No rest for the weary

So I thought I'd last posted about a week ago...turns out it's been over a month! There's not a lot of time for things these days. Nathan and Abigail are still the most amazing children, and John and I are constantly talking about how blessed we are. But the fact remains...2 kids under 2 is tough!

It wouldn't be so hard if there were any breaks. But when one baby is fine, the other one invariably needs something. And they seem to have perfected this tag-team bit. If it's Nathan's nap time, somehow Abigail is either needing to eat or super alert and wanting to play. If Abigail's sleeping, Nathan wants to play. If John and I are sleeping, you can be sure that someone is waking us up! Nights lately have played out this way...Nathan and Abigail are both down by 8pm (usually closer to 7 for Abby). We try to get to bed by 10. Sometime between 2-3am, Nathan wakes up and comes in crying. Either John or I will walk him back to his room and sleep on the floor (John has been a saint this week and has taken most of this duty). If I'm sleeping on his floor, then I sleep with one ear listening for Abigail who usually wakes to eat around 4am. If I let her stir too long, she ends up waking Nathan and then everyone's up!

OK, that's all the "whining" I'm going to do right now. I'm very tired these days and somehow there's not a lot of time for sleeping or when I am asleep, somebody wakes me up too soon. There...I'm done.

Aside from being tired, life is pretty grand. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving in Sacramento. The kids and I spent the week with my Grandma who was staying at my mom's. She had a blast playing with Nathan and loving on Abigail, and I had a blast visiting with her and watching her love on my kids. We got to see friends and family for Thanksgiving and Nathan had a great time playing with cousins and friends. After Thanksgiving, we met my dad and Paula in San Francisco for an overnight excursion to the auto show and some kid-friendly fun. They hadn't seen the kids in awhile, so it was really nice for Nathan and Abigail to see them. We rode the carousel at Yerba Buena Garden, had lunch at Bloomie's food court, walked through China Town, saw the Christmas tree at Union Square, and of course, toured the auto show. Nathan ran squealing from car to car, climbing in and test driving them. Cute! Both kids did great despite being out of their element and having their routines slightly tweaked. Abigail is very go-with-the-flow. She napped in the stroller when she was tired and was otherwise her happy self.

And now we're getting ready for Christmas. The cards are done...I just have to address them and mail them out. My shopping is mostly done...just a handful of people left. John is off to the U.K. again next week, so the kids and I will go to Sac for a few days. I "can" be the single parent but I was totally wiped out last time and am taking advantage of help this time. When he gets back, we'll put up our tree and then the fun will begin. Nathan is fascinated by Christmas tress right now...everywhere we see one, he "talks" up a storm about it. So cute!