Here comes the sun

Here we are, it's a beautiful Thursday afternoon in sunny southern California. It's so sunny that I am too hot in 3/4 sleeves and jeans. I may have to dig out my capri pants and some short sleeves and start using that razor that hangs out in the shower.

This morning was my last lesson for a while with Liz. I'm recording the first movement of the Mozart Saturday afternoon and I sure hope it's good because I have invested a lot of time and money into preparing for this. Lessons, babysitters, and not to mention my expensive accompanist. Despite the high monetary cost, I feel good. This is a goal I've had for a while and I'm nearing its accomplishment. I'm submitting the recording as part of a teacher training scholarship application AND to get clearance to continue teacher training.

In other news, I finally cleaned out my fridge. It has been on my list (at the bottom!) for months, but it is finally done. The sticky puddle of a substance formerly known as orange juice is now gone from underneath my produce drawers, the shelves are white again, and the whole thing is virtually gleaming. "Fill me," I hear it calling from the kitchen. That's my next project - grocery shopping. Unfortunately, it will have to be postponed because dh just called from school and asked for a ride. He has thrown his back out again. When I spoke with him, he was shuffling across campus, hunched over like an old man. He has done this before. Poor guy. He didn't want to ride the bus for an hour to get home.

Back to the sun. Yesterday I wrote on the whiteboard "Be the sun!" 2 days ago, I remembered a story about a competition between the sun and the wind to remove a man's coat. The wind blew with all of its ferocious might, but the man held his coat tighter around him. When the sun came out, its gentle heat warmed the man and he soon removed his coat. That story reminds me that I want to motivate by gentleness and love, not shouting or threatening or other worse ways. This is Day 2, and it has made such a difference in how I feel about myself and how Ethan responds to me. While I was cleaning out the fridge, Ethan prevented Scott from sticking his finger in the socket and from climbing over the gate, extremely helpful for me. Granted, he still sat on Scott once and hit him on the head with Joseph (from the Fisher Price nativity). But, we are seeing progress.

Learning to control my temper is much more of a challenge than learning to play a violin concerto. Maybe if I think of it this way, it will be easier to deal with setbacks. I spent hours and hours in the last five months practicing, listening to recordings, watching my taped lessons, etc. It will take the same kind of effort to meet this challenge. At this moment, I feel up to the challenge, a little bit like Tracy when she says "I think I can". If she can do it, I can do it, too.

My amazing boy

In Primary yesterday, I wrote the theme for February on the whiteboard: Heavenly Father's plan promises eternal happiness. "Does anyone know what eternal happiness is?" I asked. Ethan (my just-barely-3yo) answered, "It's when you eat the fruit from the tree." It took me a moment to realize he was talking about the tree of life, and I was stunned. He was perfectly right - that is true happiness.

Where did he acquire this knowledge? Last week, Ethan got the Book of Mormon Stories on tape and has listened to them every day at least once all the way through, following along with the pictures. I think it has become his favorite thing to do, even above jumping on the couch.

Tonight for FHE, Michael invited Ethan to give the lesson and tell us where the Book of Mormon came from. Well, Ethan certainly told us. He opened his illustrated Book of Mormon stories and quoted us the first two pages. Verbatim.

I knew he was a smart cookie, but this still amazed me. I wonder what else he knows... I would be interested in hearing from moms and dads out there who have experience raising kids who show early interest and aptitude in reading or other areas.

Glimpses

Last night, Scottieboo calmly and deliberately took 5 steps on his own, surveyed the living room, and then sat down. We were thrilled. He seemed to think it was no big deal. We are waiting for the next steps.

For those who don't get to see Ethan regularly, here is a shot of his new haircut. I think he looks pretty cute.

Parenting

Last night, at 10 pm, Ethan was still not asleep and was wriggling around his bed. "Mom, I need a drink." Ok. I hate being thirsty and I always drink at night, so I bring him a drink. A few minutes later, "Mom, I need to go to the BATHroom." Ok, no problem. Better to use the toilet than wet the bed. I bring him to the bathroom, set him on the toilet, he does his thing, I lift him off, help him get his jammies back up, we wash his hands and dry them. We are done.

Suddenly, tears and shrieks and hollering. "MOM! I NEED TO DRY THE OTHER HAND!" "Ok, go ahead and dry it off," I tell him.
"But I want YOU to do it," he insists.

Here's where the tired and cranky mom kicked in. She refused to help him dry his hand. He is perfectly capable of doing it himself. More shrieks and tears, grouchy mom grabs him and dumps him in his room with the gate up. "Mom, I want to BEEEE with you!" Grouchy mom ignores his request, enters kitchen and contemplates mounds of dirty dishes. After a few minutes, grouchy mom hears little boy talking to her from his bedroom, but she can't understand him because she is listening to glorious Mozart violin concerto #5, attempting to motivate herself to wash dishes. It is Mozart's 250th birthday today, by the way.

So, grouchy mom goes to little boy's room. "Mom, when you do something, you need to say sorry," he says, looking at me. Remorse and denial. "Did I do something?" I ask. "I brought you a drink, I helped you go the bathroom, I helped you wash your hands... and then I got mad." He keeps looking at me, with his big brown eyes and beautiful eyelashes. "I'm sorry," I tell him. "I'm sorry, too," he says. "Can you forgive me?" I ask him. He grins and opens his arms up wide and gives me a squeeze around the neck. We are friends again. When I leave his room, he settles down and goes to sleep.

Parenthood is so frustrating sometimes that you want to rip your hair out and so sweet sometimes that your heart seems to swell and then melt. Is there anything else like it?

Never accept a cell phone shop!

Well, hello. Yes, we are alive here at the Daily Moos. Michael suggested that we might consider changing our name to the Monthly Moos, considering that it has been months since my last post. I feel no remorse and no need to resolve to blog more often. My efforts need to go more towards daily personal study, playing with my boys, keeping the apartment clean, planning meals, eliminating Mount Washmore from the bedroom corner (neatly sorted into boxes and laundry bins, I must insert), practicing violin, recruiting more students, caring for my Primary kids and the Primary board, and the like. Yet, here I am. Thanks for being here with me.

Yesterday I received a menacing bill threatening to go to collections if I didn't pay up. This was completely absurd, but I was nervous. Back in November, on a mystery shop assignment, I bought a cell phone and then returned it about a week later without ever using it. The company was supposed to take care of these non-refundable activation charges. And they had. Several times. Anyway, when I got the bill, I dialed up the cell phone automated customer service line and discovered that my balance was $00.01. Yes, they were threatening to send me to collections over $00.01. "Must be a mistake, " I thought. "It's not even worth making a credit card payment of $00.01 because they pay more in fees to the credit card company then they collect from me."

Then, last night, as we were happily finishing our chicken pot pie around 7:30 pm, the phone rang. My husband answered, looked concerned, punched a number on the phone keypad, and didn't say a word. "What? Who is it?" I pestered him, in a respectfully (tic) quiet voice. I hate not knowing who is on the phone. It was an automated phone call from the cell phone company, threatening again to send us to collections over our past due balance. One measly cent was the balance.

Long story short, we eventually talked to a real live person, who apologized profusely for the inconvenience of the phone call, for the worry it must have caused us, and who took 20 minutes to assure us that after the next billing cycle, the remaining one cent of our balance would be zeroed out and we should call them in the middle of February to confirm that.

Moral of the story: never accept a cell phone shop.