Ketchup

My friend, Holly (sorry, her blog is locked or I would link to her!), uses this phrase for a long blog-post after not posting for a bit, and I love the idea! I didn't take an intentional blogging break, but that's how it has seemed to work out. Why, you ask? Well, on Thanksgiving, the 4 of us traveled to Husband's brother's house for Thanksgiving, and during the trip, the boys' "leakproof" water bottles leaked all over a bag full of our stuff -- including my camera. I hoped, hoped, hoped that the camera would dry out, but no such luck. My wonderful, amazing, "able to capture rambunctious toddlers" camera bit the dust. I eventually gave in and ordered an updated model (Panasonic Lumix -- I had a DMC-FS5 and ordered a DMC-ZR3). And what is a post without pictures?


In the past several weeks, a lot has been going on in our house. First, the boys went and spent a morning at their new school, and we had a great time. The boys liked Lori, the woman who will be their interim teacher until they turn 3 and switch to a preschool classroom, and especially loved all of the arts and crafts projects (namely glue and markers, two things we avoid at home). They will start school in mid-January when I start my JOB! Yup, I received and accepted a real, grown-up lawyer job several days ago, and will start working in mid-January. I'm very excited about starting work, and to use this ridiculously expensive degree (that I will be paying for for the next 20 years ...), and I think the boys will do great at school. Their school is also directly across from the state capitol, which will be very convenient when the Husband starts his new job in the Governor's office, and the school is about one mile from my office.

Sam learned to climb out of his crib. Although he has slept in the pack 'n play for the past several months, I still used his crib for time-out, and the other day, during a mega temper tantrum, I put him in his crib so he could cool down (because the very sight of me was making him more enraged!) -- and about one minute later, I heard the pitter-patter of little feet -- and surprise, there was Sam, standing in the living room, looking rather smug. The next day, I discovered the boys standing on their toddler chairs and doing front flips into the pack 'n play -- so I decided it was time for Sam to make the switch.

He has done wonderfully in his big-boy bed, but is a bit of a nighttime wanderer. It is a bit disconcerting to wake up with him staring at me, approximately 2 inches from my face, but I guide him back to bed, and he goes willingly. Ben tried his toddler bed for one night, but decided he wants to sleep in his crib, and I am in no rush to push him into a toddler bed before he is ready. I took down Sam's crib this morning, and felt a real sense of sadness as I disassembled it -- I put that crib together right before I started back to school -- the boys were 5 months old and had been sharing a crib to that point -- but needed their own space. I can't imagine how sad I will feel when I take down Ben's crib, my dad put that together the weekend of my baby shower when I was 29 weeks pregnant (and 4 days before my water broke!), and the very thought of it not being in the boys' room makes me feel teary.

Ben had his EEG on Friday, and did very well during the procedure, but we continue to wait for results. We should have the results by this coming Friday. He has been fighting a nasty cold for several weeks, and I worried that the test would have to be rescheduled because it is a sedated test, but his cold was not bad enough to reschedule. His sedation was not general anesthesia, but rather an oral medication that made him sleepy. Ben happily took the medicine (and actually gave it to himself!), and drifted off to sleep as I rocked him and sang "Frosty the Snowman" (one of his favorite songs, tied with "Rudolph" and "Teenage Dream"). I couldn't look at him after he was all hooked up to the monitors, his head was entirely bandaged to keep the sensors on him, and after taking a quick peek at him, I knew I would start to cry if I saw him again, so I sat on the other side of the room and tried to stay mellow. The Husband was there, too, and the techs were great and let us both stay in the room during the procedure.

The boys have seen Santa a handful of times -- first at the mall, then at my Mothers of Twins holiday party, and lately, at our favorite grocery store. It's great, the Santa at the grocery store knows us by now, and I've started using him as a resource to get the boys to behave. For example, Ben has started to refuse to put on his winter jacket. Not acceptable given this ridiculous cold-spell, so when we saw Santa at the store yesterday, he asked if Ben has been listening to Mommy -- and I told Santa that Ben won't wear his jacket -- so Santa and Ben had a little talk about that. Sam has repeatedly asked Santa for a kitty cat for Christmas -- and two kittens will be joining the household on Monday. The Husband grew up in an apartment in Queens, and has always had cats -- and his cat died at age 17 when the boys were about 5 months old -- so he is ready for pets.

My camera is scheduled to arrive tomorrow -- so I should be back to the more frequent posts soon.