Cabo Baby!

Jon and I have so been living the hard life this summer. Road trip after airplane trip after vacation... let me tell you, exhausting! It is so hard to be me sometimes... :)

Between all of the work/fun road trips we also fit in two very nice vacations. The first was a trip to Seaside, Oregon for the week before 4th of July. I have been very patiently waiting for pictures of our trip to surface on someone's blog so I can pretend I toted around a camera and captured a million memories... Don't judge me you've all done it. But, so far, the only posted pictures have been of the Baker family (who vacationed with us.) Don't get me wrong, all good looking people, but I was kinda hoping to steal pictures of my family.

Well, I guess beggars can't be choosers.

We were here too... somewhere off to the side finding our way to tide pools...

Don't the Baker's look like they are having so much fun? It's probably because their mom brought a camera & posted them online.

Ooh look! I'm related to people in this one! See, we were there I promise.

Seaside is the perfect place to slow down life a little, enjoy some sea breeze, catch up on reading and volleyball playing, and eat your weight in salt water taffy and fudge. Heaven!

We just got back from our final trip of the summer season, a little trip down to Cabo San Lucas.

Jon's parents are leaving for a mission this fall so they booked their timeshare down in Cabo for some nice bonding time before their long absence. Cara (Jon's sister) and her husband Ben tagged along for the ride. Scarlet and Rhode... not invited. (yay! Love you guys by the way)

I've mentioned this before, but I must mention it again because most my Earl relatives are still probably a little mystified by it... maybe even doubt its reality. Nielsens don't vacation like us. Where we value the number of books read, naps taken, and, most importantly, meals consumed, the Nielsens do a lot of... doing. Doing, going, seeing, being, moving... way more verbs than your typical Earl beach getaway.

We played tennis every morning for at least an hour and a half, sometimes closer to two and a half hours. And, even though we started bright and early, it was hot. Like Vegas hot but wetter. That was usually followed by a brief cleanup, snack from the kitchen, and then onto our adventure of the day. These included some fantastic snorkeling (we saw tons of eels, manta rays, and beautiful fish), body surfing, and a new adventure for me I like to call swiking.

What is swiking? I'm glad you asked.

Here is a picture of the Cabo coastline. Our resort was somewhere around the bottom of the picture.

There is a beautiful beach at the tip of the point called Lover's beach. Normal people (sadly I don't get to include myself in this category) take a glass bottom boat from their resort to the beach.

As the salesman is explaining this to us, Jon asks him if there is any other way to get there.

Javier jokingly said, "well you could sprout wings and fly... or swim!"

Curse you Javier.

That is the moment that Jon decided we would get to the beach on our own. We would hike across the lower rocks and beaches, the swim across the non-accessible parts. Thus, swiking.

We took off from the x on the right and made our way over to the left x.

It was definitely an adventure. The current was strong and most of the hiking was done barefooted. But we somehow made it all the way over to Lover's Beach.

The beach goes all the way through to the Pacific Ocean side where we hiked some more! Then, as is the problem with most adventures, we then had to swike back. At least being a Nielsen is keeping me in shape...

The evenings were a little more low key. We had some good food, were frequently tuned to the movie channel, read lots of my fantastic book recommendations, and even got to spend one evening on the Sunset Cruise. It's most affectionately known as the booze cruise because of its open bar, but that meant a never-ending supply of virgin pina coladas. Delicious.

We didn't have internet access anywhere in Cabo which means I never knew what was going on back home. That was a little more stressful than I thought it would be. Luckily, Kylie and my mom took care of everything and I came home to a clean, newly accessorized house and two very happy, well dressed children. (Gotta love grandmas!)

Kylie did a great job with the kids. If she got nothing else from the experience, I think I scared her away from any early marriages/pregnancies for awhile! I'll wrap this thing up with one of my favorite quotes made in my absence.

Kylie - Scarlet! It's time to clean your room!

Scarlet - (in a harsh, frustrated tone) KYLIE! I am ON the POTTY! You feed me all this food and it HAS to come out SOMETIME!

The Need to Read

Ok, need a little bit of help. I am in need of some good poolside literature. Any reading recomendations?

Katie Reese, Ashley Boice, Samantha Miller... I am looking at you. Not literally. But kinda literally.

Thanks!

Warning: You might hate me a little...

It all started Wednesday morning. Rhode had just woken up and was standing in the kitchen, waiting for breakfast. When, all of a sudden, he turned to me and said very clearly, "mama pee pee!"

I decided to humor him and stuck him on the potty. That is when I noticed his diaper was dry... and then I noticed the potty was suddenly full of pee.

What?

I praised him up and down the house and he got his own special potty treats (3 jelly beans) for being such a big boy. I left him bottomless for the time being.

He proceeded to pee in the potty all day long.

I really could not even believe it. His diaper was even dry post-nap and the following morning!

The next morning, I talked him into wearing a pair of underwear. He peed in them almost instantly.

So we stuck with the half-naked approach.

It has been the most insane thing. My 22 month old potty trained himself. If I could buy the kid a car, I just might do it.

We still need to master #2 and the whole covered bottom thing. Until then, thanks to dad, he gets to sport some sweet butt art.

See, I was right wasn't I? Hating me just a little bit?

Yeah... don't blame ya!

You Know You Are A Cheapskate When....

your daughter grabs the grocery ads from the mailbox, her eyes light up to the size of saucers and she screams, "mom! Fish is for sale!"

I glance down at the ad, "Um, Scarlet, that is chicken."

"Chicken?"

"Yes."

Eyes somehow get even bigger, "Mom, that means chicken is on sale... AND NOW WE CAN GET SOME!"

What followed can only be described as a happy dance.

Before you know it she will be couponing and walking immediately to the back of every clothing store. Gotta love the cheap at heart!

They Make Me Laugh...

I try to stop myself from just outright laughing at my kids and their craziness all day long. But almost every evening, as I relate my day to my very attentive husband (he usually laughs at the right moments at least) I have at least one thing to share that makes us both chuckle.

Here's a few of our more recent laughable moments:

1) Scarlet is now afraid of things. She has discovered the world of pretend and monsters. It is now a big deal if everyone heads upstairs and leaves her downstairs by herself because of the many creatures that just might get her. The invisible monstrosities usually include tigers, witches, and the occasional vague monster. But the other day, her imaginary fear was just too much.

Mom: Scarlet, go upstairs and go potty so you can get ready for bed.

Scarlet: (delaying in every possible manner)

Mom: (getting frustrated) Scarlet, you get upstairs right now threat threat, warning warning blah blah

Scarlet: But mom, if I go upstairs the giant is going to get me!

(What? I really couldn't help but respond..)

Mom: Scarlet, the only giant in the house is at the foot of the stairs telling you to go get it bed. And believe me, you do not want to make this giant more mad at you.

Seriously, my kid? Afraid of giants? Be careful about looking in the mirror in ten years babe.

2) I spent a long day at a dance event yesterday. Jon spent the afternoon with the kids and took them swimming. Then they came and picked me up. Jon loaded all my stuff while the kids ran wild in the lobby. Rhode was wearing only swim shorts, no shirt. He came up to me with wide eyes and said, "mama! Pee pee!" Not an uncommon thing. He likes to inform me when he is peeing in his diaper. He is not really interested in putting said pee in the potty... so anyway, I told him that was great.

A few minutes later, he said "mama! pee pee! shoe!" I looked down out of curiosity only to find a stream of liquid coming from his shorts, down his leg, and into his sandal. He wasn't wearing a diaper! Not even a swim one! I was very impressed with the verbal skills of one of the boys in my family.

3) Scarlet is a dress wearing fiend. She has taken the summer dress with leggings look and made it her one obsession. I used to think it was so odd when I would hear of girls who complained about wearing shorts and jeans. Now I have one. It's a dress or it's a battle.

a) Her first funny dressing quirk is her differencing between a skirt, a dress, and a long shirt. Dresses are the best, skirts are pretty good, and long shirts are only acceptable on rare occasions. How does she categorize them you may ask? Well. Skirts require finding a shirt to match them and mom doesn't have the same opinions on coordinating. Scarlet believes pink skirts match pink shirts... shade of pink or any other pattern matter little. On the days where daddy lets her dress herself, she usually looks really good.

The difference between a long shirt with leggings and a dress with leggings is quite simple in her mind. Dresses spin. Long shirts do not. If it doesn't spin, she is not really interested.

b) Now that she has determined her outfits of choice, Sundays have become a whole new day of battle. Why, you ask? Because we don't wear leggings with our Sunday dressed.

"But mom, my legs! They are so cold!"

In 110 degree weather?

"But mom, everyone will see my panties!"

Then stop sitting spread eagle in Sacrament meeting

"But mom, I just really like having my pants!"

It's a rough life kid.

4) Our best story of the month was actually in Moses Lake. We had a few hours to kill one day so Jon, Kristy, the kids and I packed up a picnic and took it out to the state park. Scarlet and Rhode spent about ten minutes on the play equipment before begging for food. I figured it was going to be a quick trip if they were already bored of the toys. We took them down to the lake shore for a quick look before we left. They were greeted by a very large, very dead, and very stinky fish to the far side of the wading area.

An hour later, we were still there. Why, you ask? Well, turns out my children, 50% are petrified of even the sight of the ocean, have no objections with green lake water and nearby rotting fish corpses.

No swim clothes, no towels, no clean clothes to change into. We were left with few options as to how to get our muddy, sandy, lake stinky kids home.

Ha ha, that one still makes me laugh.

Of course, everything seems a lot funnier after they have gone to bed. :)

*** ignore these repeat pictures. I can't get them off!!!

Car Trip Calendar Craziness

Oh, to be home again! I love to travel but at some point, it is just nice to sleep in your own bed, go to your own ward, and, above all else, it is really nice not be in the car anymore.

We have been doing more than our fair share of traveling over the past month or so. Here's a quick rundown of our adventures:

May 11-13 California

May 14-17 Utah

May 26-28 Utah

June 6-13 Washington

June 14-18 Utah

May 11-13 in California, getting a few projects done and getting in some serious beach time. We crashed our entire family on our friend's couch. It is amazing any of us lived through the experience. I give a lot of props to mom co-sleepers because there is nothing that brings me closer to losing it than having a three year old kick me in the face all night long.

We learned a few interesting things about the kids though. Turns out we are raising a big bunch of wusses. I don't know where we went wrong...

Rhode was TERRIFIED by the beach. Something about those waves washing up against the shore put him into an absolute panic. So he and I spent most of our time at the farthest point possible from the water's edge, trying to be distracted by digging sand holes and crunching dried up seaweed. Every now and again, he would still give the water his evil eye, made sure it knew what he thought about it. Shockingly, the water did not seem too perturbed by this.

Scarlet is not the biggest wimp in the world. She was a bit more daring but not by much. Of course I took absolutely no pictures of the trip at all and this is all I have to show from our trip.

Gotta love a great picture of someone else's kid. Heck, it's a better picture of the dog than of my kids.

May 14-17 (notice the one day between this and our last trip) in Utah staying with Jon's sister, Cara and family. Having them in Utah is really nice. Not that I don't love intruding in on my cousin's lives all the time (because I actually do love it) you always feel a little less of a burden when it's a sibling whose life you are disrupting. Not only did they let us crash at their house but they watched our kids a ton. It was awesome.

May 26-28 back in Utah and back at Ben and Cara's. They must really love us to see that much of us in that short amount of time. And they only kicked us out like one time! Ok, that didn't really happen.

***Funny side story****

When Jon and I were dating, he took me on a trip to Lake Powell with his family. Before we got there, he must have told me a million times, "Nielsen's help out, they aren't going to like you if you are being lazy and not being helpful." Thanks for the pep talk buddy.

So I spent the week in turbo helpful mode. Not only did I spend most of the day washing dishes and making meals but by the end of the weekend, every woman on the boat had two french braids courtesy of Kacey's hair styling skills. They loved me.

Not that I wouldn't have been helpful otherwise, I'm not that lazy, but Jon really got me in a frenzy. From then on, whenever we were staying with his family, I was like a cleaning machine the whole time trying to be helpful. I also totally love when someone has cleaned up for me so I try to spread the joy ya know?

Anyway, after five years of knowing me, Cara had never stayed at my house. But they were here for Thanksgiving. She then admits to me that for years she thought I was a total neat freak, just as clean and organized as possible. As she told me this, I could just imagine my mother's reaction to this. She would either faint with shock or be rolling on the floor with laughter. Her daughter, a neat freak? Hilarious. Well, a week at my house got her over that idea quickly.

*** Back to Crazy Calendar***

On June 6th (a week later) we flew from Las Vegas to Pasco and stayed a week with my family. It was recital weekend, graduation, and my dad's big annual golf tournament. Most of my family will find it funny that I mention it was graduation that weekend. All week, people asked, 'oh, are you guys in town for graduation?' because that was why all of their supportive relatives were there.

Nope, in fact of the 13 of us that were in town, only my mom went to watch Kylie graduate. I'm not sure I would have made an appearance towing the kids either way, but it was a no-brainer when I found out they were graduating on Lion's Field in the middle of the afternoon. Not awesome. So Rhode, Scarlet, Kristy, Trevor and I supported Kylie across the street at the aquatic center.

My kids love being at Grandma Peggy's house. And who can blame them? A TV screen that makes Dora the same size as Scarlet that would be turned on by any member of the family (except mom and dad that is, they stopped asking us after awhile). Snacks of all kinds within fingertip reach. And, if they were just a little out of the way, there was always some willing aunt in the kitchen ready to make their M&M wish come true.

It really hit the pinnacle, though, when we took a little trip to Walmart with Grandma Peggy and she went through the toy aisle, just haphazardly tossing shiny, noisy objects into the cart at will. My kids eyes were as big as saucers at the glory to behold.

"Mom!" I told her, "my kids do not know you can take the toys home from stores. They think they are just there for the occasional button pushing when mom is in a nice mood!"

"But I don't have enough toys at the house!" she replied, "they'll be fine."

Says the woman who lives four states away.

It is a true miracle we were even able to get our kids to leave.

We got back late Sunday night and I took off Monday for Utah once again. This time, sans the rest of the Nielsen family... and with the only car we own. So Jon and the kids spent four carless and momless days. It was quite the adventure.

I, on the other hand, had my own kind of adventure. This time, I stayed with Courtney in her BYU apartment. It was so surreal. Roommates, who's turn to empty the dishwasher, 10 p.m. is still early, talking about the most random things until finally someone stops talking and everyone instantly passes out. No kids, no car seats, no nap times, it was the craziest couple of days. I enjoyed it to its full potential.

At some point, Rhode figured out how to call me from the house phone. So every now and again, i would get a call from what I thought was Jon, but instead hear a very excited, "mama?!" He never had much to say other than that but he was pretty stoked his button pushing would work.

Now I am back home but not for long. Maybe with all of this traveling, this miserable Las Vegas summer will be over before we know it! It's already August right? No... only June?

It's not working.

Sewing Club Withstands the Test of Time... And other stuff

It's been awhile since I wrote down our Nielsen happenings. Here's the long version on what we've been up to.

Scarlet finished her first puzzle! With the help of dad. Puzzles would be so much better if they didn't come with so many pieces to clean up....

Mother's Day happened! Jon, being the truly sentimental type, bought me my favorite kind of cake and inscribed it with a heart-felt message.

Yes, that man of mine, always the romantic.

And according to the pictures on my computer, that is all we did. Our small car trips to Utah and California will have to wait until I can borrow some pictures from people who actually like their children enough to document their trips.

Ok, back to the main post topic.

I have a ton of good ideas of all the amazing things I should be doing to improve my life and the lives around me. Well, honestly, they are not all good ideas and 99.9% of them stop mid-thought and never see the light of day.

Sewing Club is a different story. The organization that began almost one year ago is still going strong every Thursday. Some of our members have come and gone. We've made many new friends along the way, but Sewing Club has officially become one of those great things I will look back on and just smile every time I remember all of the chaos and craftiness.

Everyone has kind of gotten in their own routine. It takes very little planning on my part anymore. Someone is almost always working on something, raiding the fabric closet, or taking the week off and just enjoying some girl chat time.

And, with that said, here is a sampling of some of my more recent creations.

I tackled one more mens-shirt-into-toddler-dress creation.

I have mostly been working on my mending. The pile of stuff that I kept meaning to fix was teetering precariously and I figured I should fix the things I have before I make new stuff. So, in the middle of all the button sewing and hem mending, I cut off two pairs of pants I wasn't using to make some summer wear.

Now what do you do with khaki and white leg bottoms? Why not make a skirt?

I have made this same skirt a couple of times with other fabrics and I love it. It is the easiest, so darn cute, and I love that they have a constant little poof to them.

I then tackled my most difficult project to date. Something for myself.

It started out as a wrap skirt but I just wasn't liking how it fit. It ended up involving two different patterns pasted together. It took way more effort that I am used to putting into things but I am pretty proud of it.

This picture not only give you a nice side shot of the dress but also proudly displays my Topsy Turvy tomato grower that is producing one very real tomato bush. No tomatoes yet, but one can dream!

And, this little ditty I finished just last Thursday. My baking buddy needed something to keep her dresses from getting messy.

I made aprons for my mom and sister, Kristy, around Christmastime. So, counting Scarlet's, that is three cute aprons made... and none of them were for me. One more apron may soon be in the works.

Hmm... might need to make that two aprons.

What mother could deny that face? The kid definitely knows what attire is required to score first dibs on the cookie dough spoon.

No decision yet on what is next in our sewing schedule, though rumors of wood working have been circulating... stay tuned.