BOO!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!!

I wanted to post a photo of the boys in their cute costumes, but I haven't managed to get Nick to try his on yet. He is very excited about Haloween, and about candy. He has been practicing saying "Trick Or Treat!" But whenever I start putting his costume on him, he starts shouting "Take It Off! Take It Off!"

We shall see.

How to get a good night's sleep.

There are many ways to get a good night's sleep.

But watching 4 episodes of MEDIUM in a row, and then reading Stephen King's latest novel "until you fall asleep" is not a good tactic, expecially if your husband happens to be away on a business trip.

Testing Testing 1 2 3

Yesterday's post would not publish, no matter how many times I tried. I'm wondering if today's will be any different.

Last night we went to a wedding. It was good to see my friends there, and to catch up a bit, although I was a little over-excited to be kid-free, and probably came across and a crazy lady. Well... maybe I AM a crazy lady. Maybe my kids have driven me there.

A Little Dark Humor...

So, last night we settled down to watch the latest movie Steve ordered from Netflix, The Hills Have Eyes.

The Hills Have Eyes, as far as I know, is a movie about people driving cross country and being pursued by inbred country savages who want to eat their brains. This is pretty consistant with the movies Steve chooses to watch, being a fan of the horror movie genre.

But last night, after putting the DVD in the player, we realized we were watching commercials. A Life Insurance commercial. We were confused. Why did they put these ads in front of this horror film? Was the DVD playing? Yes, yes it was... how odd. And you know how Steve feels about ads on DVD's, and if you didn't, you do now.

But then, then we started noticing that there was something... well, off, about these adds. And then this show started playing... it looked like the type of show you might find on the History Channel, one of those, well, historic documentaries. But it was wrong. Oh, so wrong.

Ladies and Gentleman, we were watching CSA, The Confederate States of America, a mockumentary about what this country would be like if The South has won the civil war.

OH MY GOOD LORD!

It was actually really interesting, if you can watch the offensive material and understand that it is, well, supposed to be offensive and it might be OK to laugh. Besides, there are really funny "commercials" and clips included, including a musical version of Gone With The Wind, only caled something ese and with a twisted plot... and a clip from a film called "I Married and abolitionist!"

So, the movie snuck up on us, but we enjoyed it. It was really... interesting. We'll have to watch the horror movie about the crazy zombie country bumpkins some other day. And as for the title of todays post... oh! Look at the time! I have to go.

Potty Talk

I try not to write too much about potty training because I know Nick will hate me for it later, and quite frankly, who needs to hear about that kind of stuff. But this was funny.

We have made an effort to teach Nick the correct terminology for boy parts and girl parts. This morning, while Nick was sitting on the potty, he asked "Nathan has a penis?"

"yes, Nate has a penis."

"Daddy has a penis?"

"Yes, Daddy has a penis."

"Mommy has a penis."

"No," I said. "Mommy doesn't have a penis."

There was a light pause and then he said:

"Mommy has GENIUS?"

Yes. Yes, mommy has genius. A whole lotta genius.

Pinch of This, Dash of That

Nathan isn't walking yet. But he will stand for short periods of time without falling, as long as you stand him up. He won't do it himself. He has recently developed a huge separation anxiety thing, and whenever I leave his line of sight he screams like a banchee. And sometimes he screams like a banchee if he sses me but I am not holding him. This makes it incredibly difficult to do things like, oh, make lunch, prepare a bottle of formula, or tie shoe laces.

Nicholas is a little imp. He is two. His favorite word is "NO!" But, since starting school, he has no also learned "Not Yet!" He also knows most of his colors, which amazes me.

In Tennessee, we all packed into the car to go someplace, but with two carseats in the back, there wasn't a whole lot of room. My Aunt Frances sat up front, and my mother squeezed herself in between the two baby seats. I had strapped Nathan in, and was lifting Nick into the car when he looked at my mother with this strange expression on his face. "Gramma," he said. "Get out!" Didn't this woman know her seat was in the front?

King of the Castle

One of the things we did in Franklin was to visit a playground. Now, usually a playground visit isn't worth mentioning, unless things have been unusually boring and I'm trying to liven things up as much I can. But this playground was different. I wish I had taken more picture of actual construction... It was built like a castle, all in wood, with steps up to walkways and slides, and underpasses, and big pits of sand, and tunnels and dragons and all sorts of fun things. It really was amazing. I like our playground here, but this one was simply amazing.

It was so much fun, in fact, that I wished I was smaller so that I could run around and play without attracting stares from parents. You know how some people are - they don't want adults having fun around their kids. But my mother ignored them. She tried to crawl through this tire tunnel with Nick - and of course Nicholas was gone in two seconds, but it took my mother awhile to get out of there. Mary joined her, and I stood there taking pictures.

And finally, here's Nathan. Doesn't he look big? He's 9 months.

Chaos Theory

Here's a picture of Mary Claire, showing us all how to REALLY take care of a baby.

Other than the frantic travel stories, our trip to Franklin was really very good. We spent one day at the house and Luana came over with her boys - Lucas, who is Nick's age, and Marcus, who is 6 weeks old, pictured here with Mary. We also had a visit from this little girl named Maya, almost 2. The house was packed full of babies and old people. It was actually quite funny!

The busiest part of that day was when I decided to give the boys a bath before dinner. Lucas came into the room. Then Nathan slipped and bit his tongue. (He's not used to his teeth yet.) Blood started pouring out of his mouth. I picked him up to comfort him, and just then my Aunt Betty came in to tell me Steve was on the phone. I asked her to stay with Nick and darted down the stairs, blood pouring from Nate onto my white T-shirt. But by the time I came downstairs, they had already told him I'd call him back.

Back in the bathroom, my Aunt Betty was drying off Nick and trying to get his diaper on. Lucas was chewing on Nick's toothbrush. Nathan was still bleeding on me, and started screaming when I tried to get him dressed...

I wish I had it all on film, because I know you don't believe me!

Getting Back

Believe it or not, in my lifetime I have been on many flights that went smoothly, sailing through security with just enough time to buy a coffee before getting on the plane, which takes off on time, and gets in 10 minutes early. Yes, even after 9/11.

Our first flight coming home, the one from Nashville to JFK, went smoothly. Sure, we were all over the gate and I kept rushing back to the bathroom to change diapers, but that was OK. And my mother ended up loosing both her earing and her glasses during the frantic time we had boarding and installing the carseat while Nate screamed and Nicholas tried to sit ib every other seat on the plane, but that was still OK. We left just a little bit late, but that was still OK.

Then we got to JFK.

In my whole life, in all my visits to JFK, to Heathrow, in all of my delayed flights and rerouted flights, including the time I was dumped at an airport in Chicago for hours and that time I ended up having to take the big purple plane with the basketballs on it... even that time we were coming back from France and our flight got cancelled and we all had to stay at a hotel... I have never seen a zoo like this.

The gate on the monitor said 25R. Not Gate 25. But 25R. SO I asked the lady at the desk what it meant. Apparently 25 other flights were also scheduled to depart from that gate during the next five minutes, so it was a little tricky. SHe told me that the gates flip flopped. "Sometimes it takes of from 25, sometimes from 23. But now it says 25 so stay here." Well, our departure time got closer and closer... Then the big monitor told us it was delayed by 20 minutes - 5:18 instead of 4:59. No big deal. I took the boys to a play area and they got to run around for a bit. Then we headed back... the gate had changed. It did not say 25. It did not say 23. It did not say 25R or 23R. It said SPO.

I stopped an airline employee (there were 50 people on the line in front of me) and asked what SPO meant, and she helpfully told me that she had no idea. So I stood in line. I was lucky enough to be behind a young man who asked the exact same question. The lady behind the desk, now a black woman with long dreadlocks, a yellow vest, and the ability to ignore a person for up to 20 minutes while talking and looking busy the whole time, finally told him she didn't know, but it probably meant they hadn't chosen a gate yet. "Stay here." she said. "I'll let you know."

This is when the girl next to me said she had missed her FIRST flight that way - they kept telling her the flight as coming, to wait, and then they told her it had taken off at another gate. Naturally I refused to leave the gate area after that, and insisted on asking about our flight every fifteen minutes, just in case something happened and I wasn't notified.

Meanwhile, please understand, there were 50 other flights, most of which had been delayed. Flights kept beeing switched to gate 23, and none of these passangers were happy. at about 5:15, our flight time changed to 6pm, and I was forced to leave the gate with the boys to find something to feed them. Nathan was drinking the last of the baby formula, and Nicholas had eaten nothing but cookies since breakfast. I found a newstand and got a bottle of juice, some m&m's, and some Pringles. What a meal.

By the time we got back, our flight was no longer on the board at all. It just wasn't up there. But the other people going to Manchester were still there. After another round of standing in line and being ignored, the dreadlock woman finally told us the plane was there. It just couldn't make it to the gate because of the OTHER planes in the way. And the OTHER planes didn't have crews, so we were waiting for THEM. She didn't know why it wasn't on the board, but we should just WAIT. When our flight finally made it to the board the time of departure was 6:45. The gate still said SPO.

Finally the woman got on the speaker and said our flight was boarding. I have never seen a group of people move so quickly. Once on the plane we waited 45 minutes before we could take off. The flight itself took less than an hour. At no point were we given beverages, or snack, or even apologized to for the airline's obvious incompetency.

It wasn't that the flight was delayed, really. Things happen, flights get delayed. That's understandable. It was that they kept pushing it back in small increments. If they had said TWO HOUR DELAY up front we could have found a sit down place to have a meal. But not even the employees knew what was going on, where the plane was, if it had a crew, if even if there WAS a flight to Manchester. No one knew where it would be, or when it would be.

What do you think?

I Hate the Wright Brothers (getting to Nashville)

I had it all planned out. It was a work of genius.
Our flight out of Manchester was scheduled to leave at 6:30 am on a DELTA flight. We would fly to JFK for a connecting flight, which my mother would join us for, and we would all arrive in Nashville by 10:45 am where we would scoop up our bags, pick up our rented car. Voila! We'd be at my Aunts' house for Lunch!
Ha!

We woke at 4:30 am. We left Nick's sip cup in the car.

Going through security was something like this: Declare the 8 ounces of baby formula to a security person, who notes it on my boarding pass. Declare the tiny bottle of disinfectant and some lens wipes, put them in a plastic bag. Remove NIck's Jacket. remove Nick's Sweatshirt. Remove Nick's shoes. Remove my shoes. Remove my sweatshirt. Place all items in the bin. Remove Nate from rolling carseat. Remove Nate's sweater. Place sweater in bin. Place diaper bag on rolly thingy. Place bin on rolly thingy. Fold rolling carseat while keeping Nick near me and holding Nate. Place carseat on rolly thingy. Send Nick through metal detector twice because he keeps touching the sides. Walk through detector carrying Nate. Show security that I have already declared baby formula. Put on my shoes. Put on Nick's shoes. Put Nate in bin. Put sweaters and sweatshirts in diaper bag. Remve Nate from bin and place in rolly carseat. Unfold carseat wheels. Hope that none of the disgruntled people behind us are on our flight.

We made the flight with plenty of time. A flight attendant helped me get the carseat and the baby and Nick and the diaper bag down two flights of stairs and over the runway and up the stairs into the plane. She gave me a seat extender for the carseat and two bottles of water. We pulled away fromt he gate.... and then the plane started making funny noises. Lights flashed on and off. "No problem folks!" the pilot said. "Everything is fine, we just have a discrepancy here." And I knew.

We returned to the gate. Mechanics got on the plane. A ladder set up under one of the wings and someone started messing with the insides of the plane. The flight attendant passed out cookies and water. Time passed. A woman started bringing out new flight itineraries for those of us who had missed our connecting flights. I found out that my next flight was going to be to Detroit, where I would then catch a third flight to Nashville, all with a different airline. I took both boys into the bathroom with me, which was so small that one person would need to stand to open the door... And then they told us all to get off the plane.

We all stood on line - we were last in line, of course. They gave me a THIRD itinerary - through US Airways - which would fly me from Manchester to Charlotte and then to Nashville. The first flight left at 12:40, six hours after our original flight was supposed to leave. That left me almost four hours in the airport with the boys.

Here's what happened during the four hours of waiting: We spoke to Steve, my auntes, my mother, and my father on the phone. We visited the rest room 5 times for diaper changes. Each boy got a complete change of clothing. We went to McDonalds with the meal voucher. Nate emptied my coffee down the heating vent. We visited the arcade where Nick pretended to drive a car. We went to Starbucks to get water and a yogurt and a coffee. Nick spilled the coffee all over the carpet at the gate.

Our second flight Nathan made faces at the men sitting behind us, two men in suits and a young guy in a T-shirt and a cap. Nate spat up on me twice and knocked a half made bottle of frmula all over the aisle. Wehn we landed I wanted to wait until everyone else had gotten off so I wouldn't hold anyone up. But the men behind us wouldn't move. "You can go ahead," I said. "It may take us awhile." But the men just sat there. "By all means," one guy said, motioning for us to go. The T-shirt guy said "I'm not in any hurry!" That's when I realized HE WAS IN HANDCUFFS! Duh.

The airline hadn't managed to get the stroller on the plane, so I had to stand in line - twice, since the first time I didn't know which baggage claim number when to the stroller - and file the correct paper work so they would bring it to the house. I should have left it at home - we didn't use it once.

So... that's getting there. Maybe tomorrow I'll post my adventures of getting back - also a delightful experience.

One of Those Days

It's one of those days. Here's a list:

- Every morning the boys wake up at 5:30am. It is pitch black. Every morning Nicholas's bed is soaking wet because his diaper leaked. His diaper isn't leaking because it's on wrong, or doesn't fit. It's leaking because the boy pees so much at night that the diaper can not possibly contain all of the pee, so it ends up all over his PJ's and his bedsheets. The first thing I do every day, at 5:30am, in the pitch dark, is to strip his sheets and start laundry.

- I'm potty training Nick. Which is a pain. He's doing well. Sometimes he even pees on the potty. But mostly not. And I promised I wouldn't talk about it too much because no one wants to hear it and Nick will hate me later for telling people, but when we go every 20 minutes, and we go, and he doesn't pee, and his diaper is dry, then 20 minutes later we go again, but his diaper is wet, and he doesn't pee, and he doesn't care, and it seems like a big huge waste of time... am I crazy? it's very frustrating, and we've just started.

- See this wonderful sweather in this picture? I love this sweater. Nick wore it. Nate wore it. Then today I accidentally washed it with the regular wash in warm water, and it's wool, and now I have a baby doll it might fit because it's THAT SMALL. I ruined it. Not baby food, not spit up, not even grass stains from playing in it. It was me and my ineptitudity for laundry.

- I have been using words like ineptitudity all day.

- People have been cutting me off and stealing my parking spaces all morning.


That's it. I won't go on, mostly because it's not worth it. My brother Jamie should be home at last! Jamie - call me! Then come and visit me! We shall force you to visit indoor playgrounds and play Monopoly while eating apple pie until you explode. As I have done.

Tomorrow I leave for Tennessee, and I'll be there until Saturday, so I may not post much. But maybe I will. Who knows?

Bye-Bye, Bug!

Well, the bug is gone, folks. We hadn't driven it in over a year - it speant most of the time stuck in the mud down by the shed. So we sold it to someone who will fix it up and make sure it gets driven. Nick will miss it. Ever since we took the cover off he asks to sit in it and pretends he is driving. We sang Toot Toot Chugga Chugga Big Red Car in it. It's the end of an era.

Forever Young

Tell me this isn't a great photo. Just go ahead and tell me. I know you're lying.

Friday the 13th

When I was in 5th grade, on Friday the 13th, I fell and split my lip on a city curb. I was lucky I didn't knock my front teeth out because I already had my permanent set, my baby teeth having been knocked out in second grade by a gatepost, which I walked right into. (I'm not sure if that was on a Friday, let alone the 13th.)

Since the curb vs. lip incident I always considered Friday the 13th unlucky and avoided doing anything on that day. I am very superstitious, although I don't mean to be. As a kid I refused to wear pants to school for 2 years because I had a bad day in the 3rd grade while I was wearing pants. (I wore skirts - please don't think I went to school unclothed.)

Anyhow, I have since discovered that it isn't Friday the 13th that is unlucky. It is actually Thursday the 12th. All my Thursday the 12ths are miserable. I have really, really bad days, and I never know why. Then, the next day, when it's Friday the 13th and everyone on the radio is talking about the day and the horror films are planned for that night on TV, I think back and this feeling of enlightenment washes over me. OH YEAH! I think. THAT'S whay the day was so bad!

The good news is, my Thursday the 12ths are usually so miserable that the Fridays are a breeze, relatively happy and carefree.

Have a good day, everyone!

I am a Rock

I think this picture just about says it all for me today.

Crazy Horse

I think this is the picture of Nathan on the rocking horse. But it took me a couple of times to post a photo, and I had to do it a couple of times for it to work, and then I wrote a little bit about playing Monopoly, then I deleted everything (who really wants to hear about Monopoly?) and started over, and then I got distracted with my day.

Now that the photo is posted, my browser won't let me see it. So I'm guessing.

Like Father Like Son

This is a picture of Nick eating a donut. He's actually thinking "Look at all that yummy donut on the FLOOR!"

I remember my dad getting his first home computer. It was an Apple 2E. There was no such thing as a mouse, so you had to type the name of the file in, and the computer would find it on the "floppy disk" which was about the size of my head. We were really impressed with it. There was a game called "ghost town" that would actually LET YOU TELL IT WHAT TO DO! You had to use 2 word commands, but it had a vocabulary of almost 200 words! That's a fraction of what Nick knows now. The computer could also show pictures! There was a program called "Turkey in the straw" which showed a stick figure dancing to, you guessed it, Turkey In The Straw. We were amazed. The future had arrived.

As many of you know, Nick has a thing about phones. He's been given a billion toy cell phones, many of which make irritating beeping noises, and also a few old real phones that no longer work, and also some remotes which he pretends are phones. When anyone around him speaks into a phone, Nick picks something up and pretends to speak into the phone.

The other day Nick picked up one of his toy phones and started pressing the buttons while he was looking into it. He looked up at me. "I'm checking my email," he says.

The future has arrived.

Look Mommy! He's Staying with me!

When my friend Alee was a little girl she got a kitten. She would clutch the kitten to her body, longing for the cuddly closeness a kitten promises. The cat would be a wriggling mass of legs and fur and trying to escape. And Alee would just squeeze it closer and shout "Look, Mommy! He's satying with me!"

Sometimes I feel that way with Nate. I love nothing more than to rub my face next to his, to breathe in the baby shampoo smell, and to feel the softness of his skin and his hair. But I can only do it when he's asleep. Otherwise he's all wriggling and claws and trying to bite my face off... he's playing, but his nails hurt, and he has a few teeth now, and he really wants to get down and wander around the house so that he can find paper to eat.

What you've been missing

The leaves have turned over the past couple of weeks. It really is fantastic. This is one of the reasons I like New Hampshire as much as I do.

I keep trying to capture this beauty with my camera, but I just can't do it. I am obviously not a photographer. The pictures do look better on the computer than on the camera, though.

This will probably be the last week for the view in our backyard. Leaves have been falling like crazy and the next windy day or rainstorm will leave the branches naked until spring.

So if you ever wonder when to visit me, think late September / early October.

Please and Thank You

This is a picture of Nicholas when he was sick. You can see a little bit of the ear sticking out in this image. You can also see how tired and completely worn out he was. He is much, much better now.

Even when he was very sick, Nick said Thank You. He doesn't always say it to other people, but he says it to me and Steve a lot! In the middle of the night, when he calls out for water and I bring it to him, he says "Ganks, Mama!" And at dinner, when Steve hands Nick a roll or a tomato, he says "A Pamato! Gank you so much!"

No matter how hard I try, though, I can't get him to say PLEASE. He only says it if he REALLY REALLY wants something, and usually it's to Nathan, who is immune to manners. It just doesn't make sense to me. Of the two, Thank You should be the hardest to reinforce. If he wants something, he must say Please to get it. Or he doesn't get it. We've actually had a few meltdowns because I withhold something for the please. But I can't withold everything. The kid needs to eat. Besides, most of the time he doesn't WANT to eat. So it's us saying "PLEASE EAT!"

But Thank You... he already has the prize. So there is no real need for him to learn the Thank You. He already has what he wants. But he chooses to say it anyway.

Have I lost everyone yet?

xormnpo[sf

This is how sad my life is: I was really, really looking forward to going out to eat at Bertucci's tonight. It was supposed to be Bertucci's because I found a gift card we still hadn't used. But since Nate was running a low fever and Nicholas was coughing as though his lungs were going to exit his body via his mouth, we've called it off.

We were also supposed to go apple picking tomorrow at Mac's Apples, and even pick our own pumpkin! What fun! But not when your kids are sick and the air is cold and the ground is wet. This is the third time this trip to Mac's has been called on account of illness.

And I'm not sick! I'm really tired, but honestly, getting out of the house, even for a little bit, would be such a grand thing! And the doctor's office doesn't count. Neither does the grocery store, or Wal-Mart. Or the drug store. I know, I know, I'm being picky.

So if I'm sounding a little down... If I'm complaining even more than usual, it's just because I've got early onset cabin fever. I'm not supposed to feel this way until at least February, when the snow and wet and cold has us trapped inside.

FREE or Best Offer

Item 1: Red Ford Pickup Truck. It's sucking out my life's energy. Seriously, this truck does nothing but sit in our driveway all summer because it needs to be fixed. This costs thousands of dollars. Once we get it fixed, we can put the plow on it, and Steve plows our driveway when it snows. But because it has the plow on it, he only drives it when it snows, and so it starts falling apart, and then by srping it needs to be fixed again. Plus we pay registration and insurance. I hate the truck. I might pay you to take it away.

Item 2: 28 month old boy names Nick. Obviously he is defective. He is sick again. He has a cold. He will only drink juice and will only eat between thr hours of 2pm and 4 pm, and only if you are feeding him Golden Grahams and grapes. He refuses to eat dinner because he is too tired, so he falls asleep at 6pm and then wakes up every couple of hours crying for no obvious reason until 6am, at which point he gets up for good.

Item 3: 9 month old infant, male, named Damien. I mean Nathan. Sorry. This child refuses to sleep at apppointed times, including the hours of 11pm to 3am, and also 4:30am to 5:30am. He insists, instead, on singing loudly in his crib, waking up anyone who might be in a three mile radius, including the cats and the dog. He also has the ability to appear in dangerous situation in the blink of an eye. One second you place him in the middle of the room, and the next he's stickign one finger in an electrical outlet while sitting in the dog's water dish. He likes to put small, hard objects in his mouth, like rocks, dog food, and batteries. We haven't yet figured out where he is GETTING these objects, however.

I'm hoping to get some sleep tonight. But since ER is on, I'm sure to be dissapointed one way or another.

I tried to find a picture of the truck, but here is a picture of shoes instead.

I didn't mean THAT normal!

Things are back to normal.
It takes Nick 90 minutes to eat breakfast because he's eating one Golden Graham at a time.
Wake up time is 5:30 once again, but somehow worse after all those days of 7am wake-ups. It also doesn't help that 5:30 is now still pitch black.

Linda - Nicholas was feeling Nate's head in an effort to exorcise whatever it is that has taken over our little boy. After much time and effort, however, he told us that there is NOTHING possessing Nathan. He just acts that way all the time. Ha! We thought NICK was hyper and loud! Ha! That's like when my mother thought I was a "difficult teenager" and then my sister hit puberty and dyed her hair green!

There are no pictures today. I didn't take an awful lot of them while the kids were swollen and snotty, so I need to catch up.

Today is the First Day of the Rest of My Life

I have officially declared today the day things "get back to normal."

This means that Nick is back in school. This means that nap times shall be nap times, and TV shall only be watched at very specific times, and very specific shows, and I'm not allowed to let Nick be in our bed not sleeping while I watch episodes of HOUSE.

This also means the return of THE LIST, and by that I refer to my master list, my master planer, the one where I designate specific tasks to do each day, and then I do them. Today, for example, I shall do laundry, go to the dry cleaners, take Nick to and from school, and throw away anything I think Steve might want to keep. (Ha ha! Just kidding!)

Today I am also getting back on MY DIET, and that signals the return of MY WORKOUT. These were both amonth the first casualties of the great "Illness of Late September '06" episode. The detailed title should give you some idea of how many illness episodes there are. A lot. And sleep is always the first to go, and diet and exercise soon after. The same way that, if you stop breathing, you will then pass out and then die. Or if you throw a rock stright up, it will eventually come down and smack you in the head. Anyway, you get the picture.

This photo, by the way, is of my flower bed. The one I planted this spring. I cleared it, digging up every root and weed and rock I could find. And then I planted wild flowers. And then green things started poking out of the ground and I realized I couldn't tell the difference between a growing wildflower and a weed.

I was born a rambling Writer....

Gone are the days I spoke about in my February 22nd post, which you can find in my February Archives. I am talking about the "how to speak Nicholas" post, where every other word is "guk" and woe to the listener who misinterpreted...

These days Nicholas can say quite a lot. He has words like "thermometer" and "stethoscope." He surprises me every day with words I just don't think he learned from me. "Polka-dots." Sure, I may still be the only one who understands him... There is a show on TV, a Dora The Explorer shoot off, called Go, Diego, Go! But Nick gets confused and just calls the boy "Ah-go-go."

Nick speaks in sentences. He says "Boys wants to sit on Mommy," or "May I have a round cracker?" He also can follow multi step directions, such as "Go upstairs, find your shoes, and bring them downstairs to Mommy." The best part is when he speaks to his brother when he thinks no one is listening. "My truck, Nay Nay. Here, hava this toy. Look, Nay Nay! Colors! Move, my truck!"

Nathan, on the other hand... is not talking. But he is getting teeth. Upper teeth. Teeth which he insists on grinding on anything he can put his mouth on. The crib railing. The pot for the potted plant. The trash can lid at the doctor's office.

These boys... these boys they wear me out! Thank goodness it's the good kind, like running for a couple of miles and knowing it was good for you and that you rock, and not the icky kind where you stayed up all night trying to memorize your German vocabulary list, but you're so tired that all you can remember is the word of "ape" and besides you fall asleep and miss the class.

Now that I've gotten sufficiently off subject, I shall go.