Happy Halloween!

Reuben has conked out in his carseat for what looks to be a semi-successful nap, so I'm going to take that opportunity to blog a bit.

My kids are both sick. This sucks. Rachel is a little better today, but Reuben is having a really hard time. To top it off, the night before this all went down I couldn't get to sleep for some reason so I only got about 4 broken hours of sleep. Babies getting sick basically just means they don't do anything like they normally do. So on Sunday at 11, when Reuben would usually take a nap, I went to nurse him down and he wouldn't go. Or, he did, but only for 9 minutes. It was like that all day. I would either nurse him or rock him to sleep but he would wake up 9 minutes later. I finally got him down around 2 and decided just to hold him as long as I could, so he slept really well for about an hour. It's amazing what that hour did. He was actually in almost a good mood for the rest of the day. But I was fretting the night...I nursed him down at 8:30, which is normal, and he woke up 9 minutes later. So I just stayed up with him for an hour and a half talking to Richard and trying to keep my little guy happy. At 10 we gave him some Tylenol and I nursed him again, but he didn't go to sleep. I rocked him for about half an hour and he was finally out for a while. If my groggy mind remembers correctly, he woke up just about every hour in the night. He would eat, then wake up an hour later just wanting to be held a little, then wake up an hour after that to eat again. I was worried I'd have to rock him back to sleep every time he woke up, but luckily that wasn't the case. So he slept all right, and I guess I did too, but man morning came way too quickly with Rachel wandering in looking for breakfast. Richard basically told her to go back to bed and instantly fell back asleep. When we finally got up we had no idea where she was lol. She had just been playing with her toys like the wonderful baby she is :)

So this morning went kind of similar to yesterday. I kept trying to get Reuben to nurse to sleep and he just wouldn't. He finally did, but woke up the second I set him down. I had no idea where Rachel was at that point, but luckily she hadn't gotten into any trouble while I was dealing with Reuben for like an hour. She really is a great girl who isn't too terribly naughty most of the time, so I wasn't too worried. Reuben finally fell asleep for about half an hour, so I was able to get some stuff done. It's funny how stressful a day can be when you have to get work done but you just can't do it. Yesterday I gave up before it even started and just planned to hold Reuben all day, and that's what I did. But when I woke up today and saw dead tissues and clean socks strewn all over the living room, I just couldn't handle it. So first chance I got I started picking stuff up. Now I'm on my second load of laundry, but there's still crap all over the living room.

I was feeling pretty good about this afternoon's prospects at lunchtime, until my dad called and asked if I could take Beau to the foot doctor. No problem there, except it took twice as long as I expected. Seriously, when you're appointment is at 1:20 why does it take until 1:45 for the doctor to show up? What is he doing that whole time? Anyway we got back from that and Rachel was actually ASKING for a nap! She's been kind of feisty about that lately, so I was rejoicing. Maybe I'll get a nap after all. Maybe I should be taking one now...

I wanted to share some cute stories about my kids or just some fun facts about where they're at right now, so here goes.

Rachel
2 1/2
Hysterical
Spending time with my daughter makes me realize why people have kids. She cracks me up all day long. The littlest things she does are not only amazing but tender to me. Right now she's coming up with a million different ways to ride her rocking dog, including putting my flip flops on the handles and watching them fall off as she rocks.

The other day I took her to Reams to return a movie to Redbox. On the way she said she wanted to sing, so we went through all the songs she knows. Let me restate that: My 2 year old KNOWS over 5 songs! Most of the words, even! I love it :) After we sang all our songs she wanted to say prayers. That's when I realized she was doing her bedtime routine in the car. Makes sense, she hadn't slept much so she was probably tired. So she said a little prayer (again, she's 2) and then said "Mom, I go sleep now." On the way home from the movie dropping off she pointed out the moon. It always amazes me what she's able to see. She'll spot an airplane before I'll even hear it. Her game lately has been to ask what everything is and then what it says. So when she pointed out the moon she then wanted to know what the moon says. I've been trying to be as creative as she is when coming up with what inanimate objects say, so when she asked that I responded by howling at the moon. So now I guess that's what the moon says :)

Most recently Rachel has been learning to say "please" when asking for something. This is great, except when the answer is no. Then she'll try to convince me to give her whatever she wants by saying "pweeeze??" over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. This is annoying.

Today was fun...I was trying to keep Reuben happy until naptime (I'm trying to regulate his naps so that he'll sleep through most of my work shift) and Rachel pulled out an empty diaper box. She sat in it and asked me to push her to her room. So I stuck Reuben in there with her and pushed them both around the living room. I love these kids :)

Anyway Rachel is awesome. She now picks out her own clothes and can put some of them on by herself. Sometimes they even look okay :) She loves to wear skirts, but not socks. I think she got Richard's circulation, because whenever I'm freezing she is happiest in a skirt, t-shirt, and no socks. But she loves to try on her coats and have me zip them up and put the hood on. She has always loved doing this. She's getting so smart. She can recognize a few letters, even pointing them out in the credits of movies we're watching. She's learning to "read" one of her books, and we'll see if that ends up helping her learn to read for reals. The book only has about 4 words repeated over and over, and she's almost memorized them and the order. One of her favorite things to do is sit by the bookshelf and look through ALL of the books, one at a time, very slowly and carefully. When she sees something she recognizes, she runs over to show it to me (and to ask what it says). She is also big enough now that we've moved her to a booster seat at the table rather than her high chair. She eats with a big person fork, and today Richard taught her to eat over her bowl instead of spilling cereal all over the floor, so we'll see how that goes. Lately I've been trying to get her to eat more fruits and veggies, and she loves peas. Not as big a fan of butternut squash, though :) Rachel sleeps in a regular twin bid (she actually has two beds right next to each other, so each night she picks her favorite) and puts herself to bed. We read scriptures, sing, say prayers and give hugs, then she walks herself into her room, shuts the door, turns off the light, and goes to sleep. She's started to do the same thing at naptime, which is phenomenal. Sometimes she doesn't take a nap, but she still goes in her room for at least 3 hours so I can work. I'd love to let her run around while I'm working, but she's just so loud. Rachel also climbs into her carseat by herself, and does really well at walking with me so I can carry Reuben when we go places. All in all, my daughter is amazing :)

Reuben
5 months
Super cute
I love this boy. He is such a happy baby! He wakes up smiling and stays that way for a while, until he gets tired or hungry. I was watching videos of Rachel when she was this age, and she liked being on her tummy more than he does, but I'm ok just holding him so that's no big deal. I wonder when he'll start crawling, though. Right now we're working on sitting, and he's doing pretty well at that. He likes the new perspective it gives of the world. He loves toys, but gets bored with them pretty quickly. One of his favorite things is to sit on my lap and smack the desk while I'm working, or to bang on the piano. He also likes to look over my shoulder while we're sitting on the couch and look at the bright colors of my afghan. He hates the stroller. He does pretty well in the car, especially with Rachel right there to keep him entertained. We're still figuring out the whole eating thing. I think he has a sensitive tummy. When I put him down for the night he always wakes up about an hour later just screaming. When I pick him up and rock him he lets out a good huge burp or three and maybe a fart, and then falls instantly back to sleep. He's been having a hard time at naptime lately for the same reason, and I think it's because I've been giving him solids at lunch instead of dinner. So I'm going to stop doing that. It's more important for him to sleep well at naptime when I work than it is at night, because I'm happy to rock him all night but it's kind of impossible to do when I'm working. But he does like those solids...last night he ate a ton of applesauce even though he was in a bad mood. He also loves taking baths and splashing around A TON. He wiggles all the time, and his new thing is to kick me rhythmically while I'm feeding him. I anticipate music to be part of his life :) Reuben loves it when I hum to him, and being wrapped up tight and rocked is his favorite thing in the world.

I love my kids :)