update

It seems like a good time to write a blog never comes these days. I'll explain more about why in a bit, but here's some of what's been going on the last week or so.

Last Monday, Joe defended his thesis. Yes, it is a bit early in the school year for doing something like that, but I told him (and he agreed) it really ought to be done before the baby comes in February. So he badgered his professor into moving along with the project all summer and into the fall, and a week and a day ago he passed his defence! Now all he has left for his master's degree is the classwork from this semester and next. Of course we found out that he only has two real classes next semester-6 of his 13 credit hours will be research/thesis work, which will give him some time to get going on his dissertation stuff as well as help out with baby Rachel some.

Tuesday and Wednesday mornings I went visiting teaching. I have another new companion, and this one actually returns phone calls. So far we get along well together, but I figured we would when I first called her cell phone and realized it had an 801 area code. There are just so many nice people in that area code ;) (okay, so there are plenty of wierd people too...but let's not focus on that). Anyway, I find that the longer I'm a stay-at-home mom, the more I enjoy going visiting teaching, and having my visiting teachers come as well (which they did yesterday; I also have one new visiting teacher just in from Idaho Falls... but I'm not sure what area code that is). Karen also enjoyed our visits, since all but one of our sisters to visit has little kids, and the exception has a cute little pug dog. However, Karen seems to have shared with the kids a little too much and by Tuesday night had a bit of a sniffle...

This weekend was really awesome. We had stake conference, which is usually just a nice break from the regular church meetings. However, we got a new stake presidency, which was a big deal to most of the people who have lived in the area a long time. To make the change, church headquarters sent out the 'big guns' (in the best sense of the term), and Elder Bednar was the presiding authority at the conference. It was really cool to hear him speak both Saturday night and Sunday morning. He was definitely more personable in person than as the talking head from General Conference. One note of interest about Elder Bednar is that he is a doctor of Organizational Science-the same thing that Joe's studying. It was really wierd to hear him talk a little bit about that, since it's the same kind of things I hear from Joe almost every day when he comes home from school. Hopefully Joe becomes a successful professor like Elder Bednar, but I don't expect or want him to be a university president or an apostle, so I hope the similarities don't go too far... Anyway, back to stake conference: Joe and I both sang in the choir, which meant we had to be up on the stand the whole time...with a 1-year-old we didn't know how it was going to work-until our friends volunteerd to take her during the meeting. We got there really early and saved a bench seat for them, and then watched Karen play and eat apple slices and cheese for the two hour meeting. She was really good, and it was nice to be able to listen to the meeting and not worry about Karen being too loud or obnoxious.

Also for this past week I've been transcribing some interviews that Joe had to do for his qualitative methods class. I think he's really supposed to be doing it himself, but with his thesis work and getting ready to go to Michigan for a conference he hasn't had the time and it needs to be done soon. Hence I've spent most of my computer time typing, and it hasn't been nearly as enjoyable as writing a post for my blog, but sometimes that happens.

Last note for the week. Karen's cold that she caught from someone last Tuesday has been getting steadily worse. I was going to take her to the doctor yesterday, but she seemed so much better yesterday morning that I didn't. Well, I should have because all she did yesterday afternoon was lay on the floor and watch PBS-not her normal active self. And this morning before we went to the doctor she could hardly walk because the fluid in her ears is messing with her balance. So, note to self: if Karen gets a bad cold again, take her to the doctor before she can't stand up by herself. I'm sure after a couple of days the antibiotics will have helped enough that she'll walk just fine again, but I feel like a lousy mom right now... At least I figured out the answer to one of the questions: when do you take a sick kid to the doctor? before they're too disoriented to walk.

What is it?

It seems like every time you announce that you have something new, or are going to be getting something new, every person you tell wants to know all about it. You mention in passing "we're thinking about getting a new car-maybe a minivan" and all of a sudden there are swarms of people around you, asking what kind, when is it coming, what color do you want, will you get the cool roll-down back windows...and on and on. Then if you go to a dealership to actually test-drive or try to buy any kind of said minivan, the sales person automatically assumes that you 'need' the most expensive one on the lot and won't show you anything else. (and then when you say you won't buy said expensive vehicle, they get extremely angry.) If you can't tell, we did have an experience like this a couple weeks ago at a Honda dealership. While we liked the all-leather, rolling windows, and all the other neat features, we didn't want the 7-year loan they were trying to force on us, or the $400/month car payment ("I'm sure there's enough wiggle-room in your budget for this kind of payment") for a 2-yr-old Odyssey that didn't actually drive that well. The sales guy started yelling at us when we said no politely. So we said it again, a little less politely. He got so mad that he kinda stormed off and his boss came and tried to get us to buy it. We were getting angry and Karen was a pill, but we tried to be polite as the next guy started yelling at us to buy the dang van. We still haven't picked up a second vehicle...but when we do it won't be from that place.

Another time people ask 'what is it?' is when you're carrying a shopping bag. It might have dirty dishtowels in it, but people still have to ask. Our friend and Home Teacher Justin went to BYU on a recruiting trip for work a couple weeks ago. He bought us a couple of 'fully invested' shirts, so we can fit in with the home crowd even though we're 2000 miles from 'home'. Well, he gave them to me in a BYU Bookstore bag in the middle of church, which was just fine with me. I pulled one out to look at it up close (which is different from staring at it on a computer screen, let me tell you), and right after I put it away several BYU alumni saw the bag and came running (okay, not quite) to ask, what's in the bag.

The last and sometimes most annoying time that you are always being asked 'what is it?' is when you announce a pregnancy. As soon as someone knows you're expecting, the first words out of their mouth are "what is it?" For those of us who have uncooperative children from conception onward, it can be a difficult question to answer. You may have two or three ultrasounds before you can actually tell what gender the child is. For my first 20 weeks this time, and nearly 35 weeks with Karen, the answer to 'what is it' was 'a child'. Not knowing the gender of your child-to-be can be really annoying, especially the farther along you get, and most people don't consider that if you knew the gender you would tell it when you tell them you're expecting. However, I don't have to answer 'a child' to this question anymore (at least in this pregnancy). Yesterday at the doctor we got the results from our ultrasound, which also stated the gender was still unknown. So, the nice doctor asked if we would like to wait a couple minutes and see if we could tell the gender. Of course we did, and it took all of about 10 seconds with the machine to be able to tell... that this baby is definitely a girl. She's a lot bigger than she was at the last ultrasound, too. So, now when people ask 'what is it', I can say 'it's Rachel Kay Allen' instead of just 'a child'. Yes, we already decided on the name over a month ago. Sorry to all the other Rachels out there, but my baby Rachel is the cutest one ever-and she's not even born yet.

How do you know?

That's a question I find myself asking a lot lately. How do you know what you're supposed to feed your kid? How do you know when to feed them? How do you know how much to feed them? How do you know when bedtime is? How do you know when you should potty train? How do you know when you should punish or not? How do you know when you should change from a crib to a bed? How do you know when they're ready to play at the park? How do you know which diapers are better? How do you know when all the sales are so you can get cheap clothes? How do you know if the kid is ready for nursery? The list of questions sometimes seems endless. And the answer seems to be nearly the same for every question, and it comes in two parts. You either get a) 'Every child is different, so you never really know,' b) 'She'll tell you when she's ready', or c) 'All you can do is try different things until you figure it out.' So, this last week or so we've been trying different things with Karen to see if we can figure out if what we're doing is the best or if there is a 'better' way. Here are a few examples:

We have lots of books in our apartment, 3 bookcases full, and one about halfway there (mostly with Karen's books on it). Karen knows that pulling mom and dad's books off the shelf is bad, but it usually gets her some attention. So, whenever I get busy with something (playing the piano, doing the dishes, taking a shower...) she would pull the books off the shelf so I would notice her. Redirecting her attention had worked, but it wasn't cutting it any more. So I decided that every time she pulled a book off the shelf she would have time out in her crib, since there is nothing to play with in there. I started this on Thursday last week, and it was a horrible day. Karen was in time out at least 6 or 7 times (for about 2 minutes each time). I didn't think I could keep doing this, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to try it for a couple more days. Friday we only did time out 4 times, and she has not been in time out at all since Sunday morning. It's been nice not to have to pick up books all day long. I guess in that case it was okay to punish, and be really consistent about it.

Another thing we've been working on is changing to a 'big' (twin size) bed from the crib. We only have the top bunk of our bunk beds set up, with rails to keep her from falling but a space where she can get out. At first I only put her there when she was already asleep (usually around lunch/nap time when we were somewhere in the car for too long). One afternoon I put her down and she just got out of bed and tried to sneak to her toys...So she went in her crib. Last night we put her down for the night fully concious in the big bed. She went to sleep! It was amazing! However we went to check on her before we went to bed and she was sitting up, aware that this was not her normal bed. So, we put her back in the crib...but I still see it as a triumph. She lasted almost 4 hours. Maybe by the time we have this next kid she'll be able to go the whole night!?

As a last example, we've been getting ready to go into nursery. Karen is now a very large 16 months old, but has recently been dealing with a bit of separation anxiety. She wants to play with the other little kids, but she wants mommy to be right there the whole time. I've tried leaving her in different nursery classes (like for Enrichment night, etc.) but it hasn't worked out... until this morning. Tuesday mornings I have my 'Let's talk about it' class at the church, where moms come and talk about stuff; anything from laundry and shoe issues to who wears the pants in the family and is that how it should be. Today, for the first time ever Karen went into the nursery and started playing with the toys. I told the lady watching the kids that I'd take her if she had any problems because she's not used to it. But she was just fine. After an hour and a half she came walking down the hall holding hands with the other kids, having a grand old time and didn't even notice me until I called her name. It was a great feeling.

Well, it seems like I've figured out the answers to a couple of questions, at least for now. If you want, I can give you the answers. They're at the end of the first paragraph. If I ever find any better answers, I'll let you know. Here are some other 'firsts' that Karen's had the last month or so.

Karen's first time at the playground; she's much more self-sufficient there now; we just have to make sure she doesn't slide head-first.

the first day as a superhero; Super Karen is wearing the oh-so-stylin dish towel, and reading the Book of Mormon. I'm making her a cape as part of a Halloween costume...

Karen's first time putting olives on all her fingers; when I started taking the picture they were all on, but they didn't last.