I'm in trouble.....

When Bruce and I have plans for a Saturday night, we like to do something for the boys. Since Nathan has been doing so well in preschool & daycare, we decided to go out to eat and let him pick the restaurant. I ask him if he wants to go to McDonald's or somewhere else. Guess where he chooses? Al's!! Is it a bad sign when your kid wants to hang out in a bar already? We are afraid to take them anywhere nice as they never sit still, lean over to the next booth/table and have to see what is going on at that table. I was in for a shock when they were very well mannered and stayed in their seats for the most part. Maybe we will attempt to take them somewhere nicer next time????

Preschool

After all the trouble we had with Nathan in daycare, we figured that he was not going to do well in preschool. Well, we were in for a shock when Joyce stayed one night to talk to Bruce when he picked the boys up. Joyce said that Nathan is probably the best behaved kid in the four and five year preschool sessions! She said that he actually wants to learn and seems to be enjoying it. Bruce and I were ecstatic to learn that, but we weren't that way too long. It seems that after preschool is done, Nathan turns into a misbehaving, unruly child. We joke that since he is so good in preschool that he has all this built-up energy that he has to release. We were worried last spring that he was going to get kicked out of daycare with all the trouble he was always in. I have a preschool workbook that we were working on this past Sunday, and Nathan flew the exercises. Apparently he is taking to preschool like a duck takes to water!

Darren's vocabulary seems like it has exploded lately. He is finally calling a tractor a tractor instead of a choo-choo. He knows what a combine is, and knows where I hide the fruit snacks (his absolute favorite food). I will point to his cup and say, "Darren has a blue cup" and then ask him what color his cup is. He never gives me an answer, but I know that he has processed the information. I have been told by several friends that some boys will not answer questions that they know just because they are stubborn. Darren knows most of the alphabet, but when I ask him to say the alphabet, he clams up. Both the boys are stubborn just like their Mom!

Antics

Darren was sick and running a fever this past weekend. Of course, being the conscientious Mom that I am, I never took his temperature but I know he was warm. He just wanted to be held all weekend, and I was more than happy to oblige since he doesn't sit still for more than a minute. Then he asks for milk. I know not to give him milk when he is sick, but he was so pitiful when he asked for it that I couldn't resist. Needless to say the four times he threw up this past weekend, it was curdled milk. Yuck!! I was gagging cleaning up the mess myself.

Nathan has been taking a shower by himself for a while, but we have to watch thru the glass shower doors to make sure that he is washing up instead of playing. Last night he was funny to watch trying to wash his back. We use liquid body shop and a loofah. Nathan was bent at the waist and had the loofah on his back and was trying to reach around to his back and scrub it. It was like watching a contortionist. Too funny!

18 month checkup

I had Darren's 18 month check up yesterday, and he sure is a runt! He is in the 70th percentile for height and 15th percentile for weight. He only weighs 23 pounds but is 33 inches long. The office asked if Darren was a good eater, and I told them that we can't get him to stop eating. We don't know where he puts it all, but he probably eats more than Nathan.

I went to Wal-Mart today at lunch to get the boys some winter clothes since they each only have a couple pairs of pants. Nathan is still in XS (4-5) boys and it was weird buying 12 months pants and 18 or 24 month shirts for Darren. He actually should be in 9 month pants as they fit better in the waist, but they are too short. I was for sure that since Darren was born in the same season as Nathan that he would be able to wear Nathan's old clothes. Alas, he is too small for that. Nathan doesn't have much clothes to save now as he seems to ruin everything. He is such a boy.

Antics

As with most kids, my boys are fascinated with water. Nathan is constantly climbing up the counter and sitting at the kitchen sink playing with the faucet. When I am doing dishes he runs to get a stool that he can wash the dishes. When he first started this I thought, "Great! He can do the dishes from now on." Well, that plan isn't working out like I imagined. He spends more time dumping the water from one bowl/glass/pan to another than anything else. When I tell him that the dish he is working on is clean, he spends two days rinsing it. I won't let him do dishes anymore because our water bill is to high the way it is, so I don't need him wasting any more water than he already is.

Darren. He is going to be a bigger trouble maker than his brother. When he was younger he always tried to play in the toilet so we would close the lid and that would be the solution to that problem. He now has enough strength, and smarts, to lift the lid up. When the lid is lifted slightly, he then puts his fingers in the bowl and then straight into his mouth!! Gross! I thought about getting a toilet lock (if they even make such a thing) and putting one on but Nathan waits to the last minute to use the bathroom and I am afraid that he won't make it to the toilet in time. The moral of the story is to NEVER EVER put his fingers in your mouth!