Vision Therapy Update

I am still in vision therapy, it's almost been a year.  I am making lots of progress and am even experiencing stereopsis from time to time in real life.  Snow, clouds, and trees have been some of favorite discoveries.

Eloise was complaining about reading and wasn't really progressing and said a few things that made me think that she might have some vision problems.  Her teacher said that she was struggling to see the board and complained about her vision.  We decided to take her into see Dr. Dan and make sure she didn't have any vision issues.  

She checked out pretty well but has one eye that isn't quite as good as the other so she ended up getting glasses with a small prescription.  We've been working extra hard on reading and she is taking off and has started reading chapter books.  Ivy and Bean have been her favorites!

Sunrise Spirit Week

For spirit week at the girls' school they had different fun things to do each day.  It was a Dr. Seuss theme.  One of the days was "thing 1 and thing 2" and they were supposed to dress up as twins with a friend.  Eloise was twins with Miley Newell, but they were gone before I could get a picture.  Adeline was twins with a girl named Jada.  We kept it pretty simple and the girls were excited to be opposites of each other.

Everly was excited and insisted on a "big blue bow" to be part of it too.  She picked out the flower shirt because it matched Adeline.  haha. I wonder if she is color blind...

They also had a crazy hair day.  Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of Addy's hair, but it was similar to Eloise.  A braid on one side, and straight down on the other with lots of bows.

Sometimes we ignore spirit week all together, but Eloise kept us right on track and reminded me multiple times about each day and what we were doing for the day.  She certainly keeps me on my toes!

Midnight Snowhoe Shenanigans

It's good to have crazy friends, right???  Our friends, the Ivins invited us on a Valentines date that won't soon be forgotten.  First, we went and ate out at a Chinese restaurant (barf, I do not like that food!) and then we went up to Kelly's Canyon and Jeremy took us on a snowshoeing hike.  There was a full moon, which is why we waited until it was dark outside to leave. We had headlamps, but didn't really need them because the moon made it SO incredibly bright outside.  It was definitely a workout hiking up those steep hills, but it was an amazing view at the top.  We could see Rexburg, Rigby and Idaho Falls all from the top of the hill.  

We laughed so hard, tried to scare each other, tripped and fell down the steep slopes, and even tried racing-which ended in each of us crashing face first into the snow.  It was so much fun!  I'm so grateful we have such awesome friends that take us out of our comfort zones!

Donut Party

One of our favorite things to do on a Sunday afternoon is make donuts.  Sometimes we put them on plates and run them around to the neighbors, but we decided to have the Ivins and Davis's over on this particular day.  We made a maple glaze and ate and ate and ate until we were sick.  It was so fun and so delicious!

Mom's Weekend Away

I was spoiled with a few nights away from my responsibilities and it was so much fun!  I left Thursday night and on Friday I got to spend the day with Whitney at an all day Jody Moore event.   She is a life coach and teaches the most amazing tools for helping people be happy in life.  I learned so much and enjoyed and soaked up every second.  

Then I headed back to Julie's house and we had a girls night out.  We got yummy salads and snuck them into the movie theater where we chatted and laughed way too much.  The lady behind us shushed us about 10 times during the commercials before Little Women even started, which made us laugh even harder, then she would shush more.

It was an amazing day, I feel like I am the luckiest girl in the world to have such amazing built-in best friends.  I always say that God chose my best friends for me when he made them my siblings, he has AMAZING taste.

The next morning we all went out to Peggy Ann's for breakfast for Julie's birthday and I loved it.  We talked all about Jody's event and the things she taught us and it was just the cherry on top for a perfect weekend.  I headed home Saturday and found a house full of very happy people who managed just fine without me for a few days.  Maybe we all needed a break from each other.

Addy's first Black Eye

Our back porch was covered in a sheet of ice and once it started warming up I decided to go out and try to break it up so that we would stop slipping so much.  Addy decided to come out and help me and it was all fun and games until she hit herself in the eye with the metal bar.  Poor girl! I was scared to death that she was going to be blind, but luckily she just got swollen and bruised for a couple days.  

Everly Update

 Everly is a darling and has us all smitten with her.  She talks non stop and has a huge vocabulary for being only 2 years old!  She has taken her spot as the youngest child and screams and hits until she gets what she wants.  We are working hard to break that habit!  She also falls asleep in random places when we miss nap time.  We all love catching a snuggle with Everly!

Everly LOVES to color and draw and asks to get out the markers every day.  The other girls are just getting into coloring now so this is all new to me.  Now I understand what other moms mean when they talk about their little girls sitting and coloring for hours.  Unfortunately, Everly chooses to use her face, clothes, tables, walls and couches as her canvas from time to time.  

She will sit and play with Jenny's World for hours on her own and has the cutest little imagination!

We are currently working on potty training Everly and it is going OK.  It has been 10 days and today wasn't great.  She still has accidents and is so scared to poop on the toilet.  We are trying all sorts of things to get her excited about it.  Bubble parties worked for a few days, when that got old we gave her little jewels from our "Love Letter" game and told her they had special powers to help her poop.  Now every time she sits down she asks for her special powers.  They do not have any affect on her ability to do a #2 though.  Dang.  Today I tried yelling at her and shaming her after she pooped in her panties.  Shockingly, it backfired and she started peeing her pants as well and pooped her pants again later.  Will it ever end???!?!  I really hope so.  I can imagine that Everly will one day read this and at that point, if she is still pooping her pants, I will have to promptly sell her to the zoo.