Just like Star Wars

#2 was looking through his math assignment today and noticed we start Roman numerals.

Oh, I know all about these...just like on Star Wars.

Yep.

Some string...a door...a tooth

# 2 lost one of his front teeth in June. The other front tooth became loose shortly after and I told him I thought it would be so cool if he lost the second before the first started growing in so he'd be missing both his front teeth at the same time!

But #2 likes to take his time to do things. Mr. Wiedz says he has two gears, slow and just a little bit faster. Loose teeth happen in a similar fashion. He likes to just let them get really wiggly, no wiggling them himself. One of my closest friends and her husband TrevStac came for a visit a week ago, the Trev part of TrevStac being a dentist tried to get #2 to let him pull out the pretty wiggly tooth. Nope, but #2 had fun playing around like he would let him then shutting his trap right quick!

Last night Mr. Wiedz left the house to take some sleepover necessities to #1 who was at a friends house. As soon as he left #2 wondered if we could get his tooth pulled before Mr. Wiedz got back. He also wanted to try tying a string to the tooth and the doorknob and slamming the door. I got out some string, tied some slip knots and we gave it a go.

The door did nothing but I think trying to get the string tightly around the tooth got the tooth REALLY loose. One pull with a washcloth and we were in business! #2 was so excited...Mr. Wiedz thought it was so cool...the tooth fairy made her appearance...and I got my little boy missing his two front teeth!

To strike fear in any 21st Century mom

All my babies have been swaddlers. They love it. They don't sleep without it. I actually remember when shortly after we moved back home from California with #1. The first six weeks of her life in California had her spending most every nap in my arms. I did't work and we lived in a small, easy to care for duplex so I spent my days holding her. When we moved back and I had boxes to unpack and friends to see and Mr. Wiedz's new real estate business to help with and...a life, I had to put her down. Only thing was she wouldn't stay asleep for more than 10 minutes during the day. Even in the swing. I was telling whining about this to my neighbor who asked, "don't you swaddle her at night?" Why, yes of course. "Why don't you swaddle her for her naps?" Ahhhhhh. The angels sing. Naptimes! Amazing! That's all it took. And #1 liked to be swaddled and didn't break out until well after her 8 month!


Of course moms now are told to put our babies to sleep on their backs. Never a problem for my babies. My mother-in-law asks in amazement with every child if they sleep on their backs. Yep. Like champs. With the bald spots to prove it.


Now enter #5. Being swaddled real nice just like his brothers and sister. #5 learned to roll over just about when he turned 4 months. (Good thing I blog, I've already forgotten when he rolled over. *sigh*) One evening #1 went into their room for something after dinner and came out to say we've got to see #5! Not only had he unswaddled himself but he'd rolled to his stomach bunched up in all the blankets.


I couldn't help myself, I had to move his head so I'd know he was breathing, which of course woke him up.


It's just fully ingrained in me...babies sleep on their backs!


Now of course I don't swaddle him (my earliest EVER) and he stays on his back all on his own!


Crazy baby!

Another one...

#3 decided it was time to keep up with his older siblings and asked Mr. Wiedz to take his training wheels off. I was shocked when I went out to play Sunday afternoon and there he was riding straight for me with a huge grin on his face. He is by FAR the earliest to take the training wheels off (#1 was 8!) and we attribute his "skills" to Santa bringing him the right size bike even though there was quite an amount of discussion about the size that he needed...

Oh, growing up...it does happen so fast even when it seems to be crawling by.

Homekeeping for boys

#3 and #4 help me around the house most days. A lot of helping includes fighting over who gets to do what. With laundry that usually means a lot of arguing about who gets to clean out the lint trap, who puts in the dryer sheet and who gets to load the washer with a new load.

The other day I got a load of towels out of the dryer and was folding them in the living room. #3 took one and set to work folding it very nicely. #4 was mad that he didn't get a towel so #3 put on a towel folding lesson for him.

It was all so cute I had to take some pictures.

A clean basket

#4 and I were in the playroom the other day and, even though I tried to talk him out of it, in true 2 year old fashion he dumped out the whole basket of cars and trucks.

Not a scene a mommy likes to see, but I decided to make the most of it.

I broke out the Clorox wipes, handed one to #4 and let him go to town.

He forgot all about the cars, well actually he never was playing with them…dumping them out was all he was about. But he did spend a long time scrubbing the basket.

When he was done we had a nice shiny basket ready to refill with cars…he wasn’t into that either.

Training who?

I decided this weekend I would work on re-training #4's sleep pattern. He had been waking a number of times in the night. Like 12:30, 2:00, 3:30 and 6:30. I was tired!


Oh. So. Tired.


So this weekend I figured with Mr. Wiedz out of town I could let the older boys sleep in my room and the re-training wouldn't disturb them.


#4 woke at 3ish that first night. And cried and fussed for a little while. He was just settling down and it had been quiet for a bit...I got comfortable again in hopes of that being the only protest and I could get back to sleep. Until #4 was standing next to me.


Disoriented I put him back in his crib and everyone slept the rest of the night. The next morning #1 came to my room to let me know it was morning...#4 was right behind her. I scooped him up, took him back to his crib and explained that he was supposed to stay in bed and call for me to come get him. He needed to stay in his crib!


Nap time had the same result. When he woke up he climbed out and came out to find me.


Saturday night when I laid him down I was clear that he was to stay in his crib. And he did. He slept well all night (a full nights sleep) and I got him out of his crib when he woke up in the morning, I heard him talking. Sunday, while I was enjoying the Kit Kittredge movie with the older kids I heard the obvious thud that is the sound of a baby climbing out of his crib...and falling to the floor.


Last night I took the mattress out of the crib and put it on the floor until Mr. Wiedz can convert the crib to the toddler bed. #4 is not sleeping in a crib anymore!

What!


How'd that happen? When did my baby get so big?


We've never converted the crib since 1) the older kids were, well, older when they stopped sleeping in the crib and 2) by the time the older kids were out of the crib I was pregnant with the next one and we'd be needing it as a crib.


#4 is doing pretty well with his mattress and hopefully this afternoon's project will be trying to convert the crib without an instruction manual for a 7 year old crib.

An interesting training session, indeed. I think we both got a little bit of training this weekend.

Heavy Load

#3's job is to take dirty laundry from the bathrooms and bedrooms and deposit into a pile in the laundry room (someone else sorts it later). Last week he found a quick and fun way to get all his job done.

He loaded the dump truck with as much laundry as he could and pushed it to the laundry room and even "dumped" it out in there!

So cute!

He Did It!

#2 has been working for the last couple of weeks at riding his bike without training wheels. Mr. Wiedz has moved them to the highest position and #2 has tried and tried. He got the balance down and even had not problem falling off. The last hurdle was starting by himself.

He decided this past weekend it was time to take them off completely!

He took off around our "loop"...

splashed through some puddles...what a boy!...

and took some spills. After one fall I heard him yell, "SWEET!"

What a big boy!

The 80's Revisited

The other day was 80's day for #1.

Mr. Wiedz told her she looked like I must have looked like back in my elementary years.


I went to the school to take #2 for preschool and saw a lot of kids chose to dress up for 80's day. Some of the outfits were hilarious! The lady who cooks lunch told me her husband asked why their daughter looked like Cindi Lauper!

Proof

I took some laundry into #1's room to put away and found this on her bed. Picturing her sitting in here making her "schedule".

For those of you loyal blog readers that really know our family you'll know how many comments I get about #1 being just like me.

Some more proof...

She's so much like me!