10 months old - the double digit months

There are six teeth in that mouth now. Four on the top and two on the bottom.

This past month has really been a month of discovery. I swear you barely stopped to rest, despite being SO sick for a good two and a half weeks of it.

Napping has been a struggle all month, mostly because of all the sickness. For the last few days, though, we've pushed your nap to 12:30 p.m. for one good three hour nap. And so far, you're still ready to sleep by 7:30 p.m...which is good, though Lily always falls asleep first.

You sleep with your bum in the air.

Your crawling is fast and furious. You won't even be out of the kitchen (where I am) for ten seconds when I see you crawling up the stairs, already on the third step. You don't crawl like you're a soldier anymore, but like a real baby on your knees. More than half the time, you're on a mission. A musical mission and it's more than adorable.

You have to stand on your tippy toes to reach. Could anything be more sweet?

The kennel door and the baby gates are your fave things to play with. Open, close, open, close, hit yourself in the face as the door swings by, open, close... You get the idea.

You get into everything. I think we've finally stopped you from opening the warming drawer on the stove, but you can't get enough of the pantry, tea towel drawer and cutting board/kitchen scale cupboard. Sometimes you get careless and those chubby fingers get slammed inside. Ouch. I've also caught you climbing up the step stools in the bathrooms and peeking over the counter at the wondrous place of water, the sink.

All of those things – the crawling, the climbing, the stairs, the opening and closing – they all equal injuries, mostly to the head. You started crying one day in the living room and I rushed in to find your head tightly wedged between the couch leg and the end table leg. Another day you lost your footing and feel on your head on the hardwood floor; it even left a big bump for about six hours. I suppose it's just what happens as you learn.

Speaking of things you learn, your Dad and Lily used to think it was cute when you hit them in the face any time they were in reaching distance. They'd laugh at how sweet you were. Didn't stay funny for long, though. (Well, I still think it's cute but only because you rarely hit me and I'm the only one you'll "kiss" when I ask. A good ol' open-mouthed sloppy baby kiss.) You still automatically hit Lily in the face when she nears and honestly, she probably deserves it because she's always in your face or picking on you.

Though she loves to help you, too. And she is an excellent teacher when she puts her mind to it.

You point. The other day, I pulled out our family picture and said "Where's mama?" and you pointed right at me. Then your little finger went to Dad when I asked where he was, then to Lily! We were SO proud. Before you were born, I wasn't sure I'd be as amazed at every little thing you were going to do seeing as you are the second child, oft regarded as less photographed and less coddled than the first. And with Lily unwilling to be photographed these days, you are my muse.

The best thing about this month, though? You say mama and mom and mmmmmmmmm, mmmm – and you specifically say it to me or to Dad when you want me or hear my voice. Lily didn't say it until she was about 14 months old, so this is a treat. You say da da and once you said hi Daddy, but not with as much purpose and yearning as you say mama. Perhaps I'm biased...

A new year

I started writing this in mid-January, but with everything that has been happening, I never finished.

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Happy new year! Okay, so I'm a bit late but we've been busy tackling and thinking about life changes. I think the new year automatically sparks that in most of us. We had no intentions of making any resolutions per se, but it happened all the same.

That feeling of potential, of newness that came with the new year, also came with some problems. With me being busy and Lily being home from school, I'd noticed that t.v. was a really big part of Lily's day in a way to keep her occupied – though in a mind-numbing, stare-fest kind of way. When I mentioned it to Chris, he confessed that he, too, had been thinking of curbing his own screen time. So we concocted a plan that would see none of us watching t.v., surfing, playing computer games or Playstation for any more than two hours a day. And we set out to do this for a week; this was experiment number one.

Right now.

I am sitting here, half covered in puke, with Finn in the wrap on my chest. He's only in an undershirt as he was also covered in milky puke, but oh so desperate to sleep that I popped him on before I could fully take care of the situation. Over the last two or three days, his illness has returned and he is puking every time he coughs. And Lily's cough has returned also. She was even able to hear us for 24 or so hours as her ears seemed to unplug a bit, but now we're right back to her saying, "What?" every two seconds. I've taken to raising my voice to everyone as I'm so used to talking so loudly for the last week. Poor deaf kid. Back to the doctor this afternoon.

In other news, my mom was admitted back into the hospital yesterday. She's basically the same as she has been for the last few weeks so it's still a plain old waiting game for her to regain what's been lost. Nigel is in town until Sunday so at least until then, we're dog-free.

***

I've uploaded a bunch of photos to Flickr so until I have time and/or energy to put words and pictures together, this is as good as it gets. (But it's pretty good because they're really, really cute.) Enjoy!

Checking in...

It may have been obvious from my last post that things were only going to go from bad to worse and that it was best for me to just stay away from here.

After my mom got out of the hospital last Wednesday, my breakdown a few days following that, the kids being as sick as ever and needing antibiotics for their eye, ear, throat and lung infections to now; now where Nigel is here to stay with my mom and yesterday Finn smiled spontaneously for the first time in over a week (and he looked almost back to normal), things are a bit better. Of course, I'm currently in the throes of this cold that Chris has all ready been dealing with all week, but it's a little more manageable.

Perhaps if I can get into top form by the end of the weekend, I can start talking about how wonderful and big my kids are; there is lots to say. I'll have to pick up my camera that I haven't used in a while...

Role playing game

In early 2003 or so, I addictively played the Sims, likely to escape what was our reality of the time. The premise of the game is simple. Basically, you are given control of one or more Sims and after building a home for them to live, you need to satisfy all of their physical and emotional needs – which include hunger, energy, comfort, bladder, fun, social and environment – to live a content life.

It kinda feels like we're losing the game right now.

This certain mix of Chris working overtime, Finn being miserably sick and not sleeping (which also means Chris and I are taking turns not sleeping), my mom in the hospital (still) and her decline over the last few months and the fact that if we don't visit, no one is, Lily needing more of us than we've been giving, the fact we have no groceries or time to get them, the cold weather...

Deep breath.

While I know it's not forever, when you're in the thick of it, it's almost certainly sanity-crushing. And I write about it not for sympathy or concern, but because it helps me to get it out there, to record it, to talk it out, to rationally know that this is just a blip, to remember that this is what bad looks like and that it will get better. It always does.

Holy croup!

 Kinda like holy crap, but with croup. Yes, my son has croup. He started barking like a seal on Saturday and each night since then has been followed by this throaty, low-pitched crying. He can't sleep unless he's upright which means I've been wearing him a lot. And while it was really, really adorable when he crawled over to me crying last night, reached my feet and said, "Maaaaa ma," it's really sad to see him so sick and miserable. Lily's been kinda sick, but only at night when she's stuffy and coughing up a storm.

Meanwhile, Nana is still in the hospital and we're not exactly sure for how much longer. Hopefully just a couple more days; the dialysis people are supposed to visit her today to assess her ability to do her dialysis. Her dog is driving me batty – possibly because we don't eat meat and she's used to a daily serving at suppertime – or she's just the most annoying dog ever.

And it's cold. It was -34˚C this morning when we went to school. Finn was so exhausted he fell asleep in the freezing cold in his sled...which is wear he still is, the sled, looking all adorable and not crying.