Garden of Faith

During church I will often have Eden sit on my lap and I'll play with her arm pretending its a garden (planting seeds, sun, rain, etc.) It gets Eden to sit still during sacrament for a while.

A while back we had a lesson on faith and how its like a seed. For part of it we had her "pull out weeds" and name different things that could be weeds in our lives like disobedience and lying and not being nice to everyone.

Today I was doing the garden on her arm and in the middle she said, "Wait, we didn't weed the garden!" So, we weeded the garden and she named off "weeds" in our lives (she would say things like "not doing dishes...that's a mommy weed...not sharing...that's an Eden weed...").

After doing a vegetable garden and flower garden on her arm, Eden said that she wanted the next garden to be a garden of faith.

So, I planted a little garden of faith on her arm.

Going to the Doctor

Eden had a doctor's appointment today. She was very excited. But sad that she didn't need a shot. She was so intent on showing how brave she is.

But she is VERY excited to hear that she gets to have a flu shot.

Note: Story below is more of a bad-mommy-ism

During part of our visit the doctor was trying to be kid-friendly by using the stethoscope to hear her tummy.

Dr: "Oh, I bet that if I listen to your tummy, I could hear what you had for breakfast."

(I hid my head in shame....)

Dr: "Oh, was it...cereal?"

Eden: "No, it was PIE!"

Yes, we had pie for breakfast. Pie and eggs. I'm so ashamed.

Memorizing Books

Eden had just been put down to nap when I hear....

"CATASTROPHE! CALAMITY! A CONSIDERABLE SETBACK!"

I figured she wasn't really having an emergency. At least I wouldn't guess she would quote A Wish For Wings That Worked by Berkley Breathed if it were a real emergency. But I'm glad that book gave me a little chuckle when hearing my child quote it to delay going to sleep.

You Can Run But You Can't Hide

Eden is often grumpy when she wakes up.

Leila is ready to play...or eat...after she wakes up.

After nap Eden laid down on the floor with her blankie, a little grumpy and sensitive.

Leila ran up to her and jumped on her back ready to play.

Eden (whiny voice): "Mom! Leila's on top of me!"

Mom: "Maybe you should lay on the couch so she can't get you."

(Eden crawls to the couch and makes a fort of pillows)

Eden: "Now I'm safe from Leila!"

(Mom finishes some cleaning.)

(Leila grabs a kids chair)

(Leila takes the chair to the couch)

(Leila climbs up on the couch)

(Leila jumps on Eden)

Eden: "MOM!!!"

Good old Leila...

And here's a reenactment in picture form...

I wasn't able to reenact the beginning while Eden was on the floor. I also didn't get the very end with Leila pounces on Eden cause once Leila saw the camera she insisted on just looking at me innocently and smiling.

The Haircut

Stranger at the gas station: "Oh I love your cute hairstyle!"

Eden: "Its OK. It will grow back."

The Pack 'n Play

Eden and Leila's new favorite game is to climb inside of Leila's pack 'n play and play around together. They found out that if they get on the head of their giant, rocking caterpillar then they can tumble inside.

Eden's version of play: Pretend to be animals in a cage.

Leila's version of play: Sit and stand on Eden as much as possible.

Mr. Purple

Eden: "Mom, I'm going to marry Mr. Purple in the temple."

Eden loves the color purple so much that she wants her name to be Eden Finlinson Purple. Anyone meet someone with the last name Purple...let me know.

Salmonella

At the library I decided to get Eden a educational book. I lead her to the books about animals and asked her to pick one out. She decided said, "I don't want to learn about animals. I want to learn about this." She handed me a book on Salmonella. She wanted to learn about a disease over animals. Go figure.

Apparently she's been understanding the book.

Today's after dinner conversation.

Eden: "I think I'm sick. I have salmonella."

Mom: "How did you get salmonella?"

Eden: "I ate a raw egg. And you have salmonella."

Mom: "I do?"

Eden: "And dad has salmonella."

Mom: "Oh no, it must have been something I cooked."

Eden: "NO, it was something you DIDN'T cook."

She's got me there.

Backwards Undies

There is one pair of undies that Eden INSISTS on wearing backwards (even though it ends up giving her a wedgie). Today she put those undies on (backwards of course), came in, showed mom and dad, and said,

"I like my undies to be wedgies!"

Don't Cry

(Leila starts to cry.)

Eden (in a comforting voice): "Leila, don't cry. We live in the Plan of Happiness!"

Leila the Bear (& other noises and words she says)

My ward has an exercise group that gets together 2 times a week. The mom's exercise and they let the kids just run around the gym and play.

Eden, Leila, and another little boy discovered the storage under the shed for tables and chairs. They had climbed inside and I went over to make sure things were OK (and perhaps tell them not to play in there...I can't imagine that place is the safest and cleanest place in the world).

Mom: "Hey guys! What's going on?"

Eden: "Mom! There's a BEAR in here! RUN AWAY!"

(Eden and Roman run out.)

And there sad Leila....not running away from the bear.

Leila: "RAAAAAWR!!!"

Leila was the bear.

Leila loves animals and she does do the noises of a bear, dog, owl, cow, fish, leopard, lion, and whale.

Other than that, she doesn't say much else other than "mom", "dad", "nana" (for banana or other snack), "woah", "oooh", "that", "hi", "up", and "pop". But she does shake her head "yes" and "no" and can let us know plenty of what she's thinking with body language.

Fighting Viruses

I was sick a few days ago and I think Eden was getting tired of such a boring mother.

We explained that a virus was making me sick.

A little while later, Eden came inside the room wearing dad's hat, her pink backpack, and a stick she was holding like a gun.

"Mom! I'm going to kill the viruses!"

"PA-CHEW! PA-CHEW!"

Family Home Evening Song

Eden LOVES family home evening.

Last week we talked about the Plan of Salvation and she's been talking about it ever since.

This week we talked about the gospel and how to get to the Celestial Kingdom.

At the end of family home evening she said,

"I want to sing a song now."

Since it was technically still FHE time, we said, as long as it was a church song, it was OK.

Eden stood in front of everyone and sang (to the tune of "the more we work together")

"I'm going to the temple.

I'm going to the temple.

I'm going to the temple.

I'm going to marry a man

and go to the Celestial Kingdom.

And I'll be baptized and have faith."

It was a beautiful song.

Chores

I gave Eden some extra chores to do around the house for some money. She was very excited. I was just trying to get the place cleaned up. Eden would pick up one thing and before she put it away...decide she wanted to play for a while...so on and so forth.

After doing this a few times I said, "If you don't do your chores then I'm going to do them and you won't be able to earn money."

So, she picked something up and once again before putting it away she stopped to draw a picture.

I decided to just start doing her chores since mine were done.

She didn't notice I was doing her chores.

Eden: "OK! I'm done drawing! I'm doing chores!"

Mom: "Eden, I already did your chores."

Eden: "NOO!!!! I wanted to do them!"

Mom: "Sorry but I said if you didn't do them then I was going to."

(Eden start to cry and get a little hysterical)

Eden: "MOM!!! I REALLY AM GOING TO SELL YOU TO THE GYPSIES! I REALLY AM!"

(I'm trying not to laugh)

(Eden settles down and thinks a minute)

Eden: "Mom, I have a good idea. How about your write MORE chores down so I can do them."

Mom: "I'm sure there will be plenty of chores that will need to be done today."

And all day she keeps asking me to write a list of chores for her to do.

That was the first time I've heard her use the "I'm going to sell you the gypsies" comment where she was really serious. You could tell that she was serious....she wanted to sell me to the gypsies.

The Celestial Kingdom

Our last FHE we had a talk on the Plan of Salvation.

When general conference came on today, Eden heard, "The Celestial Kingdom" she responded,

"Mom!! That's where WE'RE going!"