“Lidia’s not a girl.. (short pause) she’s a kind of sister” with this extra funny sort of confused look on his face.

It’s a good thing we had not started moving yet and then I had to explain to him why I was laughing. And yes he has seen Aristocats but I doubt he knew he was pretty much quoting it. The boys did end up with gummy worms which ended any concern over Lidia getting chocolates.

Lucky, by mid morning, Gavin was done “throating”. Unluckily for him, this particular virus had a nasty stage 2: diarrhea. I suppose it’s good that he didn’t have both at the same time. However, this being his first experience (in his memory) with this malady, he really had no words to describe it. I really didn’t think to give him the words, either. He had enough control to make it to the bathroom every time (thank you, son), but did have to endure the problem for a few days. Yes. Real life is gross. Quite.

Fast forward to this morning. After a day of rest, he finally visited the throne again to do his thing. He soon after summoned me to the bathroom with an excited voice, “Mom! I no poop throw anymore! I pooped in a circle!”

Not knowing what to call this new bodily process, he took what he knew to form his own conclusion: If I was throwing up from my mouth, it only stands to reason that is what was happening at the other end, too.

I congratulated him on reentering the realm of round poo, wandered off to have my laugh out of his hearing and of course shared the story with Dad. This kid is so observational. He cracks us up.

But, back to the plague, thus far I am the only other person to have been afflicted. Lidia and Adam have thus far escaped its grasp. Hopefully that continues! I’m ready to leave this particular gross in the past.

Two hours before dinner last night, I told the small ones that they would need to clean up the bucket of Duplos and the bucket of Thomas Trains that they had dumped out on the living room floor before dinner. One hour before dinner, I reminded them. Dinner came, plates were made up, the rest of us sat down…and two little boys had the nerve to look shocked and distraught that their plates were not among those on the table.

“I will be glad to get your plates as soon as you finish cleaning up your mess in the living room,” I told them….and told them…and told them many times over the next few hours.

My words were always met with a loud/angry/whiney “Noooo” or “Don’t want to”.

No problem :)

Unfortunately, they thought it was better to go to bed hungry than clean up their mess. Fine by me, the choice was in their hands: Do 3 minutes of clean up and eat or go to sleep hungry. They made their choice and stood strong by each other.

What they did not anticipate is that my stubbornness would carry through to breakfast.

Once again they were met with the dreaded words “I will be glad to get your breakfast as soon as you clean up your mess in the living room.”

They lasted about 2 hours with the occasional sad little whine of “Hungry…” here and there. Finally they made a different choice and the living room floor is once again free of Duplo booby traps.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, they are asking for their third! helping of cereal.

When I saw Liam get up and high tail it after him, I no doubt expected a squabble to ensue over said binoculars.

When Liam caught up to Gavin, he put his hands on his shoulders, whipped around in front of him (hands now on the front of his shoulders) leaned forward and planted a big loud wet one (accompanied by a “MWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA” sound) right on his face.

I about died. It was the cutest thing. I was grinning, laughing and getting misty-eyed all in the same moment.

The best part was the look on Gavin’s face after this transpired. He turned around with the cutest smile on his face that totally said, “Aww, my brother loves me!”

I will try to remember this moment the next time I see Gavin dragging Liam down by the hair because he wants to sit where Liam is sitting….

First let me re-cap our day. We were pretty busy for the most part. I got up and got everyone fed and ready so we could meet some friends on the East side of town to play at a park. The kids had fun, it was a beautiful day–warm and sunny, but still a nice breeze.

We came home and jumped on our usual routine–lunch, and then nap for the boys. (Or rather, the nap that wasn’t really a nap as both boys had slept the last 10 minutes of the ride home–thus re-energizing themselves enough that they would not sleep again). While the boys napped (er… hung out in their cribs making noise, playing and intermittently fussing), the girls and I had some fun dying play silks with Kool-Aid. (Playsilks: think silk scarves used in play–they are really quite fun and can be anything from dress up clothes, baby blankets, dancing props, picnic blankets…whatever). The girls had a blast with that project and even more fun playing with them once they were dry. They are still playing with them this morning and are very proud that they put the color on themselves (they were white to begin with). Once we got the boys up, and snack was eaten, we sunblocked up again and sat by the pool. That sound so much more glorious than it really was (well, for me anyway). The kids had a fabulous time in the kiddie pool. I had fun playing lifeguard :) After a couple hours, it was time to go in, get dry and start dinner.

Dinner was delicious–we made one of my favorite dishes: Apricot-Ginger Glazed Salmon. So simple, yet so yummy. Even the kids will eat this one–and all of them are very fussy about which meats they will eat, and how they are prepared.

After dinner we split into teams. There was much sunblock and sand to be washed off of the 4 small people in our charge. It was boys against girls- Adam bathed the boys in one bathroom, I bathed the girls in the other. The boys were done first (they don’t have all that hair to wash! Nor all the pretend play that seems to happen whenever these 2 girls get together). Once everyone had hair combed and were properly jammified, the 2 teenies went to bed, and we set the girls up with popcorn and a movie. Finally, the man and I got to relax for a while. The girls really didn’t need us much while their movie was on, but once bed time hit, I knew any relaxation would be over. The teeth were brushed, the tucking was done. A slipped out with a goodnight and wandered back downstairs (with monitor in hand because I knew they would need a little bit of “supervision”). I sat down in my chair, with a sigh, and flipped on the monitor.

Yes… Let the giggling begin.

There were no less than 10 treks made up the stairs by us (mostly me) in the next hour. There were tiffs to mediate, shushing to be done (Lidia’s room borders the boys room on one wall, and they were getting loud enough that they were waking the boys), and drinks of water to be gotten.

There was much giggling to be done, in proper little girl fashion. Of course, I expected this, and it did make me smile, fondly remembering my own sleepover days. After that hour, suddenly things became quiet and we knew that the exhaustion of the day had finally caught up with them. So they were asleep by 10:30–earlier than I had expected, really. Lidia is a master at keeping herself awake, no matter how tired she may (should) be.

I was hoping after this late night, they would sleep in–not so much luck, on Lidia’s part anyway. Lidia was up watching t.v. when I got up at 7:30 to get Liam up. Gavin slept til almost 8–Naomi, until at least 8:30 (I believe Lidia may have suck in and woke her up when I wasn’t looking).

All in all, however, it was a successful sleep over. Lidia had her usual melt down once or twice, but she is 4. What can I expect, really? She isn’t all that used to someone being here full time, getting into all her stuff (the stuff in her room that the boys aren’t allowed to touch).

Today, I’m hoping to take it a little easy and get some things done in the house (though that will be hard with the weather being so nice outside!)

I’ll leave you with a couple pictures from yesterday.

3 of the 4, enjoying the pool–Liam really preferred to splash from outside the pool…

Gavin loved being in the pool with the girls…

Liam stayed in the shade, a lot, too, so it made it hard to get any good shots of him…I guess he’s all about sun protection ;)

Awwww… BFF?

We’ll start with the Princess, since she’s the eldest.

She had a grand time collecting dandelions…

But there’s always time to monkey around…

Next in the birth line is Gavin (still my Peanut Butter)

He finally figured out how to make the dandelions work…

But not without a few mishaps…

And last but not least my lil’ Jelly, Liam gives the dandelions a try…

But moves on to rocks and sticks…

Gavin is:

-standing and cruising on furniture
-walking behind the little push toys
-clapping his hands (MIGHT be saying yay, not sure yet)
-saying: all done, more-more, Uh oh and boo (complete with hiding and peeking motions)
-still has 2 teeth, but seems another is thinking about joining the party soon
-signs: more (sometimes) and all done
-standing up without holding on to things (no real steps yet, but he’s thinking about it)
-drinking out of straw and sippy cups just fine
-feeding himself exclusively (well except yogurt and applesauce–Mom’s not ready for that morning mess)
-sleeps through the night ONCE in a while (only nights that his brother is up a lot)

Liam is:
-standing and cruising on furniture
-walking behind push toys
-clapping his hands
-saying: uh oh (and maybe boo, not sure if it was him or brother)
-still has 6 teeth, no signs of more yet
-signs: more
-drinking out of straw and sippy cups without issue
-stands up without holding on–will even tip his cup back and drink, while standing there. No steps yet.
-feeding self completely (see yogurt and applesauce rule above)
-sleeping through the night ONCE in a while (only on nights his brother is up a lot–I sense a conspiracy here)

Not long and my babies will be toddlers… crazy…

Way to go, Peanut Butter!

Over the weekend the guys turned the big 9 months old!

In honor of this occasion, Liam cut his 2nd tooth.
Gavin thought about it, but will remain toothless for now. He doesn’t seem to mind. He may just pop 2 at once–there are 2 suspicious bumps on his lower gum, accompanied by cranky behavior…

In related news, the whole fan damily trekked to the doctor’s office today to see just how much these bugs have grown.

They are looking quite healthy, of course, and came out with a clean bill of health.

Gavin measured in at 28 inches tall (putting him in the 40th percentile) and weighed 18 lbs 11 oz (putting him in the 19th percentile).

Liam measured in at 28 1/2 inches tall (putting him in the 58th percentile) and weighed 18 lbs 9 oz (that’s the 18th percentile).

So, Gavin is still shorter than his brother, though he is closing the gap–however, he has now reclaimed the lead in the weight race (he was the “big guy” at birth, after all), pulling past his brother by all of 2 ounces. If you remember 6 months, he was 15 ounces lighter than his brother. All in all, they are staying pretty close in size, which is nice for the purposes of dressing them–no need to have 2 different dressers and separate clothing by size. Makes mom’s life easier for now. I’m having to put away a lot of their clothes from summer and summer is not even over! I’m buying 12 months now, which are a bit big, however they’ll work for now and (hopefully) get us into at least the beginning of winter… Time will tell.
Soon I will be ordering them some cute little shoes form Preschoolians because they offer a 40% discount for twins!! Can’t beat that! (Thanks for that tip, Laura!)

Their next appointment will be at 12 months! That will not be a fun one. It will consist of vaccines and a finger poke–blood for a standard lead test. Yuck. I remember all too clearly doing that with miss Lidia when we came home from Russia. The poor thing. Took them forever!! Maybe I should make sure the Dad can come with us on that one…