I'm dusting this site off, at least temporarily. M. is winging his way to AFRICA* for work (god, he gets to go to the coolest places for his job), and I'm holding down the fort at home. While he's out for the next week, I'm hoping to post a few photos here from him (so we can all be jealous when he has dinner with a KING), and some photos of us (to remind him of the glamorous life he's missing).
Since he's still en route, and the kids and I did nothing interesting after he left this afternoon, I don't actually have anything interesting to post right now. Instead, I thought I'd put a few recent-ish photos up, since it's been so long that you may have forgotten what we look like :-).
Here's one from the first day of school - Finn as a second grader, and Lucy as a kindergartner:
I missed documenting a few other big milestones on this blog, two of which happened on the same day - on October 20th, Finn turned 8, and Lucy lost her first tooth. If I had been laboring under any lingering illusions that my kids are still babies, I am now quite thoroughly disillusioned.
The year has been speeding along. Can you believe there are Santas and wreaths EVERYWHERE already? Even Christmas lights!?! Before we forget that fall happened (is still happening, damn it!), here's a quick snap of the kids during Halloween. Note that Finn (zombie) is sporting homemade guts spilling out of his shirt, lovingly prepared by M. using paper towels, flour, water, food coloring, and a pair of panty hose. Rather creative and gross, no?
I forced everyone to take a "picturesque fall walk" so I could try to capture photos for a Christmas card. I let the kids try taking pictures of us. This was the best of the lot, and spoiler alert, it did not make it into our card (which I have already ordered, by the way, in the only act to date that has given me any sense of feeling prepared for the rushing onslaught of Christmas):
Finn, at eight:
Lucy at five and a half:
Still the cutest things I've ever seen:
The End, at least for tonight.
*Not the ebola-ridden part, in case you were wondering. Morocco, in fact.
I love my children, I really do. Let me just say that first, to soften the blow of what I say next. Which is... I am SO tired of my children. So, so tired.
I had a long week at work last week, involving two VERY early wake-ups on Tuesday and Wednesday. Before I had fully recovered from that, M. winged his way off to Boston for the entire long weekend. He boards a return flight in about 20 minutes, and should (fingers crossed) be home by around dinner time tonight. The nearly 5 days that he has been gone took an eternity to go by. The kids and I survived, but I can't say that this was my easiest "single parenting" gig.
It was kicked off by Finn coming down with a cough/headache/fever on Thursday night. We've all had broken sleep for every single one of the last 4 nights (WHY can't modern medicine figure out a way to treat a cough, FTLOG), with me up multiple times each night for Finn AND Lucy (2 a.m. this morning ushered in a tearfully angry Lucy standing in the hall with her hands on her hips shouting at me that she "HAS TO GO TO THE BATHROOM!" - not understanding that I had turned my fan on to drown out the sounds of Finn's coughing after I administered less-than-helpful drugs, and couldn't hear her the first few times she called for me. It was magical and restful, as you can imagine). Finn only managed to stay fever-free without ibuprofen as of this morning, just in time for Lucy to start feeling horrible. I have a feeling we are ushering in another few days of sick kidness.
So to recap, not only were both kids home with me on Saturday and Sunday, but Finn was also home with me on Friday, and both kids are home with me today (gone are the days when I can just drop them both off at daycare on some of these minor holidays). Aside from a brief birthday party interlude and the guy at the grocery store fish counter, I've been bereft of adult conversation. I may order pizza tonight just so I can speak to someone over the age of 6.
We're capping the weekend off with a trip to the dentist today for both kids. Making it the seventh kid dental visit in a row that M. has squirreled his way out of. Not that I'm bitter or anything.
On a brighter note, THIS happened:
First lost tooth - one for the virtual baby book! February 18, 2013. Sorry for the slightly gory photos, but such is the nature of parenthood, I suppose. I have one excited Kindergartner who is eagerly anticipating his first visit from the Tooth Fairy tonight. Which M. will have to coordinate, as I plan to be officially off duty.
I'm SUPER loopy, because I was up until about 1:45 a.m. last night working on worky stuff, and up again at the crack of dawn to head to a meeting in Arlington, VA. And I'm on the rag. Sooooo, ~ 3 hours of sleep plus stress plus fresh hormones, and this will be a slap-dash and likely nonsensical set of updates.
1) Finn's Kindergarten situation: This turned out to be much ado about nothing, as Finn is NOT moving to the newly created Kindergarten classroom. He is staying with his original teacher, as is his best friend. Plus he's been doing very well behavior-wise lately, and brought home an excellent report card last week. I will say that I did meet the new Kindergarten teacher, and heard how the transition for the kids moving would occur, and I was very reassured. She was lovely and positive and nice the way, magically, all Kindergarten teachers are (though I did question her choice to wear leggings as pants when meeting a large majority of the Kindergarten parents - coming from a person who has done this herself, but never in a "professional" setting, so...). The transition plan was thorough, and I would have been OK if Finn had been selected to change classrooms. But he was not, so there you go. And the upside is that his class size went from 28 to 23, so it's really a win/win for everyone.
2) Finn has his first loose tooth!!!!! And also, his first adult tooth. Which has started coming up through his gums behind the loose tooth, before it has fallen out. Blerg. I'm encouraging him to wiggle his tooth to make it more inclined to fall out, though M. thinks I'm crazy. But I don't want us to be faced with the possibility of Finn having to have a tooth pulled by the dentist if this thing doesn't come out on it's own, so wiggle encouragement it is. I need to lay in a stash of quarters and/or crisp dollar bills. I asked Facebook to tell me what the Tooth Fairy brings these days, but mainly got answers that I find unacceptable (i.e., too spendy). I'm pretty sure our Tooth Fairy brings $1 a tooth - that's my story, and I'm sticking to it.
3) I signed up for Weight Watchers, again. Online only, not the in-person meetings. Things are getting desperate. Too many cupcakes and too little restraint. I also signed myself up for a 5K in April. I'm turning this ship around, stat! First "weigh-in" (aka me stepping on my bathroom scale) is tomorrow. Pretty sure the wine I had tonight and the potato chips DARPA served me today won't help, but at least I was a good girl the rest of the week. Which really just means I was good on Monday and Tuesday, since I didn't sign up until after the debauchery of this past weekend. I could have used Monday as my weigh-in day, but wanted to pick Thursday instead because strategically it's a much better day. You can let loose over the weekend [to a degree], and then still have plenty of time to walk the straight and narrow during the work week before the weigh-in.
I'd write more, but I'm beyond tired and going to bed now. It's a pitiful amount of updates, just three - not even sure why I numbered it, since you can barely even call it a list. But something is better than nothing, right?
Update to my updates: It is now Thursday morning, and since I've had some sleep (yay!), my mind is clear enough to remind me that I wanted to show you a photo of how Finn looked yesterday when he came home from participating in his after-school program's "Crazy Hair Club":
We get to look forward to similar such creations every Monday and Wednesday for the rest of the month. His hair was SO STIFF. He loved it. Cutie.
Also, I was down 5 pounds from Monday at my "weigh-in" (still can't take it seriously when it's just on my bathroom scale - I feel like I need the technology and audience and sheer scale from the Biggest Loser weigh-ins) this morning. Pretty sure the pre-period water retention and salty Sunday Super Bowl food had a lot to do with that, but I'm taking it as a win anyway!
Friday marked Finn's very last day of daycare. I didn't get choked up the way I thought I might - perhaps because I'll still be coming back every day to bring Lucy. And Finn - well, all he could think about was how excited he is to start Kindergarten - I had to prompt him several times to "SAY GOODBYE" and "LOOK, THESE PEOPLE HAVE CARED FOR YOU FOR THREE+ YEARS, COULD YOU PLEASE JUST GIVE SOMEONE A HUG?!" But I wasn't really upset - his excitement for Monday is gratifying, especially when I saw one little girl start sobbing at the prospect of lining up in front of the classroom door to go inside the school during Friday's Open House. Even though her mom was RIGHT THERE, and had no intention of leaving. I think several kids are going to have a tough Monday, but I'm pretty confident that my little guy is going to bound right into the school. It helps that Finn's teacher is one of the two that ran his earlier JumpStart program, so he already knows her pretty well. Also, his favorite little friend from JumpStart has been placed in the same class, so he already has at least one friend.
I do think that once Finn truly realizes that he won't be seeing the handful of really good daycare friends he's made over the years every day, he will get a little sad. But that aspect of Kindergarten hasn't really sunk in yet.
How about a little "before and after?" Not the hardwood floor photos I owe you (I have them! They will be posted!), but photos of Finn:
On his very first day of daycare, December 18, 2006:
And here he is on his very last day of daycare, August 24, 2012:
I will restrain myself from gushing about those eyes! Those cute cheeks! Can you believe that little teeny baby grew into this energetic, fun, funny, smart boy?!? Of course, that's what's SUPPOSED to happen, I KNOW that. Well done, nature. You've done a great job so far with this whole "growing up" thing.
So those pictures mark a "first" and "last" for Finn (and you can bet that the traditional "first day of school" photo will be shared here, too, once it has been captured). Now here is a photo of a "first" for Lucy:
Her first dance class!:
Sorry for the not-so-great pictures - Lucy was NOT in the mood to pose prior to heading out to her lesson. And I couldn't get any photos of her during class, as parents aren't allowed in the studio - we all sit out in the lobby and watch what is going on in the studio via a video monitor.
Lucy's class covers both ballet and tap. Is it ridiculous to buy tap shoes for a three-year-old? Maybe. But my heart is not-so-secretly thrilled that Lu is developing a love of dance - I took lessons for about 10 years LONG, long ago, and have fond memories of jetes and changemonts and pirouettes and shuffle-ball-changes... (and I'm sure I just spelled most of that wrong). Anyway, you get the picture. I think she looks adorable, and I am glad that we finally have a chance to concentrate on doing something that LUCY wants to do. Usually she just gets signed up for whatever activity Finn wants to do or, even worse, she just schleps around with us and watches Finn do an activity on his own.
You can get a sense in some of those pictures of how the hardwood floors turned out, but I will be back with a proper before and after post once we are done with Phase II of the project (did I mention there is a Phase II?), in which new tile is being installed on the kitchen floor. Which SHOULD be this week (I fervently hope, as currently my pantry is spread out over several chairs in the dining room, which doesn't exactly facilitate quick meal preparation. Not to mention the thick layer of dust coating all surfaces everywhere).
But first, I need to get myself to bed so I can be well rested for the parental heartbreak I am about to experience tomorrow. KINDERGARTEN - THIS IS NOT POSSIBLE, RIGHT?
My day today started at 4:30 am. I managed to recognize my alarm as something other than a dream, and rolled myself out of bed. Brush teeth, wash face, throw on clothes, fashion a pony tail. I made it to my friend's house by 5:30 as planned, and we set off for Baltimore.
The sky was just changing from pitch black as we found parking in a lot behind the Raven's stadium. We met up with one of our other teammates, and huddled in the bathroom for a little while, chatting, fastening on our bibs with safety pins, and avoiding the chilly morning air. Finally it was time for me to catch the bus to my relay point, half an hour before the start of the race. I sat on a warm school bus, listening to nervous chattering all around me, as we zipped through downtown Baltimore and up north to our start point. I looked at our line of buses, at least 10 buses long, and the crew of police cars and policeman escorting us, blocking traffic. And I couldn't help tearing up, feeling emotional. Somebody thought what we were about to do was important enough for this, for the hoopla. I inwardly laughed at myself, and wondered about how emotional I'd be at the end, if I was already crying (spoiler alert: I was far too exhausted to cry).
Our route through Baltimore took me through so many familiar areas, places I had seen many times, places I had been, places I had lived. Our buses drove right past the driveway to the Department of Biology building at Hopkins, the place where I devoted many hours and made many friends. Right past the new-ish building where M. worked, toward the end of his grad school experience, after his department moved out of their old, rusty, cranky headquarters. I saw the Stieff Silver building, the Maryland College Institute of Art, the Belvedere building. We almost, almost made it up to my old apartment building, a beloved brick building built in the 1920's with few amenities but lots of charm, until each bus, one by one, made a 3-point turn to back track and drop us at the exchange point.
My first thought, upon emerging from the bus, was to find a port-a-potty to pee... and maybe, ahem, do more (nerves, what can I say?). Some busmates and I looked around for the facilities and saw... a line. A very long line, leading up to ONE port-a-potty. One port-a-potty, for hundreds of people. Pretty sure someone screwed up there. Perhaps some of the 100 or so port-a-potties at the finish line were meant to be delivered to Relay Point #2? Maybe at least one or two were wrongly directed? Figuring out how to handle this situation took up a good chunk of the time I would have otherwise spent hanging around pacing and fiddling with my iPod. Never fear - someone managed to get in to one of the locked Hopkins academic buildings, and a steady stream of runners (including myself) made good use of their very nice (read: far superior to a port-a-potty) facilities.
By then it was about 8:30, and the race had been underway for half an hour. The relay teams started at the same time as the full marathon runners. I was expecting my teammate right around 9:00 based on her predicted pace. I spent some time stretching, talked a bit with a friend who happened to be running the relay as well (this was nice, as I wasn't expecting to know anyone), and then watched the front runners for the marathon pass by. The wheelchair participants were crossing by us (at mile 5.7) by 8:30 or so, and the leaders of the runners began showing up by 8:45. I was blown away by how fast they were running - not only was it uphill at that point (and a steep hill at that), but they still had over 20 miles to go!
I nervously alternated keeping watch for my teammate and checking my cell phone to see what time it was. The race transponder would only record one time for our whole team, so the only way to know my own pace was to figure out what time I started, and what time I ended. I glanced at my phone at 9:01, and about a minute and a half later, I spotted my friend. She ran uphill for most of her 5.7 miles, and looked DONE. I'm pretty sure she was happy to see me :-). I grabbed the transponder from her, tossed her my sweatshirt and bag, and took off.
The race itself was a) fun, and b) exhausting. The fun part was the beginning. After a slight uphill, it was downhill for about 3 miles straight. And not a steep, bone-rattling/knee-jarring downhill. It was fairly gentle, just the kind of hill I like to be running down. As I neared the Inner Harbor, I began to wonder when I would see M. and the kids. He had gotten them up and out of the house by 7 am, drove to a light rail station south of the city (think above-ground subway), and took the train in so they could all cheer me on. Luckily, my leg of the race circled down close to the finish line, so he could pretty easily see me at about my halfway point AND at the end of my leg, and we were still positioned pretty well to get to the finish line to cheer on my last teammate.
I managed to spot M. and the kids - M. tried to video me, but apparently didn't actually have the camera ON. At that point I looked perky still. The kids saw me, but looked a bit confused and didn't really get excited.
Then I continued on, excited to end the race and hang out with them. I had figured that seeing M. would be about the mid-point of my leg, but as I continued running on a road that was supposed to loop back around, and I still hadn't looped around yet, I began to realize that M. probably hadn't been waiting at the midpoint, he'd been earlier than that. And I couldn't find a mile marker for the life of me (through the entire race I never saw one, though I imagine they must have had them) to know how much further I had to go. AND, I was suddenly tired. My legs were numb - they had been from the start (the cold, maybe?). But now they were also tired. I was slowing down, in the face of what I was sure was a lot longer to go. And we were no longer running downhill. There were some uphills, though they were pretty gentle (and I really can't complain about them, as I have seen a map of the course elevation and I know my teammates had some hills that were doozies). I kept grabbing cups of water and trying to gulp some down, though I wasn't terribly thirsty. I would have preferred food, I think - at that point, my Cliff bar and Cliff gels that I had gulped down earlier were no longer giving me energy.
We finally cut across and started back toward our relay point. I tried my best to find a couple of bursts of energy, to move my legs faster. Sometimes it's easier to run faster - if you run too slowly, your mind focuses on just how slow you're going and tries to convince you to just stop. So I pushed on, intermittently, running a bit slower in between. I never walked.
After the loop around, I wasn't sure how much further I had to go. My perspective was completely confused. But then I saw one of my teammates, the one who had run the first leg of the race. I saw her, cheering for me and smiling, and asked her how much more I had left. She told me I was almost done (still wasn't sure what that meant), and that my next teammate was all set to take over. She ran with me for a little bit, then ran ahead to let our teammate know I was headed her way. I realized, then, finally, that I truly was almost done. I saw the Relay banner, and the crowds of runners waiting to take over. And I saw M. and the kids again, cheering for me, waving at me, encouraging me. I picked up my speed for the last little bit, suddenly renewed, and made it to my teammate. I shoved the transponder at her, gave her a hug, and looked at my cell phone: 10:21 am.
78 minutes to run 7 miles. Boo-Yah!
Just before the end, when I passed by M. and the kids the second time. You can see my friend running just ahead of me, getting ready to alert our teammate that I was coming. Excuse the lengthy rear-end footage, please :-)
The kids waiting for me to run by
Me and two of my teammates, after the race (our fearless fourth had to leave just before this was taken)
My last post demonstrated some of the havoc Lucy is able to wreak from a mere few inches off the ground, crawling. Well, as of this weekend, her havoc-wreaking tentacles have extended:
This happened, of course, about two hours after I left town for a few days. Mommy leaves, Lucy decides to start walking. Because why would Mommy want to see that anyway, right? Perfect timing. Apparently she was sitting in her PB Anywhere chair, stood up, and started walking. Just decided it was time, I guess.
We are not up to full time walking yet, there is still plenty of crawling mixed in. But we are definitely getting there, and despite my failure to witness the big milestone firsthand, I couldn't be happier. All of that crawling on the playground at school that is completely ruining Lucy's brand new white sneakers may have something to do with my happiness, but I'm also thrilled that she's found a new talent that she loves practicing.
This weekend marked another Lucy milestone, too - Lucy is now completely bottle-free. I thought it would be a huge struggle, because Lucy LOVED her bottles. She got so excited to see them, and would do no more than throw any sippy cups filled with milk. We hadn't been forcing the issue at all, but something seemed to just click, and all of a sudden Lucy started getting excited when we brought out a sippy cup for her (or her brother). So we just went with it, and ditched the bottles cold turkey. Surprisingly, it has worked out really, really well.
As I mentioned, I left town for a few days. I went from a 3-year-old with an attitude occasionally bordering on teenager-ish:
and a 1-year old who just learned to walk and drink from a cup:
to this:
Oh, the contrast! My babies are babies no longer! I happened to have a work trip in the Boston area, and used the opportunity to spend a couple of days with my sister, MommyEsq, her husband, her 21-month old twins, and her brand new baby girl Josephine Alice (Josie). Josie was only 5 days old when I arrived, and so adorable! I had lots of fun holding her and remembering all those sleepy, cuddly newborn days (the good parts only, of course). If MommyEsq or any of my siblings want to have dozens of kids, I'd be totally supportive - I'd come take care of them whenever they wanted! This baby factory may be closed, but I love, love, love new little babies, and I couldn't be happier for the Esq family.
As much as I'd like to be drinking a large margarita right now (yes, it is only 8 am. But I've been up since 5:45 with both kids, so it feels much later), I'm not. But I do have a nice, large, steaming cup of coffee in front of me, so that'll have to do.
I'm on borrowed time here, with far too much to do to be blogging. But M. is out of town - the country, really, as he's in Brussels - and blogging at night is near to impossible at the moment. So instead, I shall steal a few precious moments of work time to bring you.... well, just updates, really.
1) Houston, we have a first word!! OK, possibly third word, as Lucy has been saying Mama and Dada for some time now, but we're not sure if we can count those as real words since she likes to call EVERYTHING Mama and Dada. But sometimes us, too. Regardless, we now clearly have a "used in the right context" word and it is.... MORE! Yes, that's right, my daughter's first word is more. What does this say about her planned future of selflessness and generosity? Not sure. But if she is eating, and she runs low on her food tray, she says "mo." If she has a toy and you take it away, she says "mo" (and/or cries). If she just went down the slide and wants to go again, she says "mo." If she just threw her sippy cup on the floor for the tenth time, and you have picked it up and put it on the table out of her reach so she can't do it again, she says "mo." Basically, she is saying it ALL THE TIME.
2) We have discovered the age at which "ear worms" develop, and it is apparently 3-and-a-half. Finn walks around constantly singing little snippets of songs. It's adorable, really. He is by no means in tune, and the words are often unintelligle as he sort of has a lazy mouth while he does it, but still adorable. Now if only we could get him to sing some classic rock instead of kids' TV theme songs or Sandra Boynton songs, then we'd really be getting somewhere.
3) Operation Re-introduce Dairy has been moving along. Lucy is up to taking 1/3 of her bottle as milk, the rest still formula. We have introduced no other sources of dairy into her diet, just to be safe. So far, no puking or diarrhea. We are doing this very, very slowly, though, so I don't want to assume we are safe from a milk protein intolerance yet. However, things are looking up a bit in that area.
4)There are a plethora of fuzzy caterpillars outside our house right now, and Finn is enthralled. He goes on little hunting trips to find them. He and some of the neighbor kids spent about 20 minutes last night taking turns picking up about 10 different caterpillars, shrieking, and dropping them. Those poor caterpillars must have been having heart attacks. Until they were squished, of course, because one of the little boys kept having a change of heart about his degree of affection for these creatures, and stepped on them one by one.
5) M. is due back this Saturday afternoon, if that Icelandic volcano doesn't go and strand him (Just heard a report today that it has started spewing volcanic stuff again). I can guarantee that by Saturday afternoon, I'm going to be in need of some reinforcements. But also, I am jealous, as the most exotic place my work has ever taken me is St. Pete's Beach, FL. In August. The trip went something like this: I thought about exploring a little, and then I melted. The end. I'm hoping M.'s trip is much more interesting, and that MAYBE he'll hop online and blog a little to let us (me) know what he is doing. He doesn't have an international plan on his phone, and the 6-hour time difference is a little awkward, so our only chance to talk will be if he can somehow use Skype to call my work phone during the day. I'm hoping he'll call me any minute now...
OK, 5 snippets/bullets/updates/random paragraphs seems like a good stopping point. Hasta luego!
I need to be better about letting this blog be a record of my kids' early lives, because there are already so many things I am forgetting! And yet here I am, more than a week since my last post, and I'm too exhausted to do more than throw a few more pictures up. Aargh. Though I will put out there the fact that Lucy is starting to pull up in her crib. Apparently we are going to skip right past crawling into walking. Who knew? And Finn is mastering the art of brushing his teeth with fluoridated toothpaste, which means lots of messy spitting. LOTS. His enthusiasm for it is both humorous and adorable. Oh, and it took me a while to notice because I was just so amazed at the sheer quantity of food and the excitement with which she can eat it, but Lucy is apparently left-handed, as evidenced by her left-handed eating. We'll have to see if this sticks around or not.
And now for the photos:
Remember those snowmen M. and Finn made at the start of Snowmaggedon? This is how they looked after the snow stopped falling.
One final picture from the hopefully never-to-be-repeated insane snowfall, taken in our neighborhood. Two weeks later we are still working on getting rid of the now-disgustingly dirty snow.
Please ignore that my child is chewing on an infant Tylenol bottle here, and just take note of the Pebbles-style hair that is insanely cute.
The kids just enjoyed a visit from my mom who was in town to babysit while M. and I were both out of town for work. As you can see, she was a big hit.
And finally, a little brother-sister driving fun was had tonight before dinner. Hopefully Lucy appreciates the chance to drive, I'm not sure that will be repeated often!:
Age: 6 months (exactly) Weight: 18 lbs (75-90%) Length: 26.5 in (75%) Head: 17 in (75%) Teeth: 1 Cuteness: Off the Charts
I haven't been posting about Lucy much because I don't even know where to begin in describing what a wonderful baby she is. I'm just trying to enjoy every moment. She is so good natured and easy going, we really hit the baby jackpot. Did I mention that she transitioned to sleeping unswaddled without a peep? And that no crying-it-out was necessary to teach her to fall asleep on her own? First night unswaddled we laid her down in her crib awake after bath, jammies and a story, and she fell asleep, just like that. And has been doing it ever since. She is happy and growing and cute and, well, what more could you ask for in a baby?
Latest accomplishments for Lucy include learning to sit up on her own (not to the point where I can plop her down on the floor and walk away, of course) and cutting her first tooth (first felt by the parental fingertip meter on October 21, 2009. For the record, it is the front right bottom tooth). On the solid food front, she has tried and liked: bananas, carrots, sweet potato, peas, butternut squash, avocado (mixed with banana), mango (also mixed with banana). We are staying away from pears and apples as they seemed to aggravate her reflux a bit, and cereals haven't gone over well digestively. By our next visit to the doctor's office at nine months, Lucy will probably be eating things like little bits of pancake and other table foods. When the doctor mentioned that, I actually teared up like an idiot because good god, my BABY can't be almost old enough for REAL food, can she??
The last week or so of photo-taking has focused mostly on Finn for birthday reasons, so I don't have much to share of Lucy. But here is a pic snapped right after I discovered Lucy's tooth popping through:
Finn
Age: 3 years Weight: 31 lbs (50%) Height: 37 1/4 in (50%) Teeth: All 20 accounted for, and time for his first visit to the Dentist! Cuteness: Ranges from Ogre to Off the Charts, depending on mood
It's been a busy couple of weeks for Finn. He went to his first Chuck E. Cheese birthday party, battled a cough for the last week, and turned 3. Social development-wise, he's been kind of a crab. Moody and cranky, and very fond of saying NO. To anything we ask him to do. To much of what his teachers ask him to do, too. All fairly normal behaviors, but annoying enough that M. had to have an impromptu "conference" with one of Finn's teachers about it. Some of it is learned behavior from watching some of the older kids in his new classroom, I'm sure. But the child clearly has a bit of the stinker in him. He still gives hugs and kisses voluntarily, but is just as likely to tell you that he doesn't like you. We're working on teaching him some tact...
In the "skills" department, Finn is learning to recognize his letters and numbers, and he is starting to write some of them, too. School is working very hard on the letter "A" with him, with some success. He can write an "F," and knows how to spell his name (though not write the whole thing). He has been quite the goofball, making up his own nonsense words and telling jokes. Some of the jokes make no sense at all, but some are actually funny. Friday was Finn's 3-year check up (and Lucy's 6 month, hence the stats), and it was the first time he was weighed on a regular scale and measured for height instead of length (standing up instead of lying down). Sigh and sniff, he's getting so big!
Yesterday marked Finn's first real birthday party. 11 kids and 10 adults all squeezed into our living room/dining room when pouring rain and thunderstorms ruined our plans to have the party at a local park. It worked out for the best, though, as it gave everyone something to do on a very yucky day. The kids all had fun playing with Finn's toys, and when it was all over the house didn't look too trashed, so I'd say it was a success all around.
Cuteness level quite high here, no ogres in sight
At a local farm. The hole was so small his head got stuck
Training it
Modeling with the stack-o-presents he received during our little family celebration on his actual birthday
A favorite new toy that M. picked out - Monster Truck
"The Snail and the Whale" by Julia Donaldson is also going over quite well
Blowing out three candles
A sweet new ride from Grammy and Bumpa. Now he just needs to learn to pedal (don't be fooled by the photo, this bike still needs parent power to move).
Finn's birthday cake. Of course all of the brand new toys he received over the last few days pale in comparison, in his mind, to the cheap plastic Mater and Lightening McQueen that came on his cake.
Singing Happy Birthday during Finn's party
Tearing into his new presents with an audience of friends
Lucy seems to be doing a bit better on the reflux meds. She actually slept from 8:30 pm until about 3:00 am last night. We are still working on the pooping issue (switching her formula AGAIN), but she is less fussy and a bit more comfortable with just the addition of Pre.vacid.
Finn is decidedly less comfortable, unfortunately. Because he somehow contracted croup. Aargh. He has been miserable and waking up quite a bit at night. It has also been really hard to keep him away from Lucy - he doesn't understand why he can't touch her and kiss her right now. Saturday night he woke up at around 9:30 with a coughing fit, and couldn't breathe. It was actually pretty scary for M. and me. He woke up off and on all night long, shaking with fever and coughing uncontrollably. We've been doping him with pain relievers, and he has been on a steroid medication for a day and a half now to help open his airways. He is doing better, and will hopefully (I fervently hope!) be going back to daycare tomorrow. But he is still unbelievably whiny and clingy. My first foray into having both kids home with me all day has been more than a little trying, and we still have at least 4 more hours to go until M. gets home. I'm trying to have patience, but it doesn't help that at soon as I got the second child (Lucy) down for an afternoon nap, her older brother woke up not 10 minutes later. This happens often on the weekends, too - it seems like the two of them have some kind of sensor that goes off whenever the house is temporarily a quiet, adult-only zone.
In other news, Lucy starting giving us real, actual smiles on Saturday, of the social variety. Not the "oh my, I just farted or had a fleeting pleasant thought" variety, the "Mommy is smiling at me and talking to me so I must smile back" variety. I am terrible at record-keeping for my kids (Finn's baby book consists of a piece of printer paper with a list of dates and milestones on it), so let this blog show that at 5 weeks old, Lucy began smiling. For real. And it's adorable. She is also starting to explore her tongue, but it's more lizard-like than cute at this point so I won't gush on and on about it.
How do stay at home moms do it? We're already, shamefully, on about hour #5 of television, today, had a trip to Target, and about 40 minutes of playground play. How do you entertain two kids of vastly different ages and developmental stages, both of whom (one due to age and the other due to illness) want you to hold them all the time? And how do you get them to nap at the same time??
A. and M. are two former lab rats who met in grad school, got married, left the bench, and settled in suburban D.C. A successful experiment in developmental biology resulted in a bouncing baby boy, Finn, in October 2006. He was joined in April 2009 by his little sister Lucy. Add to that a neurotically needy cat, lengthy commutes and the joys of homeownership, and there's never a dull moment! E-mail them at uncontrolledexp at gmail dot com.
