Playing Mom and Dad - Take 2

Wow. I didn't think I'd be writing another post like this for at least a little while, let alone the next week. Mom Troff has been whisked away to Girl's Camp for the week and with Dad Troff working, Alyssa (my ALMOST 18 year old sister) working, Jeremy (my ALMOST 16 year old brother) at Cross Country High Altitude Camp, and Zachary (my ALMOST 13 year old brother) being so popular with the neighborhood kids that keeping him home is like trying to keep the paparazzi away from the celebrities... that left Kayden (my 10 year old brother) and Brynndi (my 3 year old sister) in need of someone to watch them. Grandma Dunford (my mother's mother) was kind enough to watch them during the day on Tuesday and Wednesday, leaving Thursday through Saturday for Jake and me.

But first: TANGENT! I held my first piano recital in quite a long time on Wednesday evening at the Piano Gallery. I had 27 of my students performing in two separate recitals and we had a turnout of about 110 people. Several of my students surprised me by playing their songs completely from memory at the recital even though they never mentioned to me at their lessons that they were thinking about it. Overall it was a great experience and I was very pleased with the performance of each of my students. They showed a lot of poise and displayed their learning to a great degree. I was quite impressed with the quality of many of the performances, especially considering that this was the first recital many of them have ever played in.

After the recitals were over, Jake and I set our course for my parent's house to pick up the little ones. It took us a while to find the bag that my mom packed for Brynndi, but we made pretty good time and got home shortly after 8:00 pm.

For those of you who don't know, Jake and I live in the West Valley area in a basement apartment. It is quite an old house but the landlady has kept it up beautifully. We have 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, a large kitchen, and a large storage room/laundry room. AND, if any of you know anything about old houses, for some reason they thought that it was stylish to change the carpet in every room. The carpet in our living room is tan, the carpet in our hallway is blue, and in our three bedrooms we have one with pink carpet, one with red carpet with black stripes, and one with a different shade of blue carpet than the hallway. I had told Brynndi the week before that when she came to stay with us she would get to stay in the pink room, and she was very pleased with the accommodations. We put Kayden in the red room (with the stucco patterned ceiling with sparkles mixed into it) on the Futon.

Because my Father in Heaven loves me so very much, it worked out that Jake had Thursday off this week. It was so nice to not be left alone to take care of two, very energetic, kids for the whole weekend. My brother Kayden is a chess champion and has 4 hours of chess practice to do each day - which he made sure he was up at the crack of dawn doing so that he and Jake would have plenty of time to play games.

Thursday is my longest piano lesson day and so I was gone for a good part of the afternoon, but Jake held down the fort. Brynndi spent a lot of time in the red room watching Disney movies on our computer while Jake and Kayden played Heroes of Might and Magic 3, Nintendo 64 Super Smash Brothers and Mario Kart, and some other old computer games. We had tacos on Thursday night which Jake made all by himself (YAY!) and we were visited by our very dear friends: Alaina Mills, Michael Anderson, and Harmony Hurst. After a great dinner and several rounds of Mario Kart, we wrapped up our first day of being Mom and Dad.

Jake was back to work bright and early on Friday morning. The kids and I spent the day watching movies and playing some games. Correction: Kayden and I spent the day attempting to hold Brynndi's attention for more than 5 minutes. She is an absolute little dear and I love her to death but, man oh man, that girl has energy. She must be going through a growth spurt right now because she is ALWAYS hungry. We had lunch on Friday (Brynndi ate an entire TV dinner by herself) and 15 minutes later she came and told me she was hungry again. She then proceeded to eat an entire banana and still munch on things throughout the day. She carried a box of Cheez-its around the house with her for most of the week until she had devoured the whole box.

Because Jake doesn't get off work until the mid-afternoon, I took the kids with me to piano lessons. Luckily it was right at the time of Brynndi's nap and she slept through all of my lessons. That gives Grandma less time to fill her with popsicles and candy and get her all hyper. (I teach lessons at my Grandparent's house.)

After a very exotic meal of chicken nuggets and instant potatoes, Jake, Kayden, and I played some Smash Brothers while Brynndi watched "Meet the Robinsons." We decided to celebrate the last night they were with us by taking them to the Leatherby's Family Creamery for dessert. Kayden and Jake shared a Daddy Doug's Banana Split (if you haven't seen it, it's HUGE) and Kayden ate HALF of it. Brynndi and I shared a Jill's Jersey (which Brynndi ate most of while devouring half a basket of fries.)

Because I have to park underneath a plum tree in our front yard, my car has been covered in plums and plum juice. After ice cream we found a gas station with a drive-thru car wash and got the best car wash we possibly could. Jake and Kayden scrubbed down the car with giant brushes before we even got into the car wash, and even after the most deluxe car wash ever... my car still has some plum remains on it. But the experience was highly entertaining for a few reasons: 1) I don't think Brynndi has ever been through a car wash that she remembers and so she was completely scared and the boys kept teasing her about sticking their heads out of the windows, 2) The back windows in my car have leaks and so both kids got severely dripped on. Jake and I were laughing hysterically as screams are emanating from the back. If anyone were to ask Brynndi what exciting thing we did last night she wouldn't say the ice cream; she would say that we got a car wash.

Today was our last half day with the kids and I spent most of it teaching while Grandma Dunford took care of watching Brynndi. Jake has to work from 5:30 AM - 2:00 PM today and so I am spending a few hours of time at my parent's house until he gets off.

Between our last mom and dad experience and this one I think that Jake and I have certainly learned a lot about the ups and downs of parenting. We are excited and nervous to welcome our own little bundle into our home, and we look forward to the many years ahead of us of great life-long learning experiences.