Nicholas has a problem with his toenails. He gets extremely jumpy and a little upset if you mention it is time to cut them. It takes acts of God to actually convince him that cutting his toenails will not hurt. Most of the time, he will let Joel cut the little ones, after much negotiation. It’s when we try to cut the big toes, that Nicholas puts up his force field and tells us NO.

So, you might be sensing a story here. Yep. Saturday evening after dinner, Joel allowed me to escape to the grocery store for food. He and the boys usually do fine without me. After all, I’m the catalyst for bad behavior (more on that subject later). I mentioned to Joel on my way out that I had tried for two days to convince Nicholas to let me cut his toenails and now it was his turn. After I left, Joel struck up a deal with Nicky. The deal was that the boys would help their Dad change all the batteries in the smoke detectors and fix the broken light bulbs, and afterwards, Nicholas would let Joel cut his big toenails. Joel fulfilled his part of the bargain and Nicholas reneged.

Well, Joel, I, and Malina had been having conversations lately that we were starting to list consequences of actions without then following through. Once down that path, it is very hard to come back. With this thought in the back of his mind, Joel let Nicky know that he was disappointed in Nicholas’s choice and that he could sit on the couch until he was ready for his toenails to be cut. We all know that Dexter is stubborn. Nicholas isn’t as much. Until that night. Nicholas spent 1 hour on the couch before Joel relented because it was bed time. What is a parent suppose to do when involved in a face-off with a child? We try our hardest not to be put in those situations.

Anyway, by the time I got home, the boys were already upstairs and just climbing into bed. Joel filled me in on his evening after we tucked the boys safely into their beds. I’ve been in a face-off with Dexter before and I know it sucks for both parties involved. You feel like a bad parent either direction you take. My suggestion was, why don’t we cut his toenails while he is sleeping? At first, Joel didn’t like my idea, but then it started to grow on him.

Picture this scene: two parents creep into the children’s bedroom armed with a flashlight and a pair of toenail clippers. They silently tiptoe to the bed of the child with the long, sharp toenails. They kneel down and gently lift the covers, and pull out the offending feet. The husband grabs the big toe, while the wife shines the light on it and holds the covers up so that if the boy awakes, he won’t see the light. The first clip is made and the sound reverberates around the room. The foot jumps, the light is snuffed and the parents stay as still as mice. Both look at the sleeping boy. He doesn’t awake. The next clip is made and the pattern repeats itself. At this time the parents are near laughter because the scene is near absurd. Finally, the toenails are clipped to good enough standards and the parents creep back out the room. The Toenail Fairies have done their work for the night.

Hi all,

As you all know, my dad had a stroke following his back surgery and birthday. Funny how things come in threes. Anyway – GOOD NEWS!!!! My dad has been given the green light to drive again. The vision is basically gone on the right sides of both eyes but as long as his pays attention, he can drive. The doctor mapped out the blind spots on his eyes so that he knows where they are. Dad says that things look all funny to the right but that he can see. And, best of all, his eyes can continue to improve for up to a year. Also, now that he is off of morphine for his back pain, his brain has clicked back on again. Phew. Almost as good as new.

Dad – I love you and I really happy that you can get out and about again. Just thought that other people that read the blog might want to know that you are doing ok.

Yesterday morning while I had the boys to myself, I was cleaning up after breakfast and trying to convince Dexter to go to the bathroom.  He hadn’t since before he went to bed the night before, and now it had been something like 14 hours.  His bladder is AMAZING.  It looked like he was headed there, so I went back to the dishes, and Nicky called out, “he’s not doing it, Daddy.  He’s doing something else.”  <sigh>  Already tattling…  Anyway, I popped back out into the Living Room, and saw Dex at the bookshelf.  So I told Nicky, “it’s okay, Nic, Dex is just finding a book to read while on the toilet.  It’s what guys do.  Especially married ones, who want 30 seconds to themselves without being given a honey-do item by their beloved wives.”

Nic understood perfectly, and said, “Okay Daddy, wahoo!”  I’m not sure where the “wahoo” came from, but you just have to run with these things.  Then Dexter grabbed a book and headed for the potty.  Nic ran out to the family room, and I headed back to the kitchen to get on with the dishes.  Then I heard Nic struggling with something, and went back out to the living room and found that he’d taken the other potty from the kitchen over to the front door, was sitting next to Dexter, and asking Dexter to read the story to him.  Nic had used the potty 30 minutes earlier, but story time is story time, and he was not to be deterred.  They sat there for maybe 15 minutes, reading about Thomas and Gordon and Diesel 10.  It’s amazing how sociable and friendly two boys can be with their pants around their ankles, sitting on toilets next to the front door, reading stories.

Each morning the boys are sorely in need of lotion, which Malina dutiful applies as they’re getting their clothes on.  She first dabs the lotion onto them, with a little saying in German.  It’s something like “punkt, punkt, Komma, strace…” and it keeps going, but I can’t follow it.  It’s punctuation marks, “period, period, comma, something…”, and she traces each shape with the lotion before rubbing it in, and the boys tell us about how she does this all the time.

They also tell us we’re doing it wrong because we don’t say that, but if we try to we get yelled at.  Today I asked Nicky to teach me, and started saying it to him, and he interrupted me:  ”No Daddy, you don’t say that, because you’re not German.  And Mommy’s not German, so she can’t say that either.  Dexter’s German, and Malina’s Germany, and I’m German, so we can say it.  But I’m not from Germany.  I’m from, from, from – umm, Daddy, what’s that city we live in?  Everett?  I’m from Everett.”

Last year, on the first weekend after Annie’s arrival, we went as a family to the Pacific Science Center.  It turned out to be an awesome day to visit, as there was a model train show for the weekend.  We had no idea it was going to be there, and Dex and Nic are still talking about it a year later.  So this year, we kept our eye out, and when we saw that the show was coming back, we planned our weekend and off we went.

They did it a little differently this year, and had all the trains spread out all over the place.  The boys gravitated to the ones they could control, and the ones they recognized.  It took us rather a long time to get them away from the Thomas train tables:

As you can probably see, Malina had done her magic to the boys’ hair after their last bath, so they were rocking some prety styling do’s.  Then, predictably, they wanted to go to the toddler play area, but Nic’s new look helped him cruise for girls.  Ever the conscientous boy, he carefully put on his seat belt before adjusting the radio for her.  He doesn’t like Country any more than I do, fortunately.

A few minutes later we lucked out again, when it was story time.  A lady came up with a big Thomas book, and children gathered around to listen.  I found the boys a comfortable chair so they could relax and enjoy the tale.

I’m feeling a bit dumb about the next part, mostly because I have to explain what we were looking at because I forgot to take a picture of it.  There was a small train that ran outside (not terribly well thought out, considering that this was in mid-January, but who am I to judge?)  It was maybe golf-cart sized, with four or five cars behind it.  We waited out in the cold for 20 minutes, but the boys loved their ride so it was worth it.  And once I taught Katie that the key to avoid getting terribly car sick was to look at fixed points outside the train as we spun around in circles, she got into the spirit too.

The trouble with having an Au Pair is that sometimes you’re sitting in your den, diligently working from home and doing your part to boost Boeing shareholder value, when suddenly you hear giggling fits and scampering feet squeals of delight.  The only possible conclusion you could reach is that the Au Pair has done the unthinkable and let the children out of their cage, and that they’re now cheerfully shooting bricks into the Plasma TV.  You run out to find out what’s the matter, and you see your sons gleefully running around without pants, stepping in paint and making artwork on rolls of paper taped to the floor.  And you stop and think to yourself, self, aren’t you glad they have their underwear on?  Anyway, way to go Malina.  The result was a bit messy, but it’s awesome, and the boys loved it, and that’s kind of why we love having Au Pairs in the first place.

Somewhere amidst the explosion of language we’ve been witnessing our boys have become rather enamored with singing.  It’s manifested itself a bit differently with each boy, though.  Dexter takes after Grace, from “Home on the Range”.  She’s a cow with perfect pitch, who enjoys sharing her talents loudly and frequently.  And when I say “perfect pitch”, I mostly mean that it all sounds perfect to her, and terribly offkey to anyone else.  Dexter really started singing after watching that movie, and ran around yelling, “HOME, Home on the RANGE…”  Over, and over, and over again.  And as cute as that was, he has gotten better.  He’s singing more of the songs now, and every once in a while he has the tune, too.  A few days ago we (the boys, Katie, myself, and Malina) were sitting down to dinner when the boys burst into song.  Dexter was singing a new one he’d learned at school.  I think these are the full lyrics:

Oops! Oops!  I’m always spilling stuff

Oops! Oops! I’m always dropping stuff

Oops! Oops!  Do I have to pick it up?

I don’t want to pick it up!

But I have to pick it up.

I don’t want to pick it up!

But I have to pick it up.

I guess I will pick it up…

And really this should be Dexter’s theme song.  The first few times I heard him singing it, he just kept repeating the line, “oops, oops, I’m always dropping stuff” which is about as adorable as you can find.  Here’s the portion I captured on video:

Nicholas, on the other hand, loves to make up his own lyrics.  He hasn’t quite mastered fitting the lyrics to a melody yet, but he’s making progress and I’m sure we have a young Arlo Guthrie in the making.  So here’s what Nicholas belted out for our general entertainment:

So yeah, that’s what dinners are like around our house, most nights anyway.  And before anyone calls Child Protective Services, it’s Apple Juice in front of Nicholas, not beer.

Hope you enjoy,

-Joel

I’m certain there’s a long list of things I do wrong as a parent, and before Malin or Laura (or Katie) rushes to document them, let me preempt them with the most recent blinding failure.  We work hard to teach the boys to be polite, to ask nicely and say thank you.  By and large they’re very good about it, I think. Not always, mind you, but they haven’t yet threatened to burn down the house if we don’t comply, so I think we’re on the right track.

Sometimes when they ask me to go get something for them, I’ll say, “hmm, well maybe I could, if I really wanted to.  Maybe if you give me a kiss I’ll want to go do it for you…”  I don’t exactly do this all the time, mind you, but anything that gets extra hugs and kisses from your kids should be considered fair game, right?  Well, yesterday when I got home from work, I said “Hi” to the boys, and asked Nic if he’d give me a hug.  He kind of ignored me, and then he noticed that Trouble was missing (his stuffed animal, the black lab).  I asked him where Trouble was, and Nic told me he was upstairs.  Then he said, “if someone wants to go get him for me, I’ll give them a hug.”

There it is.  My son just reinvented prostitution.  <sigh>

WOW – it’s been a month since the last post. So much for that New Years’ resolution.

In the past month, Joel and I have been struggling with some big issues. It’s pretty much consumed us and now we have a going forward plan that didn’t come without tears. After two years of fertility treatments and multiple miscarriages, I’ve been a little down and unhappy. I mean really, who wouldn’t? That door is now officially closed and I must say, I’m glad. Now we can move on with our plans for adoption. That hasn’t been without it’s hiccups too, though. For some reason, my fingers refused to be fingerprinted. I’ve been rejected twice now, at the cost of 10 weeks additional waiting time. No matter how much lotion I slather on, it doesn’t help. I go in again this Friday and I’m sure I’ll be rejected again. Until this whole finger printing problem is taken care of, we can’t start the matching process with the Foster system.

So, that has been one of our issues. The second issue is what to do about daycare. Malina has been great. In fact, we’ve thoroughly enjoyed our au pairs and loved the cultural exchange. The boys are developing and learning, and are well on their way to becoming master manipulators. They are perfect for Malina, good for Joel when he’s on his own with them, but if I enter the picture, the tantrums begin. They are not so bad and I’m learning how to nip them in the bud, shift tactics, and just plain let them throw them until they are ready to talk. It doesn’t help that they boys have pretty much had a string of colds since school started back up in January. It’s when Nicholas wakes up at 6am in the morning crying that he doesn’t want it to be a work day, clinging to me and telling me that he’ll put on his socks and shoes and come with me to work that just about destroys me. Two weeks ago, after endless discussions and scenario planning, Joel and I decided that I would stay home, quit working in June and we would not get another au pair. The next day, I was offered a new job at Boeing and my dad had a stroke. (My dad is ok – although his vision suffered and he may not get to drive again and his memory was hit – which totally sucks, but he can function.) I felt like I had been run over. Thank God it was a Friday when this all went down, which gave Joel and I the weekend to figure out what to do. You see, I had been in my current job 7 years, through 4 different managers, 4 different directors, and I was just plain tired of breaking in a new boss again, and I’ve been getting pressure to go back to full time. So, stale job, manipulating children, and a dream dashed. That’s a lot to deal with. Needless to say, being offered a new job started to excite me. But I wanted more time with the boys. Really, I think I wanted more quality time with the boys when they weren’t pushing my buttons. Yes, I realize that is too much to ask for. Anyway, when Monday rolled around, I had accepted a new job (still in Finance and I start on March 23rd). Now, what to do with the boys. We had looked at a Montessori school but it was so sterile and quiet. We do not want to put the boys in daycare. We like au pairs and the amazing love they provide. Another decision made. Stick with an au pair and now rush to get an application in because Malina leaves us in June. To any future au pairs, we are really a great family and the boys won’t give you any grief. They save that for me.

I am totally rambling. Sorry. This story is just way to confusing to tell it in a coherent manner. Needless to say, we are still wondering if the co-op is the best place for Nic and Dex next year, or if we will find a regular preschool in which to enroll them in. (Dexter is back in occupational therapy. He just checks out when you are talking to him and doesn’t clue into the fact that he needs to show that he is hearing you.) I’d like to check out the preschool at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church (we’ve heard good things), but religion and Joel just don’t mingle well.

Now that some of these decisions are made, Joel and I need to figure out how to not feel guilty for leaving the kids and working, especially those mornings when they beg to come with us. Stuff like this is totally hard. No one really prepares you for these choices. So, I’ve started to think about our summer and how we can maximize our fun and have true quality time with each other. Joel and I agree on one thing, it’s time to shove our to do list into a closet. There are some things we really don’t need to stress about or fix right now.

OK – now my questions to you. What would you do? How do you handle going to work and leaving the kids at home, or how do you handle staying at home and not going to work? I still wonder if I’m making the right decision. And before you say it – I do not know what is the right decision for me. I just love my little miracles and want them to know it. And, I don’t want to go crazy.