Kids

It's absolutely pouring rain outside--so fun to listen to, especially after this winter where it barely rained at all. The rain is thwarting day 2 of my "get back into running" plan (I'm not that hardcore for an after dark rain run). Oooohhhh, now it's a thunder and lightening storm. Fun!

Since I'm not running I thought I'd sit down and write the post I've been meaning to write for a month--a kid update. Of course in that month Oscar is a completely different child (a month ago he was a child that slept. Now? Not so much.) A month from now he'll be a different child again (one that sleeps? I certainly hope so!). I best capture the right now, right now. His baby book is a bit sparse.

Biscuit:

I'm not sure Oscar could have a better big sister. She loves to play with him and is so good about keeping an eye on him when we ask. Currently it's all about hide and seek. She hides, he's confused, she pokes her head out, he spots her and crawls over, she hides again, he's confused. I can't imagine how it's fun for either of them but it seems to work.

Easter: She was pretty excited about the Easter bunny and provided him (her?) a detailed note about where she'd be sleeping (on the couch with Aunt Laura) and where the egg hunt should be held (at Grammy's house). The funniest thing was Mr. H's idea to color the chicken eggs and return them to the coop. Boy was she impressed/surprised when she went to collect eggs Easter morning and they were fully decorated. Her theory was that the Easter bunny "had paints or markers or something" and decorated them and put them back in the coop. ;)

Moods: Maybe it's a six-year-old girl thing but wow is she moody and whiny lately. It seems like everything is an overreaction (to me). Tears, angst, oh. my. gosh. We're working on the whining piece. Last night we had a deal going (she agreed to it, not sure why) but she got a big piece of candy before her bath under the agreement that if she whined at all during the bedtime routine I would throw away all the rest of her Easter candy. She made it for quite a while but ended in tears with a whine over wanting to go running with me. I told her I threw the candy away but it's actually in the cupboard for my personal enjoyment. Now I'm thinking about letting her earn it back with whine free evenings. It was so incredibly pleasant last night to do the routine sans whine.

Writer: Tonight she was so, so cute and so, so excited. Her teacher called to let her know she was getting some sort of award for a story she wrote. The little event is next week and she's going to get to meet a real author. I don't think she could have been more excited if she was going to get to meet the Easter bunny himself. I'll have to post about her adorable book factory project. According to the marketing materials she developed the website is PaigesBookFactory.com. Smart girl :)

All in all, things are good with kid #1.

Oscar:

It's a blurry photo but that's our little cutie. All tilty head "hugs" and grins and teeth. Oh, and fingernails. The pinching/biting/scratching is a bit old. As I tell him several times a day it's lucky he's cute 'cause he's been kind of a butthead lately. Of course that's in comparison to his first 9 months where he was pretty much the easiest baby ever. These days he's getting up 2-3 times/night and is tough to get down for a nap or bed. He has such a strong need to pull up to standing and such an inability to get down from standing that he has to be put into his crib fully asleep. If he's even a little bit awake he pulls up to stand and gets stuck. I swear I've watched him in the morning about 95% still asleep but blindly grasping for the crib bars and hauling himself upward. Crazy boy.

Let's not talk about the sleep anymore, shall we?

Eating. He's trying to feed himself. You can be glad I didn't have a camera around tonight when he fed himself refried beans. That doesn't look good smeared across the face! He is a very fickle eater. On Monday he loved, loved, loved curried tofu (!) but on Tuesday he wouldn't touch it with a 10 foot pole. He pretty much always loves applesauce, noodles, Cheerios, citrus and bananas and consistently hates broccoli but for the rest your guess is as good as mine.

Adorableness. He's playing peek-a-boo and it is SO CUTE I can't even tell you. He pulls a blanket over his own head and pulls it down with a giant grin. If you cover your face with your hands he yanks them off, smiles, and then slaps them back onto your face. He's a total mimic and likes to shake his head side to side, stick out his tongue, puff up his cheeks, blow on your face and, sometimes, give high fives. He's soooo big and soooo ticklish as soon as he puts up his arms.

As I tell anyone who asks, we totally scored some awesome kids. I'm feeling very lucky these days.

Comments

[Swistle]

Our 6-year-old girl is also having a bit of a STAGE. In her case it is exhibiting as SHRIEKING if any of her brothers even address a remark in her direction. There is also a lot of bursting into tears.

[Melissa Haworth]

Ah yes, the random and dramatic tears. Weve got that too. Since you have more boys plus the twin comparison tell me, is this a girl thing or a six-year-old thing? Does it end soon? ;)

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