Ha, every once in a while, the boys amaze us with their thought processes.  This happened tonight at dinner.  Aunt Emmy gave the boys two plates – one with dinosaurs on it and one with monkeys.  Dexter traditionally gets the plate with monkeys but tonight, Nicky got it which totally ticked off Dexter.  Then Dexter lucked out and got the special Christmas  spoon, so I guess Joel and I thought the playing field had been leveled.

As soon as Nicky saw Dexter’s spoon, he wanted it.  Sorry Nicholas, we told him, you got the monkey plate and Dexter got the spoon.  The next thing we hear is Nicky saying “Trade” and plates were being swapped before our eyes.  Now, remember, Nicholas had already eaten most of his chicken and sweet potatoes when this trade occurred and Dexter had hardly touched anything.  Dexter happily handed his plate over and Nicholas demanded the spoon.  Utensils were swapped and all was right with their world.  Joel and I were astounded by what had just transpired.

Please forgive us if this post it a little light, but we’re absolutely exhausted and it’s been a very busy couple of days.  We had all of our Christmas shopping done a while ago, but the Christmas cards weren’t out until Tuesday, and the presents weren’t finished being wrapped until Thursday, and then everyone except Katie caught a bloody cold.  And now that the caveats are out there, I can say Christmas was AWESOME.

On Christmas Eve, we started the day by skyping with Helen, Petra and Peter, and opening the gifts from them.  Later, Katie’s family came over for our pre-Christmas Christmas.  We exchanged gifts (keeping the gifts from us to the boys until Christmas morning, naturally), and then ate an incredible Swedish dinner ably prepared by Malin.  She kept insisting that cooking counted for her working hours, but since we can’t legally ask her to cook for the family that obviously isn’t the case, and so she owes me at least 4 more poopy diaper changes.  It was a bit chaotic.  The boys were really excited, but also a bit overwhelmed and tired (in part due to their colds), so it was a little dicey at times.  Still, they got new bathtub crayons from their Uncle Too Tall, and an inappropriately loud ambulance and firetruck from their Uncle Uncle Dick.  Then they got a workbench and two enormous stuffed animals from Grandma and Grandpa French, among other things.  When they got the power tools out, they got a little bit scary.  Dex came after me with two power drills, and now it’s uncomfortable to sit down.  We had to skip desert because we were running late to church.

At 6:44, we managed to get out the door and on our way to the 7pm service.  The boys were not really in the mood for church this time.  Nic probably would’ve made it through the whole service, but Dex started jumping and squealing, so I left Katie and Malin to the service and took the boys to the playroom.  It was 54 degrees in there when we got there, and by the time we left we’d gotten it up to 57, so we were feeling toasty.  By the time we got home and the boys into bed, it was 45 minutes past their bedtime.  We hurriedly reloaded the tree for our Second Christmas, picked up and put away the rest of the dishes and toys from the day, and then sat down to finish Sherlock Holmes and give Katie a chance to finish her wine from dinner. (It was more like I finally got to start and then finish one glass of wine.)

We set our alarms for 6:30, figuring the boys would let us sleep in a little bit, and that we still would still have enough time to finish with showers before they got up.  Nic mostly cooperated, sleeping in until just about 10 to 7.  For better or for worse, Dex slept until past 8am.  Poor Malin – we’d told her to be ready at 7, and there we were trying to distract Nic until Dex woke up because he kept eying all the presents with more than a little bit of interest.

After breakfast, PRESENTS!  We didn’t make it far into the stocking stuffers before we ran into our first major dilemma – I’d bought Dex a motorcycle matchbox car, but not one for Nic.  Dex LOVES motorcycles, but Nic usually couldn’t care less.  Not so much the case this morning. (I (Katie) would just like to say, for the record, that I voiced my concern to only one motorcycle.) To distract them, I told Katie to grab two of the presents from Grandma Zaidee and Grandpa Loren – a large Jeep and a Truck.  Problem #2, for the past 3 weeks we’ve been talking to them about what they like more, and they were very firm – Dex wanted a Jeep, and Nic wanted a truck.  Until Nic got a truck, and saw Dexter’s Jeep, and then wanted a Jeep.  It made me want to drink, and it wasn’t even 9am yet.  By that point, the gift opening had slowed.  Once the trucks were out, the boys lost interest in opening any new presents and just ran around playing with them.  It took a concentrated effort over the next hour to drag them back to other presents, and honestly in the end I think Malin opened most of them.  Oh well.  I guess there’s worse problems to have than having two gifts that are such hits that they don’t want any others.  Maybe next year we’ll be able to predict that before hand and just stop the shopping there.  Sound workable?  Right… ( But wait, I’d like to state Problem #3 – Laura, Cathy & Karl – we loved your gifts and the Aussie version of the Night Before Christmas is awesome, but I cried when there was no box of Tim Tams to be found.  Why do you hate me so?)

Well, after all was opened, and the paper cleaned up (I think I made 4 trips to the garbage / recycling cans), we finally coaxed the boys upstairs for a nap.  After the nap we packed them up again, and off to Grandma and Granpa French’s for Christmas Dinner.  We took a portable racetrack for matchbox cars, which turned out to be another source of constant argument, but it let us get through dinner in peace (well, that, or the fact that we turned on a Mickey Mouse Christmas special).  Marilyn came through with an excellent meal (as high as she sets the expectations, she keeps living up to them and our belly’s approve).

After dinner we headed home, tricked the boys into eating something (by tricked, I mean offered Dex’s rejected food to his brother, whereupon Dex became EXTREMELY possessive and wolfed it all down.  Our other trick is to use sprinkles.  Nicholas happily ate his leftover tuna pasta only when sprinkles were applied.)  Then, because we were all exhausted and not willing to fight through another round of car races, we put on one of Katie’s presents, Despicable Me, and the whole family (Malin included) sat down for a Christmas night movie.  I don’t know how much of it the boys found amusing, but Dex sat on my lap for over an hour without moving, so it worked pretty well for us.

Now they’re all nestled up in bed, after hearing the Aussie Night Before Christmas, the True Meaning of Christmas, and of course, the Hicupattomus (“there was a hippopotamus, who hiccuped quite a lottamus…”)  Now we’re buggered, and trying to clean up the house, but figured we should wish everyone a very merry Christmas, and share a few pictures of  the last two days.

(Wait – I have to share what made me snort with laughter.  When the tools were opened, a toy hammer appeared. Grandpa Carter  asked the boys the question “do you know what you do with that hammer?” to which I responded “hammer your brother.”  Yep, you guessed it.  That’s exactly what Dexter did to Nicholas.  I have got to stop saying things like that because the boys will follow through, not with what I ask them to do.  No, they do the stuff that they shouldn’t do.  Dexter made me proud when we asked him to go get his brother and in true form, he turned around and yelled at the top of his lungs “NICHOLAS”.   Another snort was generated when Nicky, Grandma Marilyn and I were sitting in Grandma M’s kitchen.  I called out “Joel” and Nicholas echoed with “Joel!”.  That wasn’t the last time he would call his father Joel today. I got dirty looks from Joel over that.  Oh, and it sounds like  Joel didn’t share, but Malin got him the cutest elf boxer shorts with bells on and a matching hat.  If I knew how to upload that picture, I would.   Anyway, I hope you all had a fantastic Christmas too. – Katie)

Someone asked me today what we did last weekend.  Bear in mind that I’m writing this on Monday evening, so this shouldn’t have been much of a stretch.  I remembered Sunday well enough, but I couldn’t remember ANYTHING about Saturday.  10 years ago this might have been a sign of a wild weekend (hey, in my retrospectives I can have a more exciting adolescence), but in this case I think it’s more a matter of sleep deprivation and general age-related detioration.  i.e., I’m getting old, fast.

Which has little to do with this post, except that it happened on Saturday, I didn’t even remember it had happened until Katie sent me downstairs to blog about it while she gave the boys a bath.  Well, after the boys woke up from their nap last Saturday, we worked on decorating Malin’s stocking.  With the paint out, the boys got all excited and started yelling “me too, me too!”  So, we surrendered and got out the supplies.  We spread the butcher paper across the kitchen table, got out the paint, put on their smocks, gave them some brushes, and sat back to watch the genius.

Seriously, this all happened inside of 2 minutes, 3 tops.  They started so carefully with their brushes, then Nic started spreading with his hands, and suddenly he looked at his hand, and seconds later he was in war paint.  It was in his hair, all over his face, his arms – he was ready for the jungle.  And of course it didn’t stop there.  No, he picked up his paint brush, looked at it, and started painting his own forehead.  Then his eyes.  Then his hair.  Then up his nose.  Dexter joined in.  Then Nic licked his brush.  Dex licked his hands.  This is why we can’t have nice things…

Clearly something wen’t wrong.

And then it got worse.

And monkey see, monkey do.

At leas Nic had the common decency to seem ashamed.

Wait, is he licking the paint brush?  Maybe not.

<sigh>

So I guess this means that we should take Dex to see the doctor, now that his nasal discharge is green, right?

So I doubt we could sell the actual painting for much, but maybe a photo of the process?  Doesn’t this just scream “unbridled creative inspiration” to you?  Perhaps as an inspirational photo for art students – “LIVE your art.  Feel it.  Smell it.  Taste it.  Literally.  Have a washcloth handy.  And a jelly belly helps for the aftertaste.”

OK, you heard from Joel that I wanted to move the boys’ bedtime back to 8:30pm.  We compromised and said our good nights at 8:15pm tonight.  And this is what happened next – Joel left me upstairs to go clean up downstairs.  The boys were chatting up a storm so I decided to wash my face to see if they would talk themselves out.  No luck.  So, I go into the spare bedroom to look for a white elephant gift.  I hear Nicky calling out something repeatedly. What now, I think.  I walk over to their door ready to say my Shhhhhhs and I hear Nicky say something like “my sleeper off”.  What?  I open the door and walk into a dark room.  I find Nicholas sitting up in bed, naked except for his diaper saying “my sleeper off” and smiling.  When did he learn how to do that?  I try not to laugh out loud, thankful it is dark in their room.  I put him back into his sleeper, give him a hug and a kiss good night, stroke Dexter’s hair, and leave the room.  Haven’t heard a peep since, except for Nicky’s snoring.

Ran into Malin and told her the story.  She informed me that the boys took off their zippered sleepers this morning.  Mystery solved.  How I love my boys.

Wow, ten days since our last post.  We must not love our children anymore, huh?  Actually, come to think of it, I don’t recall when this blog became the “Dexter and Nicholas” blog, but obviously it is.  I can’t imagine typing up a post that isn’t about them.  Well, to be fair, I don’t really do much of anything that isn’t about the boys anymore, so it’s no great loss.  Rest assured that our days have been busy, and our silence is due in part to simply being overwhelmed with pre-Christmas deliverables, and in part because we can always rely on Malin to keep every well aprised of the goings on of the family (and her most recent shopping trip, but to each their own).  I hope Anamaria can keep some of that alive, though maybe we can get her to write a few post on OUR blog, but hey, Malin wrote 2, so we shouldn’t complain overmuch, right?  Wrong.  We should.  Because she made me eat fish tonight, and I hold a grudge.

We’re almost done with our pre-Christmas binge.  I think we’ve purchased all the presents, though wrapping is still a daunting challenge.  Packages have been arriving from the grandparents, and are being stuffed into every nook and cranny we can find.  The boys are going to be seriously overwhelmed.  Maybe we should open a couple of presents a day over a month or two instead, to keep the magic alive…  I’m kind of excited.  I’m getting so bored with their current batch of toys…  Sure, we have no room for any more, but I can always build a pole barn if need be.  I never realized how cool boys would be – their toys are FUN, and shopping for them rocks.  Sometimes I have to remind myself to buy only 2, and not 3, of each toy.

I don’t think the boys have much of a clue what’s coming.  They’ll both yell “Ho Ho Ho Merry Christmas!”, and they love the lights, and the tree, and the snowman stickers on the windows, and the songs, and the Christmas movies, and the Advent calendar (MORE chocolate – we’ve barely put a dent in their Halloween candy…), but I don’t think they have a clue that there’s a big day coming.  Next year will be interesting.  Next year we’ll have to choose between keeping the magic alive and putting gifts from Santa under the tree with the inevitable feelings of betrayal and disillusionment, or depriving our children of a quintessential element of childhood.  Ah, parenthood.

At least the books are fun, and provide some welcome variety.  I could do without Elmo’s 12 Days of Christmas, but such is life.  Dexter’s godparents, Mike and Monica, sent him a great book about the true meaning of Christmas, which Katie enjoys reading to them.

And in the meantime, we’re battling with the boys over their bedtimes.  Since their move to big boy beds on Thanksgiving they have been doing pretty well, but in the last couple of weeks they’ve been getting more and more energetic at bedtime, and Katie’s getting tired of staying with them for half an hour, rocking them into unconsciousness.  She thinks we should move their bedtime to 8:30pm.  Nicky clearly agrees:

Go ahead – try and tell him no.  Regardless, I’m not so sure.  It doesn’t seem right to me for a 2.5 year old to be going to bed any later than eight.  I figure it’s partly that their room is novel to them – it’s the first time they’ve been allowed to play in there, and they only figured out that they can get out of bed a couple of nights ago.  I should post the video clip we took while sitting outside the door, listening to the mayhem before intervening.  Or maybe they’re getting ready to drop their nap.  Or maybe the absurdly short Washington nights are messing with their little biological clocks.  I guess time will tell.  The only thing we can be assured of is that 6 months from now everything will be different, and between now and then we’ll probably have to deal with some feces.

Okay, those Christmas letters aren’t writing themselves.  I think Katie’s currently at 3 pages with her most recent draft, so we’re nearly there.  The boys seem to be out (knock on bits), so we’ll see what we see.  Good night, and good luck.

Tonight at dinner, after Nicholas and Dexter had made Joel and I extremely frustrated, and Joel glanced under the table and saw all the crumbs and food that had accumulated in just 20 minutes and uttered “Oh my God.”  Nicholas responded with “Oh my God. Oh my God. Crap.”  Joel and my eyes met.  Our lips twiched in mirth.  Thank goodness that is all he has picked up on.  I guess now is the time for Joel and I to be a lot more careful of what we say and when.  You never know when it will be repeated, and to whom.  Just ask Dex how he pronounces “Frank.”  I think that one almost got us dis-invited from the grandparents house.

The other day, I was building legos with the boys and we were having a grand time.  After a while though, Dexter got bored and he started to use his little plastic bin (about the size of a lunch box), to smash the legos from side to side on the table – going into full destructo mode.  Nicholas perked up with interest and of course, copied his brother.  For those of you who have stopped by to visit, you know that our living room, with the high ceiling, can get very loud, very quickly.  Think about how long Lego crashing on a wood table can be.  Yep – darn tootin’ loud.  I put up with it for a while and then kindly asked the boys to stop.  Nicky complied.  Dexter smiled and did it again.  “Dexter – this is your warning – no more crashing legos.”  CRASH.  “OK Dexter, time for a time out – 3o seconds.”  We walked to the blanket and I set the timer.  Yes, I realize you are all thinking – a time out for crashing legos?  Yes – it had been a long day and I was done with that noise.  Anyway, the timer went “ding” and the time out was over.  Back to the table and CRASH.  Nicky followed his brother’s lead – CRASH.  “OK – both of you to the blanket.  A minute time out.”  They walked over to the blanket and stood looking at me.  This is were things really started to get interesting.  I honestly can’t remember who started it so I’ll blame Dexter, but all of a sudden, a Dexter’s toe crept off of the blanket and was on carpet.  If they didn’t want to be in time out, the boys had a way of getting off the blanket before time was up.  So I said “time out isn’t over, back on the blanket.”  Then Nicky was straddling the blanket – one foot on / one foot off.  He was smiling - it was rather a large smile with a definite twinkle in his eye.  “On the blanket, Nicky.”  “Dexter – back on that blanket, mister.”  Ding – time out was over.

They both ran back to the legos and shouted “Time out!” and ran back to the blanket with hug smiles and giggles.  They would then say “Ding – timeout over” and run back out of the family room.  I’d hear Dexter shout “timeout” and he’d run back to the blanket.  Giggles became laughs and I could no longer keep a straight face.  This game lasted a good 5 – 10 minutes.  How are you suppose to discipline kids if they make a silly game out of it?   Today Malin told me that she and Nicky played the timeout game.  Lordy – Joel and I are doomed.

Other interesting items to note: for the first time –  Nicholas called out to me from his bedroom after I had put them down for bed and said “Mamma – come here” in that super sweet Nicky voice.  In the past, he’s just screamed or yelled Mama, no “Mama, come here.”  My heart melted and I whispered “sucker” under my breath to myself as I headed back upstairs, caving to his stall tactic.

Crap – I know I had more to tell you but my brain just shut down.  Oh, Nicky learned how to make the mouth work on a frog puppet we have.  Dexter learned to whisper.  He only uses it in the middle of the night though.  Now I remember the other one.  I don’t know who to give this one credit to, but as Joel and I were cleaning up from dinner tonight, we heard a lid bang, a toilet flush, and giggles erupt.  Joel and I looked at one another in horror and I ran for the bathroom.  Yes, today, one of my sons figured out how to flush a toilet.  It was only with the promise of TV that I pried them loose from the toilet and diverted their attention to brain rot.

That’s all I have for you tonight.  Time to go rest my weary head.  We are hopefully nearing the end of the boys’ two year molars entering service in their mouth.  Dexter has just a half a tooth left to go and Nicky won’t open his mouth for us.  Only for his hand and food.  At least he can now tell us where he hurts.  That’s a bonus.