Cutest Moments of the Day

I was sitting on the couch with the boys watching the Jungle Book. Jack got up off the couch, turned around, looked at me and asked, "are you cold Mommy?" I answered, "well, actually yes, I am a little cold." He then went over to the basket of blankets and got one and covered me up with it. He can be such a sweetie some times.

Watching Jesse toddle all over the toddler area at the Jungle. He just barrels through life without a care and always looks up at the nearest adult and flashes the biggest smile. I hope he always retains his fun-loving, happy little attitude.

My Fantasy- a Nocturnal Nanny

Here's my fantasy... I wish I could hire a nanny to work the graveyard shift- only. In this fantasy, a very kind Mary Poppins type woman would arrive at our door at 10 pm. With a smile, she would enter our home and shoo my husband and I off to bed, "No worries dears, you go now and have a wonderful nights sleep. Sweet Dreams." My husband and I would retire to our bedroom and relax, read, maybe some other bedtime activities and fall into blissful slumber, resting assured that we will get a full nights sleep. Miss Mary Poppins would then stay up all night, maybe reading on the couch or quietly watching her favorite late night TV shows. Here's how she would earn her pay. If one or both boys woke up in the middle of the night, she would immediately enter their rooms, pat their backs, sooth them, stay awake with them as long as it takes for them to fall back to sleep- according to our past experience, this could take anywhere from 1 to 3 hours. If a one of them were to get sick in the middle of the night, Miss Mary would cheerfully clean up the mess, do the laundry and stay with them through the night if needed. All while Mommy and Daddy get there full 8 hours of sleep. Miss Mary would turn the coffee pot on before leaving at 7 am, with a cheerful goodbye until we see her again that night.

Hey it's my fantasy. I can dream can't I??

Cutest Moment of the Day

Jack discovered his shadow tonight. Before bedtime we had lots of fun playing shadows on the wall. Ah the simple things...

To Grandpa's House We Go

Went to Grandpa's house this evening for dinner. Grandpa lives about 45 min. away so we don't go there as often as I would like, but I think we should definitely go there more. The boys were so well behaved. Jack ate all his dinner- for the first time in a month. The boys were actually playing together, instead of crying and whining together like they do at home. Jack only had 4 trains and Jesse had 1 wooden bead and wire thingy to play with there, so they were forced to interact. Makes me think that we probably have way too many toys at home. Maybe I should put most of the toys away and see what happens. No, too scary. I'm not brave enough for that.

Grandpa cooked dinner for us, did the dishes and served ME a cup of coffee. Definitely a first!

Cutest Moment of the Day

We headed off to the park today after adding the tandem seat to Jack's tricycle. Wasn't sure how Jesse would take to it, especially the helmet, but he LOVED it. He really liked riding with his big brother. They were SO CUTE together and they turned heads all over the park. It was a fun day and what great weather!

Just a note

This is a post I put on a Mom's bulletin board in response to our children being forced to read in kindergarten and whether that is good or bad. The discussion took a turn to reflect on how are children are growing up differently than we did. I just liked what I wrote and thought I would also post it here for posperity.

I think in general and in all ways kids today are forced to grow up
faster than we did. When we were young our moms sent us outside to play
with the neighborhood kids- unsupervised. That just doesn't happen
today. We didn't have any electronics, no VCR's, DVD's, computers,
gameboys, ipods, leap frogs, etc. etc. We had to be creative with our
toys and talk for them, they didn't talk to us. There were no scheduled
play dates. The only kids who went to preschool were the ones whom both
parents worked and/or could afford it. Now if you don't go to
preschool, you're not going to college- according to the TV
commercials. What about the kid whose family just can't afford
preschool? Are they doomed to drop out of school?

It is a completely different world that our kids are growing up in. I
don't know if it's better or worse, but it is what it is. There is no
going back, unless you want to move to Alaska. But we live in the Bay
Area- one of the most technically advanced places in the country. They
are marketing cell phones to 6 year olds now. Geez, how did we ever
survive without that growing up? It's a crazy, super-fast paced world
we live in. So it's up to us as parents to slow down ourselves and
teach our little ones to enjoy smelling a flower, to make a puppet out
of a sock, to watch a worm crawl - and to enjoy reading a good book.

Cutest Moment of the Day

As I start to cook dinner, Jack comes up to the stove and asks, "Mommy, I help you?" and he proceeds to pull up a chair to the stove and climbs up. He says, "I stir it" and stirs the noodles. Then he proudly announces, "I cooking dinner." - and 5 seconds later he is off the chair and back to playing with his trains.

Jesse can only shake his head "no". He answers everything by shaking his head "no". Today I asked him if he wanted to take a nap and as usual he shook his head no, then he stopped and very slowly nodded "yes"- a first!

It's a Sun Shiny Day...

Ah, back to normal at last! And as I look out the window, the rain has cleared and the sun is shining. I've joined the land of the living again and it feels great. Jack is off to preschool and Jesse is napping. I've cleaned the house up and Jesse is still napping! When you're a parent, it's definitely the little things that count.

normalcy... It's a good thing.

In Sickness and in Health -part 2

It was bound to happen. I came down with the same stomach flu the boys had recently. It started at 9:30 pm and ended about 4 am. Needless to say, I am wiped out. This is one of the most challenging parts of parenting. What do you do when you yourself are sick? I couldn't even lift Jesse because I was so weak. Luckily, a friend picked up Jack and took him to a playdate for a few hours. I turned a video on for Jesse while he was safe in his crib so I could close my eyes for a half hour. I called my older sister for help, but she was too busy today with her retired life. She had to attend her painting class. Then after closing my eyes for a half hour I get the mail and there's a letter addressed to me from my father-in-law. In it is an article stating that babies should not watch any TV before age 2. I was so offended that he would send this to me- not to Tom and me- just to me, that I wanted to cry. Overly sensitive? Maybe. But I think it's really rude of someone to send their parenting opinions from across the country (he lives in Boston). Especially someone who divorced his wife and moved all the way across said country when his son was 4 years old.

Anyway... both boys are napping now and I will do the same. One thing they don't tell you when you are trying to get pregnant is how many colds and flus you will have to suffer through. Germs become your life.

Where's my bed??

Cutest Moment of the Day

Jack has become obsessed with his nipples. Every time we change his shirt he has to touch them and go look in the mirror.
Today when he had his shirt off, I noticed he didn't make a comment about them, so I asked him, "hey, how are your nipples today?" He put his little fingers on them and replied, "they feel goooooooood."

It was our one laugh-out-loud moment in our very long day.

In Sickness and in Health

Jesse woke up last night about 10:30 pm vomiting. It seems he's caught the bug Jack had 5 days ago. Poor baby. I hate their first "sick". It's just so sad because they don't understand what's going on. Luckily when it was over he went right back to sleep. It was a rough night though. I moved his crib mattress next to our bed on the floor and piled pillows around him. He woke again at midnight and again at 2 am. Then it was over. Needless to say, I didn't get much sleep. Tom pretty much slept through the entire thing. I don't know how men can do that. I guess it must be nice to have such peace of mind to just turn off any concern because you know someone else will take care of it. I wish I could do that sometimes. But mothers just aren't wired that way.

Luckily it's a quick bug. By morning, Jesse was a lot better. Not much of an appetite though. That's just how Jack was last week when he had it.

Most of our day was filled with a lot of whining and crying. Jesse was out of sorts, wanting to be held a lot and Jack just decided to chime in with his own constant whining. I guess he was getting jealous of any extra attention given to Jesse. Tom and I just looked at each other. It was one of those "is it over yet?" kind of days.

The only good thing about a day like today is that you know tomorrow will be better.

Cutest Moments of the Day

Jack asking me at dinner in his little voice, "Mommy, do you want something to drink? Milk? Water? Apple Juice?"

Hearing Jesse laugh as he walks around the house holding a ball in his hand. (He just started to walk about 2 weeks ago)

Tired and True

My 2.5 yr. old, Jack, woke up last night at 2:30 am. He wasn't crying. He opened his door, walked into the living room, grabbed his sippy cup and calmly walked into my bedroom and asked, "Where's Daddy?". Even at 2:30 am he can amaze me.
Tom has been gone skiing since yesterday afternoon and now at this hour Jack decides to realize that Daddy isn't here.

I'm convinced that my two little boys are practicing for some future track team relay race. They will never both sleep through the night. They tag team every night. Last night, after questioning the whereabouts of his father, Jack slept in until 7:45am.-- normally, an unheard of event. But as if they had preplanned this the night before, Jesse woke at 5:30 and would not go back to sleep. Usually Jack is the early riser, but last night they pulled a switch-a-roo. So after waking up at 2:30 with Jack to put him back to sleep, I was awake again at 5:30 with Jesse, watching him practice his walking around the living room.

At 8:30 I dropped Jack off at preschool. At least I'll get half a break this morning. I returned home and just as I started to put Jesse down for his morning nap, the school called- Jack has diarrhea, please pick him up. So I snag Jesse out of the crib, put him in the carseat and off we go to pick up Jack. There will be no breaks for Mommy today.

Such is life right now...

Rene'

First Entry- Home - not so - Alone

This is my very first Blog entry. What spawned the idea to do this? Believe it or not, it was a movie I watched yesterday with Heather Locklear and Hilary Duff- "The Perfect Man". In the movie, Hilary frequently wrote entries in her own blog. I had been hearing about this blog thing. But didn't quite understand. I'm a 39 yr. old mother of two boys- ages 32 months and 1 yr. Needless to say, I don't get out much. The tech world, which I used to be completely up on before giving birth, is now passing me by with the speed of light. But a quick Google search got me up to speed on this whole blogging thing. And 10 minutes later, here I am starting a blog of my own, while the boys are nestled snug in their beds.

Where's hubby you ask? He's away on an overnight ski trip with his best friend of 28 years. So here I sit in bed with my laptop delving into the blogging world.

My intent is to journal about my life with two little boys who are 19 months apart. I hope to make it interesting and funny, because life around here is just that and so much more. I want to tell the truth about raising kids- the good, the bad and the ugly. So much of the bad and the ugly is tucked neatly away, by all mothers, never to be shared. So we always feel like we're the only ones who ever experienced this or that.

I intend to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

So help us all.