FOUR

Bean's 4th Birthday

Folding laundry has to be the most mind-numbing thing I do.  It is so boring!  Today as I folded piles and piles of clothes, I thought about how dramatically different things have been since I set my watch 4 minutes fast.  I'm suddenly on time to everything, Marcus never has to make a mad dash for the bus (he still has another week of school) and the chaos in our house has been significantly reduced. It's strange.  Life changing really.  Who knew four minutes could make such a difference?  I should've changed my watch years ago.  As I continued to fold laundry I thought I'd liven things up a bit and began to think if there were any other significant things in my life related to the number 4.  As my list quickly grew I realized I must be pretty desperate for mental stimulation if this was where my thoughts lead me.

Here's what I came up with:

4 - the number of years I knew Randy before we were married

4 - the number of miles I run on a regular basis

4 - the average number of times Landon used to wake me during the night for the first 16 months of his life

4 - the number of times I remind Ethan to practice the piano every day

4  - the number of times I flew from Japan to Utah to be with my mom after she was diagnosed with cancer

4 - the number of scars on my stomach from my surgery last summer

4 - the number of boys I hope to have someday

4 - (multiplied by 1,000) is the amount of money we estimate spending on fertility treatments to get baby #4 here.  FYI, Landon only cost us $600.  Apparently fertility clinics in Japan are much cheaper, in case you were interested.

4 - the number of places we've lived since we got married (Boston, D.C. Okinawa, Seattle)

4 - the number of sisters I have

4 - the number of loaves my mom's delicious wheat bread recipe yields.  I made some for my dad last week.  He took one bite, hung his head down, closed his eyes and said, "This tastes like Mom."  Then we both sighed and tried to think of something that would make us less sad.

4 - the number of hours it took me to run the only marathon I have ever run

4 - the number of times I listened to this Taylor Swift song while I typed this post