I just don't even know anymore

There are good things, bad things, exciting things, and scary things going on.

First, some good things.

I don't think there's anything more heart warming than when I give one of the girls something like a banana and they immediately break it in half and deliver half of it to their sister.  They don't take a bite first, they don't acknowledge that it's theirs, they just immediately give half to their sister because that's what you do.

Teeny Tiny won a coloring contest!  When I picked up the girls from the grocery store daycare a couple of weeks ago (a really good thing in and of itself), one of the ladies told me how Teeny Tiny spent 20 solid minutes working on her coloring, trying to stay in the lines (they are still in that complete scribble stage) and that we should enter it in the contest.  Yeah, sure, ok.  Got a call a couple of days ago that she won and picked up a small prize package yesterday.  Yay!  Last year, amazon had a great deal on a laminator so I was able to laminate her coloring page to go in her scrapbook (scrap pile shoved into a folder for future organization) as her first ever award or contest win.

Middie Biddie is now asking for things instead of just reaching and whining.  It's so nice to know what she actually wants!  And what does she want?  Bubbles.  Endless bubbles.  Millions of bubbles.  We got a cheap bubble machine but that blows sooooo many bubbles that the floor ends up slippery if I use it.  Just a tip - try different brands of bubble mixture.  Those with more glycerin make better bubbles and because it uses less liquid per bubble, you don't end up with soapy floors.

The girls are starting to ask for diaper changes.  Not consistently and they often ask when they don't really need one, but it's the first step to indicate a readiness for potty training!

Second, a meh thing.

We officially have our first Disney obsession.  Middie Biddie adores Sofia the first.  She's constantly using the name Sofia in her random mutterings so all day I'm hearing "Sofia, are you ok?  Run Sofia run!" and so on.  We got the girls some princess dresses and Middie Biddie insists on wearing her Sofia dress almost every day and she started crying when we would change her into her jammies at night, so now we have Sofia jammies to make her ok with taking off the dress.  Thank you Clearance aisle at Target for the extra dresses so I can wash them from time to time!

We're also big fans of Doc McStuffins in our household and have a Doc costume as well.  I'm often being told to say "ahhhh" while the girls use some tool of some sort to look into my mouth.

As far as Disney characters go, I'm ok with these two.  An adorable little girl who imitates her doctor mom by being a toy doctor, and another little girl who's sweet and not used to the whole princess lifestyle.  As long my girls don't obsess over those princesses who fall in love without ever actually speaking to the prince or who require rescuing every 3 seconds, I'm ok with a little Disney fandom.

Third, some bad things.

It's been less than a month since we put down my cat Shadow.  A large part of the decision to put him down so far before the move was to give us some time to see if Mayday would be a urine problem now that the other male was gone so we could decide whether or not we would surrender him before the move.  Well, a week or so after putting Shadow down, we had to take Mayday to the vet for a respiratory and urinary tract infection.  While he was there, they got very concerned that he's lost 4lbs in the last few months and upon further testing found that he has cancer.  It started in the colon and has already spread significantly.  Current life expectancy is now about 1 month.  So I'm feeling horrible that not only are we going to lose him, but that we could have kept Shadow for another month or two.

In kid raising news, it looks like we might soon be dropping the afternoon nap.  Damnit!!!  Middie Biddie has been fighting that nap for as long as I can remember and now Teeny Tiny, the one who loves sleeping, is starting to fight it too.  We've had a few afternoons where instead of quiet time or napping, I'm running into the bedroom because Teeny Tiny has managed to get under her mattress and is trying to throw it onto her sisters head or Middie Biddie has started peeling the tape that keeps the power cable to the monitor camera secured to the wall.  Now we're experimenting with just winging it in terms of schedule every day and just keeping an eye on them to see if they seem tired around nap time.  If we skip the nap, it does mean some crankiness starting around 6:30pm, but bedtime moves to 7:30pm and they might actually crash within a half hour.  On nap days, who knows what time they'll finally go to sleep.

But what makes this royally frustrating is that I've been counting on nap time to login to my work computer and do the daily reports to get a few more hours on my time card every week.  If we drop the nap, I'm not sure how that's going to work.  I'm trying to teach them the concept of quiet time so I can keep them in their cribs for that 45 minutes regardless of whether it's a nap day or not, but we're having mixed results with that.

Side note - I stopped the lifting of the mattress by getting some of those sheet suspender straps and pinning the corners of the sheets under the grate of the crib.

Exciting and scary - we're getting closer and closer to the move and getting a new house.  That's a constant strain hanging over us while at the same time we think about how much life is going to be different in a new house.  AAACCCCKKKKK!!!!!!