We're still alive over here!  I'm not even sure what happened to us in the past two months.  Although the past few weeks would have me believing we were just buried under snow.

Let's recap since I'm feeling unproductive today and maybe I'll realize we've all actually accomplished something these past few weeks.

Oh, yeah, we went to Cabo San Lucas where Sweet Z had to be reacquainted with an outside world that didn't involve protective wind gear.

And Little R kissed a dolphin!  She also danced with him which was, by far, the highlight of her life to date.

We tried to teach the kids to swim but they were too weighed down by their Duggar inspired swim attire to make any real progress.

We also scared Little R with statues of sombrero wearing men.

Then, we went home to a snowstorm and ate candy for breakfast.  Sweet Z is still wondering where his bunny is.

But the best news is that Little R is officially potty trained!  This should really be a separate post as I have lots of thoughts on what it was to potty train a two year old.  I was totally psyched out by the overabundance of advice and horror stories I found on the internet.  Truth was, once we set our minds to it and made sure not to back track or give up it all worked out in a few weeks.  Nowadays Little R is running around in Cinderella underpants and going to the bathroom like a big kid.  Such a huge relief!

This is a strategically shot photo that only gives the viewer the illusion that Sweet Z can move himself forward.

Sweet Z has not learned to crawl despite the fact that he rocks on his hands and knees and then throws himself forward a mere 1300 times a day.  Little R never crawled and it never mattered much to me whether she did or not but Sweet Z needs to get a move on here because I don't know how much longer I can stand putting him back in a sitting position just to see him launch himself onto his face five seconds later.

Photo taken just three days ago.  Yes, in Mid-April.

Lastly, we have been stuck in the snow.  All spring.  I have a pretty reasonable tolerance for winter weather but this has gone beyond the bounds of anything I am equipped to handle.  Today is the first day in at least 6 months that I can say we may be able to honestly tell ourselves that the snow will disappear for the season.  The City of Fargo officials must agree with me since they are predicting a May 1st crest of 38-41 feet and are currently begging for everyone to make half a million more sandbags.  We don't live in the flood plain right now.  Let's hope a record flood doesn't change that!

Overreaching

Sweet Z doesn't roll and he doesn't like tummy time but he will go to great lengths to reach whatever he is after.  Maybe it means he'll be a crawler?

2 in 3

There are times when having two kids under three seems like it may have been a bit of an ambitious idea.  Sometimes it seems like there is only screaming and toy stealing.  Not to mention endless clothes changing and the daunting task of strapping everyone into carseats in their winter clothes in the subzero temps.  I realize it is an ordinary complaint.  Many people have two kids in three years.  It isn't anything remarkable.  Still, there are days when I wonder how everyone else is doing it.


Then, there are days like this where I realize that the kids are going to be just fine and maybe even occupy each other once in awhile.

Is this playing together or is Sweet Z just super tolerant of having buckets strapped on his head?

There's no doubt about it dogs can be gross at times.  They do all sorts of unspeakable things when you send them out the door to go to the bathroom.  They stick their heads where they don't belong and they eat things out of the garbage.  Well, at least CleverDog does these things.  And I can't lie, as she gets older, she stinks.

But she is also the sweetest companion.  She has adapted to having two kids in her house so well.  She lays on the floor with them and allows for their sometimes less than completely gentle hugs.  She even comes back for more.  It was 8 years before CleverDog had to accept all of these changes in her peaceful existence but she did so gracefully.

People often ask us what type of dog she is.  We always joke that she is part cat, part bat, part pain in the neck.  Truthfully, we have no idea exactly what she is and it is a shame because we will never find another dog like her whether or not we know what breed she is.

And there must be something about a boy and his dog because Sweet Z and CleverDog hang out together all the time.  

Is there a trend here?  Maybe CleverDog just wants to hang out on the soft blankets in the danger free not carpeted potty zone.

Love

Blizzard Sunday

Although it isn't as flashy as when it happens where people actually live we are having a blizzard here today.  Since we were going to be trapped in the house anyway Big R and Little R decided it was a good time to catch whatever black lung type illness that has been plaguing Sweet Z all week.

Little R poses in one of her mitts in front of our windows that have been almost completely covered in blowing snow.

Since Sweet Z is feeling better he is enjoying some quality time with CleverDog who is wondering why we took away the carpet from the room. 

Little R is also spending quality time with Clever Dog but her time is more of the trying to share the only soft spot in the room variety.

With all this downtime thanks to the blizzard Sweet Z has had time to figure out the iPad.  He's almost as good as Big R is at Words with Friends!

Today's Faces

Child Transport

Finally, I think we have it figured out.  All of it!  No, really, we don't have much figured out at all, who am I kidding.  I do think we hav the solution to transporting the kids though.  Particularly for me when I'm alone with them.

When you only have one baby to take care of,  pretty much anything will work.  But two is a completely different story.

Little R and CleverDog used to do pretty well with the Graco stroller.

Of course, we also tried out the various carrying/baby wearing mechanisms out there.  The Baby Bjorn made our necks incredibly sore after just a few hours and Little R didn't look terribly comfortable either.

Little R is giving the camera the thumbs up because she thinks Big R and her are about to do a "buddy jump" 

into the canyon.

When Sweet Z was born I was afraid he was going to be as fussy a baby as Little R was so I tried to investigate baby wearing more thoroughly.  As it turned out he was perfectly content to lay wherever I put him so I never had to resort to wearing him around the house.  I did discover that the ring sling I had purchased actually is a lot more comfortable than the Baby Bjorn and I've used it on trips and for running through airports many times now.

Added bonus that I get to hug him all day long in this.  It also kept both of us warm in England when it was chilly.

Knowing we were going to have two kids under the age of 3 we also bought a double stroller.  I knew they were often problematic in their bulkiness but it seemed like I just had to deal with that since I was asking for something that would push two kids.  We ended up with the Graco Ready to Grow stroller.  It was a huge mistake.  It is so long and heavy that I never had any idea what I was running in to in the mall.  And if Little R was riding up front I couldn't see her at all.  

Don't be fooled by Little R's smile.  The seat barely fit even her little butt.

It wasn't until we were in England that we found there was a solution.  Lots of rain and bumpy sidewalks made us realize just what a pain it is to push our umbrella stroller and when we got stuck in a rainstorm we borrowed my sister-in-law's City Mini so we could use the rain shield.  Oh my gosh.  Once you push a stroller like that you can't go back.

I'm trying to sleep here, mom.  Do you think you could make the ride a little smoother?

Which is how we discovered the beauty of the jogging stroller.  Well, what I always called a jogging stroller.  I had always dismissed them since, well, I don't jog.  The last time I was running it was either between terminals at O'Hare or away from a wasp.  When we realized that there was a solution to our double problem as well with the Phil & Ted's we were smitten.

Testing out the Phil & Ted's last weekend.  Now I'm looking for excuses to bring the kids out and walk around.  Anyone want me to run errands for them?

Wish us well...

Despite our reservations we are giving it a shot and seeing if training Little R in training pants gets us anywhere.  Rolled up the carpet, of course.  This feels much like housebreaking a dog.

What we save on diapers will probably be made up for in paper towels and Clorox spray.

Fargo: Always a Surprise!

You would think that after almost four years of living in Fargo we would find there aren't many surprises left for us.  Think again, it seems, as Fargo seems to be a host to many strange phenomena.  Invariably most of these surprises are accompanied by extreme cold.

 Just this month, what we thought was another broken dishwasher turned out to be a frozen one.  After getting a repairman in to assess the problem we were told that our dishwasher was not broken at all.  Maybe our builder wasn't a Fargo native.  (No, he probably was.  What kind of outsider would move here?)  Perhaps he was just a bit lazy in his design then because it seems that having an appliance on an external wall can cause the pipes to freeze.  Even when the interior of the house is a balmy 72 degrees.

Don't tell Little R that the dishwasher wasn't broken after she scrubbed all those sippy cups for us!

This winter has been extra cold these past few weeks.  (Or as native Fargoans like to say "average.")  Which has led to the condensation on our windows to freeze.  This wouldn't be a problem if we could just stop breathing inside of our airtight house.  Since we can't seem to manage that we just get a thick layer of snow and ice on the inside windows that we have to chip and blow dry off if it bothers us.  That, or wait until spring when all of the windows will puddle.

Even Lola and Charlie are a bit nervous about the ice that is starting to form behind them.

Of course, there are some things that we've known for quite some time.  It didn't take long to figure out that the sunnier the day the colder it would become.  Nothing makes us happier than a grey, snowy day since it might mean that we can go outside without these expressions:

This must have been a particularly cold day since you can see we practically needed sunscreen it was so bright out.

Our Own Brand of Busy

I would say we've been busy lately but busy has a weird definition in a house with a toddler and an infant.  We have been busy:  trying to go potty in the bathroom, learning how to eat solids, and learning that every color isn't "red" but it isn't the kind of busy that sounds very exciting to people who actually leave their house on a daily basis.  Be that as it may, it is the kind of busy that creates a lot of laundry.

What we've been up to:

Little R has been busy suddenly looking older.  When did she turn into a kid instead of a toddler?

Sweet Z has been busy sorting through the toys we dump on his lap.  Now that he can sit up with some degree of confidence Big R and I have made the progressive parenting decision to sit him on the floor and surround him with as much stuff as possible in the hopes that he will be entertained for more than 5 minutes.

 Little R is not a climber and wasn't able to get onto our chairs or couches.  Until yesterday when I was doing the dishes after dinner and found her sitting here like this.  I guess she figured it out.  She couldn't look more smug about it, could she?

She has also been taking an active interest in taking care of her Naked Babies.  All of them.  This here is definitely a result of her watching us feed Sweet Z solids this week.

Sweet Z  has been busy trying to eat his own fist.  He'll figure out how to get the whole thing in his mouth by the end of the week, I'm sure.   Also, real men don't wear shirts.  Even in Fargo when the temperature hasn't entered the double digits in days.

Oh, and as mentioned above, Sweet Z has been eating solids.  They are usually received better than this, thankfully.  In fact he is eating his way through all of the Stage 1 foods with a real vigor which definitely assuages our fears that we are incapable of raising a child who eats vegetables.