29 months 2 days

Day 885. Last night I headed to bed at midnight. I had just turned my computer off, when Emmy called to me from the top of the chairs. I went upstairs, but I still had to finish loading the dishwasher and turning it on, so Emmy stood by me watching. Then we went to bed together. He told him he could stay a while. I couldn't even sleep. At 12:45 I put him into his own bed, and he was fine staying there. I could finally go to sleep. Tammy came some time in the early morning hours, and so did Emmy. They were up by around 6:30, and not long after we got up as well.

I made breakfast, and then we sat down to eat. After breakfast I cleaned them up and dressed them, and we went downstairs to read a Bible story. Then I took my computer and went upstairs. Randy was about to go downstairs with his breakfast. I turned my computer on, as I still had just over an hour before we had to leave the house. I used my hour well, and then got ready for Sammy and me to leave for his first physiotherapy session in months.

I went to get Sammy from downstairs, and the other two started crying hard, when they couldn't come upstairs with us as well. They wanted to come with us real bad. They cried and cried until we left the house just after 9:30. We took two subways and walked to the place, where Sammy goes to have private physiotherapy sessions, when he's not going to the center, even though we have to pay.

We got there a few minutes before it started. I took his coat off, and then we went inside. It had been months since the last time he was there. He was skeptical at first, not being so sure about where he was and who that woman was, but it didn't take long for him to warm up to the physiotherapist again.

To start with he was standing by bench, and he sat down and stood back up a few times, with her giving him some stability and checking how much of it he can do by himself. Sammy got pretty busy with all the toys on top of the bench. Then she put him on the floor, and he crawled real fast to the other end of the mat, where I was. Then he pulled himself up into a sitting/kneeling position on my leg. He then crawled over to the other benches, and pulled himself all by himself again. It wasn't just her who was impressed, I was too. I didn't know he could do this so well now. And then the 45 minutes were already over. We made an appointment for next week, as he starts at the center in two weeks, and said our good-byes. Sammy kept waving and saying "baba" (bye bye).

We left and walked back to the subway. On the way there was a drugstore, something I had needed for a while, and so we went inside. I bought my shampoo, and then some of the kids' favorite snacks. Then we continued on to the subway and took two trains home.

We only got home at 11:45. The other kids were excited for us to be back, and they came upstairs with Randy, while I put the soup on the stove to warm up. By noon we all sat down by the table to eat, and everybody ate well, plus puddings. Then we cleaned them up and dressed them, and the boys went to bed, while Randy went downstairs with Tammy. Neither boy was falling asleep. Sammy was playing and moving around, and Emmy was reacting to him, making him play and move even more. At 1 pm Randy came upstairs with Tammy, but Emmy was still awake, while Sammy had fallen asleep. So I picked up Emmy and lay down in our bed with him, that way Tammy could lie down in her bed, with Randy sitting next to her. Everybody soon fell asleep, including the adults.

I woke up at 2:40, when Tammy walked into the room. Emmy woke up, when she did, and they both got up and went downstairs with Randy. I gave them some snacks. At 3 pm Sammy woke up as well, and I took him downstairs. I returned to the computer to get some work done, but that didn't last long, as they were calling me from downstairs. And so I took my computer downstairs and stayed with them.

The first thing they wanted again was to swing together, and so I put them in there and pushed them to maximum heights, which made them giggle. Tammy came out first, when Randy brought some of the toys from Mali he hadn't given to them yet. Emmy wanted to swing some more by himself, then he came out too.

It wasn't long until they asked to watch a service, but after a few minutes Tammy already asked to watch babies, and Emmy agreed, so I put some baby YouTube videos on the phone, put it on a shelf, and they sat on the old office chair together.

It was Tammy who left first. She had been carrying her doll around, and she had a little doll potty that she put her on. Then I showed her to empty the potty out in the toilet. And so the doll had to go potty again and again, just so that they could empty out the potty into the toilet.

Then we started tidying up together. Even Emmy helped a little today, and so they both received 10c for their piggy bank. At about 5:40 we all went upstairs, and they pulled up chairs to the kitchen counter. I put their plates in front of them, and they started eating what I put on them. Once it was all ready they moved to the dining room table, where I put the soup on their plates. Then I turned the bathwater on before sitting down with them. Once they were done eating, they usually go into the bathtub, but they wanted to go potty. So I took their diapers off, and first Emmy sat down on the potty, and then Tammy, but nothing happened. Still, it's great that they're excited about it, and it won't be long.

They went into the bathtub, where they were having lots of fun. They were doing all kinds of songs that they had learned in their dance class together with me and were having lots of fun. Two more weeks before classes start again! Sammy was very upset again, when he was the first to get out, when he was having so much fun, but the others followed right after. We got them ready for bed, and today it was nearly 7 pm, when they were all in bed. I sat down by their beds, and Tammy wanted to lie on my chest right away, and Emmy joined her there. They were talking about the day with me, and wanted to pray for Sonja and Renate, our friends, as well as Grandma and Grandpa. After a while I put them into their beds. They were still talking and all three were moving around. Once Randy was done eating around 7:20, he took my place and stayed with them until they were asleep, which didn't take that much longer.

I got my food and went downstairs to eat, then I went back to work. I'm still working on the 2021 financial report, and that's stilll a lot of work, work I cannot do, when the kids are around. Now it's 11 pm, and I haven't seen Emmy yet.