wabbit

Abs at the ready.

Typical result of some ill-fated art attack. (art attack...get it? It's a pun)

The anguish

15 more days of blog left to go! Let the countdown begin. Picasa has decided it would love a hand in making these last two weeks as difficult as possible, and has stopped recognizing my hard drive in its database. In theory, this change should only amount to a slightly different way to upload pictures, a non-event; instead, it makes the posts twice as annoying to format because of some idiosynchrasies of this website. Don't ask me why...just promise me to never ever start a blog on Blogger if you can help it.

When I returned home this afternoon, Jen was weary and ready for relief. It didn't take long to figure out why: the kids were little neanderthals. They weren't totally unpleasant from one moment to the next (this is a survival technique passed down by children all over the world - annoy and pester, but always do so pleasantly), but when their behavior was taken as a whole, it was rather rambunctious and trying.

As an example, Lily refused dinner. She wanted to dance instead. Fair enough, we're not quite to the point where forced dinnertimes are a standard (although that is going to be around the corner pretty soon). So she danced. When there was a pause between songs she would scream angrily at the space heater (which, adoringly, she thought to be the source of music) until the next song came on, then begin dancing again.

After a long while, she waddled over and indicated that she was hungry. She went up into the high chair and proceeded to ignore her pizza, thumb her nose at the beans, and use the cottage cheese to fingerpaint her tray a solid, nauseating white. I don't actually recall her eating anything, and would be surprised if she didn't wake us around 3 with a Chinese takeout menu in her crib.

Abby's misery came from its usual source: she has the patience of a gnat. She got really upset tonight, tantrum-level, and somewhere in between the sobs I heard her say, "Eeeaat!" "Oh, do you want to eat?" I asked her. She stopped crying, made the correct sign (good monkey), so I put her in the high chair while Jen started to get her dinner ready, where she lost it again. Another huge fit of crying and thrashing. She just cannot wait for anything.

Around the same time, she wanted my cell phone so badly her head exploded. Very gross. I couldn't even get it to her fast enough...this kid waits for nothing.

There were good times as well. Lily, in the process of throwing a stuffed otter at Jen (in play, not fury) yelled, "You take it!", a phrase absolutely impossible to not laugh at when coming from a 2 year old. Abby sat in Lily's crib and read me a story about a rabbit for almost 20 minutes. The book was truly about a rabbit, so all I heard from her was, "wuzzlle wwahhh dat dat wabbbit dug bump baaaah bunny sheeeeshgah glorp ...etc"

Day three hundred and fifty. (15 craaazy days left.)