Even Better Than We Thought

I thought I would continue with the updates on the kiddos. Even though Demand has come down with some kind of bug she's still insisting on learning to read at nap time. As of today she is up to thirteen words! She's retaining everything we go over and every day picks up more and more and she's really interested too because since she's been sick we've taken candy off the table and she still wants to learn. Fever and all she still wants to learn. I'm so proud of her. If she seems distracted I ask her if she wants to be done and I'm more than willing to stop but she insists we go on. I think on Monday she'll be able to read her first book in the program. (We're talking VERY simple books) The Sloths find this really exciting.

Now for Happy. The weaning process has been easier than I thought but there have still been some tears. I can't believe how easy nap time has been. Earlier this week he was still nursing to sleep for a nap but he stopped cold turkey no problem by switching to our nighttime routine. I was a little nervous when Demand, who is sick, requested to to nap and it was earlier than the usual time. Thankfully Happy seemed equally tired and all went well. Today Happy fell asleep before Demand and I even finished our lesson AND he slept for a full hour and a half. I couldn't ask for a better transition. Last night however, although Happy went into his crib without fuss halfway through the nighttime routine saw me in the hallway and possibly remembered the missing element. There were many tears but Mr. Sloth pushed through. Another sad moment was today I was in our bedroom getting clothes ready and I looked over and saw Happy resting his head on the nursing chair. Now there is a very good chance he was just cuddling the chair or trying to climb it both are common characteristics of Happy. Just the same it made ME sad to think we may never have our cuddle time in the chair again.

Before you get too impressed at how quickly and easy weaning is going you should know that I have been nursing him at night, but not without reason. We would otherwise let him fuss a bit but with Demand having a high fever we need to keep him quiet. Plus, if I'm honest with you and myself I'll admit that I enjoy our late night cuddles and it's as much for me as it is for him. So we still haven't gone 24 hours but we're close.

A bit more about Happy. I cannot tell you how much I enjoy one year olds. Something about miniature walking people who think they can talk that are a constant joy. Both Demand and Happy are learning more and more each day but Happy is showing pride for the first time. There is nothing cuter. Not only does he want to do everything his sister is doing but he has a mind of his own as well. He's really into coloring, throwing and moving rocks half his size (which is scary). He'll bring me shoes (anyone's) when he wants to go outside. And he'll bring me empty cups and bowls when he wants more of something. (Instead of just crying for more). He's also starting to answer yes and no questions...sort of. Today he brought me one of his socks. (The other one was still on.) I asked if he wanted me to put it on. As he walked away he shook his head no, but then he brought me one of Demand's shoes so I don't know exactly what his plan was.

Hopefully Demand is better soon so we can have some more cute stories from her world.

Progress

Big steps in the Sloth household these day.

First, Demand.

For well over a month she has been outright asking us to teach her to read. She's always loved books and we read a lot. So with the glory of homeschooling we decided to move ahead and start her kindergarten reading program. It's three steps but since she's known the alphabet and what each letter says since the age of two we were well past the firs step. First day of learning didn't go very smoothly but lesson number one of homeschooling is be flexible so I adapted. Instead of working at the table first thing in the morning while Happy played in the living room I decided to wait until Happy was asleep and then start. Recently Demand and I have been napping together in my bed and I read her some of the "Boxcar Children" before we go to sleep. (First of all she's sleeping! Can you believe it?!) So I thought I would try to teach her to read during this time. It is quiet, we're alone, and it's cozy. I also threw in a bribe. One piece of candy for each word she legitimately reads on her own. Wouldn't you know it she read four words. First thing this morning to asked to 'read' again and she read even more words today plus she was able to read a word in one of her 'real' books.

There was an added bonus to today's naptime. I've decided that it's absolutely necessary to wean Happy. We'll both be sad but it needs to be done. I'm just working up the courage. Our biggest obstacle will be naptime. Happy is usually so tuckered out by naptime he quickly falls asleep nursing. Today I nursed him for a bit but then we went in his room. I thought I would try and do their bedtime routine and see what happens. It worked! The only difference was that I gave him a sippy cup of milk. He wasn't happy with the situation at first but once he realized that Demand and I were sticking around and heard me start to read he slipped into to his sleepy-time routine. He sat there flipping through two books , playing with a few stuffed toys, or sometimes even laying down drinking from his sippy cup. Meanwhile Demand and I read a few books and then started our reading lesson. At first she was getting her candy rewards right away but she was doing so well that at one point I asked to read something and she told me with a mouthful of candy that she needed to swallow first. So we decided to stock pile the candy until the end of the lesson. Five minutes later we were done so I laid down. Seeing me lay down, immediately Happy laid down, rolled over and went to sleep. Demand was soon to follow. Both children asleep in their own beds. I'm as shocked as you are.

Tonight was CCD which means the kids are exhausted by the time we get home. I somehow managed to slip Happy into his crib without nursing him first. He was tired enough to just move along with the routine. It will be great if we can be just as successful in all our adventures tomorrow. Oh, and by the way, 90% of why today went so smoothly was that I actually got out of bed at 6am like I plan on doing every day instead of staying in bed until I have to get up. I was out of bed, showered, coffee made, breakfast started and had some time with the Bible before the kiddos even left their room. What a difference it all makes for the Sloth family.

Early Spring Pictures

Picture update. After taking some ridiculously cute pictures of Happy today at Wal-mart of all places I thought I would add some pictures from the last month. The first few are from St. Patrick's Day. The kids looked so cute in their green get up. Then there are a few random pictures, some of Easter cupcakes and the last are from our trip to Wal-mart today.

MarchApril 2010

Happy Easter!

Demand has become well versed in the Paschal Mystery. She has learned more than I ever hoped from her Good Shepard classes. Many times I find myself thinking, "Well I guess I don't have to teach you that now." Some mornings, if I've had my coffee early enough I'll read Bible Stories to Demand and Happy over breakfast from either the Children's Bible or her Magnifikid! so she was really excited about Palm Sunday and the Tridium. She knew the events of Holy Week like the back of her small little hand. Every day she would ask what day it was hoping for some big event. Finally Holy Thursday came and Demand proudly recapped the events of The Last Supper. She's been really in to pretending the Last Supper the past few days. She definately knows what happened on Good Friday but I thought we should discuss more details. In the afternoon we did the Jerusalem project that was sent home from the Good Shepard program. I thought it was great for adults too. There was a blank map of the walls of Jerusalem and then you pasted pictures of buildings from the Passion of Jesus on the correct numbers. It really get a good time line and layout of the events. Holy Saturday is an odd day so I read the story of the burial from her Bible and it mentioned that Jesus was pierced with a lance. Upon learning that Jesus was cut in the heart with a sharp knife Demand wisely declared, "Knives are for food, not people!" Yet another thing I don't remember teaching her but I'm glad she recognizes.

So today was Easter Demand is a realist and was of course interested in a delivery of candy for breakfast. According to Demand the Easter Bunny is small (about the size of a grapefruit) and pink. Although excited for the Easter bunny she was a little freaked out. Demand and Happy woke up with their empty baskets outside their door. The Easter bunny hid eggs throughout the house and two piles of goodies in the living room. We thought Happy would be more interested in going directly to his highchair for breakfast and not in collecting eggs but we were proved wrong. He got down and started putting eggs in his basket right away. It was more than adorable and he was rather good at it too. Demand got just what she wanted for Easter a chocolate bunny just like on Veggietales which she promptly began to eat. Happy started in on his Gerber fruit strips and he made quick work of one too, then again this kid likes breakfast before a diaper change.

That brings me to my next point. The Easter Bunny works for the enemy. Sugar and television is not good breeding ground for Joy. There was more than one temper tantrum before we even got to Mass. Once at Church Demand was very excited to see what color the priest would wear and what color the tabernacle would be, sure enough she was right and it was white. She also liked how the statues had been uncovered and loved hearing "Alleluia" sung. Her teacher had told her that she'd head a lot of "Alleluia" during Easter. After Church we had another Easter Egg hunt this one with real eggs and outside hidden by mommy. Happy didn't care much for eggs this time he was just thrilled to be outside. After a nap that seemed more work than restful it was off to Grandma and Grandpas for yet another egg hunt. Demand likes her egg hunts. At dinner Demand wanted to play Last Supper but I don't think her cousins knew what she was talking about and when she told me to say "This is my body" I said, "Take this asparagus and eat it, this is your vegetable" she did not appreciate it. Sorry kid I'm not going to blaspheme on Easter.

So that's been our Easter so far. We have about 50 plastic eggs with candy to eat along with bowls and baskets full around the house as well. Poor baby sloth has gotten a significant amount of sugar today in the name of rejoicing. Tomorrow we'll work on remedying that situation.

Discovery

I suppose I should update a bit but I have no desire to really think things through right now.

I'll start with today and see where it takes us. Happy has been discovering more and more each day. He learned how to do his first puzzle today (3 of them actually). When he put a piece in successfully I clapped for him. He looked at me surprised at first and then he started glowing with pride. For the next half an hour he would alternate placing a puzzle piece correctly in it's place and clapping. Sometimes he needed me to clap too. It worked rather well because while he was occupied with his new talent, Demand and I were able to do a puzzle three time without interruption or "help". Happy later showed off his new skillz (yes I said skillz) for Mr. Sloth. He didn't even want to go to bed because he was so into his puzzles. Once he realized I was out of the room though, he changed his tune.

This warm weather business is changing his entire perspective. Today he was looking out the storm door and then started fussing, hinting that he'd rather be outside. Mr. Sloth came home for lunch to see him standing barefoot in his blue overalls holding a paintbrush. The kids are big fans of sidewalk "painting" using only water. We played outside while waiting for Mr. Sloth to get home this time Mr. Sloth came home to find him obsessed with sidewalk chalk and covered with it too (he did have shoes on this time though). After dinner took the kids to a park by this time Happy was a bit tired but still interested in being outside when we got home both kids still wanted to be outside so we played just a bit more so we squeezed just a little more outdoor time in before bed.

Ok, there's your quick update.

Sweet Dreams

I thought I would post an update on how the room sharing is going. In short..WONDERFUL!
Mr. Sloth and I were just explaining to friends that was one of the scariest things we done so far parenting-wise. It was a LOT of work, the crib has to come completely apart to be moved anywhere. There could have been a lot of sleepless nights, but it went pretty smoothly. Happy is sleeping through the night regularly now and Demand isn't waking up crying as much.

It was daunting have to change the sleep routine of both of them but that too went pretty smoothly. Up until tonight the new routine was that I would nurse Happy in our room while Mr. Sloth read Demand a book. Then Demand would brush her teeth and use the bathroom. Then everyone went into the bedroom. Happy went into his crib with a few books of his own while Mr. Sloth read Demand two more stories, then lights out, prayers and finally bedtime. So far the only downfall is Happy rarely lets a parent leave the room (one can leave not two). However, if the downfall involves one of us sleeping in a bed until the kids fall asleep it's not the worst thing in the world. Happy usually reads a bit more then plays and then finally goes to sleep. That's when the parent leaves and Demand's behavior gets "iffy".

However, tonight Happy went to sleep without nursing and he didn't realize that step was skipped. I started to go into their room to get him and saw he was in his crib already reading books. Mr. Sloth looked at me like "He's ok with it!" so I stayed out of sight until they were both asleep.

Mornings are everything we dreamed of. Demand is usually up first and them comes in our room. We tell her to go to her room until the clock says "7" and she does without argument (a big improvement) but then she usually goes and wakes up Happy. We don't really like that she wakes him but he's happy. They then play until one of us comes and gets them or Demand realizes it's after 7am.

This morning I headed downstairs around 6:30am. After working on my Bible Study and having some wake up time. I realized it was 7:07am and I hadn't heard a peep from the kiddos. My only regret about mornings is that I can't make coffee if the kids are sleeping because the coffee grinder will wake one of them. As I was getting the coffee ready I heard Happy ,what I can only describe as cawing (like a bird) at Demand to wake her up. Sometimes we think he's saying her name but it's really indescribable and unrepeatable.

Overall it's really been a joy to hear them talk and play back and forth on the monitor in the morning and I can't tell you how great it feels to put a baby in a crib without tears and to collect them the same way in the morning.

Erin Go Blah

CAUTION: Gross story follows. Skip to paragraph 3 if you don't want to know.


Tuesday night seemed normal. I decided to go to bed around 11pm. I came in the bathroom to find that Demand had eaten an entire tube of her toothpaste and tried to eat (thankfully) empty bottles of medicine. This happened while we thought she was asleep.

I had a hard time falling asleep (Mr. Sloth fell asleep right away). Soon I started to feel nauseous. I couldn't get comfortable and I still couldn't fall asleep. Finally around 1am I decided taking a bath might help. It did, in fact I started to doze off (which Mr. Sloth doesn't like) so I went back to bed grabbing the bathroom garbage can on my way just in case as I still felt nauseous. I couldn't have been in bed two minutes before I went all "Exorcist". I mean I just shot out of bed. Thankfully I grabbed the garbage can in time and then dashed for the bathroom to finish the unfortunate event. Poor Mr. Sloth had to be woken up with that horrid sound. However, he was somewhat relieved to find it was me and not Demand who he thought would be paying for the toothpaste she had eaten earlier. He was thrilled to find out I had not gotten anything on our bed but we were both still baffled as to why this was occurred. The first thing both of us thought was Mr. Sloth can't stay home. There's no way with a possible pay check on the line he could take a day off.

Thankfully it was just a fluke and the only other symptom I had was a horrid headache caused by the violent episode. I still had the headache when I woke up and Mr. Sloth let me sleep until 8am which was great except when Demand burst in and declared "Happy St. Patrick's Day". Eventually the headache went away and I was able to function fully for the most of the day. Shortly after lunch my headache started to come back with a vengeance. Thankfully it was nap time. Happy was in his crib and Demand in I in my bed. When Happy woke up I realized I had a full blown migraine. Not cool. I plopped Happy in his exersaucer, threw some snacks at him and turned on PBS. I then made a desperate call to Mr. Sloth to do a Motrin run for me. As I lay on the couch waiting for him for the second time in a week I came to the conclusion that this migraine was most definitely fatal. "There's no way I can recover from pain like this", I thought. I was sure that if the kids fussed for any reason my head would most definitely explode. Mr. Sloth was again my hero and arrived with medicine and offered a quick massage before heading back to work. We both decided the horrid show on PBS could be making the pain worse so we put on a DVD for Happy instead. (Two grown men should not be that eager to talk to a lemur puppet)

Within a half an hour my migraine was gone. I felt great. In fact I was able to make cupcakes for CCD and put together a meal for the children before heading out to CCD.

At some point in the day we found out Mr. Sloth's dad was in the hospital. That together with the fact that we are praying to get paid soon, and my knowledge that a friend was in labor at the time gave me plenty of options for things to offer suffering up for. In fact I was offering up my nauseousness for my friend around the time she was pushing. Nothing is in vain I guess.

After CCD we came home and put the kids to bed. Note that I didn't say to sleep. Happy was a rock star actually. He read books and then eventually laid down and put himself to sleep. Demand on the other hand. SANCTIFIER! That girl is going to get it soon. After eating her toothpaste the day before she was punished by not getting sweets on St. Patrick's day which also meant she had to help make cupcakes without getting one taste. You would think this would effect future decisions but no. What happened next we knew would happen some day. It does in every family. We thought she was asleep but it turns out she was in the bathroom playing with my make up and CUTTING HER HAIR. I had already sent her back to bed when I found the hair on the bathroom floor. It didn't seem like much but I couldn't find my scissors which scared me. Well I found them this morning along with the rest of her lopped off hair in the bedroom. At seven in the morning I lectured her about not using my scissors as she repeatedly asked if I liked her hair. And then she had the gall to say, "Can I have a cupcake?" ARRRGH!

So that was our St. Patrick's Day but I guess vomiting, headaches, and unplanned haircuts aren't too unusual for this special day.