All about the kids again

Once again, I've been mainly writing about what we've been doing lately and not about the kids -- so here's a quick update on what they're up to.

The two kids get along really well right now. Austin loves his little sister and likes to sit and play with her -- although he doesn't always know to be gentle. And Alex thinks that her big brother is the funniest person in the world. She's always giggling at him as he runs circles around her. It's pretty funny to watch.

Alexandra

Alex has mastered the art of crawling...backwards. And it's quite frustrating for her. She'll start off by sitting and playing, and then, in an effort to grab something out of her reach, she'll fall over onto her tummy. Then, as she continues to try to reach that something, she'll end up pushing herself backwards -- further and further away from whatever it is she wants. On occasion, I've even looked over and found her stuck halfway under the couch!

She may not be crawling, but what she really wants to do is stand. At every opportunity, she's grabbing on to something and trying to pull herself up. She can easily do so by grabbing my hands, but has not yet figured out how to use things like the couch or a chair to get herself standing.

She still has no teeth. A couple of weeks ago, she was definitely going through teething pain and you can still see the two little bumps on her lower gumline, but as of yet, she still hasn't popped a tooth. So, for now, her meals consist of completely pureed food and mum mum crackers (which disolve in her mouth). Although, to be a little selfish, I have to admit, I don't mind the no teeth, because I'm still breastfeeding her.

And lastly, she has finally started sleeping well at night. After about two months of waking up several times at night -- and not necessarily because she was hungry, but just because she'd wake up (and sometimes even to play in her bed for an hour or two) -- she finally started sleeping through the night. Before I left for Ottawa, I decided I'd had enough of these poor sleeping habits and, as soon as we got home, she was going to be sleep-trained (in other words, we were going to let her cry it out). In Ottawa, she started sleeping through the night (from 8ish to between 5 and 6). She now does so pretty consistently -- although the last few nights she's been up a couple of times and I wonder if it's because these teeth are trying to pop through.

Austin

In the last couple of months, Austin's language abilities have greatly improved and he's now speaking in full sentences and in such a way that almost anyone can understand him (instead of just mom and dad). Almost every day, he's trying out new words, or surprising me by knowing something he didn't know yesterday. We definitely have to spell around him now when we don't want him to know what we're talking about.


His swimming lessons have finished for the fall and he greatly improved over the course of the session and really enjoyed them. So much so that I'm going to be signing him up again in the winter.

We're also working on potty training and after about two and a half months of sitting on the potty every day for anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes with no success he finally started going in it about two weeks ago. He gets so excited now when he sees how happy we get -- which I think is motivating him to go. He only manages to go in the potty once or twice a day, so we still have a long way to go, but it's a start and we're very happy.

The big news is, is that as of Christmas, Austin will no longer be going to the sitter's part-time. I decided that I wanted to keep him at home with me for the rest of my maternity leave. And although they both may drive me crazy some days, I'm really looking forward to it. I talked to the agency, and they've assured me that they will give him his full-time place back, and have one for Alex, when I go back to work at the end of April.