One Dollar

In an effort to give Dave some quiet to sleep, I took the kids to Fred Meyer after church this morning. I figured it was as good of time as any to get their Valentines for school. It should be no surprise that Tyler picked out Star Wars and Hailey picked out princesses. After the valentine selection we wandered over to the valentine candy isle. I was looking for a bag of small treats that we could attach to the Valentines. Both kids were in a good mood (after having just put boxes of valentines in the basket) and Hailey was being her dramatically cute self. "Oh mommy, look at these (picking up a package of candies). They look sooooo delicious. Mmm, yummy". She has similar comments for several different candies. Each time I had to respond, yes those do look great but we aren't buying candy for us today. The kids accepted that and moved on to the next. There was a woman browsing the isle with us smiling at the kids. We rounded the corner to check out the other side. This same lady came up to us and asked if she could give Tyler and Hailey each a $1 to buy a valentine. Apparently they had charmed her. She was very nice and after our thank you's the kids were so excited to find something they could buy. Hailey quickly found some princess chocolates. Tyler (not a big chocolate fan) gravitated toward the stuffed animals. Since he couldn't find anything for a $1 we headed for the toys and after quite a few minutes he settled on a match box car. They were so excited for their gifts and even more excited to give their $1 to the cashier. Tyler was giddy about his car and how it is the best car ever and just so special. I had a proud parenting moment as we were walking out of the store and he said, "we should send that nice woman a thank you note". Yes we should. Why didn't I think to ask her for her address. ugh.

Anyway, it was a huge treat for the kids. Very special. Hailey did break down in tears after we go home. She all of the suddent wanted her "green ticket" back. She didn't quite understand she traded it permanently for her chocolate.

$1 treasures

Batman...I mean Batgirl

Basketball

Saturday's at the Quiggle household are made up of gymnastics and basketball among other things. Tyler decided he wanted to try out basketball this year and he seems to be having a fun time. His favorite part is running down the court as fast as he can and standing under the opponents net arms out stretched.

Well, I guess his favorite part is making baskets but running is definitely second best. It seems to be hard to remember to guard someone. Dribbling is encouraged but not essential at this age. The kids are mostly happy just shooting and running down the court. He claims he likes practice more than the games but seems to really be enjoying the season.

Force field

Dave's back on patrol and we are back to his crazy patrol schedule. It's been a major adjustment for us all (still is). The days he works nights and needs to sleep during the day I've been making an effort to be out of the house as much as possible. Yesterday afternoon I had a bunch of errands to run so I packed up the kids (such a fun trip for them) and we headed out. After our stop a Trader Joe's we went to the pet store. I thought it would be a fun side trip to break up all the boring stores. The kids always love looking at the fish, birds, and whatever else the store has. In the back of the store they had a fish pond and above it was a very large bird (whatever the huge parrot looking birds are called). It was sitting on a branch in the open air and nothing was keeping it at it's "home". Tyler looked up at me, eyes wide and very serious, and said "Is there a force field right there?".......convinced there was some magical (super cool) invisible shield keeping the bird contained. It made me smile.

Thank You Hello Kitty

This little girl is diaper free! Well for the most part. Of course she still wears one at night and we are working on one other time of day (ahem). We've passed a huge milestone none the less. It has been en entirely different experience than with Tyler. Hailey was actually ready at the beginning of last summer but it was hard when we were out and about so much (at playgrounds with no bathrooms) so I put it off (good parenting, I know). I decided this fall was a good time to tackle it and of course Hailey wanted nothing to do with it. So the last few months we've been sort of working on it. I've tried to get her in unders for at least a little bit each day but some days she flat out refused and most days she'd wear them but wasn't at all committed. A couple of weeks ago, I let her pick out some new panties at Target. She picked out some Hello Kitty ones and has been wearing them exclusively ever since. Who knew it would be that easy. Even more amazing is that she has really only had one real accident. She has even been wearing them out and about in public when we run errands and to school etc. She's had no problems what so ever.

So now we have no naps and no diapers (and it takes even longer to get out of the house). They are growing up so fast.

The secret to our success

A Little Rest

We've been a napless family for a while now (It seems only I would really like to have a nap each day....not that I've ever gotten one). You may remember a post a while back where I mentioned Hailey had given up her naps or perhaps more accurately I've been encouraging her not to take naps. She generally falls a sleep so much faster when she doesn't have one. As a side note, we still haven't solved her night time waking. Even if she has a little nap it seems to keep her awake an extra hour or two at night. The problem is, this girl loves her binky (yes another big change that needs to happen soon). And the truth is she really does love taking naps. So generally around nap time I hear, "Mommy, I need a little rest". Then she takes herself upstairs, gets her binky and hangs out on her rocking chair and reads books or sings songs or whatever. It looks a little something like this:

ok, this is her not wanting her picture taken but notice her book choice

Batman is her favorite

This is how she likes to "rest"

Than maybe 20 minutes later she comes back downstairs and is ready to continue her day.

But some days I notice that it gets a little quiet upstairs and I go up to find this:

Can this be comfortable?

Or this:

This definitely can't be comfortable.

There is at least a foot gap between the chair and ottoman and her buns hang right off the chair.

not sure why the color is funny on this

but yes she does have her lights on and it doesn't stop her from falling asleep

At this point I usually feel bad that she was able to fall asleep in such an uncomfortable position and I let her sleep for 30 minutes to an hour (depending). Of course about 10:30 that night I'm wondering why....why did I let her nap? Why can't she nap and still fall asleep? Why does she love sleeping during the day but hates going to sleep at night? I often go into her room and tell she needs to close her eyes only to hear her say "I don't want to sleep, I don't want to close my eyes". Why? Why? Why? Will getting rid of her binky solve all our problems? And how painful is that transition going to be. Remember the two weeks or terror when we tried that before. The hours upon hours of crying and her falling asleep standing in her crib? Eeesh. Maybe mini naps on the rocking chair aren't that bad. Maybe.

Mattress Fun

I'm back. I finally down loaded all of our Jan pictures (thus far). So now I have plenty of pictures to blog about and will hopefully be a little more diligent this week. Time has gotten away from me. Again.

Last week Tyler and Hailey got new windows in their bedrooms. We really need new windows in our house. We keep our blinds closed at all time in the winter because you can feel the cold air coming through them when the blinds are open. But it will likely take several years for us to replace them all. We are just going to plug along little by little.

Anyway, we had to move Tyler's mattress while his window was being replaced. We stood it up against the wall to get it out of the way but the kids thought this was the best ever. They had a ton of fun climbing up and sliding down. Hailey had no problem monkeying her way up too.

the climb

On top

Hailey preferred to just hang out on the top

Tyler was all about sliding and jumping down