Birthdays

 This week, we celebrated Evelyn's fifth birthday. It's hard to believe (don't moms always say this?) that it's been five years since her unexpected advent into the world. (She was a full month early--arriving just one day after my parents left town for vacation).

Since I was planning on heading up north for the LDStorymakers writing conference on Evelyn's actual birthday, we celebrated it early. Ever since Andrew had his last birthday party at the local aquatic center, Evelyn has been wanting to have hers there as well. However, a bunch of seven year olds is a very different proposition from a bunch of five year olds. Evelyn had two friends come, plus an older brother of one friend to keep Andrew company. She had a lovely time, but I spent most of the time feeling like I was trying to herd cats--at any given moment, one of the three five year olds was off doing their own thing and I'd have to try and corral them together again.

Oliver also thoroughly enjoyed the water, though he was pretty exhausted by the time we finished.

Thursday morning, a friend and I drove up to Provo, with Evelyn and Oliver in the back seat (Andrew stayed with his dad, since he did not want to miss his school field trip on Friday). I spent most of Friday and Saturday at the writing conference, while my mom watched my two younger kids. This was, I realize, a very generous gesture on her part, especially since Oliver invariably refused to drink the milk I left for him.

I can't speak for how the others enjoyed their Friday and Saturday--Andrew had his field trip, Evelyn had a tea party with her cousins, Dan worked--but I had a (mostly) lovely time at the conference. Some of the sessions I went to were enormously helpful; some were less helpful, but the reviews were still useful. And it was fun to see writing friends and meet new ones. (I've said more about it on my other blog, but I don't want to bore readers who aren't interested).

I arrived home late Saturday night to an interesting challenge: I wound up taking Oliver to the ER just before midnight for croup; Evelyn might have pink-eye (although her eye looks much better today than yesterday); and Andrew has a nasty cough. And of course, in the midst of all this sickness, Dan had to leave early this morning for a work-related trip. Happy mother's day!

(Really, happy mother's day. My own mother helped salvage mine by arriving here this evening to help with the sick kids for the next few days).