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February 07, 2010

Oh my GOD! That was CRAAAAZZZZYYY!!!

What a whirlwind of a day!  We dropped Lewis off early this morning at Bubbe's so Art, Ben and I could go run a race.  Art has some new "racing" shoes that look just like grown-up running shoes and we signed up for a race to try them out.  Art ran a 1/4 mile and then Ben and I ran a 5k while pushing Art in the bike trailer.  That was really hard to do considering we are out of shape, Art is very heavy in there and it was twenty some degrees.  It took us about 36 minutes to run three miles.  Ouch.  The race-walker was ahead of us.  The whole time.  Art was the last kid to finish the 1/4 mile since he wanted to put on an extra sweater mid race, stopped three times and almost didn't finish (I said, "You just have to run to that sign down there!" and he said, "I don't want to," but then he did).  He exclaimed to Ben at the finish, "I ran the whole time, Papa!"  I love how simple a four-year-old's sense of achievement is.

Anyway, while at Bubbe's Lewis took an early nap for about an hour, but he was awake by 11am and we felt pretty confident that he'd go down later for some more sleep.  And after the big morning we thought FOR SURE Art would snooze.  Well, neither did which made for a crazy afternoon of frantic, maniacal children and frazzled, burnt out parents.  When Art misses a nap there's always an hour or so of really manic talking and buzzing around between 4 and 5pm.  Today was no different.  These are the days I wish I had a nickel for every time I heard "Mama?"  He just gets really wired and moves from one activity to another, and everything he does requires (at least in his mind) an audience or adult participant.  It's exhausting to hear the constant requests to watch him do things and to remind him over and over that I am not going to watch him do everything.  And then to keep his overtired, manic body from injuring his brother or himself or driving me crazy.  It's a hard period.  Often ends in a major meltdown over a lego tower falling over or Lewis breaking his train track.  Man, oh man.  Today the cause of the major meltdown was Lewis hitting Art on the head with a toy hammer.  That must have hurt.

And Lewis was in the manic act, too, being short on sleep as well.  But his method of destruction is constant whining.  And I mean CONSTANT whining.  Oh my God.  That was awful!  The whining is bad and really draining but even worse is the screaming "Nooooooooooooooooooo!!!!" for every little misunderstanding or denial.  For example, let's say Lewis wants some water, as he did this afternoon in those sleep-drained hours.  I naturally got him a small, Lewis sized glass like I usually do, but he screamed "Nnoooooooo!!!!!" as if his fingernails were being pulled off (that's Ben's analogy) and practically threw the cup back at me.  He uttered something like "bug" and I finally lifted him up to the cabinet and realized he wanted a big cup.  Oh, God.  I'm trying to teach him to just say, "No, Mama" or something - ANYTHING - less freaky-outy, but this will be a slow process, I anticipate.  

At 4:30pm Ben and I were so desperate to get rid of these insane, sleep-deprived kids that we were willing to sacrifice a reasonable bedtime if they would just take a nap.  We tried to get them down even though it was very late, but it didn't work.  Probably for the best, since they were both in bed by 7:42, but we suffered those next couple hours.  Well, in all honesty it was pretty good for about 45 minutes while Art and Lewis were busy disassembling and playing in the boxes downstairs, but dinner got crazy again.  Lewis whining to be on my lap, Art wanting to then be on Ben's lap but squirming all over and then wanting to be on my lap but squirming all over.  I had to get out of there and left Lewis crying and screaming as I went upstairs to unwind for a few minutes.  

After Lewis took a bath while Art watched some nature show both boys did some more maniacal running around upstairs, wrestling and laughing and knocking each other over.  Art knocked Lewis over one too many times and Lewis got hurt, or at least upset.  Then it was both kids wanting me to read their books.  After I read to Art I went to Lewis and read him a book and he screamed about getting into bed.  Then I went back to Art and he decided he was going to get out of bed.  Oh, wait.  That's right.  Just as I was about to turn out his light he said he was hungry and wanted to finish his dinner.  WTF!!!!  Well, we obliged and he went back to bed after eating and asking questions and basically continuing his seemingly amphetamine-driven evening.  

Thank goodness they are asleep.  May they nap tomorrow!!!

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