Monday, May 30, 2011

Another Picture-less Post

I've been bad at taking pictures lately, which is sad because a lot of fun stuff has happened and my boys are growing up so fast!

This past week Morgan went to WoodBadge. He left early Monday morning and came home Saturday afternoon. He wasn't allowed to have cell phones up there so I didn't even get a chance to talk to him the whole time. It was pretty lonely and missed him a lot, but he had a really great experience that he will blog about since this is our family journal too.

The first couple days went pretty well. We went over and played with friends and had a few distractions to keep us busy. Then on Wednesday afternoon my mom flew in to town, so we got to pick her up at the airport. My boys love the airport! Probably because they associate that with Grandma coming to town. :)

On Thursday morning I got to take Logan to the library all by himself. He was so good and it really made me love him so much more. I haven't ever really had the chance to do much with Logan one on one, usually the other kids are with us too, but it was so fun to just get a chance to talk to him and look at books and be together. I need more dates with my kids like that. Even if it was only for a little while. It made me realize how much he really has grown up. He is such a good big brother, even if he is quite the tease. And he's really fun to have a conversation with, especially when he's in control of the conversation and gets really excited about things. He's so animated when he talks.

On Thursday afternoon my sister in law Raquel and her kids came over to stay the night. Those kids just love each other. They did really well too, we had a few little tiffs, but nothing major. And for the most part they went to bed pretty good...except Damon, but I'll get to that later. So in the evenings we played games and watched movies. It was really nice to have a little girl time while the boys were sleeping.

The weather was pretty decent on Friday so we got to do a little playing outside. With enough people we were able to teach the kids Red Rover, and Duck Duck Goose, and London Bridges. It was a blast and the kids had a lot of fun.

On Saturday we mostly cleaned and got the house ready for my hubby. My mom took the kids for a walk so I was able to get the house cleaned without any interruptions, and there wasn't a ton to do since she helped me get a lot of it done the night before. We had a little picnic outside since the kitchen was clean and the weather was nice.

Morgan got home a little after I took my mom to the airport so he had a chance to shower and get cleaned up before the kids wanted his undivided attention. They were so happy to see him, so was I.

Some of the things Morgan missed out on this week:
-We got our hose line repaired, they had to come fix a pipe that froze.
-Our final inspection was completed on the house and of course it passed with no problems.
-Our Oklahoma renters up and moved without any notice...:(
-I finally cured Damon of his nighttime terrorizing of Logan :)

On this last note, it took and outside perspective from my mom to help me figure out the solution. The last couple weeks Damon has had a hard time going to bed, whether he takes a nap during the day or not. He doesn't mind going to bed, but once they are in bed he'll get out and turn on the light and bite and hit and fight with Logan (I'm sure Logan is partly responsible for some of this, but at least he stays in bed). I was getting really upset by this and probably blinded by my frustration, especially when he would get in the closet and pull all the clothes out of the drawers and off the hangers...that's always been a huge pet peeve of mine.

I tried everything, singing to him to calm him down, more stories, more music, a night light, ear flicking, and spanking, until I was just at a very frustrating loss. Then my mom suggested just putting him in another room and immediately I thought no way, they are always going to be sharing a room so they need just figure it out, but then I realized that Damon probably wouldn't like being away from Logan and it would actually be a consequence that he could understand.

So, I went to Lowe's to get another door knob that we could turn so we could lock him in, really not as bad as it sounds, if I don't, they just keep slamming the door and coming out. Anyway, got the door and duh, I got some closet locks too so he couldn't get into either closet at night. We cleared out a spare room of everything except a blanket and I told him that if he got out of bed and turned the light on and started fighting that he would have to go in the back room all by himself. I put them to bed and waited....5 minutes....10 minutes... nothing....and I was actually a little disappointed because I wanted to try this out, but then the light came on and the fighting began....YES! So, I scooped him up, grabbed his pillow and took him gently to the back room (I could do this gently now that I wasn't so mad about it all). And of course his crying was music to my ears. It went on for a good 10-15 minutes before he stopped. I went back in to give him another shot in his room and he quietly walked back to his room, climbed in bed and I didn't hear another peep. It's been two nights since then and he has gone to bed great!

I've always taken great consolation that my kids go to bed so well and so our little problem was getting really distressing to me, but now that we have remedied the situation life is good! Now I just need to figure out another solution to them climbing in bed at 5:00am. We usually don't mind on Saturdays and Sundays, but during the week is not cool. We'll have to work on that this week.

Lastly the Tragon update: his teeth finally cut through, but only after a couple blows to the face. :( His top two front teeth were being really stubborn and painful and then one morning he and Damon were playing peek a boo in the cupboard and Tragon went forward a little too much just as Damon was kicking his way out and it clocked Tragon in the mouth and cut his gum, it bled a little, but then we noticed that the impact had cut the gum and since then the tooth has really sprouted. A couple days later he was playing on a pillow, he likes to roll them over and climb over and he was too close to a wall and went to fast and hit his mouth again on the baseboard...it cut his other front gum and now that tooth is coming out just fine too. Poor kid, but at least it was just a moment of pain and gone instead of the constant pain he's been in for the last few weeks. He's also crawling really fast now, he can go up the stairs, and he pulls himself up on his feet whenever and wherever he can.

May has just blown by so fast and I hope that things will slow down just a little bit, but I'm not counting on it. Until next time...

1 comment:

heidijogoody said...

I think it sometimes takes an outsiders view to help remedy problems going on with our kids. Thank goodness for moms and I am glad they are doing well for you going to bed