be able to stop taking it, kind of like how I no longer hope to enjoy eating anything. Maybe the medicine will keep me from puking during labor?? Ha!

If you’ve ever been pregnant or known a pregnant person, the rest of my issues are probably quite familiar:
back—ache
stretched belly—ache
bony baby—ache
braxton hicks—ache
swallowing bitter pills—ache
every day is the longest day ever—ache
vacuuming—ache
dishwashing—ache
sweeping the floor—ache
thinking of things to eat—ache
cooking—ache 
nothing tastes good—ache
no energy—ache
carrying laundry baskets—ache
walking—ache
standing—ache
bending over—ache
sitting—ache
laying down—ache
thinking up this list—ACHE

How do people DO this? I hardly ever hear any other pregnant person besides my own sister complain. I try not to complain, I really do, because once I start, it’s hard to stop. Now I’m going to spend the next few hours perfecting this list of aches in my head. As if I need another temptation to dwell on them!

When I saw the picture of darling AmyJane, I wished we lived closer so I could go hold that sweet little 6lb 9oz bundle. But then I realized that I can’t really hold anything across my big round belly without enduring a painful internal punching and pinching. So it’s just as well.

I’m trying to cloak the complaints and negativity in this post with the joy of a new niece, but I’m not entirely sure I’m succeeding. Sorry, it was my best effort. I really am happy for my sister and I love my new niece. And it’s the second day of fall, my most favorite time of year!

More pregnancy number crunching: in 2 days, I’ll have less DAYS left than WEEKS in an entire pregnancy. That’s 39 days left vs. 40 weeks total. I’ll take it.

Jay is sympathetic.

The Primary Program

Here's Jay's Primary program part from this year. I'm not sure what he was doing with his hands, and he said it in a completely different voice when he was up front during the program, but this is the video I got.

Today was our ward's Primary program. It was the first time in the last 3 years that I did not write it, and while that was very nice, it was also actually kind of weird not to be in the presidency. My head knew from past experience that being a Primary teacher during the program was an effective form of at-church-torture, but experiencing program as a "lowly teacher" again reminded me in full force what exactly that entails. Mostly it was lots of sitting and singing the same songs over and over till I felt crazy and figuring out how to keep energetic/mischievous kids reverent for hours on end. We made it though, but it like I said, it was different...and a tad on the draining side for my pregnant self.

One thing that really caught me off guard was my brain analyzing the goods and bads of the practices and thinking up suggestions for what to do better. I was not in charge! And I didn't want to be! At all! Of course I didn't say anything unless I was asked for my input because it was so not my place. But it was still an oddly antsy feeling to sit there and battle my analytic brainpower and only focus on singing the songs and keeping my class of 5 year-olds reverent, especially when I kind of felt the same way as they did--like "make it end!!"

Once again, Jay memorized his part in a few seconds at home and said it loud and clear into the microphone. He loves that podium and the microphone. In the program today, he got in front of the microphone and cleared his throat into it deliberately before launching into his two sentences: "Successful families work together. One thing my family does together is work in the yard." His enunciation and voice modulation were in the classic Jay-microphone style (when he gives talks in primary, he speaks in the same way--slowly, with an enthusiastic tone, and clear voice). He never said his part like that at home, so the video is not quite accurate, but it's better than nothing. After Jay delivered his lines, the congregation enjoyed its light ripple of laughter. As I joined in, I was also feeling somewhat relieved that Jay did not feel the need to embellish his lines any more than the throat-clearing!

While one of the older girls was saying her longer part up front, I overheard Jay whisper to his friend in an envious voice: "her part is really long!" I was chuckling to myself after that comment. Wow, Jay did not inherit his microphone gene from me, that's for SURE.

After church, Jay informed us "I cleared my throat so everyone could understand me."

Bill’s!

This morning we loaded 8 people up in our van and went to Bill’s Berry Farm with the cousins for the first time this season. We got there early enough that it was still cool outside. Bonus!

First, the kids climbed some straw mountains:

[Rose is totally posing up there]

That Tate-face!

Jay and Rose are the best. When we started walking over to the playground part of the farm, they saw Jeff and I holding hands and copied us. I adore this.

And on to the tire swing:

 

Last up, a cousin picture:

After this we got a bag of steaming hot fresh apple cinnamon donuts (which, as usual, disappeared too fast for any kind of picture). Then we clambered back into the van and drove home. There’s nothing like a quick Saturday morning family excursion!

Rose and Me

At home together.

We’re still getting used to our time together while Jay is away at school all day.

Sometimes we go out…

Costco pizza is huge.

 

I got my hair cut last week, and Rose sat patiently at the salon, flipping through Good Housekeeping magazine (the only one in the salon’s collection that seemed acceptable for a 3 year old) and drawing with crayons on her “twip-boad” (clipboard).

Mostly we stay home.

We eat plenty of snacks.

Rose cranks out the multi-colored scribbles.

I try to convince her that we can only hang up a few of them on our fancy new pinned-up twine strings in the kitchen. Rose really likes hanging up her artwork.

Rose also rather enjoys taking selfies. Her eyelashes!

We talk about baby Amber and daydream a little. A while ago, the maternity store gave me a gift card for a Carseat Canopy, so I ordered one and it came this week. 

Rose plays. She told me that this is a family: the baby, with her pink Bunny as the mom, Jay’s Monkey-Kid as the dad, orange bunny as the sister, and the little white monkey as the brother.

I do my best to keep up with the dishes and the laundry. This week I even vacuumed the upstairs! It was exhausting. Two days later I still haven’t made it to the basement, although the vacuum is waiting hopefully at the top of the stairs.

Rose reads stacks of books to herself. Sometimes she asks me to read to her, but lots of the time she likes to gather a big stack and look through the entire pile, one book and one page at a time.

We miss Jay. The other day I realized that we can actually SEE his school from our house. This is the view from our back porch, fully zoomed out, half zoomed in, and all the way zoomed in. That white water tower in the middle is a useful point of reference. Jay’s school is the building right behind the bleachers—that tan triangle is the roof. For some reason it’s a comfort to live close to the school.

More armchair selfies. We do plenty of snuggling.

It’s a calm existence. We’re ok with it while it lasts…

[7 more weeks]

A real piano!

For the past 6 years, we’ve had a 66-key electric keyboard. I never played it because 1. keyboards are wimpy and wobbly and don’t sound as good as real pianos and 2. all of the fun music requires more than 66 keys to play—something I didn’t know until I tried playing it on the keyboard. So it’s been a while since I’ve played the piano regularly. I was never very good at playing. I learned the requisite 10 or 15 hymns for my Mom as a teenager and didn’t really play much after that (unless you count the creaking, grudging opening hymn for seminary class).

It all started 6 or 7 months ago, when our friends the Peters got a new piano. They offered to give their old one to us for free, and of COURSE! I said yes right away. Then I became deathly pregnantly ill and stopped caring about anything except my next hurl. Jeff was completely occupied taking care of our life without my help. So the piano plan was left hanging.

Then a few weeks ago, the patient Peters family offered us the piano again because they were really ready to get rid of it. Can you believe they kept two pianos in their house all that time, waiting for us?? They are so nice! With some clever over-the-phone measuring, we discovered that the piano would fit in our van. Jeff set off with his father one Saturday afternoon, and they came back an hour or so later, drenched in sweat, hauling a piano. In our minivan. I chose not to watch them lift/slide/whatever it out of the van because that kind of thing totally stresses me out, especially when I am incapable of helping in any way (or even doing a nervous dance). Somehow they maneuvered the piano into our basement to its spot behind the couch. And just like that, we had a piano.

It’s not a fancy piano or a recognizable brand, and it probably should be tuned sometime soon, but it IS a real piano. I was slowly saving up for my dream beautiful Baldwin piano (like the one we had when I was growing up), but we were still a solid 3-4 years from having enough $$ for one of those. Now that we have this little piano, I’m kind of tempted to reallocate what little had accumulated in the piano fund elsewhere, like to have our current piano tuned. Because when you’re no expert, a piano is a piano. As long as it’s in tune.

Having a real piano in my own private home has inspired me to play the piano often. Since we got the piano, I have been playing it 5 or 6 times per week! Laaa!  What’s really surprising is how much fun I’m having with it. I must be an adult. I never really enjoyed playing piano when I was younger. It was just something I had to survive. But now I’m finding such satisfaction from playing our “new” piano. The nice thing about never excelling in my past piano playing is that I am at about the same skill level now as I was 10 years ago, ha ha. The only way to go is up!

I have a very modest music library including a hymnbook, a mini Primary songbook (hard to read those teeny notes), The Man from Snowy River book, and a book of simple kid songs (love that one). To supplement this slim library, I ordered the Piano Guys’ new songbook as well as a Les Miserables piano book from trusty Amazon.com last week. The latter is a comfortable challenge and the former is WAY out of my league, but still fun to attempt. When I sit down to play, I just pick up whatever music I’m in the mood for and go with it. I’m not actually practicing much, just playing and stumbling along for fun. It’s bound to help some eventually, right? Rose loves to sit and listen to my hesitant plunking. She says “Mommy, this song is bootiful,” even to a messy rendition of The Wheels on the Bus.

I’m still working on the decor for that giant wall. [Any ideas?] 

On Sunday nights, Jeff has started his very own sing-along. He stands behind me and sings hymns and kids songs at whatever pathetic or choppy pace I set. Often he sings the same note over and over or holds it long while I fumble around to find the next chord. My favorite so far was his rendition of Skip to My Lou—he pulled out his faux-opera voice for that one and sang it long, warbly, and slow to match my unpracticed tempo. It’s even harder for me to play when I’m LAUGHING MY HEAD OFF! It’s so much fun.

 

We have a real piano!

That’s the story, morning glory.