Weeping and Gnashing of Teeth

I think it's official. The terrible twos are upon us. Yuck! The boys have become more irritable, they are demanding, they're aggressive (actually for now Jackson is the aggressive one but I'm sure he'll rub off), they spend a lot of time in "Time Out" and they throw spectacular tantrums. Oh the tantrums...

Don't believe my sweet looking little boys are capable of such terrible things? Just wait until you see the pictures! First though, I feel like I need to build the story from yesterday afternoon just so you can see how fast they go from adorable crowd pleasers (literally) to little monsters in the car.

Yesterday on our way home from a meeting I had at church, I decided to stop by the basketball camp Nick is working at. I knew the morning session of camp was about to end and thought the boys would love running around a gym and seeing Nick. When we walked in, camp was just wrapping up. The boys were pumped to be in a huge gym, see lots of kids and lots of balls. The squeals were hilarious! I so wish I'd had my video camera with me because the excited signs and talking (basketball! coach! balls! etc) were so funny! Nick and I kept saying and signing "wait" which they would then say and sign back and then they'd run a happy little circle around us in anticipation. It was quite entertaining for all the parents waiting to pick up their kids.

When camp broke up the boys had a blast running around and a lot of the kids (whose parents weren't there yet) were great with the boys.


Then we had to leave.

Uh oh.

The boys did not want to leave the gym and they certainly did not want to leave all those basketballs. Oh boy. The crying and fit throwing started as soon as we tried to leave the gym, and continued in the hall and all the way out to the car. Nick and the head coach even grabbed a few extra balls to give the boys for the ride home in hopes it would calm them a bit. Nope. Chase enjoyed looking at his, but he was in a relatively good mood to begin with. My other two angels?

And this was after we'd already been on the road for 10 minutes!

They did that the whole way home. They were so worked up and crabby I didn't even bother trying to force feed them lunch. They went right down for their nap and I didn't hear from them for 3.5 hours (over 4 for Ty!).

Video Clip of the Week - Fun with Sharing

As promised, here is video footage of the boys enjoying their Step 2 Coaster! As you will see, Tyler is not a fan of sharing...

Let's Get Ready to Rumble!

So my post yesterday that was just chalk full of love and sweet moments came back to bite me later in the day. Here are the cliff notes of what went down at about 4:15pm.

Chase is happily playing with a toy.
Tyler comes and steals said toy.
Chase decides to bite Tyler's shoulder in retaliation.
I decide to rescue Tyler from the clutches of Chase's jaw.
Chase is less than thrilled with this and decides to try to bite Tyler's feet.
I then hoisted Tyler up higher so that Chase couldn't reach his feet.
Chase then decides to turn on Jackson (who had since wandered into the kitchen to see what all the fuss was about).
I then set Tyler down and rescue Jackson, considering he is completely innocent in this ruckus.
Tyler is now angry about being set down and decides now would be a good time to head butt the back of Chase's head. Repeatedly.
I set Jackson down and do my best to separate the mob.
Separation does not work, so instead I observe a squirming, whining, crying pile of arms and legs.
About 30 seconds later Chase discovers Tyler has dropped the toy in all the chaos, so he scoops it up and takes off.
Tyler takes the opportunity to wrestle with Jackson. See?


At about 4:35pm Tyler wanders back into the kitchen and decides he must play with my slipper right now, even though I'm wearing it.
I calmly take the slipper back and tell him he can't have it right now.
Tyler now acts like it's the end of the world. See?


Ahhh what a fun 20 minutes it was! Hey, at least I got a picture of Jackson "playing" with one of his brothers!

Today is the last day of Cans for Comments! We're up to 35 comments. Let's finish strong!

Pushed to the Limit

Blogging has been a great source of release for me. Not only do I get to brag about my kiddos but I get to continue to utilize my writing skills. (For those unfamiliar with my background, I was a radio ad copy writer before and during my pregnancy.) Brace yourself now for a little venting from this tired mama.

Yesterday I reached my breaking point. In the early months of having three tiny babies in the house I reached that breaking point several times, but it's been quite a while since it happened. The last two days have been horrible. The boys somehow reached a state of being over-tired, were super crabby and driving each other and me crazy.

I expect Wednesdays to be bad; it's a long day here at the house. Nick leaves for work at his normal time but then doesn't get home until well after the boys are in bed for the night. Usually on Wednesdays I just tread water until bed time and then I collapse on the couch for a few minutes before cleaning up the house. This past Wednesday bed time couldn't come fast enough and I thought with relief "at least tomorrow will be better". Unfortunately I think it was worse....

It turns out the boys woke up quite early yesterday morning. I didn't know this until I spoke to Nick mid-day, but it sure explained a lot. Tyler and Jackson had been crying, whiny and clingy all morning and were driving me up the wall. Chase, thankfully, was in pretty decent spirits. I prayed for a nice long afternoon nap so that the boys would be in better moods in the afternoon. No such luck though! The boys were up and ready to go less than 90 minutes after I had put them down. I knew I was in trouble then.

The afternoon consisted of one precious moment - Chase was chasing (hehe, that sounds funny) his brothers around the house and when he would catch them he would hug them from behind. Awww! From there things went down hill.... Tyler thought the chase game was fun but decided to kick it up a notch. He thought it would be fun to chase Jackson, tackle him and then try to bite him if he tried to get away. This upset Jackson a great deal and then it upset Tyler when I pulled them apart. This "game" went on for a good 30 minutes. By the end of the 30 minutes Tyler and Jackson were wound tightly and rarely stopped crying and/or whining. It was then that I decided today was not the day to try to go without a Diet Coke.

By 5pm I was at my wits end. I called Nick at 5:10 to make sure he wasn't running any errands then I broke down crying. When Nick arrived home 10 minutes later I was kneeling on the living room floor crying, while the boys whined around me - until they saw Nick. Then all was well in the world.

I had a moment of irritation when I realized Nick never sees just how bad things get here because as soon as he comes home, all is forgotten and the boys are full of giggles! I then remembered I should just be thankful the crying and whining had stopped.

If you've made it through this whole post, than congrats. I promise to be in a better blogging mood on Monday, when I'll be handing out a couple of blog awards!

Messed Up!

It's official. The time change over the weekend messed us up. Big time! Last spring wasn't a big deal and last fall wasn't a big deal. We were able to just keep them right on schedule. I think in the spring we had to modify slightly the day after the switch but that was it. This year is a different story...

Yesterday the boys woke up at 6am. 6am! I finally got up with them at about 6:45am because it was clear they weren't going back to sleep. Because of the early wake up, breakfast was done early. They proceeded to then need snack early, lunch early and their nap early. They were so cranky! They took a great nap (almost 3 hours) but because they went down so early they were ready for bed much sooner. I held out as long as I could to get them close to their regular bed time (7:30) in hopes that they would be back on schedule today. No such luck.

Here's how my day has gone so far... Boys up sometime between 6 and 6:30. I'm not sure of the actual time as I was too groggy to look at the clock. Nick got the boys up early and played with them for a bit in hopes of giving them breakfast at the usual time. He said they got close. By 9:30 this morning the monkeys were getting tired. I knew this because of the increased whining, biting and crying. I did my best to entertain and distract them but almost always someone (usually Tyler) was upset.

At 11 I decided I would make them lunch early and put them to bed early. I peeked into the living room before I got started and found Chase on the floor, head on a pillow and sound asleep. Awwww! Jackson looked like he was about to crash too but he was holding out to see what neat thing Barney was up to today. Tyler was just pacing the house crying. It was then that I made an executive decision. Everyone was going to bed immediately and we would do lunch after their nap.

I sure hope they're better tomorrow! If not I may have to consider moving to a state that doesn't recognize Daylight Saving Time.