the haystack: February Update from the Hays Family

It's a beautiful Sunday today. I'm sitting here on the very edge of the computer chair because Kitty is sleeping so peacefully on it that I don't want to move her. Bridgette is fading in and out of sleep, which means I run back and forth to put her pacifier back in and I've already nursed her twice in the three hours everyone has been gone and still no luck with sleep. She's entering that fussy phase where they are constantly tired and you're always trying to get them to sleep and they only sleep for short periods of time and you live in fear of the "over tired" because you know it will be a beast from 4-7pm.

But she is adorable. I've been going back and forth this week between feeling like nursing is going well and feeling like it's going terrible. Yesterday was terrible, today is going well again. I'll be heading to church in a few minutes for Liesel's Great to be Eight meeting at the church. It's crazy to think that she'll be getting baptized this year and while it's not for a while still, as Brian keeps telling me, "the year is already 1/12th over!" He can be kind of obsessed with the passage of time and frequently will tell me that he likes breaks or changes in the routine because it slows down time. Which is very true. Vacations always feel so long because they are so different that the every day stuff, you know? So what I'm saying is, her baptism will be her before we know it.

This was a very good week. The HIGHLIGHTS included:

-Getting over the nursing hump! It is still painful on one side, but I remember thinking with my other kids that it was still somewhat painful even at two months and I could still feel it at 9 months. BUT the zinging down my arm is at a 1 instead of an 8 and I don't dread nursing her every time like I did before. I love that she is opening her little fists more and looking up at me occasionally and I love her slumping peacefully on me once she's asleep. Bridgette is now officially accepted by all of the girls as part of the family. Felicity has been more interested in her this week, but due to the giant ropes of yellow snot hanging out of the nose 24/7, I've tried to keep her from rubbing Bridgette too much.

-Liesel's swim meet this week! Her first one in mid-december was slightly traumatizing. It was more intense, loud and intimidating than any of us were expecting (especially her) and she ended up crying half way down the lane and only swam in one other event after that. She cried a ton and felt very embarrassed. She was persuaded to not give up and try again, so she stuck it out until this last meet. And she did amazing! I was so proud of her. She competed in 4 events (free, breast stroke kick, dolphin kick, backstroke) and 2 fun events (paddle board relay, full team relay). She was especially impressive at the breast stroke kick-- she is the youngest member of the whole team and she competed with two other 9 year old and won! She was very good at dolphin kick and backstroke and her breathing on free has improved so much! She was really proud of herself. She had prayed frequently leading up to it that she wouldn't be too nervous and that her goggles wouldn't come off and her prayers were answered. The next day she got to attend the pool party and they had a huge blow up obstacle course set up and treats afterward.

-Hannah and I got to get outside quite a bit together this week. The weather was in the high 50s/low60s and it was so nice that we ended up playing outside almost every day. I took her to the BMX park and watched her ride and had to close my eyes sometimes because she was so daring!

-Another highlight this week was hiking behind the girls while they mountain biked a loop here on Friday after school and again yesterday. They are pretty darn good and Felicity even rode her strider on the whole thing! It's amazing what they'll do for a little box of nerds.

-Liesel started horseback riding lessons and hasn't stopped talking about it since. I got her 12 lessons for Christmas and her first one was Saturday. Brian went with her and said there was no waiver, no paperwork and they pretty much put her on the horse and said "go for it." She was trotting around by the end of the lesson. I told her not to expect to even get on the horse the first day except to walk around some, but I was wrong! She said she learned to turn left, right, back up, walk and trot. Hopefully she'll learn to catch and bridle the horse since that can be pretty hard and intimidating.

-Brian has been working super hard in his three weeks off. This week we moved the giant boulders/rocks we had as a small retaining wall in our backyard. He moved the ones he could and buried the others. Then he put in another part of the sprinkler system so we could have grass coming up to the big porch we put in last year. Now it will just slope nicely down from the porch with grass. It took him a few days to accomplish this because it was a ton of work. He did manage to get out and ski/summit a peak with a friend (see photo below) but then got the colds that the girls had and was sick this weekend. This break he also managed to fix our automatic van door (he replaced the motor), stained the fence around our property, do our taxes (with my business it gets kind of crazy!) and spend hours meeting with realtors and looking for land so we can possibly build a duplex or something.

-I was able to get out once and mountain bike with Leslie which felt great. I also got my first stretch of sleep longer than 2.5hrs-- it was 4 hours long! That also felt great.