Additional Sleep Deprivation

I'm loosing valuable sleep right now, but I have to loose it sometime I suppose, if I'm ever to post again.

My boys have been tag-teaming me again. All of them. Grandma came home, and for the two days thereafter I got 12 and 10 hours of sleep, respectively. It was great!! But then the boys changed their minds. (Insert tears, real ones.) Alexander has - ironically - been the one to sleep more. Christopher, however, has been driving me crazy. He seems to have developed some phobia of sleeping or something. When I have been successful in getting him to sleep, it's after hours and hours of fighting with him over it, and him begging for me to sleep with him or for more food or one more movie or one more..... you name it. Whatever he can think of to avoid sleeping. And if you think just leaving him in bed works: It doesn't. I've tried that too, and he honestly will just stay there awake until unfathomable hours of the morning, like 4 and 5 am. And the problem with this is that I hear him and I therefore don't sleep, or if I doze off I dont' sleep well because every little sound wakes me up. I'm not a light sleeper, except when I hear my boys. I've slept through Bryan sleep-talking and I can sleep through the racket the neighbors make, but when the boys stir, I'm up. Dratted that mommy-sense!

I realized last night that I have reached the dreaded stage of hating to go to sleep. I'm so exhausted that I actually don't WANT to sleep because it WILL require that I wake up! And I dread waking up because I'm never ready to wake up, so I dread going to sleep in the first place. Granted, I still go to sleep of course, but I don't really like it right now. It's not a respite, it's a survival mechanism.

After two days in which I got a grand total of about 3 hours of sleep in 30 minute increments, yesterday I ran out of rocks. "Rocks?" I hear you ask. Well, for those of you who know about the rocks, I hope you're laughing. For those who don't, suffice it to say that it's a parable for having enough emotional reserves. And I ran clean out of rocks yesterday. I felt it set in about 2pm. Alexander was screaming his head off (he screamed so much that he went hoarse by the end of the day), and I picked him up and just stood there. That was when I knew it: I was out of rocks. I'd spent them all on others and I didn't have a single one left. I spent the second half my day trying not to cry. Around 1am I cried anyway and Bryan came to my rescue. He let me put noise-canceling headphones on, turn on the BYU radio station, and ignore the crying baby and Christopher's incessant train of "I want"s. It wasn't pleaseant, but man was it necessary!

Why was Alexander screaming, you wonder? And why was Christopher still up? Alexander sleeps overnight, waking up every 1.5 - 2.5 hours to eat. During this time I put him in an oversized diaper because changing him wakes him up, and I don't want that. This only works because he doesn't poop until morning when he wakes up. And yesterday for some reason he didn't poop at all the whole day. And he was mad about it. I bounced him, patted him, squeezed him, bathed him, gave him a massage.... and then I ran out of ideas and just let him cry. He also threw up on me a ton yesterday. But he was eating normally, so we figure he wasn't hungry, and that he was probably just uncomfortable. Today he's eating normally, and he pooped on me 3 times in thirty minutes. Oh well.

As to why Christopher was awake: He went to bed nicely at about 9. He slept for.... ready for it? .... He slept for 30 minutes and then woke up. And would NOT go back to sleep. He lay down when asked, but he wouldn't sleep. And he wiggled. And eventually he got up and I didn't stop him. When I finally gave up and went to bed at almost 4am, he was still awake. Bryan, by the way, was also awake and helping me all this time. And this is not the first time this week that Christopher's done this. Both of us are exhausted. And if you think that he's doing this because we let him nap or sleep late, think again. I've tried getting him up at 7-ish in the morning, wearing him out during the day, stuffing him full at night, and he has still done this. I still love him, but boy oh boy is it frustrating! Not to mention that it adds to the previously mentioned problem of dreading to go to sleep because I know he'll be up again.

Oh, and one last thing about sleep deprivation. Actually, more than one thing. First thing: It's really bad for you. Ok, there, got that out of the way. Second: One of the other things I hate about it is that if I'm not in the room with the baby (like, if I don't sleep in my own bed) he doesn't hear me and therefore sleeps deeper and longer. If I sleep in my bed, he hears me and wakes up MUCH more often. It frustrates me that he'll sleep through Christopher in the other room screaming and crying, but he won't sleep through me rolling over in my sleep. I still love him, but I could use some infant earplugs I think.

I was going to make this post about all kinds of random things, but it turned into this instead.


**Addendum: It's a few days later, and I asked Bryan if I could pretty please nap today. So at about 10:00 I put the baby down for a nap and told Bryan I was going to sleep. Assuming that I was actually going to get some sleep, I crashed HARD and was sleeping very deeply..... for about 30 minutes. Between 10 and noon, I was woken up 4 times. And then I admitted defeat and got out of bed. No naps here.

A cute link

Someone sent this to me for Mother's Day, and I liked it enough to forward some copies on. The baby made me laugh.

http://news.cnnbcvideo.com/?nid=vqfSSIsNGDx_JjOetilo3jE0NjE1&reffered_by=16142678-9TqDDXx&p=moveon

More on my "haircut"

Last night Christopher comes running up next to me. I reach over to pat his head. And when I move his hair, I discover that he's missing some! I can't tell if the original hair was his hair, because mine is darker, so I'm pretty sure it's not his. I am suspcious that there is an incoming scissor ban in my house, because after realizing that he's missing hair, I also realize that I'm missing scissors. I can't find them anywhere. Kinda like the time he brought me a picture that he said he drew with crayons, but I could tell for certain that he'd used my paint pens because the paint on the paper was still wet and shiny. But I couldn't prove it because I couldn't find the pens. And then the next day Bryan found them tucked way back in a cupboard where Christopher had hid them.

Today Bryan was sitting with the baby, and I looked over at them. I was so shocked that all I said was, "Bryan, poop!" He looked down in horror to see what I was seeing. The baby was covered from his toes to his chest in poop, and Bryan's lap and chest had poop all over them too. I picked up the baby and walked off, while Bryan sat there with his arms up looking down at the mess, probably trying to figure out how he'd get out of those clothes without getting even more poop on him. I cleaned up the baby. And it wasn't his diaper's fault he'd made such a mess. I think he'd been saving that batch all last night and this morning just for Bryan, who always seems to be the one to get thrown up on or pooped on. After I changed my clothes, taken Bryan's clothes, and cleaned up and redressed the baby, I put stain remover on all the above and the changing table cover, and threw them all in the wash.

On a related note, I have never used this much stain remover and laundry detergent before. This baby produces more dirty laundry than I thought that we own. And more than once I've thought of my friends who use eco-friendly cloth diapers and said to myself, "I'm so grateful right now that I'm a wasteful, disposable-diaper-using mom, because I'd never make back the amount I'm spending in laundry expenses!" I'm already doing a load or two a day out of necessity, I can only imagine what it would be like if I had to wash as many diapers as I throw out each day. And on a related note to that, I'm SO grateful that when Bryan's family had a baby shower (I think it was at least in part just to get to hold the baby!), they all gave me diapers. It's such a relief to not have to be buying diapers right now. And I have suspicions that the Lord is secretly restocking the supply that Bryan's family gave me, because in spite of Alexander's talent for making messy diapers, I've used less than two bags, which is a small portion of what I have.

On another semi-related note, when I tossed all the dirty laundry in the washer, I tossed in a few other clothes to fill out the load. One of which is a shirt of Christopher's. This particular shirt is amazing. I now suspect that it actually has permanent stains, but they only show up once I put the shirt on him. The reason I think this is that every time I go to wash it, I look at how dirty it is and say to myself, "Well, I'll try to clean it, and if it doesn't wash out I'll throw it away." Each time I wash it, it comes out clean, in spite of looking like Christopher did a mud derby, and a painting contest, and a food fight in it. So I put it back in the drawer. And the next time I go to wash it, it looks as bad as the time before, so I repeat the process. It never ceases to amaze me. Like my kids.

A last memory to store away: I was already in bed, but was thirsty so I came out to grab a drink. I had thought Christopher was already set up and going to sleep on the couch (yes, I still haven't cleaned his room, but I take chunks out of it every day, it's that bad) but when I came out I saw him standing next to his daddy's chair talking to him. I walked into the kitchen and got my drink. I hear the mumble of Christopher's voice from the living room, then I hear Bryan say, "A hot dog?" I hear Christopher mumbling again. I walk out and see a blank look on Bryan's face, and Christopher looking up at me earnestly, like I know something. I ask "Does he want something to eat?" (Christopher always gets voraciously hungry right at the moment we want him to sleep, and we usually just plan that he's going to ask for food and juice.) Bryan says, "Yes, but I already asked him if he wants all the usual stuff, and he said no." I look at Christopher who is still looking at me. I think through the list of foods that we usually offer him at bedtime, check those off my list since Bryan said he already asked, and tried to think of something different that Christopher would like and was fast. I said, "How about peanut butter bites?" (This is peanut butter on graham crackers.) Christopher, still looking up at me, smiles and says "Yes!" Then he bounces happily over to the couch, and as he bounces up on it he cheerfully proclaims:
"She always knows what I want."
I walked right over, hugged him, kissed him, and told him he was the most wonderful boy in the world, and I love him! What a perfect thing to say!

I'm a blabbermouth

I've been informed that I write too much. I replied that if someone doesn't want to read this, they don't have to! I know there's a lot of my family that's missing all this and likes to read it, even if it is long.

Besides, this actually isn't for everyone else. The Stories were started as a way for me to create a more effective diary, and to share my day-to-day happenings with someone special. I just decided that instead of only emailing them and having one person read them, I'd share them with everyone. I'd be typing just as much and getting twice as much done!

As I have looked over The Stories this evening, I admit that I do type a whole lot. But I knew that before. I go to great lengths (literally) to translate the visual and verbal goings on of my day so that when I look back over these Stories years from now, I will fully remember what it was I was writing about.

And another thing that is important to me is that I record these silly little day-to-day things before they disappear into my memory bank. After I hit the pillow, exhaustion tends to wipe away most of the previous day. And I feel that cute things such as my children do should be recorded now so they will be remembered later.

There, my last thought for the day. Pillow of Oblivion, here I come!

Go go Inspector Gadget!

And keep going! Further.... further.... Is he gone yet? No? Oh, of course not. Because it's not Inspector Gadget, it's my son, Christopher, pretending to be Inspector Gadget. Why does this matter? Oh, it matters!

Tonight after we had a really nice sit-down dinner together (I've been actually doing it, go Mom!!) I collapsed into my chair, baby in arms, expecting to rest for a minute.
When what to my wondering eyes does appear, but lockets of hair, and some scissors quite near! I rose from my chair to see what was this matter, and when I found out I made quite a clatter!'

"Bryan!!!" I exclaimed.
He takes off his headphones and completely flatly says, "What?"
"LOOK!" I thrust my hand toward him, the clump of hair clutched in it.
He's slightly interested now. "What is that?"
"It's hair. More to the point, it's MY hair!"
"How did that happen???"
I turned around and looked at my oldest son, who's behind me watching, of all things, Pink Panther. I look back at Bryan, who looks from Christopher back to me.
He asks, "Are you sure it's your hair?"
What woman doesn't know what's her hair and not? Silly boy! And besides, no one else in the house even HAS enough hair to loose that much. But I just say, "Yes, I'm sure it's my hair."
My dear sweet probably well-meaning husband asks "When did that happen?"
My eyes about popped out of my head! I looked at him in disbelief and my jaw actually dropped. I just shake my head, and when I get my bearings back I reply, "How should I know!"
(Mind you, I'm not mad at him, or Christopher. I find great amusement in how different (and weird!) boys are in how they think.)
It doesn't look like my husband believes me, so I walk over to Christopher and check his head. I ask him "Christopher, did you cut your hair?"
Without even acknowledging me he responds, "No." Then he suddenly seems to 'come to' and looks up at me like 'Uh oh....'.
I turn back to Bryan. "It's my hair."
"How could you loose that much hair and not notice?"
[Insert repeat of eye-popping, jaw dropping, mind boggling moment as described above.]
I flip my foot-and-a-half of hair around to the front, fan it over my hand, and say, "With this much hair, how COULD I notice?!?!?"
(Remember, I'm not upset, but I am in a state of shock about the sudden realization that we have a hair-nabber in our house, and disbelief and mild amusement over my dear husband's response to my loosing a decent chunk of my hair.)

Now we turn to Christopher, who has obviously realized that we have found the hair, and the tell-tale scissors, and he suspects we may be on to him. Now obviously, I didn't cut off my hair and drop it on the floor next to my chair with the offending scissors. And as we can obviously deduct, unless my husband is a better lair than I give him credit for, he didn't do it. And there is a guilty-looking, worry-faced someone else over on that couch who is now watching his parents with a wary eye.
Bryan asks, "Christopher, did you cut your mommy's hair?"
His eyes dart back and forth between his parents as he gives a firm, "No."
I'm walking into the kitchen to throw it away now, and his eyes are glued to me.
Bryan says, "Christopher, it's ok, you're not in trouble, we just need to know what's going on. Did you cut your mommy's hair?"
A more hesitant voice says, "No."

I realize he's not going to confess, so as I'm coming back in I say, "Christopher, did you cut your hair?"
I get an immediate and earnest, "No, I didn't."
"Did you cut mommy's hair?"
"No....."
"Did someone else cut mommy's hair?"
"Um, maybe."
"Who do you think cut mommy's hair? Did mommy cut her hair?"
He gives a half a smile and says in a scoffing way, "Nooo."
"Well then who do you think did it?"
"Maybe some other little kid."
"Some other little kid did it?"
"Yeah. Maybe... when you were a little kid... you were sitting on your chair and some other little kid cut your hair."
"Oh, ok." I see how it is! I still have the baby in my arms, and he needs a pacifier from his bed, so I walk out of the room snickering to myself. Christopher follows me into my bedroom. He doesn't say anything, he's just following me with a curious, worried look on his face, like he's waiting for the other shoe to drop.

After a minute I say, "Christopher, if any sneaky hair-cutters get into our house again, can you please protect me from them and keep me safe?"
"But they didn't hurt you."
I smile when he can't see. This is funny! "I know hon, but I don't want them stealing any more of my hair!"
"Oh, ok sure. Go Go Inspector Gadget hair-saver protector!"

Ah ha!!! I suddenly realized EXACTLY what happened. I am certain that earlier today while I was sitting with the baby, and probably looking down and away, some secret Madd agent, or an Inspector on a mission, snuck up and cut off my hair, then almost instantly dropped both it and the scissors, either because the Inspector realized his mistake, or because the Madd agent got caught and had to leave it behind. I can't prove it, but I'd be willing to bet a lot that I'm right.

Besides, I don't miss it. I'd never have known if I hadn't seen the evidence. And I even made my little offender mini muffins later, which is a funny story in itself!

More about Mother's Day

Ok, so Mother's Day did NOT AT ALL go as planned. In fact, rather than being a pleasant, or even special day, it was just about downright terrible with little tidbits of nice.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not actually upset. Because my Mother's Day was FULL of mothering. Oh yes.

It all started last night. Albertson's has crab legs on sale for $4/lb. Bryan and I LOVE crab. So we got a lovely meal for two of steamed veggies, wild rice, and crab - for under $15. (Christopher hates crab (yes he's tried it, every time) and wanted soup, lunch meat, and soy sauce. Yuck!) I cooked it up, we all sat down at the table (a rarity in itself!) and began to eat. No more than 5 minutes in Alexander decides he doesn't want to be in this awful swing a moment longer and starts to cry. I get up to hold him (Bryan hates hearing him cry, and Bryan is sweet enough to do an awful lot of holding in spite of it) and I try to find something I can eat one-handed. Rice & veggies, yum yum. I eat all of them, and I wait for Bryan to finish so he can take the baby and I can eat.

Well, after just now discussing it with Bryan, neither of us can remember what exactly it was that prevented me from eating, but I didn't get to back to my crab for about a half hour. And it was my kid's fault. My sweet husband really did try to facilitate my quest to get some dinner, but we were foiled at every turn. So after that break from my food I went back and sat down - alone - to my now-cold crab legs. I started to shell them, got about half a set of legs shelled, and was again interrupted.

About an hour and a half after I had first begun eating, I sat back down and realized that I still hadn't eaten everything I had initially served myself. And it was all cold. And I was actually MORE hungry now than when I started because every time I ate a little bit, I'd have to get up, and the whole time I was taking care of the kids I was thinking "Wow, that was so good, I want more." So in the end I was more hungry than when I started, even after having a nice sized dinner. Eventually I got the baby to sleep, Christopher playing, and Bryan doing I don't know what out of sight, and I sat down and ate until I wasn't hungry. Sure, I had to tell Christopher to stop attaching yarn wings to my arms while I was eating, and I had to ignore the sounds coming from the closet as someone dug around for whatever it was they wanted, and I had to say "Not right now" about 50 times, but I DID get to eat until I wasn't unpleasantly hungry.

And then nightfall came. To prevent any unnecessary bad feelings toward any one boy, I will simply call them Boy 1, Boy 2, and Boy 3 for this part. Boy 1 fell asleep at around 9:30. Boy 2 fell asleep around 11:30. Boy 3 kept me awake until 4 am. At that point Boy 1 woke up and decided that he didn't want any more sleep. Now Boy 1 and Boy 3 are both awake. Boy two is now also awake because everyone else is. I got one boy to go to sleep, but one would not. Bryan offered to stay up so that I could get at least a tiny bit of sleep. So there it was, 4:30 am, and everyone's awake. I gave up and went to bed, although I still had to wake up twice during the next few hours to feed the baby. That was NOT how I wanted to spend my night before Mother's Day. Or any night at all, to be honest.

Bryan came to bed around 7am. Christopher was then awake. So I got up. Hurray for about 3 hours of sleep. I felt nauseous from so little sleep. I got out everything I would need for church. I decided that even though it was obvious none of my boys would be coming, I wanted to go at least for a little bit of church. Christopher was on the couch looking drowsy. I decided to not move until he went to sleep, as that would prevent him from getting any sudden bursts of energy while trying to discover why I was getting dressed. Church starts at 9am. At 8:50 Christopher closed his eyes and didn't open them again. I literally threw on my dress, clipped up my hair (I had to redo it before walking into church), and snuck out the door.

At church I slid in the back door just as they were starting. I sat on the back pew right next to the door. Suffice it to say that I don't remember all of church. I struggled very hard to stay awake and not throw up. But I was determined to stay at least until I could talk with the bishop. I could always come back after I fed the baby and slept for 30 minutes. I found the bishop, and he assured me that we could bless Alexander the first Sunday in June, and it wouldn't be put off any more. I also paid our overdue tithing from Bryan's severance. Due to various mishaps and miscommunication, we haven't been able to get to the bishop before now, and both of us felt much better today once I'd given it to him. It seems that having tithing set aside isn't the same as actually giving it to the Lord. (Duh.)

I escaped (not a term I usually apply to church) and weaved my way to my car. I say "weaved" because I certainly didn't walk in a straight line. For anyone who may need to know in the future, high heels and sleep deprivation are a terrible combination. I stopped for a minute to do a mental check and see if I really thought I could make it home. I decided that I could. And I did. As soon as I got home, I realized that EVERYONE WAS ASLEEP!!!! AH! I ditched my clothes and landed in bed. Ah, sweet oblivion. For a whole thirty minutes........ Oh well.

After having to get up to feed the baby, he was kind enough to go right back to sleep! So I did too, of course. I actually got a few hours in the middle of the day. I really had meant to go back to church, but I slept not only through church but until 2pm. I had planned on going out to deliver all my mother's day cards to my "moms", but I slept through that window of time too. And you know what? I really didn't mind. I needed that so badly.

When I did get up for real, I ate a little something to stave off additional nausea. Christopher and Alexander were up by then too, so I fed them too. Then I took care of kids until about 4, when Bryan was supposed to leave to get in line at Pinnacle Peak. Oh, and for those of you who don't know, my side of the family isn't LDS, and I decided back when I was younger and living with them that I'd rather not make them think any worse of the church (they don't like it) by making an issue out of skipping Sunday Dinner when spending money was happening. It's rare, and it's usually over something special, so I decided to not kick the bucket on that issue with them. So back to today.

The Tadpoles (my Uncle Tad's family) wanted to go to Pinnacle Peak. It's kind of a traditional family gathering place for my side of the family. Bryan was going to go down and get us a place in line because they don't take reservations. But when it came down to it, he and I decided that I would take Alexander and I would go. It actually turned out rather nice. I got to walk around holding my lovey-dovey baby for about 30 minutes. He is so adorable, and I love him tremendously. He was so sober the whole time. Except for when he saw one lady who looked like a perfect mix of Grandma and Mimi, and then he lit up like a Christmas tree. He wiggled, smiled, talked to her; it was so adorable. And of course she was completely charmed. I enjoyed just holding him and looking at all the neat things in Trail Dust Town - where the restaurant is.

Eventually everyone showed up - except Bryan and Christopher. As they were seating us I called him. Apparently there had been some issue with clothes, and they were running late. I didn't ask for details. I don't know that I wanted to know. He arrived just as the waitress was taking orders. And just in time for Alexander to melt down because he was worn out and hungry. So I ordered and left to the ladies room. They had a nice - although very old and rickety - chair I could sit in, and I thought that was nice of them. I fed the Alexander, but he was so cranky that he continued to cry after he was done eating. Which was actually not so much crying like babies usually cry as it was howling and screaming in fury. He doesn't really do "cry". He does "I'm upset and I'm giving you a chance to fix it fast" - which is little fussy pouts followed by looking at you to see if you're responding, or "I'm out to get you" which is screaming but not crying. So this was a bad case of the latter.

I finally resolved that there was nothing that would stop it, and I had tried, so I walked out with him and headed to the car to find a pacifier. Why me and not Bryan? Because he didn't want Bryan. Incidentally, this was the second nice meal in a row that I was missing because of my kids. And yes, as I left my plate of steak and salad to get cold and slimy, I did recall that this was looking more and more like a repeat of yesterday. On the way to the car Alexander was quiet and looking around with a solem look. I retrieved the pacifier and stuck it in his mouth. He breathed a deep breath, dropped his head on my chest, and fell asleep instantly. Oh brother.

So now I go back in the restaurant, and Bryan takes the baby. But all our food is here. "Lindy, how about we get the baby's seat so he can sleep in it while we eat?" Bryan offered to go get it, but he didn't know where I'd parked, so I decided it would be considerably faster if I just went and got it. I didn't run, but I thought about it. My feet were starting to hurt, and I was hungry. I just wanted to sit down! Is that too much to ask, on Mother's Day no less?? (The answer, by the way, is "Yes." Anything is too much to ask if you are asking anyone under the age of about 21 who is related to you by blood.)

I bring back the seat, put him in it, set him behind us, and do I get to eat? Nope. Christopher needs me to get make his food edible. What? You ask why? Because the corn on the cob at the restaurant doesn't have nails or corn holders to hold it with. So I get another fork and solve that. Mom, hot dogs in buns are NOT ok. They need to be cut up. And I need ketchup mom. And can I have some of your food mom? Eventually, all is well, and I start to eat. I ate about half of my now-lukewarm steak. It was yummy! Yes, in spite of not being hot-off-the-grill. And in spite of being a little soggy, my salad tasted good too. However, I harbor some suspicions that my hunger and exhaustion level had something to do with how good the now-less-than-fresh food tasted. But I ate it, and I loved it. I love steak. And it was perfectly done too. Yum yum!

But if was shortlived. I never finished it. Shortly after being put down, the previously dead-to-the-world baby woke up. He was quiet for a minute. After Bryan (who had had a considerable head start) was finished, he picked Alexander up. Not five minutes passed before Bryan elbowed me and said, "We have an issue." I say calmly "What?" (Secretly "What now, for heaven's sake, can't you see I'm finally seated and eating something?!?!?!") Bryan wiggles a little, motioning that it's something about the baby. "What?" I ask. Bryan wiggles a little more and reveals that the baby has pooped, not only in his diaper, but on Bryan. Oh great. So I get up, instruct Bryan to come sit with me on some chairs away from the group, and I'll clean him up. Once he removed the baby from his chest we see the full extent of the damage.

You'd think the kid hadn't been wearing a diaper at all! Bryan was covered with poop. Lots of it. There was no solving that. He'd have to go home. No, wait! The extra clothes in his trunk, that we'd put in there when we went to Phoenix, could he wear those? He said he'd go see. So I vanish to the restroom again and he goes out to his car. I'm cleaning up Alexander, who is also covered in poop, and my phone rings. I know it's Bryan. Yes, it is, and no, there are no extra shirts he can wear in his trunk. He said he was going home and offered to take the baby so that I could enjoy the rest of my meal and my family. I think that's a nice idea, so I finish up and meet him out in the parking lot.

I get back inside and realize that I just sent him home with the diaper bag - which has all the Mother's Day cards in it. Doh! *Slap forehead with palm* My dinner is now stone cold. Everyone else is finished. The waitress is clearing places. I sit down and scarf up as much as I can before everyone leaves. Steak isn't very good when it's room temperature. In fact, it was nearly unpalatable now. So I eventually just tossed it in a take-home bag, along with the t-bones for Onyx. (Who loved them, by the way.) Mimi was too tired to stay awake, so she and John went home. But the Tadpoles and I stayed. Kids can't leave a place as cool as Trail Dust Town without doing a lot more fun stuff first!

Christopher had been bugging me all day, and all while we were at the restaurant, that he wanted to go look for treasure. Trail Dust Town has lots of Old West shops, props, and amusements. One of which is panning for gold. I take Christopher and my little cousin Thomas (who is 5). I show them how to use the pans, and this old guy walks up and starts grunting at us. I finally realize that he's in charge of this little booth and he wants us to pay to use it. That's news to me, and new. It's always been just there and you just do it. There's never anything to find, just little flecks of gold-colored paint at the bottom. And everyone knows it. Why would I pay to let my kids stick their hands in the water and pretend to look for gold? Well, the guy's insistent in his grunty growly way, so I give him a dollar for each kid so he will stop making them get out of the water. Then he shuffles off. I start thinking I should talk to a manager about the fact that this guy might LOOK very authentic, but he's a jerk and he's scaring the kids. He shuffles back a minute later and "helps" the kids learn to pan for gold. Wait, isn't that what I was doing? Then I notice that he's not actually "helping" them, he's holding the pan and shaking it like he is, but what he was really doing was dropping little gold rocks into the pan for them. Ok, so now I get it. He is actually stationed here, he actually has a job, and I'd actually pay for having someone sneak real treasure into the kids pans... but he was still scaring the kids and being very gruff to them. Eventually he left them alone after apparently doing his job, and they were much happier to dig around in the dirt and water unmolested and find little bits of this or that.

We soon had to leave to go to the wild west show that goes on there every evening. It's slapstick Old West comedy performed by stunt people and includes lots of explosions. Perfect for little boys. The last time Christopher was there with us he was so scared we had to leave (it was a very funny story, ask me sometime), but since he's been watching Inspector Gadget and some Bugs Bunny, I knew he'd love the explosions this time. I stayed out and talked with my uncle. I've seen it, he didn't want to. When the kids got out we decided to ride the train. They have a little train that runs around the town. But the train was full, so we waited for it to come back. Incidentally, there were a lot of mothers walking around carrying tiny new babies, and every single time I saw one I wished I had mine. I love Alexander, and I get baby-hungry for him when he's not around, really quick. When the train got back and unloaded, we all got on and rode around. It was great fun, and Christopher loved it. He asked if we could ride again, and was a good sport when I said no. He asked if we could walk and see the places again. I said no, only the train can go to those places, but we could walk by the indian village on the way to the car. That appeased him.

Then we split ways with my cousins. They were planning to go home, and Christopher wanted to investigate the ferris wheel he saw from the train. We found that you could ride it, and it didn't cost an arm and a leg any more. (It used to cost about $5 per person, per ride, and you had to go with your kids because the thing was made in the 1920s and looks like it.) This time it was a dollar. I can handle that. Christopher LOVED it. He apparently thought it would just go around once, because when it kept going around and around, and started to speed up, and the horse went up and down, he got so excited. He had a great time. I loved seeing how much he enjoyed it.

Then we went to the novelty store. They have all kinds of old, special, and interesting toys, nicknack's, and doohickeys. Christopher especially liked the wind-up walk-around toys and the finger puppets. He asked to buy a rubber band gun (they had all kinds of amazing ones, I have firm intentions of making one with Grandpa because they were awesome, and very simple in design), and he was a really good sport when I said no to that, and the finger puppets, and the wind up toys, and the pen and pencil as big as his arm, and the overpriced candy. He just said, "Ok." He's so great!

Then we actually went to the candy shop. Like the novelty store, this candy shop has old, special, and interesting candies. If you want it, they probably have it. If they didn't, I'd bet they could find it for you. They have almost everything you can think of and a lot of things you wouldn't think of at all. As part of Mother's Day all mothers got a free chocolate. Another couple that didn't have time to wait in the line gave me their ticket and so I got two. Which actually means that I got one and Christopher got one. I also bought Bryan his favorite candy because they had it (it's hard to find here), and I bought Christopher a candy that he loves and never gets, and I bought me a rootbeer and a cinnamon candy stick, because I love those. I had them all put into a bag, and we all got our special treats later at home. Yum Yum.

As we headed home, Christopher got to see the indian village, and he got to ride in the front seat next to me. I enjoyed spending time with him, we both had fun together.

I arrive home to discover that Alexander has screamed the whole time I was gone. He was so happy to see me. And so was Bryan! I had missed Alexander (I blame all those other cute babies), so I was happy to see him. Yes, I know, I was only gone like 2 hours, but still! I'm a mother, after all, and I love him so very much. So even though he was a cranky brat all evening, I didn't mind. Although it did cross my mind that it wasn't very nice of him to be so fussy on Mother's Day. He eventually went to sleep, quite a long time after everyone wished he would.

I decided that the last thing I would do before I crashed in bed tonight would be to write about the insanity that was my Mother's Day. As you can tell, that wasn't a short endeavour. Most of the time I've been writing I've also been stapling papers shoved at me by my oldest as he makes airplanes, rockets, secret notes, surprises, and other things that 4 year old minds can create with wads of paper, tape, and staples. About halfway through I started laughing about something, and Bryan said, "Hey, don't laugh!" I laughed more and said, "It's Mother's Day, and I haven't done anything that *I* wanted to do, so I'll laugh if I darn well please and no one is going to make me stop!"And you know what? For the first time all day, I did!

Missing sleep

If you find some lost sleep somewhere, please return it. I need it back.

You see, I don't get much of it, and even though I try to horde it, it gets away from me - all the time! (Pun intended.)

Lately Christopher has not been going to sleep before midnight. The ONE time we got him to sleep by 9-ish, he woke up at 4am. What's worse (I think?) is that instead of sleeping a sane amount of time, like from midnight to, say, 8am, he's sleeping from midnight to noon. In fact, today he woke up exactly at the stroke of noon and the first words out of his mouth, I kid you not, were these:

"Mom, I want to sleep for half the day."

"Honey, you did. It's the middle of the day right now."

(Insert young, sleepy child giving me a skeptical look.)

"Really, look at the clock." I point behind me. "See the hands? They're both together at the top. That means it's the exact middle of the day. You really slept half of the day!"

Christopher becomes much more alert. "Really? Wow!"

What can I say? Oh, that's right - nothing! I'm too tired to think! Because of course *I* didn't sleep until noon. Nooooooooo. I'd been up off-and-on since 4am. Oh, oops, I mean, I love sleeping from 1am to 4am, it makes me feel fantastic!!! (Insert tears.)

Of course, I try to get some sleep in when the baby is sleeping, but considering that he only sleeps for about 45 minutes every hour or two, it's not like I settled down and slept for all of that, each time, between 4am and noon. But I did make a valiant effort. About the same kind of valiant effort I put into staying awake and maintaining my sanity.

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day.... to everyone else!

Some well-meaning people have already wished me a happy Mother's Day. I haven't done it yet, but I'm tempted to tell them, "Thank you, I'll pass your message on." For you see, I am quite content in the fact that it's not my turn to be the mom who's celebrated on Mother's Day - yet. I have so many mothers to whom I pay homage on this day that for me it's a celebration of how much I'm blessed to have lots of "moms" who love me, rather than how cool it is for me to be one. Besides, as pertaining to those who ought to be celebrating me, Christopher doesn't see why I should be more special on Mother's Day than on any other day, and Alexander doesn't yet know I'm seperate from him. Does that mean he thinks I should be celebrating him too? Interesting idea. Of course, I do, but that's a different story.

So today, on Mother's Day, I will be running around all day telling all my mothers of all sorts how much I love and appreciate them.

Simple updates

We've been having an interesting time around here. Recently we had some friends over, and their little girl Lorelai is Christopher's "girlfriend". Also, whenever Christopher tells me about what he's going to do when he grows up, he includes Lorelai as his wife. He has even told me that he will buy her her very own car, and it will be blue (incidentally, MY favorite color). And he will take her to the temple - after his mission. It's very funny when he gets going.

Also, Christopher and his dog have succeeded in completely anihilating his room. I woke up the morning before our guests were to arrive to find reams of paper (yes reams, I found the empty packages to prove it) tossed around in huge stacks, mingled with all of the toys from his shelves, all of his arts and crafts supplies, his bedding, his clothes, and the stuffed animals from the toy hammock. Incidentally, the entire mess managed to stay in his room excepting the stuffed animals, which somehow - perhaps being the toys with legs enough between them - must have walked themselves throughout the house, as they were in every room. Seeing as how I had other things to do that day to get ready for dinner guests, I hacked a path down the middle so I could reach his dresser (which I then realized had no more clothes in it!), then I walked out, closed the door, and locked it. I just decided I was not going to deal with that right then.

And you know what? Between my three boys, I haven't gotten enough sleep the past few days to get up the gumption to clean it yet, so it's still there, and Christopher is quite happily having campouts on our couch until I can reach his bed. I really need to get to that soon though, because with the loss of the orderly clothes drawers I can no longer find any of his underwear or pajamas. Why I can find pants, shirts, socks, and even capes but not those is beyond my ability to understand.

On a baby note, Alexander is now a pro thumbsucker, but thankfully only when he's sleeping. And he's getting skilled at that rolling thing. I thought they didn't do that until they were older than this, but I must obviously be wrong since he has already rolled himself over in the mornings and rolled off of where I set him. He is also starting to chew on things. And he babbles incessantly. His favorite chatting partner (besides Mom) is that "other baby" in the mirror. That other baby is obviously a comedian in the making, judging by how much Alexander laughs at him. Somehow, everything he does seems to be sooner than Christopher did it. Maybe I forgot. Maybe I notice better this time. Maybe he's just faster and will be into things and into college before I can blink my eyes.

Speaking of which, people told me that Christopher would look huge after Alexander was born. Well, it didn't work. Alexander looked enormous, and Christopher as I remembered him suddenly seemed like such a tiny little baby. And it has stayed that way, until lately. Christopher has either grown, or I've just noticed that he had. Because he is suddenly SO BIG!!! I scoop him up to hold him, and he's more than half my size! Where'd my little boy go?!?!?!? Which is so weird to me, because his behavior is getting more infantile, and his size is getting more adult. Ever since I had kids, I've had so much more sympathy for my mother. And it's reaching a whole new level as I say to myself, "He's growing up!" One of these days I'm going to wake up and he'll be driving my car, or packing for college. I'm sure as my mom is seeing Joe pack up to head to BYU, she's thinking "Wasn't he just 4 yesterday? I was sure that he was....." and I'm sure I will be doing the same thing soon.

Speaking of the boys, about once a day Christopher gets this compelling desire to hold "my baby brother". It won't wait until the baby is fed, or awake, or whatever. When he has to hold his brother, it's an immediate, urgent need. I don't know what it is. When I mentioned it to my mother, she said that one of my siblings did a similar thing. About 4:00 in the afternoon this one child would say "I have to chase my brother!" and would go chase him! Weird! But whatever it is, Christopher has it. And so about once a day he holds his brother. Pictures below.

So, in other news, Bryan and I are the oddest couple. It seems that the best course of action is for me to find him a job and for him to clean the house. We have always agreed that I should be home with the kids. But still, just to go over some options, I asked him the other day if I could get a job if he can't find one by the time our finances have run out. Christopher overheard that and started crying and saying he didn't want me to go away and not be with him. That, of course, sealed the deal. I'll never go to work now! (We hope!) But back to me and Bryan. I decided one morning to just see what kinds of jobs are out there. Bryan saw me at it. And we've never stopped. I look for jobs, I fill out applications, and he does the dishes and holds the kids. Weird, huh? It makes me laugh. But then, who better to sell his good points to someone else than me, right?

We've all been going to the park lately as well. Sometimes I take the kids, sometimes Bryan takes Christopher and Onyx, and sometimes we all go together. It's been fun, and when it's not fun, it's still satisfying because we're out and about. Bryan and I are trying to be more active and get back in shape. I am determined to get in good shape again. Nine months of complete inactivity are terrible for a body. I didn't realize until I started working out how much pudge I have put on and how terribly unused to work my muscles were. Since I was married I've put on 35 pounds. Considering that I was about 10 pounds underweight before I had Christopher, I happily kept ten pounds after he was born and was a good healthy weight. After Alexander was born I weighed 20 pounds more than that. And in the last few months, I've added another 5 pounds. But I figure that if I have to gain a little muscle weight before I loose a little pudge, that's totally fine. And since I've been more active, I've noticed a great increase in my muscle tone, especially on my poor squishy tummy. I'm happy that at least I'm going to get THAT back. *Girly giggle!*

What else is new? Alexander is sleeping AT night, about 6 hours in a chunk, and then eating but not really waking up every two hours thereafter. So his sleep cycle is a total of about 12 hours. If only my other boys would let me use all of that time!!! Oh, what wishful thinking! Christopher has discovered the old "Inspector Gadget" series. Well, ok, he didn't discover it. Bryan started it. I blame him. And now Christopher wants to be given "missions" because he is "Little Gadget", and daddy is "Big Gadget", and I have been dubbed "Mommy Gadget". And here's a bad mommy admission: I don't play, and pull the "I don't know how" card as much as I can. Only Daddy Gadget can make up missions, in my opinion. Not only am I not a fan of such inately boy-all-boy-ish games, I am also even less of a fan of incompetent secret agents; although as I am exposed to more secret agents, I am beginning to believe that there are only super-smart or super-incompetent ones, both of which are mysteriously just as effective. Who knew?

I took the kids to the zoo with my friend Lisa last week. That was interesting. Nothing special, the boys mostly just got a kick out of being at the zoo. I base that observation on the fact that neither one spent more than .5 seconds actually looking at any one animal. They didn't even try to catch the convenient ones, like peacocks or pigeons. But wow, that dirt off the path! You'd think there was nothing more enticing! And that fake turtle! Wow! The real, living, breathing, even moving one behind them? Not worth noticing.

Well, I think that's most of the news I can contrive to share at the moment. I'm sure there are other tidbits that I'm forgetting, but I suppose that they will just have to wait - until I can remember them. With the amount of sleep I'm getting, don't count on it being soon. =)

Here's Alexander attempting to chew a toy that he commandeered.
He actually clutched that toy in his arm for quite a while.

Here's Lorelai and Christopher at the park together.
They were both having a blast posing for the camera on that slide.

Here's the kids having a pajama party while waiting
for the other set of parents to take away the pretty girls.

Christopher and his faithful companion settling down
for a campout on the couch.

Their faces say it all.
This is how they each really feel about this daily brotherly moment.


Although this one sadly turned out fuzzy, it's my favorite.
I love my boys.

Giggles!

My dear sweet husband was kind enough to take this video for me. He was, at the time, unaware that you can't take movies with my camera sideways, so I apologize that you will just have to tilt your head to watch it. The things we do for babies!!!

Haha!!!

Christopher and I were looking through old pictures of him, and we found these videos. We both laughed and laughed and laughed!