Long time, no update

Potty training is in full force here. Its certainly not fun, but I guess they can't be in diapers forever. Norah's actually doing fabulous on the pee front. She is managing to stay dry all day. Its just the poop issues we have to worry about. And poop issues she has. Holy cow. We need to break her of her holding it in behavior. It involves multiple laxitives, enemas, and visits to the children's hospital gastroenterology clinic. Good times.
Elliott is doing pretty good, too. He did pee himself today and just kept playing...never came in to tell me. I will chalk that up to being busy. I hope.

Aidan will be out of school after 6/15. I am kind of scared of what the summer holds. He tends to be, um, sassy, bossy, naughty, etc, when bored. So its up to me to keep him busy, but still have a fun summer. He'll be in a summer playground thing every M-W for 2 hours in the morning, all summer long. He's got t-ball at night. And he's taking 2 1-day zoo classes and a 1 day gymnastics camp. Norah is in dance (night) and is in the gymnastics camp, as well. And Elliott is also in the gym camp, and is doing swim lessons at night. Between all of that and playgroups, the park, and pools, and a few summer festivals, I hope we'll have fun.

Speaking of festivals, last weekend, we walked down to a small festival. En route, I looked down and saw that Norah and Elliott were holding hands between the strollers. How sweet is that?

he says the cutest things

we were in the car and the song, 'personal jesus' was on the radio and elliott said to me, "oooh, mom, i really like this song."

later on (same car ride), he said, "my eyes keep falling down." tee heee

Picasso in Training

Norah loves to color. She will spend a large chunk of her day coloring. However, the past two days, she's decided to try out her crayons and markers on other mediums....wood, vinyl, cotton. It hasn't gone over very well in this house. Yet, it hasn't stopped her from doing it again.
Her butt has been seeing a lot of the time out chair lately.

Misc Babble

Elliott pooped on the potty!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was Saturday night and he did it unprompted. Of course, he hasn't done it again since then, but I hope its a start of something. He really wants to wear his Lightning McQueen and Spidey underpants, so we'll see.

When I ask Norah if she wants to poop on the potty too, she answers with a, "not meeee." as if she's telling me she doesn't want butter on her toast or waffles for breakfast.

Right now, Norah's really into identifying boys/girls and the whole brother-sister relationship. She often tells me, "2 girls, mommy. 1, 2", pointing to herself and me. And then, "3 boys. 2 brothers. 1, 2." Sometimes she'll tell me I am her sister, but usually she says she's a little sister and a little girl. Very cute.

My little character

The other night when I was tucking Norah into bed, she said that she wanted to sleep in Ellie's room. I told her no, she needed to sleep in her own bed. She said, "I want my little bed." I was stumped for a minute and asked, "huh? your little bed?" She said, "yeah. My white bed." I said, "You mean your crib? You haven't had a crib in a long time!" Norah said, "Yeah, my crib. I want my white crib." I told her that she was a big girl and needed to sleep in her big girl bed. She told me that no, she was too little and her bed was too big.
Such a character.
I said, "good night, Norah. Sleep tight."
She said, "No. I a princess."
Ok. "Goodnight princess. Sweet dreams."
"No sweet dreams!"
Whatever, girl.

Musings of a 5 year old

Aidan: Mommy - where does the easter bunny live?

Me: I don't know. Where do you think he lives?

Aidan: I think he lives in California, where its warm. Easter bunnies like it where its warm.

Me: oh really.

Aidan: Yes. And I think he flys Midwest to get here.

Ain't that the brutal truth.

We had just finished eating lunch and Aidan rubbed his belly and said, "oh mommy, I ate so much and now I have a fat belly like Grampa John. He's got a big belly. But you don't have a fat belly and daddy doesn't have a fat belly. Grampa John has a fat belly because he likes to drink a lot of beer! And Gramma T* has a fat belly, too, because she likes to eat a lot!"

Funny at Five

I was diligently knitting my first ever baby blanket (SnB's Big Bad Baby Blanket) when, 6 rows into it, I realized I made a huge mistake and the only way I could fix it was to frog the whole damn thing. How disheartening. I've restarted it, but I am taking a break for an hour to rest my poor wrists.

So anyway....there are just a few things that I want to note about Aidan at age 5.

This is the first Lego car that Aidan built all by himself. He's gone through building all the cars in the book with us, but today, he sat down and went step-by-step through the instructions and built this. We were shocked. WOW! That's just amazing to me.

He's been saying some funny things lately. He's fixated at three-oh-oh being his snacktime. So recently, when we were talking about him going to school next year for full days and not getting home until 3:30, he said, "But I will miss my snack at 3-0-0! That's no good!" And today when we were out running errands, he said, "mommy, is this going to take a long time? Because I don't want to miss three-oh-oh."
That cracks me up.

Later on, we were at the grocery store and we rounded a corner and the meat counter came into view. He loudly exclaimed, "look mommy -- NASTY!" , pointing at the meat. The lady standing there started cracking up.

And finally, since he's always fixated on his birthday, we were once again discussing it today. He said, "when am I going to stop having birthdays?" I told him never...that you have birthdays forever. He said (with a very irritated tone in his voice), "but I don't want to have them forever. I will get sick of them!" To which I said, "but everyone has birthdays every year. Even Nana and Papa still have birthdays. You have birthdays for as long as you are alive. Until you die." He looked at me and then said, "WHY DID YOU SAY I AM GOING TO DIE!? DON'T SAY THAT!"
Geez Louise.

She's going to be one of those freaky cat ladies...

I just cannot get her to play with dolls, no matter how hard I try!

5 year stats and musings

Aidan's Stats at 5 Years:

44"
42.5#

So he's a tad taller than average, but not much, and of average weight.
He's finally outgrowing his size 4 pants and is moving into size 5, but they're still quite large on him because he's got no fat on his body. He's sporting the baggy look.

The pediatrician was highly impressed that he can whip out a 300 piece puzzle in about an hour or so. Heck, I am impressed because I could never do that.
She also mentioned that some boys don't night train until age 9. AGE 9?!?! Oh man. That just sucks.

We got him a Razor scooter for his birthday and he's gotten really good at it, just practicing in the house. He's very very eager for the snow to melt so he can go outside and take it for a spin and show off some of his "tricks" he's been practicing.

He's been diligently working on building Lincoln Log structures, but we HAVE to use the directions. He's finally gotten one of them down on his own...no help! When he's gotten frustrated and I told him to use his imagination to just build something, he got angry with me and said, "no! I don't want to use my imagination. I'll use it when I am 8 years old."
8's the magic age. He claims he'll do a lot of stuff when he turns 8. I wonder why he picked that number and if he'll change his mind?

5 year old artwork

Aidan's people have progressed over the years, but they're still very square. I wonder why? He's gotten very detailed - adding fingers, teeth, ears, and even pupils.



His teacher recently started a unit on space, which has really interested Aidan. So we've done some things at home, as well, like make a solar system mobile for his room.
After we did that, he drew this:

Saturn is in the top right corner - yellow w/ a green ring around it.
The solid yellow one is Neptune.
Sun is obviously the big orange one.
Next to the sun is earth: the brown and blue one.
The big purple and green one is Jupiter.
The tiny purple one is Pluto.

He missed a few, but I am very impressed with what he got.

5 Years Old?!?!

Aidan Thomas at age 5

I asked Aidan these questions, and here are his answers
Favorite Food: pepperoni pizza

Favorite Show: Wow! Wow! Wubbzy

Favorite Movie: Flushed Away

Favorite Stuffed Dude: Aidan Tiger

Favorite Game: Hullabaloo

Favorite thing to play at home: puzzles and do art projects

Favorite Book: 5 Little Monkeys Wash the Car

Favorite Color: Red

Favorite Center (at school) to play in: art

Favorite thing to play outside: winter: snow fights ; summer: swim

Favorite Sport to play: baseball

What do you want to be when you grow up: A Pirate or a Train Engineer

Potty Progress

I really had no plans to tackle the potty thing w/ the twins until spring or summer, but Elliott is doing really well. Over the past 4 days, he's done better each day. He's gone several times a day, and each time he's sat on it, he's produced. Today, he asked to sit on it twice and produced! And its only 9:30 am! Of course, I am using a mini MnM as a reward, which is kinda against my philosophy, but if it works, I guess that's ok.

Norah decided she didn't want to have a repeat performance after her first hurrah, but then after seeing Elliott get all these props, she's produced twice in the last 12 hours. So maybe the pressure is getting to her, as well.

Now if we could just tackle the poop. Ugh.

of jingles and tinkles....

The other day we were at Target and I was in the toilet paper aisle and naturally, the twins were chattering away, making noise. That's when I tuned in and picked up what Elliott was singing.... "da da da...Charmin! da da da...Charmin!" (ok, so its "cha cha cha". close enough!) I said, "were you singing about the toilet paper?" and he pointed to the Charmin on the shelf and said, "yeah" and then repeated himself. I don't know if I should be a proud mama or if I should be embarassed for clearly allowing him to watch too much TV.

And the big news...........


NORAH PEED ON THE POTTY!!!!!!!! She sat on it on her own free will and she produced! For the first time ever!! Please let this be the door that was opened. Please?

Eidetic Memory...or.....?

Aidan can, at times, amaze the crap out of me.
For instance, in December, with some adult help, he completed a 550 piece puzzle over the course of several days. If that wasn't impressive enough, he got out that same puzzle this weekend and over 48 hours, did the puzzle himself. With no help whatsoever.
Ok. That's 550 pieces. I am 33 and I have issues doing puzzles that large. To me, that is just amazing. But Aidan....once he does something like that once, its like he stores it in his brain and can whip it out again and again, quick as ever.

The other day he said to me, "mommy, how come Norah took that little baby kitty that I got from Old McDonalds when I went there with Grandma ****?" I said, "you mean that little grey one that she calls baby kitty?" and he said, "yeah. I got that when I went there before Norah was borned."
I just about had to pick my jaw up off the floor.
Aidan was only 20 months old when the twins were born. And he remembers details like that??!?! Damn.

So then why can't he learn his alphabet? He has had no issue memorizing it. But recognizing it out of context is another story. And why does he have the patience to do a 550 piece puzzle, but he doesn't pay attention at soccer? And his teacher wonders about if he's 'all there' at times?

I just signed off on the final piece of paper, so it shouldn't be long before we have an appointment for his evaluation w/ the school district to see if he may have some sort of learning issue.

Cats Dance? Really?

Without fail, every day the clock radio is playing tunes in my room. Today I asked Norah why she feels the need to turn it on all the time. She looked at me with this look that said, "well duh." and said, "cuz. the kitty. quinny need music. she need to dance!"

Oh. Silly me. Why didn't I think of that.

Two Times the Fun

She's a unique little girl.

She's sweet and spunky

She's cute and gentle and girly

She's a tomboy with a twist

I turned in applications for preschool for her and Elliott recently. I was worried about them being ready, but I am not too worried about Norah anymore. For the past 3 weeks, we've had library storytime and she's done fabulous. She listens, follows along with the songs that have dance and motion and fingerplays, and sits.

Now we have to work on this one :)

He's all boy, all the time.

Dental Hygiene: How NOT to do it

Yesterday, I was flossing my teeth and I caught Elliott staring at me intently. I tossed the floss in the trash when I was done and went in the kitchen to start lunch. I looked over in the bathroom because I heard some commotion and that's when I saw it.....Elliott had dug my used floss out of the trash and was attempting to floss his teeth. EW EW EW!!!!

Such Motivation!

Today Aidan said to me, "Mom, when I am a grown up, I don't think I want to work. I think I want to be like you and play all day. Work is not fun, is it? But if I change my mind, then I think I'll be a fireman. Or Thomas the Train." Ooookay then.
I didn't know that I played all day, either. Is that what this is called?

Now What?

Little girls need to come with hair instructions. I've always wanted my girl to have long hair, just like I did as a little girl (before my mom let me get that wretched shag cut and then permed it back in the 80's). However, I don't remember it being this hard to manage! I should have figured as much, given that I cut my hair off every time it gets long.
But here we are...she's finally got it long enough so that I can put it in pig tails, a pony, braids, or even a french braid. And she doesn't want it cut. She'll even sit for me, if the mood is right. But 80% of the time, it looks like a scraggly mess. So do I go against the wishes of a 3 year old (does she really care?) and get a nice, chin length bob? Or do I just go with the flow and hope that once winter is over, it looks better? But then we enter popscicle season. Oh joy.