198 + 94 Weeks

It has been a very rainy week here!  We were hit with so much rain and wind, and it has left our back yard a muddy mess, and made for a lot of indoor time with the kids.  We did make a trip out to Conjola one day, which was tough work, as Jeff has thrown his back out, so I had to man Arley on the slide and Carmie on the swings at the same time, not an easy feat!  But fun none the less, and still good to get out.  Carmie and I also made a trip to Bunnings (like Home Depot), and she got her face painted there.  After that, she has begged me pretty much every day to paint her face, she is totally hooked on being a sparkly pink butterfly.  We have also had lots of craft time, and the kids were given a train set from their cousins, and Arley is completely hooked.  He is totally obsessed with watching these trains go round, and when they pass him, he lies as flat as a pancake on the floor to watch the wheels pass.  And he kicks the track with his feet and I have to rebuild it about a thousand times a day.  He is talking a lot, but only one word at a time, and he still does this horrible high pitched scream when he can't tell you what he wants.  It makes Carmen cry.  Carmie has had a few full blown tantrums this week, crying like her life is over for the silliest things.  She is doing this ridiculous thing where she pretends her feet don't work when she is crying.  She drags herself up the stairs like she's half rag doll, and then grips onto her bed to pull herself up, but makes sure she drops helplessly to the ground at least 10 times for full dramatic effect.  It is the silliest thing to see, but she thinks it is totally believable.  It is hard not to laugh, but her tantrums are that bad that I want to throttle her at the same time.  I think it's from having cabin fever.  And there's more rain to come next week!

 I am a terrible mother!! But at least he can multitask!

197 + 93 Weeks

It has been a fairly good week, with no major meltdowns, the kids both sleeping through the night, Arley is still refusing to eat dinner unless we have pizza, Carmie spends a lot of time drawing.  The weather is getting cooler, summer is definitely over.  Carmie is still loving school, but for the life of me, I can't get her to tell me about her day.  She just giggles and says that it's a secret.  Arley has an obsession with delivering fruit to us.  He has moved a footstool over to our sideboard where our fruit bowls are, and he takes out all of the fruit one piece at a time, and runs over to whoever he chooses and gives them a piece of fruit.  When he runs out of fruit to deliver, he takes each piece back and deposits it back in the fruit bowl, so that he can start the whole procedure again.  He does this all day long.  It is ridiculous.  This morning I found Carmie sitting in her little chair watching tv, and she had four oranges, five limes, two apples and three lemons in her lap.  Arley has also gotten a bit smart, and has realised that he can get boxes of crackers out of the pantry and give them to Carmen to open for him. We are starting to potty train him by putting him on the toilet in the evening before bath.  He thinks it is great, and sits there saying, "Wee wee, wee wee" but hasn't once yet actually done one.  His separation anxiety with me is very taxing (I can't even walk in the opposite direction without him going into full blown hysterical crying).  I am hoping it is a very quick phase, because it makes life much more difficult and it is so sad to see him so very upset.  We have had a fair amount of behind the scenes drama this week, and I am glad it is drawing to a close, and that the kids went easy on us!

196 + 92 Weeks

This past Sunday was Easter Sunday, and the kids woke up to an Easter egg hunt.  Carmie was very excited, but waited patiently for me to go get Arley out of bed before she started collecting eggs.  Below there is a rather long video of the egg collecting, I advise only those who are Carmie & Arley love-starved to watch it.  After our hunt and some breakfast, we went over to the farm for a family morning tea, and Carmie's cousins treated her to a treasure hunt.  The weather was perfect, and it was a lovely morning.

We have also had some really cold days this week, just like winter.  However, we still managed to get out to the park, and the kids had races on the double slide.  Arley has figured out how to climb the ladder by himself, but of course I am always hovering like a worried mum.  Arley has been quite cranky, especially when he wakes up from a nap.  He put his first two words together this evening.  He said "apple juice".  Carmie has had a couple of episodes herself this week, mostly from being overtired, I think, but they were doozies.  The latest one was tonight.  She followed me up to her room to shower and get ready for bed, but she crawled along the floor pretending to cry.  I told her it was her choice, she could stand up and have a shower and get a book before bed, or she could go straight to bed without a shower and book.  She chose shower, but then refused to get up off the bathroom floor because she apparently was too tired.  I walked out of the bathroom in frustration, and that's when all hell broke loose.  Oh, the crying, the screaming!  What to do?  I picked her up and put her to bed, which just made it worse.  And poor Arley was suffering, because all he wanted to do was shower and get a book read to him, and he got upset and started hitting Carmen.  Finally Carmie calmed down enough to ask for some "Mummy love", and I was able to put her to bed, albeit stinky, in the clothes she wore to school.  So not fun.  In fact, the exact opposite of fun.  And now I have spent the night analysing what I could have done better.  And I'm still at a loss!

Below are two videos.  The first is an awesome video of the kids on the slide, and the second is the very long egg hunt video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_GMnisngOU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-KsbvkDTfU