Crazy Week!

Eli

What good little kittens they have not lost their mittens! We got new mittens and they didn't even try to take them off, they must have realized it would keep their hands warm : )

Mama Sue with Mr. T and Caleb

Eli came up with this new game were he puts a toy in his mouth and then either I or Phil take it from him by biting the other end of the toy. There is usually a lot of chasing involved in between transfers.

Sickness and Bad Behavior

We had a crazy week, I threw my first baby shower (yay!) and I was consumed with making 75 cake pops for three days straight (it's quite the process). Phil was going to fix a leak in our plumbing and ended up unearthing a much bigger problem were he ended up replacing a huge section of piping that had rotted so bad you could poke a hole through it with your finger. Then as you know from my previous post the babies all got some kind of stomach bug and were all barfing for a couple of days followed by diarrhea which hasn't entirely cleared up. Phil's parents saved the day though (week really), they were visiting and helped us with all the happenings of the week. Sadly we didn't get to do much fun stuff with them but we are very grateful for all their help and they were very good sports about it. The boys get sick a lot but usually it's just a runny nose and cough. If the grandparents had not been here we might have been tempted to fly them in cause it was brutal! I have lost track of all the loads of laundry we have done, every poopy meant a new out fit change. We went through our entire weekly allotment of 150 cloth diapers two days before our next delivery. And let me tell you, nothing can contain diarrhea, not disposables or even cloth diapers. Ugh so gross!

The smells are slowly dispersing from our house and the last few days the boys have been awful bad. After we have people visiting they seem to go through a withdrawal from all the attention they get. They have all been ganging up on me. The day after Phil's parents left there was so much screaming, fighting and extra destructiveness. I tried playing with them, giving them snacks, putting on their favorite videos, even ignoring them and nothing seemed to make them happy. I have never been so close to throwing in the towel and calling someone to bail me out so I could get a few hours break from them. Even when Phil came home they were no happier and he even agreed with me that they were being really bad. To top it off last night Thomas was up in the middle of the night just screaming his head off for what seemed like hours (I think he might be getting some molars). Anyways, I think they are getting over it now though (BIG SIGH of relief). We'll see how tomorrow goes when Phil goes back to work.

I stole this idea from another blog, I used the boys' newborn clothes and tiny pastel colored clothes pins to decorate the room : )

My pretty cake pops, I'm so proud of myself!

Random Act of Kindness

The other day I got a call from the cloth diaper service saying that someone anonymously transferred the remaining credit on their account to ours, which by the way covers almost a months worth of diapers for these guys. We are really touched by every ones generosity, besides many friends and family, some who have donated more than once, several persons I've never even met have donated to our diaper service. Here we are at 14 months and we have not yet had to pay for diapers! Thank you, thank you, thank you! A few months ago I wrote that once the donations ran out I would just bite the bullet and start washing my own diapers but the boys are sooooooo much work (I'm afraid to say more than ever) that I don't think I'm up to the challenge anymore. I am praying and hoping the boys will potty train by age 2, I hope that's not wishful thinking and it is indeed a realistic goal. Lots of boys don't potty train until they are 3! Ok so I guess I better start reading up on potty training, two is coming up fast : )

If the boys need an outfit change I put them down while I pick out some new clothes and for whatever reason they love running around like this and Caleb in particular hates it when we chase him down to re-dress.

Picture Update

Don't even think about messing with us!

Caleb

Eli

Who loves me?...

Daddy loves Eli

Mommy loves Thomas

Grandma loves Caleb

I love?...

Thomas loves mommy

Caleb loves daddy

Uh Oh!....Eli loves everybody!

No time to write much so just a cute picture update, can you believe it the boys are sick again (sarcasm!). We are knee deep in baby puke and diarrhea (not the typical cold). My house smells awful. Thankfully papa Ed and mama Sue are visiting so we are not overwhelmed by all this, it's a bad one : (

I'm 29 years old, I'm 29 years old, I'm 29 years old! Ok, got that out of my system, how sad I turn 30 tomorrow, life ends at 30 right? : (

Cameo appearance by Don Elias

the Bad and the Ugly

I've given you plenty of good, now here's the bad and the ugly...

You see this face above, well he backed up his brother in a corner and...

Little did he know that his brother doesn't like being pinned up in the corner so....

Eli bit Caleb!

(ladies and gentlemen we have our first biting incident ever and many more to come I'm sure)

Eli's response to all this, "nobody puts baby in the corner!"

Baby safety devices are death traps for parents! The picture below is of my knee after I ran into into a safety gate. Stupidity you ask? Well maybe, but in my defense it was really dark. That isn't the first time something like this has happened. A few months back when we still had the baby prison (superyard XT) I needed to make an important phone call to the bank and had been procrastinating for a really long time. The babies had just woken up and eaten, at their happiest and I thought it was the perfect opportunity to finally make my phone call. While I'm in mid conversation the boys all start screaming, well more like high pitched squealing, they are all in a tug of war for who knows what toy. I need to break up the fight to continue my conversation, so I start to climb over into the baby prison when I just can't quite make my foot over it and fall right on top of the thing, completely flattening almost three panels. My phone flies out of my hand and dies. Oh and the best part is that the babies stop dead in their tracts and laugh at me! That time not only my knee was bruised up but also my butt and shoulder. OUCH!!!

14 months!

The boys showcasing their awesome Beatles shirts (gift from dad)

Caleb thinks its a modern day tragedy not to like The Beatles

We had a lazy four day weekend. We had no real plans which is nice every once in a while. It was so great to have Phil off from work, we had a lot of good quality family time : ) Phil's cousin David's had us over for a very yummy dinner one night, he and his family live about 40minutes away from us. Thanks to his obsession with finding and chopping up fire wood he keeps us rolling in wood to heat our house. He also keeps the boys rolling in hot wheels cars, we probably have close to a hundred cars already! The boys are still a little young for them, they'll get unlimited access to them as soon as they stop putting everything in their mouths. So in case anyone is wanting to get the boys a gift I think hot wheels tracks or accessories might be a good one : P

At Davids' house

Don't get your fingers nipped!

Baby Updates

Eli's right top tooth next to the two that were already there broke through sometime last week. Eli has a total of 5 chompers and his brothers both have 6 chompers.

The boys have really impressed me this last couple of months, they used to have lousy appetites but they have really turned it around. I'd say they are ALL good eaters, Caleb can really put it away, Thomas is very good at not being phased by a new texture or taste, and Eli still needs some work but he's a much better eater than he used to be.

I think the boys really changed this last month, they are looking so different, more like boys less like babies.

Taking a walk

First order of business at the play house is take down all the books from shelf

The boys cute girly friend from the hall : )

Caleb

Cut their hair? Why would I want to do that?!

Caleb's round head prevents awesome mohawks, they always turn into droopy curls

T

The boys have been pushing their cars sideways. They learned that this is what happens when you use your car in unintended purposes. The same day Caleb did a complete 360 degree flip over his car he was in such shock he didn't even cry.

Tear It Down!

O.C.M.S. heard that Thomas could do a mean two-step stomp so they hired him for their "Tear It Down" music video : )

The boys have really been into 'copying' lately, if I blow raspberries they do to, if I stomp my foot they do to. This made teaching them to actually brush their teeth and not just play with the tooth brush a whole lot easier!

Last Fall Day?

Even though it still looks like fall the air was quite chilly. In Portland when you get a break from the rain you have to seize the moment and run out side!

T

E

C

Adorable Peruvian hats in care of mama Elda, previously seen in awkward Family Portraits post

the neighborhood cat Fuzzy, apparently he's a terror to the other neighborhood cats =^..^=

Even with a bugary nose Thomas is still such a handsome boy, he calls this look "blue steal" cause he'll steal your heart with it : )

What do you notice about this picture? The boys are all upright and playing! When the boys first learned to walk I thought how great, I can bring them to the play ground and let them go wild. WRONG! When I put the first boy down onto the tan bark it was like "OMG I'm in a sea of things I can put in my mouth even though I shouldn't." So we've been confined to the swings and asphalt otherwise every little thing they saw would go right into their mouths. Just the other day I saw Eli trying to lick up a tiny scrap off the floor! It grossed me out so much that I mopped the floor the first chance I got. I cannot wait for this stage to be over! This last day at the park was the first sign that this stage may be over sometime soon. I did have to scoop out some twigs a couple of times from Eli's mouth but that's all, I'm so happy they actually played : )

We need mittens!

By the time we made it back home the babies had claws for hands, they were frozen stiff. They wouldn't keep their hands in their pockets for more than a few seconds (well Thomas made it for a few minutes, see pic above). How did I over look this detail, we need mittens! What kind should I get and from where? Seriously can any one give me some info. I don't imagine they will want to keep them on so I need ones that have some 'trickery' so they will stay on. I also think leggings(leg warmers?) would be a good idea so I can slip them on without having to undress them. Oh yeah and I don't want to pay more than $6 for a pair of gloves, I have to get three pairs!