Splash Pad

A few days ago we had a little heat wave and since it might be our last for this summer we decided to soak it up at the splash pad!

ETC

Caleb getting a bucketfull on the head

Eli

Caleb

Darn that paparazzo!

Thomas

Some how they always end a playtime session with some pretend choo choo play : )

Here is a little video of our afternoon at the splash pad as well as Eli speaking some Spanglish...

Weird Stuff

This post is all about the weird stuff that goes on here....

perhaps the weirdest picture I've ever posted?

1. Since the boys have been potty trained my house and life have been over taken by tiny underwear. Everywhere you look there is more than likely a pair of underwear. My whole day is consumed with putting underwear on, taking it off, and talking underwear politics with the boys. We have over 40 pairs of underwear and somehow we are always running out, it's usually what determines when it's time to do laundry again, the limiting factor. The boys still go to bed and naptime in diapers. In the morning the boys get up crazy early (6:30am) and they usually roam the house unattended while Phil and I squeeze a few more minutes of sleep. In that time they usually take off their diapers and if available will eat two weeks worth of string cheese or yogurt and ruin $5 dollars worth of produce (because a few bites out of three peaches doesn't constitute as "eating" to me). By the time we get out of bed we have three well fed children naked from the waist down. So begins the underwear politics:

"Eli, go put some underwear on"
2 minutes later..."Eli, go pick out some underwear"
2 minutes later, I go and get a pair of underwear
"Eli come here so I can put these underwear on you"
"No! brrm brrm"
"We are all out of cars underwear Eli"
Eli doesn't believe me so he runs to the bathroom to pick out underwear. After seeing there are no more cars themed underwear he picks out the next best thing. I put his underwear on for him.
REPEAT for the next two boys.
REPEAT for all three after naptime
REPEAT if someone dribbled on their underwear
REPEAT if someone suddenly realizes they don't like the pair they have on
REPEAT if someone spills water or milk on their undies
REPEAT if I find a turd in a potty, this means someone didn't tell me to wipe their butt, then I'm on a search for the boy with skids in his underwear

Underwear ends up in various places, often time I didn't see who took it off or why. I assume it's dirty unless I see why or when they took it off. So 40 pairs of underwear lasts us approximately three and a half days.

this is only about half of them

2. Caleb is the only one that prefers to put his own underwear on, but I think he just likes to wear them backwards so he doesn't want me messing him up. This results in one butt cheek always sticking out, we call it the signature Wibbies wedgie (his nick name is Wibbies, a derivative of Caywib)

3. I've stopped buying the boys toothbrushes because they never use them. When they were younger they were a little obsessed with tooth brushes, we'd often find them gnawing at a tooth brush only to see that it was either Phil's or my tooth brush (we went through many tooth brushes back then). We started hiding them but they'd always manage to find them. The tooth brush obsession is over now but they still refuse to use their own tooth brushes. When it's time to brush teeth, I ask each boy, "so which one do you want to use tonight, mommy's or papi's tooth brush?" They couldn't be happier.

5. There are only a handful of dreams I've had that I actually remember. For whatever reason I still remember this one vividly. I had it when I was still pregnant. So I'm sitting in a hospital room recovering from my c-section and remembering nothing of what happened previously. A nurse tells me she's bringing me my triplets. When she comes back she hands me three kittens that look just like my cat Pacha! If you already know my cat then you will agree with me when I tell you that she's CRAZY! (Unlike, my other sweet cat Lankston). So I'm sitting there looking at these three kittens thinking I don't hardly want my crazy cat Pacha let alone three more! I tell the nurse, "I thought I was having babies, I want babies not cats." I remember feeling greatly disappointed....and that was it, ha!

Lastly here is a little video of Eli being cute, not weird : )

Zoo Train

Lately we've been going to the zoo a lot, mostly just to ride on the train. When we get to the zoo we check out a few animals then jump on the train and get off at Washington park. After hanging out at the playground or the rose garden we ride the train back to the zoo. I guess you can say we're taking advantage of the boys being able to ride free since they are still under 3. Pretty soon the train will be a once a year thing, ha! We might have to get one more ride out of it when mama Sue and papa Ed visit next week : )

C

All aboard!

The train is no less exciting on the third time as it was the first time!

E

Pops and C

C

The zoo sure does tire a boy out!

Two days later we went hiking in Forest Park with fresh haircuts!

TEC looking mischievous

They don't call it stumptown for nothing : )

goin up!

Caleb just got too tuckered out!

Playing Dress Up

The boys sure had fun playing dress up with these costumes! They chased each other around like I've never seen before. They got so riled up that when naptime came it took them 2 hrs to fall asleep! I think we need to play dress up more often because they had so much fun doing it, but perhaps we'll do it post naptime next time : )

T the lobster man

C

E

Caleb and I went on a donut date after dinner one night : )

Caleb shows you which donut he got!

Getting one on one time with the boys is a challenge but we are trying harder, especially now that they are older, you can tell just how much they LOVE it. They get so giddy and feel so special, it's really cute to see. It's funny, the boys, when they are together, can cause a heap of trouble. But when they are by themselves they are seriously the BEST behaved children you ever did see! What a weird phenomenon?

Here is a cute video of our little date, Caleb surprises me with a random act of kindness...

2yrs + 11mo!

A day early but here it is!
2 years and 11 months old
Our last month as 2 year olds has begun!

Went peach and apple picking : )

iPad time with Tia

I let the boys watch The labyrinth while they "ate" dinner (special occasion),
I am very pleased they liked it since it was my favorite movie growing up and I may have disowned them if they hadn't liked it!

The boys with their Tia and Tio, their visit was much too short!

How do you keep control of 10 boys? You cage them up!
Just kidding!
We had a play date with two other BBB triplets plus a big brother : )

Running wild and free!
They did this for what felt like an hour, it was great seeing them play together : )

Currently the boys favorite meal is Mexican Spaghetti

Caleb ate seconds (they did eat their broccoli too btw, willingly)

So good he licked his hand clean!

Mexican Spaghetti

I ate Mexican spaghetti as a kid but had long forgotten about this meal until my mom made it again for the boys a year or so ago. It was an instant hit and is currently their favorite food. I made it last night and thought to ask my mom where the recipe came from since there is no such thing as authentic Mexican spaghetti. Turns out my mom just invented it! It's a super kid friendly meal so I'll share with you a little family secret in case you've been looking for something super easy to make and hopefully something your kids will actually eat too : )

Ingredients (I pretty much just eyeball everything so take this as approximate measurements and feel free to tweak it as you like)

16oz (1LB) package of spaghetti cooked however you like
5-8 cloves of garlic, finely minced (maybe adds up to 2-3 tablespoons)
2-3 tablespoons Butter
2 16-oz cans Tomato Sauce
1/4-1/2 cup of sour cream
1/2 of a medium sized onion, slice it very thinly so it looks like spaghetti (most of the time my boys don't even notice it and eat it right up!)
Cotija Mexican cheese (It's a salty and dry cheese, you can pretty much find it in any major grocery store), chop it up or crumble it up with your fingers

-Add Butter, garlic, and onions to the pot (medium heat) and saute until the onions are soft and transparent. -Add tomato sauce and start adding the sour cream a spoonful at a time until the right color appears (you want it to look a little pink and taste creamy).
-Add spaghetti and mix
-Sprinkle Cotija cheese on top and enjoy!

I believe we'd sometimes eat it with garlic bread too but I usually don't go through the trouble since it's already a carb heavy meal : )

Drawings and Friday Flashback!

Eli's drawing (and his brother's too) is improving very quickly and I'm a impressed because just two months ago he was still just scribbling random stuff that didn't look like anything. It all started with happy faces, and now cars, monsters, trains, and people. All stuff that actually resembles the real thing! I'm finding it all very fascinating, as this is the first time I get to witness this in a child : )

Eli said these were cars

Eli draws his first person!

Eli drew "chiquito mami, big papi"

A person or three-eyed monster?

Triplet Talk

I want to write down some random words and phrases that the boys made up before they quit saying them and I forget all about them. Twin/Triplet talk is to be discouraged but it spreads like wildfire among multiples and I'm not sure it can be combated, or should it be?

Deet = cut or scissors

Amen = menta (mint in English)

Deet Amen = Floss (because you cut floss and it's mint flavored, of course)

Qui Qui = Queso (cheese in English, although they do say cheese but only for pictures) or chiquito (little in English)

Caci = butt (although they are saying "butt" now too)

Agua Nemo = fish

Ding ding, ya! = my turn (this one requires a more extensive explanation, I set an alarm sometimes to signal someone else's turn hence the "ding" and 'ya' in Spanish means enough)

There is a lot more code that I haven't been able to crack so with triplet talk and using both English and Spanish words who knows when anyone will be able to understand what they are saying!

Flashback Friday! Happy Friday everyone : )

A flashback to December 2010!
I love my mismatched pj's, I guess you can say I had bigger things to worry about : )

When Does It Get Easier With Triplets?

This is a post for those who love to know more about the mysterious life of multiples and not so much for those that just love to look at pictures (I'm admittedly one of those that mostly likes the pictures in the blogs I follow, gotta love eye candy!).

I guess we've read one too many books about trains because the boys are obsessed with tickets (mostly Thomas but the others are too). This is a small pile of "tickets" that Thomas made. First he either tears or cuts out pieces of paper, draws some random squiggles on them and then hands them to me so I can repeat a line from one of their favorite books "thank you sir, dinning car to the rear."

This is a section of a handout I read about how kids drawings evolve. I found it very interesting because when I first got it they where on the 'scribble stage' and now I think they are somewhere between 'shapes and intersecting lines' and 'suns.'

On the left, Eli drew a monster and on the right that same monster is now eating a snake. Eli is really into drawing monsters that eat snakes, fish and spiders. His snakes look the most realistic : )

Just a cute pic of T and I post bath time

This morning riding our bikes : )

The Secret Life of Triplets

Immediately after the boys were born I began asking any and all who had older triplets, "when does it get easier?!" Never once did I get the same answer, so I kept hoping that someday it would. So here goes my answer to that question based on my own personal experience. For those that are expecting or have babies currently, you are not going to like my answer: IT DOESN'T, IT'S JUST DIFFERENT! Ok, well not exactly, let me explain...

Personally 0-3mo were the roughest, the babies themselves were very easy. All they did was eat and sleep, at least mine did. In reality it wasn't very hard work, what made it feel hard was only getting 4 hours of sleep each night, which I should mention were interrupted because I had to get up and pump! I'd wake up feeling pretty good but shortly after my body would demand sleep and I had to put up with feeling like a zombie the rest of the day. So everything you did, change diapers, clean bottles, feed babies where just that much harder. Awful, I don't ever feel like repeating that again! 

4-12mo was still pretty rough although this is when I started getting more sleep so you at least have the energy to tackle the quickly compounding tasks that are added as the babies grow. During this period of time I fed the babies every three hours (except at night) because I was not blessed by the milk gods and that was the maximum amount of time I could go between feeds and still give my boys as much breast milk as I possibly could. Some of the new tasks include starting them on one feeding a day of solids, then later two, and then three. Mine still woke up a lot at night so I still put up with interruptions in my sleep but it was not too bad because I'd just give them a boob and we'd both be back to sleep quickly. Also naps were frequent but short so you never got enough time to finish anything. And at this point you have very active babies that you need to entertain while they are wake. They become very demanding of your attention through these ages. So actually it gets harder but at least you sleep and have energy!

1-2yrs was when we started to venture out on our own (just mama and babies) because they went from napping 3 times a day to 2 and then eventually to 1. Before this I never had enough time to change, feed and then go out to do something with enough time to be back at home for nap time. I didn't like rocking the schedule too much because nap time was so precious and still is, it was the only time I could do anything productive so I wanted to be home while they napped, no car napping for us! So with going out more brings more tasks that involve planning ahead, packing diaper bags, getting the kids in and out of the car. And the hardest part of this age is getting used to all the fighting! Constant conflict, you become a referee now too! But at least you got the big breaks at nap time and bed time, these were the golden ages for sleep. A solid 7:30pm -6:30am bedtime and 12-3pm nap time, I think back and am jealous of all the time I had!

2-3yrs Terrible two's/three's, need I say more...(I'm not there yet but most agree that 3 is worse than 2)

It might not be getting any easier but I will say this, having triplets now at the age of almost 3 is about as hard as having say three kids of separate ages under the age of 5 or 6, it's just different of course. The same in some ways, harder in different ways, and easier in other ways but in the end about the same amount of work. I have probably the same amount of laundry, the same amount of cooking and cleaning, etc. It's harder because of the conflict and fighting between kids since they all have to share EVERYTHING. And no older brother or sister to help out like re-tying someones shoe or holding a hand while walking somewhere. It's easier because everyone is on the same schedule, I don't have to juggle picking up older brother from school while the younger ones nap or having a sleepless night from baby. Also everyone has the same interests and abilities (extra plus from having BBB or GGG especially if they're identical) so it's very easy to make everyone happy when going out or picking an activity to do together. 

From what I've heard (and more consistently now) is that as triplets get older it will actually be easier than having three of different ages. I'm excited for that time to come, I envision it starting around the age of 4/5 but of course I have no idea. I'll be sure to write about it when that day actually comes, so stay tuned for part two, date TBD : )