The Days of Our Lives (Nov 3 - Nov 9)

Sunday - Daylight Savings Time - the bane of all parents everywhere!  We had been keeping the kids up so they may have slept in until 6:30.  At least that's when their clock turned green and they were up right away, so who knows when they actually woke up.  Church was a little dicey with tired kids, but thankfully we had small group in the evening which keeps all in a good mood even when we're up way late!  (Side note: Sunset on Sunday was 4:35!!!!!!!!!  This winter may do me in just due to the short days!)

Monday - Cold, cold today so the kids and I stayed home and hung out at the house.  It was great just to putter and play and read.  

Tuesday - We ran errands in the morning to Target, the Asian/Mexican grocery store, and TJ Maxx.  Nathan did not want to change out of his shorts before we left, so I confiscated them for the rest day as his consequence.  When we got home he ran to change like he usually does and asked for his shorts back.  I told him he was out of luck for the day so he came to lunch in his short sleeve shirt and undies!  After lunch I helped him find a pair of fleece "soft" pants that he decided he liked enough to wear for the day.  Before bed, he helped me go through his summer clothes and only keep out 2 pairs of shorts and 3 short sleeve shirts for him to wear inside during the winter.

Wednesday - I woke up laughing because Sarah walked into my room in her diaper saying "Naked!  Naked!"  Apparently the kids had been up a while and Sarah decided to take off her jommies while still in her crib.  I hadn't heard them because I put one ear plug in after I woke up at 4am to our upstairs neighbor vacuuming their apartment.  It seems that they only vacuum between the hours of 11pm and 5am.  Really?!?!  Anyways, she said she was cold when I asked her, so we went straight back to her room to change her diaper and get her dressed.  About half the time Nathan will get out of bed and change from his pjs into clothes, so she must finally be deciding to emulate him.

Our landlord was replacing our washer/dryer that day so we were excited to hang around and see the action.  When they had removed the old unit, the maintenance man wondered if I wanted to clean up in the closet while it was empty.  Imagining just a thick layer of dryer lint and dust on everything, I happily agreed.  But this was what I actually found in the closet, thanks to the previous tenant.  Yikes!  There must have been 50 or 100 plastic garbage bags and tons of other junk.  A couple of trashbags and trips to the dumpster later, though, it looked much better.

Sarah wasn't sure she was on board with the men removing our old machines.  She kept telling me "No take wa sheen!"  But I explained to her how our old one was really loud and they were going to give us a new one that was much quieter.  So for the rest of the day she kept reminding me "Old wa sheen woud.  New wa sheen qui-e."  (Old washing machine loud.  New washing machine quiet.)

So the good news is that the new washing machine doesn't sound like it is trying to blast off into outer space during the spin cycle.  The bad news is that the washer capacity is WAY smaller and the buzzer on the dryer can't be turned off - bad news for trying to finish laundry during naps!  But overall I'm still really thankful that we have laundry in our apartment, so these are just minor annoyances that I can totally live with!

Thursday - Sarah came into my room naked for the second day in a row!  Then later, Nathan was thrilled when I told him he could wear his shorts and short sleeve shirt with a jacket to the library today since the temperature was in the low 60s this morning!  Once again he wasn't interested in going to storytime, but was very interested with piling his basket high with lots of books to check out.

We stopped outside the library to pick up some leaves from the beautiful maple, since it was supposed to rain in the afternoon and I keep thinking "this will be our last chance to play in the leaves".  A lady was walking by with her toddler daughter and saw us playing, so decided to stop and let her daughter play too.  And it turns out (this was so random) she is one of Brian's attending physicians at Boston Children's Hospital!!  She actually hadn't worked with him, but since there's about 100 attending physicians and 13 fellows, I guess that's not unexpected.

I brought my leaves home to (hopefully) do some projects with, but Nathan and Sarah took theirs straight to their play kitchen and started 'cooking' with them.  Nathan picked out a miniature "Where's Waldo" book from the library (first one he's ever done) and is crazy good at finding Waldo!  On the first two pages he found waldo in less then three minutes, but the third page stumped him a bit when there was another guy dressed up in Waldo clothes, but he got that too after a few more minutes. 

Friday - We had a dentist appointment for Nathan in the morning and it went SO GREAT!  On the new patient information I filled out, they asked if there was anything they could do to make the process easier for the kids, so I wrote something like "Nathan really likes to know what's going to happen before it happens."  I'm not sure if was that or just standard procedure, but the dental hygenist (named Sara!) spent lots of time talking through the different equipment with Nathan and showing him how it all works and feels before he even sat down in the chair.  It was the first time that he had his teeth cleaned with the spinny toothbrush or used the suction tube ("bubble sucker") or had water squirted in his mouth, and he just rolled with it all like a champ!  His option of chocolate-flavored toothpaste may have helped with his cooperative spirit!

Nathan with his mirror (so he could watch what Sara was doing) and his 'bubble sucker'.

 Sarah was practicing with her new toothbrush so that she would get a good report next year when it was her turn to sit in the chair!

The happy kiddo after his teeth were nice and clean!

Nathan came home with a big bag of things - toothbrush, floss, toothpaste, 2 stickers, 2 toys from the "treasure chest" and a picture that they took and printed out of him with his hygienist.  He counted the items in his bag twice before nap and twice again in the hour after he got up, just to make sure nothing was missing.  That bag and its contents are his new prized possessions (at least for today!).

I was talking with Brian later about it, about how Nathan keeps completely surprising me lately.  He was so cheerful and cooperative at the pediatrician's office, both when getting his flu shot and again during his yearly checkup, and then again at the dentist office.  He can be so stubborn and frustrating at times, but recently when he's in new and potentially stressful situations he's been so cheerful and cooperative.  Last year at the dentist he we had moments of freaking out and crying even though all they did was count his teeth, but this year he handled a new dentist office and weird dental equipment like its no big thing.  I guess he really is maturing!

Saturday - After we had gotten up and puttered around for a bit, Brian and I though that maybe we should DO SOMETHING.  But this colder weather has really sapped our motivation to get out of the house.  Also the fact that it gets dark SO EARLY makes it hard to try and plan anything for after naptime.  So we decided that next weekend we would try to do something as a family.  We'll see how that works out...