20 months 2 days

I again succeeded in going to bed at midnight last night. Maybe I'll be able to make this my new lifestyle. We got up exactly at 8 am for breakfast. After they had eaten, been cleaned and dressed, I took Tammy and Emmy downstairs, while Randy was finishing up with Sammy and getting his breakfast ready. Emmy likes pulling up the blinds, so we did that, while Tammy wanted to be in the swing. It took about 15 minutes before Randy came to stay and I could go back upstairs. I cleaned up, and then I sat down to work. At 10:30 Randy put Sammy to bed for a nap, as he could not sleep after lunch today.

At 10:45 I got up to make lunch for the six of us, and I needed all that time to be ready by 11:30. Sonja arrived at that time as well, and everybody had chicken with rice and vegetables, which they love eating. Then they had watermelon, banana and yoghurt. One time Sonja gave Tammy something, and she responded with "danke" (thank you). We're saying thank you a lot, so I guess it's catching on. It was still impressive to see that she said it without being asked to do so or just repeating it.

They are saying "heiß" (hot) all the time now. When I said to Emmy, "no, not hot, warm", he actually repeated "warm" back to me. And Sammy is still saying "mama" all the time, and today I tried to record it, but he stopped every time as soon as I started filming.

After lunch, I put Emmy to bed, and Sonja took Tammy downstairs. Then I dressed Sammy so we could leave at 12:30. Once Emmy was sleeping, I put Tammy to bed, and she also fell asleep fast. Sammy and I, we left.

We took 3 subways, which is quite an ordeal, changing so often, and always having to go the detour to the elevators, but we got to the hospital early. I had to show my negative Covid test to get inside, and then had the receptionist call the dietitian we had an appointment with. We had to go to a waiting room, where I took Sammy's jacket off and gave him something to eat. A few minutes later she arrived and took us to a room to talk. She had me keep a journal of all he's eating for three days that I emailed her, and then she calculated how many calories a day he was getting. She told me that he was getting about what he was burning without any activity and that he needed another 150-200 calories a day. She then started telling me how to get those additional calories into his food. Sammy was on my lap the whole time, and his hands are always pretty busy and grabbing everything. She then suggested we'd weigh him, and his weight had actually gone up these last three weeks. When I weighed him at home at night, which she asked me to do, he was 300 grams heavier than three weeks ago.

From there we went downstairs for Sammy's physiotherapy. We still had a few minutes in the waiting room before going inside.

And his physiotherapy session went great today. He never cried, didn't need warm-up time, was active the whole time, even when the session was over, he was still busy trying to get to toys. The therapist said that he'd done a huge developmental growth spurt in the last two weeks and was impressed to see him so active and cheerful. And she was impressed when Sammy pulled both knees up under his body, and another time when she noticed fine motor skills in his hand. Sammy had a really good day today, including in the stroller on the way there AND home, never been cranky at all.

It was going on 4 pm, when we got back home. Sonja was downstairs with Emmy and Tammy, while Randy was working on the new shelves upstairs. I took Sammy's clothes off, changed his diaper, and took him downstairs to his siblings. He was getting tired, only having had that one hour nap in the morning, so he was getting cranky because of that. A few minutes later I joined them all downstairs to play with them until 5 pm, and we had lots of fun. The girl can now walk up the slippery slide all by herself, but Emmy couldn't quite do it on his own yet, though he tried. Emmy was tired too and put his head on my chest a few times, which he does, when he's tired. But I was also chasing them, making them laugh and giggle. And Emmy was jumping off the box again, with Sonja's help.

At 5 pm I went upstairs to get their food ready, and Randy went downstairs. The shelves are nearly done now and looking good. Picture to come. At 5:30 I called them upstairs to eat, then they went into the bathtub, where they had fun with the new ducks, but Emmy was so tired he put his head on my chest again. They all finished their food, and then they came out of the water, and each one of us got one kid ready for bed. Then I put them to bed in the opposite order, Tammy first, then Emmy, then Sammy. The boys were so tired, they fell asleep right away. Tammy was awake, walking around and throwing her rabbits. I could hear hear while getting my food ready. The more cranky she gets, the closer she is to sleeping. I finally checked on her, and what kept her from sleeping was that she did not have any of her three rabbits, so I returned two to her that she had thrown out, and then she could go to sleep.

By about 8 pm I was done eating and could start working. A little later I went upstairs to clean up the kitchen and dining room and pick the food for tomorrow. And now I only have a few minutes left before it's midnight, my new bedtime.