Category Archives: preschooler

Preserve your memories… they’re all that’s left you.

Bonus points to those who recognize the lyrics in my blog post.

Some days I feel glued to my phone and pulled in a thousand directions.  Some days life feels chaotic and stressful and I feel like if I stop to think about it all I might crumble and fall apart. Then there are days when I turn the sound off my phone and set it aside and just… am.  Sometimes that means sitting quietly somewhere without even a book to distract me.  It’s amazing how many sounds a house can make if you really sit and listen.  With two kids, I’m not often alone in the house, but every Monday I work from home and when I’m finished, I try to take at least 15-20 minutes to just BE while I wait for Josh and the kids to get home.  Some days this means sitting quietly on the couch with my feet up and listening to Ziggy sleep (she occasionally snores) and the sounds of construction happening across the street as well as the random sounds that a house makes while watching dust specks in a ray of sun.

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It’s easy to take these moments when I’m on my own, but I’m slowly getting better at remembering to put my phone aside and to shove unwanted thoughts away for a few moments at a time. The other night at dinner I couldn’t get over how grown up Enzo seemed. I don’t recall what exactly everyone was talking about, but I felt a tug at my heart as I watched him. Do you ever have those moments where you’re talking to someone and want to commit every little detail to memory?  It was one of those. I wanted to remember the exact color of his hair and how in the sunlight you can see bits of gold. I wanted to remember the exact blue of his eyes and the mischievous way they sparkle. I wanted to capture his dimple and his smile and for a moment I wanted to just freeze time because every day he gets bigger and bigger and it seems like more and more I forget the tiny little things and I don’t want to forget Enzo at 4 when he still retains just a hint of babyness.

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Thank goodness Phoebe is still very much a toddler in so many ways, despite being almost 3 and pretty much a preschooler.  She’s still terribly attached to her nukie and insists on snuggles morning noon and night. Enzo was never a big snuggler and has always been more independent and wanting to do his own thing.  I love their differences and am still in awe that we created these tiny people.

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Time is indeed fleeting.

When Less is More

I had my yearly checkup and apparently stress is contributing to slightly high cholesterol. Wee.  How can I be old enough to worry about crap like that?  Oh wait, I shouldn’t worry… that’ll just make it worse. There’s been a lot going on, to say the least and I’m stretched pretty thin lately. I haven’t picked up my camera lately and seem not to have time to keep the house clean between one thing and another. So… I need to re-prioritize and I think that means blogging less. I think for a few months I need to completely focus on my work endeavors and then see where I’m at.  With so little time I like to focus on my family when I can and my own personal needs, so… yeah.

As far as the kids go, despite there being more stress and chaos in the house than usual, Enzo has been doing great in preschool lately, which also seems to coincide with his preschool teacher leaving and a new teacher stepping in.  He’s been having so many good days and has been bringing home more worksheets and seems to be learning more.  I can’t even tell you what a relief that is.

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Things I want to remember about right now.

  • Enzo
    • Has an ongoing imaginary game/story where we travel to outer space. Typically it’s him, me and Phoebe since we usually pretend we’re in a spaceship on the way home from preschool, but now and then Josh is allowed to also come. My job is to drive the spaceship and Enzo is in charge of “Pewing” (sp?) bad aliens. They can usually be found on meteors and Enzo uses a special gun that shoots fish that eat the aliens. The fish also have the powers of expansion to eat and/or destroy anything in our path.
  • Phoebe
    • Has started telling little white lies like asking her if she washed her hands and her saying she did when she very obviously didn’t and other little things like that.
    • Is a tad bossy and adorable at the same time. She often holds up her little hand and will say, “Just one minute” if you ask her to do something.  It’s all in the inflection and hand motion.

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With luck this next year will give us much more time together and the current chaos will make it all worthwhile.

6 Hours

We are a tired household. I think I remember feeling rested… once.

For a while now, Enzo has been staying in his bed all through the night.  He used to come to our bed at some point during the night, but then that all stopped and he now happily stays in his bed all night… until 4:00am.  I am thankfully asleep at this early morning wakeup call only because he usually insists that Josh come and get him and that it is time to wake up. No. No it is not. It is extremely difficult to convince a 4 year old that it is in fact still time to sleep and it is often around this point that I start to hear whatever whining or crying begins when Josh pleads with Enzo to please just go back to sleep. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.

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Normally I wouldn’t sleep through his waking, but I too am often tired because of a tiny little human who likes to dig her feet into my stomach, back and ribs and often pull my hair while sleeping. She started waking up and wanting someone around 1:00am a while ago, but gradually that time has moved up until now almost every night at 10:00pm she wakes up and calls for me. I usually attempt to tuck her back in and get her to stay in her room, but even if she dozes off, within minutes she climbs out of bed and makes her way into our bedroom. So no more late night reading or late TV watching. Also, we have a king sized bed, so how is it that I end up with a mere 6 inches of sleeping space??  Not only do I have her burrowing into my side, but Uzi also insists that he needs to sleep on me.

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Something’s gotta give.  At the very least I’d be satisfied if she Phoebe stayed in her bed until at least I’m ready to go to sleep, however, we still don’t know how to get Enzo to sleep in until it’s actually time to wake up. No wonder he gets cranky, he’s gotta be tired.  There’s got to be an answer, right? Anybody?  I guess it’s time to consult the Google and then sort through the dozens of different ways to go about getting sleep again.

Things they say and do…

I can’t remember every little thing they do, but it’s nice (for me) to write down what I can now and then so I can look back later.

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  •  Enzo
    • Wants to be a dinosaur when he grows up.
    • Has nightmares now and then, but has been able to tell us about them in more detail. The other night it was monster faces in his room. Only occasionally does he end up in our room, though.
    • Huge imagination! We’ll have a conversation about wildlife and suddenly he’s telling a story about how when he was a baby (how most of his stories begin) a skunk sprayed him and a squirrel stole all of his candy. Yesterday it was a giant who tried to eat him (and apparently succeeded) but then he also looked at Enzo afterwards and said, “Time for dessert!” and ate him again…
    • Quite the bossy pants and I have to often remind him he isn’t the parent when he tells Phoebe she can’t have any more TV if she does such and such. This morning he told her she couldn’t watch TV if she kept laughing. Yeah, not so much, Buddy.
    • Has discovered my least favorite game of all time – the Copycat game. I turn the tables on him, but he usually just thinks it’s funny and it doesn’t stop him.
    • Was worried we might move the other day and said he only wanted to stay in our house and anxiously asked if we would move. I told him not to worry about it for now. Poor boy likes change about as much as I do. 😉

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  • Phoebe
    • Peeeeze!!! Just a little bit (Don’t forget the thumb and pointer finger pinched together for the full effect). Also the outraged scream when you have to say “No” for one reason or another.
    • No longer stays in bed when I leave her room if she’s still awake. Instead she climbs out and curls up with her head against the door, so when I try to go put her back in bed I can’t open the door… not until her demands are met and I agree to lay in bed with her again.
    • Loves My Little Pony and she has a ton now thanks to Josh’s thrift store finds. I had to go out and buy some new outfits for her because she became obsessed and NEEDED pony shirts.
    • Wants yogurt all day every day and every morning sits in my lap while she drinks her chocolate milk.
    • Is in the midst of potty training! It’s going fairly well during the day time, and yesterday was the first day without accidents!

I know it’s said all the time, but they really do grow up so fast. I can’t believe we’re not going to have any diapers to change soon and that soon Phoebe will be moving up into the preschool room at day care.  They won’t be in the same class, but will be seeing a lot more of each other. Sigh. Slow down!!

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Zzzzzz…

Going into being parents I had a vague idea of some of the things that could prove to be challenging. I knew to expect sleepless nights with newborns, that the twos could be terrible, that potty training could go smoothly or not, but I didn’t realize that so many things could drag out for as long as they do. In 4 years I think we can probably count on our hands the number of nights where we have slept undisturbed and have felt truly well rested. There always seems to be at least one child who wakes up in the night and if one child goes to bed without a fuss, then it’s highly likely the other one will not go down easily.  Quite frankly, it’s exhausting.

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I can only hope that this stage won’t last another 4 years, but who can say?  Phoebe has suddenly decided she doesn’t want to stay in her bed at bedtime, unless I lay down with her and for some reason it is taking her forever to fall asleep lately. I’ll leave 20-30 minutes later only to hear her calling out for me, but even more aggravatingly she has started to lie down in front of her door making it impossible to get in her room!  She thinks it’s quite hilarious and then Enzo ends up wanting to know what’s going on as I try to convince Phoebe to back away from the door. We’re working on leaving her door cracked and so far threatening to not let her watch TV the next day if she doesn’t stay in bed has been somewhat working.

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Then you have Enzo who has to get up and pee at least once a night, but sometimes more than that and insists on a parent (usually Josh) to come and get him, which is probably for the best since I don’t want him getting hurt climbing out of his bed when he’s mostly still asleep. Sometimes Josh and I will surprise each other in the hallway late at night – him taking Enzo to or from the bathroom and me heading to Phoebe’s room or back to our bed, though generally if she calls for me in the middle of the night I end up just sleeping with her because I fall asleep while trying to get her back to sleep.

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It’s a darn good thing they’re both fairly cute and have redeeming qualities or this whole lack of sleep thing would be a lot harder to bear.