Funny thing that happened today. Let my preface by saying that Spencer's tantrums have tripled in intensity in the last three days. He's also been drooling a bunch. Earlier today I asked him if he wanted Tylenol and he said yes. That's a first. Anyway, we are sitting at dinner and I put a piece of his roll on his plate. I put the rest away because I knew he'd eat the whole think and then be full. He asked for another piece, actually saying 'more bread'. Coolness, he gets more. Then he wants more. I told him that it was great he was using his words, but he needed to eat a bit of his food before he had more bread. Begin tantrum. He's staring at me like I'm withholding oxygen or something. After about a minute (which seemed like an hour) I scooped some food on his fork and handed to him. No dice. So as he's wailing, but facing slightly away, I slipped the forkful of food in his mouth. Oh, you mean this stuff? This stuff is good! So I gave him a piece of the bread, because he took a bite of food. Then we repeat the entire scenario, but at about one tenth the scale. Then he eats all of his food and gets the last of the bread. Crazy child.

Rachel is trying to pull up on anything. She succeeded a couple times. She's starting to move right and left too. She crawled a few inches again as well.

Spencer said computer and where car and more bread. I am so happy I could just float right up to heaven.

Mike was in a mood though. It was like the old Mike was back. He just wanted quiet and well, that's not going to happen with an almost two year old and an 8 month old. He left midday to go see Cloverfield. Came back in a good mood, but it disappeared fast. Bummer. I told him that the difference was that last weekend he was part of the playing, so the noise was part of his activities too. This weekend he was not, so it was just noise. And to be fair, Spencer had the annoying remote control car, Pat Pat Rocket, and the ball popper on all at once. I can tune it out. I have to or I'd be insane by now. He is taking a four day weekend this weekend. I hope it goes well.

There was a 'checklist' of sorts on the bbc boards and I was so pleased to see that Spencer did pretty much everything his peers are doing. The exception being the things involving speech. It's really hard for me when I see posts about one kid singing his abc's or counting to 10. I'm happy for that child, but my gut clenches and I have to recite 'he's fine' about 50 times to calm myself down. Someone else posted a thread about the kids who aren't talking much and there seemed to be as many non-talkers as abc singers. My point is though, that in every other respect, he's good to go. He was jumping with both feet in his crib the other day. I know I should have told him to stop, but I was so happy I didn't. And we were working on jumping off of the foam blocks tonight. He jumped up with one foot then the other (like hop-skip) and I pulled the block so he landed on the floor. He loved it. Oh, and he put Leo in the tub Rocket and was talking to him about something. More pretend play everyday. Oh, he also said Lightening - as in the car that was behind his crib because he'd taken it to bed and it had fallen (or been dropped) out.

Rachel's excema flared, not doubt due to the super cold we were in yesterday. Went to TRU to get some presents for Spencer's birthday. I went through the toy room yesterday and took an entire pack n play's worth of toys to the basement. Literally filled the pnp they are stored in. In a few weeks I'll take some more down and bring a few up and start rotating toys. We have too much and it all gets forgotten about.

I guess that's it for now. Things are good here. I read the report of the woman who phoned 911 on last Friday night. Her story didn't put things in a better light. Apparently everyone, including my friend, were in their bedrooms and the fire was contained on the second floor, where all but the eldest girl were. She was on the third floor. The lady said that she didn't see the father in the yard when she drove up, but that flames and smoke were pouring out of the window in the front. The incinuation being that he would have had to come out the front door. If that's true, I don't see any possible way it couldn't have all been intentional. I'm still going to try to believe that that's not the case. I didn't think about it as much today, which is good. Don't want to think about it any more now...