Benny the tooth-puller

Benny lost his first tooth last weekend. "Fine-a-wee," he said. His friends in kindergarten are acting like snakes poking their tongues through big gaps in their tooth-line and he hasn't been able to play along.

We didn't even know Benny's tooth was loose until he pulled it out himself.

He said he kept feeling something weird with his tongue. It was the adult tooth growing in BEHIND the baby tooth. So, braces are in our future.

Benny was checking this situation out in the mirror when he saw how wiggly that baby tooth was. Max was like, "DON'T DO IT!!!! IT'S GOING TO HURT!" And Benny was like, "what, like this?" Yoink. Out it came.

Oh joy, oh rapture, Andrew is almost there

We are so close. So close to being fully potty-trained. Andrew saw "Cars" underwear at Costco 2 weeks ago and said "Gimme gimme gimme," so I said, "OK, this means you can now go on the potty all the time, no more diapers." We had dabbled before with going on the potty, but this time it was all systems go.

He tried first thing that afternoon -- holding all his precious new underwear at the same time -- and there has been no looking back.

He is now dry almost all the time. Fantastico. But #2 is still an issue. Always it seems #2 is the issue when potty-training.

You've read this book before, you now how it ends. I'm just looking for an excuse to share a picture of my third boy holding all his underwear as he watches "Thomas" on the ipad on the floor and sings, "Fresh from my BODY straight into the POTTY!"

James is 10 months

Big baby boy!

Can you see all 6 teeth in that kissable, smiley mouth?

The rest of the family was behind JB while he took pictures on our front lawn. We all made big goofy faces and said "Hiya, James! Hi hi hi!"

Gerber baby.

When those four top teeth were coming in, James had an on-and-off rough couple of weeks.  Today as I type this, he's happily throwing his toys across the living room.  He likes to be around people, but doesn't like to be left doing one thing too long. And he likes being held and entertained.

He says ma-ma-ma-ma and buh buh buh and what sounds like "ball!" He rolls around but no scooting or pulling up yet. He prefers to feed himself by picking up food and putting it in his mouth. And he loves JB's barbecue pork.

He loves his older brothers, and they love him.

We nap on the bed together everyday, baby boy and I. He sleeps much longer when he can roll over and nurse whenever he wants. He often ends up in bed with us at night for a stretch too, because of my early bedtime. I say little thankyou prayers every day for my sweet, roly-poly squishable kissable baby.

My brother's sitter

Sometimes I think Andrew can't wait for James to grow up and be his buddy.  I mean, look how well he plays with him.

And here's the video.

Andrew said, "Widdle brudder!  Imma sit on 'im."   See why our baby isn't crawling yet? I can't leave him on the floor!

Brother Hen

My heart swells when I see my boys do kind things for each other.

 (Andrew sharing his animals with baby James)

Don't get me wrong, they are often pounding or poking or bossing each other around, but sometimes they just are so sweet.

1) One night 6-year-old Benny forgot that I had given him his kiss goodnight, and the next morning I found out he had cried about it, until 8 1/2-year-old Max climbed down from the top bunk and gave him kisses on both cheeks.

2) Three-year-old Andrew sometimes has a nightmare or night terror and cries out in his sleep. But before I can get there, Max has climbed down from the top bunk, turned on his flashlight, and has covered Andrew back up or talked to him to help him out. I caught him doing so at 4 AM on my way to work and praised him for his kindness. He sleepily said, "It's ok mom, but could Andrew sleep with you guys?"

3) JB and I both had overlapping church meetings one evening and got a babysitter. When I left, the three older boys were all tucked into bed downstairs (and thoroughly kissed goodnight), and 9-month-old baby James had not quite fallen asleep yet so Macy had charge of him. She texted about 40 minutes later that the baby was crying and all the boys were out of bed.  I rushed back to find that Max and Benny had been getting out all sorts of toys for the baby, and were singing to him, and even tried to feed him. They told me, "Macy sure needed help." I loved their willingness to help, though I'm pretty sure they only unsettled the baby more!

Of surprises

I'm not blogging as often because 1) baby James 2) Benny likes to watch Rainbow Loom tutorials on my laptop and 3) spring has sprung and we must be outside.

We struggle sometimes with how much to tell the boys about our plans. If we tell them we are going to do something, but plans change, they have a tendency to huff and puff or weep and wail, depending on how big the plans were. I'm talking about things like promising, "When we get home from our walk we can have a girl scout cookie" and then I find out we are down to one left, and this gets greeted with extreme sadness.  Or "We will be going to such-and-such place" and the plans get canceled for weather or sickness and this is another big deal. "YOU PROMISED!"

And, if we tell them something in advance, we get "Is it time yet? Is it time yet?" 

So we go back and forth, with the above examples giving us pause before committing to anything, versus sharing plans so the boys know what to expect when their routine is broken. Their routine being "stay-at-home-poke-around-homework-basketball-baths-books-bed."

Andrew is pretty relaxed, but the older two can get intense. So we waited until the last minute to tell them about the invitation (given more than a week ago) to go to our friends' house and eat pizza and watch March Madness on Friday night.

Note: These two older boys love pizza and basketball, and love going to the Peters' house.

Observe.

You'd think we had just told them we were going to Disneyland pronto.

We went, we had a great time, and we got tucked into bed late but it was worth it.

Fun with babies

We have never had a baby Bumbo, just a kitchen sink.

This is baby James a few months ago, pre-haircut and pre-teeth.  Below is baby James last weekend, while I was baking a cake. Max was tasked to talk to him if I got out of arm's reach.

It's been a perfect place to put the baby while bustling about in the kitchen, as he has remained immobile. But now he's reaching and twisting and wiggling a lot more, so alas, this must end.

He acts fast. I turned my back, and he had scattered my yarn all over like a big kitten.

Here's a little piggy-back horsey ride. He liked it -- until he didn't.

I never remember Max and Benny carrying a baby Andrew around -- perhaps because they were ages 5 and 3. But now they are 8 1/2 and 6, and they always want to hold James and carry him.

He likes it -- until he doesn't. 

One of them asked me if they could hold the baby in church, so I handed him down the pew and put Andrew on my lap -- then the ear-splitting shrieks caused me to quickly take back the archy-backed baby and flee the room.