You all politely read my frustration with naps
in the past few months, so I thought I should post an update
for you (and me). I’m not sure what’s changed, but he has
started napping again. YAY!!!! It usually takes him anywhere
from a half hour to an hour and a half to fall asleep, but he
stays in his bed, stays fairly mellow and eventually falls
asleep. If he gets out of the bed I stick him right in the crib
and he falls asleep there. I don’t feel like we are doing much
different from the past many months, but maybe we are. Or maybe
he made it through some phase or something. Not sure, but I’m
much happier now. And he’s MUCH happier now. Which makes
everyone else much happier :) Our plan for this weekend is to
do some sleep training with Eve now. She’s been waking up 2-3
times a night to nurse. She eats more often at night than she
does during the day! I’m sure she isn’t really hungry though,
so we’re moving Lex into our room for the weekend and doing a
little training with her. I will be a happy camper if I can get
both of them napping and sleeping through the night. What we
need around here is a little more sleep!

The picture is from
today and has nothing to do with the post. Just felt like
including a picture :)

Lex got a few board games for Christmas (Candy
Land, Chutes & Ladders, and Trouble) and he LOVES them!
He’s so funny. We play several times a day and he’s really good
at the spinning, drawing a card, popping the dice, counting,
colors, and moving (when he wants to), but what he really needs
work on is his focus. Last night we were playing Candy Land and
the game went something like this: Alan draws a card, moves his
piece, I draw a card, move my piece, Lex jumps on the
trampoline, grabs a card, runs over and tucks it under doggy, proclaiming “doggy got a red!!”,
sits down and does a few little silly moves around doggy, jumps
back up on to the trampoline, a few more bounces, climbs over
Alan and finally makes it back to the board. Now, if he’s had
enough, he’ll move his piece to the next red square and the
game will continue. Otherwise he’ll move his piece backward (I
think he does get confused about forward and backward
sometimes) or he’ll put his piece ON the card over by doggy, or
use his piece to “draw” all over each red place on the board,
or do some other silly thing. All the while Alan and I are
saying, “Come on Lex, draw a card, move your piece, come back
over here, etc.” Then finally he’s done and Alan and I go and
it’s right back to Lex again. Needless to say, games take
awhile. But he loves them. Earlier in the evening they were
playing alone while I fed Eve and Lex ran into the kitchen to
show me each card that doggy picked. :) Remind you of a Family
Circus cartoon?

Now a game we can all
play…
I got a new camera for my
birthday 8 weeks ago and we’ve already taken 743 pictures and
movies. That’s a lot! Most of them of Lex and Eve. When I saw
that I was reminded of a comment my Grandpa made at his 80th
birthday party two years ago about how the number of pictures
taken of a person is the inverse of their age. So, the
challenge is to guess how many pictures we have taken of Lex
over the past two and a half years. Most of the more recent
ones also include Eve, but for the purpose of the game I’m
going to just say Lex since he was born. Now, I have NO IDEA
what the answer is and I’m not about to count every single one,
but in a few days I’ll go back through and come up with a
reasonable approximation. The person with the closest guess
will win a fabulous, wonderful, exciting prize… like a
picture of Lex!

Just a quick post to welcome in the new year. We
spent the day doing not much. Haircuts for the boys so I could
clean up my last attempt at cutting Lex’s hair. Then Lex and I
spent awhile playing outside. It snowed all day and it was
beautiful. Big, fat, airy flakes drifting slowing to the
ground. The temps were good and there was no wind, so it was
really nice outside. We had fun. We’ve had a nice few weeks of
holidays and vacations. Alan has been working off and on, a day
here and a day there. Tomorrow we get back into the real
routine. My daycare baby comes back (I’ve missed her!) and
Alan’s back to work every day. Was a nice vacation, but life
has to get back to normal sometime, right?

This was from Christmas Day at Alan’s
parents house.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJb6sxTJS6g]

I haven’t really been in the Christmas
spirit lately (crazy, I know), but we just had a lovely
Christmas Eve that put me in the right frame of mind. Grandpa
and Grandma came over for dinner, I cooked a delicious dinner
(if I do say so myself) of soup, salad and bread, with lots of
cookies for dessert, of course. Lex and Eve opened presents
before dinner and enjoyed their new things. Eve now has her
very own hand knit stocking (yay, thanks Grandma!), and Lex is
loving his front loader and coloring supplies. It was such a
nice, happy family evening. Merry Christmas to all and to all a
good night!

Here are a few movies from today. Just
every day life as we get ready for company.

Eve’s sippy cup shower:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAl1nzJyF4c]

Doggy doing laundry:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWiejVNuj44]

Talking with Doggy:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLOSSQPQlNs]

Lex’s imaginative play is really developing lately. It’s
fun to watch and listen as he plays with his toys and makes up
some interesting stories.

Lex found a cup of “goldfish and bunnies” in the
backpack and managed to dump it all over the floor. Then he and
Eve sat right down to eat them. I figured, “Snack time on the
floor? What the heck, it’s Christmas!” Stay tuned for a video
of her drinking her water during this snack time.

The two of them are so sweet these days, and
extra sweet today. Right now they are upstairs, not napping,
but doing something that they both find very funny. I’m not
sure what (probably should find out) but they are up there
laughing and laughing together. I suspect he’s playing
peek-a-boo or something like that with her. It doesn’t bode
well for a nap, but it’s cute anyway… heheh… he just said
“1… 2… 3…” and then she cracked up.

Turns out they were
laughing because Eve started pulling herself up in the crib. I
walked in and she was standing up and he was peeking at her
through the bars. Both were hysterical. Then she fell over and
hit her face right into the bars. It’s been a tough week for
her.