Big walkabout

Two weekends ago we had one of the first beautiful spring-like days, and we went for a long walk around town. We started by playing at a big park nearby, and then put the boys in the stroller for their naps while we walked along the water through much of the city. We ended by stopping at a historic house in our neighborhood.

Oh - and yesterday was James's birthday! He wanted a day of food, so he treated himself to his favorite cafes for breakfast and lunch and then our favorite Indian restaurant (thanks, Mom!) for dinner. Also, one of James's best friends from his PhD is visiting Stockholm with his wife, so we spent a couple hours walking and talking with them. We finished the night with one candle in a batch of homemade brownies after the boys went to bed. I have pictures of none of this.

But I do have pictures of our big walkabout!

Double nap in the double stroller:

At the historic house:

He's so cheeky! And we've taught him to say "cheeky monkey":

Chasing Chaos

James was teaching last week (and will be again next week), so I was in charge of pick-up every day. I love picking up August from dagis: I try to sneak up so he doesn't see me, so I can see what he's doing and watch how he plays when he doesn't know I'm around. But, all the kids know the parents now, so as soon as one of his little friends spies me, I start hearing "August mama, August mama!" and then August starts looking for me. As soon as I walk through the gate or into the building, a little friend will come up and tell me "August är där" and point in whatever direction August is playing. It's very cute.

But. August has been having a hard time with James being gone at work even just a few hours longer, so he's had a hard time this week. So after I've picked him up, we three (Leif and I remain inseparable, as needs be) have gone to a big park to play until James can join us.

This usually ends up with me chasing August.

Taken a different day from the above shots - what it looks like when we get home without Baba:

This page is from a book called Weslandia that August enjoys. This afternoon he pulled my hand mixer from a kitchen cupboard and took the beaters out. "Wes-land-ya!" he shouted, and ran to his room. A few minutes later I followed him to find this - the beaters, to him, looked like the lacrosse stick-like implements they're using in this game. I thought it was so cool to see him making that connection between totally unlike, unrelated objects.

The ferocious street tiger

Well, you decide how ferocious he is...

Little napping wonder

Our sleep experience with Leif has been a trip. We've gone from it being impossible to get him to sleep to him easily putting himself to sleep for every nap and bedtime back to it being a major chore to help him get to sleep; from four or five 45-minute naps per day to a couple one-three hour naps per day; from getting up every two hours overnight to only getting up once back to getting up every two hours. As soon as we get used to a sleeping pattern, it changes.

When we visited the nurse yesterday she basically said Yep, that sounds right. With all the developmental stuff going on, and his shifting milk requirements, it's normal for sleep to be wonky at this age. It is so nice to have our health care provider tell us this and reiterate how normal it is. In the US, you can be shamed to think that if your baby isn't sleeping through the night at a ridiculously early age (3 months!), you are doing something wrong and have probably f&*ked up your baby's chance to become a good sleeper for the rest of his life. Here in Sweden, the biological norm is understood and accepted: segmented sleep is just the way it goes for a while. You aren't a bad parent if your infant sleeps like...a baby.

I used to post a ton of pictures of Augie sleeping; because Leif sleeps in a much darker room I don't have many of him. But, here:

Leif and I went on a little adventure yesterday to our new neighborhood to check out preschools for August. It was a gorgeous spring day in the countryside.

 I didn't like one of the schools but really like the other, but the one I liked is a bit out of the way so I don't know if we'll choose it. It's a Waldorf school.

A little art installation by August:

Double whammy

So this happened after preschool pick-up today:

August actually climbed out of the stroller while we were moving. Twice. I even have a sound recording of both of them screaming at the same time, but I'll spare you that joy.

This joy, however, I'll share:

My little Leif at 5 months

Yesterday afternoon Leif mastered the back-to-front rollover. He'd been very close for a week or so, and then finally yesterday, while August and I were doing some scissors work (cutting strips of blue and green paper for an art project today that failed miserably), I glanced down to see him finally make the roll all by himself. He repeated two or three times, and then again with James. Today he's rolled a bunch of times, too, so I'd say that trick's in the bag. But, he hasn't done the front-to-back roll in a long time, which I say is good because it means he's still mostly stationary and we don't have to wrap his head in bubble-wrap. Yet.

It also seems like he's been wanting to be a side sleeper for a few weeks now but hasn't quite figured out the hip part of it: he gets his shoulders all twisted around but his hips aren't stacked, so as soon as he falls asleep his shoulders slingshot onto his back and he wakes up all pissed. Hoping he can put all those pieces together soon, too, and start sleeping better on his side.

August has been sick, burning with fever in the nights, but mostly fine -- if the tiniest bit slower -- during the day. He seems a bit better this evening.

Without further adieu, the pictures.

And the video (try to ignore me cooing in the background):

Happiness Project - month 2 recap

So February was the month I worked on my marriage in my happiness project. I knew it would be a difficult month for me, but also one of the most important of my year-long project. I thought long and hard about my resolutions, wrote them out in my chart....and pretty much never touched the chart again.

Not that I didn't do the project last month, or that I just ignored my resolutions; it's that when you're trying to change the entire way you relate to someone else, it's hard to follow a chart! Rather than tangible things to do, like write a to-do list or meditate, all of my resolutions were behaviors and as such, much more difficult to measure and keep track of. While I certainly tried to be more light-hearted and watch my tone, had I really done it?

On the last day of the month, in the evening after the kids were abed, James asked me how I thought the month went. In truth, I have been feeling more connected to James, less bothered by the little things, more able to find the humor in his (questionable) jokes, and definitely more like we are on the same team. I knew I hadn't made any major changes or fundamentally changed my personality to be the all-loving, all-supporting fount of patience and compassion that I sometimes aspire to become -- but I felt the little changes had made a pretty good difference.  That's how I felt - did he, too?

I bit my tongue and asked James how he thought it went - after all, no one would know better than him, right?

"Incredible," he said. Incredible!?!!?

He went on to say that it was even better than incredible; that he felt deeply supported by me in his work, and that feeling freer in his work meant he felt less anxiety overall, which actually allowed him to both work harder and feel more comfortable being fully at home when he wasn't working. He said some other glowing stuff, but you know what? -- I've forgotten it all already! It was probably the kindest thing James has ever said to me (much nicer than when, on my birthday a few years ago, I asked James what he loved most about me and he answered that I have been a perennial underachiever who hasn't done much with my talent in life!), and I've forgotten it!

The month went so well that James and I agreed that we should make every October - our anniversary month - our marriage happiness month, and we will each spend the whole month working on finding and creating more happiness in our relationship.

Hooray!

A dumpling and his dad

I owe you a few posts, don't I? I have two happiness project posts to do (reviewing my second month and introducing my third) and a 5-month Leif update. You'll get them eventually.

I find his bug-eyed look so funny.

And James's hair! I also find that funny!

Major Dumpling

More of the band-aid boy

I finally plugged in the big camera today after a couple weeks and found some great pictures - stay tuned over the next couple days for some great Leif shots. But I want to share more of Captain Chaos wrapped in his band-aids, first.

I take pride (though "pride" probably isn't the right word) in the fact that we almost never ask August (or Leif) to smile for photos. I keep meaning to write a post about that. We just take pictures, and let the boy(s) just be. I think you get truer, more compelling photos that way. Of course we get lots of pictures with smiles, and we love them - particularly because they are genuine smiles, not parent-imposed smiles.

(I think that's dried snot mixed with marinara sauce he's sporting.)

In this one, August was fascinated with the flash popping up before each picture and thought it was soo funny.

Band aid boy

When Ah Mah visited she brought us several winter headbands - which August calls "band-aids." This morning he decided to try them all out - at once. He experimented with how he could wear them: all around his torso...

...or all around his head:

A bit later, James had his first Superdad moment:

The sweetest thing happened yesterday at dinner. As we were all sitting at the table eating, I said, "August, isn't it nice to have Baba back with us, and to all be eating dinner together?" He didn't say a word, but he climbed down from his chair, walked to James, and wrapped his little arms around James's neck and gave him a big squeeze. Then he went back to his chair and continued eating.