12 years of wonderful.

(The pictures are from your birthday party today- A trip to Cartlandia (evidently a portland hipster party?) and then what was supposed to be going to see "Adrenaline Rush" at OMSI, but they changed the movie and so instead we came home and watched a movie and hung out here. Happily you and your friends were fine with the change of plans!)


Dear Ainsley,

Twelve years ago today God made the world a better place. Yes, I am your mother, so of course I think that. But it is true. I have had twelve lovely years to watch you grow into an amazing person. You are sweet, kind, smart, and most importantly, have a heart that follows God.

Don't get me wrong, you are also on the verge of being a teenager. So you also have times of being awkward, pouty, and sometimes downright surly. But that is the way it was meant to be. You are learning how to operate in the world without us, and these are the growing pains. As we were going through a major temper tantrum throwing fit stage with Reagan a little over a year ago I though about how we celebrate like crazy as little kids develop and go though milestones like learning to walk. Yet, when they go through the milestones of developing their independence and the way they go through that is by throwing crazy fits we don't really celebrate much. Same way with teenager "issues." I'm trying hard that when these little things come up, to remember that it is just how God intended, minus the whole sin part. You are growing, and figuring out life for yourself. And I get to walk with you, be your cheerleader, and consultant. And it is such an amazing honor to get to do this with you.

Last month I celebrated a birthday with a zero on the end of it, so I guess it was a little bit monumental. As I was reflecting about turing 40, which when you are 12 seems so old, I thought about what I would go back in time and tell myself when I was younger. What is amazing is, I get the opportunity to in some ways do that by talking with you. Not in the creepy, mom re-living her life through her child, sort of way. But in a "here is what I've learned, I wonder what you are going to learn," sort of way. I am constantly amazed at how well you take instruction, and how you really care about what your dad and I think. You really are wise beyond your years. 

The past year has really been pretty great. The year before was filled with lots of drama, and we had really braced ourself for it as you started middle school this fall. However, much to our happy surprise, this year has been very pleasant. There have of course been issues, but for the most part you love school, your friends, and your family. For the first time since kindergarten you didn't play soccer. You played in your first tennis tournaments, which were a great experience, even if you didn't bring home a trophy. You played basketball, which dad coached again. Having him coach you is such a special thing for the two of you. You also did "Battle of the Books." Which was a team you were on that read a set of books and then went to a competition with questions about them. Being the amazing little reader that you are, you pretty much killed it at this. You were your schools team captain and your team did better than any other team from our district has done before. You are also in the midst of practicing for the school musical you got a part in. This drama production has lead to some actual drama, but we are hoping overall it ends up being a good experience. That is still up in the air right now though. 

A whole new world has been opened up to your dad and I. That is because you now babysit! You can stay home and take care of your siblings. It is wonderful. You are great at it, and now are doing it for other families as well. It is a fun stage to be in. You help with your siblings so much. Someday you are going to be a great mom. The way you can get your siblings to do what you want is masterful. We are going to call it motivation, not manipulation. (Pretend I'm inserting a little smiley face right here.)

You get great grades and are very responsible. We couldn't be happier with how hard you work and what a great student you are. As parents though we have some learning to do. I still feel terrible about when you brought home your mid-term progress report. As you showed it to dad and I, and it was all A's, we both noticed that there were two assignments in one class that you had C's on. You still had a very high A in the class, yet we pointed out these two assignments and asked what happened. You looked at us and got tears in your eyes, and at that moment I realized I was being a HORRIBLE parent. I'm still so sorry. We are so proud of you for being they lovely girl you are, no matter how you perform on anything. We love you because you are a precious child of God that he blessed us with being able to parent. I'm sorry we mess up, we just want to be the best parents we can be for you. I hope you look back and know that above all, we love you immensely and would do anything for you. 

The thing that I am most excited about is that in February you and Hudson both got baptized. You accepted Christ actually when you were four, but we have had you wait for awhile to actually get baptized. It was such a special experience, and we are so happy and excited for you. Tonight as I was driving your friends home from your birthday party you were all talking about how awesome Trout Creek Bible Camp is, and how you all want to be counselors. It makes me so excited to think about how your life is going to impact the Kingdom of Heaven. I've probably written about this verse in a previous one of your birthday letters, but if I did it bears repeating. Jeremiah 29:11 says, "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and give you  hope and a future."

 That seems like such a perfect thing to think about as you navigate through the middle school years. God does have great plans for your future Ainsley Grace. I am so happy I get to watch it happen.

I love you so much,

Mom.

P.S.- I notice as I go back through this letter a glaring omission. It is that I didn't use the word epic even once. Considering how often it comes out of your mouth this is a travesty. Someday this may make no sense, but Ainsley, you are EPIC! 

A 2012 review addition

I forgot something I don't want to forget in the 2012 review. In October Reagan got her tonsils out. Really I want to remember this because someday all my children's spouses will owe me big for giving them a husband or wife that is not the nightmare snorer that they would have been had we not gone through the major drama of taking out their tonsils. To my future children in-laws, your welcome. No matter what sort of crazy things I do as a mother-in-law, at least I did this for you. And I also helped put our ENT"s children through college.

As it was with the other three, the tonsils are a nightmare for a few days then it was over. But the few days are really not much fun. The story I want to remember, or actually I should try and forget, is leaving the hospital.

Reagan was hardly a cooperative patient. She hasn't been great in any doctor or dentist office yet, and so I knew the hospital would be even worse. With all three of the other kids we declined getting the pre-medicine, but I knew with her we would have to do it. I was right to not do it with anyone else because the waking up process was much worse.

She actually went back into surgery fine, the anesthesiologist put a Dora cartoon on his ipad and she had never seen Dora before and was memorized. It went downhill from there. While she was in surgery the nurse explained that when she came back she would have to do a series of things before being discharged including get up and walk and eat a popsicle.

Not long after, Dr. Wobig came out to tell us the surgery had gone great, and he was just shocked at the size of her tonsils and adenoids and he was so glad we took them out. A few minutes later they brought out a super sweet, sleepy little girl to us. Then she woke up.

As she was waking up she became very agitated. She did not want the pajamas on, but also didn't want hers put back on her. She certainly did not want the IV port in, yet didn't want the nurse to touch her. That was fun. She did take one bite out of the popsicle, and promptly spit it out at the nurse. Great parenting moment.

After about 45 minutes she was finally just fully screaming and thrashing around. The nurse said, I think you should just take her home. At that point she had completed a total of zero of the things the nurse originally said she needed to to do be released. That nurse, who was very nice, could not get us out of the quick enough. She handed us our discharge papers along with the post-surgery instructions and said over Reagan's screaming, "you've done this before so you don't need me to go over this with you. If you have any questions just call your doctors office."

We headed out with Andrew carrying our stuff and me carrying Reagan, and by the time we were out in the main hall before the elevators I couldn't physically hold her anymore. We switched and that totally put her over the edge. She was screaming, hitting, scratching, and trying to bite Andrew. She was in a crazy drug induced fit. We made it down the elevator and into the main atrium of Providence Hospital. That big room goes up multiple stories of open air and her screaming just echoed to a deafening level. Everyone, everywhere stopped to watch us, I'm sure they were looking at her to see which appendage had been removed from this child because that is the only explanation for the noises coming from her. Andrew and I just sort of shook our heads and laughed, because what else do you do.

Finally, we reached the car and had a bigger problem, getting her in her carseat. Two grown adults could not get a two year old in the carseat. She was so out of her mind and amazingly that translated into super-human strength. She made herself as straight as a board and we couldn't get her shoved down into the seat. I seriously worried that even if we got her in that the seat belt in her carseat might not hold her. Fortunately one time she stopped for a breath and we caught it at the right moment and were able to shove her little rear-end into the seat and get her in. She continued to scream for about 10 minutes and then almost instantly fell asleep.

Fortunately, the trip out was really the worst of it. The first two days were pretty okay, then days 3, 4, and 5 were pretty miserable and they slowly got better from there. All in all it took a good 10 days for her to get back to normal.

As I've said many times, I wish in our genetic soup we had created something else that was crazy amazing, rather than the size of the lumps of tissue in our kids sinus cavities, but at least it is something that is (relatively) easy to fix. I found on our hospital bills (I was more careful about checking them this time because our insurance is so bad now our deductible means we paid for most of it) that they charged us $17.85 for the half of a popsicle that they gave Reagan. The very one she only took one bite out of then spit at the nurse. We didn't get a surcharge for abusing the nurse, so I suppose I should be happy about that.

And now when you listen to Reagan sleep she doesn't sound like an old man. Success. Future spouse, you owe me awesome grandchildren.

2012 in review- or for the first time.

I am official a failure at blogging. I had planned to do a year-end-wrap up in December to make up for not really blogging anything last year... and here it is, Feb. 4th and I'm just now doing it. While I do a scrapbook of pictures, this is the only place for me to write down a little longer information about what goes on in our family. So I'm going to go ahead and give it a shot- here are some things I don't want to forget about 2012. 

Easter- If it doesn't rain, it is a good Easter Egg hunt! We had the Sunday School crew all come over for a hunt in the greenway. It was very fun. 

And no rain even on Easter day. Cute kiddos. 

Andrew turns the big 4-0! We celebrated with a limo ride. We took the kids out first and drove around Damascus. 

They thought it was really fun. At first Reagan was totally confused, and a little worried. She was probably wondering why she was in a car without a carseat. Then she got on board. Ainsley spent most of the time talking in a British accent. Pretty funny. Then we dropped off the kids, and picked up Eric and Cyndi and Ryan and Jenne and went downtown for dinner. It was really fun!

Our kids LOVE going to "big kid" parties. The end of the tennis season party is probably their very favorite. For the past 6 or so years we have been lucky enough to have it at the Helm's house. Swimming with the big kids is fun, but they especially like hanging out in the hot tub. 

Camden went to preschool at Barlow, with Mrs. Dupuis as his teacher. It was a great experience. We always knew he was a really smart kid, but we also know he is a busy kid, so we didn't know exactly how school would go. Turns out it was amazing. He was a perfect little student and always did great. Except that time he snuck out of class. During calendar time one day in May he actually left the classroom. A student found him in the parking lot at Barlow on his way to daddy's classroom. When we "talked" to him about what in the world was going on, he calmly explained that he was going to Dad's class because he was sick of calendar time. He didn't understand why the kids couldn't figure out that Tuesday always comes after Monday. Of course. We took his graduation picture in front of the calendar. 

Hudson on his last day of school with his teacher, Mrs. Terveen. The cool thing is I was job-sharing with Laura back when I was pregnant with Hudson, and then she ended up his second grade teacher. 

Ainsley with her fifth-grade teacher on the last day of school, and the last day of elementary school at Deep Creek. The last day that is, unless it becomes a K-8 school and she moves back. We will see. 

While our kids started playing tennis at about 4 and have always been on soccer and basketball teams, playing in their first tennis tournaments this year was a big deal. It is quite a bit more pressure to be out on the court all alone than it is to be on a soccer field with a whole team. They both did great and can't wait to do it more. 

We again did fireworks stands with the Strandbergs. It was a great year. We have, however, turned our children into little fireworks freaks. Ainsley and Hudson love to come and work at the tent. This year Ainsley started making posters and little displays that said "Our favorites" and "Ainsley's Picks." After Camden had left one day I discovered that he too had made a display of his favorites, and then taken a pen and written signs with arrows all over the tables pointing to his display that say "Camden Picks." It was so cute, even if it was graffiti. Good thing the tables aren't exactly high quality and that the rental company probably didn't notice. 

Ainsley went to Trout Creek Bible Camp for the second year and loved it again. It is quite possibly the highlight of her year. Sarah, Natalie and Lainie went with her. It was so much fun. She still talks about it and remembers different things to tell us about it months later. So happy she gets to have that experience. 

CALIFORNIA!

Grandma and Grandpa took us to Disneyland! The first day we got to go play at the Santa Monica beach and for the first time our kids got to experience playing on a WARM beach. The Oregon coast will never be the same again. 

We have so many fun memories of Disneyland I don't even know where to start. It was the perfect Disney vacation. The kids were amazingly good, the weather was perfect, and everything went basically exactly as we had planned. We were there for five days. We did three days going back in the evening for the night shows, Fireworks, Fantasmic, and World of Color. The kids really loved all the rides. Ainsley, Hudson, and Camden even all loved California Screamin', Space Mountain, and Ainsley and Hudson even did Tower of Terror. Reagan loved every ride she could go on, she was a total dare-devil. 

Speaking of Reagan, we thought taking a 2 year-old was going to be difficult at best. She however, was AMAZING! She was delightful pretty much the whole time. Before we left I cut her special blankie into fourths so if we lost it we had more, and so that we didn't have to take the whole thing everywhere. It worked perfectly. She slept a few days in the stroller, and pretty much just went with the flow. She loved everything she saw and did. We realized she didn't really know any of the Disney characters though, but she still loved them. Whenever she saw Micky Mouse she would shriek, "Mousey!" She wasn't scared of anything. We even took her in the Haunted House and she said over and over, "Is this scary?" I just kept saying, "No, it is just fun." And she would say, "Okay, and laugh." 

I think the thing I've been the most surprised about is how much Reagan still (6 months later) talks about Disneyland. She remembers so much and will say, "I love California Adventure." Or whatever part she is thinking about. She rode the Ariel ride so many times I can't even count because she did that quite a bit when there were rides she couldn't go on, one time Grandpa took her and just stayed on it three times in a row, waving off the employees telling them that they weren't getting off. She love it so much. 

We were so happy that all three boys got chosen to do the Jedi Academy. We were worried about what would happen if one or two got picked, but not all of them. Fortunately they all did- and loved it. The battled Darth Vader very bravely!

Eleison and Camden couldn't get along better. They have so much fun together. As they get older they will probably not be as good of friends because they are a boy and a girl, but for right now we are enjoying what great friends they are. 

It was such a fun trip that everyone will always remember.

We love going to the beach each summer with the Strandbergs.

Our hike to drift creek falls when were were there was awesome. So awesome, Camden didn't even need a shirt.

Really it is the moms that make the whole thing happen. It is so great to spend time together just relaxing, or you know, cooking for everyone!

The very tough Pate men.

After a great summer it is hard to go back to school, but the kids were pretty excited. Ainsley got to start middle school and we braced for the "middle-school" experience. We are five months in at this point and it has been pretty much wonderful. She has great teachers, works really hard, and has fun friends. Sixth grade has been gloriously drama-free and a positive experience. We hope it continues this way! She started playing the flute in band, and her teacher is Mr. Evans. I taught his youngest daughter (who is now a college freshman!) in first and second grade. I must say, a beginning band teacher has to have the patience of Job. Hudson started 3rd grade and gets to have Mrs. Manzella who he also had for kindergarten. This is good news for him, but was sad news for Camden who was expecting to have her. Instead Camden started out kindergarten a little rocky because he wanted Mrs. Manzella, and instead got a teacher that, to put it mildly, needed to be done teaching. She lasted five days. On day six she didn't show up. It ended up perfectly because Mrs. Brier, who had retired a few years before after teaching kindergarten at DC for 20+ years agreed to come back and just teach his class. She is exceptional and she adores Camden. It has been a great year so far for him.

Ainsley's first band concert. 

A very cool thing we found out the night before school started was that Andrew won the Oregon State Social Studies Teacher of the Year Award. He got lots of recognition, including an article in the Oregonian. His assistant principal is who nominated him. One of the best lines from the letter he wrote was, "If Andrew doesn't walk on water, it is only because that won't help his students do better in their social studies classes." It was a great honor. 

Halloween costumes have become trickier for older kids we have found. Reagan was thrilled with a pink princess dress, Camden and Hudson both found inspiration from Disneyland. Hudson is Indiana Jones, with his hat, whip, and gun purchased in D-land, and Camden is a pirate with his hat also from there. Ainsley ended up settling on being a Greek goddess. They all had a great Halloween. 

And then there is Christmas. Easily one of the most memorable parts was Camden getting to do the opening prayer at the Cornerstone Church Christmas Pageant. Weeks of agonizing over the prayer because he said he didn't know what to say. He finally settled on something, but never would say it for me. On the way to church that morning I ask him to practice it and he said, "It is a prayer mom, your just supposed to say whatever pops into your head to talk to God." At that moment I about died. I think I held my breath from then until he uttered Amen at the end of his perfect little sweet prayer. He said (what he practiced) "Dear Jesus, thank you for coming down to earth to be born in a manger. And than you for dying on the cross for our sins. Thank you for Christmas. Amen." 

Hudson's job was to carry the tent-thing over the wise men. He got to do it with Jackson, so it was perfect. 

 The program couldn't have been cuter.

 Christmas morning we were at home with just our family. It was really fun. The kids had a great time.

 Then we went to Salem to spend the afternoon with Grandma, Grandad, Great-Grandma, and Auntie Kate.

 The next morning we headed to Milton-Freewater for a week. We celebrated Christmas again and had so much fun with Grandma, Grandpa and the Zieglers. Our kids were more excited about seeing their cousins than Christmas presents by far. That makes me happy.

I know I didn't include tons of things, and probably some big things that deserve to take the place of some things here. But at least it is something! I can (maybe) do a blog post here and there without feeling like it is weird because I skipped all of last year. We were very blessed in 2012 and love our little family.