I thought Sacrament Meeting was supposed to be a place to get away from it all...

From what? My kids fighting and making messes and crying? Not so much. I left in the middle of Sacrament Meeting crying today. Not because I was feeling the Spirit. Because I wanted to strangle Spencer. Really.

**WARNING**
This post is lengthy and I am on one right now! If you're not in the mood to hear me rant and rave, stop reading right now!! :)

Over the past month or so, Jack has become increasingly difficult in church. Church starts about the same time he usually goes down for his morning nap. He refuses to sleep anywhere other than a bed (it doesn't even need to be his bed, just a bed. My arms? Never.) So, tiredness combined with the fact that he now has an opinion and has a squeal to voice it with, it's really a stressful situation for all involved.

I told Austin as soon as we woke up this morning that we needed to adequately prepare the diaper bag with things that will keep him occupied. Snacks, sippy cups, a myriad of toys, whatever. And, I really didn't want to be late for the 115th week in a row. So, we get going this morning and are sticking right to schedule. Our entire family is ready for church by 9:30 (it starts at 10)! It's a miracle. I start packing the diaper bag and am having a renewed faith that church actually might be worth going to today. We can do this.

We get to church five minutes early and things are going great. However, Kamae is leading our family in and chooses the row four from the front, in which one of the most intimidating people to me is sitting on. I thought about relocating, but convinced myself to stay. I think to myself, "We're early. We're prepared. We can do this." We fill up the other half of the pew.

Sacrament Meeting begins and all is well until the Sacrament is being passed. The bread comes and goes and Jack flips out because he wants more. I had already armored Austin with a bag of snacks because I saw this coming. Jack was so riled up about it, however, that he wouldn't even pay attention to Austin's hand right in front of his face holding some more food. Austin has to shove it in his mouth and we're good.

Jack eventually wanders down towards me and I have my arsenal all ready to keep him busy and happy. I start hiding finger puppets under the stacking cups. He's loving it; I'm loving it. The aforementioned lady is kind enough to help entertain. Then he starts dropping the cups. They start rolling under the pews. Jack crawls to get them and hits his head. Whimper. He recovers quickly. Whew. This goes on for 10-15 minutes and I'm patting myself on the back for coming prepared, thinking to myself, "As long as I bring the necessary equipment, this isn't so bad!"

Then Jack decides he's done. Done with what, you might ask? Done with everything. He wants on my lap, he wants down, he wants his sipper cup, he wants to throw it, he wants the hymn book with the binding that's falling apart so he can further destroy, wants to drop that on Spencer's head, who's now laying on the floor. I see everything unraveling quickly, so I get Austin's attention (who is at the end of the pew...I'm smack dab in the middle) and tell him that Jack needs to leave. He quickly escorts him out, followed by Spencer.

Now, Spencer knows he's supposed to stay. But, he also knows that I am too far away to do anything about it. So, Spencer trails after Austin, which I'm sure Austin is unaware of until he gets to the foyer.

I realize that if I am going to get anything out of this meeting, now's the time. So, heaven forbid, I start paying attention. I glance over at the girls, one of which is laying down on the pew, kicking the other one gently, but just enough to be annoying. I get her to sit up, but I can't get them to leave each other alone...they are either playing or fighting or play fighting. I didn't care what they were doing, it was too loud.

Spencer comes back in, alone, with his arms folded. Then he starts trying to talk to me from the other end of the pew about a book. I can't understand him. I motion for him to come closer, but he just says it louder. Still don't know. I hold up three fingers and he comes towards me. I pull him onto my lap and ask him to whisper it into my ear. I can barely understand the boy when it is just he and I in a quiet room, let alone when I have girls next to me giggling and someone speaking into a microphone and he's whispering so close to my ear that there is condensation. I can't understand him still and he's getting so frustrated. He says he wants to go back out to Dad. I tell him no. He says he needs to go potty. I call his bluff. He starts throwing a fit. He's pushing my arms to get out of my grip. I am thinking of every threat I possibly can. Then I try a different angle. "Spencer, this is Jesus and Heavenly Father's house. We need to be very reverent and listen. Do you think they would be happy if you were hurting your mom?" No affect. I pull out a book and start looking at the pictures. I ask him to find the chicken. It works. Sheesh. Now find the cow. Now count all of the birds in the whole book. That's as far as we got. I had released my death grip by now because he was calmed down. He slithers away when I am again trying to get my girls to be quiet. He's now at the end of the pew and I am a good 8 feet away. He looks at me and I tell him to come back. He stands up and says, "I'm going to get Daddy." I mouth, "Sit down." He walks around so he's now standing in the aisle at the end of our pew. Three fingers are up now. Two fingers... I give him the death look. He starts to come back. I tell Paige to sit on the other side of me so I can grab him. She does and as I lounge over to grab his arm, he stands up. I am now practically laying on the bench and I slide over a little more for my second attempt. He stands in the aisle. I dive over Kamae to finally grab him and drag him back into our row. He starts crying really loudly because he says I've grabbed his arm too hard. By now, I can only imagine everyone's attention directly on us. I swear the speaker even stopped. If not, that's how it felt. I quickly put my hand over his mouth and whisper through gritted teeth, "Stop crying.... Now.... If you don't stop crying, you'll get in big, big, big trouble....... Knock it off......" But now he's starting to gasp for air because he's all worked up and his little nostrils weren't going to cut it. However, I know that if I let go, it's going to be quite the wail. I figure it's better to let him be loud than to make him pass out, so I let go and sure enough. Loud and clear. I let him get the air he needs and my hand goes right back, this time with space between my fingers for ventilation. By now he thinks I'm trying to kill him. He's squirming and bawling and I just pick him up and haul him out.

I open the chapel doors, only to miss Jack, who is on the other side, by an inch or so. Austin is standing right there and I mouth, "I'm going to kill him." I take him into the gym and stand him against the wall. He starts wailing and I break down. Austin is just staring at the two of us, like "What the @#$@ happened in there?" Now, I'm pretty sure that that's not how you are supposed to feel when walking out of the chapel doors.

We both had a good cry. It was several minutes before I could get a hold of myself to begin explaining to Austin what had happened.

When Sacrament meeting ends, he hands Jack to me and takes the other kids away. I couldn't find them for about 10 minutes (mind you, Paige is supposed to be giving the Scripture thought in Primary at this point). Austin finally comes and finds me and escorts me into a Sunday school room where all of my kids are sitting on chairs, perfectly still, perfectly quiet with their arms folded. They all say sorry because they were told to.

I was just so mad and so so humiliated. Paige fell apart and said she didn't feel like going to Primary today because she was so awful. Kamae started crying because I think she felt like she was supposed to. Spencer looked at me and said he was "so so so so so so sorry, Mom." As a mom, what do you say? I couldn't bring myself to say it was OK because it sure wasn't. I just said, "I'm sorry, too. I'm sorry that you can't go to Primary today." He fell apart.

Jack is getting ornerier by the second. We take the girls into primary, splotchy faces and all. Austin helped me to the car to take Jack home for a nap and as far as I know, Spencer will be sitting by him on that same chair for the rest of church. They are still there. I came home and devised a reverence plan for next week. I am just beside myself. I can't believe that we're "that" family. Not next week. Not us. Not ever again. Hopefully.

As if you haven't read enough...
Here's the plan I devised, if you're interested. Wish us luck. Pray for a miracle.

The Orton Family Reverence Plan

We have to earn the privilege of sitting near the front of the chapel.

*We will start in the very back. If we are good, the next week we will move forward several rows. If we are irreverant, the next week we will move back. If we are pretty good, but still need a bit of practice, we will stay in the same place until we get it right.

*In order to get the seats that we need for that week, we need to get there early.

What to bring:
Paige and Kamae:
Each bring one bag
Contents:
Scriptures
1 book
1 Friend
1 Spiral notebook
1 pencil

Spencer:
Can bring one bag
Contents:
Scriptures
1 book
1 coloring book
1 small bag of snacks
1 bag of crayons
quiet book from Grandma Orton

Jack:
Stacking cups
finger puppets
snacks (cereal, string cheese, pretzels, etc.)
sippy cup
diapers & wipes

Sitting order:
Paige Mom Spencer Dad Kamae
-or-
Kamae Mom Spencer Dad Paige

Ideas to participate in Sacrament Meeting:
* Sing the hymns
* Listen to the talks and come up with trivia questions to ask the family later
* Draw a picture about something that the speakers were talking about
* Sacrament Meeting Bingo
* Read the Friend

Rules for Sacrament Meeting

* Get a drink and go to the bathroom before we leave for church
* There will be absolutely no leaving during the meeting
* Stay sitting up at all times
* Stay on the bench at all times
* If you need to say something, it must be whispered
* If one of the parents has to take Jack out, you are not allowed to go. Don’t ask!
* No trading or borrowing things from another person...what you bring with you is all you have. You are in charge of getting your bag prepared properly.

Once we make it back to the front of the chapel and do a great job, Mom and Dad will take you out for a fun evening!

Kidism

I was informing Austin the other day that the girls had a make-up class for gymnastics on Saturday morning because they missed their class during the week due to dentist appointments. Kamae overhears me and starts jumping up and down and clapping and says, "I'm so excited, Dad! We get to go to a make-up class!" As she's saying this, she's miming putting on mascara. She really thought that she was going to a class that was going to teach her how to put on make-up! We got a pretty good laugh out of that one!

Who are you and what have you done with my children?

Now that summer is in full swing (well, except for the weather....seriously, what's going on?) I decided that it was time to get my kids doing chores. I know that most of you have probably had your kids doing chores for eons now, but with me teaching piano last year, I just didn't feel like it was fair to them (or the babysitters) since I wasn't around to oversee it. So, I've been chomping at the bit to get chores going now that they have my full attention! Sunday night I sit the kids down and start going over their new chores. There are some they have to do everyday and 6 that they have to do once a week (one on Monday, one on Tuesday, etc.). So, I fully expected to get the loud sighs and eyerolling as I'm dishing out their responsibilities. No siree! They are jumping up and down with each new chore that they "get" to do (their words) and with the ones that they are really excited about, I got a kiss on the cheek! Holy moly! Are they serious? Who knew?! I guess I should have started this a long time ago! So, Monday morning I wake up and the girls are already dressed and their room is clean and beds are made. I'm not awake for 1 minute before they are requesting the chore chart to be printed! I print it off and post it on the door and they are just giddy! They got it all done (and it's quite a bit) in record time and they've been just as excited every morning since. Paige even does a load of laundry and is getting pretty good at it. Okay, folks, I'm not delusional enough to think that this enthusiasm is going to last, but I am sure going to enjoy it while it does!! Now, if I could just get them this excited about practicing piano, we'd be set!

Last Day, I Promise

We inevitably started the day off swimming. Well, I guess I shouldn't say we. Austin took the kids swimming after breakfast while I went back and laid Jack down, got ready and started packing our exorbitant amount of stuff. I honestly can't believe how much stuff we ended up having to take and we actually used almost everything. It's insane. Actually, here's a picture of all of our schmack...for only two nights. Seriously?

It's never a good thing when you're glad it can all fit on one cart. So, like I was saying, the kids went swimming...again. It makes me wonder if one day we ever owned a pool if I would ever see my children dry again or if the magic would wear off after too short of a period of time. The funniest thing about all of this is that when we were driving home, I noticed that most of the kids had really rosy cheeks. I thought, "Oh, no! They're getting sick!" Then one of them mentioned that their shoulders hurt. It wasn't until Austin mentioned that his did as well that I realized that they all got a little sunburned! As you can see, it's an indoor pool! Isn't that crazy? Who would've thunk? I can only figure that it's from the reflection off of the water. So, note to self: "Wear sunblock, even indoors!?!"

When they were all done swimming, we got them all ready and Austin and I started loading up. I looked over and all of the kids are on the bed just glued to whatever was on TV. I snapped a picture, which, in turn, became a little picture fest. I took probably 10 and sadly, this is the best one. C'mon, Spencer...

That kid's impossible to take a good picture of. Most of the time I think it's because his eyes are so darn big that it's inevitable to get a shot of him with them completely open. But this? I have no explanation...

After we got all loaded up, we were definitely excited to see that all of our tires still had air in them! :) That's always a good thing. We headed out and decided to take a stroll down Main Street. It was so fun. Like I said before, it's sad that we've never done this in our own town and someday soon we need to. You never know what you're gonna find!

The kids thought this was the coolest thing on the planet.


A little further down we found the cutest soda fountain in Bulloch Drug store. My friend, Ally, recommended it and I'm so glad we went! When I'm rich I will have one of these in my house! I was in heaven. Surrounded by candy jars and soda fountains. Not just because I love candy and soda, but the whole atmosphere made me giddy. I would've loved to have grown up in the 50s and I think this is as close as I'm gonna get anytime soon!

Look at all of the candy jars behind us! Yippee!!

After sodas, candy and A LOT of free popcorn (I'm sure the girl was so glad when we finally left), we finally thought we were headed home. On the way out we spotted a museum. Austin and I decided to check it out. We laid down the rules before going in: if it would cost us less than $10, we'd go in, if it was more, we'd opt out. Well, can't beat $6 for our whole family. I thought the kids would be beggging to go home, but they loved it! We spent WAY too long there for my liking, but I was patient and let Austin and the kiddos have a grand ole' time.



Paige pretending to work an old loom.


Some funny signs I came across. If you can, try to read the small print.


Spencer could've stood here all day!


Mr. Orton's class is in session.
They all took turns being in the dunce corner. Them trying to look sad just cracked me up!
Woops!
Try again!:)

We finished up at the museum and started heading out of town.

Okay. Prepare yourselves, folks. This had to be the most entertaining part of the whole trip. I'm so glad we didn't miss it! I was driving and when I saw this, I practically stopped in the middle of the road to take this picture! I couldn't believe my eyes!

We actually saw people "LARP"ing! Time Out: The only reason I have any clue what this is is due to my quality education from Beauty and the Geek. When they explained this on the show (I guess one of the geeks was way into it), I couldn't believe that people actually did that! Then I saw a group with my own two eyes! I was belly laughing! LARP stands for Live Action Role Playing (I think) and they take these foam swords and shields and make up this whole story line and whack each other and they "lose" limbs, etc. It's ridiculous. If I didn't have all of the kids with me, I would've gone and hung out at the park just to get a closer look. The saddest part of all of it to me, though, is that I can see a stroller in the second picture. Oh, that poor, poor baby...

And thus concludes our epic journey to Cedar City. For your sakes, I hope we don't take another, more eventful trip anytime soon! But for my sake, I hope we do! We had such a fun time and it accomplished everything we hoped it would...fun, bonding and memories! I'm so blessed to have such a wonderful family!

Day Two

I know by the time I am done blogging this that it's going to feel like the longest trip in the world. We went over a month ago and I'm sure no one really cares anymore, but I have to finish what I started. Sorry it's taken so long...life's been a little crazy.

Day two starts with the kids being so so so excited to go eat breakfast. They know from our trip to So Cal that breakfast in a hotel means that they have many choices and they are in charge of what they get to eat. So, we went down and ate breakfast and they all took way more food than they could ever eat, but that's all part of the fun of it for them. Then Austin took them swimming while I laid Jack down for an early nap and I got ready for the day. They came back a little while later and we started the long process of getting them all ready for the day, which had to include baths due to the excessive amount of chlorine in the pool. They were so excited to leave because we were heading out to go bowling, then out to lunch and then to go see Horton Hears a Who. We head out of the hotel, all excited, to come upon this:


Seriously? Our front tire is completely flat. So flat that our car was tilting. Remember that our first stop before heading down was to? Oh, yeah! Get new tires! Let me tell you, I was so excited to get to buy another one. We thought maybe we just got a dud, but the people said it was a puncture. Lovely. It was so anticlimatic! We get all ready, all psyched up to go bowling and they get to wait in the car for about 45 minutes while we put on the donut. Our car jack gave out on us, so we had to find someone else's to borrow. Good times. Good times.


But, just as before, I thought the kids were going to be all whiney now that our plans have to be delayed to get a new tire. (No, we couldn't just get it fixed because it was on the side wall of the tire. So, we got to buy another new one! Yipee! I love the added expenses of trips that you weren't planning on!) So, we head over to Wal-Mart to get the tire replaced and the kids were so excited that we got to eat at the McDonald's there. I never let them eat at ours because I am so not a McDonald's fan. So, they felt like they were getting spoiled. We ended up at Wal-Mart for over an hour, but they found ways to entertain themselves. Who knew?





I'll bet good ole' Ronnie's never had this much attention! The kids were so determined to take pictures with him. Whatever floats their boats, right?

So, we finally leave and go watch the movie. Luckily Austin and Spencer had already seen it (they went with Scott and Linda and Tanner once during one of the girls' dance competitions) because Jack was not at all excited to be there. He started out okay, but once he had had enough, he was done. So Austin spent most of the movie pushing his stroller up and down the hallway along side the stairs in the theater. He pretty much just got to hear it the second time. Thanks, Austin!:)

Then we went over and went bowling. Okay, so what's up with the price of bowling? It was about $30 for our family to bowl one game. It's bowling, for Pete's sake! Whatever. The kids had fun, we built some memories and that's all that matters.

Jack took the nap he was desperately needing during the movie. He slept almost the whole time!


Kamae posing for the shot as usual!:)

I was so proud of Paige. She felt she was too old to use the ramp, so she bowled the whole time like a grown up. She would get so frustrated, but she didn't give up. No matter where she started or what she did, the ball would go to the back left corner EVERY TIME! She's anxious to go back a try again.

I know it's blurry, but she actually had pretty good form. You know, since I'm such a bowling expert and all!:)

This happened at least twice. Either Kamae or Spencer thought they wanted to be like Paige and not use the ramp. The picture's really dark, but the ball didn't even make it to the pins. We'd have to call the person to come and help us. I'm sure they loved us! (The ball's on the left side.)
Jack woke up towards the end and was a much happier camper.You'll have to excuse all of the food chunt on the collar of his shirt. That's from all of the food I was trying to shove in his mouth during the movie to keep him quiet!
I just like this picture of him. This is what he's like a lot of the time...just watching and observing.

All I have to say is that I was very glad to be somewhere that I knew I wouldn't know anyone. We realized while we were at Wal-Mart that Austin and I forgot to bring socks for bowling. So I just bought a package for Austin (since he needed some anyway) and I just wore a pair of his. I was also wearing capris, so needless to say I looked so hot that I needed to take a picture. Aren't you proud you're my friend?The final scores. I'll bet you can't figure out who fudged their score a little!

Of course as soon as we got back to the hotel, the kids were right back in the pool. This swim suit that Jack has on is 6-12 months. Normally he wears bigger clothes than that, but look how long these are! It made me laugh!
I bought the kids some goggles at Costco before we left! It was the best $15 I've spent in a long time! They loved them! I was glad they had them, too, because with as much chlorine that was in that pool and how long they were in it, their little eyes would have been fried!
Paige being silly.
Austin bathed the boys and they came out of the bathroom like this! Ah, my cute little men!
Day two comes to a close. The kids went to sleep really well...it helps that we had a packed day and they were all really tired!

Day One (continued)

I forgot to mention in "Day One" that we no sooner walked into our hotel room before the kids were stripping their clothes off asking where their swimsuits were. Needless to say, we spent most of the day swimming. Then we went to Brad's Food Hut for dinner (oh, yummy greasy fried food and thick shakes) and came back and played games. It's so fun now that our kids are older and they can play games that are actually enjoyable for Austin and I as well. Our favorites are Mexican Choo Choo (dominoes), Sorry and Pictionary, Jr. We get pretty competitive during Pictionary! We just went in the breakfast "dining room" and slid some tables together. We laid Jack down in the hotel room with a make-shift monitor (we forgot to bring one, so we had my phone call Austin's and left mine in the room and brought his with us and left it on speaker. It actually worked pretty well! Thank goodness for free mobile to mobile minutes!) Jack finally went to sleep and we played games. When we were done, without thinking, we gave the kids the room key and they ran up ahead. Do you think they were nice and quiet upon entering the room? Of course not! They barge in and Jack starts crying. Yeah! Now I'm completely exhausted and Jack's awake and ornery! Grr... I wasn't a happy camper. He just crawled around on our bed for awhile and then he eventually went to sleep. It's never easy trying to get four kids (one being a baby) all to sleep in the same room. It did happen though...eventually.

Day One

If any of you have ever traveled with children, you know how much work it is to actually get out of the house. After a day of doing nothing, and I mean nothing, but laundry (I think about 10 loads by the time I was done) and then packing everything, I think we're all ready to go first thing in the morning. Well, then you have to get everyone ready for the day, which always takes longer than it should and then you have to get all the paraphernalia, people, stuff, etc. in the car. I have some hereditary disease where I have to clean my house before we leave on a trip. I think it's because my mom always did and I hate coming home from vacations so much as it is, that the thought of coming home to a messy house is almost unbearable. So, I do it to make me happier to come home. Also, I know that this is a bit morbid, but what if something happened to us while we were gone and someone had to go into our house? Needless to say, by the time I am ready to leave, my family's been in the car waiting for me for way too long. I go out into the garage to get something as I am preparing to leave and all of the kids are ready to go. At this point, they are waiting patiently, but by the time my rear is actually in the car and we are pulling out of the driveway, my entire family (led by Austin) is singing at the top of their lungs, "Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, birds in the wilderness, birds in the wilderness. Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, waiting for Mom to come." Off we go...finally.

So the kids are all excited to finally be on the road. We get no more than 2 miles when I get this nagging feeling that we need to get new tires before we drive out into the middle of nowhere. One of our back tires has had a slow leak for awhile and I just felt like we needed to get it taken care of. I almost didn't dare say anything because the kids (not to mention Austin) would be so annoyed, but I couldn't ignore it. So, our first stop was to get tires. Woo hoo! I was definitely wrong about the kids' attitudes. They thought it was the coolest thing ever that they got to stay in the car while it was being jacked up. Who knew?
Just about every time (it seems, anyway) we head down south, Austin likes to take a stop in Parawon where his dad grew up and his paternal grandparents are buried. So, we take a pit stop in Parawon and we head over to the cemetery. I have to tell you that Austin has a little obsession with cemeteries. Well, not really cemeteries, but as part of his geneological duties he feels like he needs to take pictures of headstones. It's not a bad idea, seeing as how you can get most of the accurate info that you need from one picture. So, we pay a visit to the graves of his grandparents (although it might sound like I am, I am not complaining about this...I think it's very sweet), but Austin then decides that we need to search out any and all other Orton's in the entire cemetery, something it feels like he's done a million times already. However, this time he did remember to take a picture of a headstone that he didn't have. It's one of his main ancestors (Orson Owen Orton, or as we so lovingly nicknamed him, "O to the third" or "O cubed"), so I guess it turned out to be worth it! Austin has passed his love of headstones on to Paige, who insisted on going around and picking up any loose fake flowers and decorating this particular headstone. It's all a little strange to me, but at least it's a productive and free hobby, right?:)