January Second, Two Thousand Sixteen

A new year. Goodnight, 2015. You insane year, you.

Eleanor is sitting next to me in her bouncer, I’m giving her a gentle bounce with my right foot. We’re both downstairs, Gill’s sleeping in the bedroom with Sadie beside her and Martha in her crib. Oz is still asleep, as he’s been up too late the last couple nights. He fell asleep at 4:30PM yesterday, and was so exhausted we couldn’t wake him up - Gill and I decided that maybe he was just out for the night so I plopped him in his bed, only to find him creeping out of his room fully refreshed at his exact bedtime of 8:30, ready to party. Whoops.

Anyway, he and Gill and Sadie all went to bed around 11 last night, so I’m happy to let them slumber. It even gives me a rare opportunity to be alone - the scarcity of which is probably the only thing I’d change in all this. I miss solitude. And yet, even though I'm never alone, it can get lonely, because tiny babies and a three year old aren’t always the best company. We're getting a bit squirrelly up in here.

The ladies are focusing on faces, they’re grabbing at and/or swatting away their bottles. They keep their heads up for long half-minute stretches. They whine when they want to be held. They sleep at night and are up in the day. They’re all on the verge of smiling. The hour hand ticks along, imperceptibly and inexorably as always.

Martha is the leader - recently got big. Larger than the other two. Heftier. She’s a bit cranky, and can have the most angry or sorrowful little cry. But will often be adorably snuggly.

Sadie is the sweet one, generally. Big, wide open face, full of wonder. Will wake up howlingly hungry sometimes, and can crab with anyone, but general temperament seems to be a little bit more peaceful.

Eleanor is still small, and can often be the fussiest. Generally needs to be held the most and, when she’s in the mood, no amount of holding will placate. It's never enough. But those big beautiful eyes make her easy to forgive.

Oops, I hear the boy singing/shouting upstairs. Time to get to work with the morning routine.

Alright, got him settled with a peanut butter sandwich, some broccoli and a glass of milk, watching his favourite movie, Inside Out. Shouldn’t be watching so much TV, but damn that movie’s so good it’s hard to complain.

Girls are now lazing about on the floor, as they are wont to do.

We took the Christmas tree down yesterday - Oz has been fairly upset about it ever since. I tried telling him, don't worry, it's still nearby, just sitting outside in the cold waiting to be picked up by the garbage truck. Only noticed the cruelty of it all when he started to cry.

Christmas itself was… wearying. We were stuck with the dilemma of having to determine on the fly whether it was crazier to pack up all the girls and accessories and haul them somewhere else, or simply have the gathering at our place, entailing home clean-up and various other preparations. The answer: Doesn't matter, everything's hard. And we had four gatherings, two at our place, two at elsewhere. (And with a fifth to come. Too much.)

Anyway, we got through it. To compensate for not being able to buy the too-young ladies anything for xmas, everyone agreed to doggypile toys onto the boy. And every gift seemed to not just be one toy, but thousands: duplo, tinkertoys, puzzles, etc. So basically we've made a minefield for clumsy dad now.

Quick memory: Trudging through the snow on Christmas eve to my parent's place, trying out our triplet stroller for the first time. Gill pulling Oz in the sleigh, me plowing the sidewalk with our baby tank. Not the best option as it turned out. The stroller can’t be brought up or down stairs with the girls in it, so all securing and strapping and packing must be done in the blistering cold. Not a super wise move with two-month olds. And yet, the exhilaration of pulling it off was kind of fun…

Quick memory #2: I knew the wife wanted a Bluetooth speaker for the shower, so I picked one up at Superstore earlier in December. Christmas morning she unwraps it, she's happy, then opens the box to find... nothing. The thing was stolen from it's packaging in the store.

We had agreed to go light on the presents for each other this year, so that's all she got from me. An empty box.

Happy holidays!