Leah, Emma and Claire (and Jen and John)

We had a nice weekend. Friday night we took the girls to Costco and then ordered Thai food and watched the craptors, I mean Raptors, game once they were in bed. It drives John nuts when I call them the craptors. I’m only joking - I mean I still watch most games with him so I can’t think they’re that bad. Our new mantra is every loss is one step closer to more balls in the draft pick lottery draw.

Saturday night we were supposed to have dinner with our university friends at Coby and Carrie’s house but Ronan got sick so we had everyone here instead. We had Alicia, Jeff and Amelia, and Liv, Scott, Emma, Brady and Conner. Sean and Sylvia dropped in for a bit before leaving for dinner plans(and swearing they would never have children I’m sure!). We were even numbers with the kids which was good because it really was something to see. Liv’s Emma is 3, the girls are 19 months, Brady and Conner are 10 months and Amelia is 9 months. Needless to say we didn’t even attempt to eat at the table. It was fun to see the kids crawling, dancing and running all over the place. Alicia posted lots of pictures. Here’s one I took that I find amusing. Liv and Scott with 6 kids - can you find them all!

Yesterday I had book club. We used to do it on the last Monday of every month but we’ve moved it to Sunday afternoons. Bev made us all brunch and then we played Scene It. Not having seen more than a handful of movies (rented and in the theatre) in the past 3 years I was a bit worried that I wouldn’t know anything but it was actually pretty fun. That’s high praise from someone who traditionally can’t stand board games although I think the interactive DVD part was what sold me.

Today the girls woke up sneezing. By late afternoon we had snot city. By bedtime we had the famous snot bombs. Leah seems to have forgot how much she loved ramdomly blowing her nose (fingers crossed!). Every episode of sleep hell we have had has started off with them getting a cold. We’ve had TEN nights in a row now…I wonder how long this streak can last.

The girls really like to dance. It is pretty entertaining. They each have their own dancing style. Emma is very intense and Leah just walks around all happy go lucky. I'll have to get some more video to capture them when they're really dancing but this one was too funny to pass up. Enjoy.

I know some of you saw this when I posted it and couldn't see the video. I can't get the video to embed (something weird is going on with YouTube). Here is a link. I'll try to embed it again later.

THE VIDEO

…how frustrated I was with them.

They have slept right through for SIX nights in a row. They go to bed at 7:30pm - no crying or fussing. They wake up around 7:30am and laugh and play with each other until I go in and get them at 8am.

They eat up all their breakfast, lunch and dinner. They even ate quiche yesterday (big steps in our house!). They ask nicely for drinks and snacks and they are sharing with each other.

All week they have napped after lunch which I must admit is quite enjoyable. I find it breaks up the day much better than when they would nap and be up for the rest of the day by 11:30am. It’s been a bit of a fight to keep Leah up but she’s been better with each passing day. They’ve been napping for 2.5 hours. The house is clean, the laundry is done and dinners are much improved (right John?!).

They are in very good moods and there isn’t much crying of any kind. They are picking up new words like crazy now. All in all they are much more enjoyable - or maybe I’m just not exhausted.

Jackson has also stopped whining and is eating her new food.

This can’t last but I do enough complaining here that I thought I should give the 3 of them some credit for their excellent behaviour this week!

The girls have slept through for 4 nights in a row. We’ve started leaving the radio on for them all night (we accidentally left it on the first night and now we’re scared to turn it off…) and we gave them these neat flashlights my dad bought them that don’t need batteries (you shake them). The flashlights are pretty funny…if you peek in right after they go to bed it’s like Starwars (but entertaining!).

Unfortunately I can’t say that I am well rested yet. Before we left for Florida Jackson was nearly out of her food. We went to a few stores but couldn’t find it so I ended up mixing the old stuff with new stuff (same brand - some organic expensive crap)for when she was at Drew’s. I’m assuming this was acceptable to her and that Drew wasn’t lying when he said she was good. Well now we are out of the old food and she is not happy…and she is most unhappy between the hours of 1am - 6am. She likes to voice her unhappiness on my bedside table right in my ear. This past weekend we went hunting for her food only to be told that they’ve stopped making it. Nice. She does eat it so at this point she’ll just have to get used to it. I don’t have the heart to lock her in the basement yet but it’s coming.

We had a nice day yesterday. The weather was great so I decided to walk the girls over to the voting station. An educational field trip! They got to go again with John after work. Last night was TV heaven with the Senators beating the Leafs, 24, the Raptors game and the election coverage. Sometime after 10 I decided it would be fun to watch the election stuff in bed. I had to check online to see who won in our riding this morning.

John had a good first day at work. I had a good first day back solo with the girls. I’m trying to get them to nap after lunch instead of in the morning. So far so good.

We’ve actually been back since Thursday but I’ve been enjoying the last few days of our vacation.

Our last couple of days in Florida were nice. We all went out for dinner twice and the girls were pretty good. We don’t take them out much at home - it’s not relaxing so we usually wait and go out just the two of us when we have babysitting in town. Maybe if the girls were into food it would be better but they are much more interested in running around so you have to eat fast or in this case take shifts entertaining them. At one point we gave both of them forks and discovered that they are quite capable of stabbing food and feeding whoever’s lap they are on.Leah also got a taste of spicy food when she stole a piece of cajun chicken off my plate. She was very upset and could not understand why her mouth was on fire.

Our trip was a nice break. My mom and dad have the perfect location - you can see Tampa Bay from their deck (see picture below) and the ocean is across the street on the other side. There is water everywhere and it is very pretty although hurricane season can be a bit stressful. The weather wasn’t too hot and it was a nice break from snowsuits. One bonus of the girls being so small is that all their summer stuff still fit.

The plane ride home was a bit better. I gave them gravol again and this time it knocked them each out for about 45 mins - not at the same time of course. The plane was mostly empty so we got two rows in the back to ourselves and they were able to move around a lot more which made them happy.

It was nice to be home and sleep in our own bed. As I have mentioned, the girls have not been sleeping well for the past few months. It is slowly sucking all of our energy and we really did need a break. I think the majority of our problems are because they are in the same room. Emma has night terrors and it wakes Leah up. If you go in to comfort Emma, Leah sees you and wants up. If you try and leave with Emma all hell breaks loose. The same thing happens if Leah wakes up. We have got into the very bad habit of just giving them bottles in the middle of the night because it is the quickest way to settle them both down and there is always some reason why we don’t want to be up for hours in the middle of the night trying to get them both to settle!

It has become an expectation that we be up in the middle of the night with one of them. With Christmas and then this trip I was hesitant to start any sleeping boot camp but I have reached my limit. I’m not 100% sold on separating them yet so our first try will be getting them off the night bottle. If they wake up they have to work it out (with minimal intervention from us because I don’t want the bottle to be replaced with the expectation that they get snuggles if they cry). Thursday night Emma cried for 10 seconds in her sleep and woke Leah up. Leah played in her crib for about 30 mins and then decided it was show time. Emma then woke up. I went in, gave Leah her soother and Emma her chickie and left. They weren’t impressed. John and I made a deal that we weren’t going in unless it was real crying and not just the whiny cry. Emma fell asleep after minimal whining. Leah alternated between whining and playing for 1.5 hours and then went to sleep.

The last two nights they have slept through which I’m sure is just a fluke. I am determined to be strong on this and not let exhaustion cloud my judgement. I will embrace coffee and diet pepsi! John starts his new job tomorrow and I will not let him get up with them. If he has to put ear plugs in and sleep in the other room then that’s what we’ll do. I really hope this works for us because I really don’t want them in two rooms but I am just so tired and fed up with getting up in the night. I get so frustrated that I can’t fall back asleep! I guess I got spoiled with them sleeping through until they stopped 3 months ago.

So that’s the news here. Tomorrow starts a new phase for us. John will need the car for work so I will be carless (which I’m sure I will whine about here on a regular basis!). Hopefully he will have clients downtown so he can take the train in sometimes.

I have to mention that Emma peed in the potty. They are still not at all ready for the potty but we are back to trying before bath now that we are home. John’s mom was here Friday night and Emma peed for her.

They have also started saying a few two and three word phrases. Emma is much more into it because it usually involves bossing around Leah. She can actually say “No touch Leah” which is pretty funny.

Here are a ton of pictures from our holiday. No pictures of the cruise - I didn’t bring the camera.

The first picture is of three storks that showed up the night we arrived. Nobody in the park had ever seen storks before (not many babies in a retirement community….) and it was really, really weird. They are definitely not at all what the storybooks portray them as - long pointy beaks and a creey fixation on the girls. They actually followed them down the street. One lady took it as far as to say that it meant that one day I might have triplets. I didn’t laugh.

The creepy storks

“Hurry, they haven’t noticed us leaving yet..”

With Granny on the pier

Hanging out with their new friends.

RUN!!!!

Leah looking for shells

Emma posing

What’s that?

Leah

Emma

John and Leah

All of us

The view from the deck.

With Granny and Grandpa

We’re still on holidays. Our trip isn’t flying by which is nice.

The plane ride with the girls was about as good as can be expected. We flew Westjet which was really good. They gave us a row to ourselves and each seat had it’s own tv with all the satellite channels (including Treehouse). Unfortunately the girls (like at home) had little interest in the TV. Boy was I cursing not letting them watch TV!! They wanted to move around but we managed to keep them in our aisle. They were both tired but wouldn’t nap (again our fault for never letting them sleep on us). I am not looking forward to the plane ride home. Oh, the Gravol had little to no effect…maybe a full dose on the way back
We spent 1 day with my parents before we left. The weather was warm and we spent the afternoon on the beach. John fished off the beach while the girls played in the sand. They weren’t interested in swimming so it was quite nice. We were all able to relax while they played happily in the sand and pushed the wagon down the beach.

Thursday morning John and I left for Miami to get on the cruise. We made good time and we were one of the first people on the boat…and at the buffet! The cruise was just what we needed…we slept a lot, ate a lot (ok, maybe we didn’t need to eat a lot but at least we didn’t have to cook!), and relaxed. We stopped in Key West and then in Mexico. John’s birthday (29th) was on Saturday and I think he had the perfect day. He slept in, went snorkling in Mexico, ate not one but two dinners, played blackjack, poker and last but not least got to spend the whole day with me! The most memorable part of the cruise started Saturday night. There was a big cold front and the wind was crazy. The boat was rocking like nothing I have ever experienced. From my unscientific poll I think the majority of the passengers (including the staff) were sick. I had on my barf bracelets from when I was sick with the girls and I was queasy but managed to keep everything down. John was not so lucky. Gravol helped him out though. All in all the cruise was really fun and we would both do it again.

The girls had a good time with my parents. They spent a lot of time at the beach. They are quite popular with all the people in the park and they have received lots of gifts. They have adjusted to Florida life quite well and I think the cold weather is going to be a shock to them. My dad gated off the deck so they can go outside whenever they want. It’s nice to not have to run after them.

We’re here for two more days and then we fly home on Thursday. I’ll post some pictures then.

We’re off tomorrow morning. I’m packed, the girls are packed, John is packing. We are not looking forward to the plane trip with the monkeys. I talked to the pharmacist yesterday and he suggested a half dose of gravol to settle them down. I think we’re going to do it. Whatever happens it will be memorable.

The girls were 19 months on Saturday. I think I’m done with the monthly update (for this month anyway - too busy). Instead I’ll just highlight some of the things they did this month…

- Emma can now run and climb up on all our furniture. She is starting to show an interest in walking up the stairs rather than crawling. Leah is still quick walking and can only climb on the leather couch. They are fearless when they are on the couch and we have saved them from some nasty tumbles. It’s scary.

-They are learning new words everyday. Their latest is more. It was a very frustrating word at first because they just repeated it over and over again and got frustrated when you didn’t bring them what they wanted. They are starting to understand that they have to tell us what they want and are putting it together with what they want. More pasta is their favourite. They love rotini. They also understand help and hot which has proven quite useful. They also say beep beep when they want you to move.

-They are eating much better. Their appetites have increased a lot. They still love bread, cheese, yogurt, chicken and pasta. Emma is much more willing to try new things. Leah still throws it on the floor without even trying it.

-They are sleeping much better. We had some bedtime issues over the holidays but they are back on track. We stil have some night wakings but it seems that they are more night terrors than them just waking up for the fun of it.

-They are really starting to enjoy each other. They’ll share their toys and have been known to randomly start kissing and hugging each other. They will sit together and build thing with their blocks or climb up in a chair and read a book together. They like to chase each other and sometimes the squeals of laughter are so loud it’s piercing. I really hope they always get along - wishful thinking I know.

We are going to Florida. The plan has been in the works for many months but there were a few things keeping us from booking. The most important being that John got a new job. His last day with his current job is Friday and he starts his new job on the 23rd. We leave for Florida on the 10th and we get back the 19th. Yipee! Not many of you have seen my mom in action but she’s just like me when it comes to taking care of the girls. I give her the rundown at the beginning of the visit and then I sit back because she wants to do it all. She occasionally tries to give them fries or chocolate (suspiciously my dad is always close by at these times) but I know they are just teasing me.

Oh but it gets better. John and I are going on a 4 night cruise. Yipee! Yipee! Sleeping, eating, swimming and reading my book. There are even poker tournaments for John. Four days to ourselves. I need a break. John needs a break. We are very excited. The girls will stay with my parents.

The girls are doing much better. The snot production is way down and they are much happier. Their bedtime is slowly coming back to normal. Last night they were in bed at 7:55. Emma cried a bit but she settled by 8:15pm. They slept right through til 7:45 this morning when they woke up happy and lay there and talked to each other. They are napping again in the morning and I think they are slowly getting back to normal. I don’t care if they want to go to bed at 8…I just need to know what time they go to bed at so I can get through the day. I know that makes me sounds pretty terrible but as much as I enjoy them I need some time of my own and by the evenings I am tired and my patience is low. Hmm…do you think I need a break!

I have to write some of the cute things they are doing these days. They are sharing very well. If you give one of them two of anything and ask her to give one to her sister they do it no problem. Emma has started saying “aaahhhh chooo” when anyone sneezes. Leah loves blowing her nose - kleenex is optional. When you carry Leah in the store she says “walk” over and over again. Emma has started climbing on the kitchen and dining room chairs. Yesterday she made it up on the dining room table. They have tested every toy for step stool capabilities - some have been confiscated. Their language has really taken off. Leah can name every animal in one of her books and they both are constantly pointing out things they know when we’re out. They are able to repeat and remember very quickly now. They can also follow two commands like “go find a magnet and put it on the fridge” or “go find the lion and give it to Jackson” (they are willing to give Jackson anything!).

No more luck on the potty. Last night Emma refused to get in the bath - she wanted to sit (but not pee) on her potty…

I have never been a big fan of celebrating the new year. It used to be because I thought there was too much hype that rarely lived up to expectation but now it’s simply because the thought of staying up past midnight is not very appealing. Throw in two 18 month olds in tow and I’m sure you can understand why I wasn’t all that keen on going anywhere. We always get together with our university friends for New Years and this year we were all set to go to Liv’s. We had exchanged emails on how we were going to get her twin boys, her three year old, Amelia and the girls settled and sleeping so we could enjoy New Years. Unfortunately Liv’s family came down with the flu so plans changed to Alicia’s.

The girls have been a disaster since Christmas. I know they say kids thrive on schedules but I always thought that didn’t apply to us. Now I’m not so sure. They have been hard to get to sleep at night (hysterical crying etc) and they have given up a set bedtime or wake up time. I’m hoping it’s the cold they have because to be quite honest it sucks. They are not happy so we are not happy.

So back to New Years, I was pretty skeptical about getting them to settle at Alicia’s but we packed the trunk full of their stuff and crossed our fingers that maybe we’d get to spend some alone time with our friends. No such luck. We were there a total of 3 hours where John and I took turns attempting to have conversations with people while keeping the girls out of trouble. We gave them their bottles but we just couldn’t get them settled. We might have stayed if they were willing to play happily but Leah was in full tempter tantrum mode and there was no reasoning with her. We left. We were home by 9pm. Emma went to bed…Leah, fully recovered from her tantrum, was miss happy til 9:57 (yes, I kept on looking at my watch!) when she finally fell asleep. John and I were in bed by 10:30 talking about our evening when the neighbours behind us set off the best home display of fireworks I have ever seen. I was glad I got to see it. We were all fast asleep at the stroke of midnight…which was good because Leah was up bright and early this morning.

Today was a lazy day. John finished painting our room so we got it all put back together. It is so nice to have some colour in the house. We took the girls out this afternoon and shoveled the driveway and went for a walk. Emma likes to walk but Leah gets fed up pretty quickly. The rest of the day was spent napping (thankfully they still nap!) and playing with the girls.

I just went back and read what I wrote last year on New Years day. Apparently 2005 was everything I thought it would be…we sold the condo, moved into the house, the girls sat, crawled, walked and started talking. It was a busy year. I don’t think 2006 will be quite as eventful but hopefully it will be just as much fun…with maybe a bit more sleep!

It’s 8:50pm…they are still not settled. John is back at work tomorrow. Leah peed in the potty again tonight!

Off to work

All done

Pretty snow

Walking with Dad

Posing with Dad