Monday, February 28, 2011

So now I'm a clutz.

I cheered for the better part of my life, real cheering, not flitting around on the sidelines in a skirt. This was tumbling, tossing girls above my head, competition kid of stuff. I never so much as pulled a muscle. Yesterday I was cooking rice that started to boil over so I stepped up onto my ottoman and hopped over our babygate.....and fractured my stinking ankle. Seriously, athletics for my whole life and I got my first real injury cooking rice.

I screamed...a lot. And I think it scared Lou and Squish pretty bad. Squish came running up to the gate and asked Lou to help him over and then he sat next to me (while I writhed in pain) and gave me a back massage. How sweet can a little fella get?

Lou has stepped up big time. He drove me to urgent care and took the boys while I was there and today he has taken off work to be the full time dad while I laid in bed popping pills. It was actually kind of nice to have a day in bed, but also tough to hear all the giggles and fun that I was missing.

Squish is confused as to why I'm only wearing one special boot. He keeps telling me to put another one on.

OH! And to add insult to my injury, Lou put the Bear down for his nap today....which lasted almost 2 hours.

Gaggi comes tomorrow to be my reinforcements, and after that I'm going to have to figure out how to chase these boys down with the boot on. Good times!

Sunday, February 27, 2011

Jellystone Park

I am a bad blogger because I have no pictures. I discovered that all the pictures I've been e-mailing from my phone are running up my phone bill. Hubby isn't too thrilled with that. And since I use his work computer I can't download my camera software to it. So I can't post the great pictures I took of our super great day yesterday.

We went to Jellystone park, which I should have known about way sooner. It was $9 for our whole family to get in and we had such a great time! Squish played on several different playgrounds, Bear sat in the mulch and played with sticks (he's always super content to do that) Then we went to the reptile show where squish got to pet lizards and snakes and all kinds of gross stuff. Bear got to sit and talk to a turtle. Squish got to sit on the back of a HUGE tortoise. He thought it was the coolest thing ever. We got to ride the train (or as Squish calls it the "sue-sue sane") We had a little picnic lunch and then headed home for nap. Special thanks to Jen who sent me home with her cookie pie. The only way we could coax Squish to the car was to promise him a bit of "soc-wet pizza"

Once we got home from this big adventure Bear napped for 40 minutes, which I call a win (unfortunately) An Squish had to be woken up at 4:00!

Friday, February 25, 2011

Friday Nite Leftovers

- Last night I told Squish to clean the living room. I even gave him detailed instructions as to how he should go about cleaning the living room. He walked in, surveyed the mess, gave a HUGE sigh and said "Here goes nothing" I have no idea where he got that phrase from.

-Lou and I walked in to see him sleeping last night and the reality that he is really a little boy and not at all a baby anymore hit us like a load of bricks. It made my uterus hurt.

- I have this fear that my Squish is going to be a player when he's in his teenage years. He is such a proficient flirt at this tender age...it can be going nowhere good.

- At our play date today Bear pushed around this very light and not at all steady kid sized stroller frame...further solidifying my belief that he can, in fact, walk. He's just choosing not to to spite me.

-We are contemplating a trip to the circus this weekend (insert your comments about the mistreatment of the animals here____) I think Squish would love it but I'm not sure how well Bear would do sitting for that long.  It is always fun to do this kind of stuff because Lou grew up in a super small town and has never done any of it either, so it's like taking 2 kids for the first time and seeing their excitement.

- This sometimes becomes a problem, because Lou tends to get very distracted by shiny things. So it's like taking 2 kids for the first time and having to keep them looking forward, walking in a straight line, not running into people, staying with mommy....I'm thinking one of the kiddie leashes would be a good thing for both of them.

-I'm so looking forward to Lou being home for a couple of days...this parenting by yourself thing is for the birds. I'm not looking forward to two more months of it.

-Since I'm parenting by myself, I have no energy to cook anymore. I feel like all my boys ever eat anymore is chicken nuggets and fish sticks. That heavens for play dates at Jen's house so they can get some variety in their diet. Lou and I have had frozen pizza twice this week and I believe well go for number 3 tonight. And there will be wine....and Ben and Jerry's ice cream. Ahh bed time, I can hear your seductive voice calling my name right now.


For more leftovers, go check out Danifred...who is far cooler than I

http://sippycupsarenotforstarbucks.blogspot.com/

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Don't they know how important I am??

I realize that my little corner of the world is a small one. I realize that only within these four walls do I matter more than all else. I realize that the world outside of these walls is not going to stop turning just because I need a break and my boys need to sleep.

But for the love of God, this racket has to stop! As I type (and the little Bear cries) there are men in the yard behind us cutting down a MASSIVE pine tree. There is no hope of my cranky baby getting a nap, every time he settles down they rip out a chain saw. And of course this project can't be done without a sufficient amount of yelling at the guy in the top of the tree. They just pulled the largest branch right down on the deck, taking the whole side rail off...you can bet that stirred things up around here.

These people have no respect for my sleep. They let their dogs bark all day and night. When I was fighting the pregnancy insomnia (both pregnancies) I got to lay in bed for hours in the dead of night listening to it.

I am not a girl who expects the world to revolve around my children. We don't let Squish run like a fool through stores and restaurants. We quietly sneak out if Bear gets fussy during church. I am discreet when I breastfeed in public.  So I'm thinking, if I make all those adjustments the rest of the time... why can't I just ask people to shut down their lives for naptime like we do??

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Mommy Princess (a bullet-y blog)

Squish keeps bringing me a toy that he wants fixed (because he's making a game of breaking it) and saying "fix it Mommy Princess" Boy that kid has me figured out, I'd give him cake and booze for breakfast when he's being so sweet:)

Bear took a 45 minute nap today. He woke up and fussed several times but the key is HE WENT BACK TO SLEEP!

Squish wanted to be Woody today so he wore his cow print vest and cowboy hat to story time at the library. He was a hit.

No matter how many things I give Bear to put in his mouth that he is actually allowed to put in his mouth, the kid keeps trying to eat playdoh. This is why we can't often play with it.

Squish keeps telling me that Woody is "the tooty-est cowboy in the whole wide world" I realize that he's going for "rootin-est tootin-est" but I like this better.

He has dubbed his Pop as "the eagle emper zurt" (evil emperor Zurg...for when I read this in 10 years and have no idea what he meant)

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Jesse the Outlaw

After weeks of enduring his shrieking about it, I broke down and got Squish a Jesse doll. He has Buzz and Woody, so it's only fair that the set be complete. He got it yesterday when he got home from Gaggi and Pop's house. He was super excited all day. And then it happened...Lou made a rookie mistake and let squish take Jesse (the TOY, complete with pull string voice box) to bed with him. I knew if I tried to reverse this decision I would succeed at two things    1.make my two year old hate me (thus solidifying my status as "bad cop" and Lou's status as "man who works for me and gives me whatever I want")    2.start up a screaming fit that was sure to wake Bear (and probably the rest of the street.)  So I said nothing, and I listened to Squish and Jesse's adventures until he finally fell asleep at 10:00.

At 3am I am awakened by the shrill voice of Joan Cusack "YEE HAW!!!" and I listened to the adventures of Jesse and Squish until 4am. This time I gave Lou an earful about making decisions as a father, not as a friend and reminded him that since he won't be home for the rest of the week I will be the one who gets to fight the battle of "No Jesse in bed" probably everynight. Thanks for that, dad.

At 6am....you guessed it. The posse saddled up to ride again. I'm thinking of posting reward posters.

My saving grace is that he has somehow managed to bust the battery cover off the back of her head and now she can't talk. Sometimes it's glorious to have rough little boys.

Sunday, February 20, 2011

So I won't forget...

Bear gets super excited about things. So excited that he doesn't really know how to process it. These things are usually me or Lou...or his big brothers room. His way of dealing with it is to crawl at warp speed towards whatever it is that he's so excited about but the joy overwhelms him before he gets there and he just starts crawling in circles. Poor thing can't even begin to deal with being in Squish's room, he just wants to get at everything in there and ends up doing about 5 minutes of almost getting there, turning circles, finding something else exciting, rushing for it, crawling in circles, finding something else exciting, turning circles....

Cute baby Saturday (the sunday morning edition)

This little man is after my own heart....

Friday, February 18, 2011

friday nite leftovers

-Squish has developed this really REALLY country accent on is "ow" words. He says it like A-yow (with an emphasis on the long A) so he'll say things like "are we going to out hayows (house) or put me dayown (down)." I'm so unsure as to where he picked this up. I have a bit of twang, but it's nothing that bad!

-We did a play date with the little boys I used to keep today. Squish had so much fun it made me almost depressed that i don't work there anymore. His life would be magic if he could play with those boys 3 times a week. And mine would be magic if I was making a little money!

-I said this once this week but it bears repeating. If I knew I was dying and had to write a bucket list right now....Among other things it would include these three: brush my teeth before noon, take a shower two days in a row, poop without a two year old at my feet. It's gross, but true

-I got a lot of sewing done this week, turns out that Bear digs his pack-n-play, which I never expected. He spent about 40 minutes in there while Squish was at school and I did some sewing for a friends baby shower.

-Lou has decided that his favorite evening activity is watching me play Mario Brothers on the Wii. My thumb throbs as I fall asleep each night.

The calm after the storm

This post is supposed to be for thursday...my days are running together trying to get it all done!

I've been doing some cry it out with the little Bear. I did not come upon this lightly or without trying everything else first. It's heart breaking to hear him crying in his room, but I know he is a child who needs sleep because he's such a miserable son of a gun when he doesn't get it. Going in to get him is one of my favorite parts of the day. He isn't mad at me, he doesn't look scarred for life. He just reaches up for me, knowing that we are about to go sit in th rocker in the quiet corner of his room and snuggle.  When he has been sufficiently snuggled we play the cutest game. I lay the rocker back and sit him on my belly and he gets this super cute grin just before he spreads his arms, throws himself down on my chest and hugs me.Squish wasn't a hugger this early so I feel like it's a special treat to get hugs from an 11 month old. Then he starts in on the kisses, which are really just wide open mouth/slobber on your face things that are totally gross and really make my day.

Squish got his hair cut yesterday. Lou had all he could take of hearing how pretty our little girl is. The girl who cut it had blue streaks in her hair and I asked Squish if he was going to get blue hair too. For the rest of the day I heard about how upset he was because "that gurl did not give me bue hair"

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Desperately seeking a nap

As I write, Bear has just woken up from his third consecutive 30 minute nap.  He was up twice last night and then up for the day today at 5:45. I have exhaused my options, and my sanity. With Lou coaching baseball and leaving before the boys get up and then not returning home til after they've gone to be, nap time is literally the only break I get all day long...and 30 minutes just wont cut it. I can see him on the monitor, rocking and crying and laying down...but never going back to sleep. I even gave him some benedryl today (an option I don't often employ but I am desperate). To add to the insanity, he is waking his brother up, which makes for some really tough afternoons. I've tried gentle solutions, I've tried reading every stinkin book out there, I've tried cry it out. NOTHING has worked to get this child to nap. And I could eventually resign myself to this if he wasn't so miserable to be around when he's tired.

In keeping with my plan to get out of the house as much as possible, we went to pre-school story time at the library today. I was hoping to meet a couple of other stay at home moms and maybe find a little boy playmate for Squish. We were the only boys in the room, it seems like it's always that way. As per usual, Squish latched on to a little girl and played like crazy. And I think that's wonderful but my little man has nothing in his life except for little women. Thankfully at the very end a mom walked in with two little boys. We talked and I'm hopeful for some play dates, which lets face it, are the saving grace for the sanity of stay at home moms everywhere.

Sunday, February 13, 2011

I want my Wibef!

Well ,it has happened. My son has realized that his girlfriend is gone. There was mention made on friday because he noticed that his dvd player was missing from the car, then on saturday he asked to "go see Wibef-es Jesse" and today...full on meltdown. "Where's my Wibef? I want to see mine Wibef!!" I'm trying to explain that Wibef is at Disney World...but that's really just salt in the wound.

Saturday, February 12, 2011

Nuts!

Well, the Bear is allergic to peanuts. Thanksfully it's not a severe allergy and the doc. says he might grow out of it. But no peanut butter sandwiches for him for the next year atleast. That's such a toddler diet staple. He isn't allergic to tree nuts so I guess we'll look into almond butter. I just love peanut butter so much, especially when pair with chocolate...I have these visions of my self sneaking into the closet to eat peanut butter cups like some renegade.

Squish had a man day with Pop while I was at the doctor with Bear. They had breakfast at IHOP then they went to feed the geese at the park and then to the "man store" (Home Depot) While at the man store Pop was looking at backhoes to put in a fence and the guy who is in charge of rentals came out and gave Squish a keychain with a bobcat on it and showed him how the "diggers" work. I believe it was a good day to be a little boy.

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Oh No!!!

We are a peanut butter family. I love the combo of chocolate and peanut butter and will chose that for dessert whenever I'm given the chance. Lou has a peanut butter sandwich for lunch every day, Squish has them most days. Bear started on it a couple of weeks ago. And then yesterday he had a reaction to it. His face turned red all over and he broke out into hives that were the size of the pad of my thumb.  He's going to get tested Friday morning, I sure hope he isn't allergic to peanuts, we eat so very many peanut products around here!

On a brighter note, he took his first honest to goodness step yesterday too. I had a cookie. He wanted it. He took one good step to get to it. I still didn't give it to him. I'm holding back on the sweets until his first birthday.

Today I coaxed him with a graham cracker and he took four steps in a row! I did let him have the cracker:)  And it was nice because Lou is home today helping me monitor the peanut situation so he got to see it.

Monday, February 7, 2011

One more for the line-up

Bear can say the normal words for an 11 month old....
Mama
Dada
Bye Bye

and one thats not so normal...
Tuh Duh! (which is touchdown. He throws his arms in the air like a ref and grunts this one out.)

Tonight we added a new one....
Uh oh

and he is so cute when he says it:)

Playing together (for now)

Squish let Bear into his world this morning. They played Buzz Lightyear (Lou was Zurg, or "Zurt" as Squish calls him). They all three ran around the living room (well, to be fair Bear crawled. He still has no interest in walking) Squish fired his lazer. Bear (at the tender age of 11 mos) has already learned to play guns. Such is life in a house full of boys, I guess. Can't walk or talk yet but he knows to stick out his little pointer finger and blow razzberries at you when there is a battle raging in the living room.

It's time to put my little ones down for a nap. I have every crossable part crossed for more than 30 mins. from the Bear. He's getting so miserable  from being chronically tired.I'm starting to think our grandmothers had the right idea when they used whiskey for teething:) If it doesn't put him to sleep at least maybe he'll be a happy drunk!

Sunday, February 6, 2011

The weekend update

Seems that I never get around to blogging on the weekend. You'd think that with the hubby around I'd have more time for it but somehow it doesn't work that way.

Squish started sleeping in his "big boy bed" on friday night. He was staying up and playing and fussing about his movie. So I just thought "hey! Well take the crib rails off and see how it goes. It can't get worse" And it didn't! We're on day 3 now with 2 naps thrown in and he's so proud that he stays in bed and waits for a grown up to come get him. The few times we've had to go in and calm him down he has asked "you're not going to put the rails back??"

We had a super rough time today with him and Bear. Squish pushed him down for no reason so I sent him to his room and he kept telling me that he doesn't like Bear and that he's not his friend. It breaks my heart to hear him say that, and I know he doesn't really mean it but it still kills me. So I told him that our family loves each other and doesn't hurt each other and that if he didn't want to be a part of our family then he could stay in his room by himself. So that's what he chose to do for about 20 mins. I made him hug Bear before he could come out and tell him that they were brothers and would protect each other and be friends their whole life. Maybe if he keeps saying it it wil happen....

We went to Chuch E Cheese again this morning. Wibef wasn't there, we thought the world would implode, but it didn't:) We certainly hope to see her next time though.

Isaac is getting into Diego. We are happy to finally see him identify with a male character. I don't know how much longer Lou could listen to his first born son running through the house yelling "I am Dorothy" or "I am Jesse" or "I'm a balerina!" :)

Bear continues to hold tight to the half hour nap. It will be the death of me.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Little baby half-steps

Bear took three little half steps today! One was just a scoot, and the other two were full-on lifting the foot and moving it diagonally forward about 2 inches. He's about a month behind Squish in the beginning walking department. Probably because he's such a hip baby!