A quick update

Hi all,

Just a quick note to let you know we are heading to NB tomorrow morning, for Christmas holidays, so I'm not sure if we'll have time to update the blog over the next week or so. (Although it's not like DoT has been updating it anyhow!) Maybe. DoT's mom has a computer so I may try to sit down at it sometime and give you an update. We'll see.

DoT seems to be managing being a stay-at-home dad. The first week that I was back to work I would come home and supper would be waiting for me. It was great. But, like many people predicted, that didn't really last. But who knows, maybe it will be a New Years resolution. :-)

DoT is doing great with the girls, though. I don't think they miss me at all. :-( At least they don't let on like it.

DoT took them swimming for the first time this week. A friend of ours has a pool in his apartment building, so he and DoT each took a twin and hit the water. Apparently, A took to it quite well. She was laughing and playing in the water. E was a bit more hesitant (as she is with all things), but by the end was smiling and splashing a bit. We've packed our bathing suits for our trip and may try to get to the pool in the hotel we're staying in tonight. We'll see. We have a fairly early flight tomorrow morning, so we might be turning in early and won't have time for a swim. Wish I could have been there to see the first pool experience, but it just didn't work out to do it in an evening. Oh well, I'm sure it's the first of many "firsts" I'll be missing. How's that for Christmas cheer. :-)

Well, gotta run. I'm updating this blog during my break at work, and I really need to get back to work. Lots to do before I get out of here today.

Merry Christmas all!

K...

A couple more videos

Here we are.. my last day at home before going back to work. I can't believe I go back tomorrow. :-(

Well, since I won't be home from now on, I'm not sure how much time I'll have to update the blog. DoT may update it from time to time, and I'll try to update it too, so we'll see how it goes. In any case, I thought for my last work-free* blog entry I'd put up two videos. This first one I just find hilarious because I can't get enough of the two of them laughing. You'll have to turn your head to the side if you want to see it, but trust me the audio really is the best part.



On the weekend we went to southern Ontario for my mom's side of the family's Christmas dinner. It was great to see the whole clan. We don't see nearly enough of them. Anyhow, on Sunday morning my folks, DoT and I were all sitting around applauding E's walking attempts, and A decided she wanted in on the action. So she stood up and took her first steps. Of course, we didn't catch them on video, but tonight I took a couple videos of her walking. So, here's one of them...



* -- I had to put a note on the "work-free" comment, because as I'm sure most of you realize, my 4.5 months at home were anything but work free.

Steps 3, 4 and 5

Okay, as promised, I'm putting up a video of E taking her first steps. She caught me by surprise with her first steps, so I didn't get them on video. But here are steps 3, 4 and 5. (Note: this happens at the beginning of the video. I kept recording thinking she might take more, but she doesn't. So, feel free to hit stop after the steps.)

Progress report

So, here we are nearing the end of the week and I thought I'd give you an update on how I'm doing on my list (see previous post). So far the number of tasks I've finished are .... none, zero, nil, nadda, zip, zilch,... you get the idea.

I have purchased a couple more Christmas gifts, but I'm certainly not done my shopping. And I've got the tree up, but only partially decorated. Today was going to be the day -- the day I got so much stuff done -- since I didn't have any playdates or anything else I had to do. But, the girls have had other ideas. First E pulled one of the needles out of the sock I'm knitting (she's done this before). Then, as I carefully tried to pick the stitches back up without losing any of them, she tipped over a plant stand that held a giant african violet. And of course this particular plant was in a self-watering pot. Which means that unlike the other plants in our house which are typically bone dry, this one had nice wet soil... which ended up all over my beige carpet which, incidentally, I just had cleaned about a month ago. Great.

Then, in what I can only assume was E's attempt to redeem herself from her early behaviour, she took a couple of steps today. Yup, that's right. Just when I'm ready to pull my hair out, she throws me a bone. She's trying to walk. So, of course, I spent most of the rest of the morning trying to capture this on video. I have got a video, but it's not great -- too much light and I wasn't at a good angle. If I can, I'll try to get a better one this afternoon (if she decides to try it again) and will put it on the blog.

Well, the girls have just now, finally, gone down for their naps, so I figure I have about 90 minutes to accomplish about 8 things. So I've gotta go. Blog ya later.

K...

A million things to do...

and one week to do them in.

When I started my parental leave there were a bunch of things I thought I could get done before going back to work. And since I've been off there are a bunch of other things that have come up that need doing, and I thought, "yeah, sure, before I go back to work". So, now here I am, one week away from returning to work. And the things on my "To Do" list for this week are:

1. finish Christmas shopping
2. wrap all gifts
3. put up Christmas tree and all other decorations
4. empty out the garage so we can fit two cars into it (this means moving a bed, strollers, tires, etc. to the basement)
5. clean up and organize the office
6. move one of the cribs into the guest bedroom
7. finally put the buttons on a sweater I knit about 9 months ago
8. visit the refugee family we used to 'help out' with (poor kids - as far as they know, we just disappeared off the face of the earth sometime around a year ago)
9. write out Christmas cards (NOTE to anyone who will be receiving one of these cards... don't expect any witty or polite banter in the cards... count yourself lucky that our names are on the inside of the card.)
10. all the other weekly to-do stuff like groceries, laundry, dishes, etc.

And this list doesn't include all the things that I know I should be doing, but realistically there is just no way it's going to happen... like cutting down perennials, raking leaves, etc.

So, who thinks I'm going to get all the things on this list done this week? Yeah, probably not.

I am trying to catch, on video, the girls trying to stand on their own. But so far I haven't got any good clips. If I do get a good shot, I'll put it on the blog this week. But for now, I'll just leave you with a couple of pictures...

The first is of E having a bit of a 'bad hair day'.
And this one is of A.













That's it for today.

Time flies...

In just one weeks time I will be enjoying my last day of parental leave before returning to work. DoT will then start his leave and will be off work until the end of April. I can't believe it's been 5 months since we got the girls in China (exactly five months tomorrow). The time has flown by. I remember how, when I first started my leave, December 11th seemed so far away. And now I'm thinking I was an idiot to agree to let DoT take the second half of the leave. What was I thinking?!! I could be off work until May! Aargh.

While the weeks have flown by, I must say that some days just don't. By the time DoT walks through the door at the end of the day, I'm exhausted. Mostly from hauling around 40 pounds of kid for what feels like hours. I know that I don't have to hold them or carry them nearly as much as I did when we first got back to Canada, but now that they're crawling they seem to get up the stairs in record speed, and then need me to carry them back down. Could be worse I guess -- it could be the other direction. Up until now I've been carrying the two of them at the same time, but now that they're pushing (or past) 20 lbs each, I'm thinking that may soon have to change. It seems so inefficient though... making two trips for everything. DoT's brother's wife (how's that for a mouthful) has the same philosophy, if I remember correctly. DoT's brother once told me their nickname for her was "one-trip Tam".

Aside from all the hauling, I'm also spending what seems like a huge portion of my days picking stuff up. The girls have not yet grasped the idea of putting away one toy before taking out another. So several times a day I pick everything up, if for no other reason than self-preservation. With all the toys spread out everywhere I'm at a real risk of tripping. And if that happened while I was carrying the previously mentioned 40 lbs of kid, that would be bad. I also pick up utensils off the kitchen floor at least 40 gazillion times a day. Both E and A feel the need to have their own spoons or forks when we're eating, even though we feed them using ours. And both of them like to hurl them onto the floor and exclaim "uh oh". Telling them that they can only say "uh oh" when it's an accident doesn't seem to make any impression with them. And then once the utensil is on the floor they become quite agitated if you don't immediately pick it up and hand it back to them. It's quite the fun game. For them.

Wednesday nights I have my piano lesson. So at some point during the day on Wednesdays I clue into that fact and realize that I haven't really practiced much, if at all, during the past week. And I make a last-ditch attempt to do some practicing that day. Well, this past Wednesday I sat down at the piano and about 10 minutes later I heard the girls laughing. That should have been a warning to me. And it kind of was, but the piano non-practicing guilt outweighed it, and I ignored the laughter. Well, five minutes later when I checked on them, they had emptied an entire Kleenex box all over the family room. There were Kleenexes everywhere. When I picked them all up, I also found a box of cheerios that they had figured out how to open and they'd both had their fill.

The latest accomplishment for both of them (aside from emptying the Kleenex box, which they seemed to think was quite an accomplishment and something to be proud of)is standing on their own. They will now both stand up from a squatting position and remain balanced for a little while before sitting back down. They both get a big grin on their faces when they do this, particularly if they last for more than a couple of seconds. If they are distracted by something, they seem to do better. E averages 10 seconds or so, I'd guess, and A is probably about 5 seconds.

Well, I think I better end here. The girls are napping and I have a lot to accomplish during nap time. Have a great weekend, y'all.