More challenges . . . but it's all good:)

Lynsey has continued her difficult streak this last week. She challenges us, whines, doesn't want to go to bed, etc. I know all these things are normal for a two year old, but not my two year old! She has been acting like a baby, which was not cute for very long. I really hope this is a very quick phase. We are phasing out her naps, because she is now becoming more difficult to put to bed than ever before. We are still trying to make her have "quiet time", but some days that is very difficult to enforce. I'm not giving up, though - I need that time in the afternoon. One thing that IS getting better is her ability to play by herself. This has become somewhat of a necessity for her, because we have told her that TV is for "big girls", and so until she decides to pee on the potty, she can't watch TV. I figure it's win-win, because either she decides to pee on the potty on her own free will (finally!), or she just doesn't watch TV, which is not a bad thing. It's been a few days, and every time she asks for a show, we tell her she can't until she pees on the potty, and she instantly talks about doing something else. I don't know what that potty has done to offend her . . . anyway, I am pretty sure it won't motivate her to potty train, but I'm glad she's not whining for TV all the time anymore!

Adam is cutting his bottom two teeth! Already! He's not even 6 months old yet! He's had a lot of teething symptoms the last few days (more than Lynsey ever had) and has been a bit whiny, but it's not too bad so far. The nights have been reasonably good, but we'll see how tonight goes - they are on the verge of cutting through now. He loves his Jolly Jumper so much - it's become my go-to place to put him when I need free hands for a while. His thighs haven't gotten any smaller, but he's burning some calories! He loves grabbing his feet, and it sounds like he's on the verge of making the "ba" sound - we'll see how long it takes!

I am done with pumping - WAHOO! I didn't quite make it to 6 months, but so close - less than a week away! I pumped my last bottle yesterday, and it took a long time - my milk is basically gone. I can't tell you how happy I was to put that breast pump away. I wasn't sure how he would like the concentrate formula in the morning, but he drained it in like 4 minutes so that answered that question. He is warming up to the baby food, and I'm thinking about trying some strained meat in the next day or two. He is still drinking just as much milk as before, so I think he can handle more solids. Every morning it amazes me how hungry he is - he just drains that bottle. I have a hungry boy on my hands!

Brian and I bought a DSLR camera last Saturday! We have been taking a lot more pictures trying it out, so there are quite a few pictures attached to this post. We are still learning how to use it, and I'm going to Black's tomorrow morning for a one-on-one tutorial on how to use all the features (it's a Canon Rebel T2i for all the camera people out there). Even in Auto mode, the quality of pictures it takes is unbelievable compared to our old camera - and our old camera wasn't bad! I'm excited to learn more about the features and getting into photography a bit - I say a bit because I don't think I'll ever be a total photography buff. I am thinking I'll take a photography course in the fall, though - can never have too many hobbies!

Lynsey wants to know "why not"

The last few days have been a bit difficult on both the Adam and Lynsey front. Adam was doing a lot better at night, quite consistently sleeping through with maybe one or two short wakings during the night. The last two nights haven't been good, though. He's been waking up and crying without calming down - I've had to take him into bed a lot again. I am not totally discouraged, because I think it might just be a phase he's going through, but it is a little disappointing because he was doing so well for so long. He's been super hungry the last few days, and a little constipated because I started giving him some baby food (which he absolutely loves by the way!) so that may well have something to do with him not being as content at night. His ridiculous appetite continues to amaze me! I can hardly keep up! I'm down to only pumping once a day, and am on pace to be done pretty much at 6 months. I am looking forward to being done.

As far as Adam's development goes, he continues to progress! A few days ago, he started actually jumping in his jolly jumper! He might jump off some of those thunder thighs yet:). He is showing signs of possibly sitting sometime soon - he still leans forward a lot, but he can straighten up and has corrected himself sometimes when almost falling over. I have hope that I will have a "sitter" yet!

Lynsey has been a bit difficult the last little while. It's almost like she is entering the "terrible twos" late! She gets whiney really easily when things don't go her way, and has started fighting naps and bedtime more than ever before. We are trying to establish boundaries so that she knows who's in charge, and she does relent eventually, so I feel like we just need to be consistent and she'll get through this stage okay. My patience has been tested a lot lately, and I've come up quite short a lot of days. I do have to also talk about how sweet she's been at times to balance this out:). She just loves her brother, and he gets more hugs than he knows what to do with! She plays with him as much as is possible at this stage, and it actually has started helping me a bit. She has definitely entered the "Why" stage in full force, and lately she's been asking "Why not" a lot as well. We have an intelligent, inquisitive little girl and although she is testing me a lot, I do feel lucky to have her!

Long trip in the van + Sickness = Not much fun

The last few weeks have been pretty good, with a few unfortunate things thrown in. We went to La Crete just this last weekend for my nephew Dion's wedding. The wedding was beautiful, but having the kids at the reception was slightly less than relaxing. We spent an extra day visiting and drove home yesterday. The trip home was really long. We had to wait at the ferry for a long time, and Lynsey was a bit sick (diarrhea) and a few stops were required. We stopped in Edmonton for a few hours before heading home. Yes, it was a really long day. Today was a very lazy day - Lynsey had two naps, which is unheard of, and I slept quite a bit as well. It's never good to feel ill the day after a big trip, when all I want to do is get caught up on everything, but what can you do! Things are starting to look up:).

I can't believe I'm still talking about this, but there is ANOTHER potty training update. I just can't believe she hasn't mastered this yet. I just want to pull my hair out already! Last Saturday, we were at our friends Bobbi and Jer's house, and she peed in her panties twice. And it wasn't like she was in desperate need of going - the first time was an hour and a half since the last time she'd gone, and the second time was like 20 minutes later. I was so frustrated! Brian and I talked about it and decided that she was clearly not motivated to master this skill yet, and we would put her back in Pullups until she decided she wanted to pee on the potty. It pains me, but it really is true what they say - you just can't force a kid to do something they don't want to do! We have tried rewards, taking away things she really likes (TV in the morning) and nothing seems to matter. I have now ordered her a Curious George doll in the mail and I've been telling her that she can only have it if she starts peeing on the potty, and it STILL doesn't seem to matter! And she really loves Curious George - a lot. I guess some people get lucky with kids who learn the potty fast AND want to do it - I am clearly not one of those people. Maybe God will have mercy on me and make Adam easy. Even as I'm writing that, I'm sure that won't happen. Oh, well - such is life!

Adam had a checkup two weeks ago Wednesday and is a healthy 20 lb 6.5 ounces. Apparently his weight gain has not slowed down much! I stopped feeding him at night a few weeks back, so he is now on a four bottle schedule. For a while, he kept waking up at 5 and not wanting to go back to sleep, but it's slowly been getting better. I think he was a bit hungry so he didn't want to go back to sleep, but Brian and I decided not to feed him until closer to 7 instead of giving him a little snack at 5 just to get him back to sleep. We thought that in the long run, making him wait would pay off. In fact, it's already starting to pay off. He had an 11 hour night when we were in La Crete! I could not have needed him to sleep well more than I did that night - I was sick and sooo tired, and him sleeping through the night was just an absolute Godsend. So in summary, he is slowly but surely getting onto a schedule that is acceptable to me. He goes to bed between 7:30 and 8, and is slowly starting to sleep longer in the mornings. Ideally, he would sleep 7:30 to 7:30, so we'll see when he can get there! He is becoming more interested in toys, finally starting to hang onto them for more than a few seconds, and actually putting them into his mouth. He still doesn't roll from his back to his tummy, but that has to be coming soon.