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."