Knocking on our Wall

I may or may not have mentioned this when we moved into our new place. The external hallway lights are automatic. Come Shabbos, we are pretty much locked in to our 1200ish square feet. Normally it's not an issue. We have the balcony. Sometimes (read: basically every week) we don't even get dressed, just stay in our pjs and relax. Saturday night, our apartment usually looks like a hurricane hit. I try to follow behind the kids and clean as much as possible during the day, we like to use Saturday night as tv catch-up night.

Sometimes, it's a bit much for the kids and they start bouncing off the walls. Literally. Yesterday, Benny crawled into the pack n play and started jumping. By the time we got him to stop (didn't take very long) he had apparently, unbeknownst to us, pissed off our neighbor. A few minutes later, Bella went in to take a nap. Her crying must have taken the cake.

**BANG BANG BANG**

In almost six months of living here and never having an issue, on a Saturday afternoon, that is what brought our neighbor to get upset and slam his fists against the wall!

Of course, the banging on the wall freaked Bella out, who would have been asleep in seconds otherwise. She started screaming even more. Shuky said something like, "Can we help you sir???" through the wall. I hear him walk out of his room. Seconds later, he's at our door.

"Um. I'm not answering that one Shuky, he's all yours."

Shuky opens the door, ready for war. He explains to the guy that by knocking on the wall, she won't go to sleep any faster. He's here to complain about the two seconds of Benny jumping earlier. And to apologize for banging on the wall. Said he worked the night shift (not sure what he does but now I'm super curious!) and was exhausted and totally overreacted. We agreed to try to keep it down. He agreed to stop banging on the wall. Everyone went back to their respective beds.

I keep muttering to myself, "Two more years, two more years."

A Pinner's Life

Our computer is finally functioning properly again and I am truly enjoying it! Pinning away, getting my blog posts done in a timely fashion, being able to do an appropriate amount of stalking on Facebook. Sipping my tea, looking out at the cold, windy day from my warm living room. This is the life!

We won't talk about the suitcases that need unpacking/packing.

There's laundry to fold. At least it's clean, right?

Bella's third tooth keeps teasing up, popping up for a second and retreating.She is obviously not feeling so great because of that little, and seemingly crooked, tooth. She has a very low fever, has been pretty clingy, and wants to nurse all day long. Hopefully the tooth will make a full appearance and stick around for a while!!

I have to pick up Benny from school and I may just choose to veg all afternoon with the kids. Or I may actually get stuff done. Who knows. Thankfully, I'm getting my post done now so I don't  have to confess which route I choose!! ;)

Have a peaceful and relaxing weekend everyone!!

Fish Land

It rained this morning and there was a strong possibility that it would continue through the day. With that in mind, we planed a very low key day, going to a downtown area, one town over. Do some co-op shopping, maybe visit some other stores.
It didn't rain in the afternoon, so on the way back to Postville, we stopped at the fish hatchery, Fish Land, as Benny called it. The kids loved it! They have little feed machines so you can watch the swarms of rainbow trout devour the pellets. What an amazing sight! The water was murky so I dont think I got any great shots of it but we shall see how they came out when I get home tomorrow.
Afterward, we had a bbq with friends, the kids all really enjoyed running around in my dads enormous yard! :)
And now, im ready for the sun to set with my fully charged camera.

100 Miles

Sometimes certain things from your childhood stick out in your memory stronger than others. When I was about ten years old, my, family took a day trip up to the mountains. I don't remember much from the actual trip. What I do remember is my shock when I heard we would be driving 100 miles to get there. In one day. And then coming back!
Fast forward 16 years and I'm casually doing drives double and triple that on a regular basis.
I am currently in Postville with the kids. Visiting my father before we make our summer move. Giving Shuky a chance to study for finals in peace. Taking advantage of the gorgeous weather and being able to run around barefoot.
The air is different here. I love the smell of freshly mowed lawn. The windows are open and the birds are singing as we watch the same amazing sunset. Which is ten times more amazing over an open field than over a city landscape, by the way.
I definitely plan on putting my new camera to the test over the next few days. These are from my phone, but adorable nonetheless.

Clap Clap

Over the weekend, Shuky taught Benny a trick. Clap your hands two times and you can make someone fall asleep. Yell something funny and that person wakes up. Shuky was committed to his role. Mid-speech he would fall asleep. There was even some snoring involved.

This morning, Benny didn't want to get dressed right away. After my third time asking him to take his pjs off, he saw I was getting frustrated.
He smiled a sneaky smile and clapped twice.
I was still there, getting even more frustrated.
He tried again.
Still didn't work.
"Mommy!!!!! Why isn't it working!?!?"
Oh the beauty of freedom of creativity as a parent. "Benny, it doesn't work if Mommy or Tatty are asking you to do something!"

He is still a hypnotist but he got dressed and went to school. Another successful maneuver on my resume.

We're Back For a Few Seconds!

Blogger has changed its format so I've been avoiding coming out here. But, ultimately, I always come back!

Pesach was beautiful, lovely time with family, drama-free, fun with friends, amazing food, more than enough sun, peaceful, relaxing. I could keep going. I won't.

I'm going through my millions of pictures I took and will post some soon. For now, I give you my words!

The last few months have been pretty hectic around here, and in true 'Us Style', it won't be slowing down any time soon! We are currently in the midst of a storm known as Get-To-Kansas-City. My day is a plethora of to-do lists and organization. My brain will possibly suffer from spontaneous combustion. Only time will tell!

In reality, it's not that bad. There are tons of lists. If I could, I would hire a little elf to sit on my shoulder and remember things for me. I'm constantly remembering things to add to my list while doing something else from the list. By the time I get near my paper to jot it down, I completely blank on it. I slowly backtrack what I was doing until I find the spot where I had the random burst of memory juice flowing through my brain. Sometimes I  figure it out. Hopefully everything eventually makes it.

I do have more to write but I also have a bunch of things I'm ignoring to get this post done. Like look through the pictures from Pesach. Priorities folks!

Before I leave, I give you a few fun anecdotes.

After our beach day, Shuky and I came home slightly redder than when we left. A few days later, those sunburns started peeling. Benny was having a hard time going to sleep one night so I crawled into bed with him and he started rubbing my back, as he usually does. He stopped and yelled, "MOMMY!!!! Your back is plastic!!!"

We were driving somewhere and Benny goes, "What's a LUMOR???" The radio was on and Adele's song Rumor Has It was playing. We explained what a RUMOR is and he is now obsessed with the song. To the point where he recognizes the first note of the song and hears it and asks me to make it louder. And air-drums along with it. Perfectly.

We had many occasions where we got into little arguments with Benny about who's Ami it is - MyAmi or YourAmi!! He would not accept that the name of the city was just Miami.

The pictures are distracting me.

These kids are devastatingly cute sometimes!!

Just Breathe

When the kids have meltdowns, I often find myself making excuses for them. "He woke up so early this morning, he's obviously overtired!" "She missed her nap and didn't nurse long enough. Forgive her screeching!" I think the only excuse to be given is, "They are kids. It's what they do." And, as a parent, I feel like I shouldn't even have to explain it! With that thought in mind when picking Benny up today, his tantrum was much easier to deal with. He doesn't usually have tantrums anymore, although if you've been here for a while, you know he's no newb here! My mind was cycling through which excuse I should use. Granted, they may have been valid. Yes, he did get up super early. But who cares! He is three!! I was able to calmly deal with it. Yes, it took me about twenty minutes to successfully get him buckled in his car seat. And of course, by that time, Bella was crying as well. But I got her in too. The drive home was exciting. My music was loud, I put the windows down and enjoyed the scream-infused tunes. He knows not to unbuckle while we are driving so in his mind, the answer to that problem was, "Crash the car Mommy!! I need to get out of my seat!" We sat in the garage for about an hour, I wasn't about to drag him up to the fourth floor. I took advantage of the time and let Bella out as I cleaned the car. Eventually, he asked to go in the stroller and come eat lunch. Moral of the story: Breathe deeply and remember, they grow up eventually. And for those of you with older kids, I don't want to hear how it only gets harder. Have an easy day everyone!!

Hair Care

On Friday, the boys got their hair cuts for Pesach. We are a week early but there is too much going on this week to leave it to the last minute. We use Fantastic Sams in Ankeny, about 25 minutes away. We use a specific stylist there, Amanda, she's awesome with Benny and does a good job with the haircuts. Benny really loves her and she talks to him during the cut, as if he were any other client. It's adorable. I love hearing him tell her about what's going on in his life. He talks about school, his friends, our neighbors, anything he finds exciting.

The boy really knows how to enjoy the finer things in life. He gets a shampoo treatment from her. He sits back with his legs crossed at the ankles, closes his eyes, and melts away into the  bliss of the head massage.

He watches her every move in the mirror. Wants to be sure he will look good on the playground!

Right now, theres a fundraiser going on at the school and Benny is selling chocolate bars. Amanda is now two chocolate bars rickety. Unless shes anything like me, and she's now two pounds heavier!

Hope everyone's holiday preps are going smoothly, whichever holiday you may be heading into!

Prize Day

Lately, Benny has been having more behavior issues than normal. I have a feeling it is because Bella is now completely mobile and while he definitely loves her, that makes it difficult for him to rule the roost. But, it also seems like this may have all started even before she was walking. Although he could have been feeling threatened by just the crawling!

Before we went to Florida for the wedding, Shuky and I decided that enough was enough. Something needed to be done. The methods we were trying were obviously not working.  We looked online for a rewards chart and decided to order one from my friend's Etsy store. We were able to personalize it and made it something that would truly excite him each day.

Mission accomplished!

Every day, right before he crawls into bed, we have robot time. Some days he does amazing, others leave room for improvement. At the beginning of the week, we decide on the prize and all week long, he checks out how he's doing, trying to figure out if he will get his prize or not.

Sunday is prize day. At the crack of dawn, definitely before any humans should be conscious, we hear in the monitor, "It's Sunday guys!!! It's prize day!!!! Come count my robots!!!!!!" Then we hear the running towards our bedroom, the door flinging open and the same proclamation, ten times louder.

I would like to formally apologize to our downstairs neighbor. This week he won an indoor basketball game. I am going to lay the blame on my aunt Jordana. She sent our as a chanukah present. I hid it in our closet, hoping he would forget about it. No such luck. He has asked about once a week since unwrapping it! I'm figured the almost full chart this week deserved to be richly rewarded. So again, I'm extremely sorry Dear Downstairs Neighbor. We'll be gone in a few weeks so at least you'll get a quiet summer!!!