Weekend Catchup

It's been a busy weekend at the Melder house. Our good friend, Melissa, came into town Saturday morning for a baby shower for Aunt Jen. I hosted the baby shower. Unknowingly, Doug got roped into childcaregiver for the afternoon. He had Benjamin (5 months), Tavin (10 months), Koen (3 years), Roman (4 years) and helped a little with Molly (7 years). Pretty impressive. Here are a few funny pictures at the beginning of the shower when Doug had some of the kids outside. The first one, he's holding down the fort, the second one he (and Koen) are responding to a surprise spit-up attack from Benjamin. Ha!
The shower was a blast. It was a pleasure to throw this party with Jen's other friends. Aunt Jen is such an amazing friend, it was great to get a chance to bless her back a little. I think it was a great success! Here are a few shots...

Koen, Tavin and I got to go out for lunch with "Miss" Melissa after church today. It was fun to have someone around all of Sunday since usually it is just the boys and I. Here are the boys at lunch. They were so well-behaved and it was a really enjoyable time out on the back patio of the Elbow Room, not to mention yummy food!

Koen and Tavin have really warmed up to Melissa. I laid both the boys down tonight with Doug out, so Koen got to watch a little show with Miss Melissa while I laid Tavin down. They are officially pals. =)

Tavin's Developing Play

It's amazing. The moment they figure out how to crawl, it all changes. Tavin get his hands on so much more now and he is interested in figuring it all out!

Here is a glimpse into some of his new abilities...Comin' at ya! Watch out, he's fast! We now setup a gate between Koen's room and the playroom so if Koen wants to set up a "job," Tavin can't come and crash it down.Ok, so he can't exactly get on the truck himself, but he loves being up there and sits up on it by himself playing with the steering wheel activities. One day we surprised Koen at the end of his nap by opening the door quietly and then pushing Tavin in on the truck by himself. Hilarious!
Playing with Big Brother's Play-Doh toys while Koen takes a nap...finally the fun stuff!Still of course, plenty of time for rolling around on the floor with Mommy having some loves and ticklefests. My productivity during the in-between between the boys' naps is quickly disintegrating as Tavin is into everything in my room and multi-tasking on the computer is quite interrupted. A quick pre-nap read, nothing like J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit" from Daddy's bookshelf.

The Zoo with Two

Today Koen, Tavin and I went to the Pittsburgh Zoo & Aquarium. Thanks, Aunt Abbie! She's gotten us a membership for Koen's birthday the past two years and it is such an awesome gift that keeps on giving!

It is a beautiful Fall day here. I've been looking forward to hours outside in the good, crisp Fall air. The boys are still dealing with runny noses, so I bundled them up really well for the outing. The sun was warm though and it was completely comfortable spending that much time outside.

We met our neighbor and some friends at the zoo with their kids. Koen's best bud, Delia, was there and they had such a good time pal-ing around the zoo.

You can barely see it in the above picture, but Delia and Koen are spotting the tiger lazily laying in the sun. Not the most exciting first stop, but they were quickly off to the next. But first, Koen had to stop at the Zoo Map to chart our course. He loves maps and planning - a perfect combo!

So after the map we passed the rhino, the lions, a construction site, gazelles, ostriches and then on to the elephants. One of our family favorites. Above is a picture of the two little buddies watching the huge beasts romp around. Koen saw the baby and said, "he is so cute!"

Koen and Delia were excited to see if they were as tall as the Baby Elephant, Zuri. Just about!
The orangutang was in a crazy mood today. It had a new toy and was pulling it apart. The kids were mesmerized! The gorillas were kind of slothful today, so we hiked up the hill past the bears and then got to the aquarium. The penguins, polar bears and seals are our favorite in that area.
On our way out of the zoo the kids spotted this large rubber ducky and we put them up there. Delia was singing a song and Koen was just watching his friend sing. So cute.

There were not that many people at the zoo which was a nice change from our summertime visits. The animals were really active and interesting today, I think they were enjoying a beautiful Pittsburgh Fall day too.

Koen and Tavin both did very well. Tavin took a short nap in the stroller, which was a perfect help. Then he pretty much listened, watched and sucked his thumb the rest of the time. Huxley was also a perfect little cherub, just hanging out in his stroller watching the older kids. Koen did a pretty good job with "listening and obeying." He walked a lot with Delia, but also rode in the carriage eating and eating and eating. Man that kid can eat!

The boys are napping and I'm blogging (although about to start working and then getting some house stuff done). Ahhh....

Moving Backwards

The last week or so have been very frustrating with Koen on many levels. He is really, really testing and trying us right now with his behavior. He had the croup issue. He is totally using toilet training as yet another way to try and push our buttons.

For about a week or two he's been calling us all the time to come up because he has to go to the bathroom (lots of times after we lay him down and then several times in the night). It's just ridiculous. He usually holds it 13 hours, so I know he can. He is totally doing it because he knows he can control us with this. So what should our approach be? We decided to only go up if he requested help twice, so we would know if he really had to go. This seemed to work well for a few nights as he would just go back to bed if we didn't come up and he wouldn't have an accident either. I totally understand if he wakes up in the middle of the night and needs to go once, we all have to do that, it's mostly the right after we lay him down stuff that bothers us, because you know he is just trying to get us to come back up, extend his lay down routine, etc. Anyways, after a few nights of seeming like we were "winning," Koen took it one step farther and started going in his pull-up and calling us after the fact (no warning that he had to go). This is really, really annoying! It's like we are back to square one. Previously, this was just a nighttime issue, but yesterday he did it in his underpants at naptime too and then called me after the fact. So frustrating! This morning he did it and so I took him downstairs and rinsed him off with cold water. He definitely didn't like that (thanks for the tip, Amie!). I'm hoping that maybe that annoying affair will make him think twice before going just to spite us. Any tips are welcome. I'm trying really hard to not let him see that this is annoying to me, but instead talk up the fact that he is a big boy now and I know he can hold it or tell me in time. So frustrating!

Koen "Playing" with Tavin

Recently, I've been able to see signs of what it will be like when the boys will be at ages where they can actually play together. It makes me happy to see them turning into playmates, however early a stage of that we are at. It will be so fun when they can entertain each other with imaginative play and I won't have to play a leading role so often (although I make a fabulous "Carlos, the School Bus Driver," I'm fine giving up some stage time). Anyways, Koen chased Tavin around crawling today and vice versa, very cute. Koen was a little hyper, but was enjoying the physical silly activity on the floor (he has no pants on because they got filthy outside...boys will be boys!).

Divide & Conquer

So, after the stressful all-together outing yesterday, Doug and I took a different approach today. Doug took Koen on a bike ride to Highland Park while I stayed at home with my sweet Tavington Bear. It was a huge success! Tavin only slept 40 mins., but was happy for awhile when he woke up. During his nap I got a bunch of annoying jobs done around the house. After a run-through shower, I got Tavin from his bed. It was so sweet, he was trying to comfort himself back to sleep, he was awake but sucking his thumb and curled up. It took him a few minutes to even realize I was rubbing his back he was so deep in his moaning and thumb-sucking. The sweetest thing! Anyways, Tavin and I had a refreshing, beautiful walk to the library and Whole Foods. When we got back, Doug and Koen were back and Doug had to get ready to go to work. I got the boys fed and myself (ravishing as usual!) and then we played upstairs for a little while. Here are a few pictures of my boys playing. I think it is so fun that Tavin is now more independent because of the crawling. While I read Koen books before nap, Tavin completely entertained himself. In general, he does really well playing independently which is so nice!

Koen slept in until 9am this morning, I'm reaping the consequences now. He didn't go to sleep for nap. The whole toilet-trained thing is so frustrating with naptime/bedtime. I never know if I should take his extra requests to go to the bathroom seriously or not. Today I answered 2 bathroom requests, which I think ruined my chances of him relaxing down into a nap. Oh well. He's playing with his trains up there happily for now. Hopefully it lasts and he doesn't wake his brother up with his enthusiastic story-telling play.

Getting Back to Normal

Koen slept so much between yesterday and last night that he woke up in good spirits today with lots and lots of energy. He and Doug started their morning making us all French Toast. Yum! Then Doug played with the boys in the living room and kept an eye on the guy changing the windshied out in our car. Koen was very interested in checking in on him through the window every few minutes. It was a nice morning distraction (not to mention we've had a crack going across half the windshield for months).

Koen (and I have to say Doug too) was quite proud of their creation this morning. In case you can't tell from the picture, it is a parade.

After the windshield was fixed, we took off as a family to run some errands. It came at a good time because both boys were running out of steam, so some "quiet" car time was helpful. We figured Tavin would nap in the car, but our car time was pretty short and I think he only slept about 10 mins. max the whole time we were out. Tavin is so easy-going though, he never got upset, he just chilled out sucking his thumb, cuddling his blanket in his car seat through Target and Walmart. Koen, on the other hand, was a basket case. Just an absolute emotional roller coaster. It is so frustrating when that happens when we are all together. It makes Doug frustrated, it makes me edgy, it just takes a lot of the fun out of the family experience. We don't do a ton of stuff together as the four of us out and about and so Doug and I were really looking forward to this, but I don't know that we will do it again for awhile.

We had a pretty good time at lunch though, so that was nice. Koen held it together for most of that time. The distraction of food and coloring were key. Tavin, of course, ate like a champ and barely made a peep.

Both boys are sleeping well this afternoon. I needed the break. Doug is off to work for the rest of the day/night, so I needed some down time before being on my own tonight with the unpredictable Koen. I wish I knew what to do to make him less frustrating. Is it his age? Is it the way we treat him? Are we instigating it or causing it? Will it go away? Some days I feel like he is going to be a very difficult child/person for a long time, and then other times I'm encouraged that he will be OK after he grows out of it and learns in this teachable time.