Add to the "Trying to Get it on Video" File...

There are two funny things I have been trying to get on video lately. One is too funny to spoil until I actually have managed to capture it and can post it. Trust me, it will be worth the wait. ;)

The other is Simon learning to sing Itsy Bitsy Spider. It's his favorite song right now and he has learned the hand motions and everything. Every now and then, you'll hear him off by himself in a sort of sing songy way going, "Pie-der... up... rain.... OUT! 'Un... Rain... Pie-der... up... again!" It makes me laugh every time. But yeah, would love to catch it in action with my camera... and, you know how that goes! :P He also likes to watch various renditions of Itsy Bitsy on Youtube. You always know when one is over because he'll yell from the other room, "Pie-der!! Again!!!" (sigh)

Uncle! UNcle! i Cry Uncle!

i woke up in the middle of the night with what I am fairly certain is an ear infection. Add to that I always eventually end up with a sinus infection when I have a head cold and the fact that I still can't breathe and i am not a happy camper. :(

Thankfully, I did at least get sleep last night so I'll be moderately more functional today... but still. I think a lot of movies will be played on our tv in the next 12 hours.

Ow. Ow. Ow.

Mommy Needs a Sick Day!

My benign but annoying cough, achyness and tiredness, which seemed like it was on its way out, has now morphed into a full blown headcold. I don't know if I got hit with two separate things or what, but it sucks.

I felt kinda off all day yesterday, tired, sneezy... and by bedtime I couldn't breathe despite a dose of generic NyQuil. Then I couldn't sleep and watched the hours tick off the clock while I listened to the goings on within my head and enjoyed somewhat limited breathing out of alternate nostrils depending on which way I rolled over... finally at 10:45, I just got up and played on Facebook until nearly midnight. Then I laid in bed some more. I think I slept a little between 12 and 3, got up to blow my nose and resituate, then slept a little more from 3-6, more nose blowing, slept from 6-7. Now I am up because Simon is and I feel half dead.

The best news? Simon has the same cough I had last week. So I'll be blasting him with his full asthma regimen all week, I suppose. Poor little guy. :(

And as of right now, Ben is still sleeping, which is odd... so now waiting to see if HE wakes up with it.

WINTER BE GONE!

Simon's Word for Spiderman...

(lest I forget this someday when his talking becomes clearer)

"Pieder-manner!" or sometimes just "Pieder", but Pieder-manner makes me laugh!

A Must Read...

A friend of ours, who we haven't seen in person in entirely too long because he moved to Texas for grad school, is in India right now. (for what reason, I have yet to actually discern entirely, but I think it's a wedding)

Anyway, he is keeping a blog while he is there and it's side-splittingly funny. If you need a laugh, walk, do not run, here.

The only background you need to know is that he is whiter than white (his nickname when we knew him, was "Whitey") and bald. ;)

Big Boy Bed...

Pondering our big boy bed options for Simon. The ultimate goal is to have he and Ben sharing a room and, ideally, the bunk beds. But... we've hit a snag that I didn't foresee and that is that Ben is VERY attached to the bottom bunk. I'm not sure he'll take kindly to being ousted from his nook and sent up top, at least not anytime soon.

Simon, on the other hand, would probably sleep in the top OR bottom bunk tonight if I'd let him. Though there is no way I would let him sleep on the top until he is at least four, it scares the living daylights out of me.

Thinking of putting together the toddler bed and relocating some of Ben's furniture elsewhere so it can fit in the room and we'll use that for a year or so... the other option is to separate the bunks, which will also require a lot of furniture relocation.

Townhouse living requires a lot of creativity, that's for sure! But we are determined not to move as long as possible. No plans in the near or even distant future, really.

Just thinking outloud. I'd like to have Simon in a big boy bed by the time he's two or just after, just so there is no bitterness about any eventual baby brother or sister stealing his crib and his room. Plus, Ben really can't wait to have a roommate... he talks about it all the time!

Facebook Blahs...

I am thinking of divorcing Facebook, at least to some extent. It's totally my own fault for being so liberal with my friending, but I've started to become irritated that people who I haven't seen since high school or who I only took one class with in college (or who didn't even SPEAK to me in high school ever), suddenly have opinions on things I post as status updates. Often really annoying and judgmental opinions. It's only happened a handful of times, but I got one today that was just the metaphorical straw that broke the camel's back. (it's deleted now, don't bother looking for it... it annoyed me way too much to leave it up on my screen)

Maybe I'll just go through and weed out the friends list down to a respectable 25-30.

Grr... The lesson I've learned from it? Sometimes bridges are meant to be burned. Bleh.

An Update for the Sake of an Update...

Blah day... though Ben had school, which is always good. It was the beginning of doctor week and the kids all apparently covered the teacher in various medical supplies -- neck brace, bandaids, etc... and told her she had 13 hours to live. LOL. So funny. I wish I could hang out one day and just watch, but those days are mostly over with Ben. :( Next year, he'll be gone 8 hours a day and I'll probably NEVER really know what goes on. At least I get to do Mommy and Me with Simon in the fall. :)

Speaking of which, the little hellian in Ben's class (who has actually been pretty decently behaved lately, it seems) has a little sister who is a month older than Simon. Simon HATES her with all of his 21-month-old being. . No exaggeration. Every single time he spots her from across a room, he screams like a banshee. If she comes near him? He screams louder. The few times they've made actual contact? There has been pushing and screaming and toy snatching from both of them. The best part? They are in the same 2's class next year. Shoot me. I hope they both get over it before September or it is going to be a very. long. year. ( It's not just him being his screechy, posessive, second-child self either because she really is the only child he reacts QUITE this way around. He just doesn't like her. I'm thinking, based on the little girl's older brother, that Simon is probably just a good judge of character. ;) )

Let's see, what else? I dunno... Ben is moody. Simon cut his nap short for some reason today. And I'm still worn out and sore from this stupid cough I've have for four days now and currently looking for the lung that just flew across the room during my latest coughing fit. Tom's on a train on his way from from a meeting in New York and I'm just hoping and praying that train is on time... because I'm clock watching today!

Off to watch some Curious George with the kiddos and try to make it through the rest of the afternoon...

Sadly, This is A Fairly Accurate Visual Representation of My Firstborn's Thought Process These Days...

Typical first-born mentality... we're working on it. ;) Once during a recent Gymboree class (he gets to come sit in the circle during bubble time), he actually plopped himself down in the middle of the circle, declared himself the sun and commanded all the toddlers to orbit him. (sigh)

Why?

Why don't the people over at "What to Expect..." write "What to Expect, the Preschool Years" and "What to Expect the Elementary School Years" versions? They really kind of leave you hanging after The Toddler Years.

That's all...

I'm Not Sure He Could Be Any More High Strung...

Yesterday at school, they had a visit from Wild Willy Woo Woo. (I tried to find a link for you, but came up empty handed) He's a no-makeup clown/magician guy. Apparently, he is quite funny, so funny in fact, that I'm told one of children wet their pants laughing. Ben also enjoyed it and kept declaring throughout the day that Wild Willy was "A-larious"

However, there was a dark side. Wild Willy brought with him, as part of his act, a bunny and a dove. He let the children pet them at some point . And I guess, since his show ran until pickup time, the kids didn't have time to wash their hands, so he said something to the effect of, "Make sure you wash your hands if you pet the animals."

Well, halfway home, Ben mentioned this sort of frantically. I said not to worry about it, we'd wash his hands as soon as we got home. He was quiet for a moment and then burst into full-on tears. "I didn't MEAN to pet the bunny and the bird. It was an accident! Now I'm going to get SICK! WHY do bunnies and birds make you sick?!?!" He continued to sob.

!?

I explained that it's not anything to get all worked up over, that people keep bunnies and birds as pets just like cats and dogs. But that it's always a good idea to wash your hands when you touch any animals... that animals sometimes walk around in their poo and that poo carries germs. (I didn't want to freak him out further with talk of specific things that birds or bunnies carry, good grief) And that anyway, he should ALWAYS wash his hands when he gets home from school and ohmahgah calm the heck down already!

All the way home, he continued to express his tearful regrets about touching the bunny and the bird and begged for the Purell that hangs from my keychain.

Sheesh. For the love of pete, the child is going to have an ulcer by the time he's 8.

For the record, and to preempt and suggestion that he gets this from his mother, I may be a bit ocd, but I am not particularly germophobic. Heck, if it had been me, I probably would have completely forgotten about washing my hands altogether and ended up with Hocuspocusitis or whatever it is magicians' animals carry.

Bleh...

Sorry for the lack of content here. I am SO achy and tired... I've been fighting something off since the weekend. I was feeling better and now I'm back to feeling cruddy again. I put Simon's nap off as long as I could this afternoon so I'd have a quiet afternoon... hopefully he'll still down until after three. I am just so wiped! Ben is playing with his toy laptop and some blocks... I'm thinking about curling up on the sofa with a blanket and some tea.

Also was THRILLED to find out this morning that three of Ben's classmates have come down with another godawful stomach virus. Wonderful! Here's hoping they do not share it.

And lastly, the wind today? HURTS. So not leaving the house again today!

Is winter over yet? Seriously? Because I can't take much more of cold and wind and germs.

YouTube Baby...

I forget to menion that my brother used Simon in a video awhile back... it's quite funny. ;)

Good Old-Fashioned Family Fun...

I was cleaning up dinner when Tom called me into the living room to see what Ben was doing. He had a map of United States propped up against the wall and was looking at it while contorting himself into odd positions. It took me a minute to realize he was actually making himself into the shapes of various states. LOL!!! We spent the next ten minutes guessing which states he was. I'm still laughing!

Ben's New Friend the Dentist...

So Ben had a dentist appointment yesterday afternoon... it was a reschedule from WAY back in October when he flaked on me for the second time. He assured me he would be cool this time, though he did keep declaring, in the days leading up to it, that he "might get tired and have to cry". I told him his appoinement was at 1:45 and he does not get tired at 1:45. LOL.

We arrived about ten minutes early and what did he spy on the dentist's wall, but a world map! (It was there to show the cities and countries where our dentist has sold copies of his book, but I prefer to think it was placed there by God himself just for Ben... LOL) Ben spend ten minutes pointing out countries and drooling over the map... by the time Miss Joy, the hygenist, was ready for him, he was just the happiest little thing, babbling on and on to her about maps and not even noticing that he was sitting in a dental chair with a bib tied around his neck.

Yes, that's right. He sat in the chair by himself and didn't even question it. I busied myself reading various leaflets about dental hygiene. Woohoo! He let her clean his teeth, (with chocolate toothpaste... gag!) did all the requisite rinsing and spitting and didn't flake even once! Then the dentist came in (the true test because our dentist is the goofiest weirdo ever... his jokes are odd, they are not funny and he is just all and around crazy man... good dentist though. LOL)

He did awesome, earned himself a chance to spin the prize wheel and won $4! Even better though, was that they just happened to have a SOLAR SYSTEM toothbrush among the toothbrush choices. Ben was in awe...

So it was a great visit and I was relieved. Next time, they said he gets x-rays! WOW WOW WOW! Also, no loose teeth yet, which is also a relief, because I'm not all that sure how Ben is going to deal with that and I'm happy to put it off for awhile. ;)

Crash.

I've made an observation about Simon that I'm hoping to get some insight on from the many moms that read here....

I think he has some kind of blood sugar issue...

Occassionally, he'll go down for a nap without eating lunch. I always offer it, he doesn't always want it.

The first time, a few months ago, he woke up and was just shaking all over. (imagine just full-body shivers, not like large movement seizure type stuff) I took his temperature. Nada. Brought him downstairs. He just started crying and I couldn't get him under control. I finally convinced him to take a drink of milk or juice or something, just to try to calm him down. Within minutes, he was perfectly normal. I chalked it up to just a bad wake up and forgot about it.

The second time, a few weeks ago, same deal, full body shivers. Took the temp. Nothing. Massive crying fit. Food. Normal.

After this, I started piecing it together. I know when I skip a meal, I tend to have more severe reactions than anyone else I know. I get weak, nauseated, migraine headache, shaky, REALLY pissy. So I started making sure I was giving him mostly protein from the time he woke up to till naptime and if he decided not to eat lunch before he went down, I tried to make sure he at least drank some milk or yogurt. All was well until two days ago...

This incident cemented it for me. I was out with Ben at gymnastics, Tom fed Simon lunch, which he didn't really eat, save for a few wedges of orange and half a cup of juice. (if you know anything about blood sugar, you see where this is going) He woke up from his nap CRYING, which is not at all like him, he is always smiley when he wakes up. He just cried and cried and went I went to pick him up, he was shaking all over, a little disoriented and just all around ticked off. Nothing I did calmed him down. He threw me off a little because he kept grabbing at his ear and screaming... of course, I took his temperature. Nothing. Logically, I knew that even if he DID have an ear infection, it shouldn't hurt because his tubes are in and working and we actually JUST had them looked at. (he had an infection just a few weeks ago) But, I gave him some Motrin anyway and we decided to take him downstairs and just see if he calmed down...

I gave him some teddy grahams and a cup of soy milk. At first, he tried to knock them out of my hand, then he eventually came back for them and wolfed both things down in about five minutes.

Within, eh, about 15 minutes? 100% normal Simon.

Okay, so obviously, I need to mention this to the doctor... but I'm just wondering if anyone else has any experience with anything like this with their kids? I'm pretty familiar with hypoglycemia because I crash pretty easily myself... it's never turned into anything though and I just manage it by eating lots of small meals, tons of protein and avoiding things that are super high in sugar (like juice, I do not touch juice, it makes me feel AWFUL) I'm hoping he just inherited this from me and it's not something more serious... like a precursor to juvenile diabetes or something...

You know me, always the worrier....

I've googled and googled and he doesn't have any symptoms juvenile diabetes (like weight loss, ha!), which is a relief. But it really does seem like something is going on.

The Smith Sodium....

I was working on Ben's scrapbooks on Friday (I'm only TWO years behind now instead of four! Yay!) and he was looking at the pictures as I sorted through them.

"Where am I in THIS one?!" he asked, in total awe.



"Oh! That's when we went to the Smithsonian! They have a whole museum about airplanes and space flight."

"Can we go there TODAY? Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease?!"

Eighteen times a day now, for two solid days, he has asked if we could please go to the "Smith Sodium" NOW now now. I explained we need to wait for warm weather because it's a lot of walking and we have to plan ahead because we have to leave Simon home with someone.

Poor kid. Patience is not his thing. I can sympathize. I can also giggle at his pronunciation. ;) Hee. Smith Sodium.

Happy Valentine's Day!

My two lover boys!

Ben's Strange Little World...

On the drive home from gymnastics this morning, Ben was munching on a bag of animal crackers... from the backseat, I heard, "This one looks like Kansas!" "This one looks like France!"

Turns out, he was biting them into the shapes of states and countries.

Only Ben... only Ben...

I'm a Slow Learner...

Since Benjamin was just a wee thing, we have gotten frustrated with each other over what makes for a "fun" activity.

Random coloring? Pshah. That would last like a minute and a half. Even now, his drawings are rushed and scribbly and he rarely wants to save anything. Sometimes, given a good idea, he gets into it... but it's rare.

Cooking? In addition to the fact that he hates messy hands, his attention span for this doesn't last longer than five minutes. (I always thought really messy hands type cooking was a hit with kids...not mine)

Painting? See above about the messy hands and the rushed drawings. He mostly likes to mix colors together and paint the paint cups, which is a good/educational/busy activity for a good while, but still...

Reading? For him, this is a night time activity and a general waste of good running around time during the day. He'll happily sit and look at books during the day of his own accord, but will NOT let me read to him.

We hit on a few winners with tactile stuff... he loves the rice box still, any kind of sand box, playdough, water play. But most days I am wracking my brain to keep him entertained and mostly just banging my head against a wall.

Part of the problem is that he is 100% my husband's genes as far as what he finds interesting. I'm reminded of it so often these days when I'm carrying on yet another conversation with him about countries, flags, capitals, continents, etc... my husband, his brothers and their grandfather can sit for hours discussing such things, in addition to other boring topics like English monarchies and very very VERY very very very detailed American History. (I stress the very detailed part, because I find History interesting... just not in QUITE the same depth that they do)They are all trivia storehouses of dates, Presidents, countries that have changed names, biggest oceans, smallest mountains, longest rivers, wars... you name it.

(snore)

Long story short, my husband's brain genes are obviously very strong. But I digress...

Today, I had a brilliant idea. Ben's newest addition to his obession list is flags. He knows the flags of a ridiculous number of countries... it's kind of nuts, but it's his thing, so whatever.

So we were on flags.net looking up flags he wanted to see... he asked me if planets had their own flags and I said no but then I thought for a moment... "Hey Ben! WAnt to make flags for the planets?" He jumped off the couch with an enthusiastic, "Yes!!! I'll do Jupiter! You do Mars!"

My jaw fell to the floor. This is the child who is rarely enthusiastic about any idea I put out there, so I knew I'd struck gold.

He colored happily with me for a good 40 minutes while we made our planet flags. (Then, little ocd perfectionist that he is, he got mad that he couldn't make his look like mine. Sigh.) He snatched mine and starting adding details I'd left off, like extra moons and Jupiter's red spot.

Still, all in all, a good idea and I felt like I was finally starting to GET him a little more. I mean, I honestly still don't really GET most of the things he's interested in, (I *am* enjoying the space phase because I love that stuff) but I think I'm starting to understand how his mind works... at least enough to be able to pinpoint things he might think are fun.

Seriously. This kid is, as they say, a tough crowd... it's one big letdown after another when I come up with what I think are fun ideas. I was walking on air this afternoon!

Duggars...

What's with the Duggar girls and their badly permed hair? I'm starting to think it's part of their beliefs or something because I was watching the wedding special two nights ago and the girl who married the eldest Duggar boy had the same badly permed hair.

It bothered me so much, I actually googled it and apparently they actually DO perm their hair... and doesn't that seem odd given all the things they DON'T do because they think it's wrong to be preoccupied with their outward appearances?

Anyway, it seems I am not the only one who is bothered by it because Google yielded TONS of results, blog posts, etc...

... and the Side-by-Side

That sweater Ben has on was put away so long ago that I don't even know what box it's in. ;) You can see it was even too small for HIM when he was 21 months old. You can only imagine how small it would be on Simon. LOL!

Simon is 21 Months Old!

Dear Simon,

Today you are one and three quarters. ;) This past month has been a fairly easy one with you. You are less frustrated lately because you have found your words and there don't seem to be any teeth on the way to make you grumpy. I am actually starting to wonder if you even HAVE eyeteeth, but that's a whole other post.

This doesn't mean you aren't still challenging sometimes. You are rather prone to throwing yourself on the floor in dramatic fits when you don't get what you want. The funny part is that you don't have much staying power and are pretty easy to to wait out. Two days ago you were in the store with me and the following transpired: -- I've discovered the secret to buying myself some cart time with you is to take you to the store hungry and whip out a bag of goldfish. This day, you wanted to walk when we got there. I said, "Okay, but the fish stay in the cart." You seemed content with this arrangement for about ten minutes, walking happily beside me and then you decided you wanted the fish. I lifted you up into the cart and you did your patented Baby Made of Lead with No Bendable Joints (tm) routine and shrieked. I put you down and said again, "If you want the fish, you need to sit in the cart." We did this a few more times and in between, you tried all manner of extracting the bag of goldfish from the cart before you resorted to the floor tantrum, which I have to say, was quite the performance. First you went entirely limp (your Baby Made of Gelatin with no Knees (tm) routine), and then the wailing began. Ohhh, the people, how they stopped and stared, judging and tsking and a'rolling their eyes, some smiled sympathetically at me, some excused themselves to walk by us, others just peered around the aisles... still you screamed. And then suddenly, as if the Lord God himself had opened up the heavens and pointed you to the path of goodness, you stopped, stood up and decided it might actually be cool to sit in the cart (the basket, not the seat, of course) and munch on your goldfish. You were an angel for the rest of the shopping trip, babbling and pointing and waving to people. All the while, I kept reminding you that I WON. HA! And I will ALWAYS win because I am mommy so it's best you learn that early. :P

In other news this month, you like wearing your brother's underwear over your pants, walking up and down the stairs holding onto the railing (and taking years off my life while doing so), and flushing things down the toilet. Re: the latter, luckily, you only think toilet paper and small bits of paper trash work for this and haven't moved on to rubber duckies or Spiderman action figures. Anytime any of us is in the bathroom though, you come running, saying excitedly, "Fush! Fush!!" The potty go'er then has to fend you off until they are finished their business, all the while with you trying to get a piece of toilet paper into the bowl to "Fush." I usually humor you for being patient and hand you one sheet to throw in and "Fush" yourself. You squeal with glee at this activity. Tell me again why I buy toys?

You also have discovered a love of dancing. This is actually pretty recent, but suddenly it is one of your favorite things. Just yesterday, at Grandmom's, you played an ABC song on a toy about fiftyfahundred times, each time, pulling someone up from the couch by the hand, saying "Dass? Dass"? I'd like to say this means you like company in your dancing, but I think your motives are more devious. I think you like to see us all make fools of ourselves. ;)

You readily say, "Peez" these days to get what you want, which I'm happy about. If you are going to order someone around to do your bidding all day, it's at least nice to have manners about it.

The word of the month? Silly. You are just plain silly and giggly and just constantly make us all laugh. Many have speculated that your Uncle Brandon has a mini me... I guess only time will tell. ;)

See you next month!
Love,
Mommy

Outside...

...is where I hope to spend a good deal of time today with the boys. Maybe pics later? We'll see.

Also, happy 29againth birthday, mom! :D

Benjamin's Birthday Update...

I am slowly cobbling together a Tower of Terror theme, in my mind anyway -- I'm holding off on most of my supply purchases, lest he decide he's actually into dinosaurs in a month or so...

I found a musical Twilight Zone birthday card for him at Hallmark on Saturday. He'll get a kick out of that. Also, totally stolen from the webpage of the mom whose kid also requested a Tower of Terror party, I'm going to make bellhop hats. Still pondering the cake.

Of course, the child couldn't have mentioned this when we were IN Disneyworld and had access to all manner of Tower of Terror merchandise...

As for his gifts... I know lots of you have kiddos turning five and sometimes like to read my gift ideas...so, here you go--

-at the advice of several people, I got him the Leapfrog globe. It was more expensive than I thought it would be, and I don't generally buy into electronic toys over classic versions, but I read all the reviews and people just rave and rave and rave about it. I think he'll love it and we'll all have fun with it!

-Back at Christmastime, I got a total steal on the Tag reading system, case, headphones and two books, so he's getting that too

- I also got him a book called It's Hard to Be Five that looked cute

-and lastly, another book called Me on the Map

I think that's it... more than enough actually!

Back to pondering the Tower of Terror... and kindergarten registration (!) which is apparently coming up in April, NOT summer as I had originally thought! Gah! I can't believe I will have a kindergardener in a few short months...

Silly Simon...

This is not an uncommon sight at our house, but I did finally manage to be near a camera when it occurred. ;)

Simon often requests underwear for over his pants... he digs them out of Ben's drawer and brings them to us. Then, on top of that, he'll rummage through Ben's costume closet and pull out the most random things and put them on. Today it was these glasses... at one point, he also had fuzzy monster hands on and Batman gloves. (though not simultaneously)

You may also notice the sandals with socks... yes, he picked those out too.





"According to my calculations..."

Just Random...

-Still ended up watching way too much tv yesterday... but only in the morning. The afternoon we spent coloring and making space pictures and pretending Stitch was a baby (Ben even made me get a bottle out for him). We also played Tower of Terror, which is fast becoming another Ben obsession. He turned his policeman costume into a bellhop costume and pretended he was running the ride.

-In that same vein, Ben has decided he would like a Tower of Terror theme for his birthday party. So yeah, any suggestions for making a Tower of Terror birthday cake would be just AWESOME. LOL. He's not actually having a bday party with kids and whatnot, just the usual family dinners with cake. But one of them is going to be ToT themed now, I'm wondering if I can just take a print out of a pic of the ToT to one of those places who offers the photo cake option... Short of ordering a Tower of Terror from Charm City Cakes (cha-CHING!) I'm not sure there is a better option.

-Simon woke up yesterday with goo in his ear. Ear infection! Basically just means I have to put his abx drops the ENT gave us after his surgeries in there for five days... and what fun THAT is, lemme tell ya. He hates it. And he cries pitifully. :( Trying to decide if I should take him to the pediatrician this morning just to make sure that's all that is wrong. Weighing the copay against the peace of mind right now...

And on that note, gotta run. Little Dude is up. I'l be checking back for all those great Tower of Terror party ideas you are going to leave here in my comments section. ;)

(yawn)

Awoke last night around 11:15 to a police helicopter hovering over my house shining a searchlight. I'm sure it was actually further away than it looked, but it was still loud and I swear it hovered there for a solid 30 minutes.

I am also tired because we stayed up for LOST. Gah! I love that show. I can't get enough. I wish I had the discipline to stop watching, so I could wait until the DVD's came out and just watch the whole thing all at once.

Ben had an awesome day at school yesterday. Only six kids came and his teacher said she could have spent hours with the group that was there. When I walked him in, she told Ben she'd brought her books about space and put them them all out on the table. When I left he was perusing what looked like a college astronomy textbook. LOL! He stayed for lunch, because otherwise, he would have only been at school for an hour and 15 minutes. And, when I picked him up he had made a cutout of one of Jupiter's moons in his class, had a spiderman sticker on his hand from someone in Lunch Bunch, told me they had had a little planetarium in his classroom, and was just an all around happy little thing the rest of the day.

Oh, and Simon! I think he said his own name yesterday. He only did it once and of course, I can't get him to do it again so I'm starting to wonder if I imagined it. But, he was naming us all yesterday and when I pointed back to HIM, he said what sounded like, "Shy-mn" So adorable...

Blahhhhhh... We are all just so tired of being trapped in the house! I feel like we are watching way too much tv, not doing enough fun stuff, not being active enough, not to mention, my house gets trashed every. single. day. Bring on spring... seriously!

Bizarro World...

Weird, WEIRD night last night. Sometime around 2:30a.m., I sat straight up in bed, disoriented and confused... THOUGHT I heard an explosion/pop sound and swore I saw a blue flash of light. Ben was yelling, "Mommy!!" The smoke alarm gave its warning chirp as the power in the whole house died and everything got quiet. (except for Ben who was freaking his freak out because his room was dark)

I calmed Ben down, the power came back. Then I wandered the rooms looking for where the light came from. Decided it must have been our floodlight outside when the power went out and that the "explosion/pop sound" must have just been the remote falling from the bed to the floor and I had been confused because I was still half asleep.

Back to sleep...

Woke up again at 5'something or other to Ben yelling "Mommy!!" again. Tom went in this time. He came back and told me the power was out again and didn't know how long it had been out. I figured it'd be back on soon and went back to sleep witih Ben next to me.

Woke up for good at 7, power still out. Cable out, which meant also tv/internet/phones out.

Looked out the window to see... SNOW?! I was so confused!

Power came back on, but no cable/phones/internet.

Realized (still half asleep and coffeeless) that the snow probably meant schools were impacted but couldn't get to any information because even our radio wasn't working for some reason. Started to think there was some kind alien invasion overnight or Canada had decided to attack us.

Called Beth, my neighbor, who was in a similar confused and sleep-deprived and cable/phone/internet-less state. She didn't know anything about the schools but asked me if I had heard an explosion overnight and/or seen a strange light... okay, so I probably am not crazy...

Got a hold of my dad via Tom's cell phone, who told me that our county is two hours late and also that there had been a bad car accident just around the corner from our house during the night. I fount out a bit ago that the car hit a transformer, which means I definitely did NOT dream the explosion sound or the weird blue light.

Started trying to access the internet via my cell phone to find out if schools decided to close... (which is not easy -- I do NOT have an internet friendly phone)

Internet/phone/tv back on... thankfully. And so is the coffee. Schools are two hours late, which means Ben goes in at 10... this day is going to be weird and annoying all around, I can just tell!

So Much for That Second Cup of Coffee....

Until very recently, I had this morning routine... I'd get up around 6:30, have my coffee, answer email, post on my blog, check the bank account and update Facebook. Then I'd get a shower and go sit quietly with my second cup of coffee until around 7:20 when Simon got really noisy in his crib. He wakes up around 7, but generally plays and looks at books for 15-30 minutes.

Now all of a sudden, he is using words like "mama!" and "door!" And pretty much as soon as his eyes are opened, he immediately starts in with "door?" "door?" It's quiet at first, until I ignore it for awhile, then gets more desperate. "Mama?" "Dada?" "Ben?" "Door!!!!!!"

Yes, it's very cute. And so is the big grin he gets on his face and his giggles he lets out when someone actually opens said door.

...But I do miss that quiet cup of coffee. ;)

Misc...

Observation: My oldest child takes a LOoooNG time to readjust after coming home from vacation. Even today he is still cranky and weepy. And just like last year, he did NOT want to go to school today. Thankfully though, it was just mild whining and complaining as opposed to the screaming fits that happened last year. Once he got there, he was happy... but then when I picked him up, he was all weepy again. Something about making rockets in the big room and not being able to bring them home... and his friend Taylor not talking about Disney with him. I can't wait for him to be back to normal again. He's excited about the rest of the week though because his teacher is doing some space activities this week. God bless her, she actually put it off and waited until Ben got back from vacation to do this. :)

Update: Simon tips the scales at 30 pounds now. I've about reached my limit with being able to carry him. Gah. It was killer in Disney...

And, an amusing tidbit, Ben brought home an art project from school today that was a picture of Jupiter with popcorn glued all over it for stars and Simon keeps pointing hungrily at it on the fridge saying, "Corn? Corn?" He really would like to eat it.

As for me, I'm still recovering from traveling too... SO tired still. I haven't found my groove again yet and was actually almost late dropping Ben off to school this morning.

Off to play catch up with some emails and bills and laundry...

Here, Just Regrouping...

See title. Back to reality! I'll try to post at naptime. :)