Gigi

Charlotte talks about Gigi everyday, either asking where she is or looking at photos and telling us about Gigi.  She really bonded with Chris’ mom in April during her visit.  The cutest thing is she now points out everyone else’s Gigi.  At therapy she says Gigi over and over if anyone’s grandma brings them.  At the gym today a little boy’s grandma brought him and both Cooper and Charlotte told us about Gigi.  (This is only cute when the woman is in fact a grandmother.  It’s not so great when they randomly point to a woman who is grandmotherly looking, but may not in fact be a grandma.)

Charlotte has now taken to trying to call for Gigi.  We tell her she has to call loudly because Gigi is all the way in Colorado.  She actually tips her head back and gets louder and louder!

Race Car

On the way to the gym after pulling away from a red light we hear this in the back seat:

Charlotte:  Yeah, Yeah, go, go, go!  Go  momma’s tar (car)!  Go, go, go!  Yeah!  Woo-hoo! ::lots of fist pumps, clapping and cheering::

Cooper:  Yeah, baby, yeah, baby!

I think we’ve let them watch Handy Manny’s Big Race one too many times.  Chris said the last thing we need is for our children encouraging us to drive faster.

Toddler Bed Update

We’ve been doing toddler beds all week and it has gone surprisingly well.  I was dreading the worst with constant wake ups and sleeping through the night going away, but it’s been pretty easy.  Charlotte has been easy-peasy.  She LOVES her bed.  She likes that she can get up and read books and then go to sleep when she wants.  We’ve had no early wake up calls and no middle of the night waking.  She goes down easily for naps as well.

Cooper has take several days to get comfortable with the transition.  The first few nights took longer to put him to bed (although it got shorter each night), and then he would wake up after a couple of hours and be very confused.  Chris found him on the floor between the chair and ottoman crying I guess because he didn’t know to get back in bed?  He also had some middle of the night wakings and very early wake up calls (5 am!), combined with no napping.

He seems to be adjusted now.  He’s not waking up at night and needing our help to get back to sleep, he’s taking a nap (although he sometimes opts to sleep in the queen guest bed), and he takes the normal amount of time to get to sleep initially.  He’s still waking up about an hour early and crying to be let out (we use baby gates at their doors for safety).  So to help with the early wake up, we stole Elsha’s idea and bought toddler alarm clocks:

Monkey’s eyes open, time to get up. (Charlotte’s is green.)

Monkey’s eyes closed, time to stay asleep (Cooper’s is pink/blue).

Tonight is the first night using them.  I tried explaining the concept before bedtime, but they got upset when monkey’s eyes closed.  That and Cooper threw his on the floor when the eyes wouldn’t open and the face popped off (luckily it popped right back on), so we’ll see come morning time.

Here they are getting acquainted with their clocks.  Cooper was tucking his into bed while Charlotte was cuddling with hers.

Toddler Beds

We made the switch to toddler beds tonight (see photos on the other blog).  Chris had them watch while he took down their cribs and put up their toddler beds.  I’m so glad he insisted we get them fun beds.  We went searching on craigslist and found a car bed, a train bed, and a fire engine bed.  We thought the train and fire engine were the coolest, but we ended up buying all three.  Now we need to resell the car bed on craigslist.

They played and played on their beds for an hour or so after we put them up.  Cooper didn’t want Charlotte in his bed and kept telling her to ‘go’.  The first thing Charlotte did was pile all her stuff into her bed with her.  Then she jumped on her bed.

Charlotte did great at bedtime.  She’s not able to turn her door handle yet, so Chris did the normal routine, then told her to get in bed and gave her a few books.  She didn’t cry at all, but she did play, read books, and jump on her bed for about 45 minutes before getting quiet.  We just checked on her and she is passed out with the Sneetches laying on her chest.  So, so cute.

Cooper was another story.  We fully expected it would be more difficult with him since it always has been.  He struggles to wind down enough to fall asleep and we expect frequent wakings tonight.  He is an explorer in the middle of the night so we put a baby gate up at his door and then a second baby gate to keep the first one in place, since he has also learned how to knock over baby gates very quietly and then pick them up and move them.

It took about 45 minutes longer, with some extra nursing, rocking, singing, and reading to reassure him that the toddler bed was indeed a safe place to fall asleep.  He finally fell asleep on his own and looks oh so cute on the video monitor.  I hope they continue to sleep well and the bedtime routine gets easier with Cooper.

First Verbal Argument

We had a very busy day today.  I took the day off to make sure we could get everything done.  Chris and I had dentist appointments today for cleanings so we decided to introduce the kids to the dentist.  We had back to back appointments so Chris went first, while I stayed home and got the kids ready. 

When we got there they seemed to warm up to the office fairly quickly.  They played legos,

Brushed the legos teeth

Brushed the cow’s teeth 

Gave the cow kisses

Colored

Then they got to go back and watch the hygienist finish up my cleaning.  They picked my polish flavor (chocolate since they can say that word) and then got to feel the polisher with their fingers before it ‘tickeled’ (polished) my teeth.  They got to use ‘Mr. Thirsty’ to suck the water out of my mouth, which they wanted to do over and over.  Cooper even put it in his mouth!

Then they got to take rides up and down on the chair.  Cooper’s saying what about my teeth?

Doesn’t he look oh so excited?

Okay, all done daddy!

Then it was toy time!

Charlotte was all about reaching into the bottom of the drawer.

After nap, Charlotte had therapy and Cooper had his 2 year check up.  Everything is great, nothing to report, other than he is still a giant.  He’s 33 lbs and 37.5” tall.  They switched scales on measuring him from the baby scale to the grown up scale so the measurements probably aren’t quite consistent with previous measurements.  He also got two shots and a finger prick, both of which he said ‘ow, ow, ow’ before screaming and then crying with huge alligator tears.  He was very dramatic about his finger prick until the bandaid fell off, then he forgot all about it.

After his appointment I went to pick up Charlotte while Chris took Scout to the vet (she’s been having some itchy butt problems).  On the way home from therapy the kids were chattering away to each other.  I love listening to them talk to each other in the car.  This was how the conversation went:

Cooper:  Momma mine.

Charlotte:  No, mine momma.

Cooper:  No, no.  Momma mine.

Charlotte:  NO! NO! Mine Momma.

Cooper:  Nononono.  Mommmmmaaaaa. MINE.

Charlotte:  NO. NO. NO. MINE.  MOMMA.

Cooper:  Cackaw, peeze?

Charlotte:  No.

Cooper:  Peeze, peeze, peeze! Cackaw!

Charlotte:  No, no, no!

Cooper:  [crying, whining] CACKAW!  Mine. Peeze.

Charlotte:  NO! NO!

I’m pretty sure they had their first argument over something neither of them can actually hold and walk away with.  Me.  They argued over who I belong to…so cute.  I did wrestle a cracker from Charlotte and give one to Cooper.  He did say please.