We’ve been trying to come up with more things to do around the house, to keep the boys a little more stimulated and reduce the incessant demands for “choo-choo!”  We started today with pancakes.  Dexter slept in, but Nicky woke up at 6am.  He cuddled with mommy for half an hour, but then it was time to get up.  He helped make the pancakes, pouring the contents into the bowl and then stirring merrily (until he noticed the large glop of goo stuck inside the whisk anyway, then all bets were off).  Nic and I played with his cars on their roadway-carpet (emergency toy change-out this morning – out go the trains, in come the matchbox cars).  This kept him interested until Mommy was done with her shower, and Dexter work up.

We got out the butcher paper and set to coloring, but mostly this consisted of Nicholas yelling at Dexter for stealing crayons (Dexter wanted 5.  He was allowed 4.  Nicholas had 73, or thereabouts).  So Katie decided it was craft time, and we made jerry-rigged rackets, blew up some balloons, and tried to play racket balloon for a little while.  True to form, I think it took us more time to setup then the boys actually spent interested in the game.  <sigh>  We gave up and tried just kicking the balloons around, and finally tried sticking them to the ceiling.  So, out to the garage for some ball throwing and playing in their little clubhouse (the one I spent 2 hours rebuilding yesterday from 1″ PVC, so as to better withstand the abuse of toddlers, and of which they had about 3 minutes worth of interest), and more interestingly, a cardboard box.

Okay, fine.  Back inside for lunch.  Then sleep.  They slept just long enough for us to futility try and re balance our dryer to prevent the constant knocking, for me to start finally putting our tents and camping gear away, and me to tell Katie “I can finish up out here, why don’t you go get the diaper bag ready…”  They woke up before she made it to the hallway, I think.  So up we got them, read some books, packed up the car, and drove down to White Center.  Our old friends Kirsten and Jim have recently (i.e., 2 months ago) had a baby boy, Colin, and we’d had a gift sitting in our den for about 4 months.  The boys went nuts trying to play with a ribbon and their cat, Dominos, but were very gentle with Colin, and as far as we can tell didn’t break anything in nearly an hour long visit.  Then back in the car, and time for some whining as we were stuck in traffic.

Okay, finally home.  Katie runs in to make dinner, and I try to detour the boys to the garage.  It works too well.  They get to running and screaming, and they refuse to go inside to eat, and their food gets cold.  Seriously can’t win her.  We fight through a meal, Katie and I just having sandwiches ourselves, and then try desperately NOT to declare the night movie night and just surrender our parenting to a Pixar film.  We proceed to spend the next 45 minutes having a series of bizarre barnyward competitions (we set up their play barn and farm animals on the train table).  We had pig races, and sheep races, and cage matches, and tractors running over little old ladies, and little old ladies running over tractors, and a series of very bizarre altercations better left unwritten.

Afterward it was back to the balloons.  Katie tried to get the boys to race around the house trying to balance the balloon on their racket.  Dexter was really good at it.  Really good.  Never dropped the balloon.  In fact, when the race got really intense, he threw aside the racket all together so he could grab the balloon with both hands (instead of just one).  Katie and I felt cheated.  On the second race Katie got a head of me, but somehow lost her nerve when i got close behind her.  The races ended abruptly, with both of us trying to reassure Nicholas that Mommy was alright, and that sometimes Mommies need to be tackled and tickled too.  He’s very protective.  Dexter just jumped on top.

Then the boys tried to repeat an earlier science experiment, trying to put the balloons on the ceiling after rubbing them on their heads.  I’d done this for them earlier (the true reason for my rapidly receding hair line?), but for some reason my hair was all static-ed out.  Turns out Katie had the magic touch, though, and proceeded to place all 6 balloons on the ceiling, even the extra-heavy blue one that I’d been unable to make adhere in the morning.

Then we scooped up the boys with their paddles, and let them knock them all done.  They tried to sucker Katie into a second round, but while she did try, her hair had lost the magic.  So time for more cars, and farm animals (and all too often, farm animals driving cars, and cars riding farm animals), and off to bed.

Crap – what do we do tomorrow?