Another trip to Gamla Stan

We took Grandma to Gamla Stan and spent the morning chasing Augie around.

Grandma's here!

My mom arrived yesterday to spend a week with us. She's been doing a great job keeping Augie entertained, and it's so fun for me to hear the two of them laughing and playing together, inventing their own games and being silly. 

Leif's sleep remains pretty damned tough - he just fights going to sleep so hard. He'll be thisclose to being asleep, eyes closed, breathing slowed and then AHA! - arms and legs flailing, eyes wide open, again and again and again. Or he'll fall asleep for five minutes and then be up again. But then when he does sleep, he gets a good chunk in - this afternoon he napped for four hours, and last night was he put together the longest consecutive stretches of sleep he's had yet. Despite that, it's utterly exhausting - so it's been nice to have a third pair of arms to pass him off to.

It was also nice to get a small resupply from the States (there was much more!):

Grandma brought books, including Dr. Seuss.

Showing off their high feet:

And a picture from our dagis drop-off the other morning:

Oh, autumn!

Every time we have a nice day, I think, "Oh, it's our last nice day of the year! Let's get outside and enjoy it before winter comes and we're mired in grey funk and gloom for another six months!" Tuesday was one of those days - warm(ish) temperatures, sun shining, the last leaves still on trees. In the morning we all went to the local park (where Augie attacked other children with his hockey stick), and in the afternoon we took another long walk around Långholmen. We feel so lucky to live where we do and have a park like Långholmen in our backyard. It's always fun to take Augie to a playground, where there are swings and slides and sandboxes, but it's also nice to go somewhere outside where he can run free and explore, and use his imagination to make his own games.

I've had trouble narrowing down the photo selection for this post, so I'll just put them all up.

"Boo!" - we played peekaboo around this tree forever!

A dream come true

Look what different colors they are! 

Augie has been so great with Dai-dai; he showers him with kisses and hugs, he wants to carry and hold him several times a day, he shares his toys and food with him. He's only pulled his hair once, and only sat on him twice (both tonight at dinner). However, he's been acting out in other ways. We had friends over on Saturday afternoon - they have a baby three days older than Dai-dai and a boy who is four. Augie pulled this boy's hair three times, twice while they were playing alone in the bedroom, and once in front of all of us. At a playground on Saturday he pulled off other children's hats two or three times (presumably because he couldn't reach their hair?), and today at the local park he hit two kids over the head (but not hard, thankfully) with a plastic hockey stick for no reason at all! We've never seen this kind of behavior from him. We've seen him be territorial or possessive, but with the two kids he hit on the head with a hockey stick, there was no aggravating incident - he wasn't even playing with them. He just walked up to these kids and hit (more like tapped, but still) them. We suspect that it's anger and jealousy about Dai-dai manifesting in other ways, and we don't know what to do about it.

On a significantly happier note, one of my dreams came true today: the family nap. Dai-dai had been sleeping on my chest, as below, when Augie woke from his nap. He came into our room smiling and climbed into bed, then James climbed in next to him. I massaged Augie's back and head, and soon enough he was back to sleep, and I was sandwiched between my sleeping babies. *The best.* (Full disclosure: I didn't sleep at all because my neck was uncomfortable and I'd bee in the same position for ninety minutes; but that meant I got to savor the moment!)

It's been a long weekend

Augie is off from dagis today and tomorrow because they have planning days, and also because most of the city is on fall holiday this week. We've had a couple of rough nights, with both boys breaking down at the same time and James and I exchanging one screaming child for another. For nearly two weeks now, Leif has a period of 1-4 hours every night when he just doesn't want to sleep, but nor does he want to be awake. Sometimes he's okay during this period, sometimes he's screaming, sometimes he's nursing, sometimes he's refusing. It's been trying. It's also the main reason I haven't been posting.

Some photos from the last few days...

James got his guitar out and has been playing with/for Augie, who loves it (spot the baby!):

Yesterday we went to a really cool park with all sorts of different play areas - he most loved the boat and the airplane:

Today we went to a 4-H farm to show Augie some real-life animals, as he sees pictures of them in books and has several stuffed and plastic animals. He thought they were neat, but what he really enjoyed was the adjacent construction site! The playground in the park is being rebuilt, and there was all sorts of activity going on - a bulldozer, bucket loader, a buzz saw(?) shooting sparks - Augie just stood at the fence, staring, for fifteen minutes! It's the longest he's ever focused on anything in his whole life.

More painting

Augie and Baba got the paints out again the other day.

I love his focus face:

I don't think he enjoys Baba painting on his paper:

I really don't think he enjoys Baba infringing on his territory!

Oh - and here's a little Leif:

Asleep!

The big news today is that Augie slept on a mat at dagis! He's been sleeping in his stroller this whole time, but today when James went to pick him up, he saw that they had posted this picture on Augie's cubby. Hooray!

In other news, Leif had another check-up today; we should really just call them weigh-ins, because that's what they do- weigh him. He's up to 4.700 kilograms, or 10 pounds, 6 ounces. That's a gain of 320 grams in the last week (and remember, we're aiming for 150 grams per week). We go back next week for another weigh-in. 

My boys in the morning

Bunny!

Another nap photo:

And another video. Saturday we went adventuring around Södermalm and found ourselves at a churchyard. A giant hare was running back and forth across the yard, and another boy and Augie chased it. Here he is, yelling "Bunny! Bunny! Bunny!" as he chases it (email subscribers click here):

Quiet moments

Don't expect much, at least in terms of words, from the blog these days. It's taking 2-5 hours to put Leif to sleep each night, which saps my energy for anything but sleep.

Augie beeping

Yesterday afternoon I picked up Augie from dagis and took him to the park. It was an on-and-off-again rainy day, and on my way to collect him fallen leaves kept grabbing my attention.

Augie always like to play on the biggest possible bikes at the park - but at least now he's found a way to drive this thing, even if it isn't as intended. And listen to his dialog with the car! (Email subscribers click here to view the video):