Remarrying at 85

I completed this project for my most recent production course, and also because I wanted to.  I struggled unreasonably with technical production issues (i.e., not a single shot is 100% in focus, le sigh), but I'm still pretty happy with how the storytelling came together, and that part was incredibly tricky and time-consuming to do.  So, here's one of the more anomalous parts of my summer:




Because of her rather agoraphobic nature, my Grandma has never figured very prominently in my own life, but I've always known that she hadn't always been that way, and I've always felt an inordinate fondness for the fuller, larger being I had only heard stories about.  Seeing her change so much from the person she's been for the entirety of my own life has been surreal for me.  But happy surreal.  I'll take it.

Because I couldn't find a way to include enough detail of the chronology without doubling the length of the film: My grandfather was a fighter pilot in the Vietnam War, was shot down and taken prisoner in 1967, and was released in 1973.  For at least 2 years of that time he was MIA.  That experience seems to have catalyzed a lot of the problems, anxieties, depressions, and events that followed. If there are any other unclear details, I'm happy to iron them out.

Documentary Final and a summary of my present tense

I've found that the less I've been writing in places like this, the less I'm coming to trust my voice.  Which is, of course, unfortunate.  I needed another reason to feel insecure like I need a hole in my head.  But, at the moment I am trying to frantically get my ducks in a row in the weekend I have between summer terms.  There are occasionally remarkable moments that strike me as remarkable before they pass, (Like the moment of realizing what a difference a $5 load of sandbox sand can make in my life)but mostly life is a blur of ordinary busyness.

Speaking of which - this project I completed for my documentary class is about as accurate a portrait of my life right now as I'm likely to get around to composing.  If you've ever done the same thing more than once, maybe it'll mean something to you.

Our Gentleman in action

I had to shoot, and then edit a "process" with a subject (for school), and our gentleman was the most cooperative subject I had access to. To put him most in his element?  Coloring pages.  He is my only child who can sit and color for an hour at a time, which is not an unrecognized blessing.  He was not exactly comfortable in front of the camera, but here's what I managed to make of him:

Sir O outside his comfort zone

Sir O finished up the Let's Play Music 3-year program a week ago and performed in a little recital.
One of many, many epic mom fails I've managed recently shows up in the beginning of this video, as I completely spaced preparing an introduction for him to memorize for this song he composed.   So his already uncomfortable moment in front of a crowd is made infinitely more uncomfortable by not being prepared with anything to say.  I think he's forgiven me, but I haven't forgiven myself yet.



Anyway, despite his perennial reticence, I think this experience has actually given him a lot of confidence, not to mention a stellar music theory base. I'm super impressed with it, and the rest of my boys will be starting in the Fall with their first year.  So really, I must be impressed to be willing to undergo getting 3 kids to practice on a regular basis.  Torture.

Bunny Shuffle

I was so worried that Bunny was going to take off with walking during the week that Mr Renn and I were away.  She certainly made progress then, but it's been in this last week that she's finally become fully converted.  She is now fully ambulatory and passed over the peak where crawling still seems more efficient.  But she's not yet 100% solid.  You still feel like cheering for her as she goes - partly because of her gusto (everything full speed all the time!) and partly because she's still just wobbly enough that you're not certain she's going to make it wherever she's headed.





Good Golly this is a delightful age.

In which the Captain steals the show at the Ward Christmas Party

Lavender Festival

Bad mom.  Remember that time back in September when Mr Renn took a whole week off work and we tried to get out and vacation a bit without messing up the house-of-cards that is my homework schedule?  It was actually pretty great.  On one end of the week we visited the Lavender Festival in Mona.  It was A) - really affordable and B) - really not-crowded due to the crazy thunderstorms throughout the day.  So we got wet, but we had fun.

Let me entertain you

You know what is magical?  Free babysitting.

It's also mystical and scarce. Trickier to come by than a leprechaun.  Says me.

So, I am not above recognizing this recent conglomeration of circumstances for the miracle that it has been.

Some neighborhood preteen girls decided that they love to dance so much that running a (free) dance camp for all the neighborhood short people was a good idea. (?!?!) For 2 hours a day for an entire week I got to drop off ALL of my boys for 2 hours and then pick them up happier and more tired-out than I'd left them.  It was awesome.



The cherry on top was the "recital" at the end of the week.  Just try to imagine the scope of this project and the end result is pretty impressive.  Way to choreograph, girls.


And coincidentally, watching our gentleman "dance" is one of my favorite small pleasures in life.  Luckily the kid busts out bouncing anytime he hears anything remotely musical.




This has definitely been one of my favorite tender mercies of the summer.

Oh.... Captain.

If you have six minutes to spare you could watch this interview with our Captain:




Which would reveal a few things.

I needed more depth of field, sorry about the fuzzy bits.

He is a quintessential second child.

We love Mo Willems at our house.

His speech is coming along swimmingly, though you can tell he still struggles with his L's, R's, and with a number of vowel errors.

He has a really weird sense of body position.  I finally have the name for that symptom.  And I am taking it and packing myself up to go back to square one with Special Ed and the school district.  Thanks to Ms Tracy, I feel like I'm getting closer to solving the mystery that is our Captain.  Hooray for prospective answers!

Also - this kid is adorable, and I just eat him up.

Last Call

Christmas catch up posts are officially over once I share this gem:



We had my cousin and her husband (who have requested that I give them a cool pseudonym) over for dinner and I elected to throw together an impromptu nativity. (We did, after all, still have the sheep costume). I'm really hoping my kids will be more open to creating tiny narratives as they get older, it'd be fun to make them, and even more fun to watch them some years down the road.

Pseudonym, how about Pigling Bland and Pig-wig? They're Beatrix Potter creations, and oddly appropriate. No good? Then I'd have to call them the Fezziwigs.

Happy Saturday

Just a little something to cheer you up.  We're nice that way.

The manic matinee

I find myself alone with the boys a lot lately, for good reasons.  But we all get a little stir-crazy after too much of mom and three boys in the house.  So I have to be constantly coming up with alternatives for the boys to their default activity of embodying entropy and scattering objects around the house in nonsensical frenzies.  Yesterday we found these paper bag puppet kits in the bottom of the halloween box and I let Sir O construct them all by himself.  (There wasn't a great deal of assembly involved.)  Then, around bedtime I let them record a puppet show for their dad.  As a puppet show, it's an abysmal failure.  But as an entertaining slice of life, it delivers in unexpected ways.  These boys, with their insanity and energy, make up my days.  They wear me out.  In the best  possible way a person can be worn out.

stop and smell

In the midst of an abundance of craziness and abnormal levels of stress, our little Gentleman has taken to reminding us to slow down, and that life cannot be put on hold until ____ is over.  We may be up to our eyebrows in boxes and tape and missing (?!) sharpies, but he's going to choose this moment to start crawling anyway.  I'm learning (slowly) to be more fully present even when my lists and my brain are looking long and daunted.  I suppose that's part of how motherhood is teaching me to be more like God.  Not too many years ago I would have been significantly more hyperventilation-prone through this process than I am today.  But, judging by my snappy mom voice in this clip, I've still got a lot of learning to do.



Early tomorrow morning we ride, and officially change addresses.  It's actually a messy convoluted gypsy-like weekend we have ahead of us, but for all intents and purposes today is the last where I call my parent's house "home."

theme song

Our Captain is not very wordy, and it follows that he doesn't often sing.  Only very rarely when we have singing time in nursery or at home does he chime in with a word here or there.  But there is one song, in all the world, that he lurves.  It happens to drive me batty, and it wouldn't be my pick.  But when he starts singing it on his own when the whole family is in the car, it sort of makes Mr Renn smile at me and remark that our kids are so cute.  This is by no stretch his most verdant or enigmatic rendition, but it IS the one that he gave when I actually remembered to pull out a camera and capture it.  I expect to be immensely glad to have this someday.

remind me of you

I've been allowing my brain, of late, to think more than a week ahead.
Because I won't be living in borrowed space forever, it just feels that way.
Mr Renn has his first job interview in 2 weeks, and so far he seems to feel optimistic about the opportunity.
I don't want to rush into any commitments, but a big part of me is very ready to start looking for housing and a school for Sir O;
and for museums and garden clubs and music teachers.
You know - normal mom stuff.
But once I start letting my brain think such thoughts I inevitably get carried away, and start shopping real estate.  What can I say, I'm almost 30 and I want a home.  A lot of 30 year-old moms get by just fine without a home of their own, but most 30 year-old moms will confess to wanting one if they don't have one.
I found a lovely Arts and Crafts home with just the sort of details that make my heart happy.  I kept coming back to the listing every day to try to imagine what life would be like in that house.
Then it sold.  I feel disturbingly sad about that.

Because you know, our taxes claimed I am a "homemaker".  But right now I feel like I only daydream about being a real homemaker.  I have no home to make.  My stuff is in storage, and the temporariness of our living situation makes it impossible for me to develop any roots or wings.

Our next living situation may be even more temporary, but we will get all of our stuff back.  I expect it to be like Christmas - for me and for the boys.  There are so many toys I think they've forgotten they had!  And what I wouldn't give for access to one of my corner-rounders today!

Oh my boys and me.... we are such a crazy bunch.  What are we going to do with each other?

Weekend Recap: lots of singing people

I wish I could keep my head on straight.
There have been at least a dozen things this week I was certain would "make the blog" which not only didn't "make the blog" but have also completely evaded sticking in my memory at all.
I want my brain back.

My kids have been cute, and better behaved than usual this weekend.  (Which isn't to say well-behaved generally, these things are relative).  Sir O has been venturing into the world of make-believe where his shadow of a little brother is not yet equipped to go with him.



Friday night I left Mr Renn and the older boys to fend for themselves and took the Gentleman with me to see my cousin star in a High School Musical.  He was stellar, nevertheless I hold that high school students will inevitably struggle to bring to light the depth of meaning in Fiddler on the Roof.  Their lives are just too cushy and narcissistic, there's nowhere for them to pull context from.

Saturday brought round 1 of my anniversary present to Mr Renn, so we dressed up and went to the Opera.   Mr Renn thought he was being a good sport, since he so strongly disliked the last opera he went to (Madame Butterfly, 15 years ago).

Wouldn't you know, he LOVED it.  I was even surprised by how much I loved it.  Entertaining, engaging, and  oh such gorgeous duets by an impressive hansel+gretel.  The evening prayer was breathtaking.

(photo Deseret News)

I have to say that I love real date nights.  They are such a hard hard thing to prioritize sometimes, but they lift my mood and clear my perspective like nothing else can.

Getting my money's worth

Preschool is pretty much Sir O's favorite thing ever.  As in, he has massive meltdowns on the mornings he doesn't get to go.  (It's only a twice weekly class).

He's been reciting "Brown Bear" for a week now, but I was still surprised when yesterday he brought home his own handmade edition.  I think he has never been more proud than he is when he can "read" this book by himself.

Rock on, preschool.

Ritual

There are lots of parts of life where I meant to build rituals, but never quite managed.  Luckily there are others where rituals sprouted almost of their own accord.  One of my favorites is our nightly game of hide-and-seek/marco-polo.  It fits perfectly in that space between bathtime and bedtime, and always provides me with an endless stream of chuckles.  For the time being, Mr Renn and Sir O take turns hiding and seeking. (The captain participates fully, helping to seek and shouting "polo" as best he can)  Sir O still has trouble staying hidden until he is found (and his counting is sort of a trainwreck), but no matter.

Snail's Pace

With these monkey's underfoot, the going is slow, but I am finally getting to the point where projects are getting completed.
 
 Rome wasn't built in a day, and it certainly wasn't built by pregnant people and small children.
(FYI - those are my knees Sir O is attacking)

in which: Sir O is completely self-contained and I am a spy