Sunday, August 30, 2015

Funny Sammer Hammer

The scene: The other day, at 4 p.m.
Me: "Okay, Sam, time to change your diaper."
Sam: "Dad already changed Nam's diaper."
Me: "Oh yeah?"
Sam: "Dad changed Nam's diaper. Dad go to work!"

And Jeff had gone to work 8 hours earlier.


The scene: Jeff, Matt, and Sam were playing in the playroom.
Matt, looking for a toy: "Where's the hammer?"
Sam, pointing to himself: "Right here!"

Thursday, August 20, 2015

Little-kid games

Here are some of the things that go on in this house all the time.

Sam says, "Car coming down the road. Wait in the grass! Sam coming down the road. Wait in the grass! Kangaroo coming down the road. Wait in the grass!" Etc. This is from when we were in Vermont.

"Impact hammer! Impact hammer!" There's a series of YouTube videos called Twenty Trucks about trucks and machines that have catchy, informational songs. Impact hammer is a big hit around here. Sam especially likes to bang things on the floor or poke things hard with his finger and shout "Impact hammer!" He likes to switch it up and say "Impact Sammer!" or "Impact Dadder!" or "Impact Mommer!" Etc.

Sam likes to pretend to be a kangaroo. He doesn't jump around, though. He just walks around on his knees and says, "Kangaroo! Kangaroo!"

Foud time. This is when Matt's pretend cat goes to a restaurant by itself to try new foods. It's usually at 7:30 p.m. because his cat likes to spend time with its family during the day and just have foud time when everyone is going to sleep. No clue where he came up with this.

Matt has a pretend cat and mouse that do all kinds of things. They live in a nearby town. They watch Matt's babies when Matt is at his construction job. They help Matt with things. Matt plays with them when he is at his house (also in a nearby town). His cat is 14 years old.

Kratts buildings. Matt likes to build Kratts buildings. These are pet-supply stores. He's been building them all over the place for many months. Not sure where he got the name for them.

Ben loves when I say "fuzzy puzzles" to him. He laughs really hard. I've tried similar things, like "fizzy puzzles," "fuzzy pieces," "busy puzzles," etc, but only "fuzzy puzzles" is hilarious. He also likes when people say "bless you," when people make loud fake sneezing sounds, and when Sam puts his face very close to him (he thinks it's okay when Matt puts his face really close but definitely smiles bigger at Sam for some reason).

Matt teaches Sam things

Matt and Sam were both in the bathroom, so Matt took the opportunity to teach him about toilets: "It goes down to bigger and bigger and bigger pipes and then it goes to a water retreatment. For your potty it's just done."

This morning Sam was working on counting, walking around talking to himself: "1, 2, 3, 7, 8."
Matt said, "That's not how counting goes, Sam. It's '1, 2, 3, 4, taquito, 5, 6, 7, 8.' Can you say 1, 2, 3, 4, taquito, 5, 6, 7, 8?" Oh, brothers. 

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Reading plans

I'm SO tired of truck books. I asked Matt if he was just going to read about trucks for his whole life, or if he would sometime check out books about animals or princesses or rockets or something else. He said the whole time he's a kid, he'll check out truck books. I asked if he still would when he was an adult. He said no, he'll read scary stories then. He'll read "about ibexes and wolves and stuff like that."

Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Ben's sleep saga notes

(Hopefully this will be more accurately titled "Ben's sleep notes," not needing the "saga" part.)

Ben was a really good sleeper as a newborn. Then when we got back from Vermont he abruptly got all crazy with sleeping, waking up a lot at night and not napping well at all, completely rejecting the Rock N Play for a week.

The step we are taking this week to help him fall asleep on his own and hopefully not wake up so much at night is for me to not nurse him to sleep at night, with at least 20 minutes between milk and sleeping.

Last night there was a lot of crying. Jeff rocked him in the Rock N Play and held him, then I held him for a little bit. Then I rocked him to sleep in the RNP. He fell asleep around 8:05, woke up at 11:50, 3, and 6 to eat, then got up for the day around 8:30.

Tonight Jeff rocked him in the Rock N Play. Then he cried a little bit. Then I talked to him and held him, tried to put him in the RNP for a minute or two. Ben was really fighting his sleepsack, grabbing it and trying to chew on it, so I put him in the crib to distract him. He rolled onto his side, fought with his sleepsack a little, then went to sleep when I was out of the room, at 8:15. (Night wake-ups were at 11:20, 1:20, 4:30, and 7:15. Not great. Plus Sam woke up a couple times.)

August 12:
Fed at 7 p.m.
Put in crib at 7:20. Too much sleepsack chewing and fussing. Put in RNP at 7:30. Sleeping by 7:35. Woke up at 1 a.m.! YAY! Then at 4 and 6:20. A very good night. Awake for the day at 8:20.

August 13:
Fed at 7 p.m.
Put in RNP at 7:25. Too much sleepsack chewing and kicking. Put in crib at 7:40. Sleeping by 7:45. Woke up at 11 p.m., 3:45 a.m., and 6:45 a.m. Another good night!

August 14:
Rough day full of short naps. Fed at 6:20 p.m. Sleeping in RNP at around 7. Woke up at 8 and 10 p.m. to eat. I heard Ben snuffling around at 1 a.m. When I went in to check on him, he was asleep on his stomach. Around 2, I rolled him over because he was making weird noises. He woke up at 2:20 and 5:45 to eat. Slept until 7:15. Not bad, but not great. I'm glad he could keep himself asleep even though he rolled over.

August 15:
Another bad nap day. Fed at 7:40. Asleep in crib at 8:20. Woke up at 10:30, 1, and 4:45. Awake for the day at 7:30. Not so great.

August 16:
Fed at 7 p.m. Rocked to sleep in the RNP. Slept until 5 a.m.! I was very alarmed, and for good reason, it turned out. Ben was out of sorts all day today, doing a lot of crying and not wanting to eat.

August 17:
Fed at 7:30 p.m. Rocked in RNP, asleep by 7:30. Woke up at 10 p.m. and 4 a.m. Awake for the day at 7:15.

August 18:
Fed at 7 p.m. Rocked in RNP, asleep by 8. I woke Ben up to feed him at 10:45 since he hadn't been eating well at all for the past two days. Then he woke up at 3 a.m., so I tried to feed him. Instead, he cried loudly like he's been doing during the days and refused to eat. I put him back. He cried a little bit later, maybe 10 minutes later, so I tried to feed him again. He kind of ate for one or two minutes. Then he seemed to want to just smile at me, so I put him back in his crib. He went to sleep after rolling around for about 20 minutes and slept until 7...when he again refused to eat.

The nights have definitely improved now that we're putting Ben down at least 20 minutes after I feed him, but I am totally confused about his eating habits in general now. We'll see how this week goes.

August 19:
Kind of fed at 7. Asleep on own in crib at 7:45. Very hungry at 11:35 p.m. Kind of hungry at 4:30 a.m. but not really. Awake for the day at 7:35 but not hungry until 8:45 a.m.

August 20:
Fed at 7. Almost asleep on own at 7:40 in crib. Then lots of hard crying, and I ended up holding Ben until he was all the way asleep at 8. So frustrating. He woke up at 9:30, 12:15, and 6:35 to eat. Weird again.

Sam's shopping list

I was about to leave for Walmart to get some groceries, and I said to Sam, "Bye. I'm going to Walmart now. Do you need anything?" He whispered, "Fruit snacks."

Done. Can't resist that kind of cuteness.

Tuesday, August 4, 2015

Too much talking

"Sometimes I have too much talking and my brain gets mixed up and I forget what I'm thinking of. Sometimes I just am talking too much." - Matt

Amen. Sometimes he just is talking too much.