Spring is Here

I am in the process of writing out 100 things that I'm thankful for, for my 100th post, but it bogged me down. I guess I'll continue on and post that when it's complete. Meanwhile, nicer weather is here!

Guess Where We Are?

Happy Birthday!

What a beautiful day in Colorado.

We had Cory and Tyler's birthday party at a pumpkin patch and we couldn't have asked for better weather. After a cool weekend the weekend before, we were worried, but it was 75 degrees and a sunny, glorious fall day.

The boys had a wonderful day jumping around on the hay bale maze and running up and down the dirt pile. They had lots of friends and family to help them celebrate.
Three. I can't believe it!

Fussy

Ever have those days where at least one kid is crying the whole time? I think yesterday classifies as that in our house. Miles had to quickly leave right after dinner to meet with a friend and a builder to look at his house. He wanted to get some ideas for our new house. I had all three for the rest of dinner and up to bedtime.

Tyler threw his food, so had to miss the rest of dinner and go up to his room. He banged and cried until I went up to get him. I opened his door and told him he could come down when he was ready. He continued to bang and cry for another 10 minutes until I went up to see what he might want. He had stripped himself down to only his shirt and socks. (This is dangerous as we've learned from the pooh experience.)

Amber has been fussy in the evenings and I really don't know what she wants. Well, I do. She wants me to hold her and walk around with her and play with her. Hard to do at dinner time when I'm trying to make dinner, feed everyone, get their milks in the right cups, make my own plate, inhale a few bites of my own dinner, pick up thrown food, pick up thrown cups, pull dogs off the table, get finished plates into the sink, rinse off plates, pull dogs off tables, pull dogs off high-chair, feed dogs their own kibbles, feed dogs food not eaten, pull dogs off counters, get dishes into dishwasher, hand wash pots and pans and other things that can't go into the dishwasher, stop kids from hitting each other, make sure kids aren't getting into something dangerous, make sure kids only grab one ice cream sandwich from the freezer, clean off hands, clean off table, clean off floor, clean off faces, etc.

Oops, I digress...

So not sure why Amber's been fussy, other than I think she's not napping as much as she should. I have been giving her a little bit of whole cow's milk at dinner. I'm wondering if I'm pushing that and it's bothering her stomach. I guess I'll stop that for awhile and see if she's still fussy.

Cory was pretty good last night, but he gets fussy because he doesn't want to share a toy or someone takes a toy from him. He cries when he can't find DeeDee and he cries when I'm not holding him. I can usually snap him out of it by kneeling down to his level and asking him to use his words. Usually he just wants me to hold him.

So after I got most of the dishes done, we all went downstairs to watch a movie. I can usually do this in the evenings with a high rate of success. Last night was good. We all went down and they picked out Stellaluna. When the boys were settled, I took Amber up to bed. She was very glad to get her bottle and lay down. Went to sleep without a peep.

I went downstairs and Tyler wanted to cuddle in my lap. Cory wanted to sit next to us. Ahh, calm. Miles got home and we went to bed.

When does the fussy slow down? Aren't the boys old enough to stop all the crying?

Mother's Day 2008

My sweet, sweet babies. How much I love you and how much I love being your mom. Each of you are becoming your own person and developing your personalities and how much I love each of you!

Cory

You are such a sweet, cuddly boy. I love our mornings together when I come in your room and you make up words and I say them back to you. You love to giggle at this. Then you roll around and say, "You can't reach me" and I pretend I can't and you giggle, giggle, giggle. Then you want to get dressed and go down and join everyone for breakfast.

You are a smart cookie! You know all your colors and you love to put different thoughts together. I don't know why I am so amazed at your brilliance! I try to encourage you and ask you all sorts of questions. "Hey, I have an idea." and "Don't ya" are two of my favorite sayings right now. You know what a grader, a loader, a dumptruck, a scraper, a roller, a tractor, a combine, a backhoe and a snort are. You correct me when I'm wrong.

You are starting to say, "I can't". This bothers me probably more than it should. I know you can do anything you put your mind to and I don't want to do things for you and ruin your self esteem.

You are a born leader. Everyone likes to follow you. In a new situation, you just jump right in and are in the middle of it in no time. You and your older cousin Kyran like to help Bumpa with the planting of the garden and both of you run around together. You are very careful and make sure that you are safe in the parking lot and around the streets.

You like to cuddle and I love our time together. I love you so much!

Tyler

You are such a gentle soul. You love your brother and you especially love your baby sister. I have to help you learn to be more gentle with her because you like to hold her and want to pick her up. She lets you do it because I think she loves you just as much.

You are a little shy in groups, but once you survey the situation, you are comfortable anywhere. You are a tall, handsome little boy. I worry about your teenage years because you are not afraid of anything. You go all out and are very focused. When you put your mind to it, there is nothing that you can't do.

You are such a good sharer. You like to give Amber toys to play with and you will give her your DeeDee (blanket) if she seems upset. You will give Cory a toy if he's crying about it and you have it. You like to bring things to me and help around the kitchen and the yard.

You are so smart! You know all of your colors and you can count to 8 all by yourself. You love to play Sudoku and you can draw little circles inside all the squares. You are very organized and can line things up very neatly, although you mostly prefer to dump toys all over the room.

You challenge every fiber of patience in me. I hope I can be a good mom for you and guide you in a positive way. Sometimes you don't want anything to do with me, but if I go away, you want me right back. I love our cuddle time together.

You are a quiet leader. You are a quick learner and others follow you just by your very nature. You have a quiet determination and a nack for getting things done.

I love you so much! You are my precious boy.

Amber

At 10 months you are starting to really let us know your opinions. I think you've realized that with both your 2 1/2 year old brothers, you need to start voicing your opinion. You have been such a blessing and so wonderful to take care of.

You love your mommy and get upset every time I leave the room. We have had a wonderful time together and I love having you around. You help keep us grounded. You really don't like to cuddle that much, but you want me right there by your side.

You are very sweet and very independent! You never did very well with us feeding you baby food, you went straight to the solid food your brothers were eating. When you were just born last summer you would cry and I would hold you and bounce you and nothing worked. When I set you down, you were happy.

You are crawling and getting into all sorts of stuff. You love to be in the middle of the action and will often times get close to being run over by a flying dump truck or fire engine.

You are very forgiving of your brothers and will let Tyler poke at you and try to pick you up. Tyler and Cory make you giggle and you love watching them.

You are my precious girl. I love you so much!

The Kitty

I had a beautiful white kitty before we were married. His name was Romeo and the reason I had him is a long story, but he was a cranky sort and was hard to like, but I did love him and gave him the best care he could have. Some of his hard to live with traits included spraying on furniture and pooping outside his box. (Even if his box were cleaned every day, which I did.)

When I got married, Romeo went to live with my parents. Miles didn't want a cat living in the house. He had grown up with barn kitties that lived outside and didn't come in the house. After awhile Romeo got to be too much for my parents because my mom since had gotten 2 cats of her own. The unfortunate thing about the timing was that mom decided that she couldn't have him when I was 6 months pregnant with the twins. Giving him to a shelter was out of the question since he was an older cat with some health problems. They would not have kept him and he would have felt horribly abandoned. I just could not do that to him. I owed him the kindness and dignity and responsibility for him. He was a living being that couldn't just be discarded. So, we dealt with it and Miles actually cleaned the box every day while I was pregnant.

Romeo lived pretty well. He had his own room, our guest room, and spent most of the time in there. Eventually he would come down in the evenings sometimes to get pet, but most of the time he slept in the sun in that room. At night he would yowl his displeasure about many things, I'm sure. He may have been a little lonely, but I gave him what I could, especially after the twins were born. At this point, Romeo was 13 years old.

I'm giving you this background because the boys never really knew the kitty. They knew he was there and would sometimes go into the room to see if the kitty was there, but they never really paid too much attention.

About six months ago, we finally made the decision to put Romeo down. It was a long, hard decision and one I still question, but at least he left this world well loved and with a lot of dignity.

Tonight while I was laying with Cory at bedtime, Cory started talking about the kitty. He asked me where he went. Since we don't believe in a god, this is a hard story to tell to a 2 year old. I told him that the kitty went to the vet. I'm not so sure that was a good response, because then he said that Grammie has 2 kitties and they don't go to the vet. Well, yes, kitties also go to the vet for their checkups like we go to the Dr. for our checkups.

Then Cory talked about Angie's kitty and that her name is Miss Kitty and that she lives in the garage. He talked about Romeo living in our house and kept asking me where the kitty went.

This is really hard for several reasons. First, I don't want to make things up and not give Cory the chance to know what really happened. Second, he makes me think about Romeo when I'm still missing him and sad that he's gone.

I guess it's also good in a way, since Romeo is loved and asked about even by ones that he didn't even know that well. And I'm amazed at the things that the kids keep inside their heads even when they don't have much speech yet and then bring up months later when you least expect it.

Bye bye Romeo, we love you!

Morning Conversation

Tyler, "I have a truck on my pajamas."

Cory, "You have a truck on your pajamas."

Tyler, "You have a truck on your pajamas."

Cory, "No, I don't have a truck on my pajamas. I have a fox on my pajamas."

A Lefty?

I've been noticing lately that Cory uses his left hand to eat. I really haven't paid much attention to this in the past and I'm not sure when kids establish their dominate hand, but I find it interesting. I'm not even sure if he uses his left hand for drawing or for other things, but I'm going to start paying more attention.

I remember growing up that being a lefty was not a good thing. At least that's what I was told. That they had to have special scissors to cut things and they couldn't fit into society as well. I know that is a bunch of cr**, but I wonder if there truly is discimination out there based on which hand we use?

Anyway, I think lefty's are more right brained, right? More creative than analytical. I know he is very bright and has a huge vocabulary that started very early. He amazes me at the sentences he can put together, like "Can I have some of mommy's bagel with peanut butter on it?"

What a doll. I can't describe how much I love each of these kids. They melt my heart.