Naps or Painting

The boys have been miserable this week.  There hasn't been much napping due to one of them biting the other every time I leave the room.  Hubs and I have been trying to figure out a way to get him to stop biting.  We thought we got it under control.  He had finally stopped about 2 weeks ago and then the end of last week he started all over again.  The poor babe that is being bit has bruises and cuts on both biceps, on his back, and random ones on his arms and legs.  The biter will actually fall asleep, wake up, and quietly go climb into his brothers bed, bite him, and jump back into his and wait for me to get up to the room.  Needless to say, when they have napped I haven't taken my eyes off the monitor because he could wake up at any minute and just bite his brother.  

I've been doing everything I can think of to stop this.  I actually sit on the (closed) toilet in the bathroom right next to their room just so I could go in there the second he got out of bed, hoping to stop the biting before it happened.  This was actually making it worse for the biter.  That's what he wants... he wants Mommy to come into the room.  He wants Mommy to lay in bed with him.  He WANTS Mommy.  I spent 2 hours doing this on Monday, 3 on Tuesday, 3 on Wednesday, and an unsuccessful 3 on Thursday.  Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday they finally fell asleep (the bitten doesn't lay down until his brother does... he's afraid).  Thursday they didn't take a single nap.  

Anyway the end of last week and this weekend I allowed a lot of tv.  I was so tired from trying so hard that I just couldn't do much more than that.  Horrible excuse!  This week I decided NO.  I was not going to 'reward' them with tv.  Which is exhausting for me and I'm pretty sure Hubs doesn't like me right now :)  I'm no picnic by the time he gets home.  I basically went cold turkey on tv.  We were watching 2 movies a day.  NOT COOL for 2 boys that aren't even 2.  Monday I allowed a 20 minute show in the morning when they first woke up.  That way I could let the dog out, feed him, get breakfast ready for the boys with out them screaming at me.  Tuesday we didn't watch ANY :) go me.  Wednesday we watched Lion King in the late afternoon.  Hubs called and wanted to talk then I wanted to call my mom to tell her what Hubs and I talked about.  So I was a bad Mommy and put on Lion King.  After I was done with those conversations I laid on the couch with them and fell asleep tangled under them (it was wonderful).  Thursday my mom was here and was helping me so I could get ready for Hubs birthday.  She wanted to snuggle and I didn't feel like I could tell her no.  She was so helpful that I wanted to make her happy too so I allowed 30 minutes of Cinderella (and how could I say no when G is asking for Cinnnerrreaaa).  Today... we did a 20 minute show.  So I guess I shouldn't have said I went cold turkey no tv.  I still did some :(  Tomorrow is another day.

After some discussion Hubs and I decided that we were going to bring a crib down from the attic to put back into the boys room.  We decided that time outs were not working during nap time.  It is hard to ignore the babe that is crying in pain in order to get the biter to stay in time out and spend however long it takes to get him to actually sit there.  I wasn't going to remove the biter for a time out and leave the bitten in the room to cry.  I didn't find that to be at all right for the bitten.  I couldn't stand my son crying Mommy mommy bite or pull on my shirt saying no Mommy he bite because he was afraid that he would be bitten if I left.  

This morning I put the crib in their room.  I decided that I COULD NOT go in there every time one got out of bed (it made it worse for them- that's what they wanted).  So we thought that after 1 bite I would go in and give the babe a time out, after the 2nd bite I would go in there and put the babe in the crib for his nap.   I don't want him to regress to the crib, but I can't allow the other to continue to get hurt.  

I did have to put him in the crib for his nap this afternoon.  They slept so well and woke up so happy.  

We didn't even try a late afternoon nap today because they were playing so nicely and by the time we were done with lunch it was almost too late to try.  So we just waited for Daddy to come home.  

Tonight the boys went to bed with no problem.  Actually they normally have no problem at night time.. only nap time :/  

While waiting we painted...

I'm really hoping that this biting is due to the 8 molars I see coming in (4 each).  I don't know if that makes a difference.

I don't want the crib to stay in there for too long.  It's a mini crib and he honestly doesn't have much room in there.

I told Hubs that we aren't going to say that he has to sleep in the crib like a baby.  I don't want to bring the whole "baby" into it.  Since we are having another baby and he is so attached right now I think he would actually prefer to 'be a baby' if given the opportunity (not sure if that makes sense).  So we are trying to just play up his bed.  For example tonight when we went into the room for bed he walked Daddy over to the crib and said, sleep bite.  Daddy said, yes if you bite you have to sleep in the crib, but you don't want to sleep in the crib, you want to sleep in your awesome tractor bed.

Hopefully this works!

Kitchen Remodel

The boys decided that my kitchen needed a little remodel.  

All but one kitchen cabinet is locked tight... so I thought.  The boys didn't take long to figure out how to remove the cabinet locks.  Babies R Us here I come... (soon).  

I LOVE that they put the pot on their grill.   I think it's just SO AMAZING how preceptive they are!  Babes are really amazing.  The things they learn just by watching is beyond me.

At this point I was nervous that a pot would fall off their little grill and crush a toe... or crack my tile.

This is the tornado they left when they were 'done' playing in the kitchen.

20's ... What 20's

HAPPY BIRTHDAY HUBS!!!

This gorgeous man just turned 29 today.  I can't believe that he (we) are almost done with our 20's.  It's crazy to me!

We didn't get to do too much for his birthday.  Sadly he had to go to work and didn't get home until 6:00.  I was happy that he was able to get home a little earlier than normal but it did not leave much time to party.

I have been having a bit of a hard time with the boys this week so I felt like I wasn't able to get nearly as much done for Hubs as I would have liked to.  Thankfully my mom is visiting and was able to be a majorly helpful hand today so that I could finish Hubs cake and make dinner.

For dinner I made Hubs favorite... Beef Stroganoff.

*Don't mind my terrible pictures :( of our little party.

When Hubs and I first got married I started making him a 'special' birthday cake every year.  I tried something new each year.  One year, not very far into our marriage I found that his favorite cake is chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting.  He would love for me to make him the same cake every year, but I love trying to figure out a new way to use those ingredients for him.  This year I made a cheesecake filled chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting, garnished with shaved chocolate.

The boys loved that they were allowed to be taste testers along with daddy.  G and Hubs had finger licking fun tasting the frosting.

This chocolate cake recipe called for a freshly brewed cup of coffee.  With all of the different chocolate cakes I have made I have never read a recipe that called for a cup of coffee, not sure if you have.  I was a bit hesitant... BUT for someone that doesn't like chocolate cake or coffee... this cake was really really YUMMY!  The frosting is a peanut butter cream cheese frosting.  It wasn't my favorite one that I have made in the past few years.  I thought it was too peanut buttery (I think I lost count when I was scooping the peanut butter).  I'm not a fan of peanut butter so a little less would have been my choice... but Hubs LOVED it (he loves peanut butter)!  The center of the cake is cheesecake.  I was really really looking forward to this part of the cake.  I figured I would only eat the cheesecake part of this cake.  Sadly I did NOT care for the cheesecake.  It was a tad too wet for my liking.  Surprisingly Hubs liked it.  I figured if I didn't like it there would be NO way he would.  He didn't eat all of the cheesecake but he liked to have a little bit with each big bite of cake.  If I ever make this cake again, which I think I might, I would use my MIL's cheesecake recipe and not the one that I used here.

This slice is Hubs slice that some how made it into G's hands.

He did not want to give it up.

He had to make sure it tasted ok before allowing Daddy to have it.

After M had a bite of his cake (his face makes it look like he doesn't like it) he decided he didn't want his slice... he wanted Daddy's, which was MUCH bigger.

Here you can see that he wasn't a fan of his little slice of cake.

After our little dinner party we spent a short amount of time playing with Daddy.  Then we went upstairs and got ready for bed.  I was so tired that after I got the boys diapers changed, etc I laid on G's bed and just watched the three boys play.  Daddy came over and 'freed' up my belly.  He wanted to give little jumping bean a kiss.  He asked the boys to come over and say hi to baby and give a kiss.  I told him that earlier this week my belly was showing and M came over (I thought to give it a kiss) and he gave my belly the biggest raspberry ever.  Hubs didn't believe me so he asked M to come over.  Hubs gave jumping bean a raspberry and then told M to try.  M laughed and then began to give baby jumping bean raspberries for half an hour.  The four of us could not stop laughing.  It was such a nice way to end a very long difficult mommy day.

Happy Birthday Jon.  I love you!