This morning it is snowing, already four inches or so on the ground, and my two school-age children have been outside romping through the drifts in the front yard for 15 minutes, waiting for their walking buddies to show up. (This means that my previously pristine, smooth front lawn is now a riot of paths and bumps, and the trees have deliberately had all their snow shaken down upon young heads. What will the neighbors think? Gasp!)

I sent them to school by themselves when it became clear that the walking buddies weren’t going to show, and not thirty seconds later the very thing I had feared occurred – a neighbor mom in an enormous SUV saw them, pulled over, and offered them a ride.

I am outraged.

First of all, it’s five blocks to school. Six if you go the long way. It’s not hard for elementary school age kids to walk five blocks – in fact, they burn more than that amount of energy just zipping around getting ready in the morning (colliding, panicking, playing, hysterically laughing, and in the case of Preston RIGHT NOW, cuddling three light sabres and tucking them into bed.)

Secondly, KIDS LIKE SNOW. I know this comes as a surprise to those of us who don’t remember childhood. But I can guarantee that my kids, upon looking out the window this morning, did NOT think to themselves, “dammit, now I will be forced to frolic my way to school while pelting my siblings and friends with snowballs and sliding on the sidewalk in my snow boots.” They LIKE walking those five blocks in a magically transformed, white-purple world (which has miraculously become wholly edible overnight.)

And thirdly, and most outrageously, does that SUV mom actually think my kids are SAFER in an SUV which will go join a queue of a hundred other cars and SUVs, sliding on the slush with kids dodging before and behind as they unload? My kids are much, much safer walking to school than driving. Period. But most especially, they are safer in crappy weather like this. What to a driver is a harrowing death journey is to a child an enchanted wonderland. And yes, I am aware that my children probably won’t be injured because of that sheltered, heated, crowded SUV, but that doesn’t change the fact that they would have been better off outside of it.

When did Suburbia become like this? When my grandmother raised her children, she sought out a suburban neighborhood. The kids roamed in packs, playing night games and raiding fruit trees. Now, my children play outside alone unless a neighbor invites them in to watch TV or play video games. And in this lovely, soft snowfall, all the children in my neighborhood can only watch through tinted windows as they join the endless queue to drop them off immediately in front of the school doors. Heaven forbid they have to walk down the school sidewalk. They might have to do something inconvenient, like enjoy themselves.

It is my goal this year to double the amount of posts from last year. Unfortunately, I’ve been warned that posting about the two children we are currently fostering could land us in trouble, so I can’t borrow stories or pictures from home to post here. I don’t spend nearly as much time with the kids as Anne does, so maybe it’s for the best. I’m hoping she’ll have more cute happenings to relate regarding the Mimic and Captain Flail, but it might be a while before she can post them, since we’ve been both feeling a little overwhelmed at finding ourselves outnumbered so drastically.

I also can’t take the cheap and easy route of posting stories from my sister about her mission, so anyone reading this blog will have to take what they can get from me. I don’t set aside time to read a lot of books anymore. Nor do I watch a lot of movies or TV shows. I really can think of only three things I do in my spare time away from herding cats and children. 1) I read three or four comic books a month — I’m even on a first name basis with several of the employees at Night Flight. 2) After the kids go to bed, I usually play computer games. Some weeks I play all seven nights, some weeks not so much. 3) I have two separate groups of friends I play Dungeons and Dragons with. One group from the homestarmy and one group at work. So that is what I’m left with for content.

We had a little adventure around Halloween. The day before Halloween, we received a call from the Division of Family and Child Services saying they needed us for an emergency placement. A woman had been picked up for a minor transgression of the law, but she had given police no help in placing with family or friends the two children accompanying her. Since they had no other option, the children were placed in protective custody and were currently in a temporary holding place (that I won’t disclose on this blog). Unfortunately, the children only spoke Spanish and no one employed at said place could converse with them. So we were basically their only chance to live in a home with someone who could speak with them in Spanish, while their mom sorted out her problems. Of course we offered to take them in. The older was a five year old boy and the younger a three year old girl.

I picked them up that night and I found myself confronted with two very distraught children who had no idea what was happening to them, who I was, nor really where I was taking them. They’d seen their mother taken and handcuffed by police and then spent the night in a strange place unable to ask anyone for explanations. As I loaded them into my car, the little girl began to cry and say over and over, “Quiero con mama. Quiero con mama.” It was very difficult and heartbreaking to hear, especially because I had no idea when they would be reunited for sure. So we drove home and they fell asleep in the car.

I pulled into our driveway and they unfortunately woke up very frightened about being in yet another strange place. I got the little girl out of the car, but the little boy tried to run away. I caught him and dragged them both into the house. Anne had already put our boys to bed, so the two of us tried to comfort our guests, but ultimately had to settle for putting them to bed crying.

The next day went a little better. We had a fun Saturday starting out with cartoons and breakfast and then just playing with toys. I spoke with our little Spanish speakers and they seemed content to be surrounded by toys and other kids. They were both upset about naptime, but they both slept over an hour, so I didn’t feel too bad about it. They had been provided with a Tinkerbell outfit for the little girl and we had Captain Flail’s Optimus Prime outfit from last year for the little boy, so about 5:00 we set out to go trick-or-treating. The little girl got scared by all the dogs and the people answering the door in costume, so after about a half hour we went back home for dinner.

After dinner I set back out with Captain Flail and the little boy, while Anne watched the two younger kids and answered our door. We tricked-or-treated until the boys were exhausted. Our little guest eventually figured out how it worked and started racing Captain Flail from house to house to ring doorbells. We walked a little over two miles and they no longer wanted to knock on doors by about halfway back to the house. I had to carry their bags because they were so heavy, but they’d had a great time. They both fell asleep quickly.

The next day we had church which went okay. Anne is in the primary and they spent all their time practicing for the Primary Program in the chapel. A very nice lady in the ward watched both of them there in the chapel, so they kind of just hung out while the kids sang. I taught my usual Sunday School class for 12 & 13 year olds and then went to Priesthood. After church we had lunch and naptimes and then played for a while before heading out to Uncle Cary’s. They were very shy at first at his house and wanted to stay very close to Anne and me, but they eventually warmed up and started playing with Amanda. Cary was very nice about accommodating us and the kids were sad to go home.

Monday, I had to go back to work and I was praying that everything would go okay for Anne. She had to call or email me a few times about how to say a few things and by the time I got home she was exhausted, but she’d survived her first day alone with them. Tuesday went more smoothly in some ways because the kids were getting used to our routine, but that meant they were also no longer on their best behavior, so Anne was again exhausted, but the kids’ caseworker had called to say they’d be reunited with their mom the next morning. So Wednesday Anne drove them up to the DCFS offices and they went home with their mom. I guess the reunion was a little awkward, but I know the kids are happy to be back with their mom. I got the impression they were a little spoiled at home, so I didn’t feel bad in the least about sending them back.

It’s kind of weird to think I’ll probably never see those kids again, but it was a lot of work to care for four kids who were all aged so similarly. Of course, four kids of any age sounds like a lot of work, but we’re probably not too far off from that being a permanent thing for us. We’ve put in word with our Resource Family Consultant (our representative at DCFS) that we are ready for more kids. So we’ll see what happens.

I want to give a brief update on our Sister Missionary. She’s still trying to learn Spanish. As I recall, it took me quite a while to get over my bashfulness and to feel comfortable speaking with strangers in Spanish. I did better with my companions (who for the most part were native speakers and didn’t speak English.) Anyway, on top of that, she had this to say:

“This week I have just been landed in the most stressful situation I have ever been in. We had transfers on Friday, and I have a new companion. . .She speaks practically no Spanish whatsoever. She was switched from English the day after she got here from the MTC, which was about 6 weeks ago. And she is really struggling to learn. I have been able to learn pretty quickly, and the Lord has blessed me a lot, but I am still very far from being able to converse openly with people. And we are companions. I can make it through the first lesson okay, and the second and third lessons, if you were grading me, you’d give me a C+, so it’s passing, but it’s really not great.”

She’s also been stressed out about having someone come observe her and critique (hopefully constructively) her teaching methods. I guess her spirits are still pretty high though:

“[My] life is a roller coaster of stress and fun. The Lord really wants to make sure I am faithful or something! It will all work out, I know.”

I’ll miss her phone call home during Christmas this year, but I think she’ll be back with us next year.

"Mom," says Preston, "When I grow up I want to be a smuster."

"A mister?"

"NO! A Smuster!"

I pause for a moment before saying solemnly, "I do not understand what you mean." This is the only response that will prompt the child to rephrase, rather than to just repeat what he’s said more slowly and loudly, as if to an imbecile.

"You know Mom, when something is strange," he carefully rephrases, as if talking to an imbecile.

"When . . . something is strange." I have no idea what he’s talking about.

"Yeah. A smuster is for when something is strange," he says patiently.

"I do not understand what you mean," I say again.

There is an elaborate sigh, then a pause, then he bursts into song. "When there’s something strange in your neighborhood, who you gonna call? GO SMUSTERS!"

I thought I’d post a few pictures from our sealing. I still haven’t recorded my thoughts about it in my journal, and I hesitate to wax too sentimental here. I guess my biggest feeling that day was relief that all the work leading up to it was over. They’re my boys forever now and that means a lot considering where we were two years ago.

For his birthday dinner at Grandma’s, Mr. Mimic got to make pizza with all his cousins.

All the cousins making pizza.

The kids enjoy watching movies at Grandma’s during family dinner and Mr. Mimic got to watch “Ratatouille” which is his favorite.

Eating pizza downstairs.

He was very excited about his cake and I successfully caught this on film

He also got the usual Allen clan birthday song treatment

He got a shiny red bike for this birthday. . .

Mr. Mimic on his new bike.

. . .but his initial reaction was stunned (and tired because it was so early) disbelief

Thankfully, he warmed up to his bike later that day (we actually ended up trading in the original bike for a larger one.)

He is still riding around with training wheels, but I’m hoping to remove them within a couple months. In the meantime, he’s enjoying the feeling of riding a big boy bike and is slowly learning to keep up with his brother. We’ve enjoyed riding around the bike/jogging trail at the park a few blocks away.

I have birthday and sealing entries coming, but I didn’t want these videos to get left behind. My children have decided that since the dogs are the most loved creatures in the house, they will now be dogs.

Time passed, and the weather was cold and cloudy, even though it was getting into June. The bees were sluggish and we didn’t see them around much. In fact, if you didn’t know that there was a beehive in the yard, you never would have noticed they were there. They didn’t sting any dogs or children . . . in fact, they didn’t seem to do much of anything besides fly away in very straight bee-lines. That is, unless you went and stood right in front of the door. Then the little guard bees would turn toward you and jump forward with an intimidating little hop.

I stood by the hive one day watching the bees come and go, and I found the guard bees to be really interesting. There were only about four of them, and they went and felt all over the faces of all the incoming worker bees before they allowed them into the hive. Every incoming worker was greeted by that aggressive little hop from at least one guard bee – there was actually a queue to get into the hive, because the guards could only admit a few at a time. I learned that a worker bee starts her life as a nursemaid – when she is first hatched, her first job is to tend other hatchlings for about 10 days. Then if she performs adequately, she is promoted to guard bee. That’s probably why the guards took themselves so seriously – new promotion and all. Of course, the last and most important promotion she receives is worker, when presumably she is experienced and mature enough to fly herself from flower to flower and make her way back home, all in one piece. Having seen young teenage girls drive, I can see why the hive collective makes them earn the privilege of venturing out on their own.

I got hopped at countless times, but nobody stung me. A few workers flew into me, having left the hive just minutes earlier when I wasn’t standing there yet, and not having adjusted their little internal radars to the growth of a person-shaped obstacle. However, they just politely bounced off and bumbled around me to the hive. Everything was calm and working according to plan, until a wasp flew too close to the door. Suddenly, all four guard bees hopped aggressively at the wasp, their abdomens raised to the sky in the terrifying dance of all the bee warrior maidens. You would think that being so small they wouldn’t be as scary, but anyone who’s been followed and “buzzed” by a bee knows that they are single-minded in their purpose of destroying you if they can. That wasp left – and fast. Then the guard bees hurried back to the doorway and browbeat the few worker bees who had dared to get too close to the door in their absence.

As summer progressed the hive seemed busier and busier, and the Hansens came and added more “hive bodies,” which are the boxes that have the honeycomb holders inside of them. The hive grew from about 2 feet tall to about 4 feet tall. The Hansens looked inside the hive and found eggs, eggs, eggs. Not very much honey, but lots of babies! Apparently the queen was a “good layer” and was working really hard. I know it was because she felt me cheering her on. The bees got more noticeable in the yard, and Mom got stung twice (f she’d stop stepping on the bees, they’d stop stinging her) but no children, and not me! Yay! (The bees are apparently “Italian,” and thus very laid back and calm. Unless you cross them in love, and then they are pure passion! Just kidding. Bees do not love.)

Well, it turns out they don’t keep wasps out of the yard, they just keep them out of the immediate vicinity of their hive. And I can’t say if they help allergies, because by the time you harvest the honey for the year the flowers have all bloomed already, and you’ve already suffered through your sniffly months. But I can say that they pollinate the plants like crazy, and we recently harvested our first box of honey from the hive. The honey wasn’t brown, or gold. It was a light, clear color, like Karo syrup, and so sweet and delicious! The hive has grown from 6,000 confused bees to about 60,000 industrious workers (and there are a lot more than 4 guards for the doors now, too.) And if Mom can stop stepping on them, I think we will live in harmony for a long time to come.