another sister post, actually.

So i recently got back from my sister Liz's house in Utah. I went up there to help her out with her...ahem....SIXTH baby. Her kid's ages are 10,8,6,4,2, and now two weeks! Welcome baby Cameron!

My new saying for my sister Liz is that she should be a pioneer. Seriously, the woman is such a trooper! I went up there expecting to swoop in and just save the day, you know, mop the floors while feeding the kids while Liz took a 3 hour nap. But apparently, when there are 6 people to take care of, that doesn't happen. I did what I could, but running that house is a lot of work! Oh, and did I mention that her husband is the first counselor in the Bishopric and a partner in his engineering firm. But my sister Liz is that stalwart Mormon mom that you just watch in awe. It is not unusual to find Liz grinding her own wheat to make 4 loaves of her homemade wheat bread (which she does regularly--that's all they eat!), canning 40 lbs. of chicken for her food storage, whipping up gourmet meals every night, monitoring one of her kids practicing piano while nursing her new babe, running all of her kids around the town, and baking baking baking. I'm not kidding--Liz loves to cook/bake. Her idea of a simple meal on a Tuesday night is Green Chili Burros. Sounds easy enough, right? But you take a roast, cook it in the crock pot all day, then shred it, and make it into tacos. Who's cooks a roast all day just to slap it into a tortilla? Liz does, that's who. Most of the delicious things I make are from Liz--like my lemon bundt cake, sugar cookies, pb brownie cupcakes, apple crisp, lasagna, homemade french bread, and casserole after casserole. She's amazing, she really is. And her kids are all so sweet and well behaved.

While up there I would watch her and I felt like her life right now is the life that I always pictured myself living. But living in CA, is probably never going to happen. She lives in Kaysville, where almost all of her neighbors are Mormon and have a lot of small kids. So her life is just one big carpool--I'm serious, all their kids are in soccer and school activities and cub scouts and preschool together--so she just calls one of her neighbors up and it is one big co-op of babysitting and car pools. There are kids running up and down the streets, her kids are in and out of the house from playing with all the neighbors, the phone is ringing off the hook for play dates--her house is full of noisy chaos. I dig it. Liz and her neighbors will call each other and say, "Big blocks of cheese are on sale right now at Dan's, I'll pick you up one." And then one of their kids will run it right over; meanwhile Liz is at Albertson's buying boxes of cold cereal for that same neighbor because it is 10/$10. I'm not joking here people.

But living in CA life is so different. There are no small kids in my neighborhood. We go on a walk around my house and it is a ghost town, except for old people walking their dogs. And play dates are naturally more of an ordeal because our kids just can't slam the screen door and run out to meet friends on the lawn. But I felt like Liz and her husband Justin have seen the bigger picture--their life revolves around their family (no cable!), and they do it so well. I would love to have a big family like that, but when I once voiced that out loud, my oldest brother Nate said, "Oh, you're not cut out for 5 kids." Yikes....tell me what you really think!

This post is running on, but here is a conversation Liz and I had that indicates how much more qualified she is than me to have lots of kids. I was telling her how I love the stage that Ezra is at right now. I said, "he is just so hilarious....like his tantrums are a crack-up! They are just so comical that they don't even piss me off yet." Liz started laughing, and was still laughing after a few seconds. I said to her, "What's so funny Liz?" And she said, "What do you mean pisses you off?" Sadly, I think she thought I was exaggerating about how I felt just to be funny. I said to her, "When your kids are having a huge tantrum, it honestly doesn't piss you off?" And in true pioneer fashion, she replied, "Well, I start to think, okay that's enough. Stop or your going to your bedroom...but I don't think I've ever been pissed." Ummm, yeah. I guess that little anecdote says it all.

anyway, kudos to Liz. It was so fun to spend time with her. She's a great big sister and I'm not kidding, the only thing I can cite about her to make her not seem like Polly Pioneer is that the woman loves a nap! She's a solid napper, and has no qualms leaving laundry unfolded and hittin' the sack with her new babe and her toddler. I'm not sure the pioneers took too many siestas, but as a nap lover myself, it just makes you that much more endearing Liz!