2013

It's a new year, and I'm not much for resolutions.  But lots of my facebook friends are, which has led me to consider in the quiet of the evening, if there is some word, some value, I want to focus on this year.  A family theme.  A personal mission.

And being far from perfect, there are words flying through my head.  Ideas on how to better myself this year.  But days like today, a day when my tiny terrorists have cornered me in my room with a box of chocolates and the lifetime channel, I find it hard to be motivated to pick a happy adjective.

But they are now all asleep, and I have emerged from my foxhole to pick up the house and assess the damage.  I see the freshly waxed floor now covered with crushed chalk.  The broken Christmas ornaments and the back broken off my nutcracker for the 3rd time in a month, and the indications that some picky preschooler has gotten into my chocolates, and found some he didn't like.

But then I see the labels my 5-year-old has put on all the doors.  She is so excited to be sounding out words.  And I realize that I need to be more grateful.  I need to embrace what I have, even on aggravating days like today when it's the end of Marshall's 48 and I'm just ready to go to work tomorrow.

Translation: Mom and Dad's Room, Garage, Basement

And you know what?  This blog helps me to do that.  This blog is so chalk full of stories that my kids love to have me read to them, and I have missed a couple years worth now.  Stories that I can't remember anymore and I'm so sad I didn't document anywhere.  I mean, someday I will probably look back and laugh that Wes smashed chalk all over my kitchen less than a day after I waxed it.  So I'll take the pictures, and post them here.

And work on being a little more grateful this year.

Wonderland

So my Carly turned 5.

5!!!!

I can hardly believe it.

A month or so before her birthday, I asked her if she'd like a party (of course she did), and what kind of party she'd like.  She came back a few days later and informed me that she wanted an Alice party, because Alice in Wonderland is currently her favorite bedtime story.

For her party, my parents were able to come out and visit.  It was so nice to have them out to help.  We invited a bunch of Carly's friends and neighbors, and just about all of them came.  It was a lovely party.  Carly dressed up as Alice, of course.  I wore the Queen of Hearts crown, my mom was one of the Tweedles, Wes was the other, and my dad was the Mad Hatter.  Marshall even got into it and was the King of Hearts.

Wes, with Blaze.

The day of the party, it started raining, which made the umbrella vultures look quite fitting.

But it also meant that we couldn't play croquet on the lawn anymore, so these flamingo mallets had to come inside.  Quite sad after all the time and energy spent to paint them, and to make wickets out of 15 inch playing cards.

The other bad thing about the rain: the over crowding.  Since we could no longer use the yard, we were all shoved in to my kitchen.  It was tight, but I was assured no one minded.

We even had to break out the picnic table for extra seating, we had so many kids attend.

For drinks, we had pink lemonade.  Most of the kids really enjoyed pouring theirs from tea pots.

For lunch we served sandwiches and wraps, and watermelon.  Of course, we had "eat me" food picks.  And the watermelon was served balled from a watermelon tea pot.

For dessert, we had cupcakes.  Each cupcake had a white rose that had been painted half red.

For decorations, we hung placemat sized playing cards by the buffet, and garlands of playing cards from the sealing mixed in with paper lanterns and the like.

I also made some of the other birds from Alice in Wonderland.  The little hammer bird, 2 of the horn birds, and 6 of the pencil birds.  They were spread out on the tables and serving areas, but I didn't get any good pictures of them at the party.  Darn.  So you get to see them from the pictures I took while crafting.

I also framed a quote from Alice: "There'd be new birds; Lot of friendly "how-do-you-do" birds; Everyone would have a dozen blue birds; In that world of my own."

For party favors, I filled glass jars with pink lemonade mix, and put a "drink me" label on them, with mixing prep instructions.

For games, we had a pinata.  Funny story.  Carly and I worked on a pinata Cheshire Cat for days.  But ultimately the balloon we were using as our paper mache form collapsed, and the big round purple cat ended up looking like a wrinkled raisin.  So we used a store bought flower and added a face to make it look like one of the bully flowers from the movie.

But Carly was very specific about wanting her Cheshire Cat at the party, so my mom made this awesome cheshire cat out of cardboard and we used it for a game of "pin the tail."

When it came time to blow out the candles, she had to think real hard about her wish.

Wes approved of the cupcakes.

Calvin partied too.

Our big present to Carly (well, all the kids) this year was a playground.  Marshall spent the better part of 3 days turning this:

...into this:

Thank goodness my dad came and helped.  When we opened gifts, we opened the curtains to the backyard at the end, and Carly was super excited to see her playground.  We managed to build it and keep it secret from her the whole time.  Definitely a good surprise.

My parents' gift to the kids this year was this awesome teeter totter.  They are both in love with it.

It was a fun party for a special girl!!

Some missed holidays

For Thanksgiving, my parents came up and met baby Cal.  We mostly stayed in and relaxed, and snuggled the new babe.  

My dad also gave some horsey rides.  

Marshall worked on homework, while I set up the Christmas decorations. 

 For Thanksgiving dinner, Carly demanded a turkey leg, and Wes wasn't feeling the Holiday spirit, so he only wanted cereal.  I didn't think it was worth the fight.  I just wanted to add the disclaimer that I didn't offer Cap'n'Crunch as an actual Thanksgiving side dish.

I didn't manage to take ANY pictures of Christmas this year.  Bummer.  I'm lame.  Marshall had to work Christmas day, so we had  Christmas on Christmas Eve.  It was the first year we haven't traveled over the Holidays, which is probably a good thing based on our track record.  We just hung out with our own little family, and were preoccupied waiting to hear back about the house.

Easter was our first holiday we spent in our new home.

We took some Easter Morning pictures by the flowers in the front yard.

Then we had our egg hunt in the back yard.  We dyed eggs the night before, but every store I went to was out of egg dye, so we just ended up using food coloring and vinegar.  It worked really well!

 It was nice to be started traditions in our home, and I look forward to many more holidays to come.

Mr. Firefighter

Salt Lake City's fire recruit academy was tough.  And that's putting it mildly.

When Marshall was hired, it was all contingent on passing their 14 week academy.  We knew it would be hard.  We knew it would take a lot time, involve a lot of stress, and be the major focus in our home.

But we had done hard things before.  I mean, when Marshall did paramedic school, he was told that it was too hard to do the course and to continue to work.  But we're the Andrews.  We eat hard things for breakfast.  So Marshall did full time paramedic school and (more than) full time work at the same time.  And he did them both well!

So when we went to SLC's little scare-you-all-to-death orientation, we left feeling like "Well maybe it's a big adjust for some people.  But we're the Andrews, and we're good at this sacrificing/time management/big stress stuff."

Holy cow.  Did we learn a lot about ourselves.

SLC's academy were the single hardest four months of my life.  It was harder in every way than we had imagined- physically, academically, the complete lack of time, stress, all of it.

Marshall not only had to do hard workouts- he had to do them until he was puking while still running.  He was injured one day- needing staples in his head- but finished his tower runs with blood running down his shirt first.  He lost a massive amount of weight.  He was sore in places he didn't even know he had muscles.

Academically, they had tests each week on the classroom and book work.  Anything under an 80 percent was a fail, and fail more than once and you were at risk of being cut from the class.  Marshall is very strong academically, and he had to study constantly.  Many nights were spent with me quizzing him on the fill in the blank sections- sections that had to be completed verbatim, even if the diction or grammar was poor as written by the instructor.

Marshall was rarely let out of academy early, and was more often kept late.  He'd get home close to 7pm, and then we'd have to wash, dry, and press all of his uniform for the next morning- in between spending a few minutes with the kids, getting the kids in bed, studying, eating, studying some more, and trying to unwind.  Every night there were boots to polish.

I quickly took on any role that Marshall absolutely didn't have to do.  Laundry? Me.  Ironing? Me. Boot polishing? Me.  Making breakfast and lunches? Me.  Yep, I got up with him every morning at 5am to make him breakfast, pack his lunch, and see him off.  I spent most of those 4 months scraping boot black from under my nails.  Did I mention that I continued to work my job, keep 2 children alive, and get mostly through growing the 3rd one?

And even with the perpetual quest for perfection, there were still areas that were criticized.  Boots not shiny enough.  Tiny strings hanging from a shirt or button.  An out-of-place wrinkle.

Guys were cut from the program.  Some quit, not able to handle the stress or treatment from the instructors.  Others fired for poor academic or physical performance.

I know what it feels like to be worried absolutely to the point of physical illness.  What it is like to stretch and reach and pray and do all that you can possibly do and still worry constantly that it's not enough.  To know that any day he could come home and say that it was his last.

But guess what?
He made it.

After 4 long months he was done.  I have never been more relieved, and more proud.

 

Graduation was 9/23/2011.  Marshall's family all came, and it was really special that they were able to come out and support him. 

My paramedic!

We got to tour the training tower and facility after the graduation ceremony. It was really cool to get to see all of the areas where he trained, and handle all of the equipment. 

Kiernan, of course, made him a fantastic cake!  The inside was made of Blue Mountain Dew- Marshall's favorite drink that he didn't get to have the whole time he was in academy.  

Now that it's all over- it was totally worth it.  We love Salt Lake City fire!  Marshall works with some really great guys, and he really loves the job.  He has a schedule you just can't beat.  He works for 48 hours straight, and then is home for 4 days in a row.  This will allow me to continue working in the job I love too!

And it's also really comforting to know that he was so well trained, and so were all the people around him.  I feel confident in his training and his safety because only the best finished academy.  Turns out some of the more crazy things they do in academy- like crawling through rolls of wire in the pitch black while wearing full gear- is pretty useful in the job place.  Just a couple weeks ago, Marshall had to jump a fence to put out a fire while wearing full gear and carrying a hose.

So now, for posterity, that has been recorded.
Up next: Our 3rd child has lived past the week of his birth, I promise!