Everything feels good to me today. It’s Friday, the weather is pleasantly warm but not stupid hot, both of my kids slept past 6 a.m. this morning and I have an actual date with my husband tomorrow night. Yay!

Brayden is 15 months old today…wow. He’s out of the high chair now and instead sits in a booster seat at the table, which brings some new challenges, but it’s good to see him growing up. He now goes to sleep without too much help from us, which is AWESOME, and we haven’t had to get up at night with him for about two months (knock on wood). He can climb up on chairs, sofas and coffee tables now, so he can’t be left alone for a second. We have a large footstool on wheels that Brayden likes to push around, and the other day I noticed he was pushing it even with his brother sitting on it. Like I said, the kid is a tank. Justin sometimes plays a bit rough with Brayden and he will definitely pay for that someday — Brayden’s going to be able to kick all our asses.

Justin is still a big-time bookworm and will recite his favorite stories at random points during the day. I don’t know why he bothers bringing me the books to read when we could both just close our eyes and tell the stories anyway. Brayden completely ignores us while we’re reading and stays busy playing with trucks and balls. It’s odd: Brayden spends a lot of time pawing through books and looking at the pictures, but heaven help you if you try to sit him in your lap and read. He wants no part of that, unless it’s bedtime. To each his own, I guess.

July has so far been a pretty good month for enjoying the sun and catching up with old friends — exactly what summer should be. We were at a friend’s BBQ the other night where there were five kids under the age of four, and it was good to see them all playing together and running around. When Justin was a baby it was next to impossible to find kids his age for him to hang out with, but I’ve finally developed a circle of mommy friends whose kids can play with mine. Awesome.

I’m also very excited to see that Brayden is FINALLY learning how to put himself to sleep. He was a perfect sleeper for the first six months or so of his life, but since then we’ve had to rock him to get him to settle, which usually only takes a few minutes but can sometimes take an hour or more. But last night his dad rocked him for a while, then just tucked him in and left…and the little guy actually went to sleep. We never had this problem with Justin (although he did get up at 5:15 this morning, which didn’t impress me too much), but of course every kid is different, and you just have to go with the flow.

We’re at the start of what promises to be an extended heatwave, with temperatures in the mid-30s, so summer has officially arrived in the Okanagan. It’s way too hot to take the kids for a walk after supper, so we’ve been letting them just run around and play with water in the backyard (which gets plenty of shade in the evenings, thanks to the mountain right behind our house). That actually works out better anyway: Brayden can use up some energy instead of being strapped down in the stroller. He’s had better bedtimes since we started this, so we’ll definitely keep it up.

It’s amazing to me to see the size gap closing between our boys. At 14 months, Brayden already wears a size two (as in meant for a two-year-old) and is only about eight pounds lighter than his older brother. We call him a tank — he’s going to be one solid kid. He’s way more adventurous than Justin and has absolutely no fear, so keeping him out of trouble is a full-time job. We foresee many trips to the emergency room with this one.

Justin has always been tall and thin, but the best word to describe him these days is gangly. There’s not an ounce of fat on him anywhere. He’s currently obsessed with basketball hoops and loves to point out every single one in the area — you wouldn’t believe how much we used to walk around the neighborhood before the heat hit. But he still loves his books and is content to play by himself for long periods, which is very handy when I’m busy keeping Brayden from maiming himself.

We haven’t had to get up in the night with Brayden for almost a month now (knock on wood) and even though we still have some pretty early mornings, we do occasionally get to sleep past 6 a.m. There have been a few evenings lately when Brayden just wasn’t tired when it was time for bed, and he ended up staying up a bit later than we’d like, but since the whole burn-energy-in-the-evening campaign things have improved along those lines. So the sleep thing is going relatively well. And like I’ve always said, you can handle almost anything if you can get enough sleep.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been out of the workforce for a few years, or maybe it’s because I’m not a particularly ambitious person, but I’m always surprised when I hear about people my own age who are senior accountants or who are running their own law firms. I mean, granted, I’m not 22 anymore, but in some ways I still feel like a kid fresh out of college with no experience and no idea where to start. Is this just a classic sign of age? The disbelief that my peers could be running the show? I have trouble with the idea that we’re in charge now.

I’m technically in charge of my kids, but that doesn’t always go so well. For the past week both boys have been getting up at precisely 5:20 a.m. and the early mornings are really starting to get to me. We did have a bit of luck this morning: when I heard Justin get up I stood outside his locked door and told him it was too early to get up, so he could color or look at his books in his room — and he actually stayed quiet until 6. It was only a half-victory, though, cause Brayden demanded out of his crib the instant he was awake. But even that has a bit of a silver lining: when Brayden gets up that early, he at least has a nap in the morning. And they’re both sleeping through the night, so things could be lots worse. I just really resent having to get out of bed before 6 a.m. Sigh.

It was finally nice enough this past weekend to take the kids to the waterpark. I was pleased to see how much more independent both boys are this year — last summer was pretty labor-intensive, with a two-year-old who needed constant monitoring and a newborn who had to be held all the time. This year we could more or less just let ‘em run, and they seemed to have a blast. Justin was mighty proud for going down the waterslide all by himself, and Brayden’s favorite activity seemed to be sitting in a puddle splashing his arms and trying to catch some water drops on his tongue. Very cute.

When my first child was born I of course wanted to document everything about his life, so I made a scrapbook celebrating the wonder that was Justin. I even made similar scrapbooks for both sets of grandparents so they could share in the joy. I also started this blog as a way of sharing all my baby details with the wider world.

So when Brayden came along, I swore to myself that he would get equal billing. Justin’s baby scrapbook covered his first year, so I was determined to do the same for Brayden — and lo and behold, I finished his scrapbook a few days ago. The two books are even the same length, so you can’t even say I cut corners with the second child. It was harder to get inspired and much, much harder to find the time, but both of my sons now have scrapbooks for the first year of their lives. I asked Chris if he thought the boys would appreciate these books someday, thinking I’d get the standard “oh I’m sure they’ll love them” comment. Instead, he thought for a second and said: “Well, their wives or girlfriends might.” Sigh.

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.