October 2015

I blinked.

I swear, all I did was blink.  How can it be time to close out another month on the calendar?

There's a quote I've heard over and over again since entering parenthood that says, "The days are long, but the years are short."  Truth.  This month has been filled with thirty-one incredibly long days, but in the same breath, where did they all go?

Lately our days begin well before 6am when either Abby or Bruce (or both) decides it's time to greet the morning.  This actually works out well on school days because it gives Bruce a little bit of time to do his own thing before he has to head off to school, but it makes this mama exceptionally tired.  Especially since I just can't force myself into bed before 11pm most nights... And since every night Bruce still comes wandering in at least once, usually around 3am, needing to be tucked back in... And since Abby has been waking up the house several times each night with on-going coughing fits...  What I wouldn't give for eight hours of uninterrupted sleep...

Then, every day it's the same - I start making breakfast promptly at 6:45.  Bruce's high fiber, maple and brown sugar oatmeal in the microwave, start the coffee.  Scoop out some vanilla Greek yogurt for Bruce, slice a banana for Abby.  Throw some cereal on a placemat for Abby, more in bowls for Charlie and myself.  Pour the coffee, put Charlie's in the fridge.  Wrangle everyone to the table by 7am.  It's not always pleasant, but we try to make a point to all eat together, at the table, for every meal, and stay seated until everyone is finished.  Unless someone is shrieking incessantly.  Then that person has to go to a bedroom while the rest of us eat.

After breakfast, there's a hustle and bustle of getting dressed and ready for the day, Bruce heads off the school, Charlie to work.  Abby and I usually have somewhere to be, but always find ourselves in the car pick up line around 10:20.  If we get there too early, we just have to wait and wait, creeping forward inch by inch.  If we get there too late, I get paranoid that we'll be late and miss the "window" for picking up morning preK kids.  It's not like they're going to hold Bruce hostage if I'm a few minutes late, but I dread being "that mom" who screws things up.  You know, like when I didn't show up for Bruce's first parent-teacher conference.  Whoops.

We get home everyday around 10:30 and fiddle around the house, or play in the backyard until lunch at 11:30, then play some more until we read books at 12:30, then rest time at 1pm.  Every.single.day.  Routines are good for kids, right?  I like them too, but things do tend to get mundane at times.

Bruce never naps anymore, but sort of, kind of, attempts to stay in his room for an hour so I can pretend to be not-a-mom for 45 minutes.  Abby usually sleeps for two hours, sometimes longer - so that gives Bruce and I some time together, usually to play pirates.

Abby doesn't wake up grumpy, but she's definitely groggy and can easily get grumpy if she doesn't get some "adjustment" time.  So the three of us usually snuggle in on the couch together and watch some television.  Although I can't say this is my favorite time of the day, it's definitely a reprieve I look forward to every day and enjoy immensely!  Their current favorite shows on Netflix are Super 4, Masha and the Bear (our "Russian Girl" show that's recently been dubbed in English), Little Einsteins, and Daniel Tiger.

We're more or less housebound for the rest of the day, because if we go anywhere too far away, the car ride lulls Bruce to sleep and then it's impossible to get him to bed.  4 o'clock seems to be the witching hour for a boy who's too full of energy to nap at naptime, but can't quite make it all the way to bedtime...  

Charlie, the hero of the day, comes home a little after 5pm most days and tries to exhaust the remaining energy from the kids while I fix dinner.  Then we eat, play a bit more, take baths, read books, and go to bed.  Most nights, both kiddos are asleep before 8pm.

 

Bruce helping with dinner - garden fresh tomato soup (with his special ingredient - raisins)

Then I get dinner dishes cleaned up, the house straightened up, and collapse on the couch to go mind-numb in front of Netflix until I convince myself to get ready for bed.

Rinse and repeat.

In a lot of ways, it's not grand or glorious at all.  Most days, when I hear Bruce shuffling down the hallway before the sun is even thinking about rising, my insides groan as I force myself to get out of bed.  Most days, when I glance at the clock and realize it's *only* 8:30am, I don't know how I'm going to make it until 8:30pm.  Most days are so, so challenging.  But then, in the same breath, they're over and I find myself kissing foreheads and tucking tired bodies in beds at the end of another day.  And in a blink of an eye, a whole month is over.

I had a "Mr. Miyagi" moment earlier this month while painting our new shed and was thinking about how life doesn't always look the way we thought it would or think it should.  When we don't focus on the bigger picture, we can't see that it's all a refining process, and though difficult, we come out stronger in the end.  It was a truth I needed to be reminded of for sure.

"Not everything is as seems." - Mr. Miyagi

for your viewing pleasure...

Some not-so-mundane parts of the month included:

Charlie ripped out the carpet in the house and installed wood floors in the living room and hallway!

And I did my best keeping the kids out of the house and out of Charlie's way!

So, we worked on making Christmas presents

And we played outside as much as possible!

Charlie made Bruce a tree fort and we ate nearly every meal picnic-style in there for a few days...

Lots of time at the parks!

And we used our free ice cream vouchers to have a treat at Braums!

I'm so thankful my kids can eat ice cream now without making an incredible mess!  Donuts, no.  Cupcakes, no.  But they have finally learned to catch the drips on an ice cream cone!  Wahoo!  

That does mean that I don't get to "share" as much with them, but I'll take the trade off!

The new floor!  And what we jokingly call our tribute to Chick-fil-a rug.

We had so much fun with a variety of Fall/Halloween festivities!

The weather has been so nice!  We've been trying to take evening walks around the neighborhood to look at Halloween yard art!  The problem is, Abby insists on pulling the wagon... at a snail's pace.  

having her push a stroller seems to help a bit... unless she needs to bring all her babies!

Bruce and the leaf stains in the sidewalk

Some people decorate with spiders, others with skeletons... we put our own spin on that!  The other day Bruce called out to me that he found a Black Widow under the slide... 

So, naturally, we caught it in a jar and have been observing it since!

It was even kind enough to lay an egg sac for us!  Woo hoo!  

We should have a hundred microscopic babies any day now!

And we used Bruce's chest x-ray from the "nail incident" to make our skeleton!

We visited a local pumpkin patch!  

Bruce loved the hay mountain

And only ran away in the corn maze once!

Abby loved the petting zoo!

It was like a real Old McDonald's Farm!

Bruce finding his pumpkin

We found some good ones!

We painted pumpkins at the library park!

Bruce and his bestie

Abby chasing the bear!

We went to a festival at a Biker church!

Abbs found a donkey!

We had our pumpkin carving party at our house!  

Bruce wanted a "Blackbeard" pumpkin, of course.

sword fighting

Blackbeard, complete with lighted fuses - intimidating?

Playing with sparklers!

We went to the Dinosaur museum for its SpookFest!

Abbs and I joined Bruce for his school Halloween party!

We trick or treated Main Street - in the rain!!!

Blackbeard, and Abby agreed to be a "Yay Bug" (ladybug)

We found a church doing an indoor trunk or treat though and it rescued our night!

Bruce conquered the inflatable obstacle course!

checking out their loot

Abby decided she just needed to roll in the candy...

They decided Princy needed a costume and some candy.  She appreciated neither...

And we closed out the holiday with traditional trick or treating in the neighborhood with some friends!

Other kidbits:

Bruce is continuing to enjoy school.  He comes home everyday with a treasure map that he made for me, and tells me what all his friends were wearing that day, and how they wore their hair.  It's fun to hear about his friends, but it's so hard to not really know them personally at all.  I have so many questions, but he never cares to give those answers, ha.  I met with his teacher towards the end of the month for a parent-teacher conference, and while I still feel like I have no idea what his days at school are like, I was assured that he's finding his place, and doing well.  Other than pencil grip, he's not "unsatisfactory" in any of the areas the teacher is monitoring, and he's kind of hovering in "progressing" in all the other areas.  The only thing I care about at this point is that he's interacting with peers and having a positive experience at school.  I know the rest will come when he's ready.

Bruce took a break from being Blackbeard one day to dress up as 

Long John Silver instead - complete with pegleg!

And we found some awesome knight things at the dollar store which he had fun playing with - 

still all pirate though!

Bruce is still having trouble with his night waking, and comes to our room at least once a night.  We've been letting him sleep with his door open though, which seems to be helping.  He still gets out of bed about as much as before, but he doesn't have to sleep underneath all the pillows anymore, and I haven't had to sleep in his room after the 4am wake up, either - so I'm calling that progress!

He seems to be so incredibly crazy these days in the afternoons!  Someone told me that that can be "normal" when kids start school and try so hard to be "good" at school that when they get home, all systems break down.  Our latest version of "natural consequences" has been to make him run laps around the garden.  I think most of his actions stem from having too much energy, so it seems to be a good way to burn some of that off.  And most of the time, I run with him, so I don't think it's too harsh of a punishment!  But wow.  That boy has some serious energy!

And Abby - oooo-eeeee!!!  That girl sure is stubborn!  I guess I can't fault her too much, I'm pretty sure she gets that from me.  

She has to do absolutely everything by herself.  And if you try to help her, she will "un-do" whatever you did to help, just as principle, and then try again herself.  Most of the time, she eventually gets it on her own, which makes her so happy that she always claps for herself.  She will accept verbal tips, but you better keep your hands to yourself!  It's so hard to be patient with her, to go at her speed, but we're trying.  There are some times, when we're in a hurry, or it's raining, or she's stopped to pick all the popcorn crumbs out of her cars seat before she'll climb in - that we just have to take over and do things for her - but we're trying to find a balance!

She's so good at playing independently, too.  So much more so than Bruce was at this age.  She loves to go to her room and read every single book from her crate to herself or a baby, she loves to sit at the coffee table and play with play-doh, and she can entertain herself for nearly an hour sometimes with stickers and markers.  Bruce never (and still doesn't) really enjoyed coloring, but Abby will cover nearly every blank spot on the page.  Just in the past few days she's started doing this thing where she'll specifically scribble a ton of tiny details in the very tip corners of the page.  It's such an interesting practice, and I love it!

  

Also unlike Bruce at this age, she is so particular about her clothes, too!  Most of the time it comes down to telling her she has to wear something, and letting her pick out a top and bottom that are weather appropriate, whether they "match" or not...  

She definitely can be a handful with her bold personality, but we'll take her.  

This blog post was brought to you courtesy of KitKat, the unofficial, official Halloween candy.  Yes.  I ate them all.  No, I am not ashamed to admit it.  Happy Halloween!  And don't forget to set your clocks back!