I regret to say that while the children have been adorable, there has been a serious sleep deficit lately. The more sleep I lose, the less I can recall. What I faintly recall from last weekend, is that they've been tag teaming me. As soon as one child seemed to be more or less (or not at all, actually) settled back into bed, the other one wailed from their room. After two nights of this, we went to visit the Massachusetts Grandparents. They kindly took the kids off our hands while we tried to recover some sleep. Noodle was seriously damaging her image as the happy-go-lucky baby, screaming and insisting that only Mommy would do. Finally she managed to poop, and magically turned lovely again. Photo here is, obviously, after her recovery.
So I'm losing memories faster than I can observe them, but this is a posting of the few bits I can still scrape together.
Noodle- at seven months old, she's still pretty limited in variety, but she's lovely to cuddle, and amusing to watch:
* Contemplating a pacifier, picks it up, considers it, tries to put it into her mouth, only to hit another pacifier. Clunk. She reconsiders the pacifier again, turns it a bit, tries again. Clunk.
* Sharing a bath with Q, slapping the water, then happily slapping the back and limbs of her brother when he lies down next to her.
* She can now unreliably sit up on her own, and looks absolutely delighted with herself.
* She reliably loves her Noodle Theme Song and will quiet down almost any time I sing it to her.
Q - He is CONSTANTLY TESTING US. I am gritting my teeth a lot. But I'm also really amazed by how much he's picking up on lately:
* Looking at a book ("Knuffle Bunny Too") asks if this is the motory. (Actual photo is of a rotary.) I point out the New York City skyline and tell him that's where his Uncle Ralph lives. He says, "And maybe Aunt Marilyn." They evidently made an acute impression on their visit last month.
* When J sat down at the other end of the blue couch, "That is not a good place to sit. You should sit here." Pats the spot next to himself.
* I put him to bed one night at his usual time, about 6:45. At 8, I went upstairs and spot a light on in his room. I assume he fell asleep with the light on, and slip in to turn it off. Bright eyed, he looks up at me from the Paddington Bear book he is reading, "Mommy will you read this to me?" I crack up and give up any notion that I am going to scold him. (Sneaking a book to read in bed at 3 years old seems pretty darn funny to me.) Since then I have bribed him with books on his sleepless nights, he's allowed to read in bed and I'll turn off the light when I come to bed later.
* He can now accurately sing the alphabet song, as long as you don't like the letter "E".
* He is writing his name fairly reliably- enough that we got a Christmas card from Preschool with his signature. Perhaps they've been practicing without mentioning it?
* Those are simple examples of his obsession with words and letters and numbers. He frequently asks questions such as, "What does sponge start with a-?" "And what comes after S?" And so on. Soon he's going to start asking about words I can't spell without writing down. The advent calendars have been advancing his understanding of double digits. Triple digits (seen in the index of his poetry book) still thwart him.
* I told him "I love you" the other day. He replies, "Yeah, you do."
We're bracing ourselves for Christmas. Last year, Q was rapidly overwhelmed by the holiday and we simply hid all but a few gifts and then parceled them out slowly over several days. I think he'll be a little calmer this year, but he can actually anticipate the holiday, which is definitely asking for a full blown Christmas Meltdown. Whether his or ours is yet to be seen.
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