That dreaded bath time event...

We had a good time at the Discovery Museum today. Two is much harder, but doable. Joseay just had to be carried the whole time, but Brown did a good job playing and exploring without me having to be right near him all of the time. He loved it. Joseay did a good job holding her bottle on the way out to the car. She's a pretty coordinated little thing.

So when we got home, Brown had lots of sand on him from digging for dinosaur bones, so I stripped him down at the door and he ran to the bath. He had a great time in the bath and was happy for 20 minutes or so. And then… UH Ohhhhh… the moment we knew would come. Suddenly, something in the water was really scaring him. He stood up and kept trying to get away from it – crying, squealing… yelling…


POOOOO POOOOOHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

Sure enough… there were floaters and sinkers to dodge. The more he ran from them, the more they moved around in the water and tried to get him. Talk about saying “BLEEEHHGGGHHH over and over! He did not like it at all. He looked a bit terrified. So I got him out and stood him on the bathroom floor next to me while I fished for the nuggets. I put them into a bag and we dumped them into the toilet. He flushed and told them “bye bye”.

So then he had pooh pooh water all over himself, so we walked upstairs to mommy and daddy’s shower. As I got the shower water warm for him, he peed ALL over the floor.

Oye vey! Hilarious. This morning involved a lot of cleaning up time.

It's been a pretty long 5 months, but things are definitely starting to even out a bit. All of those people who told us that going from one to two kids was a HUGE adjustment... "word", is all I have to say. Holy cow.

Joseay is smiling and giggling more and more and loves showing off her 2 new teeth. She's doing better rolling over and she is really great at holding toys and banging them around. She loves the "freedom" of the exersaucer and jumpy thing. She is just SO READY to walk and run and do her own thing. You can see the frustration in her when she is being held and she just wants to do it on her own. She is going to give us a run for our money... she is making that very clear. She'll keep us on our toes for sure.

The Peace Offering (she's not too interested)

Does this count as camping?

Well we are planning a camping trip with some friends this weekend and last weekend we thought we better practice as we have 2 kids now. Shouldn’t be too much trouble right? As you will see, it didn't go so well. We pitched the tent in the yard up at the lake and began to put our stuff in for the night. But before we even got in to go to sleep, we decided that with the baby still getting up twice a night screaming bloody murder, we would try this first night with just Brown and let grandma keep Joseay. So that is what we did. Then we laid down for the night about 10pm. Brown decided it was play time and didn't even go to sleep until 11:30 while making frequent loud noises. About 1pm, just as it was getting good and cold, Chris reached over to cover Brown once again since he kept kicking the covers off. She realized Brown was soaked. Not just damp but soaked through his clothes and his sleeping pad with tee tee. So at 1am, Curt and Chris stripped Brown down in the freezing cold, changed his diaper, found new clothes, flipped the sleeping mattress over and tried to settle him down again. Well, he is not a still sleeper and kept waking up crying, moving around. This continued until about 4am when we decided to give up and go inside and put everyone to bed which is what happened. So Curt and Chris think that maybe this year is not the right one for camping with this age kids and maybe next year will be better. Even if we decided to tough it out, Curt thinks that no one else in the campground would get a good night's sleep listening to both kids scream alternatively through the night. Wouldn't exactly be fun for anyone. So this summer, anytime you hear us talking about a tent, you will know we are planning on “camping on the lawn.” It was so easy when Brown was 3months old and camping in the cold. What happened?

On another note, Joseay rolled over from her back to her front for the first time yesterday. Yep missed that one too (see last post)… Second children are so neglected…

Who said Madness?

Well, for those of you who think march madness started today, you haven't been to our house lately. The last two weeks have seen fevers in both kids, ear infection, RSV, breathing treatments, tylenol, amoxil, nexium, ear drops, up all night (ok not new) as well as vomiting on the favorite non washable stuffed bear. So in the Chaffin household, the madness is subsiding for a while. Joseay is celebrating the first appearance by the mighty mighty terriers as you can clearly see above. Wofford you know.

We are sort of using this blog as our public babybook (there isn't a private one) so I expect the kids may one day peruse through some of these entries. So Joseay, if you are reading this, I am happy to report that yesterday, you rolled over for the first time. Rolling over is one of those fun milestones. It means you are strong enough to start actually moving yourself around. You are no longer an immobile blob, but locomotion has come to your world. It is a glorious event, one for which we have kept a camera handy for weeks so that we could capture the moment on film. Unfortunately, we missed it. I don't mean that we didn't get a picture of it, we didn't even see it. One minute you were on your stomach, laying there on the floor, then you were on your back. we weren't even in the room. Brown, if you are reading this, don't tell Joseay. She might start complaining that we are treating her like a typical second child, missing important milestones and not nearly so many pictures. We are trying, but wow, there is so much to do. Like watch you both smile at each other while you "help" her. Like riding you on my back. Like watching her smile. Like helping you dump your diaper contents in the toiled and seeing the amazement on your face (more later. Uh, maybe not...) Like making her laugh. Like dancing with you. So much to do... truly march madness continues.

First Joseay REAL laughs! :)

Snow Writing

Well we have gone where many parents have gone before: We have about a thousand photos of Brown's early months, but only about 4 of Joseay so far. Terribly unfair, but true non-the-less. In a mid winter attempt at parity, we took advantage of the snow to recreate the snow writing that we did for Brown out in Utah. (see Dec 17, 2007 ) Luckily, an unusual storm allowed us to take care of this much closer to home. Brown enjoyed the snow or at least he enjoyed being out in it. I don't think he has ever voluntarily come inside.

Joseay continues to grow into herself and we are getting better at being her parents. She is sleeping much better at night, which means we are sleeping much better. The world (especially that world inside our 4 walls) looks much better with a handful of sleep. Thanks for all the encouragement over the last few weeks, and ignore just about anything we have said since November. We were sleep deprived and have no idea what we were saying/doing.

As you can see, she is growing well. People keep commenting on her double chin. They don't realize she also has a double thigh, double ankles...

Garbage Pals - following in my footsteps

Yesterday was one of those defining moments – one of those images that will be in my mind for a long time. You hear parents talk about memories of their children that they will never forget, and I must say that yesterdays image is etched in my memory. Is it too early to say that sort of thing about something that happened less than 24 hours ago?

Brown had been cooped up way to long and he needed to get outside. So I took him out to move the trash can around to the front. I walked him out the back door, grabbed the big can and began rolling it around towards the front. He loves pulling that sort of thing around. I said “come help me with the trash can.” He heard me, looked at me and ran the other way. I was hoping that once I moved the trash can, he would come running to the sound, but after I moved a bit to the front of the house, I saw nothing. I better go see where he is. As I started toward the back of the house, I hear another loud rumble from behind the house. Not a scary loud, but a curious loud. And the next thing I see is Brown walking around the house trailing a smaller trash can that we keep the recyclables in. Now, what I had forgotten about, and what I have not yet told you is that Brown loves to drag the recyclable trash can around the driveway. As soon as he saw dad get the big trash can, he thought, it is time to go get my trash can.

So with a huge smile on my face, I turned back to the trash can, proceeded to walk to the road knowing that he was right behind me with his can. Of course it was empty and I had to go back and get it later. But that vision is still clear in my mind, of him proudly following his father, trash can in tow to take the trash out.

Our last month in pictures...

Wow. It is REALLY hard to keep this blog thing happening with 2 kids. I have been wanting to write on here for weeks and just can't squeeze enough time out of the day. I thought I could at least upload some pictures to represent our last month or so since I have been slacking off on this. Time is precious these days. In a nutshell, Brown turned 2 in December. This is a picture of his daddy licking the cake icing off of his fingers. We celebrated with his cousins over at our house eating cake and opening presents, which he has really never done. He is totally digging the unwrapping thing, now. He actually hit someone for the first time - his cousin, Ella. She swiped a new truck out of his hand (a couple of times) that he was pretty excited about opening. It was chaos. He was exhausted - past bedtime. And there it was... 2 punches to her arm. It was time to put him to bed.

This has pretty much been our last 2 months or so. Crying, puking, holding... therefore, no blogging.

Bathtime for the kiddos. Is it just me, or does Curt look tired?

Cousin Keely holding her "1st cousin Joseay".
Santa's little helper (when she wasn't crying)

She has been doing better the last couple of days, and she even snuggled up for a little nap on Curt, today. It has been hard for her to be content because of her reflux and ... who knows... colic? Satan? Not sure what has been making her scream bloody murder, but it is definitely getting a little better every week, so we are thankful.

Someone noticed how few (none) pictures we have around our house of Joseay at this point. Pictures of her screaming and crying just haven't been the ones I've been wanting to blow up and frame lately. But there have been more of these moments the last few days so I thought I should start documenting them.



Brown had a somewhat hard time adjusting the first few weeks of Joseay's existence. But now he gives her several kisses a day and actually started crying last night when I was shipping her off with a babysitter for the evening.