Hebrew School

So far school is off to a decent start. Despite the episode of tears that pre-empt my drop off, the boys do seem to like school. They talk about Miss Sue and Miss "Chel"often, they get excited over their artwork, and they even ask every morning if they are going to school. And, there has even been improvement in the tear department too, if we ignore the fact that last Wednesday I had to go spend the last hour of school, and sit through the Snake Man, with a weepy Chase. For the record, it was a wonderful Wednesday, which meant they were there until 2pm (they normally leave at 12) and once I got there Chase was totally fine and hardly paid any attention to me . Some days, neither Chase nor Ryder will have wet eyes as they give me a kiss and run off to play or paint or whatever it is they do in school. I would not know since they do not tell me much. The only evidence of their activity is the paint on them, always from head to toe!
Though the feedback I am getting is minimal, so far what I have learned is Ryder goes with the flow, does not cry, and despite his blabbering at home, he does not talk much at school. As expected, he finagles with the heater buttons and is apparantly very into his art. Chase, who they call their little Tom Hanks, charms them between bouts of tears and pleas to go home. I am told they are not dependent on each other and they do interact with the other kids.
School is educational for me as well. In addition to learning creative ways to teach my children and a variety of new songs, I am also learning some of the hebrew I should have learned in my 8 years of hebrew school. Being that it is a conservative synagogue everything has a hebrew translation, luckily written in an english phonetic. So far I've learned the following: morah means teacher (something I actually remembered,) oogah means cake, which the boys made in class and now ask for oogah more often than cake itself. I also learned dubeem means bears which is their class name. At this rate I could learn a word a week. Who knew hebrew was so easy....haha

Nappy No No

I've called nap time nappy noo noo since the boys were infants. Perhaps I should not be publicizing this baby talk. The boys now call it nappy noo noo and would ask it for it by name.
I think we may need to rename it to nappy no no as we are now on our 4th consecutive day of no naps. Today I was blessed with 30 minutes, after falling asleep in the car, but I can hardly call that a nap.
My question is what to do? At what point do I stop trying and assume they are done with their naps as simply as they were done with their bottles over a year ago. Truth is, I am not ready. I already admitted I am not supermom, how do I entertain two two year olds for an entire day? If their attention spans were longer, perhaps, but filling time in 5 minute increments, means more activities than I can come up with. Plus, don't they know I need a nap??
You would think without naps the boys would at least sleep later in the morning, right? Nope, not our guys, particularly not Ryder who still greets us in our bed all too early. Hmmm, is it wrong to use Benadryl?

6:30 AM

I wake up at 6:30 every morning. Usually it's at the exact minute, but occasionally the clock will say a time nearing or just passed the witching hour.
I wake up, roll over, and spend a moment awaiting the feel of Zygie's kick. This is our time. Our time for him/her to let me know he/she is kicking, our time for me to have alone with this growing child. I will often use these few moments to try to figure out what the hell we are naming this child. So far, I've gotten nowhere.
I remember waking up the same time every morning when I was pregnant with the boys. I think it is nature's way of trying to prepare you for the lack of sleep to come. Either that, or its just cruel torture to deprive you of what you need while you can still get it.
Until tomorrow, at 6:30 AM.

Ready to Rock

I've talked about Ryder's love affair with the guitar. In fact, it seems he loves all types of instruments- drums, kazoo's, the tambourine, the xylophone, and though we do not have one he also likes the saxophone, or at least to say the word. He loves singing, particularly into a microphone. He sings most of the day, often sings himself to sleep. I do believe he could be a rock star in the making.
He's had the stance of a natural since the first time he picked up his guitar, left handed. His newest rock star moment happened just the other day. Less than 24 hours prior he had a 104 degree temperature. He woke up at 6:30 the morning after, still with fever though much reduced. He just wanted to lay on me. After a dose of Tylenol and a few swigs of juice he came to life. He jumped off of me, grabbed his guitar, and started strumming. He sang a few tunes then I asked him if he took requests. Though I am sure he had no idea what that meant, he said yes. I asked to hear "Twinkle, Twinkle.". He smiled, nodded, and with a tilted head and a tapping foot he began to count...One, Two- then he played. He somehow manages to strum and fret at the same time.
On Labor Day we were all at Mindy's house. A good time was had by all and all the kids had a blast playing together. Of course, then there was Ryder. He too had a good time but he was often off by himself. At one point he was in the basement banging on the piano. Later, when we could not find him, we discovered him in Andrew's room. Sitting on the floor, toy birthday cake in front of him, he was strumming Andrew's full size guitar singing happy birthday. We managed to get it on film. If I can ever learn how to get my videos up onto you tube, I will post it here.

Gimme 5!

Ryder did not go to school on either of his first two days. A lingering fever, which turns out to be an ear infection, prevented him from starting. He and I spent the morning together, Dunkin' Donuts, the supermarket, the doctor. it was so much fun. He was so well behaved, and he talked from the moment we got in the car until the moment he fell asleep, 4 hours later.
At the supermarket he was playing eye spy..."eye spy mickey, mommy" and then i would have to search for it. Every time I found something he would look at me proudly and say "gimme 5 mommy!". This is often the congratulations we give him when he does something well. Every time I slapped his hand to mine I laughed.

21

21 Weeks puts me just past the halfway mark. As we now move along the down slope of this pregnancy things remain to be good. I feel good, though large. I am over my nectarine craving, but that may be because as the season is changing the pickin's are slim. Peaches have made an ok replacement but the need to eat them dulls in comparison. Yeah, I am still loving the cookies. I feel movement, swimming within my belly, and it is that alone that I cherish most in this pregnancy. When I get some time alone, most often in the middle of the night when I suddenly awake, I lay on my side and wait for my baby to say hi. Todd is patiently awaiting the moment he can feel them too.
I had an ultrasound today. Nope, seeing your baby inside of you does not lose its thrill no matter how many times you do it. Here is what I learned about Zygie; he/she is an active sucker, moving around like crazy the whole time. He/she was somewhat uncooperative when the tech tried, to no avail, to get pictures of its heart. Because of this I will likely need to go back for another ultrasound in a couple of weeks;) Though I am now feeling movement, flutters of life, it is not yet proportional to the acrobatics #3 is performing.
I also learned that Zygie looks like a real baby with all parts in tact. Though baby-like, Zygie does look a bit like an alien, just as his/her brothers did before him, as most babies do at 21 weeks gestation. Todd, however, upon seeing the profile picture, decided his third child looks like me.
Zygie's heart rate was slower today than in the past, thumping at 126 beats per minute and he/she is growing as he should measuring just two days ahead of my actual gestation.
One thing I did not learn is baby's gender, for that we must wait until January.

Here is a picture of our littlest one:

Playing Hooky!

Today is the boys' first official day of school and they are both out sick. Chase, who has an ear infection, kicked his fever a half a day too late and Ryder peaked his temperature out at 104 degrees yesterday only to wake up at 6AM fever free and ready to rock. If it was not for their crusty noses and puffy eyes you'd wonder if they were just playing hooky. And so, their first day will be on Wednesday. They are ready, I am ready.
Last Wednesday we had orientation. This allowed us an opportunity to see the classroom, meet the other kids and their parents, and meet their teachers. Apparently, this was also a chance for them to acquire their first of many pre-school viruses. Chase and Ryder both loved it (school, not the virus!) We had talked about school with them, their responses were simple, "OK.". We showed them their new school bags, which they immediately needed to carry around the house. They were excited on day one, dressed in handsome duds and sporting their too big backpacks that looked like turtle shells on their too small bodies. They hovered around my leg momentarily as we entered the classroom, then ran off and loved the time we spent there. They took an immediate liking to Miss Sue and Miss "Chel" and the fish in the classroom was talked about long after we left.
When we did leave, I told them several times that the next time we went mommy would not be staying. They did not seem to care. Now, if we can just get them healthy enough to go.

Family Picture on the boys first "unofficial" day