A busy few weeks

Amendment: Since I wrote this this morning, it's official -- Alex is walking. She spent today walking all over the house. When she fell, she'd simply get back up and keep walking. She rarely bothered to crawl anywhere. I'll try to get a video of her soon.

March seems to have flown by. Here's a quick update on what we've been doing and what the kids are up to:

The first week and a half of March were a bit of a write off because I had a weird infection in my left arm (called cellulitis). This infection was in the tissue of my arm and caused my whole arm to swell to the point that I couldn't use it. I had a steady stream of friends and family coming in every day to help me with the kids because I couldn't take care of them by myself.

The infection is healed now, although I still have some pain in my arm (thanks to bursitis -- which is how the infection likely got in). But I've quickly learned to do a lot of one-armed work and can manage on my own now.

Last weekend, we went to Guelph to visit (auntie) Jamie for the day and to go to College Royal (basically the University of Guelph's open house). Being an agricultural university, their barns and vet school were open so we could visit the animals -- which both kids loved. We also visited the science department where you could touch marine life (like starfish) as well as everything else kid-friendly we could find. It was a fun afternoon.

This past Friday (March 27) I took the kids to a nearby Maple Syrup Festival. And although there wasn't as many activities on weekday as on the weekends, it was still fun -- and it was a beautiful day so it was just nice to spend a few hours walking around outside. And, of course, Austin told me the best part was tasting the maple syrup!
At least by spending so much time walking outside at the festival, Austin actually napped that afternoon. Because lately he's become Mr. I-Don't-Want-To-Nap. It's not that he's not tired -- because I do really try to tire him out every morning (I even took the kids to the zoo one day and he still wouldn't nap when we got home) -- it's just that he doesn't want to nap. So he goes into his room every afternoon, gets tucked into bed and then, within minutes, starts singing at the top of his lungs. He'll usually stay in his room for 45 minutes to an hour, so at least it's some quiet time for him, even if singing is a rather loud activity!

His swimming lessons have once again come to an end and he once again loved it. And he did really well. So, we've signed him up for the spring session, but this time, he'll be in a class with three other kids instead of in a private lesson.

On another note, Austin has been completely potty trained for a couple of months now. He still has the occasional accident -- but even then, they're only partial accidents; he still manages to make it to the bathroom before his pants get too wet.

Alexandra, believe it or not, turns one in a couple of weeks. And I'm pretty sure she'll be walking by then. Already, in just two weeks, she has progressed to "walking but falling a lot". She's taken as many as 20 steps at a time before she falls and can now get herself up unassisted and start walking across the room. So it's only a matter of time before she stops bothering to crawl at all.

The great news about Alex, is she has finally started consistently sleeping through the night. She's been on and off for months, some nights sleeping through until 5 a.m. or so, having a snack and going back to sleep and other nights waking up screaming at 2 a.m. (and screaming for 2 hours or so). But about three weeks ago, just like that, she started sleeping straight through until 7 a.m.-ish. Hopefully it'll last for awhile.

The only other news around here is I have a little less than four weeks left of maternity leave and then I'm back at work and the kids are at daycare. I'm planning on enjoying my last few weeks with the kids. Although, before I head back to reality, the kids are taking a four-night vacation at my parents house and Ryan and I are taking a vacation in Vegas!