2.5

My twinners had a half birthday yesterday. They are half-way to 3, or should we just say half-way past 2. I am amazed each and every day how big they're getting and the new things they're learning. They are such funny, sweet kids. Charlie is getting really good with his words and Dylan is still speaking French or Spanish depending on the day. Charlie is loving anything that moves, cars, trains, helicopters, school buses (or any bus or camper), and tractor. Dylan is still in love with anything electronic that has a plug or a button. Some days he just carries around my cell phone charger. They are trying to be big, trying to dress themselves, put on their own shoes, brush their own teeth and use big-kid things like scissors or knives. It's difficult as a mom to sometimes sit back and watch them struggle so that they can learn a new skill or task but they want to do it. Just this morning Dylan was helping me change the sheets on their beds. To celebrate the big day yesterday we made a snowman...or 'no-man' as the twins would say.Happy Un-Birthday buddies...slow down a little bit with that growing up thing. I need you to stay young and in adoration of me for a little longer. I treasure each day I get to spend with you both!

Translation

This morning I was nursing Oliver on the couch. Dylan came up to me and was tugging on my hand and saying something. I said to him "honey, I can't go with you, I'm feeding O. Go show me what you want." He was being relentless and just kept at it. Finally, I said "Charlie, what does Dylan want?" Not thinking that he would know, he surprised me and said, "Na, toys." Dylan wanted the closet open to get to the toys. Sure enough, once I finished with O, he led me to the closet. Hilarious.

Good Day, Sunshine

It is amazing to me the difference a little sun in our world can make. I had the opportunity today to be out by myself for an hour or so. I had a doctor appointment and had to do a couple errands for Brandt while I was in Salt Lake. It's a little chilly out, but there is a beautiful blue sky. As I was driving I was thinking about losing a few pounds. With my two pregnancies I gained the same amount of weight, I just happened to have two babies out of the one pregnancy. It's not that I gained a TON of weight with Oliver, I was just really good at watching my weight with the twins. After I had the twins my weight just fell off without any effort. This time around it's lingering and it's frusterating. If I could drop 10 without doing anything I would be so happy but that clearly is not happening so I need to be better about making sure I get in more exercise and stop eating crap. Just having the sun out today helps though. It makes me more motivated to transform myself into my best self. I'm not having another baby for quite awhile (if at all) so I need to kick it in gear and take care of myself. I cannot wait for a little more warmth so me & the boys can play outside all day. I have big plans this spring. It just needs to get here!! Bye-bye snow...

Yesterday was a day...

Yesterday we started the day off with puke. Brandt got up for work, got O out of his room and brought him into me. I fed him in bed and then we got up to go get our brothers upstairs. I opened their bedroom door and C came out and said "puke". Uh-oh. I turned in the light to find puke in his bed, on his shirt, in his hair. We had strawberries with our dinner the night before so everything was pink. Ok, lets gear up for this. I put O down in the living room, took Charlie's shirt off, and grabbed the garbage out of the bathroom. I stripped the beds and ran them downstairs to throw in the wash (in HOT water). I came back up and finished getting up all the puke and then vacuumed everywhere. By this time C is shivering so I changed his clothes and put him in some warm sweats and let him eat a yogurt. While the boys were eating I filled up the dishwasher and started it. I didn't think ahead with the fact that I needed to put the little guys in the tub so I figured I'd wait an hour and then have them take their tubby. A little time went by and there still was no hot water. Wierd. I waited until it was almost nap time and there was still no water. I called Brandt and he said that maybe the pilot light went out. That made sense cause we had those crazy winds the night before. I can't access the water heater unless we move my dresser (that has a tv sitting on it) so Brandt said he'd come home for lunch. I boiled some water and put it in the tub, then let the tap water mellow it down, and ended up with about 1-1/2 inches of water in the tub. While doing all this little C layed down on the floor with his string cheese in his hand and fell asleep. You have to understand that my boys DO NOT do this. They do not just stop somewhere and fall asleep. I knew he didn't feel well. I had to wash his hair before I put him back in bed so I had to wake him up. He cried and cried because he had a fever, was in a cool bath, and was tired. I felt so bad. I got him all snuggly again and put them all down for naps. When Brandt came home we tried to light the water heater and were getting nothing. No spark or anything. He eventually had to go back to work so I was stuck with still no hot water. I checked our furnace and it's light was out, too, so I re-did that one and read up on the water heater. When Brandt came home from work, we tried it again, and I told him he had to call our neighbor (who is a plumber) to see if he could help. Thankfully, he came over after he had his dinner and between Brandt and him they finally got it to light. Oliver needed a bath before bed so I was able to steal just a little bit of lukewarm water to give him a quick bath in the sink. Brandt and I finally took our showers about 9pm and it was nice and toasty. So, sick kids and no hot water makes for a long and not fun day. We're still not 100% today but we're on the mend. Everyone is sleeping and I think I'm going to attempt a little bit of a clean up while it's quiet. Maybe if I'm lucky I'll have a little bit of "me" time, too. I have a few cheesy movies DVR'd that I'd like to watch.

A Valentine's Day

I've never been one to celebrate Valentine's day. I'm one of those girls that don't freak out if they don't get flowers or jewelry or a heart-wrenching card. I have my man and he does a good job of making me feel special every day. Now that I have kids I feel like I need to start getting into the spirit of holidays. I think I'll baby-step into the random holiday celebrating, starting with the dear St. Valentine's Day.

Today we had yogurt for breakfast. Dylan wanted to eat his yogurt in the "baby" chair so I let him and figured he was trapped in the chair and couldn't get into too much trouble so I was playing with the other two boys in the living room. Dylan came to find me and he looked like this:

I bathe my boys every other day and today was NOT a bath day. Change of plans. It was now a bath day.

Yesterday was Sunday and since we have late church it cuts into nap time so we don't get a nap on Sundays. The boys were quite whiney this morning and I looked forward to their naps. I put them down, fed & played with Oliver, put him down, and made heart sugar cookies to celebrate. I've never made sugar cookies. It took me awhile to get the hang of it but I think the next time I give it a shot they'll be perfect. I packaged them all up so Brandt can run them to his home-teaching families so we don't have to eat 100 cookies.

The boys got up and it was evident we had a good nap. I judge their naps off of their wake-up hair. D was lookin' good today:

And just so the other boys don't feel bad, here's a couple shots from yesterday. What a handsome little guy: And Charlie didn't have a nap so he was being a butt:

Now I just need to figure out what's for dinner.

3 days in a row???

Luckily, yesterday we broke the trend. Poison control is soon going to know us by name. Two days in a row this week I called poison control. Again, the mother of the year award is mine. All you mommies out there that are aiming to steal it from me, watch out, I'm pretty much the winner each day. Tuesday morning I was cleaning my kitchen floor. The boys were playing in the living room. Once I was finished I came around the corner to find a disaster. Charlie has had diaper rash from you-know-where and the doc believes it to be a yeast infection, therefore, we have been putting yeast infection cream on his bum. Charlie took it upon himself to open the tube and smear it all over O's head. I looked a little closer and there was some white on D's face and a little on Charlie's, too, so I didn't know if they had eaten any. I called my buddies at poison control just to make sure they'd be ok in case they did swallow any. (and in case anyone needs to know, unless they swallow a large amount they're fine. If they do swallow a bunch they'll just have an upset tummy. No big deal). Anyway, the next day Brandt came home from work and needed me to help him spray the cabinet doors in the garage quickly. It takes about 10-15 minutes or so. I ran out there and sprayed for a minute, came back in to check on the trouble makers to find they had climbed on the counter to get in an upper cabinet. They found tic-tacs and gum. I took the stuff away, scolded them, and ran back out to finish. A few more minutes later I came back in to find that Charlie had gotten into his daddy's lunch pail. He had a baggy of batteries and a baggy of Advil. The Advil baggy was opened so I had no idea if he had eaten any. I was pretty sure he had cause after just eating tic-tacs the Advil looks a bit similar. So I again called my buddies at poison control. Charlie was on "watch". (if he had eaten more than 13 it is a problem. I don't think he had more than one or two if any. They said to just watch him to see if he is a little lethargic, dizzy, or nauseous.) I swear I'm a good mom. If anyone calls you to ask about our parenting please let them know we do love our kids. We are just blessed with a handful of toddlers that are VERY curious. What can I say???

{thirty}

What a big number. Yes, it is true. I'm struggling to remember things. My body is falling apart. I'm losing my hearing. I hobble when I walk. I am getting up there. I have sailed out of my 20's and into my 30's. Ugh. I'm not supposed to be thirty. I don't think I ever really understood that one day I would have my 30th birthday. People that are 30 are old. I am not old. I refuse to be old. I guess it is all a mindset anyway on how you feel about this whole birthday thing. It didn't bother me until about 2 days ago and then it got real that I was in fact having a birthday. Crazy wierd. My life has quickly passed me by. I do not know how I got here. Granted, I have many beautiful things in my life because of where my life has wandered. I'm happy. I'm grateful. I'm blessed. I'm so very lucky. Since I don't have control over that looming number I suppose we'll have to just celebrate it. Happy Birthday to me.

KEEP AWAY FROM THE BABY!!!

Charlie has loved O since he was born. He is very attentive and likes to know where he is and likes to play with him. A lot of times I'll have O on the ground just playing and I'll look over to see that Charlie has come into the room and is laying down next to him. I've loved this about him but I'm starting to get a little nervous. I don't know if it is jealousy or what but two days in a row Charlie has been mean. I can't leave them alone together. Couple days ago he was pushing on O's stomach. For no reason. I told him that he can't do that. This morning I knew he was in the living room with Oliver and I was in the kitchen. It got quiet and so I started calling out to Charlie and no answer. I went around the corner to find Charlie sticking his fingers down Oliver's throat, gagging him. I came unglued. Seriously....why??? What do you do with this? I love being a mom, I love being a mom, I love being a mom.

I really do. Most the time. A lot of the time actually.