Let me see...

What have the boys been up to lately?

Thomas discovered, today, that he can hold onto a small toy. And wave it in front of his face! And chew on it! Based on his delighted coos and grins, I'd say he's enjoying himself.

I think he's in a major growth spurt right now. Last night he fell asleep at 8:30pm. I fully expected him to wake up around 10:30 or 11pm to be fed and then put back to bed, but no! He woke up at 5:30am! Very hungry, and very glad to see me. :) We all got up about 30 minutes later, and left Thomas lying in the bed sucking his fists while we got dressed and Gabe and Jonathan got out the door. When I came back, ready to play with him, Thomas had fallen asleep.

He was awake and playing with me for a few hours this morning, but fell asleep again at 10:30am and is still sleeping now, past noon. I think the combination of learning so many new things and growing so fast (he's nearly 15 lbs now!) has definitely caught up with him. Little exhausted boy!

Jonathan is spending the day today at Grandma's house. Doesn't that just sound like he's so big? I'm enjoying my "day off", and most of my head knows that he's having a smashing good time there (attention! lots of attention! and new toys! and undivided attention!) but my mommy heart had rather a hard time letting him go this morning. Because, you know, he's such a little boy still. And he's my little boy. And what if he cries for me at nap time?

He's probably having such a great time that he won't want to come home. :)

We're all spending more time out in the garden these days. Jonathan loves to water the flowers and help me pick the strawberries. I have instituted a VERY IMPORTANT RULE: we do not eat the strawberries until Mommy has washed them off. Because Jonathan doesn't seem to notice if there is half a slug on the strawberry after he takes his first bite. Eww.

Thomas likes being outside, too. I think he enjoys the indirect sunshine and all the colors to look at. He also likes being lulled to sleep by the dryer (which we keep outside) when I'm in the midst of laundry.

Jonathan is definitely a two-year-old. How do I know? He has started saying "I do it myself!" about everything. Putting on shoes? "I do it myself!" Carrying things to the car? "I do it myself!" Climbing up into his car seat or chair for dinner? "I do it myself!" Cooking or baking? "I do it myself!" I love seeing his independence, although sometimes I do wish he'd just let me help him put his shoes on, so we could leave on time. :)

Cars, trains, trucks, airplanes, and all things that GO are the order of the day here. One favorite is making "car trains": very carefully placing every car, truck, and train that he has in a straight line. Often this stretches along the entire back of the couch!

In other news, I'm working on tweaking my Mother's Rule (see this post for more on that subject). I found that some of it was working, and some of it wasn't, and I also wanted to add a few things (like going to a midweek mass and taking Jonathan to story hour at the library and going to the gym). We'll see how it goes. The basic outline now is:

Monday - walk with Jessica, grocery shop, laundry, kickboxing
Tuesday - (home day) weekly chores, monthly chores, laundry
Wednesday - mass, story hour for Jonathan, laundry, treadmill
Thursday - errands, Mom's group at the park, laundry, weights
Friday - (home day) weekly chores, laundry, pool time with Jonathan

Notice a trend? ;) Joking aside, I do find that if I do laundry every day I have a much better handle on it. I think part of the reason for this is because I dry the clothes on the line, which means that I have to actually wait for the sun instead of just throwing them into the dryer.

My own schedule is actually written out more completely than what I've shared here - it includes such things as breakfast, dressing self and children, and reminders to sit down and play with or read to Jonathan. I find it helpful to be able to glance at my schedule and get a quick reminder of what it is that I'm supposed to be doing, so I don't get bogged down in the little things and come to the end of my day wondering why nothing got done and Jonathan is cranky. It can refocus me and remind me of things like "oh, I'm supposed to play with Jonathan now. No wonder he's fussy - he needs attention!" Or "dear me, I'm sitting at the computer and it is NOT nap time; get up and do something important!" :)

I think I like the general outline of the week, now. Two days at home is just necessary for me to have any chance of keeping up with chores and just daily household stuff. But Jonathan is a really, really social child, and he needs to get OUT of the house or he gets seriously cranky. The current schedule seems to balance those two needs pretty effectively, I think.

And I actually have times scheduled for working out. This is making all the difference in the world. It is time away, by myself, which is something that I'm finding that I really do need on a regular basis. And I come home tired but energized, which is much better than just tired and grumpy! (That is often how I've been feeling at the end of the day. But exercise really does seem to be helping.) I'm hopeful, too, that sticking to this schedule will allow me to lose the Thomas baby weight faster than I lost the Jonathan baby weight. It would be nice to fit into my clothes again. :)

Thomas is waking up, which signals the end of my allotted blogging time. :)