14 months 25 days

I was heading to bed at my typical 3:30 last night, but got held up, and it ended up being 4:15, and then I lie in bed awake for a while, thinking mainly about our upcoming Mali trip and all the details. I don't know how we're gonna childprove our house there, thinking of everything I have on bottom shelves that they would pull out.... It was a blessing that we moved in Vienna before they could walk, so that the bottom shelves just stayed empty. We don't have that space there. In fact, we need to build the upper level of the house to have rooms for them. Right now their one big bed is right next to ours, making our bedroom tight, and there is not much space.

It was as hard as always to get up at 8:50 to make their food. We fed them, and then put them to bed for their morning nap at 9:15. I let them talk, and then picked up Tammy who slept on me for about 45 minutes. She woke up when Randy talked to Sammy right nextdoor, and so she joined the boys downstairs. I put their lunch food into the warmer and went back to bed.

Randy woke me up at 12:15 to feed them, as Sammy had his weekly physiotherapy appointment. Then I took them all downstairs, until Randy picked up Sammy to leave with him at 1 pm. I took Tammy and Emmy upstairs with me to get some food for myself, so they would not cry being downstairs by themselves. They enjoy running around upstairs! I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to finish putting this wall decoration up. I had started yesterday, but I barely have time to do it, and at night they sleep here, so it has to be done during the day. I think it turned out really well and makes their bedroom more of children's room. The little ones have been pointing at it every time they see it. Emmy is the one in the picture.

Then we all went back downstairs, including my sandwich and tea, which is always a challenge eating, as they want to grab our food. I ended up giving them a little bit of cheese but successfully kept it all away from them, which especially Emmy wasn't happy about.

They were getting pretty cranky, neither one having slept very long in the morning, so I took them upstairs at 2 pm and put them to bed. They were both crying, Emmy hysterically, like he does when he's really tired. I tried picking him up once, but he still didn't calm down. I tried lying down with Tammy and leaving him alone to fall asleep, but that didn't work either (it usually does), so I gave up at 2:30 and decided to feed them their afternoon meal. Then they went back to bed for their second try.

Emmy was pretty tired, and fell asleep while I was trying to get Tammy to sleep in her bed. I had no success with Tammy, and when I saw that Emmy was sleeping, I picked her up and lay down with her at 3 pm. She fell asleep pretty fast then.

Now Emmy usually wakes up after half an hour and then needs to be held to go back to sleep. I was wondering what I was gonna do, especially with the girl on me, who had only just fallen asleep. It was was 3:20 when Emmy woke up crying. I gently slid Tammy onto the bed next to me, and surprisingly, she did not wake up. Then I picked up Emmy and lay back down, next to Tammy. We barely fit onto the bed. And it worked! Emmy fell asleep on me, Tammy slept next to me, and I was just trying to not fall off the bed.

At 3:30 Randy came home with Sammy, who was also sleeping in his stroller. Today a guy had taken Sammy's measurements to make a special seat for him. He's also getting braces to wear at night, to flex his feet and stretch his tendons. We're yet to hear how much those will cost us. We're both not very excited about him getting those things, if we can even afford it (it depends on how much of it the insurance pays).

10 minutes after their return Emmy woke up, and he was awake for good. I let him go down on the ground, and he walked away to see Daddy. 15 minutes later Tammy woke up, and she joined her brother. 5 minutes later Sammy woke up too, and it was 4 pm, which is when we would have woken him up anyway, so he could sleep tonight.

We all went downstairs to play. I got the wood blocks out and build towers that they enjoyed destroying over and over again. These pictures were taken just before and after Emmy made the tower fall. They enjoyed it, and so did I.

At 4:30 I left them to get everything ready for dinner and bed, and we fed them at 5 pm. Tammy did not eat much tonight, but Emmy did pretty well; he hadn't eaten as much in the afternoon as his sister. Then they all enjoyed the bathtub, and went to bed one after another, in their typical order. It seemed that Tammy and Emmy were on their way to falling asleep, while Sammy was wide awake. However, that was only an illusion. All three were awake, getting up, playing, and Tammy crying whenever I'd walk away, while Emmy would lie down to sleep. My patience was wearing thin tonight, as I really just wanted to walk away and move on to the next thing. I finally walked away and let Tammy cry, and lo and behold, she stopped after a while and fell asleep. Maybe I need to always do that so she gets used to it!

Then it was cooking and eating time, and now office work time. It's only 11 pm and I've already finished all the things that absolutely HAVE to be done tonight, though there's so much more work to do. We have to leave at 8 am in the morning, which means even the babies have to get up earlier than usual, and it's sure gonna be tough for me!