A Gorgeous Day For Winter

We had an absolutely beautiful day for winter: sunny, and it got close to 60 degrees. I picked up Claire from preschool, took the kids to Culver's for lunch, and then got everyone home so we could play outside for a while. The twins loved being outdoors! I took so many photos that I'll have to do a couple posts to get them all here (I'm limited to five photos per post). Then Claire played with the next-door-neighbor teenager for the afternoon while the twins napped and I worked and did laundry.

The first set of photos includes pics of the twins together and one of Claire (who, by the way, is looking through her magnifying glass at dog poop in the neighbor's yard ... but I didn't realize that until later thanks to being preoccupied with photo opportunities).

Oh, and please ignore the ketchup on Molly's face.

Handicapped Household

Yesterday Kyle had finger surgery (to fix a leaky joint) so he has become a one-handed person, handicapped by the bandage, pain, and inability to get the finger wet. In the meantime, a few hours after his surgery, I started feeling nauseated and achy. By 4pm yesterday I didn't get off the couch or out of the bed, and I went a full 24 hours without eating or drinking. This might explain why the twins were cranky recently and why they've had such copious dirty diapers. No matter what, it wasn't good timing for me to feel bad with Kyle's finger issues going on.

This morning I stayed in bed while Kyle tried to work and the nanny took care of the kids. By noon I left the house, struggled to eat lunch, and went to the office. I felt badly about not being there when I only commit to two full days per week and Monday was a holiday. We did Chinese take-out for dinner (I thought fried rice might be mild enough for me) and hobbled through the evening and I'm back to feeling achy and strange as I allow myself to feel my discomfort again.

The kids seem fine, though some runny noses are ramping up and we've had two nights of night wakings out of the twins. Tomorrow Claire has school and I have my team meeting at work in the afternoon, so we'll see how the day unfolds.

The Long Weekend Ends

The girls and I had a good day today. We went to Target to pick up Claire's "good behavior" toy (ok, I caved), then Panera for a snack, and then the pet store so the twins could squeal over real dogs. The babies were so exhausted that they napped a second time upon returning home.

I made a simply awful dinner. I think this is only the second time I've dumped food in the trash, and I was very disappointed. I tried to be creative with some ground pork by making pork and green chili burritos, but the ground pork itself had a nasty flavor. Yuck. So we all made do with canned soup and sandwiches and such.

Tomorrow starts the workweek, school and gym class for Claire, and some finger surgery for Kyle. I've also got a buyer for some of our unused toys so I'll offload a few items tomorrow. I'm doing my best to clean out our old, unused toys and I'm finally getting some interest. If only someone would buy the Volvo now .... oh yes, have I forgotten to mention we still have that car? Sigh. Thanks, economy.

Good night!

A Readjustment Day

Molly is really working on her walking and standing skills - and I got a funny photo of the three tonight after dinner (hence the naked babies, who eat without clothes to minimize stains and clean up). She took a few more steps today and did a lot of standing. Most people tell me I don't want both walking, but I welcome it ... I think getting in and out of the car will be easier with both walking.

Today was an adjustment day. Kyle was back a full day (having returned home yesterday at dinner time), and he had the kids in the morning in the usual lazy Sunday mode while I stayed in bed and got a break from kids. I took Claire to Waffle House for lunch as the twins napped. We had an aborted Waffle House attempt yesterday thanks to the foul mood of Molly and Lily, who were overtired from the excitement of Claire's tap & ballet class. We had a great lunch today though, so I took Claire to Target to pick out her special toy for being so helpful while daddy was gone, and oh lordy, all hell broke loose. Claire found a crawling baby doll that cost $25, and I told her that (1) it was too expensive (which I had forewarned her of a dollar limit) and (2) she doesn't play with baby dolls anymore so it wasn't worth buying. She threw the WORST, truly the worst tantrum I've ever seen her throw, and all the more unfortunate because it was in public. I had five people give me that "oh, poor you" look and one lady actually said, "it gets better, I promise". I stayed amazingly calm (hey, I was being watched by the public), but today I resorted to corporal punishment upon returning home. The whole ride home I warned Claire of what was to come, explaining (calmly) that her poor behavior required extreme punishment, but this time I relished no part of spanking the kid (bare bottomed, I might add). I continued to stay relatively calm under the circumstances. It's been months and months since we've had to lay a hand on her but this time I felt she needed to be reminded that we still have the upper hand. No pun intended.

She was then sent to her room, where she ended up screaming, then playing calmly, and then falling asleep. I let her sleep for 5 minutes, woke her up, and she was a great kid the remainder of the day. Of course, I ditched the family for a while to get a breather (exchanged the cute Valentine's dress auntie sent for a larger size, went to HyVee for dinner stuff), and it was much needed. My current struggle is whether she deserves the toy I had promised. It was based on her behavior while Kyle was out of town (which was perfect), but should the Target meltdown negate the previous good behavior? I can't decide yet. Kyle thinks she still deserves the toy.

So basically, to analyze my kid, what happened is that her routine and structure changed with Kyle returning and she got off kilter. For five days, she had one set of rules to follow and today she was back to two conflicting sets and that will always cause problems. I'm the strict parent, he's the lenient one (and especially lenient after being gone five days). It's confusing to a child - her pediatrician always reminds me it's Claire's job to test us, and it's our job to set clear and consistent boundaries. And that's just hard when the parents' parenting styles often differ so much.

Tomorrow's holiday gives me another day at home with the kids. Hopefully we avoid the behavior issues from today.

Single Parenting, Night #4

Tonight is my last night of single parenting, though Kyle won't be home until after dinner on Saturday so I still have a stretch ahead of me. I had a phenomenally productive day which started with the twins waking at 6am (urgh). It snowed this morning, so I had to fight through slippery roads and limited visibility to get Claire to school. Today Lily screamed the whole way to and from school and Molly was the calm one. Lily was freaked by the snow.

I did breakfast, lunch, and dinner and associated clean up. Preschool drop off and pick up (which included snow removal from the car). My job (which was quite busy for a Friday). Did all the laundry in the house, clothes and towels, and got them hung in closets too. Ran the dishwasher and emptied it. Got the last of the Christmas decorations packed up. Cleaned up toy messes several times and ensured the house was in better shape tonight than it was the last few days. Got the twins a bath and nails clipped. Did five poop diapers (yes, five). Forgot Claire's 1pm playdate, but got her out the door 45 minutes late for said playdate with neighbor. Got the trash cans back inside from trash pick up this morning. Took photos of toys we're trying to sell and emailed them to potential buyers. There's more, but I'm too tired to think of it all.

After my post last night talking about Molly refusing to walk, she took about 5-6 steps tonight! It was very exciting. I hope to see more of it. She was pretty cranky this evening and my patience got a little thin for a while, but we still had a good day.

Tomorrow I've got to take all the kids to Claire's tap/ballet class. Yikes!

Single Parenting, Night #3

It was frigid here today. So cold that Molly cried during the entire preschool drop-off event (which went smoothly with the help of the preschool director). Claire said the cookies I slaved over last night went over well at school. I had lunch with the kids, and then the nanny showed up to man the house while I spent two hours at the office for my staff meeting. I returned home, got the twins their snack, and then packed up everyone and went to the clinic (that's three car trips on an atrociously cold day, blah). A lot of hassle and $75 later, I learned that everyone is just fine. I was wrong this time. Everyone is healthy, ears look good, and Claire doesn't have strep (she said she had a sore throat today which generally means she has strep). So I created a little stress for the day with that pre-dinner clinic trip. I had to rush the kids home and get dinner on the table within 5 minutes because Molly was starving and screaming ... not my favorite kind of dinner hour.

On a kid development note, Lily has learned how to walk backwards, and is now walking 80-90% of the time (versus just a week ago, when she still crawled 80% of the time). Molly still isn't walking though I know she's capable - she "walks" upright on her knees but refuses to walk despite her three steps from a while back.

Molly saw the Dora cartoon, looked at me, and said "backpack" out of the blue. Now I don't know whether I should be awed by the connection she made or appalled by how much tv I let my toddler watch, but I am impressed. For those of you not in the know, the Dora cartoon has a song about Dora's magic backpack that generally gets played once during the cartoon - so Molly saw the cartoon and made the connection it was the "backpack" cartoon and decided to let me know with her two-syllable word.

And Claire asked me how babies get in women's tummies. Hmmm. With some high-level concepts and deft distraction about hospitals, I stumbled through an answer and have probably put off that conversation for another six months or year. Whew.

Tomorrow it's frigid again and there's slight snow in the forecast (right at preschool drop-off time). I'm hoping to get my work done early and call it a day by 3pm at the latest. It's a 3-day weekend with the MLK Holiday on Monday!

Single Parenting, Night #2

OK, so tonight did not go as smoothly as last night. Two reasons: I'm on point for "letter of the week" snacks for preschool tomorrow (and this week is the letter "C", which we chose for our snack week because of Claire's name), so I came up with the idea to do iced sugar cookies in the shape of a C (see photo). I am not a dough maker - it's sticky, cumbersome, and is never the right consistency - but I nevertheless struggled through the baking tonight after the kids were in bed and have just finished. So yes, that was about three hours of kitchen time tonight. It's a good thing I microwaved dinner and had limited dinner clean up because I didn't expect an additional three hours in the kitchen. I'm sure an experienced baker could have baked these in half the time I took. They actually turned out OK - the taste is decent (kids won't care anyway), the icing is a pale pink, and the letter "C" shape turned out pretty good. Not a bad effort for a working mother. Do I get the mother of the week award now?

Lily is the other reason the night did not go smoothly. As I predicted, the ever-so-slight rattle in the back of her throat is turning into an ear infection (here we go again!), so she needed an after-hours clinic visit tonight. Could I do it? No. Kyle is gone, and I had C-shaped cookie effort facing me ... so I wasn't going to drag three kids into the clinic tonight nor was I going to ruin my baking event and commitment to Claire/the preschool. So we listened to Lily cry a bit, and I doped her with Motrin and numbing ear drops and am hoping for the best tonight. It's likely I have a long night ahead of me. What a shame ... but I expected as much. This could really alter my current thinking on those ear tubes.

Other than the crazy evening, I was at work all day (such peace!) and the kids did fine although the twins were a little underfed again today. Molly was cranky until she got her bedtime bottle (the one I'm supposed to be stopping ... the pediatrician is going to kill me) and she sucked it down in minutes. Even Lily drank all of her bottle even though she's not feeling good and generally won't finish bottles when sick.

Tomorrow when I have to take all three kids to preschool drop-off (not a fun event on a typical day, which is why Kyle usually does preschool drop off and I'm home with the twins), it will be four degrees below zero. We're going to be miserable. Friday won't be much better.

Clearly Kyle picked a banner week to be gone.