Second Tooth

Owen’s first tooth came out just two days after it became loose.  His second tooth has been loose for over 7 weeks and Owen has been wondering what is wrong.  (I think it is because the new tooth is growing in behind the loose one so there is nothing pushing the old one out. ) This morning the loose tooth began to bleed and Owen was so excited to see little spots of blood dripping on the bathroom counter.  (That was not my favorite part)  This afternoon Owen twisted the tooth out – and he was jumping with excitement.

Eric put the boys to bed while I picked my brother up at the airport.  Owen got his tooth all ready for the fairy.

Tired Firefighter

Jack has recently re-discovered his firefighter costume that he got from Mamau for his birthday.  He has been on duty for several days now.  When we have to go somewhere in the car, Jack takes off the costume and lays it out neatly on the floor – I guess so that he can quickly put it on when he returns… Today he finally  tuckered himself out with all of his firefighting duties…

Little Joys

I made Tyler laugh today.

There is something about holding a four-month-old baby and making him laugh.  It is so pure.  And so simple.  And so pleasurable.  And somehow, so powerful.

As Jack and I talked about the events of the day, it is one of the moments that he included.  He felt it too.

Pretty

Jack tells me I am pretty almost every day.

It doesn’t matter what I am wearing or how my hair looks or if I have make-up on.  Just sometime in the day he looks up at me and smiles and says, “You look pretty, Mama.”

It melts my heart every time.

Hand Me Downs???

One  [supposed] benefit of having two children of the same gender is the ability of using hand-me-downs.  Somehow this does not work well in our family...  Jack was born very small, and needed preemie size clothes, so, right off the bat, I had to go out and get new clothes despite the closet-full that we already had for Owen.  When Jack grew into bigger sized clothes, he was apparently making up for lost time, and wore each of the sizes  “newborn”, 0-3 months,and  3-6 months clothes for only a few weeks each.  It went by so quickly that he didn’t wear all of the outfits that we had.  When Jack finally hit the 6-12 month clothes he did slow down his rapid growth – but not before his little belly had grown enough to make it impossible for him to fit into any of the little jeans and cords that Owen wore when he was that age.  Out I went again to buy little sweat pants and one piece outfits.  The next snag was the fact that Owen and Jack are 18 months apart, which makes the clothes Owen wore in the summer fit Jack in the winter, and the winter clothes fit Jack in the summer…

This past year Jack has finally been able to wear all of Owen’s old clothes – and I have been glad that things are finally working out in my [financial] favo.r  But I guess that is going to be a very short-lived satisfaction on my part because Jack now outweighs Owen, and since Owen is taller, they have completely different body types.  They now wear the same size in most clothes, which you would think would be good because they could share – but I am not so lucky… While Owen loves the idea that Jack wears his old clothes, he doesn’t like the idea of sharing.  And while Jack loves the idea of wearing Owen’s old clothes, he can’t share either because once he has worn something, he wants to be the only one who owns it.   They agree to share socks – something that I don’t’ mind having an over-abundance of (if you know me at all, this will not be a surprise to you…) – and they have agreed to share pants.  But, of course, that won’t work out because   Owen needs a very skinny waist, and long legs.  Jack needs a regular size waist and legs.  So when Owen is done with his pants – they are too tight on Jack!

Today I went to buy some new shoes for Owen.  He measured a size 12.  Just to make sure I was not squeezing Jack into shoes that were too tight, I had Jack’s shoes checked as well.

“He is measuring at an 11 and a half,” the sales lady said, and I breathed a sigh of relief, until she finished.  “on the left.  And his right foot measures at a 12.”

Great.

Anyone have 4 pair of rainboots in size 1 that they want to pass our way???

Felt Fun

I have been looking at some felt craft projects and have a big-ish project in mind, but want to start smaller.  I just want to try something to see if I am any good and decide if I want to make a purchase of some higher quality felt.  I got some new Gingher scissors from my grandma for my birthday and a pair of pinking sheers from Eric’s mom, Mary.  I needed to make something today.

I was looking as some projects on different blogs , and decided to try this blogger’s flower idea.  Most of the felt that I had was left over from making Jack’s Capt’n Sharky Pirate hats, so my colors are black, grey, and cream, but it was just for fun anyway.

I wanted to see if they would stand up, and added some stiffened felt for the stem.  Super cute – if not super useful…

The monkeys saw me sewing and wanted to try their hand at it. 

Owen sewed a flower similar to the ones I was making.  He took the project quite seriously.

Jack mostly just cut the felt into little pieces with my scissors.  He did want to sew too. I put a tiny piece of felt to one end of his thread (so that it wouldn’t pull through whatever he was sewing) and tied the other end to the needle. 

He had a ball sewing random pieces together. 

And stayed with me long after Owen had moved on to bigger and better things.  Jack left for a few minutes and when he came back he showed me his stuffed dog’s new ear decoration…

And was thrilled when he asked to also sew “wings” on his dog – and I said yes.  Whatever, it is his toy…  Jack cut out the shape of his wings.  I attached the string onto the wings with a little x, and Jack went to town.  It cracked me up when I saw that the dog’s tail was caught up in between the wings and the dog’s back!

Are we not a creative family?!?!

Week-In-The-Life: Saturday

I woke up sometime after 8 then fell asleep until sometime after 9.  Eric was in the living room and the monkeys were playing upstairs.  Eric had taken care of breakfast monkey entertainment.  Coffee was ready.  A good morning!

I said good morning to all my men, then played on the computer for awhile.  Owen and Jack joined me and we watched some you-tube videos – mostly music and dancing stuff.

We did some little chores, just hangin’ out.

I can’t believe my little guys are serving themselves without much input from me…

Today was Quinn and Penn’s birthday party.  They monkeys wanted to wear fancy clothes, so I ironed shirts for them – and one for Eric while I was at it.

I asked the monkeys if they wanted to wear “very fancy” clothes or “modern fancy”.  Owen chose “modern” so we picked out a tie to go with his shirt, a pair of jeans with sewed on rips and patches, and his pair of high-top converse (actually these are the only shoes that fit him right now, so I am glad that the “went” with the outfit…).  Jack wanted to be “very fancy” so we found dress pants and formal shoes for him.  He was excited to wear his bowtie that he got in his Christmas stocking.  I spent 15 minutes going through all of his dress-up clothes and hiding places for precious items in his room before I found it…

I threw in a load of laundry so that I can wear my favorite jeans to the party (really the one pair of jeans that I wear pretty much every day.  I should branch out…)

The monkeys and I got dressed and went to the bookstore to get some books for the birthday boys.  We chose 4 of the boys’ favorite books from when they were little.

Owen and Jack decorated some paper with watercolor,

and I dried it with the hairdryer so that we could use it right away for wrapping paper.

I took a shower and got ready while Eric did the monkeys’ hair (Eric really really loves that I am taking tons of photos this week, can you tell? – you’re a trooper, baby!)

I cannot believe that I didn’t take a final photo of us before the party!  Inspired by my 4 and 5-year-olds, I decided to dress up a little.   It will be a shock to many to know that I wore (um…some of you may need to sit down before you read these next sentences)…makeup, silver shoes, a pink shirt and a white sweater!! (no black t-shirt, no Converse shoes, no Smartwool socks!)  Eric and Tina had a photographer at the party who took a picture of our family.  If it t is comes out we will get one – and post it.

I had read the invitation wrong and we arrived a half-hour too early – totally embarrassing.  Tina, always the gracious hostess, didn’t bat an eye.  I helped finish setting up, Eric took a walk around the neighborhood with Jack, and Owen played with the twin’s toys.   The monkeys loved the party.  Tina always has amazing food(including adorable individual cups of blueberries and crackers for the kids), and there was a clown and balloon animals and other kids to play with.  Owen was especially happy to see Charlotte – who he really misses now that she is not in class with him.

During the party, a loud quick banging noise came from near the r hard-wood staircase.  I look over and Owen was crying.  His feet has slipped while he was walking down, and he slid on his back down several stairs.  It is so awful to have your child get hurt.  I know it is not reasonable (or healthy for their independence)  to follow their every step in order to prevent any injury to your children.  It isn’t even possible, but man I hate when they get hurt!  Poor O had a red stain right through his little white shirt.

One awesome tradition at the party is that each child gets their own candle in their own cupcake so that they can blow out a candle at the same time as the birthday boys.  So cute!

It was after 6 by the time we left and Jack was drifting off to sleep in the car.  We didn’t want the monkeys to fall asleep in the car, and thought they might need a little more food before bed.  So, we stopped at Burger Master, an old-fashioned outdoor restaurant where you stay in your car and they serve you on the trays that attach to your windows.  Owen, as usual, had a million questions about what was going on, and how everything worked, and why everything was done the way it was done.  Jack just wanted to know when the food was going to be served…

At home we all changed.  I read books with the monkeys and put them to bed.  I love that they both want to read each night.  Owen is not so thrilled now that Jack is reading because Jack is still horrendously slow – sounding out each three-letter word slowly and then saying it fast.  He never says anything to Jack though.  Today is just looked at me with a pained face and laid down on the bed.  I scratched his back while Jack read his book.

I made tea, downloaded photos and blogged.  I will most likely go downstairs and read a book on my Kindle or watch something with Eric.