Call Day #139, 4/4/13

The girls are always eager to see Oliver in the morning.  Oftentimes, that leads to arguing for the closest place next to him when he's on the floor or in his bouncy seat.  Frustrating, but at least they like him.  Eleanor likes holding him too. 

 I had a morning with a cup of tea, a book, and a sleeping Oliver.  Lovely!  All this courtesy of Ikea, where the girls spent some time playing at their child watch place which they love.

 Claire shows off all the coloring she did there.

 We ate lunch there.  In the past the girls have enjoyed watching a movie while they eat, but Eleanor lost that privilege.  She spent lunch time at a boring table with me not in the line of sight of the movie.

 While Claire got to watch and eat.  Hopefully it made an impact.

Eleanor learns to text.  Sending her first message, an "I lov you" to Daddy.

 Oliver is starting to smile!

 See how cute!

More holding Oliver, who seems to like her too (often smiling for her).

We got a birthday package from Mr. Tim!  Eleanor is saving her gift til her birthday but Claire got to open hers.  She LOVED the card, a cake to be decorated with stickers.  There were THREE of every decorations which she thought was great.  It's fun to be three!

 Look at her loving her new scissors!

A necklace too!  (Worn for the rest of the evening til bedtime.)

 Oliver is sleeping longer daytime stretches in his bed in our closet.  Probably only 30 min or so, but that's improvement.  Nice that he's not always sleeping on me.  I love the cuddles but need to not spend my whole day holding him when there are other kids to care for.

In his sleep sack which is over a swaddle (in case you were wondering where his arms were).  Keeps him warm in our cooler upstairs.

The end of the day involved a movie night which I hoped would be helpful in preventing arguments and kids bouncing off the walls.  It didn't really accomplish that.  Even on a good day, the hour (or two) right before bed gets crazy.  Especially when I'm learning how to handle the one parent to three kids ratio.  Well, many more call days to come to continue to get better at it, right?