After a long but very fun day at the Brockbanks, my kids came and hit the sack like a ton of bricks. When we left, Sissy was still going strong — but had completely fallen asleep before we were five miles away. When they got home, I didn’t even change Scout….
and by the time he hit his “new squishy pillow” he got for Christmas, he was dreaming away. (By the way — talk about a hit present! The Brockbanks all have them, and Scout wanted one, so I got one for him and one for Navy, and they both treasure them like they are made of gold.)
I quickly changed Icka’s diaper, and she was taking a drink while I ran out to put her clothes in the dirty clothes basket. When I came back– this is what I found.
I would love to say the night ended there, but as I was kissing them goodnight, I literally thought to myself, “They are so exhausted — this might be a REALLY long night.” And the prophesy came true. My overly exhausted girl was hysterical three times in the night for no good reason.
I should have known better….sleep begets sleep.
Oh well — the Brockbanks are worth it!
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12 hours later
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Sissy woke up as happy as can be. (Although I’m not sure why since she slept horribly.) Scout was totally chipper. I came up to find them both on my mom’s bed with the IPad.
Amazingly — they are sharing nicely this time.
It is a wonder that after a really long day, it is only 12 short hours before a new one starts.
I guess it isn’t such a wonder if you get a really good night’s sleep in between.
I’ll thank Icka for getting me “wondering” this time.
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P.S. We headed outside this morning and Icka said, “It is freezing out here Mom.” When I asked her if she just said “it’s freezing out here” she said, “Yeah.” Oh — I just didn’t know that we were having completely grown up conversations.
P.P.S. While at the bookstore, Scout came running over to tell me that “Icka made a big huge mess!” I sighed and said, “Well, let’s go over to clean it up.” But he stopped me and said, “That’s okay Mom…I’ll figure it out.” And then he went over to take charge. What a little man!
P.P.P.S. Don’t let the above stories fool you. While at a birthday breakfast for AZ this morning, my kids were the WORST kids at the table. Scout had about 8 breakdowns, Icka kept fueling the fire as she swiped bacon from his plate….basically they were humiliating. Good thing I ordered humble pie off the menu.
For the first time in a long time, the sun shone around these parts. So in its honor — we brought the activity table outside.
Scout and I started off with finger paining while Icka was still napping.
As soon as I heard her, I quickly put everything “paint” away!
We moved on to sidewalk chalk. Or in Icka’s case — darling white sweater chalk.
This little guy is so good natured. He was loving the paints, but when I told him we had to be done because of Icka, he happily helped me clean up, and then chalked it up alongside his Sissy. There has to be a point where he will be totally annoyed that his little sidekick ruins a lot of his plans — but to date, I have not even seen it once. I’m crossing my fingers that he never catches on.
Scout and I were in the bathroom when he gasped and said, “Come here Mom….I have something SO special for you!” I went to look and found a bright rainbow directly out our window. I told him I couldn’t believe that he found such a great rainbow, and that we needed to go downstairs to get a picture of it.
Here Scout is showing it to Icka. It didn’t show up in the photo, but it was certainly there.
When I asked Scout to point at it for me (for photo purposes), he looked at me like I was crazy, like hey you numskull — just open your eyes! (See above.)
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Later in the evening, as we sat down for family night, he cuddled up to me and said, “Hey Mom, wasn’t that so cool that I found that rainbow…just for you.” It was so sweet. It was exactly something I would say to him, but he turned it my way. So sweet.
OUr church time just got pushed up to 9:00 am for the year, so we have some fun afternoons on the horizon. Today’s entailed long naps by Micah and both kids (all three are now sick). Scout was the first to wake up, and he came in and asked if I would play games with him. I did for a bit, but we were being too loud with Icka sleeping in the next room, so we tabled it while he watched movies about Helaman and George Washington. When Icka finally woke up, and after we ate dinner, BKaNayNay, the kids and I all settled down to play some fun games.
Scout’s first pick was “Ring Around The Nosey”. NayNay and Ka were dying over their get ups, but tried to contain themselves for the picture.
Scout was pretty talented at getting the rings on his nose — and we declared him the winner.
Icka had a few attempts in there — but the nose was just too big for her face.
We then moved on to “Make Me Laugh”. Scout got this for his birthday party last year, and he LOVES it. But how couldn’t he — the little comedian has an engaged audience the entire time!
Here he is acting out “skateboard moves”. It took us a while — and maybe a peak at the card — but we finally got it.
Ickity Dickity Dock loved the rolling and moving parts.
Props to B. I remember Sunday afternoons while her kids were little — she always played games with them. I am glad they can now be part of our Sunday afternoons.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I am not too hot at the whole goal thing.
But this year, I thought about my goals throughout the month of December, and came up with two that I will publicly share.
#1
BE MORE CONSISTENT
(I always think about why I loved my childhood so much, and one of the things my mom was SO good at, was being consistent. Dinner was on the table EVERY night. Her parenting was always the same. She never had a bad day. Therefore, in an effort to being the best wife/mother, I am going to be more consistent!)
#2
WATCH LESS, READ MORE
(I am a huge proponent of my kids reading. I don’t let them have the television on during the day (unless it is December and I am trying to get private things done), and I have always been really good at reading to them. But I have noticed that when I get those kids in their covers at night, I plop on the couch and zone out. There is a time and a place for all things…..but this year, I am going to make those times and places fewer and further between. I would WAY rather lay in my bed — next to the Shmickity Dickity — and read alongside him than watch TV any day. Then, right when he’s in a really good part, I like to interject my thoughts and philosophies on life to him.)
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So consistency and watching less are this year in a nutshell!
Sounds fabby dabby to me!
Micah, the sickies and I rang in an exhausting New Year. We started by meeting the Denisons at Macaroni Grill where Scout took my camera and photographed everything he saw. I have a bunch of half faced pictures — and most are a bit on the blurry side.
See what I mean!
Then we headed home to have ice cream and watch our annual video that shows the pictures from throughout the year. We got about half way through when I knew it was time for our little sick kids to hit the hay. So we headed upstairs to the DVR to “catch” the ball drop and bang some pots and pans.
Poor Scout was hesitant at first because he thought he was being naughty. But when he realized I approved, he really got into the swing of things!
Superwoman never hesitated, and banged away.
The kids went down before ten, and I was down seconds after they were. And it was a good thing, because I was up from 12:30 on with sick kids. So Micah was solo this year. Talk about anti-climactic! Oh well. If that is a sign of things to come — I would love an “anti-climactic” year!
CHEERS
to 2011!!!
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