Craziness & Baby Smiles

Recently, Annie has taken temporary leave of her sanity and has gone full blown four year old crazy. This, by far, has been the most challenging stage (I'm gonna say that a lot over the next 15 years, aren't I?) She's just so defiant and snotty and it's a shock to my mothering system to watch her treat her sister and I so rotten. Ellie, the brunt of much of Annie's moodiness, responds by being a mean little tease and pushing every last one of her buttons. Ellie is a ball of energy and personality -- when used for good, this makes for the single most adorable two year old in human history -- when used for evil, it's a force to be reckoned with. And combinet that with Annie's drama and attitude, and it's like the perfect storm of moodiness. Well, this all culminated yesterday, in a mess of tears and screaming (mostly the girls, but I wasn't immune), that landed both of the girls in their room at noon, with a strict 'you will not leave this room until you take the nap we all so need for you to take!' mandate. There was much screaming in protest ("Ellie! I didn't even know Mom could be this mean!" and "I don't even know if I love Mommy anymore!"), but I stuck to my guns (and also went for a walk outside with Isaac for awhile, just around the circle repeatedly, so that I didn't lose it with them), and almost THREE HOURS LATER they both finally crashed and slept. Ellie for a total of 45 minutes (so guess who was grumpy all evening?), and Annie for a blissful two hours or so. Which, of course, meant she was wide awake until about 10PM last night. I still haven't decided if it was worth it or not.
With the girls screaming in their room, I hid out in mine and made goofy faces and cooed and chatted with Isaac for hours. It was a really nice break, to just hang out the two of us without anyone wanting or needing anything else. Plus, a smiling baby was just what my beaten down mood needed! It was a nice break from an angry, ranting, dramatic, possibly-hormonal, four year old girl. That baby is so cute, and I could just sit there and smile and coo with him all day. Well, if I didn't have two other kids and a house to take care of . . .

Today he's 7 weeks old, and I was taking pictures of him and Ellie this morning. (Annie was downstairs watching 'Mickey Mouse Club', and we weren't gonna mess with that.) Ellie was a little cheese ball, per usual, and Isaac was fairly smiley . . .

Ellie was sporting sunglasses with her pajamas, bright and early this morning.

They're just so cute! And lovable! And today better go better than yesterday!

I Am a Domestic Goddess

So, yesterday I spent more than my fair share of time in the kitchen. But I'm fairly pleased with the results.

I canned tomatoes.

That would be my first experience with canning (other than creatively avoiding my Mom for days as she worked on canning her homemade salsa she made for years while I was still at home). It took a long time, and made a huge mess, and I believe would not have even been worth my effort had I not been given all the cans, lids, supplies and tomatoes for free. But I'm really pleased with the fact I now have a shelf of freshly picked tomatoes ready to go anytime I want to make homemade spaghetti sauce. I've had some really sweet neighbors who lately have kinda taken me under their wing (and given me free produce!) and started teaching me all manner of useful stuff. Canning tomatoes was my first solo attempt at these new found skills. And I didn't screw anything up, so I'm really pretty happy with the results.


I also made some semi-healthy brownies with Annie. (Not really healthy, but just healthier than normal).

Did you know that you could take a can of black beans, drain off most the liquid, top it off with water so the can is full again, blend it all until smooth in a blender, then dump the liquid into the brownie mix, stir it altogether and bake according to the package instructions.

I have finally found a use for beans in my kitchen! (They're not my favorite).

And they weren't funky at all, no recognizable bean taste. The texture is different, more cakey, I guess . . . but top a warm one with whipped cream or ice cream, and it was really pretty good. And more nutritious and packed with way more fiber than your typical brownies. It was kind of a fun new experiment, and I was pretty pleased with how it turned out.


And now here's some random pictures of my girls from this morning. Annie was playing up to the computer before breakfast, and Ellie decided to join her. This is usually fun for a minute, until Annie just ends up yelling at Ellie for standing up instead of sitting down, for touching the mouse/keyboard/screen or for taking up too much room on the oversized office chair. This morning though went much better than normal, and it was cute to watch them while they were getting along so well!


At one point, due to the fact that everything else on the computer table is off limits to poor Ellie, she started to play with a lint brush. I think the only thing that made sense to her was that it must be a hair brush. So, she sat there and 'brushed' her hair with it for the next several minutes.



When her big sister, aka 'the Enforcer', wasn't looking, Ellie snatched up some lotion and had this very mischievous "I'm getting away with something" face going on . . .

Sugar High

Most people who know me well know that I obsess a little about my kids eating habits. Having battled with my sluggishly slow metabolism most of my life, it was imperative to me that my kids learn how to eat well from a young age, (including junk food in moderation, as I had no intention of cutting it out completely from our lives), all the while trying not to make a big deal out of it, or put an unhealthy amount of focus on foods. And for the most part, we do well with this. Lots of whole grains, tons of veggies and fruit, healthy proteins. Annie will even eat raw onions and peppers for snacks. But, of course, these kids also inherited my sweet tooth. Which means there are some mornings when I leave the room for a minute, and my kids find and sneak into my hidden M&M stash, and Ellie drools chocolate all over half my bed.
I find such incidents are a good reminder that it's time to wash all the bedding again.





Then Annie wanted in on the picture taking, so she started striking random poses and making faces.

(She's shoving a Starburst in her mouth with one hand . . . which was also in the candy stash, and probably left over from Easter, so it may have been a little hard . . . and has M&Ms in the other.)

Sleep, sleep, sleep

I never worried too much about sleep before I had kids. When I saw still single, my roommates and I would have friends over four or five nights a week 'til two or three in the morning, leaving me only a handful of hours of sleep before going into work . . . until one of my coworkers told me one morning I looked like a haggard drunk. Then I started kicking people out earlier and getting at least six hours of beauty sleep. But, all in all, I just didn't think too much about sleep.

Then I had kids.

It's funny how quickly my entire life suddenly revolved around sleep. My sleep, my kids' sleep, was my husband getting enough sleep? How does our schedule for the day match up with nap times? Bed time? Teaching your kids to fall asleep on their own. Sleep, sleep, sleep. There's times when nothing feels more important than the sleep issue. With Annie I literally became a barely functioning human being due to extreme exhaustion during that first little while. I used to sing the "ABCs" to Annie when she was a baby, because after the first week of never getting more than an hour of sleep at any one time, I could not remember the words to another song. Not a single nursery rhyme, lullaby, primary hymn or childhood ditty. I remember the complete horror I felt when I was singing to Annie one day, "A B C D E F G . . ." and I could not remember what came next. I started to cry. Of course, I pretty quickly was able to come up with the letter 'H', but for that briefest of time I couldn't get more than 7 letters into the alphabet due to my sleep deprivation. People would tell me, "You just need to sleep when she sleeps." This sounds like it would work . . . but if your colicky baby takes 20 minute naps on average, this usually left me falling asleep minutes, sometimes mere moments, before my baby woke with a screech that caused me to shoot up in bed like someone had used a bullhorn inches from my head. Babies, apparently Bush-leaning in their politics, have no qualms with using such sleep deprivation torture techniques.

With Ellie I was determined to do whatever it took to get the sleep I needed . . . I was prepared to co-sleep, nurse around the clock, learn to sleep in a rocking chair, earplugs, whatever it took to never feel that tired again. Fortunately, Ellie has always been a better sleeper than Annie, and although we do sleep her fully swaddled in a swing on its highest setting with a white noise machine going, she sleeps. And, I feel really pretty rested. It's been a huge relief.

Then she got sick this week. With her stuffy little nose we have to fight her to get her down for a nap, then she only sleeps 20 minutes tops. Last night it took us hours to get her down for bed, much later than normal, than after her initial stretch of sleep she was up every hour. I woke up four times last night with her. I forgot just how incredibly taxing that is . . . and when I was doing that with Annie I didn't have a two year old waking up and wanting breakfast at seven in the morning.

I feel guilty asking for Greg's help during the night, since he has to wake up at 6AM to go to work . . . but once I change a diaper she needs to be re-swaddled, and my swaddling is weak and ineffective, where as Greg's swaddling technique could restrain large, angry prisoners, and usually three month olds. Greg assures me it's not a problem, since he only half remembers waking up anyway, and unlike most Moms I talk to, he seems to be able to fall right back asleep after dealing with a squealing infant, whereas I take much, much longer to lull myself back to sleep. It all adds up for a night that seems like I spent more of it awake than asleep, which equals a day when I have absolutely no desire to play with play doh, run in sprinklers, or make cookies . . . but it's not Annie's fault I'm this tired, so it doesn't seem fair to deny her the simple pleasures of her life just 'cause I'm too tired.

Then I go and waste the twenty minutes when both kids are sleeping simultaneously and write a blog entry.

Stupid sleep.

Here's how we do get our baby to sleep. It doesn't last long though.

Only Benadryl would keep her that way, and drugging kids for sleep is frowned upon.

Sleeping Beauty

Annie isn't known for her good sleeping habits . . . so imagine our shock when she fell fast asleep up to the table the other day in the middle of eating her toast.
This is the first time she's ever 'accidently' fallen asleep.
Hopefully not her last.



Here's the girls right after waking up from their naps.




Here's why Ellie is, wisely, a little nervous around her affectionate big sister.