Super Stuff on a Saturday!

My sweet Baby A was sick last Friday, and she was nothing short of devastated that she couldn’t go to school.  Her spirits perked up, though, when we went downstairs to spend some time with the furry babies.  She covered up on the couch, and Miki and Alex immediately jumped to her rescue.  I snapped some pictures of them “taking care of her”.  That made her smile for the first time all day…and she was so excited to share the picture with her sissy when she got home from school.

The girls won ribbons in the display board contest!!!  Baby B got 2^nd place (for kindergarten and 1^st grade), and Baby A got 3^rd place.  They were so excited!!!  And I thought it was so sweet that, from Day 1, they talked about how they would share their gift certificates ($10 and $5, respectively) at the book fair.

By Sunday, Baby A was feeling better, and Mother Nature was giving us a beautiful taste of spring.  We had discussed going to the park, but we decided to play at home instead.  The girls rode their bikes and scooters, and Mommy and Daddy broke out the Frisbee.  It was such great fun to all be doing our thing!!!

Spring soccer season kicked off this week!  I surprised the girls with that on Monday morning, and they were stoked.  How great it was to see them running around on the field!

Baby A cracked us up with an extraordinary display of manners one night.  At the table: “I’m sorry to ask this, but could I please have some more guacamole?”  And when she played a wild card in UNO, she said, “I would like some green, if possible.”  HA!!!

The girls went out to supper with Daddy on Thursday night.  It’s sometimes hard to pull details from them, but Baby B came home and proclaimed, “We had the black and blue pizza.  It was so delicious!”  Her enthusiasm cracked me up!

And some previously-shared-on-FB-quotes that I couldn’t resist including here:

One of the kitties was eyeing the table tonight at supper. B said, "He thinks he wants to be human." And then she added, "He must not understand the things an average human has to go through." Ack! I didn't realize her seven years here as a human had been so tough so as to shape her views as such. Hahaha!

Baby B came up to me as I was getting this morning. She was holding two pictures, and she said, "Mommy, can you compare and contrast these?" I did not even know what to make of that, but it sure cracked me up out of the blue. HA!

Sharing a little bit of "awwwww" that my baby girl (A) randomly gave me as I tucked her in. "I'm always proud of you, because you're the best mommy in the world." I needed that today!

So thankful for this Super Stuff!

Super Seven Stuff on a Non-Alliterative Wednesday

This last week has been a challenging one, with one sick baby, and then two, followed by a puny-feeling mama.  Still, I am very thankful for the glimmers of great in the midst of the glop.

1)      I took B to the pediatrician last Monday, and he wanted to test her for the flu.  He told her he was going to “tickle her nose”.  I added my standard line, “It will only tickle for a second, and then it will be all over.”  When she didn’t fuss a bit, he was so impressed…that, on top of no crying last week when they got their four-year old shots.  I saw him mouth the word “amazing” to himself as he jotted a note in her chart.  Proud mama!

2)      I didn’t realize that B knew the general steps in baking a potato, but it was so cute to observe her “cooking” in her kitchen one day.  She pretended to peel a plastic potato with a plastic knife.  (Her technique was relatively accurate!)  She then emptied a plastic bag of some wooden pieces and used it as foil to wrap the potato and put it in the oven.  Of course I don’t bake potatoes once they’re peeled, but I appreciated her attention to detail!!!

3)      One night after supper, Sasha was lounging in front of the fireplace.  In order for the girls not to disturb her, I suggested they sit on the couch and read her a book.  B picked a “Splat” book, one I didn’t realize she’d memorized.  She “read” it, word for word, to Sasha.  She said she chose it for Sasha since it was about a cat.  So sweet!

4)      The girls and I were playing Go Fish last week.  We went through the pictures of all the different kinds of sea life, the majority of which were already familiar to the girls.  Despite that, they kept asking each other for jellyfish, saying, “Sissy, do you have any jellybeans?”  Perhaps a Freudian slip???

5)      Part of our ailments last week included some GI issues.  I’ll spare any more details, but the answer to one question was, “I have a skunk in my belly."  I could almost believe that!  

6)      It always baffles me a little bit…and certainly warms my heart…when one baby calls me on behalf of the other one, even in the middle of the night from their perfectly dark bedroom, “Mommy!  Sissy needs her nose wiped!”

7)      More on this to come, but we made the spur-of-the-moment decision to transition the girls from the zipper blankets they’ve known since they were born to regular, “big girl” blankets.  The looks on their faces were priceless…they were so proud!!!

 


[I wrote this back on Monday, but I'm just now sitting down to post it.  The girls are well, except for finishing up their coughs.  I am much better, but still snotty and tired.  How many days 'til spring???  Ah, well...this, too, shall pass!]

Mind Doesn't Always Triumph Over Matter

I’ve tried to deny this for a full week.

I haven’t had much to say on the blog, but all my Facebook posts have been full of rainbows and butterflies.

I generally subscribe to the camp of “Fake it ‘til you make it,” and it generally seems to work.

But I can’t hide it any longer.

We.Are.Sick.

It started last Sunday with B…cough, fever, and then vomiting.

We went to the pediatrician on Monday, and he confirmed it was just a cold. 

I kept B home from school on Tuesday, but sent A, since she seemed to be fine.

Tuesday afternoon, I went to the doctor to check on the nastiest cough I’ve ever had, which – by that time – had been hanging on for about 10 days.  He confirmed that it was just a cough, and prescribed some cough medicine.

B had really tough days on Tuesday and Wednesday, and by Thursday morning, A didn’t look quite right.

Thankfully, B was turning a corner for the better by Thursday lunch, but by Thursday afternoon, A was sick.

We muddled through Friday.  By Saturday, B was well, but A was still sick…and by then, so was I.  I called my doctor back, and I was so thankful he called in a prescription for me.

Saturday was rough.  But thank goodness it was finally the weekend, and Daddy was home.  B was feeling mostly fine, but A was still very pitiful, and this mama needed some rest.

Today is Sunday…Day 8, if you’re counting (as I am).

B is fine, and A has turned a corner.  I’m feeling better, too.  Today was the first in a full week that we all ate a normal breakfast.  Both girls drank milk.  Woo hoo!!!

I’m hopeful that we will start a fresh week tomorrow, full of true [not fake!] vim, vigor, and vitality. 

Among other things, I’m looking forward to having a few good days under my belt so I can begin to restore my faith in the concept of mind over matter.

Super Stuff on a Monday

So very THANKFUL for a truly fantastic Thanksgiving week, full of family and friends and fun!

1)      We made our annual pilgrimage to the zoo on Wednesday before Thanksgiving.  (We go to the zoo much more often, but we went last year the day before Thanksgiving, and the zoo was almost deserted…it was great!)  The weather was beautiful, and we had a great time hanging out with our animal friends.  I love the simple pleasures of a trip to the zoo!

2)      On Thanksgiving we worked with the kiddos to make a “Thankful Tree”.  The trunk and branches were traced from their hands, and I had planned for the adults to write what the kiddos were thankful for on leaves.  Baby A insisted on writing her own leaves!  Of course we had to spell everything for her, but she did an amazing job!

3)      We took the girls to the nicest restaurant in town on Friday night.  I was a little nervous, but they did great!  We all enjoyed a delicious meal, and no one pulled the tablecloth to the floor…or set a cloth napkin on fire…or broke any glasses.  Success!!!

4)      Daddy decided to work with the girls on phone manners.  They did pretty well with “This is she,” and “May I take a message, please?”…but the hilarious thing was hearing them try to make the “Brrrriiiing!” of a ringing phone.  B, in particular, had the funniest guttural growl.

5)      The girls were acting very silly before breakfast one day.  Unsatisfied that he wasn’t joining in the acrobatics in the den, B said, “Daddy, you need to do something silly!”

6)      It’s amazing what a box (or two) of new crayons can do for our household.  The girls love to color these days, but when they have nice sharp crayons, they can go at it for hours, it seems!  The girls invited Daddy to join in the fun, and – much to their complete delight – he accepted their offer.  I had to laugh at the colors he chose, but the girls didn’t mind a bit.

7)      The girls do their best hide-and-seek when Daddy is orchestrating the game, but they were trying to play by themselves one morning.  They just can’t resist talking to each other.  B might be searching for A: “Sissy, where are you?”  And A would say, “I’m not supposed to talk now!”

8)      The girls had their first pomegranate this weekend.  B liked it, but A was downright smitten.  She was double-fisting the seeds as quickly as Daddy could clean them.  I think she would have eaten an entire pomegranate if we’d let her!

9)      We were reading in the den one day, and at random, B said to me so sweetly, “Mommy, you made me feel better when you read to me on my blanket when I was sick.”  (I am tearing up just typing that!)

10)   We bought “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” over the weekend.  After we read it through once, B said, “You can read it again and then I’ll try to learn to read it.”  I didn’t realize she made such a concerted effort to memorize books…although she does do a crazy-great job!

11)   Daddy took the girls for a ride on Sunday morning.  They came back for a potty break, and then we were all heading to lunch.  While I was with B in the bathroom, she told me very excitedly, “Mommy, Sissy has a big story to tell you when you get in the car, about her living in a pond!"  Apparently they’d been making up tall tales as they rode.

12)   And so many quotes!!!

B, after lunch out on Wednesday:  “I can feel this going into my intestines.”

A, seeing B doing something she wasn’t supposed to:  “No, Sissy.  Mommy and Daddy would not appreciate that.”

B, seeing A practicing writing B's name:   "You are the sweetest sissy I have ever seen."

A, while working on a puzzle of the United States, planning where she’d like to go:  "I want to start in Louisiana, and then go to New York, and then to Kansas, and then we'll come home to Kentucky. And then we'll go to Washington, and California, and then Nevada. And then we'll figure out what we want to do next."

A, commenting on a broken hanger in my closet: “The hanger lay broken on the floor.”  Her syntax (which I later recognized from a book) cracked me up!!!

[Looking at my list, it’s very clear that Daddy was on vacation for five days, huh?!  We got to spend a lot of great, relaxed family time together.]

...and now I'm so excited to kick off the Christmas season with my baby girls.  I just know this is going to be the best year yet!!!

Thank Goodness for a Sisterly Advocate

When the girls came home from the hospital, we took them straight to the pack-and-play in our bedroom.  They rarely left that little cocoon until they were about 10 weeks old.  And consequently, I spent lots and lots of time in the bedroom, too.  That’s where we fed babies, changed babies, dressed babies, bathed babies.  I spent “awake time” reading and singing to them, and I’d spend at least some of their naptime napping myself.  And of course they were within six feet of me while we slept (or tried to sleep) at night.

I think it was this near-constant togetherness that made me so aware of the girls’ each and every noise.  And from a very early age, I’ve been able to discern who was making which noise.  Certainly the girls’ voices are different, but even their coughs and sneezes and laughs and grunts I can determine with a pretty fair degree of accuracy.

That skill has come in very handy, of course.  I know who may not be sleeping well, who’s calling for me, and who is still zonked out, despite her sister jumping on the bed.

Over the past several weeks, though, I’ve gotten a little thrown a few times.  The girls have had a couple of bouts of the sniffles, and that’s what I’ve blamed for my confusion.

But for every time I’ve been called into their room by a “Mommy!  Wipe my nose!”  or “Mommy!   I need a tissue!”  or “Mommy!  I need potty!” I’ve been so thankful that they have each have a sisterly advocate.

Particularly in the middle of the night, out of a deep sleep, I’ll go bounding into their room.  Standing in the darkness, I guess my confusion is apparent.  Sometimes I’ve said, “Who is it?” or sometimes one of the girls will volunteer, “It’s Sissy!  Sissy needs her nose wiped!”

And there are times, when I must not respond with the lightning speed that is expected, that one baby is yelling, “Mommy!  Wipe my nose!”  and the other is yelling, “Mommy!  Sissy needs her nose wiped!”

While the “in stereo surround sound” requests can be a little rattling in the middle of the night, ultimately I’m so thankful that my baby girls have such sweet advocates in each other.