This and That (January 2014)

When I think about things I want to blog about, lots of times I am pondering "What am I going to forget about life right now that I'll want to remember later?"  I love documenting the bigger activities, trips, events, etc, but part of me thinks that these little tidbits about life might be my most treasured reading in the years to come.

It's started snowing again and I think we're expecting around a foot of snow.  I guess this is our third big snow of the winter?  Sheesh!  Brian actually drove to work today since he was assigned to a satellite surgical clinic.  On the way home someone on the radio said it was "Snow-mageddon", so for the hour after he got home Brian would randomly (and loudly) call out "Snow-mageddon!"

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Nathan has been my great vacuuming buddy for years.  He loves his little toy vacuum that Nana bought for him when he was two.  We have become a good team over the years: I'll start on one side of the room and work toward the middle then call out "switch" and he'll run around me to the other side so I can keep going.  These days he usually anticipate me and will ask "switch?" before I have to tell him.  For a long time he's always asked to turn the vacuum on and off, and lately I've started letting him plug it in and unplug the cord from the socket (and he gets irritated with me whenever I forget to let him do all of these things).  When we first moved to Boston, Sarah was still scared of the vacuum so I would close the door and she would wait outside until Nathan and I were finished with our chore.  Lately though she's been "helping" vacuum as well - using the toy stroller as her pretend vacuum.

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Nathan has fallen into the bad habit of picking at his nails all the time.  I NEVER have to trim this kid's nails!  A few weeks ago his thumb nails were becoming so terribly tiny that Brian decided we needed to take some action since verbally reminding him wasn't making any impact.  So we started having him put band-aids on his thumbs before quiet time (since I can just imagine him spending his whole quiet time absentmindedly picking) and at bedtime (same deal).  Sarah, of course, wants to do everything like her brother so she is also putting on bandaids at naptime and bedtime, though we limit her to only one.  We are seeing improvement on Nathan's nails - they just look short but not grotesque, though Brian is now lamenting the cost of all these bandaids the kids are using!

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Sarah has developed a fascination with checking her feet for toe lint and asking me to help her clean it out.  This usually occurs when we're sitting on the loveseat reading, which is a perfect opportunity for Sarah to clean between toes and for Nathan to pick at his nails.

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Whenever a timer goes off in the house, or the oven beeps, or almost any alarm sounds, apparently my usual comment is "That's me!" as I dash to take care of whatever needs to be done.  I didn't realize that's what I say, but it must be since now whenever any alarm sounds around the house the kids tell me "That's you!"

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With the forecast of brutally cold weather on top of the snow we're supposed to get over the next 18 hours, I woke up this morning with the plan to start potty training Sarah.  We spent a little time on the potty this morning before Nathan made a last-minute decision that we needed to go to the science museum today.  I think the process may not be too difficult since Sarah was loving sitting on the potty while I was reading book after book to her.  She thinks she's getting a great present of having Mommy read lots and lots and lots of books to her AND getting to wear big girl underwear on top of that!  I foresee lots of the three of us crammed into the bathroom reading over the next few days (since Nathan's not one to miss a chance to read either!).  She did actually have success once this morning before we switched into a diaper for our outing.  On a side note about reading, Sarah's usual plea of "cuddle" when she's feeling sad or grumpy is slowly being replaced with the plea of "read book".

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Sarah has some "tenacious earwax" according to Brian.  He will periodically check the kids' ears with his otoscope and a few weeks back was worried about some wax that was impacted in Sarah's ears.  At the time she was NOT interested in sitting still for Brian to try and clean them out.  We ended up trying again last weekend and Sarah amazed us all by being super cooperative!  She literally spent half an our laying on her side while Brian scraped and prodded and flushed her one ear to get it clean.  And Nathan was such a sweet helper - he gave her one of his special little cars he got for Christmas for her to hold and look at, then later he was reading her a book and singing to her to keep her entertained.  Boy did that make my heart want to burst with happiness!