A look back on bathtime.

If you are a regular follower, you know Sarah takes 95% of our family's still photos. I take 95% of the video. Therefore, you'll see mostly video on my blog, mostly still shot on Sarah's blog.

This is a video of each of the girls getting a bath back in November 2007. The girls were just about seven months old. It's amazing how much of the girls' personalities showed at 7 months. Enjoy.

What I learned today.

"You Learn Something New Everyday."

Have you heard that saying? Has anyone ever said that to you? Well, there is both wisdom and truth to that statement.

In no particular order, here are a couple things I learned today:

My niece Julie, who died at the age of 13, could have been buried at Arlington National Cemetery (my brother in-law served our country and Julie was not yet 18 when she passed).

The movie Gone Baby Gone is based on a book.

There are other people, besides Sarah & me, who can speak our angel Abigail's name and not be uncomfortable with it.

Jason Varitek and Normar Garciapara were roomates in college.

Jason V. played in the Little League World Series, College World Series and The World Series.

I cannot stay up late at night. I am old.

Fast Cars.

As things are, our girls spend a lot of time in one room in our house. Because of this, and the fact that we have had a mosquito issue in our back yard, Sarah suggested we purchase some age-appropriate ride-on toys for Allie, Anna and Em to play with in our driveway (away from the mosquitos).

During our staycation week, we took a trip to Toys R Us. After some discussion, we came home with three different ride-ons: a Crazy Coop, Toddler Toon Coupe (very similar to Crazy Coop), and the third is called Little Mermaid Ariel Big Wheel. I assembled the Crazy Coupe first, during one of those hot and humid days we had - so much fun. Two days later we had all three ready to roll!

I'll pass on doing a complete review of the three cars, but I will say that we got a good value on the purchases. After redeeming some TRS credit card dollars, the total purchase was about $125. The only other thing worth mentioning is that the Ariel big wheel blows bubbles and it also plays music and makes sounds which are LOUD (and there is no volume adjustment).

What ever happened to just a plain Big Wheel - are those still made? I got something called a Cheetah (check out this blog on the cheetah!) as a gift when I was a kid. It was awesome - I could blow away any kid in a Big Wheel!!

Anyway, the girls are not tall enough to pedal Ariel, but the bottom line is they like riding their new toys. On a daily basis one of them says "...pay in dryway!" = "play in driveway"!

Pigs in a Blanket.

Sarah and I are always trying to think of new foods to introduce to our girls. Foods that they will eat. Foods they will like.

Sarah had heard moms speak about how their kids loved pigs in a blanket (basically little hot dogs wrapped in Pillsbury Crescent Rolls). Sounded great. "Our kids will love these" we thought. So, a couple of weeks ago Sarah made them for the girls. Here is a video clip of the event. Emily on far right, Allie and then Anna on left:

I think Emily enjoyed her dippy more then the piggies. Allie tried the piggies, but they were not a huge hit with her either. Anna, as can imagine, liked them! We'll try them another time.

The garden.

With the girls turning two this past spring, we have found that we are able to now do some things we haven't been able to do since they were born. One of those things is to start a garden.

Our garden is not a garden we boast about. The garden hasn't had the nurturing nor the time required of a garden which yields a good harvest. Our garden isn't necessarily even appealling to the eye.

Our garden is a garden which is survivng, though. It has gotten just enough attention to allow the plants to grow, but not quite enough attention for all the plants to thrive.

Our garden is the garden of a family where the parents have two-year old triplets and where both parents work full-time jobs.

We will be lucky if 40 percent of this year's seeds produce a vegetable. But, I bet next year more than 40 percent will produce. And the year after that, the soil will be richer and yield an even greater harvest. More time spent fertilizing, turning and caring for the soil will ultimately reap greater results.

In April the garden was nothing but grass and dirt. It's not much more than grass and dirt now, but it is a garden.

I can see the beauty amongst the dirt and weeds, can you?

The week that was Anna.

I was thinking about what we did with the girls on my vacation last week and specifically thinking about my daughter Anna. She was mostly a source of joy, but a little frustration also.

The start of the vacation week was the Falmouth Road Race - I was running to support my daughter Anna and others with Spina Bifida. Sarah, Anna, Allie, Emily, my mother, two of my sisters and one of my cousins were at mile 5. I was able to stop and say hello to my girls and Sarah was able to get a photo of me giving Anna a smooch (see August 11 post). Emotional moment.

Later in the week Anna was the recipient of a few timeouts (imposed by daddy) for throwing a plate of food and disobeying several directives to stay in her room.

The latter part of our vacation week included a trip back to the Cape for a day at the beach. All the girls had a blast, but I was especially surprised and impressed with Anna. She loved the ocean - she would get blasted by water, then laugh, cough out any water she swallowed and then want more of the ocean! I was able to hold her, swing her around, dunk her up to her waist and just have fun. A memory to last a lifetime. Sarah's mom was able to capture that moment of us:

Before the mosquitos.

We had most of our yard fenced in this spring to allow the girls to play safely. Fencing in the yard was money well spent - it has been great. However, for the past few weeks, the mosquitos in the yard have been absolutely ruthless so we limited time in the backyard this week.

I was reviewing some video of the girls playing in the yard - before the fence and the mosquitos. There is nothing special or super-exciting about the video clip. I just find it amazing to see how much the girls have developed since the video was shot about 4 months ago.



P.S. - My comment "good job Anna" was for Anna standing up to her sisters who, can sometimes take advantage of Anna's passiveness!

Just thinking.

Mike Barnicle, for many years, had a column in The Boston Globe. He would periodically write a column titled I Was Just Thinking....

I Was Just Thinking

• I'm not going to do a part two of my last post The Second Sunday In August.


• I heard the Patriots are playing tonight - news to me.


• Is Kevin Youk's charging of the mound going to have the same end result for the Red Sox as Jason Varitek's tackling episode did in '04?


• Sarah and I really do have our hands full.


• I am a lucky man.


• What is it like to be an identical triplet?


• My new saying to Sarah is we are doing the best we can.


• I am extremely tired.


• Will my life ever be "normal" again?


• We have received a ***tload of rain this year.


• There has been an equal amount of mosquitos this year.


• Why can't anyone tell us what the odds of having identical triplets really is?


• I know why so many strangers tell Sarah & I that our daughters are adorable:

The Second Sunday of August.

For the past fourteen years I have known exactly where I would be at 10:00 a.m on the 2nd Sunday of August - the Falmouth Road Race. (the race changed from the third Sunday to the second Sunday several years ago.) If you are unfamiliar with Falmouth, it is located on Cape Cod, a short ferry ride to Martha's Vineyard and a favored vacation spot in the summer for locals and travelers alike.

This year I ran for the third time as a father to triplets and it was my first year running for the Spina Bifida Association (I had run previously to raise money for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation). In addition, I was running on the least amount of sleep I had ever had before a race as our girls woke up screaming at 4:00 a.m. More details on our wonderful Sunday morning are forthcoming in Sarah's blog.

Anna,the second oldest of my daughters has spina bifida - my reason for running Falmouth for SBAMass. Here's a pic of me giving her a smooch just before mile 5:

After seeing my girls, I continued on my run and found myself overwhelmed with emotion. Another first: tears while running. The tears were of gratitude for what I have in my life. I have three beautiful, adorable, loving girls to come home to every day. And I have a wife who gives all her energy, time and love to our family. On Sunday morning Sarah, like me, could have stayed home. She had every reason to bail. Who would want to feed, dress and pack three toddlers for an early Sunday morning drive when you have been up since 4:00 a.m.? I think many parents wouldn't have done it. Thank you, hon for pulling it together and being there. It means everything to me.

I am exhausted (what else is new) and need to continue this post tomorrow.

Good night.

Simple fun.

I think Saturday was one of the best days we've had all summer around these parts. I did not hestitate to take the girls outside to play while Sarah caught up on some much needed sleep. After Friday's fiasco, the girls slept until about 8:00 am yesterday morning.

Allie, Anna, Em & I had fun hanging out. They played with their water table, which they absoulelty LOVE and I enjoyed a cup of coffee while keeping an eye on them. It was a pleasant change from Friday when I was trying to survive at the office.

Like I said, the girls played well, laughed a lot, and said some very surprising and funny things! I captured a moment with my phone camera. The quality of the photo isn't great, but I think my girls' smiles make the picture a keeper!

Anna is pushing Emily from the back while Allie assists on the right.

Disaster.

So much for normal sleep.

All was good (I think) until 3:00 this morning. Screaming. Sarah goes into the girls' room to assess and put out the fire. Doesn't happen. 45 minutes pass - they are all still awake. Sarah returns to bed. We wait it out to see if they fall asleep. No go.

Fast forward to now (6:15 am). Anna and Allie have been downstairs with me since about 5:15. I don't think either of them have closed their eyes much after 3:30 am. I know I haven't. The good news is that Em is sleeping in her crib and Sarah is locked in the bedroom "napping" before we begin our commute to work.

I have a meeting first thing this morning which I need to prepare for when I get to the office - not a Friday to look forward to. We are on vacation next week. I guess that is something to look forward to because it seems all else has been disastrous lately.

Could it be?

Could tonight be the night that we return to some type of normal sleep?
It is 9:15 and ALL the girls have been asleep for at least 15 minutes.

Allie was the last to go down after about a half hour of whining/crying. Poor Allie has had a tough couple of weeks, which you probably know from Sarah's blog. Last night was better, but still difficult. Allie ended up falling asleep next to me in the rocker. That's right, she was propped up, but cuddled, next to me in the chair when she finally dozed off at about 9:30. It was then on to Anna, who had been watching "the show" ie watching me and Allie the whole time and would periodically stand up and say "wheah Allie!?". I would respond with a firm, yet quiet "she is right here SLEEPING". Anyway, I picked up Allie (dead weight) and placed her in her crib to a little whimper. Allie was out. I spent the next half hour with Anna until she dozed off. 10:00ish I left the girls' room after being in there for almost an hour and a half.

They slept most of the night after that until Sarah and I were awoken at 4:00 am (Allie) and again at about 5:15 am (Emily). Sarah saved us in both instances without any major casualties.

We are exhausted and I am running the Falmouth Road Race (www.falmouthroadrace.com) on Sunday. I am tempted, as I was last year, to put a sign on me that says "I have two-year-old triplets, what's YOUR excuse?" I'll do a post next week about Sunday's race, which has special meaning to me, for a variety of reasons. Here's the girls hanging out at the race last year waiting for me and the 9,ooo other runners:

The quick route.

The past week or so I have felt the way I did the months following the girls' birth - burnt out, anxious, TIRED, and on edge. Em wasn't feeling well and then Allie became sick. Because of this, I have not had any "free time" for blog posts.

So...I am taking the easy route tonight and posting a video clip.

The clip is from two weeks ago when we introduced a sprinkler to the girls for the first time. The girls had more fun with it when the water was shut off!