Swim Lessons!

Kalena started swim lessons on Monday.  I held out until she turned 3 because I had no intention of actually getting in the pool with her.  (Especially since that would mean needing someone to watch Will during all her lessons.)  And on Monday when we got to the pool and it was only 58 degrees, so I was extra glad I didn't have to get in.  Fortunately Kalena was not deterred by the cool, cloudy day.

Here she is being too cool to have her picture taken.

Learning to back float.  Her teacher said she had some trouble with listening and following directions, but I sort of think that's just because she's 3.

And while Kalena has lessons Will gets to play at the splash pad.  Of course, this was all we could get him to do.  Well, he would do this and let my mom carry him around.  Good times.

So far, so good.

Belated

Happy Father's Day to Brian, who has been an amazing father since the first moments.

And continues to be an amazing father every day.

If you have a dinosaur loving child...

And you're going to be in western Colorado sometime between now and labor day, go to Dinosaur Journey.  They have a temporary exhibit that has a full sized animatronic T-Rex.  It's pretty awesome.  And it's big enough that it scared Kalena.  Actually, that cut our trip a little short since she didn't want to be anywhere in the museum that you could see the T-Rex.  And you could pretty much see it from everywhere.  Don't you worry though, there's a McDonald's next door with an excellent play place, so short museum visit just meant longer lunch.  (We ate lunch while Kirsta and Patrick finished seeing the dinosaurs.)

Of course, while I was filling our drinks Kalena went into the play area and something happened (don't know what) that caused her to come out to me crying and saying, "I hurt my butt!"  And instead of wondering what happened all I could think was, "I wonder how many of these other parents are judging me because my 3 year old is saying butt."  She was fine, by the way.

Over.

Well.  For a minute there I was pregnant.  But now I'm not.

It's disheartening mostly.  It's also making me considerably more cynical about positive pregnancy tests.  I would love to be one of those women who get a positive test and believe with certainty that they'll get a baby out of the whole deal.  Instead I see a positive and think, well I'm pregnant.  Again.  For now.

The whole thing was unexpected since we were preventing, but definitely not unwelcome.  I had just enough time to start getting excited about the idea of a third child before the beginning of the end.  When the spotting started I knew it was over.  Despite my intuition and a first doctor visit on Wednesday, miscarriage wasn't confirmed until this afternoon.  But it was confirmed.

My medical history now officially includes: Pregnancies: 4, Live Births: 2.  *sigh*

We may be crazy

At the end of July, my mom and I are flying to California.  We're taking both the kids.  I'm already worried about how we're going to keep both kids entertained through the entire flight, especially since we're in "open seating" so we aren't guaranteed to have seats together.  We're counting on at least two seats together (one of us and Kalena.)  Will is young enough that he's a lap child and I'm hoping that's not a disaster.

So.  Any great ideas on what I should be doing to prepare?  You know, like finding a doctor that will prescribe sedatives for the kids?  (Kidding.  Mostly.)

My children: little tiny black holes

We don't live in a very big house.  There aren't that many places for things to get lost.  And yet?  They do.  When we moved in here we had 6 child-sized spoons.  (Awesome metal ones.  I'm not a big fan of the plastic ones or the rubber coated metal ones.)  Now we have 2.  Where are the other 4?  NO IDEA.  I've looked, believe me.  They're just *poof* gone.

Also, remember when we found Gizmo in the yard?  He disappeared again a few weeks after that.  I have yet to see him again.

And, after WEEKS of looking, I finally found one of the kids toys that I'd been looking for.  It's actually a piece of a toy, a little purple flag that goes with the Little People airport we have.  Why couldn't I find it for so long?  Because it was in an UNOPENED box of diapers.  Yep, when I opened the box there it was.  One of the kids must have shoved it through the little hand hold opening.  Apparently finding a comb in the refrigerator wasn't crazy enough.

Do your kids manage to lose things like this or is it just mine?

Kalena at 3

Kalena says "you not" instead of "don't."  As in, "you not say that!" instead of "don't say that!"  She even does it when she's "reading" Where the Wild Things Are-- the line that says, "Oh please don't go, we'll eat you up we love you so!" turns into "Oh please not go" it's pretty awesome.

Instead of telling me that she doesn't want Will doing something, she'll tell me that Will doesn't want to do it.  I hear a lot of, "Buster not want to play with that!"

When she goes to get something she'll say to me, "You stay RIGHT here.  I be RIGHT back."

If I ask her to do something she doesn't want to do she'll look at me with her hand on her hips and say "I busy."  She's definitely got a sassy streak.

If she knows only adults are allowed to do certain things she'll tell you that only mommies and daddies can do that.  (Open our back gate, for instance.)  Of course, it's a little amusing when she tells me that only mommies and daddies can use mascara.

I'm not sure if I mentioned this before, so sorry if I did.  When we moved in to this house, I started making Kalena go to her room if she wanted to cry.  I don't mean when she gets hurt or anything-- just when she's crying for no reason or pitching a fit over something ridiculous.  When that happens I tell her that if she wants to cry she can go do it in her room.  And now, if something happens that makes her want to cry she will often go to her room before she even starts crying!  Sometimes I have to remind her, but she is good about it most of the time.  It has saved me from having to listen to a whiny crying child MANY times.  Plus, lots of times she gets so distracted in her room that she forgets to cry in there at all.

Some days, to encourage her to go to sleep at nap time I'll tell her what we're going to be doing when she wakes up.  Playing outside, going to Grandma & Grandpa's house, watching a movie.  Then I remind her that she needs to take a good nap before we can do that.  But some days I don't have anything in particular planned so I'll just tell her that when she wakes up we're going to "do fun things."  And now when she wakes up from nap she'll come find me and say, "I want to do fun things."  I guess I need to get together a "fun things" list.

In the few days right before she turned three, if you asked her how old she was going to be on her birthday she would say, "I fink I be free."  I pretty much tried to get her to say it as many times as I could.

So far I'm enjoying age 3 quite a lot.

Home again

Brian has been out of town for work since Tuesday.  Did I mention that?  I don't think so, probably because I was trying not to think about it.  But now he's home and I survived!  Of course, I ate dinner with my parents every night (wouldn't you, if that were an option?)  Still.  While he was gone I learned some things about me.

1) When Brian isn't around I snack late at night.  I don't know why since I don't usually snack late at night.  Maybe it's because...
2) I stay up late when he's not here.  Like, an hour or an hour and a half later than I normally do.  This is because...
3) I don't like to go to bed when I'm home alone.  (I mean, obviously the kids are here, but you know.)  I don't mind going to bed alone if Brian's here, but when he's not here I just stay up.  Even though I'm tired.

It's a good thing Brian doesn't have to travel much for work, otherwise I would gain weight AND be tired all the time.  I'm glad he's home.

And now it's bedtime

On Monday night I woke up to fireworks.  My first thought was, "Who in the world is lighting off fireworks in the middle of the night?!"  Then I looked at my phone and saw that it wasn't even 11 pm yet.  And that's when I realized that I'm an old lady.



P.S. It was the Memorial Day fireworks at JUCO.  We live only a few blocks from where the stadium so they were LOUD.  Not loud enough to wake Brian up though.

The tray is getting a little cramped

It's getting a little hard to feed Will in his booster seat these days.  Why?  Because of all the toys he insists on having while he eats.  

He got more upset when the triceratops fell off the tray than when his milk did.