You Gotta Wiggle It

Ooookaaaaay....

So, obviously, Abbie spends more time with the boys than I do. Well, today, I saw a hint of what to expect when I get back from deployment.

The boys were sitting at the table eating breakfast and they wanted some slices of an apple. They kept asking for "pieces of green". So finally, Abbie pulls out the apple...then says, "okay, Boys, dance...dance." And guess what? They all start to dance in their chairs. "You gotta wiggle it, just a little bit!" and they keep wiggling it.

Its wonderful to know that the boys exist just for our amusement. Abbie was like, "yeah, they'll be in school in the lunch line and just start wiggling it. They're friends will all be like 'what are you doing' and the boys will be like 'what, don't you dance before you eat?'"

Mmmm-hmmmmmmmm.

Unwelcome Visitor

One day back in May the boys and I were in the living room. As is usual (well was) the boys would go to the patio and play there and come in and go back out. Getting them to keep the door closed was impossible. So we had a show on and I was reading something when out of the corner of my eye I see something crawling across the carpet and under the train table. I thought it was a baby raccoon! I started squealing and pretty much running around the apartment without a clue what to do. All the while the boys just keep watching their show. I grab a broom and try to locate where he's gone. No luck. So I pick up the phone and call Jim. As it's ringing I swear I hear a voice in my head laughing saying to me, "What in the heck is Jim going to do at work?" So I hung up. Both the boys were now planted on the couch and I realized hey I live in a dang apartment complex this is what maintenance is for! I called and a woman Sharon answered. I hysterically told her I needed maintenance to come get a baby raccoon. She starts laughing and says she thinks baby raccoon's are cute and will be right down! No joke she came barreling down the hill in that golf cart with a cigarette dangling from her lips. I thought oh my I'm about to get shown up! She tossed the cigarette down and said, "All right where is he?" I had finally located the bugger hiding behind our toilet and locked him in the bathroom. I let her in and just heard a few tussles and a, "Come here you!" Next thing I know she's coming out with this little head poking out of a towel. That weren't no raccoon it was a baby possum! She put him outside and the little bugger turned on her like he would bite her if she came too close. She laughed and said it was perfect she'd just returned from a funeral and this was exactly what she had needed to cheer her up. Hey whatever I can do to help right?? The moral of the story...... we keep that screen door closed now that's for sure.

COME HERE, COOPER!

Okay, so I've been wanting to post this for some time but am finally getting to it.

As Abbie has pointed out on this blog, she's been potty training Cooper...well, more like he's potty training himself and we're just giving encouragement and emptying the pee bucket for him. Ain't nothing like having an outhouse sitting in your living room. But I digress.

Anyways, this happened when Abbie and I were sleeping in the living room on the air mattress as we conditioned Bear to sleeping in his crib by himself and without us in the room. It was probably three days after Cooper had started using the potty consistently, so, this past weekend or just before I would say.

Abbie and I were over near the kitchen talking and Cooper went over to use the potty. Normally, after he's done, he'll just close the lid and move on. Sometimes, according to Abbie, he'll pull out the pee bucket and bring it to Abbie to dump, but only after she asks for it.

Well, this particular day, Cooper got an A for initiative, but an F in judgment.

I'm talking to Abbie not paying attention, when all of a sudden, her eyes get wide and she bolts past me towards the living room. I turn, and there's Cooper with the pee bucket in his hands, walking around the foot of the air mattress (no, we didn't deflate it every day and re-inflate it every night), trying to get through a narrow choke point between the mattress and the toy bins. We just watched both Cooper and Bear fall flat on their faces when trying to navigate this choke point, so Abbie is moving at a fast clip towards him saying, "Cooper, baby, give me the bucket."

But she's moving too fast at him. He gets scared. He turns around and runs.

Abbie: "Cooper, no no no no no! Come here, Cooper!"

Cooper starts to crawl on the air mattress to get away from Abbie. Mind you, he's still carrying this pee bucket.

Abbie, "STOP, COOPER! NO!"

Now, this was said very loudly and very quickly! And what did Cooper do?

He freaked and threw up the pee bucket because it scared him so much!

It looked like something from a slapstick comedy! Pee going everywhere, meaning, all over our bedding on the air mattress, Abbie trying to get to the bucket to catch it before it flings its contents all over, pee bucket flying up in the air about six feet (my boy's got an arm on him), and Abbie seething because of it.

Me, I'm struggling to keep from laughing so that Cooper doesn't think its a good thing to do. Y'know, running from his mom, throwing piss all over the living room, that sort of thing.

Man, I'm laughing just typing this story! S'cuse me...
WAH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Abbie laughed about it later after I cleaned up the mess.

FREEZE! If You Don't Move, She Won't See Us!

From Jim:

Okay, I had to post this before I got sidetracked here at work.

I get up every day and go to work at 5:30AM for Physical Training. I'll usually check to see if Abbie is on AIM around 9AM. Today, I get a call from her at 7:56AM. I never talk to her before 8AM unless there's an emergency.

So when I got her call, my heart sank b/c it could only mean something has happened to Cooper or Bear.

And I was right.

Abbie is quite upset and almost ready to go into a panic attack it sounds like. She starts out with, "Your children..." That's not good to start the conversation that way.

"Your children opened..." Uh oh.

"...and ate..." Oh damn, they ate something under the sink that's not good for them.

"...the chocolate on the table." Huh?

Seriously? They ate the chocolate on the table?

Turns out that while Abbie was in the bedroom changing and getting laundry together, the boys decide to work together and poach the sugar-free chocolate bar that was sitting on the table. She apparently comes out, and they've already eaten half the bar. Imagine this in your minds eye...Bear and Cooper eating this chocolate bar saying to each other, "mmmm, that's damned good. Shhhh. Don't let momma know." Abbie notices its really quiet in the living room and when she walks out, they suddenly stop chewing as if to say, "Stop chewing. Freeze! She may not notice us standing here with chocolate in our mouths." As if Abbie was a T-Rex that only sees movement. They were caught red handed and guilty as all get out. And they knew it! They knew they were doing wrong. I'm sure that if they could talk well enough, they'd deny it 100%.

This chocolate is called "ChocoPerfection". It's a sugar-free, dairy-free, wheat/gluten-free chocolate bar that tastes exactly like chocolate. Its great for diabetics in case you're wondering. Abbie and I have had a few bars lately as a treat and the boys have noticed us eating them wondering what they are. Turns out, they now know.

Abbie was so upset. I laughed my fool ass off. It was bound to happen, and little boys are prone to doing something like that. I can remember being a little boy at Cape Cod and me, John, and Chris went to the local candy shop and spent all of our allowance on candy, which we weren't allowed to do, and as we were coming back to the cottage, we saw Dad and Mom. We ran around a sand dune and dumped all of our candy on the ground. I don't think we got caught, but I remember being really upset that my candy whistle I had been sucking on was covered in sand.

As for the boys, we don't know if they're immune and digestive systems are ready to handle refined foods such as ChocoPerfection, so we're going to monitor their reactions today. Abbie mentioned that one of them may already have been having a reaction. This is one of those reasons we're really picky about the boys eating...they just don't react well to things that others can handle.

Shopping Excursions

So we went to Wal-Mart yesterday. They are so good about holding my hands now to get inside the store it's just once we get inside. Bear just takes off! So I have taken to parking next to a shopping cart or getting him in one as soon as we walk in a store. There's your set up. We get to Wal-Mart and Bear goes immediately into the cart. Coop starts playing the "Where's Cooper game" and hides in between clothes. Bear was hungry and fussing loudly to get out of the shopping cart. There were three ladies shopping near us who I could tell were listening. So I say to Bear, "Ok you can get out but only if you stay close to me." I put him down and I'm talking Flash Gordon here. He took off at a dead run. I catch him and put him back into the cart. Coop is now tugging on one of the ladies pant leg and looking up at her. She looks down and he just gives her this big hug. One of the other ladies wants a hug but I've pulled out the pecans and Coop has lost interest. She stood there devastated. She really wanted a hug too. I asked Cooper if he wanted to give her a hug too and he took his pecan and ran and gave her a hug. She just beamed that he had made her day. He does that often he picks random people and just hugs them and you can tell they really needed it. This kid is simply an angel in disguise is all.

So today at Whole Foods Bear is in the cart and annoyed because he wants out. (I know-shocking!) But it's not happening again that's for sure. He was just giving little frustrated yelps and trying to throw everything he could reach into the cart. I typically find random potatoes or kiwis or lemons in the cart if I'm not looking. So I move him to the middle of the isle and that increases the yelps a little bit. This older gentleman walks up to me and said, "Do I need to call social services on you?" I said, "Yes please maybe I'll get a day or two vacation!" He smiled and walked off and I thought oh my I really hope he was kidding!!

Coop who typically does a great job of staying close by had the adventuresome twinkle in his eye. He would go further than he should and then he would realize I wasn't there. I would watch his eyes start darting everywhere trying to find me. Then he would see me and yell, "There's momma" and come running. When we were at the hot bar I could tell he was getting very overwhelmed. He realized I was on his right side and not left and he said, "oh mommy that was scary hug me."

Cute Stories

I'm not big on reading all the child development stuff- I usually just call my friend Jamie if I need help on anything. I stressed out way too much over every little milestone that Cooper was or wasn't hitting and when I let that go my life was a lot less stressful. But I figure 3 is about the age for potty training so this morning I realized I needed to pull out Cooper's little potty. (I bought it months ago but gave up when I found the seat cushion over Bear's head all the time like a little hat and the bottom in the bath tub.) Cooper jumped right on it and positioned himself and knew to say potty and stinky. He just had a little party on the potty for a while. Bear realized where we were and came running in and tried to tackle Cooper off the potty so he could play with the cushion.

I told Bear that it was not a Bear toy it was Cooper's potty. Cooper responded with, "That's right Bear, wjahn aierueij diefjei, biiiig trouble my potty."
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Later Cooper found a little blue rabbit. We've had it for over 6 months but they don't play with it. But today he grabbed it up and started slamming it up and down yelling, "Rabbit bounce!" over and over again. I know what's cute about that? Well then he suddenly looks at it, holds it tight to him and says, "Oh bunny I'm sooooo happy."
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So Bear woke up from his nap and as he's started to do the last few days he runs to Cooper's bedroom door and wakes Coop up. Today Bear started the pounding on the door and I hear a frantic, "Mommy, mommy, mommy!" I go into the room and Coop grabs my hand and says, "My boo boo!" He puts my hand on his boo boo. It happened like 3 or 4 days ago and he REFUSED to let me put a band aid on him. I even tried to sneak one on when he was sleeping but he kept taking it off. Today he sits there while I put a band aid on and I'm fully expecting him to rip it off and he says, "Thanks!" then jumps off the bed and still has it on!!! I can't keep up with the rules :-)
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Now as I'm typing they are eating lunch and Cooper keeps saying, "Oohhhh mommy, that's yummy. Wow mommy that's nummy!!" It's broccoli, squash, kale, tomatoes mixed with quinoa. How cute is he????
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I didn't realize I had all these cute stories today but Coop is doing the cutest things. I asked him to throw a diaper away for me. I don't ask them to do enough I'm so used to doing everything. So now he gets his shoes or his diaper. I thought no way will he throw this out he can't work the step lever on the trash can to open it. He takes the diaper and RUNS to the trash can. He can't get it open so he rips the whole top off and throws it in and yells, "We did it!!"
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So now he's over here picking up all the tupperware lids that Bear threw all over the kitchen and putting them back in the drawer. I find that so amusing because it used to be Cooper throwing all the tupperware lids all over the floor!

Puddle Days

We finally got some much needed rain!!! There is this HUGE puddle at the gym now. A few days ago on the way home I let them play in it. I didn't have my camera but it was one of those moments where you know is burned in your memory forever. They jumped up and down, sprayed each other with their hands and then ran and ran and ran in this puddle. The grins on their faces were priceless. After over 30 minutes I guess they were just tired because they were each starting at opposite sides and I would yell, "Go!" and they would race to the other side. This time they just crashed into each other and fell backwards both soaking their heads in the puddle. So we came home soaking wet and got wrapped up in blankets and they both fell asleep totally exhausted as I rocked them in the recliner.

Fast forward to today. It's a bit colder than it was from just a few days ago. I had lots of errands to run so I promised them if they would pass up the gym puddle we would play with the puddles at home. We got home already soaked from all our errands and they had lost some of their excitement for puddles. This rain was much colder and they just couldn't muster up the same excitement. Bear just sort of stood in the puddle flinching when the big rain drops would hit his head. Coop got in the puddle a few times but then just stood on the outskirts of the puddle. You could tell he wanted to be part of it but he wasn't enjoying the cold water. After a few minutes I could just see Bear vibrating he was so cold. I kept calling him in but he wouldn't move he would just vibrate and smile. So I gathered them up and turned the heat on. It was so sweet- we climbed into the recliner all wrapped up in blankets and all three of us took a nap.

I love puddle days.

Got It Like That

I just thought this e-mail from Katie about her almost 3 year old daughter, Emily, was way too cute:

Subject: Cute Story
When I say "who is my favorite baby?" Emily responds "Sully!" Then she proceeds to be Sully and I have to address her as Sully and she calls me Ms. Abbie. Quite an imagination!
Katie

Then-----
I talked to Chris today who has a 4 year old daughter, Carly, who asks about Cooper and Sully all the time and had to create a nickname for her baby brother Cason (she wanted to call him Bear). Our boys are creating quite a stir with the ladies already!!!

Ouch

If you read the last post, and I'm assuming that if you're one of those that check this regularly, you read about Cooper and his running at you and going "ooofff" as he rams his little head into your leg/butt/crotch. Well, I thought it was funny b/c he was doing it to Abbie and not me. This week, it hit home for me. I was sitting in one of the dining table chairs, and all of a sudden, I get this immense pain in my left kidney, kinda like a boxer hit me there. I turn around, and there's Cooper with this shit eating grin on his face. And I wanna say, "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Instead, I just tell him its not nice to head butt people. I think all he heard from me was, "Wa-Wa, Wa-Wa, Wa-Wa". Then he turned around and went back to playing like nothing happened. Just weird. I think we're going to rename him Damien.

Oh, the other ouch to tell y'all about. We're trying to ween Bear from nursing to go to sleep. So we bought a second crib for him and put it up against our bed so he has a bed that opens to our's and that way, he can learn to sleep in his own bed while still being able to be touched by one of us to calm him. So, we get that set up and the first night, it works like a charm. After that, its been really hard on Bear. He screams for hours on end b/c he wants to nurse. His initial going to sleep at night is quiet and calm and he's down for the count. But at 11, about an hour after we've gone to bed and are just starting to drift into La-La land, he wakes up and starts screaming. So I scoot over to his side to try and calm him and put him down. If its Abbie, then he just wants to nurse. Last night was one of the worst we've had yet. He woke up and screamed, not cried, but screamed for an hour. I lasted about that hour, then turned him over to Abbie as the last ounce of patience I had seeped out of my ears. It was rough. Somehow, though, she got him down. I'm not sure how because I think I fell asleep. It's going to be a rough couple of weeks to couple of months as we work with Bear on all this.

Ooooofffff

Cooper seems to really enjoy running up to you and bouncing off his stomach saying, “Oooofffff.” Most of the times he’s laughing as he does it but from time to time when he’s mad he will put a little extra oooff in it and try to knock you over. He was mad at me for something tonight and took a running start and about knocked me over. “Don’t you oooooffff me,” I said. Without missing a beat he reached up and poked me and said, ‘Tickle.” How can you stay mad at someone so darn cute??

Fishy Nipples

AH HAHAHAHAHAHA!

Bear is starting to eat solids, and we sometimes give him some of the fish we give Cooper.

Well, the boy hasn't stopped nursing yet.

Today, I gave Bear some fish while making Cooper's lunch, and Abbie didn't know it. So she picked him up to nurse him and was like, "What the hell? There's something in his mouth!"

"Oh yeah, honey, I gave him some fish. He's probably still chewing on it."

And her response was, "Ewwww, now my nipples smell like fish."

AH HAHAHAHAHAHA!

Sometimes, its good to be a man!

Tazmanian Devil

This happened in January. After our trip to visit GiGi at Snowshoe he learned how to jump out of his crib. Thinking maybe we should look into a toddler bed, we pulled out the fouton bed and got him to rest there and he seemed to enjoy laying on it. So when we got home he jumped out of his crib and we thought we'd see if he'd end up going to sleep on his new bed. Ha ha ha ha ha. He was up and running around his room for an hour. We thought he was reading books, playing with toys. Imagine our shock when we opened the door and found the room turned upside down. He pulled clothes out of drawers, turned over the laundry basket and just literally threw everything around! I guess the bed was too filled with his mess so he curled up in the rocking chair and fell asleep. Needless to say that was the first and only time we let him get away with jumping out of the crib.