RazNoggle

So today Stuart and Myles feel under the weather. At least Myles doesn’t seem to have the cough that Stu is dealing with, but he has had a temp, and been altogether not his chipper little self. I’m enjoying more snuggles consequently, though, so that is a silver lining for sure. I thought I’d do a post to update you on the boys a little bit. I haven’t really done as well posting Myles’ little accomplishments. He is walking, and running, everywhere now. He and Qade get the biggest kicks out of chasing each other around the house. It’s all fun and games till one of them crashes or just decides he doesn’t feel like doing it any longer… then Mommy usually has to intervene. Myles has 12 teeth! He still has his big wide smile and gaps between his teefers that make him look so cute!! I’m not looking forward to our next teething session because that was the WORST one with Qade, but perhaps Myles will surprise us. He certainly has before. As far as communication goes, Myles is verbal! I’ve been trying to teach him signs, because that helped A LOT with our first little lad, but Myles isn’t really going for it. However, he does talk… so I guess it all works out. He said “Ah-done” and “up” (only it’s more like “uh-PPPPPPPP” with a little spit involved, ha!) and he says “bye-bye.” He got a little helicopter from his Auntie, and when it’s done playing it will say “Bye-bye” and Myles will answer it. Very cute! The other morning as I was feeding him his oatmeal, Stu came out and kissed his head and said, “Good morning!” Myles replied with a “ga-monin” I was in shock! Myles also says “Ball” which is one of his very favorite play things. He also will say please when prompted, so he’s coming along in his language skills. Oh, I almost forgot, Myles likes to say “ta-da!” too. That is totally cute! He has a bit of an ornery streak in him when it comes to pestering his big brother. He certainly knows what buttons to push. I will occasionally hear a very irritate shriek followed by 4 running feet as Myles has “stolen” one of his brother’s precious cars and is running for his life with a rather hysterical Qade on his heels. We’re learning lessons about playing nicely, and sharing, and being kind, but well…. it’s slow going. And sometimes Mommy just has to laugh at the looks on BOTH of their faces. I know, bad me!
Qade is growing leaps and bounds in his own language skills. He is very fun to have conversations with now. Sometimes we have to remind him to use his “words” because he thinks that he can revert to “Myles-isms.” They do seem to communicate together, though I don’t think they have their own language. When he does talk like a “big-boy” he uses complete sentences and will actually talk to us about things. One thing he has recently picked up is “okay.” Sometimes when we ask him to do something he’ll say, “Okay!” He will also ask us if we are okay. That’s cute! We’ve been working on him (a lot) recently on his whining. He is making progress, but it has been hard on all of us. The “whining chair” was instituted and he really dislikes having to sit on it. Also he does much better when we remind him immediately not to whine. I get discouraged sometimes because there are days that feel like a battle from “son up to son down” ha ha ha! Still that’s where Stu helps me out so much. When I’m at the point where I’d like to just go stick my head in the snow, he will continue on and work consistently with the boys. Yay for teamwork!! I knew I picked a good Daddy for my little ones, but he still amazes me! We have learned recently that Qade’s attention span is about as long as a FOX news “anchor” so in order to pass along instructions we have to help him focus. He knows that he is supposed to look at our eyes when we are talking to him, and he’ll even repeat it “Wook at Mommy’s eyes” but even while he’s saying it, he’ll be looking out the window, at his little brother, up at the ceiling or more often at the floor. So now we cup our hands around his eyes (kinda like race horse blinders) and it has helped a heap at getting him to look at our eyes and focus on what we are saying to him. I know that he is making progress and I need to stop now and then to look back. It’s like I told a friend of mine in the same boat, we’re always moving on to the NEXT project parenting-wise so sometimes it’s hard to notice the victories that we do have along the way. I love my Monkey #1 and even though we plod through some difficult days he still is such a joy to us, and he’s a sweet little boy too.
Stu was noticing today just how athletic Qade has become in recent months. His balance and coordination have really improved. Sometimes I’m not sure that’s positive since it gives him even more climbing skills! For example, Start got me some magnets for Christmas that I put “up high” on the fridge because they’re chokable for Myles. Well, Qade had asked for them, and I told him they were Mommies. SO yesterday I was talking to Stuart in the office when I distinctly heard the bathroom door close. Hmmmm…. what could that Lad be up to? So when I came to check I found that he had fished his stool out of the bathroom to try and reach the magnets. Finding that inadequate, he had pushed over a box that has a little desk for him and Myles in it (yet to be assembled) and climbed up and did indeed have all 6 magnets in his paws. I was actually too proud of his ingenuity to scold him for taking the magnets down. I actually don’t mind if he has them when Myles is sleeping. Still, I’m gonna have to keep an eye on that dude as he is figure out things for himself.
So to end this incredibly long blog all about US I’ll just say that I hope you all have a fantastic New Years Eve and New Years Day! Watch football to your hearts desire, if you enjoy that (ugh) and eat lots of yummy things because the “resolutions” have to start the next day!!!!

As Qade would say.
We’ve had a BLAST this week!! Once we finally made it “over the interstate and through the traffic” to the fam’s houses we had a great time! Qade simply revels in the attention he gets from his grandparents and Oma. I love to watch him having fun with them. He cried when we left and wanted to “go back, gam-pa’s house!” That’s just because he didn’t know what was in store for him at OUR home! Yes, we are the odd ones who prefer to have our Christmas at home. We LOVE seeing family AROUND Christmas time, but prefer to have our actual Christmas at home with just us…. okay, we’re strange.
So as our “tradition” dictates we get to open something on Christmas Eve. Well, this year Stu said that we should open our stockings SO we did. Since we don’t ‘do’ Santa in our home it’s no biggie, and the boys loved getting their stocking goodies! They both got sunglasses, hoping that it will cut down on the “sun in ma eyes” screams that we get in the vehicle. Who knows though, Myles wouldn’t keep his on for longer than 10 seconds at a time and then scream for help to get them back on. Ha! They both thought they were pretty cool, and I’d have to agree!
Qade got “Cars” glasses, of course, and you can clearly see the McQueen and Mator. Very fun!! Myles glasses are uh… hot wheels I think. I’m not sure, but they don’t have any character on the front so who knows…. they did get schmoozed pretty fast, however.
I got a movie in MY stocking so after the lads went to bed (early, yay!) Stu and I got to snuggle on the couch and watch it. I don’t know who decided that if a baby goes to bed 1/2 hr early that it equals to waking up 3 hours early, but I believe it’s a BAD practice! No, it wasn’t so bad, but at around 4am I heard some squalls coming from the lad’s room and went to comfort Myles. By then he had roused his big bro, but fortunately Qade didn’t get up. I calmed Myles down, told Qade to go back to sleep, and then Myles joined us upstairs because I knew leaving them both in there awake would be a complete calamity!! Then we all got a couple hours more sleep and that made for a good Christmas morning.
We ate our TRADITIONAL Christmas morning breakfast of monkey bread!!!! It turned out so licky, sticky yummy this morning! LOVE IT!! And since the boys don’t have the actual idea of Christmas down yet, they didn’t mind waiting for gifts till after breakfast.
It was SO fun this year to watch Qade figure stuff out. He took an active role in passing out gifts with a hearty, “Mewwy Cwismas” and he took an even more eager interest in opening his own gifts. It has finally clicked to him that when ya tear the pretty paper off, there is something really fun on the inside! Myles is still much more interested in playing with the packaging and paper than the gifts but there were a few that sparked his interest.
We are determined to teach our children thankfulness, in as much as WE can. We want to teach by example, and also by helping them learn to give. This year at my family’s house we had Qade pass out the gifts we brought and tell each person Merry Christmas, by name. Then when visiting Stuart’s grandmother in an assisted living home, we encouraged Qade to shake hands with the residents and tell them Merry Christmas as well. He was so good about it! Sometimes going there makes the boys nervous, but this time they were both showing off for the amusement of the older folks. It made my heart glad to see the smiles that our boys were able to get from the people there. Next year, since the lads will both be old enough to participate, we will make “goodies” for them and have a great adventure “giving” day. Our little ones are very privileged to have so many caring people who want to give them good things. They have fantastic grandparents on both sides, and of course, WE even have a hard time restraining our ‘gifting’ when we see something we just KNOW they’d love! But more important than them getting all the things their little hearts could wish for, we want them to be thankful and ENJOY what they already have, and appreciate new things they get, rather than think that it’s just their due. We also want to help them learn the joy of giving. That is a treasure that can’t be taken away.
SO anyway, I hope that you have all had a very very fun and happy Christmas! Hope that “santa” whomever that is for you, was generous to you this year, and that you thought a lot about what it meant for “Baby Jesus” (as Qade calls Him) to be born for us. Merry Christmas!

Qade the little entertainer hasn’t been disappointing lately. He and his Daddy have this “fist bump” they do where Stuart will tell Qade to “hit the rock” and then Qade bumps his fist. Well, one day Qade put out his little fist and said, “Hit the little rock, Daddy” Ha!! Who knew he even had the size concept down?? He’s a fun, funny kid. The other night at dinner, out of the blue, he said, “My chill pill.” He then pretended to pick up a “pill” from his place mat and eat it! I was rolling with that one! We occasionally tell him to “take a chill pill” when he is having issues. He saw my vitamin by my plate and assumed it was my chill pill and he needed one too. I gave him a flintstone kid vitamin with dinner last night and he told me it was his vitamin chill pill. It’s amazing to me what our child will come up with. I know I don’t give him enough credit.
Stuart and I were recently organizing our sheet music and books. Qade sat happily on the floor examining one book after the other and telling me each time he picked one up, “This book is my favorite!” Now he’ll pick a random person he knows like Uncle James and pick a book out of his collection and say, “This is Uncle James’ favorite book.” Silliness!
Myles is our sneaky lad. He is learning what is off limits in our house to him, but that won’t stop him from touching now and then, just to check if it’s still a “no-no.” Usually all I do is say his name and he goes running (yes, he’s getting quite fast on his little feet) in the opposite direction. He’ll adopt this “I wasn’t touching it, oh no” look on his face as well. Hmmmmm…. Myles walks everywhere now. He rarely crawls at all, and is surprisingly sturdy. He will hang on to Qade’s shirt and walk around with him, just to be annoying. Qade squeals about it the whole time which is probably why Myles gets a kick out of doing it. Typical little brother. He IS indeed learning how to push Qade’s buttons and thinks he’s quite something when he gets a reaction. Ah, little people… they remind me so much of myself it’s terrible. Ha ha!
Myles is going through that phase that Qade also went through where it’s the most fun thing ever to empty drawers. I remember this with Qade, but you see then it was only one against one. NOW however, Qade thinks it’s great fun to join Myles and since he can reach the higher drawers EVERYTHING ends up on the floor. Imagine what a happy camper I was when I went to their room one day to find the entire contents of their dresser strewn about as well as 2 under-the-bed rubbermades that had “organized” clothes in it. Oh, and every book was off the book case too. Yep, happy day. I’ve started to learn though, and Qade and Myles both get to help put things back. Qade doesn’t enjoy it, so hopefully it’ll act as a deterrent from destroying things in the first place. Though I have a feeling that when that little brother begins to have such a blast being a destruct-o-matic that he won’t be able to resist.
It’s always an adventure. We’ve been 2 days on our “potty sabbatical” and doing great! Qade doesn’t seem to care a bit, and I’d rather change diapers than deal with the constant battle at this point. The holidays will certainly be “happier” for this mommy!