I wonder how many other moms had the same Mother’s Day wish I had: to be LEFT ALONE for a few hours. (I know my own mom had the same wish, and she got it, which made her whole week.) I love my family, of course, and being a mom is far and away the most meaningful, soul-fulfilling thing I have ever done…but I do it 24/7, and a break is always welcome. Chris and the kids gave me some very nice presents, but the number one gift I got was when Chris offered to take the boys over to his parents’ place for supper, leaving me the house to myself. I sat here with a Big Mac, a Pepsi and the TV remote…ah, bliss.

I feel like I’ve been focusing too much on the negative lately, so here’s a random list of some of the good things in my life these days:

1. After spending thousands of dollars on landscaping and yard maintenance, our lawn is finally turning green.
2. I found time to jog on the treadmill today.
3. Brayden is having better nights lately so I have more energy.
4. Justin slept until 5:45 this morning. For three or four straight days he was wide awake at 5:30, so this really is good news.
5. Brayden is unbelievably cute in shorts.
6. I only have two more rooms to paint in the house.
7. I’m not cooped up in a windowless cubicle trying to look busy.
8. I can still fit into my old clothes despite the abundance of lifeless skin on my abdomen.
9. It’s been 10 years since I finished college (gulp) and the friends I made there are still some of the best friends I have.
10. I didn’t have to do any laundry today.

Justin started a kick ‘n’ run soccer program last week and while he had a bit of a rocky beginning (he’s shy and didn’t really want to participate at first), he’s more into it now. It’s always tough starting him in new things cause he’s not really comfortable unless he knows exactly what to expect — but he gets that from me, so I totally understand. The program seems a little too structured for a three-year-old, but maybe that’s just me making excuses. We’ll see how it goes.

We had a whole crowd of family visiting us a little while ago. My parents were here for two weeks and my brothers popped in for a much shorter time (Rob and Janette flew out from Saskatoon to spend exactly 24 hours here). It was a treat to have everybody here, since that was the one day this entire year that we were all together (it’ll be a smaller crowd at Christmas). It actually felt a bit like Christmas, since that was also the one day this entire spring that it snowed all day. The kids had lots of fun with the relatives but Brayden had some truly terrible nights while people were here — which explains why Grandma and Grandpa were too chicken to sleep in the house and instead escaped to their RV in the driveway. Things have settled down since everybody left, though, so here’s hoping that trend continues.

I’m three days late with this post (hey, he’s the second child — he’ll get used to it) but I finally have a chance to write about Brayden’s first birthday. His Kingwell grandparents were here, along with Uncle Dave, so there were lots of people showering attention on him. I think Justin was more plugged into the whole birthday thing than his brother was, but the little guy still seemed to have a good time. The cupcake was probably the highlight of his whole day. Good stuff.

I’m starting to wonder if Brayden will ever consistently sleep through the night. That kid has caused us more sleepless nights in the last six months than Justin has in his entire life. You could argue that he’s teething, or maybe having tummy pains, but that doesn’t make it any easier. The silver lining here is that Justin never seems to hear a thing, so he snoozes soundly all night (but wakes up at 6:00 raring to go…which sucks when we only get Brayden back to sleep at 5:30).

In other news…Brayden is walking fairly well now, so the potential for mischief has increased tenfold. I’m glad he’s growing up, but I kinda wish we could go back to the days when he was immobile. He can escape from his little bouncy chair, he screams bloody murder when you put him in the playpen and I can’t figure out how I’m going to contain him when I need to do things like step outside to barbecue. Sigh. But c’est la vie, I guess.

Apparently the napping era is not quite over yet. Justin went exactly one day without a nap but has zonked out for a couple hours every afternoon since, so all’s well. I don’t take it for granted anymore, though, which I suppose is a good thing. We finally borrowed a trick from a friend of ours and turned Justin’s doorknob around so that it locks from the outside — that way we can confine him to his room at night. He still gets up at odd hours occasionally and we have to go deal with him, but at least we don’t get surprised by him crawling into bed with us at 3 a.m.

In Brayden news: he gave up the bottle this week and switched from formula to milk. He’s already taken his first steps and we expect him to really be walking any day now — yippee. I mean yes, that’s great, but he already gets into trouble every eight seconds or so and I don’t want to imagine what he’ll be into once he’s vertical full time. But at least it’ll mean I won’t have to carry him around everywhere.

I didn’t want to believe it at first, and I tried everything I could think of to keep it from happening, but finally I had to accept it: Justin no longer needs a nap. And if you force him to have one, it will significantly mess with his overnight snooze. For a long time I was blessed because both boys would go down for a nap at the same time, giving me a couple hours to myself in the middle of the day, but that’s all over now. Today was the first time we didn’t try to get him to nap, and he didn’t so much as yawn the entire day, so clearly he doesn’t need a siesta. Too bad I do. We’ll see how things play out.

Our firstborn is three years old today! The birthday party went pretty smoothly yesterday, even though Chris and I were exhausted from a difficult night. Some friends of ours brought their two little boys over to play and the kids all seemed to have a blast running around the backyard. Justin got a soccer net from his Kingwell grandparents, and his method of playing soccer was to pick up the ball, place it inside the net and then give it a little tap with his foot. Then he’d clap and be all proud of himself. OK, so maybe he’s not a future Pele in the making, but he had fun.

He also loves his new bed (especially the drawers underneath — he finds it cool that he can keep his books in there) and Sesame Street comforter, courtesy of Grandma Lee. It took a bit of effort to get him to sleep last night, but he drifted off around 8:30 and we didn’t hear a peep from him again until almost 7:00 this morning, which was AWESOME.

Happy birthday buddy!

I always get annoyed when I hear other moms complain about their kids getting up early and then find out that “early” is 7:30 a.m. These days I’m happy if Justin makes it to 6:00 (which he didn’t this morning…he came into our room at 5:20 wide awake). And it’s not like he goes to bed especially early or makes up for it with a longer afternoon nap. I’m not yet ready to consider making him give up the nap in favor of a longer overnight snooze, but I’m hoping to train him to stay in his room until 6. I seem to recall my own parents telling me I couldn’t get out of bed until the numbers on my clock said 6-3-0, so I’m not the first parent to try this technique. We’ll see how it goes. Of course, if he decides to spend the extra time belting out the alphabet song, we really won’t be any further ahead. Sigh.

Now that the snow is pretty well gone (but not the slush — a crowd of ducks was actually swimming on the local tennis court yesterday), I decided to put away the heavy coats and switch to lighter fare. Justin has a snazzy new spring jacket that comes complete with an inside pocket for a cell phone. I don’t get the apparel industry: maternity clothes don’t need pockets but a three-year-old needs cell phone storage?

Spring is here, the family’s healthy and I have somehow managed to get out of baby duty for the past couple nights (I have an awesome husband), so life is good. We’re busy planning for Justin’s birthday — it’s hard to believe he’s almost three! Everything I read says that a three-year-old will be tuned into his birthday and will want to invite his friends to a party, but Justin is a kid who really prefers to play with adults, so that makes things a little tricky. He’s stoked about having cake and ice cream, though, so I guess that’s something.

Since Brayden never stops moving, I thought he might walk sooner than his brother did, but that doesn’t look like it’ll be the case: he can cruise around holding on to furniture, but he generally prefers to crawl cause it’s faster. He might be content for months on all fours. And actually, “content” is a pretty good word for him. The guy is just always happy. Even Chris, who complains endlessly about having to get up in the middle of the night to find Brayden’s soother for him, came back to bed the other night smiling cause Brayden gave him a huge grin. I tell ya, the little guy is lucky he’s cute.