June 28, 2008

Written Saturday evening; posted Sunday afternoon:).

It seems like it has been so long since we have just had a normal day. The dad came home from the hospital on Tuesday and went back to work on Wednesday around noon. My mom and sister came to visit on Thursday, spent the night with us and left after the boys went down for their nap on Friday.

And today is Saturday already. The dad is back in the master bath, laying the rest of the tile. He had it all cut and most of it was already cemented down so it won't take long to finish the rest. Tomorrow he is planning to finish grouting at least in the small toilet room, so he can put the toilet back in after it dries. It will be nice to have our bathroom back to normal soon and the tile is looking really nice. I'll post some pictures when it is finished.

This morning it was a rainy kind of day around here and I knew the boys were probably ready to get out of the house for a change, so I told them I would take them to play in the play area of the mall. They were very excited and so we all got ready to go and I packed a couple of snack cups and an apple. We were finally headed out the door and on our way to the mall. I gave the boys their snack cups so they could eat a bit on our way over to the mall, because I knew they would want to play when we got there and it was almost time for snack. We happily drove over to the mall and I got out and got the stroller out of the trunk. I opened the door to get Ben out and saw that he had taken the top off of his snack cup, which is fine. They do that all the time because it makes the little fish crackers easier to pick up. But, he also dumped a bunch of them out all over the car. Now if this had been an accident, it would have been no big deal. But after asking him about it, it was very clear, as he happily sported his mischievous grin, that he had dump the crackers intentionally, which he knows is a no no. I scolded him and picked them up and then went ahead and put him in the stroller. I went around to get Nick, opened the door and found that he had done the same thing, only he had dumped many more. Well, that was the end of our happy little trip. I picked up the crackers and put them away and put Ben back in the car and took the boys back home, through their (loud) protest. At one point, when they had quieted down a bit, I gave them a bit of a talking to, about how to behave when someone is doing something nice for them and about my disappointment in their behavior. They were very quiet the rest of the way home. That was our hard lesson of the day.

Thankfully, the rest of the day went better. We actually had a new milestone in potty training today. Nick finally, for the very first time, went poop on the potty. Yay! I decided to keep him near me today and I explained nicely to him why, that I wanted to help him learn when to run to the bathroom to go poop. He was very good about staying with me, never complained and happily played nearby. I also told him he could have two prizes from the 'big box' if he poop in the potty today (yes, I was desperate). I watched him closely for 'the look' (which was challenging because I had never caught it before so I was not quite sure what to look for with him:) and would periodically ask him if he had gone in his pants (knowing he had not) and remind him to tell me when he needed to go. Finally, I saw a different, kind of surprised look on his face. He quickly looked at me and said 'poop!' and he took off running to the bathroom and the rest is history. I was quite surprised that he recognize it, told me and ran to the bathroom. I am hoping that now that he has done it once, he will continue to do so. We'll see. He and Ben each got a small flashlight and a digital Matchbox watch for this huge milestone. We were celebrating big around here and even called MaMa and Aunt Kathy to tell them about it.

Everything else with the potty training is going pretty well. Once in a while Nick will have a pee accident but not very often. Ben never has any kind of accident and has not since it 'clicked' with him sometime during day three or four of our potty training efforts. So they are both doing very well with it and we have not had any accidents yet while we have been out and about, away from home. 95% of the time the boys wake up from their naps dry and sometimes they wake up in the mornings dry but not as often. We are still doing pull ups for naps and night time. Overall I would say our potty training efforts have been very successful.

In other news, we are very close to closing a deal for a 2007 Toyota Sienna XLE that has about 16,000 miles on it. If all goes well, my husband will fly to Louisville KY on Wednesday evening, close the deal on Thursday, after having it inspected by the local dealership, and drive it back. My husband has to provide 60 days notice to schedule vacation time at his job. Fortunately he had already asked for Thursday off and he has Friday off for July 4th, so it seems everything is working out OK. We think we are getting a great deal on this vehicle. I found it on www.AutoTrader.com and it is being sold by a private owner. I hope it works out. It will be nice to have some extra space when we are out and about and I would love to be able to take some longer trips for vacations in the future. After we purchase this vehicle, we will sell my car.

Did I mention that the boys are growing up way too fast? They are talking so much now and understanding and remembering so much too. They learn so quickly, they are constantly surprising me.

I am finding more and more wonderful children's books at my favorite used book store. I got some really good ones the other day, when I took my mom over there. I have noticed that you pretty much can't go wrong if a book is either a "Children's Choice" or a "Weekly Reader" book club book. I have also learned to be a bit pickier about the books I select and make sure that I will enjoy reading them over and over again:). Some of our favorites are Little Locomotive, If I Owned A Candy Factory, Caps for Sale (we love this one), Petunia and many more that I can't recall the names of off the top of my head.

Well, it's almost bath time and then bed time for the boys and then the husband and I are going to watch a movie we rented (I'll watch it and he'll probably fall asleep:), then church tomorrow morning, then we eat out for lunch and then we'll come home and I will rest while the boys take a nap and the husband grouts the bathroom floor. Yes, we lead an exciting life around here:).