Needles and a Pen » Knitting, Sewing, and Nursing School

I think everyone should be issued a little boy like Will.  Someone so full of joy and love.  He is such a sweetie.  Last night my little moth came in and asked if I would rub his back and sing him a song about a jelly bear.  Since I don’t know a song about a jelly bear he had to settle for other songs.  But it made me remember being a little girl and loving having my back rubbed.  (or being a grown up and loving it, too!)  There was just nothing better than falling asleep while someone you loved and trusted rubbed your back.

We have a new little nighttime routine lately.  They seem to change every few weeks (determined by Nic’s work schedule and Ellie’s sleep moves), but right now Ellie’s going to bed either before, during, or immediately after dinner.  And Nic’s been getting home late, so after dinner Nic and Will have some play time.  And then I do the bedtime stories with Will.  We do three stories (and it’s amazing to see him totally understand exactly how many 3 is now) and then snuggle time.  He always asks for me to lie down with him, but last week I started doing it for a few minutes after story time and I’m hooked.  He is just sooooo cute and sweet and loving.  We play little games like “I’m going to snuggle you so hard your arms will fall off!” and then we have to use sticky tape and glue and staples to put the arms back on.  Or we look out the window and talk about the birds and the trees and the frogs and the crickets.  Or we sing 88 verses of “old mcdonald had a farm.”

Bedtime used to be my least favorite part of the day.  Such hard work to get him down, and knowing that it wouldn’t last and it was only a matter of hours before he was up again…well, I still have that with Ellie.  But bedtime is my favorite part of the day with Will these days.  Sharing 10 or 15 minutes with him where it’s just us and no other distractions is so special.  I hope he won’t mind if I show up at his dorm room when he’s 19 and insist on snuggling him until his arms fall off and using imaginary glue to put them back on.

We call Willie a moth because at night, if he’s not 100% sure about going to bed, lights attract him like…well…a moth.  If we keep the office light on, he’s up and down and up and down with “I just want to talk to you”s and various other stalling techniques.  If we turn out all the lights upstairs?  He stays put.  All the moth mommies must have to use the same tricks.

I walked into Will’s room tonight after the official good night.  His little head bopped up.

“Whachyou need, Mom?”

“I just came in to give you a kiss.”

“Oh.  Can I just talk to you for a little while?”

“Sure!”

“I just like you, Mom.  I don’t hate you.”  [this is a newish thing–the “I like you” followed by “I don’t hate you” thing]

“I like you too, buddy.  I don’t hate you–I love you.”

“Awww, sucks.”  [“shucks” more often than not comes out “sucks”]

And then he told me about the pictures of me on the wall and asked if I’d seen the animals he brought into his bed.  (He doesn’t normally sleep with stuffed animals, but four were in bed next to him tonight.)

If you tell Will that he has either endangered or upset Ellie, it’s the meanest thing you can tell him.  He’s DEVASTATED when that happens.

Like this afternoon Ellie woke up from her nap.  Will and I both heard her and moved toward her room.  Will rushed ahead, and in what he clearly thought was going to be the best most hilarious game of awesomeness ever, he ran to her crib and made a silly roaring noise at her.

She paused and then let out this sad terrified scream.  Will’s eyes got big, the lower lip started to quiver, and then he lost it, too.

He had made her cry.  He was devastated.  “I made her upset!” he sobbed into my lap.   “But I was just being a silly dragon!”

Last week when I dropped him off for preschool it was crazy windy.  Ellie had finally fallen asleep in the car and I was desperate to make it into the building and back out without waking her.  In the crazy wind.  I told Will to hurry, but when I looked back at the car (with Ellie now outside in the wind) he was still buckled inside, not even attempting to get out.  I was FURIOUS.  “What is WRONG with you?!”  I yelled at him as I stomped to his side of the car, unbuckled him, and pulled him out.  “Ellie’s going to wake up and cry now and it’s ALL YOUR FAULT.”  As I stomped him inside I couldn’t see his face, but he hadn’t said sorry and I was furious with him.  But when we got to the front desk the owner said “Will, what’s wrong?” and he burst into tears.  He sobbed and sobbed.  I felt awful–me yelling at him never affects him like that.  Me telling him that he will be the cause of Ellie’s tears?  Cut his sweet little heart in two.

I felt horrible.  It was awful.  I had to bring him a chocolate doughnut when I picked him up.

She made it from 7:45 to 10:45, which is an improvement.  But I know she can go 5 hours so I’ve been doing the “do some online window shopping and proofing and ignore the cries” for the last half hour (with the standard visits in to check on her at increasing intervals).  25 minutes and she’s done.  Hopefully she won’t wake up until after midnight, at which point she’ll get what she wants–milk truck time.

And to think that at 2 months she was totally doing the 7-12 stretch no problem.  Hate that it is taking tears and screams to get back to that point.

she seems to be done.

the sad part is this could all start again in an hour.

and go on for days.

yep.  i hate this.

I went into our bedroom and found Will all tucked under our covers with his head on Nic’s pillow.

“You tired, sweetie?” I asked.

“No.” he said. “I just want to lay down and wait for my dad.  I just want to sleep until my dad gets home.”

Awww.  Sometimes I feel that very same way about Nicolas.

Will:

1)  Tonight he sang me the plot of The Princess and the Frog.  He loves to sing.  He loves to make up songs.  I’m going to get him a guitar and he can be the next John Mayer.  Except cuter and not crazy.  But if he wants to date Jennifer Aniston that’s okay.

2)  Conversation tonight as I changed Ellie’s diaper:

Will: Ellie doesn’t have a weiner.

Me:  That’s right.

Will:  But what does she have there on her back?

Me (for the 800th time):  A vagina.

Will:  I want my wiener to crack so *I* can have a gina when I grow bigger.

Me:  Sorry, honey–you’re a boy so you don’t have a vagina.

Will:  NO!  But I want my weiner to crack to a gina!

Me:  Weiners don’t become vaginas.  [side note: okay, so I was telling a lie, but I figured it would be safer to go this route than to acknowledge that it is actually possible to turn a penis into a vagina and they do actually do it by sort of cracking your weiner]  It’s special to be a boy.  You’re a boy, so you have a penis like daddy.  It’s nice.

Will:  PEANUTS?!  I don’t want peanuts.

And then he got all distracted and started talking about clowns.

3)  Will always says upside-down and upside-up.  Not right side up.  But upside up. LOVE IT.

4)  He is really into school right now and retaining the information beautifully.  I think a big part of that is that they are learning about “where things come from” and he is obsessed with that.  Has been since they started.  Always asks me where things come from now.  All.  Day.  Long.  But it’s awesome.  Today the butterfly that they had been watching through its life cycle was hatched out and he could not wait to get into the room to see it.  The other kids were mildly interested, but Will was so excited and fascinated.  Tonight at dinner I asked him to tell Nic about the butterfly at school today, and I expected maybe three words.  Instead he launched into a speech about the butterfly and how it was a caterpillar but then the caterpillar made a cocoon chrysalis and came out a butterfly but his wings are wet so he can’t fly but soon they will dry and then he will fly.  It was so cool to hear him actually telling us about what he learned today!  And tonight he was telling me about tadpoles!

Ellie:

1) She turns 3 months tomorrow!  Time sure flies when you’re sleep deprived.   She’s actually a very good sleeper.  This week she broke her reliable 5 hour stretch to make it all the way to 7 hours straight for two nights in a row!  Then it was back to 5, and then 6, and then 5 again last night.  She seems like like the 5, 3, 1-2 hour routine.  I am really wanting to stretch it out to 6/7, mainly because the books say 3 month olds should be able to go 8 hours at night without a feeding and I would like it if she was “on track” in terms of the book sleeping schedule…since a certain 4 year old who shall remain nameless still creeps into our bed if we’re not vigilant!

2)  She is such a little chatterbox.  I love it.  And she is so expressive–her little beams of joy just make my heart sing.  They light up her face and nothing is prettier than Ellie when she’s smiling!

3)  She’s holding up her head pretty well these days, although she can’t be 100% trusted not to go all bobble head on you.

4)  She has eczema and cradle cap, which requires a lot of lotions and potions.  I think I spend more time on her skin than mine.

5)  The light of her day (and bane of her naptime) is still her most loving brother.  Sometimes when he’s all over her JUST as she’s fallen asleep I try to remember that she really IS so sweet when she’s sleeping that it’s perfectly natural to want to hug and kiss her.  It’s just that I manage to suppress that desire for the greater desire of keeping her asleep!

The Bearenstein Bears Get the Gimmies has been a bit problematic for us.  I don’t think Will’s really getting the message.

He was telling me about it today.

Will: I want to say “whaddya bring me?  whaddya bring me pappa?!”

Me:  No buddy, that’s not nice. We say “Hi, Poppa.  It’s nice to see you.  I’m so happy you came to visit us.”

Will:  No.  I want to say “whaddya bring me poppa?  whaddya bring me?  goodbye.  don’t come in my house.  good luck.”

Was sitting on the sofa with the family this evening when I saw a mouse run across the floor and disappear down one of our vents.  Which totally ruined my evening.  Which is silly.  Because I saw the mouse and the mouse saw me and the mouse went on about its day and my day was ruined.  Except I’m not going to die because I saw the mouse….but the same cannot be said for that little mouse and his friends.

Ellie slept for over 6.5 hours straight last night!  10-4:30.  Huzzah!

Will has two made-up words that he uses frequently enough that I will be sad when they disappear.  (Which he pronounces as dis-is-appear.)

Twaps.  And stoo

Twaps I’m not really sure what it means.  It seems to be a noun of some sort.  He likes to say it while he’s playing imaginary games or while he’s drawing (he does a lot of draw/acting–where he draws while making noises and narrating some story.  he also likes to do a lot of play acting in front of the big dresser mirror that we have on the floor leaning against the wall in our room–he is usually playing at least two characters and likes to watch himself act it all out).

Stoo is easier–it’s an insult.  Like if I tell him he can’t hold Ellie (which makes him sooooo angry–or anger-y as he pronounces it) he’ll put on his angry face and shout “STOO, Baby Ellie!” and storm out of the room.

This weekend we were all lounging on our bed talking to Ellie.  Will was talking to her and saying “Weezie, Baby Ellie…what’s her name?”  And Nic explained that her long name is Eloise Marie Turchin, just like Will’s long name is William Francis Paul Turchin.  And Will said “But I don’t want to be a Francis.”  I looked at Nic, devastated–that his most IMPORTANT name.  But then Will continued “I’m GOOD.  I don’t want to be a bad boy, I want to be a good boy.”  (Remind me to call him William Francis in endearment, not just in exasperation!)

Today I took them to Barnes and Noble so Will could pick out a few Berenstein Bears books (he has one Halloween book that he found in his pile a week or two ago and has been obsessed with).  He also got to play at the Thomas the Tank Engine train station that they have set up that’s a big hit for all the kids.  I was sitting there with a few books when I heard Will introduce himself to an older boy:

“Hi.  I’m William Turchin Paul…Francis.  My mommy and daddy spank me.  On purpose.”

(And he hasn’t had a spanking in at least a week and I hadn’t even threatened him with a spanking today!  It was a totally out of the blue and just perfect preschooler embarrassing their mother moment.)

Tonight Nic and Will had just finished reading the “get the gimmees” book when I came into the room.  Will was talking about the gimmees, and wanting both of them, and wanting “all those things.”  And I think I said something to the effect of “but we don’t want to have the gimmees” and Will said “but look at me–I’m white.”  Nic and I about died–we’re still not sure where it came from, but I think it has to do with the green alligator in his “please may I have a cookie” story because Will always gets a kick out of it when you read it that WILL is the main character…a green alligator.  And the green part is always something he talks about, and gets a kick out of since he’s not really green, but white (he labeled himself as white, and I’m really curious if he picked that up somewhere or if he decided that’s the best descriptor of his skin).  Anyway…I’m determined to now use “but look at me, I’m white” in as many inappropriate situations as possible now.