Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Potty Post

Things are going pretty well on day three of potty training. She seems to think that I should tell her when she needs to go rather than just feeling when she needs to go. BUT, I believe she is getting the hang of it. She didn't wet the bed last night, but peed her pants standing in the bathroom this morning. She has had one successful trip to the bathroom today; so the tally is 1 and 1. I have high hopes that she will have more success than accidents today! Wish her luck.
My little goober wouldn't hold still for a picture. Yes that's pen on her forehead. I'm THAT kind of mom.

Monday, September 19, 2011

Hop Aboard the Potty Train


As parents we do a whole lot of things we do not enjoy doing. For example, cleaning toilets, doing dishes, cleaning up vomit in the middle of the night ect. But one thing that parents dread the most is potty training their little ones. Do you hear the music I hear when I read that? I think it goes DUN DUN DUN! ..Yep, It is scary.
As I have been potty training Lily all day, I have been thinking about why it is so awful and terrifying all at once. Even if we haven't done it before, when that time comes around, we absolutely dread doing it. But where does that dread come from? Do we have this fear that if we do it wrong our kid will be scarred for life? Is it that we honestly think that somehow our child will never actually get it and go to high school wetting/soiling her pants everyday? I don't know.
Do you think it is a control issue? I mean, this is my third time around and it is still so hard for me to admit to myself that I have absolutely NO control over the potty situation. I can guide it as best I can, I can try my hardest to make it a positive experience for her, but ultimately it is the child that decides whether or not they actually do what I am teaching them. As parents, I don't think we tend to freak out about teaching them to read, or even teaching them to walk, talk, etc. but we DO freak out about potty training. Maybe it is the fact that this particular lesson includes nearly constant worry, constant supervision and constant fear of pee and poop ending up all around your house/child. I mean, when you are teaching them to read, if you get frustrated, you can take a break. When potty training, that really isn't an option except for the occasional bath or nap-neither of which are completely worry free. Once you start, you are in it for good.
One thing I know for sure after doing this all day for my third child, is that EVERY single child is different! I honestly thought there were two kinds of kids. Those who get it and pick it up quickly and those who are stubborn and or don't care and take a whole lot longer. My first two did just that, in respecting order. Tyler was trained in about 4 hours, had 2 accidents and one bed wetting. that was it. Jake on the other hand, had multiple accidents, didn't want to participate and made the whole thing rather difficult; he still wets the bed occasionally. Lily has been an odd mix of the two. She is very willing to participate, but continually has accidents. She will sit on the potty if I suggest it, but won't actually go on her own accord (when she really does need to go). She insists on doing everything herself as well. I am not allowed to help her do much of anything, not even to help turn her panties right side out for her. It is so weird how different they all can be.
For those who don't know, I follow the book "Toilet training in less than a day" it was written in the 1970s and I honestly feel like it is the best method out there. It is similar to Dr. Phil's method of training for one day. You basically teach the child the skills they need to have to accomplish pottying all by themselves. When you are done with the training, they shouldn't need you to do anything for them. No wiping, no cleaning, dressing, ect. Once you start, you don't put them in diapers ever again. I don't believe in the whole "My kid is "trained", but they still need me to go into the bathroom with them to help them and then they also wear pull-ups at night." What on earth would the benefit of that be? I understand that some kids have medical/sleeping problems and that they need to wear something at night because they don't wake when they need to go, but I think that includes a very small percentage of children.
I don't claim to be an expert potty trainer. Heaven knows that I had a difficult time today. She just wasn't doing what she clearly understood she should be. She could explain to me word for word what she was supposed to do (she even explained it to her doll and showed it how, but putting it into action for herself seemed nearly impossible to her. she would constantly say "I can't do it mom." like it was a fact. It is, after all, difficult to learn a new skill. Especially when you have been doing it a certain way for 2 1/2 years.
I truly hope that tomorrow goes better than today did. I was a little more relaxed than I have been with my boys in the past. I didn't push as hard because I knew that it was better to stay positive and have more accidents than to have a negative experience. I guess I will make this a multiple day potty training and see how it goes. But I am proud of myself. I didn't cry at all this time and I kept my cool when she did have accidents. That isn't easy for me.

FYI I found this article and found it very interesting. It is about training a diaper free baby from birth. While I don't think I'll jump on board for this method with our next child, I think it has some merit. Why do we first teach our children to poop and pee their pants only to re-train them later? Very interesting.

Friday, September 16, 2011

It's a....

Baby GIRL!! We are very excited to be having another girl join our family. The ultrasound showed a very healthy albeit wiggly baby girl. She is measuring just as she should be and her due date is still somewhere between February 12-15th 2012.

Here are her very first pictures. Cute little leg
Girl parts. I love how the tech wrote "sister" instead of "girl"
back of head with arm
Profile

It is our fist time having 3D images of any of our kids. She didn't really want to show us her cute face. She constantly had both her hands covering her face. You can see her head, with her hand over her eye/nose as well as her leg.
This is the best shot we got of her face, She just wiggled so much!
Another attempt at seeing the faceSo cute. The clearest of the bunch. Her little hand on the side of her face, but you can see her nose and ear.
Lily was with us at the ultrasound and she was pretty excited to have a little sister. Every girl needs a sister right? When we got home, I picked up Jake and Lily told him the baby is a girl baby. It was interesting because he didn't show any signs of caring (He has been insisting that it is a boy because he wants a brother so badly.) So after we had been home for a while showing him photos and stuff, I said something about it being a girl and I watched the realization hit his face and he started crying saying "I didn't want a girl baby! I want a boy baby!" He cried for a while; poor thing.
I couldn't wait for Tyler to get home from school. He wanted a girl so much. So when he walked in the door I turned on the camera to get a video of his reaction. Here is the video.
ok, It isn't working, I've tried four times and it doesn't want to load. I'll try again tomorrow.
He was VERY excited to be having a new baby sister! Two boys and two girls...sounds pretty perfect to me.

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

This Girl

I was making her some lunch today (beef Ramen noodles-her favorite) and I couldn't help taking some pictures of my beautiful girl. She had recently had a bath and I had brushed her hair, but didn't do anything special to it for the day. I rarely leave it down because it gets so matted and gross by the end of the day. She was busy telling me that Daddy was at school and Tyler was at work- thinking this was absolutely hilarious.

I'm so grateful for this sweet girl. Here are some of my favorite things she does.
*She rarely stops talking. I know she isn't the only one in our family who does this, but when others watch her for me, that is the first thing they say "Wow, she doesn't stop talking does she!"

*She tells jokes all the time; they are mostly knock knock jokes, but if you don't say "who's there" then you are in big trouble.

*She absolutely LOVES going to nursery at church. I never thought I would have one of "Those kids" but it is fun to hear her excitement when we sing the closing song in sacrament meeting and she says "I go nursery now?!!!!" She honestly can't wait to get there.

*She is a little mama. She loves to take car of her baby dolls and makes sure they are OK multiple times a day.

*She is all girl. This includes mood swings. She is easily offended by things we do and say. If you don't talk to her nicely, she bursts into tears.
*She loves it when Jake and Tyler are at school so she can have some girl time with just the two of us.

*Her favorite things are: The color pink-anything pink is automatically hers. Fruit snacks- I can get her to do most anything with fruit snacks. Pizza, fish crackers, chocolate and ice-cream. she loves swimming or playing in the water and that includes baths. She loves her "blankie." She also loves her brothers. Luckily they also love her back. She loves the baby in my tummy and talks about it all the time.

What a great little girl we have!

Reaping what you Sow



I was busy canning salsa a couple of days ago using tomatoes and peppers from our garden. We have tons of cherry tomatoes and big beefy tomatoes as well as green bell peppers and Jalapeno peppers. this is just a picture of what we picked the other day. Looking out into our garden, it's hard to believe that it's time to pick again! Crazy how that works. Our Strawberries didn't do very well this year, we had a few, but some bugs got to them before we could. Also our pumpkin died and I neglected our Romain lettuce so much that it grew to be about 6 feet tall. But it is good to know that I can grow my own lettuce. I just need to pay attention and not be so...you know, sick for months at a time.

I found the picture Randy took of the lettuce before we ripped it out. It was taken with his phone, so it is tiny, but you get the picture.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

More Willard Bay Pictures

My sister Michelle snapped some pictures of us, so here are some more from our fun Saturday.

Uncle Ben on the wave runner with Tyler and cousin Will.
My dad taking Jake on the wave runner. It was the highlight of Jake's day.
Tyler and Will playing on the beach
The cousins playing
Everyone was making fun of me for wearing a fleece Jacket on the beach. I was still cold from camping the night before...so what. That's normal right?
Randy on the front of the boat
Tyler playing with the rocks
I did eventually take off the jacket AND got into my swimsuit. I'm glad she didn't get a picture of me in my suit though.
Lily sat like this in the water a lot of the time. She loves the water
Jake was freezing cold in the water. See..I'm not the only one who was cold! What a cutie.

Friday, September 9, 2011

Boating at Willard Bay

Last weekend we went boating at Willard bay with my family. The night before, we actually camped out in the campground right there by the bay. I forgot my camera, so these are pictures my sister gave me.

Tyler on the tube with my sister Michelle.

Randy wake boarding.The cousins playing on the "beach" I love Lily in her little pink swimsuit.

Randy on the tube. I never actually saw him do it, but I heard he was quite the show off. At one point he stood up on the tube and jumped off doing a back flip. ...sounds like Randy.
Now, I have heard..mostly from Randy, that I'm a 'spoilsport'. But I honestly don't see the appeal of being dragged behind a boat. It is terrifying to me. I have been on the tube, I have tried wake boarding and water-skiing. I even got up on the water skis. I DO NOT enjoy any of these activities. No, I didn't try anything this time, I am pregnant after all, but even if I weren't, I can't say I would have tried any of these things again. I like being in the boat, just not going too fast and I hate being pulled behind it.

I have to say that it was fun to watch the kids enjoy the boat and the wave runner. Jacob especially loved going as fast as these could go. Lily wasn't too sure about going fast in the boat either. She kept screaming "Stop! stop! We go back! Is scary!" But of course Randy was driving and couldn't hear her. She did like it eventually and even fell asleep on my Dad's lap while he was driving the boat. It was fun to watch Randy wake board and then to watch my Dad water ski. We had a great time. Randy especially loved boating for the day.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

There's a First for Everything


I have been driving for 12 years now. As of today, I can no longer say that I have never been pulled over by a policeman. Yeah, that's right, I was pulled over for speeding here in town. When the cop came to my window he asked how I was doing and I said "Scared. I've never been pulled over before."--and then proceeded to bawl my eyes out.--
I have always wondered what kind of person I would be if I were in fact ever pulled over. I wondered if I would try to talk my way out of the ticket, try and plead innocent by feigning misunderstanding or just be plain apologetic. I wouldn't have pegged myself as a blubbering baby. Now, I could say that the pregnancy and all its hormones are to blame for the crying, but I honestly don't know if that is right. I KNOW for sure that the hormones are liable for my inability to stop crying once I started. --seriously, I was still crying 1/2 hour after it all went down--
Apparently, The crying was to my benefit this time because he sent me away with a warning and he tried to console me by saying that he hoped my day would end up better than it had started.

12 years isn't too bad of a run and I can still honestly say that I have never received a speeding ticket (knock on wood).

Not that it matters much, but I was in a hurry to get Lily to a friend's house so that I could make my Dr.'s appointment this morning. I hadn't even realized I was speeding. I was busy talking to Lil's and wasn't paying attention. Yes, I was still crying when I dropped her off, but I had composed myself by the time I reached my appointment. FYI baby and I are doing fine, I heard the heartbeat again today and it is so much fun! I am feeling better lately, though I am still on medication for nausea. I made an appointment for my ultrasound next Friday, so stay tuned for photos and of course the announcement of it's gender.