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.