Eli has started pre-K and is loving it! Wooohoo!!! He is in an AM pre-K class from 8:30 to 11am monday thru friday a block and a half away from our house. His teacher is Ms. McAlister (SUPER nice) and the assistant is Mrs. Luebbert (Mrs. Lue). It's hard to tell exactly, but I think there are about 15 kids in his class. All of them are Spanish except for Eli and one other little girl. It would be awesome if he picked up some spanish, but I think they all speak English in school.
His first two days were only an hour each and parents were allowed to stay. I stayed the first day and was surprised to see a normally super social Eli sit off in a corner and play by himself. When talking to his teacher, he used a super super quiet voice. Day two, I dropped him off and he had a great time. That week, he kept telling me he was playing by himself and wasn't ready to meet people yet. He really enjoyed going, though, and never put up a fight or complained about going. He was sad on Friday when I told him he had two days off.
His school is new... built in 2010 and his classroom is great. There is a playground out in the back and his teacher said they will go there every day. It's very hard to determine what exactly his day is like, cause I don't have much interaction with the teachers and his response to "what did you do today in school" is usually "that's my secret." But from what I can tell, this is what his day is like.... When they first get there, they go and hang up their backpacks in the closet and then have breakfast. It's usually "cereal squares" and something else like toast, bagels, pancakes, etc. Eli told me that all of the other kids have juice, but he told the teacher he's not allowed to have juice and instead has milk every day. I was SO proud of him for that!! At some point, they do some kind of alphabet activity, some singing, some sitting on the carpet, some reading (sometimes? hard to tell) and play outside. Sometimes he tells me he plays with blocks or legos and sometimes he brings a picture home. It seems like they mainly use colored pencils there. He has a few good buddies.... Isiah, Jerrick, Amore and one other guy. They like to run around and play snake games and chase games on the playground.
He's had to sit in the thinking chair almost every day and when I ask him what he did wrong, he always tells me "I fell down on the carpet." I finally got a chance to ask Ms. McAlister what that means yesterday and she told me he's often jumping around, etc, when it's quiet time. Not suprised at that! She's been working on getting him to contain his jumps for when they go outside. Good luck with that! lol.
So far, so good!
Friday, September 27, 2013
Liam
There are a few things I forgot to mention about Liam.... he has now officially reached the age of "Me do it!" which is quite possibly the most frustrating time on earth for parents. It's ok when he wants to do things that he actually can do (or half do), like brush his teeth. It's not ok when he starts screaming "NO! ME DO IT! GO AWAY" when it's something like putting his shoes on.... he is not able to do that, yet. It's quite maddening.
He also has started this week saying "TIRED!" if you ever ask him to do anything. "Liam, come here" "Tired!" "Liam, clean up your trains!" "Tired." "Liam, time to eat." "Tired!" He isn't quite using this in the right way, cause he never then goes to sit or lay down. Very frustrating.
He likes to ride on my back a lot, if we're out and about and he gets tired. So every morning, when we take Eli to school, you'll often see me carrying Brielle in the ergo and Liam on my back. I get quite a lot of stares. Lol. It's easier for me then chasing after him, though, so I'm happy to do it.
He now gets up between 6 and 6:15 every morning. Sigh.
He also has started this week saying "TIRED!" if you ever ask him to do anything. "Liam, come here" "Tired!" "Liam, clean up your trains!" "Tired." "Liam, time to eat." "Tired!" He isn't quite using this in the right way, cause he never then goes to sit or lay down. Very frustrating.
He likes to ride on my back a lot, if we're out and about and he gets tired. So every morning, when we take Eli to school, you'll often see me carrying Brielle in the ergo and Liam on my back. I get quite a lot of stares. Lol. It's easier for me then chasing after him, though, so I'm happy to do it.
He now gets up between 6 and 6:15 every morning. Sigh.
Brielle at 7 months
Brielle is 7 months old and I feel like every day, she's growing by leaps and bounds. Here are some things about my little girlie this month:
-She's still in size 3 diapers and is now wearing 6-9 month clothing.
-She drinks 4 to 5 seven to eight oz bottles a day and eats two meals.
-She's been getting more tired/cranky at night and really lets you know if it's time for bed. She likes to be down for the count in the 7 hour and if we stretch it cause we're out, she lets us KNOW.
-She crawls EVERYWHERE, fast. This week, she particularly enjoys crawling up on top of Daddy's weights and over to the kitty litter boxes. She likes to hang out behind the couch, at the bookshelves, under the dining room table and in the kitchen. She also loves crawling into the bathroom if Eli is in there.
-She much prefers cars, trains and guys to any of her baby toys.
-She has her two bottom teeth. The officially came in on September 6th.. I don't see any more.
-She laughs and laughs and laughs if you tickle her feet or kiss her chest. She also laughs if the boys make funny sounds at her or if they do something funny. She really likes it if you say words like "POP" or make funny sounds.
-Her hair is growing SO fast. Her bangs are always in her eyes. When we put her hair in pigtails, they are super high.
-She can hold her bottle SOMETIMES but never really holds it high enough.
-She has made no effort to grab the spoon away from me when she's eating. She just lets me feed her. I'm cherishing this time, cause I know that is going to be over soon!
-She really likes fruit. She does not care for sweet potatoes (homemade) or chickpeas/tomato.
-sometimes, it sounds like she's saying Mama.
-She pulls herself to stand on EVERYTHING. She loves hanging out at her favorite train basket, the couch, her high chair, any of the kitchen chairs and the oven.
-When I'm sitting down on the floor, she likes to crawl over me. She also can climb up on cushions if they are on the floor, but she's not so good about getting down from them.
-She doesn't really know what to do with Cheerios or puffs and just kind of pushes them around and knocks them on the floor.
-For the first time, she started laughing and smiling when I put her in the baby swing at the playground this week. Before, she's always looked terrified.
-I took her to the farm today and she loved crawling around in the grass and picking up the leaves.
-She doesn't try to put as many things in her mouth as the boys did at this age.
-She is fascinated by the cats.
-She REALLY loves her brothers and they REALLY love her.
-She takes two naps, lasting anywhere from 30min to 2 hours, depending on how tired she is and how loud the boys are being.
-She likes to sit in my lap and look at whatever book I'm reading to the boys. She really likes trying to crumple pages and put them in her mouth.
-She will look at you 90% of the time if you call her name. No idea if this is because it's her name or because she's just responding to your voice.
-She's become VERY difficult to change... diapers OR clothes. She is a girl on the move and she does NOT like laying still.
-She can "Walk" across the room if you are holding her hands and leading her.
-She is still the easiest baby EVER and a total joy.
-She's still in size 3 diapers and is now wearing 6-9 month clothing.
-She drinks 4 to 5 seven to eight oz bottles a day and eats two meals.
-She's been getting more tired/cranky at night and really lets you know if it's time for bed. She likes to be down for the count in the 7 hour and if we stretch it cause we're out, she lets us KNOW.
-She crawls EVERYWHERE, fast. This week, she particularly enjoys crawling up on top of Daddy's weights and over to the kitty litter boxes. She likes to hang out behind the couch, at the bookshelves, under the dining room table and in the kitchen. She also loves crawling into the bathroom if Eli is in there.
-She much prefers cars, trains and guys to any of her baby toys.
-She has her two bottom teeth. The officially came in on September 6th.. I don't see any more.
-She laughs and laughs and laughs if you tickle her feet or kiss her chest. She also laughs if the boys make funny sounds at her or if they do something funny. She really likes it if you say words like "POP" or make funny sounds.
-Her hair is growing SO fast. Her bangs are always in her eyes. When we put her hair in pigtails, they are super high.
-She can hold her bottle SOMETIMES but never really holds it high enough.
-She has made no effort to grab the spoon away from me when she's eating. She just lets me feed her. I'm cherishing this time, cause I know that is going to be over soon!
-She really likes fruit. She does not care for sweet potatoes (homemade) or chickpeas/tomato.
-sometimes, it sounds like she's saying Mama.
-She pulls herself to stand on EVERYTHING. She loves hanging out at her favorite train basket, the couch, her high chair, any of the kitchen chairs and the oven.
-When I'm sitting down on the floor, she likes to crawl over me. She also can climb up on cushions if they are on the floor, but she's not so good about getting down from them.
-She doesn't really know what to do with Cheerios or puffs and just kind of pushes them around and knocks them on the floor.
-For the first time, she started laughing and smiling when I put her in the baby swing at the playground this week. Before, she's always looked terrified.
-I took her to the farm today and she loved crawling around in the grass and picking up the leaves.
-She doesn't try to put as many things in her mouth as the boys did at this age.
-She is fascinated by the cats.
-She REALLY loves her brothers and they REALLY love her.
-She takes two naps, lasting anywhere from 30min to 2 hours, depending on how tired she is and how loud the boys are being.
-She likes to sit in my lap and look at whatever book I'm reading to the boys. She really likes trying to crumple pages and put them in her mouth.
-She will look at you 90% of the time if you call her name. No idea if this is because it's her name or because she's just responding to your voice.
-She's become VERY difficult to change... diapers OR clothes. She is a girl on the move and she does NOT like laying still.
-She can "Walk" across the room if you are holding her hands and leading her.
-She is still the easiest baby EVER and a total joy.
Odds and Ends
I've been meaning to get to this blog every day for the past week. I'm tired now and don't have the mental power to write an organized entry, so here are a bunch of things I want to get down so that I don't forget.... (and then maybe I'll try to pull together a Brielle at 7 months post, since she'll be 8 months old soon!).
- Since Eli has started school, I'm really enjoying the extra time with Liam every morning. Oftentimes, after we get home from dropping Eli off, I put Brielle down for a nap and I have great one on one time with my little guy. He's really taken much more of an interest reading books with me, and I enjoy doing that with him. He also likes me to watch him play the iPad and play trains with him and share snacks (especially yogurt with granola).
-Liam's latest "thing" is to dump out all of his toy containers in the same spot, play with the toys for about 13 seconds, and then go somewhere else to dump something else out. He also has taken to climbing up one of the shelves to get his precious stickers. He also likes to take all of the cushions off of the couch, take toys away from Brielle, ask me 50,000 times a day for "sauce" (those baby veggies/fruit things in a pouch), hide/protest when it's time for a diaper change and do any and everything his brother is doing.
-Liam can say his name now, but he often calls himself "me me" as in "me me wants" or "me me's turn."
-Brielle is pulling herself to stand EVERYWHERE, most recently on me. Lol...she'll crawl over to me and use whatever part of me she can grab onto to get herself up. She loves standing on the Ikea basket we use to put the train pieces in. Last Saturday, the 21st, she stood up for the first time in her pack n play. She's become a confident stander and is now able to stand with just one hand holding on. She LOVES when I hold her hands and "walk" her around the room.
-Brielle has her first two teeth...the center ones on the bottom. I'm saying they offically came in on September 6th.
-All the kids have colds, and for the first time since she was little, Brielle woke up at midnight two nights in a row. Very strange for her.
-Eli's obsessed with a TV show called the Wild Kratts. He's learning tons about animals and is constantly telling me facts about honey badgers, kangaroos and oxpeckers. He loves animal facts. Ever since he started school, I made a new rule that he can only watch three TV shows a day. Surprisingly, he's done very good with this and even tells me when the third one is up. For the past three weeks, every day he selects three episodes of the Wild Kratts.
-Liam has a temper and gets MAAAAAD.
-We had Brielle's baptism on Sunday, Sept 22nd. Mike's sister, Ann, is the Godmother and MIke's friend Pat is the Godfather. Brielle did great and didn't cry or fuss at all during the baptism.
-Mike and I got away for a night to the Poconos while the boys slept at Ann's and Brielle slept at Mike's parent's house. It was AMAZING to have time away and to be able to eat meals completely uninterrupted!
-I also got to go away to Chicago for three days to visit Rachna. Mike took the days off of work and had fun with the kids.
-Mike took both Liam and Eli (separately) to a Yankees game this month. They both lasted about 90 minutes and REALLY enjoyed getting a giant pretzel.
-Eli has been a really big helper lately cleaning up toys. He even offers to clean up when it's Liam's mess. Usually, he's doing this to atone for something he did that made me mad, which means he most likely did something mean to Liam. Eli LOVES going over and poking Liam, pulling his ear, pushing him over or knocking his toys down.
-Everything these days is a RACE with Eli. He is constantly racing Liam to the top of the stairs (in front of the building), to the front door, to get jammies on first, to brush teeth first, etc etc etc. When he wins (cause he's FOUR and Liam is TWO and slower), he then taunts Liam with a "ha ha! I won! YOu lose!" We've been working on this.
-Because of the above, when I'm alone with Liam, he will run up the stairs and then turn around and laugh an evil "mwahahahaha" laugh at me, since he won.
-Eli now likes to take showers instead of baths. I'm 100% for this because there is no more fighting in the bathtub, less splashing and he is done quicker. LOVE it.
I had so many more things to say, but now my mind is blank.
- Since Eli has started school, I'm really enjoying the extra time with Liam every morning. Oftentimes, after we get home from dropping Eli off, I put Brielle down for a nap and I have great one on one time with my little guy. He's really taken much more of an interest reading books with me, and I enjoy doing that with him. He also likes me to watch him play the iPad and play trains with him and share snacks (especially yogurt with granola).
-Liam's latest "thing" is to dump out all of his toy containers in the same spot, play with the toys for about 13 seconds, and then go somewhere else to dump something else out. He also has taken to climbing up one of the shelves to get his precious stickers. He also likes to take all of the cushions off of the couch, take toys away from Brielle, ask me 50,000 times a day for "sauce" (those baby veggies/fruit things in a pouch), hide/protest when it's time for a diaper change and do any and everything his brother is doing.
-Liam can say his name now, but he often calls himself "me me" as in "me me wants" or "me me's turn."
-Brielle is pulling herself to stand EVERYWHERE, most recently on me. Lol...she'll crawl over to me and use whatever part of me she can grab onto to get herself up. She loves standing on the Ikea basket we use to put the train pieces in. Last Saturday, the 21st, she stood up for the first time in her pack n play. She's become a confident stander and is now able to stand with just one hand holding on. She LOVES when I hold her hands and "walk" her around the room.
-Brielle has her first two teeth...the center ones on the bottom. I'm saying they offically came in on September 6th.
-All the kids have colds, and for the first time since she was little, Brielle woke up at midnight two nights in a row. Very strange for her.
-Eli's obsessed with a TV show called the Wild Kratts. He's learning tons about animals and is constantly telling me facts about honey badgers, kangaroos and oxpeckers. He loves animal facts. Ever since he started school, I made a new rule that he can only watch three TV shows a day. Surprisingly, he's done very good with this and even tells me when the third one is up. For the past three weeks, every day he selects three episodes of the Wild Kratts.
-Liam has a temper and gets MAAAAAD.
-We had Brielle's baptism on Sunday, Sept 22nd. Mike's sister, Ann, is the Godmother and MIke's friend Pat is the Godfather. Brielle did great and didn't cry or fuss at all during the baptism.
-Mike and I got away for a night to the Poconos while the boys slept at Ann's and Brielle slept at Mike's parent's house. It was AMAZING to have time away and to be able to eat meals completely uninterrupted!
-I also got to go away to Chicago for three days to visit Rachna. Mike took the days off of work and had fun with the kids.
-Mike took both Liam and Eli (separately) to a Yankees game this month. They both lasted about 90 minutes and REALLY enjoyed getting a giant pretzel.
-Eli has been a really big helper lately cleaning up toys. He even offers to clean up when it's Liam's mess. Usually, he's doing this to atone for something he did that made me mad, which means he most likely did something mean to Liam. Eli LOVES going over and poking Liam, pulling his ear, pushing him over or knocking his toys down.
-Everything these days is a RACE with Eli. He is constantly racing Liam to the top of the stairs (in front of the building), to the front door, to get jammies on first, to brush teeth first, etc etc etc. When he wins (cause he's FOUR and Liam is TWO and slower), he then taunts Liam with a "ha ha! I won! YOu lose!" We've been working on this.
-Because of the above, when I'm alone with Liam, he will run up the stairs and then turn around and laugh an evil "mwahahahaha" laugh at me, since he won.
-Eli now likes to take showers instead of baths. I'm 100% for this because there is no more fighting in the bathtub, less splashing and he is done quicker. LOVE it.
I had so many more things to say, but now my mind is blank.
Friday, September 6, 2013
What my house looks like
Just thought it would be fun to talk about what things I find on a regular basis when I look around. Right now, on the floor next to me, is a little Iron Man and a dinosaur. No doubt, at some point today, Iron Man was riding the dinosaur around.
Our recycling is outside in the back, and we generate a LOT of stuff to recycle so there are always boxes and bags of stuff waiting to go downstairs. Liam likes to spread these things out.
There are always, always rogue cheerios or Kix mulling about.
There are always books on the floor.
There's always a rogue DVD box under the couch.
There are usually goldfish or goldfish pieces around.
There is currently one puzzle piece in the middle of the floor that I don't feel like putting away.
Liam likes to take shoes out of the shoe bin. There's usually one shoe somewhere.
There's usually a spoon or bowl on the floor somewhere near the table.
Currently, under the kitchen table, there is a wet diaper balled up, a few stickers, a sticker sheet and a bib. And many cheerios.
Our recycling is outside in the back, and we generate a LOT of stuff to recycle so there are always boxes and bags of stuff waiting to go downstairs. Liam likes to spread these things out.
There are always, always rogue cheerios or Kix mulling about.
There are always books on the floor.
There's always a rogue DVD box under the couch.
There are usually goldfish or goldfish pieces around.
There is currently one puzzle piece in the middle of the floor that I don't feel like putting away.
Liam likes to take shoes out of the shoe bin. There's usually one shoe somewhere.
There's usually a spoon or bowl on the floor somewhere near the table.
Currently, under the kitchen table, there is a wet diaper balled up, a few stickers, a sticker sheet and a bib. And many cheerios.
Thursday, September 5, 2013
Typical Day
Some days are really great. Some days are really bad. Most days, however, are both.....mostly good, with a little bit of horrible thrown in. Today is a perfect example of one of those days, so I thought I'd write about it...mainly so that when I look back on this in ten years and am sad about how my little babies have grown up, I can be HAPPY that they've grown out of THIS stage. :)
This morning started out how mornings these days are typically starting out for me. Brielle, the light morning sleeper, wakes up when she hears Mike getting ready for work. She still sleeps out in the living room for a few reasons.... mainly because the though of THREE kids in our room scares me a little bit.... but I think we might have to start putting her in the room with us at night. So as soon as I hear Mike leave at 6:40, Brielle starts screaming. That's my cue to do the impossible.... get to her as quickly as possible so Liam doesn't hear her and wake up....but get there without the boys hearing me leave the room. They both have a supersonic ability to hear me open my eyes in the morning, so this is a difficult task. Today, I was successful and managed to tiptoe out of the room and pick up Brielle without the boys stirring.
Greeting Brielle in the morning is always a joy. As soon as she sees you, she breaks out into a huge, happy smile. So even though I'm exhausted and want nothing than to go back to bed, it's always nice to see her. The boys managed to stay sleeping for another HOUR (whaaat? They woke up at 7:45????), so Brielle and I actually had a really nice hour together. She drank her bottle and then I watched her crawl around and explore.... we read a few books together....we laughed (quietly) together. Liam was up and joined us on the couch to read a few books (whaaat? he didn't ask to watch TV right away?) and we were having fun. I was even able to fix breakfast for him and he actually sat down THE FIRST TIME I asked him to to eat it. Then Eli woke up and ALSO mysteriously did not demand that I turn on the TV. He came over to the table and ate his muffin and bacon. He refused to eat his banana, but walaaaa... I cut it up, put some peanut butter on it and gave it to Liam and HE ate it. WIN WIN. I had time, strangely, to make myself tea and oatmeal, while the boys were eating. SOOooo I didn't get a chance to drink my tea until noon, but still! I made it!
The morning was going great.... I read some stories to Liam while Eli watched his favorite new animal show, The Wild Kratts, and Brielle was happy to crawl around and play. I fed Brielle some rice cereal and she started falling asleep, so down she went. Liam started to get a little whinier, but not too bad, and we put together a train track and built a lego structure. I forget what happened next, but that's when things started to fall apart a bit. Liam's bridge fell apart and Eli told me he was not going to help Liam fix it....so Liam came over and hit Eli on the head multiple times with his train track. Cue screaming tantrum from Eli and cue me, picking up a kicking and screaming Liam to try to get him to sit in the corner for a time out. Cause THAT works. Ha. So then I tried to pick up a screaming Liam and get him to apologize. Cue...more screaming. So we were about to watch Toy Story (Eli usually gets to pick first and Liam ALWAYS picks "BUZZ!" when it's his turn), so I turned it off and told Liam he had to say sorry before we watched the movie. His world was OVER. He started kicking and screaming and throwing the mother of all fits. Back in the bedroom. I laid him in his bed and told him to stay there until he stopped screaming and of course he instantly jumped out and followed me out of the room, screaming. I forget how or why, but he FINALLY apologized to Eli. I packed up all of his trains and put them on the counter.
Forgot to mention that I looked over earlier and saw Brielle standing by the shoe container. She had pulled herself up to standing. Already? Yes. She is now pulling herself up on furniture to stand.
So then Liam decided he wanted a snack. Fishies. I made him sit in his chair (OH THE HORROR) and he sat and nicely ate his snack. I had to do something.... feed Brielle, I think, and he quickly announced "DONE!" and promptly threw all of his fishies and his bowl on the floor. I took him out of his chair and told him to pick them up. Of course, he didn't, cause throwing a fit is more fun. My neighbor was leaving to go to the library and I decided I'd take advantage of her ability to help me get out (our elevator is out right now) and told the kids to get their shoes on. I got everyone's diapers changed, shoes on, etc... and then realized that Liam had not cleaned up his goldfish, but had successfully stepped on each one to crush it into a million goldfish pieces. Of COURSE he threw a fit when I told him he had to sweep it up, but this time, amazingly Eli jumped in and offered to sweep them up. Ok, buddy, go for it. Eli did a great (SLOOOOOW) job of sweeping them up and Liam, the little punk, came over and STEPPED IN the tray, crushing them into more pieces and getting little pieces all over his shoes. Eli swept them up again and then said.... "Look, mommy! I put all the crumbs under the (place where we keep our shoes), so you can't see them anymore!" REALLY? He was so proud of himself and thought he did the right thing, so I couldn't be mad. (And you know what? They are still there...I forgot about them til now). I hustled the three kids downstairs to Traci's apartment and threw them in there so she could watch them for a second while I went back to get the double stroller and run it down the stairs. Liam didn't want to leave Traci's fun apartment and pulled a sit down and scream fit, so I had to grab him and carry him on my back (while carrying Brielle on my tummy) down the five flights of stairs. I don't know how I managed to do it (anger??), but I also was able to carry the double stroller and both babies down the stairs in front of the building.
We then had a nice walk over to the grocery store... I realized quickly, that since the elevator wasn't working, it didn't make sense to go to the grocery store and drop the groceries off and THEN go to the playground, so we backtracked (cue Eli... "NOOO, I wanted to go to the GROCERY STOOOOORE FIIIIIRST"....really, buddy? really?) and headed for the playground. Eli was still having a hissy fit and so Liam, not understanding, also decided to have a hissy fit. To calm them down, I told Eli that we were going to see about a special new store (the new FROYO STORE! HALLELUJAH!) in this direction. Well, as luck would have it, the fro yo store is not quite open yet. Eli thought this meant it wasn't open yet for the day and asked me about 40 times if we could check back in a little while to see if it opened yet. Ok, ok, ok, ok, ok, ok eli.
We went to the playground and I was happy to be there. It was a beautiful day and I was happy we finally were out. Eli took off and went for his favorite slide. Ever so sensitive about things being in his shoes, he freaked out when he landed in some sand, and demanded that I take off his shoes and clean them. Nope..it's going to keep happening, buddy...there's a pile of sand today at the bottom of the slide. So he took of his shoes. And sat down every 10 seconds to wipe his feet off, but dude...at least he wasn't complaining anymore! So fine... he was running around in bare feet. Liam, of course, decided he wanted to play on the complete opposite side of the playground. Brielle was fine walking around in the Ergo. Liam quickly decided he wanted to go on the (baby) swings and literally as I was saying no, he snuck AROUND the gate in the 5 mm gap that I never knew existed and got into the swing area. Fine... made it very challenging to see Eli over in Timbuktu, but if he wanted to swing that badly...we'll do it. So Liam is used to swinging in the big boy swings and naturally these don't go as high. So he starts screaming "HIGHER HIGHER HIGHER HIGHER" over and over really loudly. I had plopped Brielle in a baby swing and gave her a little push and she was just chilling, looking absolutely terrified, not in any way enjoying the experience. I finally convinced Liam to get out and then he immediately went over to the swing next to that one and wanted to go in that one. I said no and he collapsed to the ground, screaming and crying. Fine. Let's give this one a go. SAME thing, obviously. I finally convinced him to get out and then realized he had a poopy diaper. He, of course, ran away from me screaming "NO POO POO! NO POO POO!" I hightailed it across the playground to the stroller, strapped Brielle in, prayed that no one would take her, and ran back to get a kicking and screaming Liam. I pulled off the diaper change while sitting up in the stroller routine and he went off merrily on his way. They played for a few more minutes and then Eli informed me that he was done and wanted to go check and see if the fro yo place was open yet. Sigh.
Liam decided he wanted to walk so I kept brielle strapped in the stroller and pushed her and Eli while Liam adorably walked along with his little stick sword, taking turns between holding my hand and holding the stroller. At one point, he started beating the Zurg he was holding with the stick and said "OW" over and over.... it was hysterical and super cute. He decided he was done walking, so I switched out the kids and we made it to the fro yo place. Closed. What a surprise! Lol. Luckily, Eli didn't have a fit, and we talked all about how fun it will be to come back next week when they are open. We went to the grocery store, Liam's least favorite place in the world, and he screamed almost the entire time we were there. That's always fun. It's very easy to concentrate on what we need when Liam is throwing a total fit. For some reason, he HAD to be holding a box of blueberry frozen waffles. He just had to be. I had to get our favorite grocery checkout guy to coax it away from him and then give it back to him immediately. So Liam was off to the side holding a box of waffles and it totally looked like I was stealing them. The manager even came over and asked the checkout lady if I had paid for them. Lovely. We stopped by our favorite fruit stand to see that it has been taken over by a bunch of non-friendly looking people (sad! when did our fruit place get taken over?) and by our favorite empanada place to grab some for lunch. Home. Challenge time.
Liam had finished eating the outside edges of his empanada and decided he was done and ready to be holding his box of frozen waffles again. I needed his hands free so he could climb five flights of stairs. I told him he could have it back when we got upstairs. End. of. his. world. MOTHER OF ALL TANTRUMS. Picture me, standing in front of my building, trying to figure out how to get everything upstairs, with a screaming two year old laying on the ground because he can't have his box of waffles. Old ladies are giving me the evil eye, not understanding what is happening (thanks for offering to help, ladies). So I opened the gate and let Eli run up the stairs while I run up with the groceries. I ran back down and forced Liam up half of the stairs and grabbed the double stroller. Eli reached into the groceries to give Liam the waffles and Liam stood there and opened it up. Lovely. I managed to get the stroller in the building and told the boys to walk up the stairs.... I carried Brielle and the groceries while Liam cried the whole way cause I wasn't giving him a frozen waffle. I walked past him and quickly got upstairs with Eli to drop off Brielle and the groceries. Liam stopped halfway up and decided to scream "MOMMMMMMYYYY!" as loud as he could. I am very happy that no one came out of their apartment to rescue him from his evil mommy. I went down and found him on the 4th floor, missing a shoe, trying to eat through the bag of waffles. I grabbed him and plopped him down inside, locked the door and ran down to the lobby to get the stroller before anyone thought I was leaving it out there to be taken. I came up the stairs, carrying the heavy double stroller (Who needs a gym membership??!?!) to screams of "MOMMY!" coming from both Eli and Liam. Why was LIam crying? Because I hadn't given him a waffle. I tore open the package and gave him a frozen waffle. Eli was completely naked except for the fact that his button down shirt was around his head... he couldn't figure out how to get it off. Why was he taking his clothes off, you ask? Why in God's name was he choosing now to remove all of his clothes? Simple, really. He wanted to take a shower.
I could go on and on, but I don't think that's necessary at this point. :) That's pretty much how my days go.
This morning started out how mornings these days are typically starting out for me. Brielle, the light morning sleeper, wakes up when she hears Mike getting ready for work. She still sleeps out in the living room for a few reasons.... mainly because the though of THREE kids in our room scares me a little bit.... but I think we might have to start putting her in the room with us at night. So as soon as I hear Mike leave at 6:40, Brielle starts screaming. That's my cue to do the impossible.... get to her as quickly as possible so Liam doesn't hear her and wake up....but get there without the boys hearing me leave the room. They both have a supersonic ability to hear me open my eyes in the morning, so this is a difficult task. Today, I was successful and managed to tiptoe out of the room and pick up Brielle without the boys stirring.
Greeting Brielle in the morning is always a joy. As soon as she sees you, she breaks out into a huge, happy smile. So even though I'm exhausted and want nothing than to go back to bed, it's always nice to see her. The boys managed to stay sleeping for another HOUR (whaaat? They woke up at 7:45????), so Brielle and I actually had a really nice hour together. She drank her bottle and then I watched her crawl around and explore.... we read a few books together....we laughed (quietly) together. Liam was up and joined us on the couch to read a few books (whaaat? he didn't ask to watch TV right away?) and we were having fun. I was even able to fix breakfast for him and he actually sat down THE FIRST TIME I asked him to to eat it. Then Eli woke up and ALSO mysteriously did not demand that I turn on the TV. He came over to the table and ate his muffin and bacon. He refused to eat his banana, but walaaaa... I cut it up, put some peanut butter on it and gave it to Liam and HE ate it. WIN WIN. I had time, strangely, to make myself tea and oatmeal, while the boys were eating. SOOooo I didn't get a chance to drink my tea until noon, but still! I made it!
The morning was going great.... I read some stories to Liam while Eli watched his favorite new animal show, The Wild Kratts, and Brielle was happy to crawl around and play. I fed Brielle some rice cereal and she started falling asleep, so down she went. Liam started to get a little whinier, but not too bad, and we put together a train track and built a lego structure. I forget what happened next, but that's when things started to fall apart a bit. Liam's bridge fell apart and Eli told me he was not going to help Liam fix it....so Liam came over and hit Eli on the head multiple times with his train track. Cue screaming tantrum from Eli and cue me, picking up a kicking and screaming Liam to try to get him to sit in the corner for a time out. Cause THAT works. Ha. So then I tried to pick up a screaming Liam and get him to apologize. Cue...more screaming. So we were about to watch Toy Story (Eli usually gets to pick first and Liam ALWAYS picks "BUZZ!" when it's his turn), so I turned it off and told Liam he had to say sorry before we watched the movie. His world was OVER. He started kicking and screaming and throwing the mother of all fits. Back in the bedroom. I laid him in his bed and told him to stay there until he stopped screaming and of course he instantly jumped out and followed me out of the room, screaming. I forget how or why, but he FINALLY apologized to Eli. I packed up all of his trains and put them on the counter.
Forgot to mention that I looked over earlier and saw Brielle standing by the shoe container. She had pulled herself up to standing. Already? Yes. She is now pulling herself up on furniture to stand.
So then Liam decided he wanted a snack. Fishies. I made him sit in his chair (OH THE HORROR) and he sat and nicely ate his snack. I had to do something.... feed Brielle, I think, and he quickly announced "DONE!" and promptly threw all of his fishies and his bowl on the floor. I took him out of his chair and told him to pick them up. Of course, he didn't, cause throwing a fit is more fun. My neighbor was leaving to go to the library and I decided I'd take advantage of her ability to help me get out (our elevator is out right now) and told the kids to get their shoes on. I got everyone's diapers changed, shoes on, etc... and then realized that Liam had not cleaned up his goldfish, but had successfully stepped on each one to crush it into a million goldfish pieces. Of COURSE he threw a fit when I told him he had to sweep it up, but this time, amazingly Eli jumped in and offered to sweep them up. Ok, buddy, go for it. Eli did a great (SLOOOOOW) job of sweeping them up and Liam, the little punk, came over and STEPPED IN the tray, crushing them into more pieces and getting little pieces all over his shoes. Eli swept them up again and then said.... "Look, mommy! I put all the crumbs under the (place where we keep our shoes), so you can't see them anymore!" REALLY? He was so proud of himself and thought he did the right thing, so I couldn't be mad. (And you know what? They are still there...I forgot about them til now). I hustled the three kids downstairs to Traci's apartment and threw them in there so she could watch them for a second while I went back to get the double stroller and run it down the stairs. Liam didn't want to leave Traci's fun apartment and pulled a sit down and scream fit, so I had to grab him and carry him on my back (while carrying Brielle on my tummy) down the five flights of stairs. I don't know how I managed to do it (anger??), but I also was able to carry the double stroller and both babies down the stairs in front of the building.
We then had a nice walk over to the grocery store... I realized quickly, that since the elevator wasn't working, it didn't make sense to go to the grocery store and drop the groceries off and THEN go to the playground, so we backtracked (cue Eli... "NOOO, I wanted to go to the GROCERY STOOOOORE FIIIIIRST"....really, buddy? really?) and headed for the playground. Eli was still having a hissy fit and so Liam, not understanding, also decided to have a hissy fit. To calm them down, I told Eli that we were going to see about a special new store (the new FROYO STORE! HALLELUJAH!) in this direction. Well, as luck would have it, the fro yo store is not quite open yet. Eli thought this meant it wasn't open yet for the day and asked me about 40 times if we could check back in a little while to see if it opened yet. Ok, ok, ok, ok, ok, ok eli.
We went to the playground and I was happy to be there. It was a beautiful day and I was happy we finally were out. Eli took off and went for his favorite slide. Ever so sensitive about things being in his shoes, he freaked out when he landed in some sand, and demanded that I take off his shoes and clean them. Nope..it's going to keep happening, buddy...there's a pile of sand today at the bottom of the slide. So he took of his shoes. And sat down every 10 seconds to wipe his feet off, but dude...at least he wasn't complaining anymore! So fine... he was running around in bare feet. Liam, of course, decided he wanted to play on the complete opposite side of the playground. Brielle was fine walking around in the Ergo. Liam quickly decided he wanted to go on the (baby) swings and literally as I was saying no, he snuck AROUND the gate in the 5 mm gap that I never knew existed and got into the swing area. Fine... made it very challenging to see Eli over in Timbuktu, but if he wanted to swing that badly...we'll do it. So Liam is used to swinging in the big boy swings and naturally these don't go as high. So he starts screaming "HIGHER HIGHER HIGHER HIGHER" over and over really loudly. I had plopped Brielle in a baby swing and gave her a little push and she was just chilling, looking absolutely terrified, not in any way enjoying the experience. I finally convinced Liam to get out and then he immediately went over to the swing next to that one and wanted to go in that one. I said no and he collapsed to the ground, screaming and crying. Fine. Let's give this one a go. SAME thing, obviously. I finally convinced him to get out and then realized he had a poopy diaper. He, of course, ran away from me screaming "NO POO POO! NO POO POO!" I hightailed it across the playground to the stroller, strapped Brielle in, prayed that no one would take her, and ran back to get a kicking and screaming Liam. I pulled off the diaper change while sitting up in the stroller routine and he went off merrily on his way. They played for a few more minutes and then Eli informed me that he was done and wanted to go check and see if the fro yo place was open yet. Sigh.
Liam decided he wanted to walk so I kept brielle strapped in the stroller and pushed her and Eli while Liam adorably walked along with his little stick sword, taking turns between holding my hand and holding the stroller. At one point, he started beating the Zurg he was holding with the stick and said "OW" over and over.... it was hysterical and super cute. He decided he was done walking, so I switched out the kids and we made it to the fro yo place. Closed. What a surprise! Lol. Luckily, Eli didn't have a fit, and we talked all about how fun it will be to come back next week when they are open. We went to the grocery store, Liam's least favorite place in the world, and he screamed almost the entire time we were there. That's always fun. It's very easy to concentrate on what we need when Liam is throwing a total fit. For some reason, he HAD to be holding a box of blueberry frozen waffles. He just had to be. I had to get our favorite grocery checkout guy to coax it away from him and then give it back to him immediately. So Liam was off to the side holding a box of waffles and it totally looked like I was stealing them. The manager even came over and asked the checkout lady if I had paid for them. Lovely. We stopped by our favorite fruit stand to see that it has been taken over by a bunch of non-friendly looking people (sad! when did our fruit place get taken over?) and by our favorite empanada place to grab some for lunch. Home. Challenge time.
Liam had finished eating the outside edges of his empanada and decided he was done and ready to be holding his box of frozen waffles again. I needed his hands free so he could climb five flights of stairs. I told him he could have it back when we got upstairs. End. of. his. world. MOTHER OF ALL TANTRUMS. Picture me, standing in front of my building, trying to figure out how to get everything upstairs, with a screaming two year old laying on the ground because he can't have his box of waffles. Old ladies are giving me the evil eye, not understanding what is happening (thanks for offering to help, ladies). So I opened the gate and let Eli run up the stairs while I run up with the groceries. I ran back down and forced Liam up half of the stairs and grabbed the double stroller. Eli reached into the groceries to give Liam the waffles and Liam stood there and opened it up. Lovely. I managed to get the stroller in the building and told the boys to walk up the stairs.... I carried Brielle and the groceries while Liam cried the whole way cause I wasn't giving him a frozen waffle. I walked past him and quickly got upstairs with Eli to drop off Brielle and the groceries. Liam stopped halfway up and decided to scream "MOMMMMMMYYYY!" as loud as he could. I am very happy that no one came out of their apartment to rescue him from his evil mommy. I went down and found him on the 4th floor, missing a shoe, trying to eat through the bag of waffles. I grabbed him and plopped him down inside, locked the door and ran down to the lobby to get the stroller before anyone thought I was leaving it out there to be taken. I came up the stairs, carrying the heavy double stroller (Who needs a gym membership??!?!) to screams of "MOMMY!" coming from both Eli and Liam. Why was LIam crying? Because I hadn't given him a waffle. I tore open the package and gave him a frozen waffle. Eli was completely naked except for the fact that his button down shirt was around his head... he couldn't figure out how to get it off. Why was he taking his clothes off, you ask? Why in God's name was he choosing now to remove all of his clothes? Simple, really. He wanted to take a shower.
I could go on and on, but I don't think that's necessary at this point. :) That's pretty much how my days go.
Wednesday, September 4, 2013
Brielle the crawler
So Brielle has been belly crawling for a few weeks now, getting around pretty good and ALMOST getting the hang of "real" crawling. Well, on Monday, she completely mastered it. She is EVERYWHERE now. I forgot how challenging it is looking after a little crawler who likes to get into all of the crazy, mischevious spots she can.... she particularly likes to go for the kitty litter, plastic bags, toy cars, cords and stickers. She's keeping me on my toes!
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