Sitting by the fire, snug as a bug in a rug, just as my dad predicted we'd be today back in the days we insulated this house. This Halloween day where The Cat in the Hat, Little Cat A, Little Cat N and Sally went all around town at above zero temps is a distant memory. Lasagna just out. Kitchen's a mess. Piles of laundry. Gotta bring more fire wood inside. One kid's napping so I figured why not write? I can barely keep up. It's been -30 to -40F outside the past couple of days. The dog hates it. He always refuses to "go potty" outside the first time we have these temps each year. Yesterday I didn't realize he'd pooped on the floor in the other room until my toddler told me to "clean it up." And I didn't realize he'd peed in yet another room until we were eating dinner and the baby crawled into it and fussed. This type of excitement is normal these days. It's usually not the dog, but one of the kids who's causing the excitement.
For us humans, who can bundle up, it's kind of a treat to have the cold temps because the sunrise (about 11am) and sunset (about 2pm) are to die for, and in between the sky is as blue as my eyes. I tried to photograph this without much luck.
We recently went on a trip to MN to see my parents. It's easier for me to remember milestones that occur in my kids' lives by the trips we take. This time, my son who has for about a year said "Dawah" in place of "Yes," said "Des" and now says "Yes" consistently. This is a kid who makes up many of his own words. In fact, he named himself "Nano," not very much like his name, and everyone's finally accepted it and joined him in calling him by that name. When we returned from our trip, he decided to do the ring trapeze at his toddler gymnastics place. For the first time, without being asked, he was not afraid at all. I find it fascinating how one day a kid will change his mind and decide finally to do something differently. The baby stopped army crawling and now crawls on his knees (maybe because grandma has carpet and that would be tough to pull a body on). He took up standing and now even cruising a tiny bit.
I can't remember without a picture, so I'm always photographing, printing, and putting in books the things we do. For sure the "firsts" are recorded. Here's the first time our 9 month old baby stood up. It was no problem at all. He saw the water and was so excited to get into the bathtub that he stood, beaming. He is such a doll.
When the baby turned 10 months is about the time that he and the 32 month old began to interact. It dawned on me that life is about to get much easier when we were feeding them both the same snack, Cheerios, on the airplane. A lot of time has passed since I started writing this post. We've eaten dinner, played trains, cleaned the kitchen. Right now they are watching Curious George together while the big brother pretends to feed the little brother peas with a spoon. They're both highly entertained. I can't wait to see what they imagine once the baby is walking.
