Bee-fore and After

This is the Marcos I've always known and loved--happy, enthusiastic, easy to please. That was before--before he got his tonsils out.

This is the Marcos I love now--today was his fourth day after surgery. Since he's so young (the tender little guy's only three) I didn't really believe the doctor when he said every day would be worse for about a week. The doctor was right. Marcos cries a lot and gets shaky and hysterical. It brings tears to my eyes. The pain medication burns his throat going down. The other morning I was trying to get him to take it. "This will help you feel better," I said. "But I'm not getting better!" He sounded so sad and desperate. I am learning how difficult it would be to have a chronically ill child. I feel blessed that my children are usually very healthy and that this is a temporary situation for little Marcos. I took this picture of him today and said, "Should we take a picture of you for Grandma and Grandpa?" He said yes, and without any prompting from me, said a weak little, "Cheese." Bless his heart.
Yesterday was a surprise 40th birthday party for my brother-in-law, Robert. He's a beekeeper (among many other things) and so I made him a beehive cake. I had made the bees bee-fore Marcos's surgery. I had made a few more than forty and put everything away when I caught Marcos (the bee-fore surgery, normal Marcos) eating one. After counting, I realized he'd eaten seven! I had to get everything out again and make more bees. Now Marcos won't eat anything. I wouldn't mind if he'd eat a bee or two.

Robert was a great sport. Here he is wearing a bee mask Marianne got for him. Our other news of the week is that we are the proud owners of a German Wirehair Pointer. Lili has always wanted a dog and lately she's been even more insistent that she get one. She wrote me a letter this week, saying "Pleese can I have a dog? Even just a littel one." I refuse to take responsibility for her wobbly spelling. It turned out that this week we found out about a family that needed a home for Hunter--our new dog. Hunter is great with the kids and doesn't bark at night, and seems like a nice enough fellow--for a dog. He also has an incredible amount of energy and a great desire to run all the time. I weigh quite a lot now, but it is difficult for me to control him. There's no way Lili could take him on a walk by herself, but we're hoping to get him used to us and our home here and then maybe he won't try to run away. He got away three times yesterday--his collar was too loose. Now he has a new collar and he's doing better. Lili is so happy with him. Her happiness is worth a lot.

A Busy Week

As I decided which pictures to post, I was surprised that so much happened this week. Besides all of the pictured events, we also spent two days in Salt Lake City where I lost my cell phone, waddled across several downtown streets with my five kids while Edgar was in the temple, and drove through a snowstorm in the dark. I could hardly see and the stoplights weren't working because the electricity was out. Good thing I'm such a stellar driver!

We began the week with a bang on April Fools' Day (pictured above). That holiday just doesn't come often enough. I love pranks. I made this delightful "chocolate pie" with "strawberry topping." My kids (especially Ruben) were hoping it was similar to their aunt Jennifer's to-die-for chocolate pie (all Ruben wants for his birthday is her recipe). They were disappointed that the pie was actually shepherd's pie and nobody ate it but Ammon and me. Edgar took some to work and was also disappointed. I had dyed the milk blue, but you can't really tell in the picture. Ruben, who is the most oblivious person I know, didn't notice the blue milk as he ate it in his cereal.

"How do you like your cereal, Ruben?"

"Good."

"How's the milk?"

"Fine."

Lili could contain herself no longer and burst out that the milk was blue.

"Oh."


Two days later was Edgar's birthday. He was working nights. I made him his favorite cupcakes (chocolate with cream cheese filling). In case you're wondering, Lili does wear that shirt an awful lot and Ammon mostly wears pajamas all day around home and the other boys are Superman on a daily basis. I finally broke down and washed the Superman suits the other day.

We celebrated Easter Eve as usual. We decorated eggs, had our Easter egg hunt, Hawaiian haystacks, and a wonderful program about the true meaning of Easter by Jennifer. She has such a gift of captivating young children and of teaching by the Spirit.

Ruben's costume du jour was that of a cowboy (in green sweats and black rain boots--very John Wayne, don't you think?). He, Luke, and Savannah were reviewing their spoils from the Easter egg hunt. It was gorgeous weather.

Here Lili, Carolina and Marcos are counting eggs. Marcos was being the mom in an apron and Savannah had been the dad--as always. She's such a good sport.

Later, our boys let cousin Luke use one of the Superman suits and these superheroes really saved the day.

The Easter Bunny brought the boys new coordinating shirts. See, Ammon doesn't ALWAYS wear pajamas.

I meant to only put one picture of Lili in her new Easter dress, but I accidentally uploaded both of these. She is a lovely girl.

Happy April. Happy Easter. Happy Spring.

THE SUPERHEROES' MOTHER

It's no secret that Superman and Batman are my sons. A lesser known fact is that they get their superpowers from me. For example:

Today all the kids took their sandwiches and carrots outside for a picnic. When Marcos came back in, I hugged him and he somehow transferred a wasp onto my shirt. I was collected, and told my little superhero to go get me some toilet paper. I learned from my mom how to squish a wasp in a little napkin or paper towel or what have you. It took Marcos forever to return with the remnants of the end of a roll of toilet paper. Lili took over as my toilet paper fetcher and returned quickly with an appropriate amount of toilet paper. By then, the wasp had walked across my ample belly, across my maternity shirt and on to my back. I couldn't see it and couldn't very well kill it with it crawling on my back. Lili and Ruben were rather concerned that I would get stung. I calmly brought my arms inside my shirt and turned the shirt around. Luckily, the wasp was lethargic and lazy and still creeping along as it turned up on my belly again. In a flash, and as my children watched in admiration, I killed the little pest and quickly disposed of its corpse, toilet paper and all.

Where do you think Superman and Batman get their superpowers and bravery? Let's just say the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. Ka-pow!

St. Patrick's Performance, Vacuuming, & Dress-up

For St. Patrick's Day, our talented music teacher for our homeschool co-op (non other than my dear sister, Marianne) arranged for us to go and sing at the senior citizens' center. We needed to get our van worked on, so Edgar dropped the kids and me off at the post office and then he took the van. We walked from the post office to the senior citizens' center in about two minutes. We were early and none of the other performers had arrived yet. I decided to keep my energetic children outside until show time--a wise choice. Marcos was holding a wooden hatchet to be used as a prop in one of the songs and was hitting the trunk of a mature and sturdy tree. I didn't think anything of it, but a gal eating inside was not pleased. She came outside and yelled at Marcos:

"Stop beatin' on that tree! It's a livin' thang!" (I didn't spell thing wrong--she really said it with an "a".) I naturally felt like the horrible, negligent mother I am. I apologized and took the hatchet away from Marcos. Later, after we'd performed, the same lady made sure Marcos got a snack--even though he was too young to be one of the performers. So maybe she forgave us. Above, the kids were singing "Big Moon."
Here Ruben got to be the executioner and Lili was Anne Boleyn. The ax is a bigger version of what Marcos was using to abuse the livin' thang.

Ammon adores his dad and likes to do whatever Edgar does. Fortunately, that includes vacuuming.

Marcos took to calling himself Mary the other day. He wore one of Lili's dresses and her hair flower. Ammon was happy to join in. It's almost like having sisters. Ruben adamantly abstained from anything girly, but he was Buzz Lightyear--in his John Deere sweatshirt. Oh, didn't you know Buzz Lightyear is the space ranger that drives a tractor? One look at Lili's hair, and you can see why the good Lord is sending us another boy. I am very bad at hair.

My parents now have a blog, so if any in my vast readership are interested in the life of a missionary in Nauvoo, this is their address: markandcoralee.blogspot.com

Marcos's Tonsils are Still With Him!

Marcos

This week things did not go as expected. We had been dreading the Ides of March (March 15) for weeks. That was to be the day of Marcos's tonsillectomy. We were as ready as could be--Edgar was going to be off work for five days, he and our kind bishop had administered to Marcos for his operation, and my mom had put Marcos's name on the prayer roll of the temple. I had done my part by buying all kinds of juice, ice cream, popsicles, fancy straws and a special cup, pudding, and yogurt. I also bought three new movies and rented two more.

The night before his surgery, I had a hard time falling asleep. I was worried about my little guy. At midnight, he started making a lot of noise. He sleeps through the night every night, and I thought it unfortunate that he was awake on a night when he couldn't even have a drink of water. I decided to let him go back to sleep, but he kept talking.

Marcos kept saying, "Rashi (his name for Ruben), wake up!" I finally went in to find that my poor little pre-surgery patient had thrown up. He said, "I threw up, Mom. See?" I did see and I gave him a bath, changed his sheets (we've always kept all the twin-size sheets in Lili's room since she has two closets--that night as I fumbled in the dark for clean sheets, I realized how inconvenient that can be), and got him back to bed.

I called the hospital--they had said Marcos had to be healthy for two weeks before his surgery. The nurse I talked to said they would probably still do the surgery since Marcos didn't have a fever and since he wouldn't have anything in his stomach. I couldn't sleep and an hour later, Marcos called for me. Throughout he was very upbeat and seemed to feel fine. I'd told him to call me and not Ruben. As our deepest sleeper, Ruben wasn't Marcos's best option in the night. Marcos had thrown up again. New pajamas. New sheets. No bath this time. A half hour later, another cheerful "Mom, I need you," brought me to Marcos. New pajamas. New sheets. Again, no bath. This time, a brilliant idea--a little bowl to throw up in for Marcos to sleep with. He used the bowl for his last little episode at 2:00 am. I hadn't slept and why hadn't I thought of the bowl in the first place?

I called the hospital again. The nurse still thought they'd probably do the surgery, but wanted me to call back at 6:00 when the surgery nurse would be there. I didn't sleep too well until 6:00 when I got to talk to Twila (gotta love her name), the surgery nurse. She said they would not do the surgery. "But we're all ready...the other nurse said we could...my husband's off work...we're having a baby soon." Twila was unmoved. "If he vomited during surgery, it could be fatal." Oh. Never mind, Twila. We'll reschedule. Our new date to dread is April 12. Edgar will have to take the day off work, but we'll still have the new movies, the straws, and the fancy cup (I cleverly put them away) and the ice cream and juice will make it until then if I keep them hidden.

The day after his surgery was supposed to be, Marcos got up and said, "Mom, did I get my tonsils out?" Not yet, sweetie. When you get them out, you'll know it.

For my parents: here's a picture of the St. Patrick's Day snowstorm you missed yesterday. I think we got 8 inches of nice, wet, mud-inviting snow!

A New Goal

My new goal is to blog weekly while my parents are on their 18-month mission to Nauvoo, Illinois. That's a lofty goal for one as inconsistent and bad at blogging as I. We'll see how it goes...

Farewell to my sweet parents! I took this picture of them right before they went to the MTC, or Empty Sea, as my children are sure it is called. I have had the hardest time explaining about acronyms. They are sure Grandma and Grandpa are in the Empty Sea. "Why is the sea empty, Mom? Aren't there any fish in it?" Ruben prays that they can do a good job and the day after we said good-bye to them, Marcos wondered if Grandma and Grandpa were still on a mission. Yes, after all this time, they still are.

CELEBRATION WITH THE COBIANS: Things are not in very good order here. Blogger and I do not get along. I have a terrible combination I'm dealing with--my great ignorance of technology, my picture files that are as big as Russia (and I have no idea how to make them smaller), and a very slow internet connection. These pictures are not in chronological order, but all of them happened within the last week or so. Above are Josefina (Edgar's mom) and all her grandchildren (and Edgar). You may notice that we are a little heavy on boys on this side of the family (and Edgar and I are only contributing to the problem by expecting our fourth boy). There are 13 grandchildren and 9 of them are boys. Below is Abuelita with her four granddaughters. We celebrated Abuelita's birthday and Liliana's together. None of these sweet girls has a sister, but they all have at least one brother.

Tia Olivia (pictured) and Tio Sergio gave Lili a new bike for her birthday. Liliana was thrilled and our weather has been gorgeous--allowing for some lovely riding time.CELEBRATION WITH THE DAHLS: Our kids are so lucky (and so are their parents) to have a lot of members of our large families nearby. We always have two birthday parties: a Cobian one and a Dahl one. Two days before Lili's big day, we had the Dahl party. Isaiah drew these great pictures for Lili. We also had an extra Dahl celebration. Almost all of us were in Utah for the weekend (to celebrate our new niece's blessing in church) and we got together for dinner at Sizzler (Lili's choice) for a birthday dinner. I wanted to post more pictures here, but it takes far too long. Among others, Tabor, Katie, and sweet girls were there:

This table was a little rowdy as you can see. Lili had shyly told me she wanted me to tell the waitress it was her birthday. When I told the waitress, she said, "That's great," but there was no special ritual with clapping and singing. Marianne got us all singing happy birthday, though, and there were 24 of us present--we made quite a spectacle for Liliana's big day.

Edgar carved Liliana a lovely wooden box for her birthday. His woodworking hobby is my favorite so far. He made me a similar box for Christmas. Edgar is constantly surprising me with his many talents and with his desire to try anything he thinks might be interesting. If he looks a little tired in this picture, it's because he is. The poor man's been working a lot and he had just gotten home from his 16-hour day when I took this picture.

The day after Lili's birthday, we celebrated another great occasion--the blessing and arrival of our newest niece, Azure.

She's so delicate and lovely. It makes me so excited to have a newborn again. If I look like I've gained 60 pounds in this pregnancy, well, that's because I have.

The day of Azure's blessing was gorgeous and sunny. The kids mostly played outside and got very muddy. Marcos and his cousin Savannah are very good playmates. As always, Marcos insisted on being the mom and Savannah had to be the dad. I like to think he wants to be the mom because of the great role model he has. I make motherhood look like a blast!

My parents gave Ammon this adorable sweater and hat. This picture was taken just moments before Ammon dove face-first into the mud. Luckily, the mud washed out of his new duds. Speaking of Ammon, all he wants to do lately is go, go, go! He insists on wearing his coat and often his shoes in order to be able to go at any moment. He and Marcos have been trying to be the Lone Ranger (we've been watching Lone Ranger movies that my parents lent us). Here both boys are wearing hats they inherited from their Uncle Tabor.

Finally, here's a picture for my parents of one of the gorgeous moonrises they missed this week. I love a full moon, and it looks so pretty coming up over the snow-peaked mountain. Most of my posts will not be so lengthy--we've just had a lot to celebrate lately.

All Gussied Up

Edgar's sister Elsa got married last week and we finally got some family pictures taken with our new edition--who is none too new. He's already one, big as can be, and loves photo shoots about as much as his old man. Poor Lili's dress was supposed to be lilac-colored, but there was a mistake made somewhere along the line and the little girls' dresses came to us in pink--5 days before the wedding and from China. There was no time to send them back. Her dress was also about a foot too long. Thanks to a lot of help from my sister Marianne (okay, she finally just did it for me after I had to take out what I had done), I was able to hem it. The website from China advertised "Too many colors! Too many sizes!" Unfortunately, that proved all too true.

I also had a tricky run-in with a dress from China (different company). We hosted a foreign-exchange dress in lilac for a little over a week. It was a nice enough dress, but it didn't fit me. I e-mailed the company (there was no customer service phone number) and explained that I couldn't even get the dress zipped up. I had measured myself and was confident that I'd ordered the right size. They sent back an e-mail which said, in essence "prove it." I had to provide a picture of Edgar trying to zip the dress up on me. He had to hold a tape measure, showing that the dress was too small--not that I was too big. After that, they agreed to consider a return. I wasn't sure I'd have time to exchange the dress (it took 20+ days to arrive from China) and the shipping was costly, so I tried to sell the dress on ebay. I took a lovely picture of it on a hanger, but the hanger didn't do it justice. I tried copying the model's picture from their website, but it would only allow me to copy the bottom right hand corner. So I called Marianne (which is what anyone with that skinny sister in the neighborhood would do--she bails me out regularly and particularly when it comes to foreign formal wear) and asked her to pose for a picture. She's a good sport and was willing to do it. When she came over, I put the dress down on the counter. I didn't realize I had spilled oil there that morning when I had made pancakes. Marianne quickly noticed the dress was stained. Would anyone want to buy a stained lilac dress? I was distraught. We went ahead with the pictures--we were able to zip the dress up on slender Marianne. After she went home I noticed some of Edgar's orange soap that he uses to get grease off his mechanic's hands. Would that work on filmy foreign fabric? What did I have to lose? Lo and behold! It took that oil right out, leaving no evidence of my dirty counter! I confidently posted the dress on ebay. I had the option of inviting my facebook friends to view it. I chose not to--forgive me if you would have wanted that lovely gown. Days went by and then a week and nobody was remotely interested in my too-small evening wear. I decided to send it back to China. The company had kindly offered to pay up to half the price of the dress for it to be altered. I asked them to keep the dress and to give me what they would have to alter it. They surprised me by refunding the full cost of the dress and the cost of shipping it back to them on that slow boat. Actually, I speak too soon, They have said they will give me a refund, but I haven't seen it yet. In any case, it was fun to learn a little bit about Chinese culture by having that dress stay with us for a little while. She seemed to enjoy American culture as well, and she picked up English very quickly.

And now, lest you think Edgar doesn't ever smile, I captured him doing this when he didn't realize anyone was watching. Here he is with his brothers Sergio and Osvaldo:


Doesn't that smile look good on him?