Caden's 6th Birthday Party

For Caden's 6th birthday he had a Super Hero party. We started with the kids decorating their own super hero masks (from walmart) and power bracelets (strips of foam from walmart) with stickers. They also got capes which I made out of those cheap thin plastic table cloths from walmart. Then they played Save the Citizen: we blew up a whole package of balloons (from walmart, of course. That's all we have in Rolla!) ahead of time and put them into an area we kind of coralled off with furniture. The blue ones were citizens, which needed to be put outside of the area. The green ones were kryponite, which they had to avoid because of course it would sap their powers and possibly kill them. The rest of the colors were super villains, which they had to beat up and destroy by punching, kicking, and then finally popping. The older kids helped by holding onto the 3-6 year olds so they wouldn't kill themselves trying to kill the villains. (Picture a 5 year old jumping with both feet onto a filled balloon. Definate possibility of bonkage there.)
Then they each got a supply of super spidey-web (can of silly string). Posted around outside were pictures of super villains which they had to Get with their webs. We also played rescue the kitten from the tree. Everyone wanted several turns climbing the tree to rescue the pink stuffed kitten. Also, Judd took them into the field behind the house and let them help launch a rocket, which had nothing to do with super heros but everyone thought it was cool. It went a couple of hundred feet high and came down on a parachute. The third time it got lost in a tree. Oh, well. A couple of the little girls who came told their moms, "It was actually fun!" (They apparently weren't really planning on enjoying a super hero party!)

The Promised Land

We had the sister missionaries over for dinner tonight. They told us that a few weeks ago our Mission President, President Seal, got a phone call from Neil L. Anderson, who used to be over our area before he got called to the 12. He said, "President Seal, the 1st Presidency would like to send you 14 more missionaries." That's huge! He said, "Would you like to know why? The 1st Presidency and the Quorum of the 12 have been thinking and praying a lot about your mission lately, and they feel like you will need 14 additional missionaries to be prepared for the number of baptisms that will happen in your mission in the next year."

WOW.

I got a chill. That means that there are a lot of people already prepared and waiting for us to find them. This is so exciting to me to be here for this! Before the sisters came for dinner they knocked a few doors in our neighborhood, and a man around the corner invited them to come back and teach him more! So when they go they will bring us with them to help teach. Apparently they're beginning a new program where instead of having the member just bear their testimony, the member actually teaches a principle. So we have been challenged to study the first lesson from Preach My Gospel so we can be prepared to help teach! There are at least a handful of families we know who we feel like we need to friendship and introduce to the church. I'll keep you posted on what happens from here. It's exciting and humbling to be living in the last days, isn't it?

Caden's Vacation

A couple of weeks ago Judd took Caden to a hotel in town for a night. (He had promised to take him camping but the weekend came and he hadn't had time to find all the camping stuff, so...) That night, while they were at the hotel, Caden called my cell phone and asked, "What time is it there?" (He always used to ask Judd that when Judd traveled for CE courses or work!) Apparently he thought since he was at a hotel that he was really far away! Then the next morning I was at the store and he called me again to say, "MOM! GUESS WHAT! WE'RE HOME!!!!!" I guess overnight is a really long time when you're 5! What a cutiepie.

More Caden

Last night after saying his prayer: "I don't really like kneeling. It painfuls up my knees."

(A few minutes later Joryn came in coughing and wanted to kiss Judd good night. He turned his head away and said something like, "Don't kiss me. It sickens up the money-maker.")

A follow-up on the mind-reading: After school he told me that he read three friends' minds at school. "Three of them wanted to tackle me outside, and one of them wanted me to chase him."

I asked, "Did they tackle you when you went outside?"

"No," he said thoughtfully. "I know they wanted to to, but they must have forgot."

When he said his prayer that night he thanked Heavenly Father that he learned how to read minds!

Snippets with Caden

Here are some pieces of conversations with Caden in the car yesterday:

As soon as he got in the car after school, he announced dramatically, "I have Bad News!"

"Uh-oh. What?"

"My MOUTH... (dramatic pause) is Half.-Way. Cut. Off!!!"

(Wow. How did I miss that?)

(I looked later and he has a new molar coming in, with a little flap of skin still over the top of it. That's what he was talking about.)

I asked, "So, your program is tomorrow, right?"

"Oh, yeah, and there's a war tomorrow."

(Not sure I'd heard right:) "What?"

Casually, "Oh, I have a battle tomorrow."

"With who?" (I know, bad grammar.)

"I dunno. We haven't decided yet. It's at seven p.m. At recess. A bunch of us are, like, battlebots."



He has been telling me for a while he wants to be a cop when he grows up. He asks very serious questions about his future profession, such as, "So, where do you get those cars with the blue and red lights?" (Worriedly, ) "How will I know when to pull people over?" "HOW will I get people to pull over?" "Where do you get those uniforms?"

A couple of weeks ago he decided he wanted to be an FBI guy instead. But then yesterday he broke the news: "I decided I don't want to be an FBI guy after all. I just, like, want to be a cop."

"Okay. Why?" I asked.

"Because I saw those two girls on that movie (I think he had seen part of Rush Hour 2 when the girls were watching it - on ClearPlay, of course!) and they didn't get to wear those cool uniforms OR drive the cars with the red and blue lights!"

Clairvoyant Caden

Conversation on the way to school today with my clairvoyant 5 year old: Caden said, "Mom, did you know I can look at someone and know what they're thinking?"

I turned off the radio. "No, I didn't know that. Tell me about it."

"Well, the first time I was throw-up sick when I was five years old, it just started. I could just, like, look really hard at someone and just, like, know what they were thinking."

"Interesting. Tell me about a time when you knew what someone was thinking."

"Well, like, Chance was standing there and I just knew she was going to fart. She was trying not to smile so I wouldn't know, but then she did it, and I said, 'I knew that was coming!'"

"Wow. Tell me about another time."

"Well, like, you know how Spencer won't let me use her bathroom?"

"Yes." (It's because he gets into all her stuff and she finds him covered with body glitter and lip gloss.)

"Well, the VERY FIRST time I asked her if I could use it, I KNEW she was going to say no!"

"Wow. Tell me another one."

"Well.... Like.... This is the last one."

"Okay."

Well, like, remember that time when Dad was burping a lot?"

(I don't.) "Okay."

"Well, like, I knew that was going to happen. And, I knew that he wasn't going to smile about it!"

"Interesting. Can you tell what your friends at school are thinking?"

"Yeah, pretty much everybody I can tell. But not all the time. Just sometimes." (We are pulling up to the school.) "You'd better ask me about this after school! You'd better not forget!"

Oh, I won't!

LAUNDRY

Brooklyn is helping Cade clean his room. She told him to go find a laundry basket in which to put his laundry pile. He left and returned carrying the laundry PILE from my closet. (I took our basket down to the laundry room yesterday and haven't returned it yet.) Brook said, "Cade, that's not a laundry basket. We need a basket." Caden answered, "Well, we can just put my laundry in this pile. We need a laundry pile." Brook: "No, we need a basket." Cade: "Well, this is LIKE a basket."

MINUS ONE DOG

We had to give Emmitt away. He shedded (is that a word?) too much to be an inside dog, if we let him out without chaining him up he wandered off eventually, and he Hated being chained up. He sat out there and cried all day. So I gave him to a family in our ward who has a little land, goats, chickens, and kids. Joryn and Brooklyn are very upset with me about it because the family's 11-yr-old boy is apparently quite brutal, which I didn't know until it was too late. So we pray that Heavenly Father will protect Emmitt from Tristan. Surely Heavenly Father won't let the best dog in the whole world be abused! And he really is the best, sweetest dog ever. From what Amanda, the mom, tells me, he is totally loving it out there. I sure hope so. Now our only pet is Lulu, who still insists on pooping in the mud room, and in the bedrooms if we forget to put the gate on the stairs. I hate that gate. Caden can't get over it. I can't carry laundry baskets up or down the stairs without moving it first. And it makes Judd grumpy, which is hard to do. Lulu is a year old now. Anybody want a naughty Maltese?

MEXICO

The view from our window:

I don't know what these are, but they were so pretty we had to take a picture!

I went with my friend Sonja Kofoed to Cancun for a week of "no one to take care of." It was a brand new hotel on Riviera Maya called Secrets Silver Sands. All-inclusive flight, hotel, food, tips... The catch was, we didn't know which 5-star hotel we would be at until we got to the airport. When we found out, I thought "This is the LAST one I would have chosen!" based on the pictures in our magazine. Because, it is totally modern decor, which is not my thing. However, although it wasn't cozy, it was spotless and peaceful, which was perfect. I would go there again. My favorite thing was doing yoga on the beach in the mornings. Everyone should be able to do yoga on the beach every morning! Because the resort is only 6 months old, the staff's English isn't perfect yet, which is fun. Sonja and I decided we would start saying "Ees a playshur" every time our children say thank you. (There was one guy who missed the "ees a playshur" class, instead blurting/growling out "SPLA-A-AYZH" at Sonja when she thanked him for her drink!) I also loved the kayaking - my first time! - and sailing.

What's growing inside YOU?

We are eating some amazing rolls baked by my friend Brooke, with various seeds throughout. Caden asked me, "What are all these little dots in my roll?" I said, "Seeds." He asked, "What will they grow?" I said absentmindedly, "Oh, I don't know." Then, back to answering the "what are these" question, I went on: "Poppy seeds, millet, sunflower seeds, oats..." He got Very excited, thinking I was answering the "what will they grow" question. "INSIDE ME??? COOL!" He then told me how a boy in his Kindergarten class who's not very smart ate an apple core. "And now he has an apple growing in his stomach!"

I'M SO CRAFTY :)

My friend Kari Young helped me make this cute craft. Okay, she actually did most of it. But I painted, picked out the paper, cut out the letters, and watched her do the rest!

BUGS

We have a minor bug infestation problem. Today Caden asked, "What's with all the ants and lady bugs? Yesterday Chance and I flushed four lady bugs down the toilet." He wandered away and I heard him murmer, "It was actually quite humiliating."

(No, he doesn't know what "humiliating" means.)