Playing Doctor

Last night I was feeling a bit under the weather, with a stomach ache mostly (it turned into the flu in the middle of the night, but I'll spare you those details, along with the details of both Ezra and Levi having it as well ... been there, done that, why are we doing it again???). During dinner last night I started feeling pretty uncomfortable and heartburnish (no, I'm not pregnant. Don't even go there), so I excused myself to lay on the loveseat while the boys and Steve finished up. A couple of minutes later, Levi announced, "I have to go check on Mommy." Steve permitted him to do so, and the following scenario ensued:

"Mommy, what's a matter?"
"I don't feel good."
"Oh. Is it your knee (pointing to my knee)?"
"Nope."
"Oh. Is it down your pants (pointing to my pants)?"
"Uh, no (shooting a weird look to Steve, who shrugs)."
"Oh. OK. Is it in your shirt (pointing to my stomach)?"
"Yeah. I have a tummyache."
"Oh. Under your belly button. I'll kiss it."

Levi hopped on back to the dinner table, ate some more, and then announced "I have to check on Mommy again."

"Mommy, where do you hurt now?"
"In my tummy still."
"No, not this time."
"Oh, OK. Where do I hurt now, then?"
"In your head."
"Oh, yes. I do hurt in my head. Can you help me, Dr.?"
"Sure, Mommy. Sure. Hmm ... I'm going to have to take your head off."
"Uh, that's no good. Is there anything else you could do?"
"Nope. Just take your head off. And move it somewhere else."

After dinner was finished Levi continued to be a very attentive Dr. for the rest of the night. He wanted to go get me a pillow, my afghan from my bed (yes, I have an afghan, a beautiful afghan from my Grandma, and it's one of my most prized possessions), a drink of water. He sang me songs (Jesus Loves the Little Children, which he calls "The Black and White Kids Song [?!?!?!?!]" and he made up a song called, "Your head hurts right now."). He tucked me in. He read me a book (The Bernstein Bears and the Spooky Old Tree, word for word). And the whole time he kept repeating two phrases: "Mommy, you're gonna be OK." and "Awww, Mommy, you're so cute."

I asked him if he is going to be a Dr. when he grows up. He replied, "Yes. At Northgate."

From Management:

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--Management

So Long Jibberish, Hello Language...ish

Baby Ezra has started to transition his jibberish from random noises into noises that sound like they could actually be words in a different language. He talks, and talks, and talks, and talks. I can't even imitate it in my head, but it's so cute! And it's so not baby sounding, it's little person sounding. It's not goo-goo gah-gah ma-ma, it's like a little person talking in a different language. I know, I know, I already said that, but it's hard to find the right words to describe it. The funny thing is, he acts like I should be able to understand what he's saying. I don't remember Levi doing this, and I think Ezra does this because he hears Levi and I talking to each other all day and he wants to get in on the conversation. Ask him a question, and Baby Z has an answer. An immediate answer. A "looking-you-in-the-eye-deliberately" answer.

"Do you want some cheerios?"
"ah glah boot."
"Are you thirsty?"
"glee glish nat."

The really scary thing is when it sounds like he's getting words right. Coincidence? Communication? Don't know, but precious either way! Tonight, I was holding toys out to him and saying their names, and he could repeat me almost correctly for each one. And then I held out an elephant for the third time (we were going through the toys over and over again), and he said, "ephet" unprompted. What?! I'm sure it was a mistake. Right?!?!

A few words he says I do not think are accidental. He does say Mama (usually when he's wanting to get up in the morning or from a nap), Daddy (every day when Steve comes home from work), Ezra (I promise, and I'm not the only one that thinks this! He says it looking in the mirror all the time, too!), Hi, and I did it (Steve has heard it too and confirmed my suspicions that he's actually saying this). He says a few other words, and the best part about him saying things is that if I repeat them back to him right after he says them his little chubby face ABSOLUTELY lights up with glee that he was heard, understood, and acknowledged. And when I say his whole face lights up, I mean HIS WHOLE FACE. See?


Yes, every baby does this "starting to talk" thing. But right now, MY baby is doing this. And it's just as yummy to me as his squishy little self is.

Time Out

Levi was given a time out today. Levi gets a time out almost every day. I don't feel bad about that fact -- they are effective for him, and he's the type of child that gets really wound up and needs to have a moment to wind down and think about how to play more appropriately. Or is every kid like that? Maybe so. Here's the dialogue from the time-out chair:

::mumbling is heard from the corner. It goes on for a bit ...
"Levi, you are not allowed to talk when you're on time out. You need to sit there quietly."
:: silence for a moment, then more mumbling but much quieter this time ...
"Levi, I told you that you have to be quiet on time out."
"I am being quiet. I'm not loud any more."
"Levi, when I said be quiet I meant no talking, not just quiet talking."
"But I'm singing 'Heavenly Sunshine' (this remark followed by an angelic head-cocked-to-the-side smile."

I can't believe he played the "but I'm singing a song about Jesus" card. He's only 2 ... I am starting to realize that when Ezra's a little older and can reason like this I'm going to quickly find myself quite outnumbered.

He has no idea ...

Tonight, putting Levi to bed, he wanted to sing to me instead of me singing to him. Here's what he sang:

"In Christ lone, my fope is found, a light a string a song. Our Cornerstone, a little ground, nu-uh-uh siersest drought and storm. Nu-uh-uh love, a depth of peace, a sears a still, a strivings cease. My comforter, my solid ground, in Christ my live."

And then, he wanted to sing it for Daddy. So we called Steve into the room, Levi crawled into his bed with Steve (for his nightly Daddy snuggle time), and Levi and I sang "In Christ Alone" to Steve.

Steve said, "oh, buddy, we are so proud of you. You have no idea."

To which Levi responded, "OK. Now let's do devotions."

Really, we are SO proud of him. So proud. So privileged are we to watch a childlike faith develop in this little boy. Proud doesn't even describe it. He has no idea.

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Edit: I ran downstairs to post quick before putting Ezra to bed, and much to my mixed dismay and delight found that I took too long posting. This is what I came upstairs to -- the squishiness of my second son cannot be rivaled:


So, while Levi's being adorable in ways that make my heart swell with pride, we cannot forget about Baby Ezra, whose squishiness melts my heart into a puddle. An ooey, gooey, puddle. That's my baby. He's 10 months old today. My beautiful, sweet, and did I mention squishy baby.

It's About Time ...

I know. It's been a long time. But it's been a crazy past couple of weeks! Apparantly last post I jumped the gun by writing that we were done with the sickness game and on the upswing. Two ER trips, many reduced-sleep nights, and a couple of weeks later I think we're now (knocks on wood) ... HEALTHY!!

It really hasn't seemed like as bad of a winter as many people are telling me I've had. "You guys sure have had a tough winter!" "Your kids are sick all the time!!" "Where do they pick up all those illnesses?!" I've heard it all in the past couple of weeks. Maybe it's that when you're in it day to day it doesn't seem as jarring, maybe my children are just not so terrible to have around when they're sick (and they're not, they're very endearing), maybe ... I don't know. But I do know that I've missed out on many great blogging opportunities, so two quick stories to catch you up to speed ...

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The other night we heard a LOUD bump/thump/crash. We rushed to Levi's room, to find that he had fallen out of bed.
"I broke me."
"You broke you? What did you break?"
"I broke my bed."
"Are you going to be okay?"
"Yeah. Daddy fix my bed?"

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Levi's new favorite game to play with me is "let's go grocery shopping." He pushes a baby toy we bought him when he was learning to walk, and I am supposed to be his child ... or something like that.
"Mommy, let's go. Let's go, Mommy."
(I wait where I am)
"Mommy, you need to stay right by my cart. Stay right here."
(I don't move)
"Mommy, you hear me? RIGHT here. RIGHT by my cart (pointing to the floor next to him)."
"I don't want to."
"You need to walk like a big girl, Mommy."
"My legs are broken."
"No. Your legs are not breaking. Be a big girl."
"I don't want to."
(walks up to me with his fingers in a pincer grasp)
"See this here, Mommy?"
"I want it."
"It's a special treat for you."
"I want it."
"You can have it, if you stay right by my cart."
"I want to hold it."
"Okay. Here. Now I'll open it when we get back to the car."

WOW! He has me down to a T. Crazy how quickly they pick up on regular scenarios! And, of course, there are more fun stories but I'll save those for other days (as if those days will be dull enough to not have a story of their own ...).

I'm posting, can you believe it?!

Folks, they're sleeping. Sleeping. SLEEPING. As in, both sleeping. Both SLEEPING. BOTH sleeping. BOTH SLEEPING. I don't know if I'm feeling the need to repeat it over and over because my brain cannot function due to absolute exhaustion, or if I'm feeling the need to repeat it because there's a small (okay, large) part of me that doesn't believe it and thus can't stop marveling over the fact that they're sleeping. BOTH. OF. THEM.

I will spare you the details of the bodily functions that have taken place over here on Wildwood Dr. for the past ... mmm ... almost a week now. There are only two things you need to know that will sum up the whole week for you in a nutshell: One, we have done a total of 11 loads of wash of JUST bedding (SO thankful that we have two washers!!); Two, this morning when the alarm rang I turned to Steve and asked, in all seriousness, "what day is it today?"

If those two facts don't give you a picture of my week, I don't know what will. Yet through it all, there have been some ponderable moments that I have wrapped up, sealed with a kiss, and locked away in the vault of my MamaHeart. Some of those moments are mine, all mine, and only mine like singing hymns upon hymns to the children who were laying next to and on top of me, wanting nothing more than their Mommy to sing to them and stroke their hair ... or like those big brown eyes looking at me saying, "I love you, Mommy. You're so sweet and cute." And some of those moments I've captured on camera for both my enjoyment and yours. So, without further ado (because I have full anticipation of actually getting a wink of sleep here myself before boys wake up), three photos to melt your heart:

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On Monday morning, after being up from 2:00-7:00am spittin', as he called it, Levi played racecars for about 5 minutes until Steve had to change Ezra's diaper and came back into the living room to find Levi asleep:


Yesterday Levi was helping me fold laundry when yet another sneak attack of vomiting hit him. Afterwards, he created this little bed for himself, saying, "I'll still help you, Mommy."

At night Levi has had a hard time going to sleep. "My really scared, Mommy." "Scared of what?" "My really scared-a more spittin'." I don't blame the little guy! He woke up in the middle of the night 3 nights in a row throwing up, and was worried this would be a forever recurring thing! Wednesday night was a restful night, no waking up all night long!!! However, last night we had a little relapse around 11:30, resulting in us needing to scrub Levi's rug and give him a shower and such. Since we were still working in his room after his shower, he created a cave for himself on the couch because "Your lights are such too loud. Too loud of lights in your house, Mommy." The lights were actually all off in the living room, which you can't tell because of the flash in the photo, yet somehow the living room lights were still too loud.

The cave seemed to be a good idea, though, because it kept him nice and sleepy (a good thing), and it kept him out of our clean sheets (a very good thing, I'm done changing the sheets on that bed for this week!!!!)

Goodnight little man. We all hope last night was your last night of rude awakenings.

The Adventures of Baa-Baa the Sheep (v1)

(Sorry, again I forgot to hit "publish" from yesterday's post. Two posts in one day again ... my bad.)

Baa-Baa the sheep is having a rough day. He has been on time out three times today, and I am not privy to the reasoning behind his punishment.

It started this morning before our walk. We were getting ready to head out the door, and I heard Levi say, "NO!" I watched as he picked Baa-Baa up, ran to the time out chair, and set him in it. He informed Baa-Baa to "sit right there and quiet. No talking."

The poor sheep had to stay on time out for our entire walk. Apparently the child who thinks two minutes is an unfair eternity feels that more dire consequences are needed for his plush friend. We returned from his walk, and Baa-Baa had to ask forgiveness. Levi led him in a prayer about forgiveness, told Baa-Baa he loved him, and sent him off to play.

This happened three times. Finally, after the third time, I asked Levi what the terrible offense was. Are you ready for it?

"Baa-Baa hit Gershio."
"He hit Gershio?"
"I know."
"Why?"
"I know!"
"Is he done hitting now?"
"Yup. And Gershio's all gone."
"Oh, did he fly away because he was getting hit?"
"No. Baa-Baa eat Gershio."
"Baa-Baa, you shouldn't have eaten Gershio!"
"You're not his Mommy!"
"Oh. I'm sorry. I'll back off."
"And you call him MR. Baa-Baa. Not Baa-Baa."

I had forgotten. A few weeks ago I was told that I have to call him Mr. Baa-Baa from now on. I'll try and correct that in the future. At least now I don't have to call Gershio "Mr. Gershio." Poor, sweet, short-lived Gershio. For some reason I have a feeling this might not be the last we hear of him ...

Cute, Scoot, Toot!

This just in: BABY EZRA IS STARTING TO SCOOT.

For a few days now he has been pulling himself onto his stomach from a sitting position and has been increasingly content to be on his stomach. Now, this morning, he started scooting backwards. Funny thing is, though, each time he scoots back he toots. It's hilarious! He scoots, he toots, and he looks behind him as if to say, "what was that noise?" Levi says that B. Ezra (he has abbreviated his name to B. Ezra instead of Baby Ezra as of lately) is "doin' little tiny toots, he needa diaper change."

Okay, enough potty talk. Let's just celebrate the fact that it looks like this second son of ours might gain mobility, after all! You go, laid back Baby Ezra. He's just taking his sweet old time, but he'll still be crawling before we know it.

Introducing ... Gershio.

A few nights ago when I put Levi to bed, he was saying "Gershio" (pronounced Grr-she-oh, emphasis on the first syllable). Both Steve and I have heard him saying this before, and when we ask him what he's talking about he simply replies, "I'm talkin' a Gershio," with this look on his face like, "duh, Mom and Dad, didn't you hear me? I said Gershio, therefore I'm talking about Gershio. Obviously."

Today he was standing in the upstairs bathroom talking down the laundry shoot. I found it rather humerous, since neither Steve nor I were downstairs at the time, so I asked him with a smirk on my face, "hey bud, who ya talkin' to?" I was not prepared for the response:

"I'm talkin' a Gershio."
"Oh really? You're talking about Gershio again?"
"No, I'm talkin' a Gershio."
"You're just talking the word Gershio?"
"NO. I'M TALKING A GERSHIO."
"You're talking to Gershio?"
"Yup."
"Who's Gershio?"
"My bee."
"Oh. Really? Gershio is your bee?"
"Yup."
"Where is he right now?" (see, I never know where he is. And if I guess, I'm always wrong).
"Downstairs."

Downstairs. Spoken, again, like "duh, Mom." So, folks, apparantly Gershio the bee has come to stay at Wildwood Dr. for a while.

Retaliation

Ezra is growing up. No, he's not crawling yet. None of that craziness. But at this rate I think his motivation for crawling will be that he's mad at Levi and trying to get him. Levi loves to play with Ezra. He wants Ezra to play toys with him all the time, and he's pretty good about sharing with Ezra. The problem is that Ezra doesn't play by the rules. Neither do I, for alas I'm a girl, but Levi can explain the rules to me and I try to modify my playing accordingly. This does not work with Ezra (obviously, because he's a baby), and Levi, who I usually think operates on the bright side of the bulb, so to speak, is not a quick learner when it comes to this.

You see, there's something many people do not know about laid back, calm, usually motionless Baby Ezra: Baby Ezra has catlike reflexes. Matched with the fact that he also has opposable thumbs ... well, watch out, 'cause he just learned that he's got thumbs, and he's not afraid to use them.

The other day, Levi took a car away from Ezra. Before Levi was out of arm's reach, Ezra lashed out and grabbed Levi's cheek with his whole hand. I kid you not -- I am the mother who had to pry one son's cheek out of the other's grasp. Then, a couple days later, when Levi was trying to tell Ezra to do something different with his car, Levi made the mistake of taking the car out of Ezra's hand again ... this time, Ezra grabbed Levi's ear, and Levi was none-so-happy about that. He sat there, shrieking, "Mom, Baby Ezra has my ear! Tell him no! A time out!" until I came to the rescue, instructed Levi to give Ezra the car back, and not until then did Ezra let go of said ear. Today, Ezra painfully removed a clump of Levi's hair. He grabbed it in his little, tiny, chubby-fingered pincer grasp, Levi yanked away, and Z was left with a pincerful of approximately 5 hairs. And he giggled about it. So there, Levi. There's a new kid on the block, and he's got opinions, too. AND thumbs. Snap.

A Bee in the Bed

I have known for a while that Levi's imagination is developing at a rapid pace ... we play with pretend hammers, I eat MANY fake hotdogs throughout the day with crazy toppings (honey, m&ms, pizza, bananas, to name a few), and there's a never-ending game of "hear that, Mommy? I think it's a __(dragon/bulldozer/playground/Daddy's junk trailer__" going on.

Well, someone's imagination is running away with him. Apparently at our house there is a bee. It was in the bathtub on Saturday and I had to scoop it out (very hard to do when it's make-believe). On Sunday morning it was "flying around big church". Last night it was in Levi's bed, and he couldn't sleep.

"Mommy, come find me ... Mommy, come find me ... Mommy, come talk to me ... Momm, I'm in my bedroom, come find me."
"Yes, Levi? What do you need?"
"He's in my bed now."
"Who's in your bed?"
"The bee. It's a bee. In my bed."

At this point I had only cracked open the door and hadn't looked in the room. I opened the door all the way and there was Levi, under the bed, in the far corner.

"Get him, Mom. Get him out."
"Okay, I'll get him out of your bed."
"Don't hurt him."
"I won't hurt him."
"Hear that, Mommy?"
"Hear what?"
"He's buzzing."
"Oh, that. Yes, I heard that. I think he's saying goodnight to you."
"Oh. Goodnight to me? Okay. Goodnight, bee."

Photo Fun

It's a lazy Saturday morning over here. Since the boys are sick I stayed home from the baby shower I was hoping to attend, and have been rewarded by some very sweet moments of playing with them and watching them play together. Currently they're playing Legos together. Ezra is handing Levi legos, and Levi is making them into, "a house for Baby Ezra." Now that Ezra's sitting up proficiently the boys play together a lot. Levi has taken it upon himself to be Ezra's translator, telling me, "Baby Ezra wants to play Legos now" or, "Baby Ezra wants to play racecars with me" or (my favorite), "Baby Ezra thinks I need a little snack." All in all, Levi is very happy to have a brother, and with the way Ezra shrieks and giggles at Levi I'd say the feeling is mutual.

In honor of that brotherly love, how about a little photo montage to end out today's post?

"Not Yet .."

The time out chair stays by the front door at our house. There's not a whole lot of front door traffic, most of you have "back door privileges" as far as we're concerned, plus with the bookcase/door/closet/wall it's pretty sheltered (read: BORING) for the person (read: LEVI) who sits there to be punished. Good placement. However, on piano lesson days I move the time out chair for the sake of the students who come in the front door and deserve better than to trip on their piano teacher's kids' stuff. This morning Levi found it in the living room, and this conversation followed ...

"Mommy, I found my time out chair."
"Yeah, I moved it for piano lessons."
"Now it needs to go back by the door."
"Oh? Do you need a time out?"
"Not yet. I'll put it there for later."

Apparently I should consider myself forewarned, and ought to pay extra attention to his actions for the rest of the day as he may or may not be planning to do something "later" that warrants a time out.

(I'd save this post for later, but I wanted to find out if it worked to add some email addresses to automatically get emails with a new post. Plus, it seems later I will be busy administering a time out. If it worked, and you got an email about this post, let me know. If you'd like to get an email with new posts, let me know that, too.)

"Jesus Forgives Me."

**Oops, I forgot to publish the post I wrote yesterday, so here it is now ... two posts in one day, my bad.**

We've been talking a lot about forgiveness over here as of late. Mostly about it being sinful to hit/bite/bonk/grab/kick/etc. On Wednesday night we went to church for an Ash Wednesday service. We put the boys in the nursery, and when we came to get them Levi saw our foreheads:

"Mommy, what happened on your forehead? What you got there?"
"It's ashes, buddy."
"Why is it ashes?"
"It means that Jesus forgives me."
"Oh. Jesus forgives me, too. I want some."

So I decided that since we've been talking about it lately at home, and since it's never too early to introduce children to spirituality and religion, we would go ask the pastor if there were any ashes left for Levi.

There were. Pastor Mark rubbed a cross on Levi's forehead, saying, "Levi, without Jesus you would be lost."

Levi responded, big brown eyes open wide, "Jesus forgives me."

So sweet. So true. So proud I was as a parent. And so privileged we are to raise children to love Jesus, accept His gift of forgiveness, and be ambassadors for Him in this world.

Who's Cuter?

We're in the middle of a family disagreement. Before you think terrible thoughts about us as parents, no we are NOT discussing who's cuter between our children. Now stop thinking about that, and keep reading ...

It started Monday night. Steve was at Bible Study, so I was putting Levi to bed (Steve usually does this while I put Ezra to bed). Every night after prayers the first words out of Levi's mouth are, "snuggle me!" So I laid down next to him, wrapped my arm around him, and he whispers to me, "I love you, Mommy." It's so sweet that he's starting to do this on his own, not just as a response to us saying it to him! So I respond that I love him too, upon which he ERUPTS into uncontrollable giggles. Not knowing what we're laughing about, I joined in. As we're winding down, the disagreement began:

"Oh, Levi. Levi, Levi."
"Oh Mommy ... you're so cute, Mommy."
(???He's never told me this before, and it's hilarious to hear from him!)
"You're cute, too, Levi."
"No, YOU'RE so cute."
"And you're cute, too."
"No, just MOMMY so cute."

As you can imagine, this went on for a couple of minutes until I told him this was not helping him sleep and I was going to leave his room. About 10 minutes later Steve came home and peeked in on Levi.

"Goodnight buddy, I love you."
"Goodnight Daddy. I love you."
"See you tomorrow."
"Daddy, Mommy's so cute."

Since then two things have happened ... Steve has begun to wonder whether Levi's trying to compete with him for me (haha), and Levi has started this disagreement with me multiple times a day, every day. Who's cuter?! And now he includes Steve in the cuteness, and Ezra. "Oh, Baby Ezra, you're so cute. So cute. So cute, Baby Ezra."

One thing's for sure, even though he will not accept the fact that he's cute, we know the truth.

I've been thinking ...

I've been thinking that it might be time to try my hand at blogging. Not so much as a personal endeavor, and definitely not as a MomBlog, but moreso as a record of the things that go on in the day to day raising of our sons. Conversations between Levi and I, new things that Ezra's doing, things I overhear the racecars saying to each other, and of course the famed adventures of Baa-Baa the sheep. Don't look here for parenting advice, strategies, or even a whole lot of what we're going through as people learning to parent ... we choose to keep that to ourselves because we feel parenting is a very personal thing. Simply enjoy this as a window into our day to day, moment by moment life as Steve and I pour our all into raising little boys who love the Lord and love life.

Right off the bat, I want to state a disclaimer for this site: I know that all kids are cute ... meaning, I do not want to come across on this site as thinking that mine are the cutest, brightest, funniest, most advanced children ever. It has become a pet peeve of mine when parents brag about their children as if they're the only ones in the world that could possibly be so wonderful. THAT'S NOT WHAT I'M DOING HERE. My children bring such joy to my life and I consider it a great privilege to be their mother. These moments that I observe and share with them are much too beautiful to keep to myself!