Big Brother to the Rescue

Things have been good here. Nothing special going on, just a lot of working and hanging out and watching our kids be kids. I've said this approximately a million times already, but watching the two of them together really is fabulous.

(Landon, trying to teach Claire to crawl)

The Biscuit has terrible allergies. Her eyes are red and puffy and her nose is constantly running and she wakes herself up coughing and it's so pathetic and sad. She's on liquid albuterol and zyrtec and I think it's helping, maybe. She's been waking up earlier because of the coughing and this morning was no different. I was tired, JP was tired, but luckily our live-in Landon-nanny popped into Claire's room at 6:45 and read her books until I trudged upstairs many (many) minutes later.

When I opened the door, Landon was cross-legged in front of Claire's crib reading (or, "reading") Clifford the Firehouse Dog. He was telling her about the stop-drop-and-roll routine and she was cracking up. Fire safety is so silly.

Landon will also run in to her room to turn on her music mobile if she's fussing early in the morning. This almost always puts her back to sleep, and he gets it done long before JP and I have registered the fact that she's crying, debated whose turn it is to climb upstairs to deal with it, and then actually climbed up the stairs and dealt with it. Our little nanny toddles back to bed until Claire starts making noises again. Then, Landon races back in (his room isn't next to hers, so I'm not sure how he hears her before we do through the monitor) and the two of them laugh, read stories, and just generally entertain each other until their absentee parents finally go up to get them. I'd feel guilty about our using our 3.5 year old as early morning childcare, but he does it on his own and he always seems so proud and happy when we come in the nursery. I consider it restitution for all the sleep he stole from us during his first 10 months of life.

Landon is very into super heroes right now. Since he's never seen any movies or TV shows with them, he doesn't really understand what they do and he gets their various powers and catch phrases all mixed up. He has a Batman cape and he wears it running around the house exclaiming, "it's Batman to the rescue -- to infinity and beyond!" I always think of that when I hear him run into Claire's room in the morning: Big Brother to the rescue, for infinity and beyond.