I've created a monster!

Living in a house with Lilly is like living with a live hand grenade. We feed the kids then clean them up, and Lilly goes to bed between 7 and 8.

Once Cindy places the live explosive, which has a pressure sensor, temperature sensor, sound sensor and timer set for God knows what, we have a reading lesson with Violet. Then Violet, depending on her mood and our focus, gets to bed between 8 and 9.

It never fails that during the night sometime, Lilly wakes up, but where it gets tricky is that Violet also wakes up. Violet will have issues like her covers falling off, bunny hitting the floor, her "elephant water" being empty, she had to go potty, or she just wants to snuggle. In the mornings, when she wakes up, she would just fake cry until one of use went in and told her it was OK to get out of bed.

The other night, during one of these fake cry sessions at 5:30 a.m. Saturday morning -- when she wanted to get up. We had a long discussion (2 minutes tops) about how she was a big girl and could just get out of bed and take care of these things. If Violet's issue is something she can't take care of, come get one of us. In the morning she is more than welcome to waltz into our room and ask if she can snuggle or even get up. That's OK. Hey, Cindy and I have been married 13 years and get an average of 4 hours of sleep at night -- the magic is in a bottle in the attic. Our idea of the perfect date is going to the grocery store without the kids.

Anyway, the last couple of mornings, Violet walks in, jumps in bed with us, and we have a family snuggle time, and then get up and have breakfast.

Today, something different happened.

It started this afternoon, when Violet told me about the show I was watching on TV until midnight -- she was sitting in the hall watching it. No biggie, it was that new show Leverage and while it has a smattering of violence (nothing too graphic), it doesn't have bad language, so I am I not to worried about it. However, we had a little talk about how that wasn't a good idea.

Tonight, while I was in the bedroom watching Charlie Rose, Violet came out and bugged Cindy no fewer than 5 times with different issues -- in fact most of the ones listed above. While Violet is a big girl, she is also a "not wanting to go to bed" girl. But I suppose quietly walking out to talk with us is less likely to wake Lilly, so mission accomplished. I think.

I see my brother and I in my little girls and it makes me smile. I was the sneaky one that put on a good front and then pushed the boundaries, while my brother was the confrontational one. He would be openly defiant and pay the price. Violet is sneaky, Lilly is vocal, but too young to really know how she is going to act.

Speaking of Lilly, today we had a doctor appointment. Doc is pretty sure Lilly has, wait for it, heartburn. That's why she keeps waking up and eats just a little bit. I guess it's normal for kids at this age, so she gave us some medicine and everything should be fine.

In height, Lilly is in the 75% and in weight she is in the 25%, she comes in at 18 pounds, 7 ounces. We want to fatten her up -- that shouldn't be a problem in our family. :)

Oh, today was day two of my Coke and sugar detox. So far, no Cokes and I did have a hot chocolate and a Snickers bar today. The Snickers was late, because I didn't have dinner and was feeling the munchies and it was here. Now all the sugar, save hot chocolate, is out of the house.

There are organic chocolate bars, but they are like $10 each so I never eat them. They sit up in the cupboard like gold bar investments.

Anyway, that's all there is to report today.

The above video was just a left over one from before the holidays. Two days until we go back to the grind. Crud. At least Monday during the day I will have the girls to myself. :) I think more movie time is in order.

Pat

PS: Elephant water is water in a elephant-shaped water bottle we go at the Oregon Zoo. She loves it. She also got a elephant had with a trunk, ears, eyes, basically a fake elephant head on her head -- she doesn't sleep with that on though. :)
Oh, and the reason I am up until Midnight (it was actually 1:30 a.m.) is that my head is killing me. No really. The caffeine withdrawl is a nightmare this time. Ouch -- in fact -- that's why I'm up now. I am drinking my weight in water (basically the bathtub) trying to get through this. Hopefully by Monday things will get better.