I really need to post about the weekend, too, but let me get this one out of the way first…

19 months old…woah.

So, what are they up to now?

My monkeys. They were not in good moods last night, when we took this. Except Oliver, briefly. But I got the picture. I’ve decided the summer pictures will be on this curb outside my friends’ pizza place, since we did their 18 month pic there. Might as well make it look purposeful.

What are my boys doing now? I feel like I haven’t done a proper monthly update in a while…

They’re:
– talking more. Words include:
bye bye
mama
dada
cat
ball
cracker
quack
moo
baa
and various other animal sounds like:
elephant (including miming of trunk)
wolf
snake
bear

– they understand more things, like body parts, clothing, people, characters, animals, etc.
– they’re signing a little, but i’m still not sure they know what the words mean, and how to use them to ask for things. but they know more, milk, and eat.
– linus can climb on the couch now
– they’re quite adept at going upstairs, but not yet down. need to work on that.
– linus is obsessed with yo gabba gabba, because he was getting to watch it while getting his twice-daily nebulizer treatments. now that the doctor put him on one a day instead, he gets VERY angry at night because he doesn’t get “gabba gabba gabba” in the evenings. ha!
– i’ve successfully gotten them hooked on elmo. it’s so freaking cute when they say “elmo”. it literally only took them a day or two to pick him out and start saying “elmo”. yeesh!
– they try to help me put on their shoes and buckle their carseats and things like that. it’ll be exceptionally awesome when they can actually do those things!

So this is really a challenging age. It’s fun, no doubt, but MAN. The tantrums. The fights over toys. The whining. The running-in-three-directions. But I know it’ll get easier when their communication improves. And the cuteness really does help. I taught Miles how to do Eskimo kisses the other day, and that, I swear, makes everything okay.

Here’s what happens when someone (in this example, Oliver, in orange) wants something (like this Sesame Street book) that someone else (Miles, in blue) has. Screaming and tears ensue. Just be glad this isn’t a video.

And I shall leave you with a completely irrelevant but cute video from Friday, when my friend took the boys and her daughter, Millie, to the children’s museum. It’s mostly cute how Millie says “Miles”, but also I love the little maze of “rooms” they have, and I think it’s funny how all three boys look in one.

The boys are 17 months old today. How did the time go by so fast? No idea. Next month they’ll be 18 months old. Only a month older, but it seems like such a big milestone. Crikey.

Now, onto a recap of the weekend. Friday afternoon, while we’re getting ready to put the boys to bed, my friend Alicia calls. She’s the one with the quad girls who share a bday with the boys. She has two free tickets to the Zoo-to-do, a really fancy fundraiser at the zoo here. I think the tickets are $150 each or something. Free food, free booze, and it’s a lovely evening, so I agree. Even though it means I have to shave my legs for the first time in god knows how long.

I get dressed, go to her house, and we head to the zoo. Oh man! It was amazing. Tons of restaurants (I mean, maybe 100? or more?) had stations set up around the zoo with food and drinks. The good stuff, too. Alicia’s husband is the executive chef at the Ritz-Carlton here, and he was there at the Ritz’s table, so he got us the tickets. We ate our way around the zoo, and I had a few fancy drinks. (Alicia’s pregnant with her fifth girl, so I had to drink for three. I kid. Sorta.)

Anyway, even though I was tired and still slightly sick from my cold, I had a great time. That was fun.

Not fun was not sleeping well that night, having babies crying all.night.long, and getting up early on Saturday with them. Alas.

Saturday was okay. Nothing terribly exciting. After the boys took their morning nap, we took them to the park to run around. But it was hot and sunny and there are stinging caterpillars everywhere at this time of year, and they were cranky, cranky, cranky. So that was kind of a bust. Went home, put them down for a nap, and they wouldn’t sleep, even though they were exhausted. Miles just screamed. I went and got him after about 10 minutes, and the front of his shirt was soaked from tears and drool. (Did I mention they’re getting what appears to be all four molars at once? I just loooooooooove having identical triplets who get all their teeth simultaneously!!!!!!! Nooooo I’m not being sarcastic who meeeee??)

So we said, screw the nap, and went for a walk. They had fun running around outside at our friend’s pizza place, but there were still plenty of random tears. Sigh. Went home, put them to bed. Linus wouldn’t sleep. He was inconsolable. Finally, for the first time ever (maybe, I think), I rocked him to sleep. Okay, not rocked, but he went to sleep on me, and I put him to bed. This is what one misses out on by having triplets.

Oh yeah, I also trimmed the back of their hair. I did an okay job. At least it doesn’t look as scraggly now.

After they went to bed, I went grocery shopping. Man, I was just beat.

Had some crying babies again that night, so no good sleep for mama and daddy, either.

Sunday, the morning was fine. I made pancakes with applesauce and cinnamon in them, and the boys ate them up. I also gave them yogurt with blueberries, and I let them go to town with their spoons. It was a mess. After their nap, we walked to our friend’s pizza place (yes, again), and had “breakfast”. Really, it’s breakfast food at lunchtime. Lots of friends were there, and the boys had fun playing and eating lunch. We weren’t sure what to do for the rest of the day, and some of them were heading to an air show at a Navy base nearby, so we decided to take the boys.

Even though we literally parked at one end of a runway and had to walk the entire length of it (pulling the wagon) to get to the air show (and back) and the boys were terrified by the loud airplanes, and I didn’t have earplugs for anyone…it was pretty fun. At least we weren’t going stir-crazy inside the house.

Last night’s sleep was punctuated by more Linus crying. And of course, when I went in their room this morning to change them, Oliver and Miles (who slept fine) were crabby, and Linus was a little ray of freaking sunshine. Kids!

And now, some pictures!

We let them go in our room this morning. It’s normally off-limits. Can you tell they were excited?

We’re also teaching them how to go up the stairs. With us right behind, of course.

The wagon at the airshow with the sun umbrellas I got for it

At the park with Daddy

We saw a lot of this, this weekend. Sigh.

Cool dude with sunglasses

Last week at daycare, I dressed them alike one day. I never do that.