Silly Monkey Story: A Naptime Surprise

Every single weekday, our 5 year old twins complain about having to take a nap.  They just cannot make it to dinnertime, which is usually around 6:30pm or 7:00pm, without one during the school year.  They are normally in bed for the night by 9pm.  Soon, they will be on a summer vacation schedule and will be sleeping later in the mornings, so naps will not be an issue.

It is not unusual for me to have difficulty waking them up from their naps because school really wipes them out.  Having them fall into a deep sleep not too long after they complain about having to take a nap is pretty much the norm.  What is not normal is for me to find this when I go to wake them up . . .

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The twins really have not slept in the same bed since they were infants and toddlers, so this was a huge surprise to me.  Also, I wanted to capture the expressions of deep sleep on their faces with a close shot, but what you do not see is how they are buried under several plush ducks and Mickey Mouse toys.

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Silly Monkey Story: Will You What?

Our 5 year old daughter is a huge fan of educational television programs, such as Dora the Explorer.  When she watches these shows, she cannot wait to run over to tell me what new thing she learned.  Then she hurries back to her show so she won't miss learning anything important.

The other night, she was playing with her two brothers when we heard her belt out repeatedly . . .

"Will I hee hoo!  Will I HEE HOOOOO!"

We didn't want to correct her because she was having so much fun and her brothers didn't correct her because they probably didn't know she was yodeling incorrectly.

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Silly Monkey Story: The Polite Patient

A few days ago, our 5 year old daughter took a spill for no apparent reason in her brothers' room.  She ended up getting a patch of rug burn right above her elbow.  After a couple of days, the patch was completely scabbed over.

Then one evening, while the children were getting ready for bed, our daughter calls down from upstairs and asks me where her Dad is.  I asked her what she needed and she said in her usual small voice . . .

"I have a little problem I need help with."

So, my husband goes to check on her and asks her what she needs.  I heard her repeat the same statement, "I have a little problem I need help with."  Then I heard her start to cry a little bit.

Well, it turns out she had bumped her scab and tore it off halfway.  There was blood gushing out and dripping on the floor.  I don't blame her at all for crying because it was a lot of blood and it must have hurt quite a bit.  What I cannot understand is why she did not just say "I need help!" or "I'm bleeding!!!" with more of a sense of urgency.  The way she was talking, you'd think she had dropped a toy behind her bed rather than bleeding profusely.

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My Photos: Preschool Brunch

Every year at preschool, each classroom throws a brunch for which each student gets to invite one special guest.  Since we have twins, both my husband and I had the pleasure of attending last year and this year.

The children really work very hard to prepare for the brunch.  They helped to bake cookies and banana bread.  They also made placemats for themselves and their guest, place cards, and a vase with egg carton flowers.  I still have our 8 year old son's vase and flowers from his last year in preschool, so now we have three to display proudly.

After everyone had filled their tummies with bagels, sandwiches, pasta, cookies, brownies, and banana bread, the children sang several songs for us, which was adorable!  You could really tell which children were shy and which were not.  Both our children were part of the shy group, but were extremely cute nonetheless.

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My Photos: W/E 5-5-12

Every time I take photos of the children for an upcoming review, I always like to take some "just because" photos.  Those are the ones where their personalities really shine through.  These are photos I had taken during our mini photo shoot for our tutu tank review.  I took lots of great photos of our daughter that morning, but I wanted to share a few of my favorites . . .

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Silly Monkey Story: I Command Thee!

Just a couple of days ago, my husband and I heard our 5 year old daughter ask her big brother for help with something upstairs.  I believe she needed help opening a plastic storage bin of toys.  I stopped paying attention after a few seconds.

Then I heard our daughter yelling in a very commanding tone . . .

"Open says ME!  Open SAYS ME!!!"

After a minute of being quite confused and curious, I figured out that our 8 year old son must have told her to say "open sesame" before he would open the toy bin for her.  This was not quite as silly as the Mrs. Hippy story, but it did make my husband and I chuckle.

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My Photos: Cool Red Sox Party Favor

I have had a shortage of photos to share the past couple of weeks, but here is one from last weekend's annual Red Sox party at my cousin's house.  At the end of the night, she gave all the boys 8.5" x 11" Red Sox notebooks and all the girls got these really cool Red Sox handbags.  They were so cute, I wanted one!

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Silly Monkey Story: A Ticking Time Potty

Last week was April vacation for our local schools.  We did not have many big plans aside from attending a Red Sox party, so we decided to take the children to the mall one evening to have dinner and to pick up a few things we needed.

While we were having dinner, our 5 year old daughter said that she needed to use the potty, so I took her to the family rest room.  She immediately got nervous because there was a self-flushing toilet.  She thinks the sound of a toilet flushing is much too loud in the first place, but not being able to control when the toilet flushed was making her very anxious.

Still, she sat down to pee.  I was very proud of her for being brave.  After I waited awhile, I started to wonder why nothing was happening.  It turned out that she was holding it because she thought that once she peed in the bowl, the toilet would flush.  Then I told her that the toilet was motion-activated and would flush when she stood up.  Well, that just made things worse.  So, there she was, sitting there afraid to pee and afraid to move, like she was sitting on a live bomb.

After what seemed like forever and after a few people knocked on the door to see if the bathroom was occupied, my husband called me from the table to see if everything was okay.  We must have been gone quite awhile.  After I explained to him what was going on, he told me that I could cover the sensor with my hand so that the toilet would not flush until our daughter had done her business and had gotten up.  Well, thank goodness that worked!

I am laughing about it now, but at the time, I was getting pretty aggravated because . . . well, have you ever tried to use logic on a 5 year old?

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Silly Monkey Story: Say What?

Earlier this year, our daughter got a new baby doll that she just adored.  That Monday, when she returned to school, she could not wait to tell her teacher all about it.  When I went to pick the twins up that day, their teacher told me that Makenzie had told her all about her doll, but when she asked her what the doll's name was, she just could not understand what Makenzie said, even after she repeated it several times.

You see, I think our daughter is the only Bostonian whose accent is so strong that other Bostonians cannot always understand her.  I have no idea where she picked up such a strong accent, since my husband's and mine are only detectable when we say certain words.

Anyways, before I left with the twins, the teacher asked Makenzie one more time what she had named her doll so that I could hear it and try to decipher it for her.  I listened carefully and after a minute, I realized she was saying "Junior."  I had forgotten that she had mentioned to me that she named her doll that even though she had decided the doll was definitely a girl.  I remember thinking that I would never be able to explain to her why Junior was not a good name for a girl, so I let it go.  I just never dreamed she would be having a conversation about that very topic with some other poor unsuspecting person.

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My Photos: Easter Egg Hunt and More

I realize that a whole week has passed since Easter, but I just got around to editing my photos.  Below you will find a few of my favorites, but you can see more on my personal Facebook page.  The children had so much fun hunting Easter eggs, as they do every year.  This year, it was a little chilly outside (it even snowed for about 10 seconds), so the hunt took place indoors.

(There's also a token cat photo at the bottom too.)

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"You May Pet Me Now"

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Silly Monkey Story: A Sign of the Times

Last month, I took our 5 year old son to be screened for speech because we have trouble understanding him at times.  The whole session took about an hour and a half.  Most of the session was our son interacting with the speech therapist verbally with a little bit of pointing mixed in.

One of the activities had to do with our son completing a sentence started by the therapist based on an illustration.  Another was just his naming what was in the picture.  During such an activity, the therapist showed our son an illustration similar to the one below and asked him what the object was.  Of course, his answer was . . .

. . . "a phone".

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My Photos: W/E 3-31-12

We have had quite a busy week last week with catching up on everything after recovering from the flu and having our family HOP viewing party.  We also colored some Easter eggs, but I'm saving those photos for Easter Sunday.

Speaking of Easter, I think I have eaten so many Whoppers Malted Robins Eggs that I'm sure to have several new cavities soon.  Not only did I finish that big potful from the party (with a little help from the children), I went out and bought more.  I have no willpower!  Help!!

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"It's Party Time!"

"A Case of the Sillies"

"Can You Roll Your Tongue?"

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Silly Monkey Stories: A Phone Call from Teacher

Last week's was the first Silly Monkey Story I've missed in four years!  The reason why I had to skip posting one was because the whole family got hit with the flu.  To keep with the theme, this week's story will be a flu-related one . . .

I was at A.C. Moore last Monday picking up some yarn for my oldest son's school project when my phone rang.  I saw that it was the preschool, so I was immediately concerned.  It turned out to be one of the twins' teachers and she explained to me that our son Luke had thrown up quite a bit.  When I asked about whether he was a mess and if the clothes in his emergency stash was sufficient, she gave me the most puzzling reply.  She said that Luke was currently wearing his underpants and another pair of underpants that look like boxer shorts over those as shorts.  Well, this raised some questions in my head, such as . . .

"What happened to the pants I sent in for his emergency clothing?"

"I know I didn't put boxers with his emergency clothes, so is my son wearing some other child's boxer shorts?"

"Is my son going to be in therapy until he's 30 because he's walking around school wearing some other child's boxers as shorts?"

Anyways, I rushed over to the school and brought in a pair of pants from the car sickness kit I kept in the car.  When I got there, Luke was wearing pants.  It turns out that, when Luke had gotten dressed that morning, he had forgotten to take off his short jammie bottoms.  So, he put on his long pants over his short pajama pants which were over his underpants.  What a confusing morning!  I suppose in the end, I was just glad that he wasn't wearing someone else's underpants.

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My Photos (W/E 3-24-12)

For a few days last week, we had unseasonably warm weather for Massachusetts.  The temperatures hit 80 degrees at one point and now we're back to 40s and 50s.  Luckily, we were able to spend some extra time outdoors before the climate went back to normal.

Here are some photos of the children enjoying the balmy weather and being able to play outside without having to wear coats.  The first photo was taken by my husband.

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"Brotherly Love"

"Sweetness"

"Hide and Seek"

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