Beware the Ides of March, Whoops........I peeked, and got caught!!

Ahhh.....Sundays! The day termed "The Day of rest". I am becoming increasingly convinced that this name has been given in hopes of the impossible, not in an actual expectation.

Beware the Ides of March, as the saying goes. Today was one of those Sundays that most definitely did not involve resting, for even a moment. This morning we had our bi-annual youth leadership meeting from 9-12am at a member's house. These events are a big deal with all of the bishopric, adult youth leaders, and the quorum and class presidencies in attendance. We serve breakfast and meet to plan the next 6 months worth of activities and give training to the youth. It is important and necessary, but I tell you spending 6 hours at "church" in one day is about as restful as running uphill! Our church is as 2pm, so normally sleeping in a little on Sunday is perfectly allowable. Today I was up a 7am finishing up preparing my Sunday lesson for the Mia Maids before I had to go to the training/planning meeting. It wouldn't have been so bad if I weren't such an overachiever and decided to make these lovely handmade mirror notebooks for all my girls, in correlation with my lesson. But, alas.... as Joe likes to say "I make work for myself".

Aren't they SO cute though??!
(these are the extras)

They went with the quote printed inside, that said:

"Happiness does not depend on what happens outside of you but on what happens inside of you"

They are gratitude journals to help them remember why they should be happy!

After the correlation meeting I quickly ran home to finish up the lesson prep, help the kids get ready, eat lunch, pack the car/bags etc. Then straight to church, without one chance to sit down. It was quite exhausting, fortunately I have an awesome husband who totally took over with the kids and got them dressed and fed for me!

Sacrament meeting is always interesting with four boys on a tiny pew. We always sit in the same spot, right behind the Aaronic Priesthood boys, and the same older couple usually sits right behind us. It is nice having tradition, right? Today all the boys decided that they wanted to be with me. It was about 10 minutes into sacrament meeting when I turned to Joe and said (eyeing his very empty side of the pew) "I am getting claustrophobic!!" He smiled sheepishly, and said "that's what you get for being loved!" What-- ever! They are just used to having me all day, and today I had been gone all day, so now it was payback time!!! I had two boys sitting on my lap, one leaning into me and the other resting his arm on my shoulders. I felt like a boy magnet! They were all stuck to me. Ansel kept grabbing my hand and putting it on his back for me to draw on his back, I was feeding Kaelan pieces of apple with the other (as he hugged me tightly around the neck) and also helping Calder with his quiet activity, meanwhile Levi just seemed to need to touch me.


Here is a typical 5 minute snatch of sacrament time with the Severson boys:

"Ansel, sit still.... remember your feet's job."
"what is it?"
"To stay still and not tap dance on the pew in front of us!"
"Mo-oommm!"
Kaelan comes over and dumps out all of the colored pencils and quickly wipes them off the pew onto the floor.
Mom hisses "Quickly, Levi! Help pick those up!"
Mom grabs Kaelan and tried to interest him in more apple pieces. No can do. He squeals, twists away from me and stands up.
"Shhh, KK" I whisper.
Kaelan promptly turns to the family behind us and puts his fingers to his mouth and says "SHHHHH!!" to them. All the family's children start giggling at this.
I grab one of the pencils Levi is cleaning up and plop it into Kaelans hand, directing it to a piece of paper. We draw a smiley face together and the lead breaks. The boys all laugh at that.
Meanwhile Ansel decides to be the feet "police". (After all mom just reprimanded him for putting his feet up.)
Ansel: "Calder!" " Put your feet DOWN" (said while slapping Calder's upraised feet)
"Ansel! That is mom's job, not yours!" I say, exasperated!
"But , MO-OM.... I am hungry!!" He says this while mournfully eyeing KK's apple pieces, as if there is some relationship between hunger and bossing Calder around!
"Those are not for you Ansel, you just ate and you are a big boy!"
Ansel whines, "I am STARVING!!! I haven't eaten for a million years!!" (Typical Ansel exaggeration....said with desperate conviction!)

"thunk, thunk, crackle, rustle, bang" ..... I turn to find Levi tossing and catching, then sitting on top of one of Kaelan's "I spy" bean bags.
"Levi!!!!" I hiss....."What ARE you doing?! Sit, still! You know better!!"
"oh, sorry mom!" Levi says, chagrined.

All the while dad is sitting on HIS side of the pew with his head down, oblivious to the struggle going on around him. Until, finally mom says "Joe! A little help here, which do you want?"

What would your guess be? What would a typical dad choose as his job??......

Taking the littlest one out of course!! Who ever said that dad's aren't sly?!!! Where does he go? To the nursery of course.... Kaelan gets to play, dad gets to relax, and mom gets to carry on with 3, instead of 4. Big Change.... Haha!


The next two hours, even teaching, is such blessed relief. Free babysitting, while you get to be spiritually uplifted...or spiritually uplift, what could be better?

How about not putting windows on the nursery room doors?!?!?!! How many of you parents out there can resist the temptation for a casual peek into the room where your little one is supposed to be playing happily?(you hope). If you are one, well then... good for you. I am not. I am just too curious, I guess. I want to see him in action, without me around. My glances are usually quick and sneaky, and are always on the way to my 3rd hour Mia Maid class, since I have to walk right past there.
Today was no different... except that this time he happened to be looking AT the window when I walked by! He saw me, his eyes lit up and he jumped off his leader's lap and ran to the door! CRAP! He thought that nursery was all done, I could see it in his little face. Sighing, I opened up the door, accepting my fate. I was going to have to bring him to Mia Maids with me now, there was no getting around it. The other option would be worse.... a huge setback in nursery transitioning. We can't have that, not since he just started being okay with the whole idea (finally!). I pick him up, apologize to the leaders for my stupidity, and sulk down the hall to my class, to teach a lesson on Finding Joy in the NOW.

As I walked down the hall, with my little happy daudling KK, the most pressing question on my mind was, "Who really needs this lesson more... Me... or my girls?"

I guess I don't really need to answer that.....