When I was preparing to potty train Lily and was thinking about her personality and how she would take to potty training, my initial thought was that it could either go really well, or it could go disastrously. Lily is a pretty stubborn child and she likes things to be just so. About every babysitter/nursery attendant we've ever had has mentioned something like, "Boy, she sure tells you what she wants doesn't she?" The combination of her being picky and a pretty darn good communicator results in a slightly bossy child. (She's also about as sweet as they come; she just knows how she likes things.) So my thinking was that the stubborn streak might rule supreme and she might just put her foot down on the whole potty training thing. On the other hand, once she sees that there is a new "rule" or way things are supposed to go, she'll glom onto it and will potty train us. Here are a couple of cases in point:
1. When she was a little over a year old I decided it was time she learned to clean up after herself and put her books back when she was finished with them. This led to a few days of screaming fits and battles of sheer will. But once she realized that I wasn't going to back down and that cleaning up was the way things were going to be, she absolutely clung to it and now she LOVES to clean up. If she sees trash, it's picked up and put in the trash. She loves to "clean up" and "put back goes". Now she's the one telling me when something is out of place.
2. When she sees that the Nuts need food or water she will not rest until they have food overflowing from their bowls (mainly overflowing because Lily is the one to fill them) and plenty of water. She even tells us "clean poops" which means "I know that I'm not supposed to deal with the litter box, so you need to do it now." Also, when we let the Nuts outside, she is sure to remind them, "No barking, doggies." She is a responsible pet owner.
So with this aspect of her personality taken into account, I thought that potty training might turn out to be a breeze with her. My thinking was that once she figured out what she was supposed to do, and that there was some sort of reason and order to it, she would put all of her efforts into making sure it happened.
So which way did it go? I'm happy to tell you that so far it appears that reason and order are winning the battle over the stubbornness!
Here's how the last couple of days have gone:
Monday morning when Lily woke up we had a big long talk about big girl undies and potties and lack of diapers and M&M's and the like. It totally went in one ear and out the other. I knew I was going to have to show her what I meant. So the first accident occurred when she was crouching on a dining room chair eating peanuts. She started saying "make mess, make mess" and became more and more distressed. I didn't pay much attention at first because Lily will freak out about making a mess if there's a little peanut salt on her finger. But when I finally paid attention, I saw that she had, in fact, tinkled on the chair. I was glad it freaked her out... that's a good sign. The next three tinkles took place sitting on the couch, standing in the middle of the living room, and then sitting on my lap. Each time I explained that what she was doing was tinkling and that tinkling should take place in the potty seat. This whole time I was setting the timer for every 15 minutes, and every 15 minutes it would ding and I would set her on the potty. She caught onto this pretty quick. Once she realized that she could go back to playing when she was finished, she had no problem with sitting on the potty. And whenever the timer dings, she gets right up to go sit on the potty. My only fear is that from now on every time the cookies are done baking, she's going to lose control of her bladder.
Anyway, Grandma Sue called me at some point that morning and as we were talking Lily used the potty on her own! It was amazing! I was so proud of her, and she was plenty proud of herself as well! It was a great moment. From that point on she became a master of the potty. Sometimes she'd go at the 15 minute interval and sometimes she'd jump up and run over to it and say "go poopy!" and then proceed to tinkle. (She peed a lot on Monday, by the way.) She even did two "big potties" in the potty! Unfortunately after her nap everything seemed to fly out of her head and she had a couple more accidents that day.
Day two was amazing. Her first potty was a big potty that she decided to do on her own (rather than when I set her on the potty) but when I went upstairs to empty it, she went and tinkled under the dining room table. Sigh. After that, she had one "big potty in the undies" incident and no accidents the rest of the day! I would still set her on the potty every 15 minutes, but when she did potty it was usually when we were doing something and she would jump up and yell "go poopy!" and run to the potty. I don't know if she just likes to say "poopy" or if she knows that poopies get her two M&M's but no matter what she was actually doing, she would tell me that she had to go "poopy". She hasn't quite gotten the whole pull-your-undies-down-first thing yet, but it will come. But yesterday we went through 3 pair of undies, which was a vast improvement from Monday's 12 pair.
Ok, so where does Mad Eye Moody come in? Right here.
This is what I've learned from potty training Lily: CONSTANT VIGILANCE!!
Not only do I have to set the timer for every 15 minutes to put Lily on the potty (and remember to reset it every time too... oops!) But in between each time, I have to remind her abut 400 times that if she needs to tinkle or poop, that she should do it on the potty. And that she can bring her book/toy/whatever to the potty with her if she wants to. And that she gets an M&M if she does her potties on the potty seat. I've literally been talking nonstop about the potty for two days straight. If there is silence for 30 seconds, I know it's time to remind Lily where potties need to take place. If Lily looks involved in whatever she's playing with, I know it's time to remind her that she can always go back to it after she uses the potty if need be. CONSTANT VIGILANCE! And I can't be more than 10 feet from her because of the whole undies thing.
After the first day, Jim said something like, "Now I know why so many parents start to potty train and then decide that their kid isn't ready and go back to diapers." It's really not that the kid isn't ready, it's that they aren't ready to have their life taken over by a molded piece of plastic and a two-year-old bladder for a week (month... year) straight!
And while I'm at it, can I write a little ode to diapers? Just when you're to the point where your kid can be out of the house for a few hours without having to take a nap or be nursed or whatever, it's time to potty train and you're back to square one. Outings have to be short and planned (where's the nearest toilet?) and you have to prepare by pottying right before you go, and having an extra change of clothing, and the portable potty seat. Before you potty train, you don't realize how lovely it is that your child can relieve themselves any time and any place and you don't have to tend to it until you're good and ready. Ah diapers... what a wonderful invention. And what is the plus-side to having a potty trained child by the way? Maybe I'll figure it out once Lily is completely potty trained and the days of Spot Shot and nightly loads of laundry are behind us.
But whatever the up-side is, we're working hard to get there!
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
I HATE MATERNITY CLOTHES!!
On one hand I love maternity clothes. They have stretchy elastic bands on the pants and the shirts have plenty of room for your growing belly. They are generally a very comfy and forgiving style of clothing. But that's not what this post is about. No, this post is about how I HATE maternity clothes. I know that most women would be aghast at this betrayal of our most comfortable state of clothing (what, is she going to petition against sweat pants next?) but I have some very valid reasons for my hatred. Read on, and you may even agree!
First of all, maternity pants have come a long way since the days when you cut a section out of an old pair of jeans and sewed in a fabric panel. And thank goodness for that! Today's maternity pants much resemble "mom jeans" in that the whole waistband has been replaced with elastic! Heavenly! You feel like you're pulling on a regular pair of jeans, but they have a wonderful amount of give around the waist area. Here's the problem, though. Some of the pants have it right and the waistband is only about an inch wide and fits comfortably around your hips. Other designs, however have this big old 3 inch wide elastic band, and once your belly starts to grow and pooch out, you have a choice: Do I sag my pants and wear them where the Giant Waistband is all below the bump, or do I Muffin-top it. And by Muffin-top it, I mean let your big old belly pooch over the waistband until it's permanently folded in half. It's so annoying! What pregnant lady has 3 inches of room under her belly for a giant waistband? Certainly not I!
If you don't want the hipster elastic waistband style of pants, there is another option. You can go with the Pants-Up-To-My-Boobs model. The PUTMB model solves the problem of fold-over muffin-top pants, but creates its own new set of problems. PUTMB style pants also have an elastic band at the top, but between where normal pants would end and the elastic band starts is a Vast Expanse of Stretchy Fabric that is designed to fit up over your belly. It's a great idea, except there is only a 2 month window where you can wear PUTMB. Before the window, PUTMB will just fall down because you have no belly to fill out the Vast Expanse of Stretchy Fabric. Once you become enormous, the Vast Expanse of Stretchy Fabric isn't quite expansive enough and the elastic band will hit right in the middle of your bump, not only leaving a lovely visible line under all your shirts, but you will spend your days hiking them up as gravity pulls them down the other side of the mountain.
I'm an equal-opportunity griper so why don't I move on to shirts for a while. Why should pants have all the fun?
To the makers of maternity shirts: Just because a pregnant woman's boobs are ginormously huge it doesn't mean we want to be showing them off all the time. We're about to be mothers for heaven's sake and the last thing we want is to be oogled all day long because you seem to only know how to make shirts that are cut down to the belly button. I know you want to "draw the eye up" and "detract from the belly" and "accentuate the positive" but come on! Some of that stuff is downright inappropriate. And I can't tell you how sick I am of having to wear a stupid camisole under every single shirt I wear just so that I can be rated PG. The last thing a pregnant woman wants is to have to wear one more stinkin' article of clothing. For reals!
And why do so many maternity shirts seem to have tight elastic around the arms? Why? Why? WHY!!!???
And it should be against the law to make maternity shirts out of anything other than cotton blends.
"Where is this coming from?" you may be asking yourself. Well the other day, I went to find a shirt to wear and there was nothing for me to wear. NOTHING Every option was either too small, made of some horrid scratchy fabric, long sleeved, sleeveless, or required some sort of extra undershirt that I was completely unwilling to don. This led to a pretty pathetic session of crying on Jim's shoulder that I had nothing to wear. (Really, I need to get rid of those shirts I can't/won't wear because they're just depressing. Some of them were given to me when I was pregnant with Lily and I've NEVER worn them because they were ugly and scratchy then and still are today. And some of them I bought when I was first pregnant with Lily and weighed a fair amount less than I do now and have been too small since 2007.) About that time I realized that I was only halfway through the laundry and most of my wearable shirts were in a laundry basket ready to be hung up. So I bounded downstairs, found something wearable, and felt a little better. But the fact remained that I had very few short-sleeved casual cottony things to fit the later stages of pregnancy and a shopping trip was probably in order.
So yesterday I headed to the Spokane Valley Mall to the Motherhood store in search of some very specific articles of clothing.
1. Shorts. I can still (just barely) at this point fit into some of my non-pregnancy shorts, but I don't hold out much hope for May, June or July. And since I was pregnant with Lily during the winter, I have zero maternity shorts.
2. Shirts that are:
a. Made of comfortable soft material such as a cotton blend. No polyester allowed!
b. Not low cut, therefore not requiring any sort of undershirt
c. LONG enough
d. Short-sleeved
e. No tight elastic around the sleeves/arms
3. A bathing suit! I tried to put on my suit the other day to take Lily to the Kroc Center. Suffice to say it was comical.
And what did I get? Five shirts, three of which are those side-ruched t-shirts. Three pair of shorts; one denim, one khaki, and one dark brown khaki. And a bathing suit!! (And it's so cute ya'll are going to wish you were pregnant. But you're not! Ha ha ha ha ha!) I will be sure to point out any pictures of me in my new comfortable maternity clothes in the near future. Look out summer, here I come!!
First of all, maternity pants have come a long way since the days when you cut a section out of an old pair of jeans and sewed in a fabric panel. And thank goodness for that! Today's maternity pants much resemble "mom jeans" in that the whole waistband has been replaced with elastic! Heavenly! You feel like you're pulling on a regular pair of jeans, but they have a wonderful amount of give around the waist area. Here's the problem, though. Some of the pants have it right and the waistband is only about an inch wide and fits comfortably around your hips. Other designs, however have this big old 3 inch wide elastic band, and once your belly starts to grow and pooch out, you have a choice: Do I sag my pants and wear them where the Giant Waistband is all below the bump, or do I Muffin-top it. And by Muffin-top it, I mean let your big old belly pooch over the waistband until it's permanently folded in half. It's so annoying! What pregnant lady has 3 inches of room under her belly for a giant waistband? Certainly not I!
If you don't want the hipster elastic waistband style of pants, there is another option. You can go with the Pants-Up-To-My-Boobs model. The PUTMB model solves the problem of fold-over muffin-top pants, but creates its own new set of problems. PUTMB style pants also have an elastic band at the top, but between where normal pants would end and the elastic band starts is a Vast Expanse of Stretchy Fabric that is designed to fit up over your belly. It's a great idea, except there is only a 2 month window where you can wear PUTMB. Before the window, PUTMB will just fall down because you have no belly to fill out the Vast Expanse of Stretchy Fabric. Once you become enormous, the Vast Expanse of Stretchy Fabric isn't quite expansive enough and the elastic band will hit right in the middle of your bump, not only leaving a lovely visible line under all your shirts, but you will spend your days hiking them up as gravity pulls them down the other side of the mountain.
I'm an equal-opportunity griper so why don't I move on to shirts for a while. Why should pants have all the fun?
To the makers of maternity shirts: Just because a pregnant woman's boobs are ginormously huge it doesn't mean we want to be showing them off all the time. We're about to be mothers for heaven's sake and the last thing we want is to be oogled all day long because you seem to only know how to make shirts that are cut down to the belly button. I know you want to "draw the eye up" and "detract from the belly" and "accentuate the positive" but come on! Some of that stuff is downright inappropriate. And I can't tell you how sick I am of having to wear a stupid camisole under every single shirt I wear just so that I can be rated PG. The last thing a pregnant woman wants is to have to wear one more stinkin' article of clothing. For reals!
And why do so many maternity shirts seem to have tight elastic around the arms? Why? Why? WHY!!!???
And it should be against the law to make maternity shirts out of anything other than cotton blends.
"Where is this coming from?" you may be asking yourself. Well the other day, I went to find a shirt to wear and there was nothing for me to wear. NOTHING Every option was either too small, made of some horrid scratchy fabric, long sleeved, sleeveless, or required some sort of extra undershirt that I was completely unwilling to don. This led to a pretty pathetic session of crying on Jim's shoulder that I had nothing to wear. (Really, I need to get rid of those shirts I can't/won't wear because they're just depressing. Some of them were given to me when I was pregnant with Lily and I've NEVER worn them because they were ugly and scratchy then and still are today. And some of them I bought when I was first pregnant with Lily and weighed a fair amount less than I do now and have been too small since 2007.) About that time I realized that I was only halfway through the laundry and most of my wearable shirts were in a laundry basket ready to be hung up. So I bounded downstairs, found something wearable, and felt a little better. But the fact remained that I had very few short-sleeved casual cottony things to fit the later stages of pregnancy and a shopping trip was probably in order.
So yesterday I headed to the Spokane Valley Mall to the Motherhood store in search of some very specific articles of clothing.
1. Shorts. I can still (just barely) at this point fit into some of my non-pregnancy shorts, but I don't hold out much hope for May, June or July. And since I was pregnant with Lily during the winter, I have zero maternity shorts.
2. Shirts that are:
a. Made of comfortable soft material such as a cotton blend. No polyester allowed!
b. Not low cut, therefore not requiring any sort of undershirt
c. LONG enough
d. Short-sleeved
e. No tight elastic around the sleeves/arms
3. A bathing suit! I tried to put on my suit the other day to take Lily to the Kroc Center. Suffice to say it was comical.
And what did I get? Five shirts, three of which are those side-ruched t-shirts. Three pair of shorts; one denim, one khaki, and one dark brown khaki. And a bathing suit!! (And it's so cute ya'll are going to wish you were pregnant. But you're not! Ha ha ha ha ha!) I will be sure to point out any pictures of me in my new comfortable maternity clothes in the near future. Look out summer, here I come!!
Monday, March 29, 2010
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes!
And I'm not talking about changing diapers. In fact, starting today I've traded in my diaper-changing hat for a cleaning messes up off the carpet and emptying a potty seat hat. (Why do people potty train their children again?) I'm sure there are some more diapers in my future, but today marks the official kickoff of Potty Training. Woo hoo! (I thought about getting Hank Williams Jr. to sing a motivational song, but he was all booked up.) I am planning on washing my cloth diapers for the last time today and putting them away for Grace. I figure that if Lily only wears diapers at night and at naps, I'll either be doing some tiny loads of diaper laundry or waiting days to get a full load. I don't want to do either so I'm just going to go disposable from here on out. Anyway, Lilypie is still sleeping so I haven't started yet. I'll let you know how it goes...
The other big change in the Klein household is that Lily is no longer a crib-sleeper! Yup, Saturday night marked her first night in a "big girl bed." Her actual big girl bed is yet to be finished, but we wanted to ease her into it and started her off on a twin mattress on the floor. We found a mattress on Craigslist, but the lady who was selling it was Jewish and couldn't do business until after sunset on Saturday. So Jim headed out to get the mattress and timed it so that he would arrive just after the sun set. We were both excited for Lily to have her first night in her bed, and we thought we might want to have the first night be a weekend night so that if it went badly, we could at least try to sleep in or get a nap in the next day. So while Jim ran to Spokane for the mattress, Lily and I watched Hercules. In retrospect, I don't know if Hercules was the best choice for a right-before-bed movie; it was a little on the scary side for a two year old. Lily didn't seem to mind at the time, but it may have played a part in her waking up later. Anyway, when Jim got home, we put the bedding on the bed and then did our little bedtime routine and Lily went right to sleep. She did wake up a couple of times in the night, though. Once she woke up asking for a snack. I think she's going through a growth spurt and she's been doing this lately from time to time. The next time she woke up, she was saying "snakes!" which makes me think that maybe she was dreaming about Hercules. She woke up one more time, and Daddy couldn't resist taking his first chance to sleep with Lily in her new bed for a little while. I think she would have gone right back to sleep, but who doesn't want to cuddle with their squirmy little two year old? :) Last night was her second night in a big girl bed/mattress and she slept right through the night. She also did perfectly fine taking her nap on Sunday afternoon. I'm sure this road won't be without it's share of bumps in it, but at least it's starting out smoothly and without a struggle!
And lastly, I think I see a sewing project in my future. When we went to Philadelphia, I had to choose Lily's pants wardrobe very carefully since we were using disposable diapers for the trip. At home when Lily wears her cloth diapers, she can wear 2T pants. But without cloth diapers, her waist is far too skinny for 2T, but her legs are too long for 18month pants that fit in the waist. So now that she's going to be without diapers entirely, I know that she's either going to have to put on her high-waters or I'm going to have to take in all of her 2T pants a little bit.
Here is Lily's mattress-bed.
And her big girl bed is built, but needs to be sanded and stained and all of that kind of stuff. It's getting close!
Lily's new favorite thing is singing. She's always liked to hear singing, but she's never been interested in singing herself. In church when we sing, she sings right along... to the best of her ability. And when the song ends, she asks "Song is?" (as in 'where is the song?') Also, when I go in to get her in the morning or after naps, she's often serenading her stuffed animals. So here is a video from one of her last mornings in her crib.
The other big change in the Klein household is that Lily is no longer a crib-sleeper! Yup, Saturday night marked her first night in a "big girl bed." Her actual big girl bed is yet to be finished, but we wanted to ease her into it and started her off on a twin mattress on the floor. We found a mattress on Craigslist, but the lady who was selling it was Jewish and couldn't do business until after sunset on Saturday. So Jim headed out to get the mattress and timed it so that he would arrive just after the sun set. We were both excited for Lily to have her first night in her bed, and we thought we might want to have the first night be a weekend night so that if it went badly, we could at least try to sleep in or get a nap in the next day. So while Jim ran to Spokane for the mattress, Lily and I watched Hercules. In retrospect, I don't know if Hercules was the best choice for a right-before-bed movie; it was a little on the scary side for a two year old. Lily didn't seem to mind at the time, but it may have played a part in her waking up later. Anyway, when Jim got home, we put the bedding on the bed and then did our little bedtime routine and Lily went right to sleep. She did wake up a couple of times in the night, though. Once she woke up asking for a snack. I think she's going through a growth spurt and she's been doing this lately from time to time. The next time she woke up, she was saying "snakes!" which makes me think that maybe she was dreaming about Hercules. She woke up one more time, and Daddy couldn't resist taking his first chance to sleep with Lily in her new bed for a little while. I think she would have gone right back to sleep, but who doesn't want to cuddle with their squirmy little two year old? :) Last night was her second night in a big girl bed/mattress and she slept right through the night. She also did perfectly fine taking her nap on Sunday afternoon. I'm sure this road won't be without it's share of bumps in it, but at least it's starting out smoothly and without a struggle!
And lastly, I think I see a sewing project in my future. When we went to Philadelphia, I had to choose Lily's pants wardrobe very carefully since we were using disposable diapers for the trip. At home when Lily wears her cloth diapers, she can wear 2T pants. But without cloth diapers, her waist is far too skinny for 2T, but her legs are too long for 18month pants that fit in the waist. So now that she's going to be without diapers entirely, I know that she's either going to have to put on her high-waters or I'm going to have to take in all of her 2T pants a little bit.
Here is Lily's mattress-bed.
And her big girl bed is built, but needs to be sanded and stained and all of that kind of stuff. It's getting close!
Lily's new favorite thing is singing. She's always liked to hear singing, but she's never been interested in singing herself. In church when we sing, she sings right along... to the best of her ability. And when the song ends, she asks "Song is?" (as in 'where is the song?') Also, when I go in to get her in the morning or after naps, she's often serenading her stuffed animals. So here is a video from one of her last mornings in her crib.
Friday, March 26, 2010
Funny Story Friday
First potty training story, done! Well, we technically haven't started potty training yet, but who doesn't like a good bodily function story? I know I do!
Yesterday I went to Target and bought another potty chair to put upstairs. When we got Lily all naked and ready to take her bath, she wanted to sit on the potty, which she's done before so we let her have at it. She sat, got up, sat, got up, and sat again. For all the sitting she's done on the potty seat over the last few months, she's never once "done" anything, so we're ok with her just playing and familiarizing herself with the situation. Once the bath water was starting to get deep, though, we put Lily in the tub, and she started crying. We tried to figure out if the water was too hot, but it was the normal temperature. She was just screaming and saying, "Get out! Get out!" So we tried to figure out what the problem was, and she said, "Go potty! Sit on potty!" Well, like I said, Lily has never pottied on the potty, nor has she ever told us that she had to potty before she actually did the deed. But what she has done is thrown a fit whenever we make her stop doing something she's enjoying and make her do another thing. We figured this was just such an occasion, and that she just wanted to keep playing with the potty chair and didn't want to take a bath. So we put our foot down and started the whole speech about how it's bath time and not play time yadda yadda yadda, when suddenly Lily started tinkling in the tub! Well that's right about when we felt like the worst parents in the world for not listening to our daughter the first time she told us she had to go potty. So we drained the bathtub and praised her for telling us, and apologized for not listening, and ran new bath water. Well, she was all scrubbed up and into the playing phase of her bath and I decided to give Jim a neck rub. Well, as we're sitting there I notice that Lily has gotten really still, and then I notice.... two little turds floating in the tub!!!! Lily has NEVER pooped in the tub before, and now here she is on the eve of her potty training kickoff doing all the bodily functions she can possibly manage in fifteen minutes!
So I'm still a little undecided on the implications of these events. On one hand it could mean that she's not at all ready for potty training because she is free-wheeling with her bodily functions. But I like to think that she did tell us that she had to potty and just wasn't given the opportunity to do so, and that it means she is ready for potty training. Who knows. But either way, I think every parent will probably get a poop-in-the-tub story. And that was ours.
And for a special Funny Story Friday treat, here are some funny/cute pictures and a video.
There was some debate as to whether M&M's would be an appropriate reward for Lily's pottying endeavors. All I have to say is, "With a name like NumNumNum's, it has to be good!"
Lily got a box from Gaga and Geezer today. She's pretty excited!
Bunny ears, an apron, and play dough! You shouldn't have!
Thanks Gaga and Geezer!
Tonight is Girls' Night! Katrina's sister is in town for the week and in her honor we're having a girls night and eating (probably) pizza and watching "Twilight" and "New Moon." So I made Werewolf Cupcakes for the occasion (Go Team Jacob!). I know the "fangs" look more like a fu manchu, but my frosting was a little on the warm side :) Anyway, I'm going to be watching to make sure nobody turns this picture into Cake Wrecks!! :)
Yesterday I went to Target and bought another potty chair to put upstairs. When we got Lily all naked and ready to take her bath, she wanted to sit on the potty, which she's done before so we let her have at it. She sat, got up, sat, got up, and sat again. For all the sitting she's done on the potty seat over the last few months, she's never once "done" anything, so we're ok with her just playing and familiarizing herself with the situation. Once the bath water was starting to get deep, though, we put Lily in the tub, and she started crying. We tried to figure out if the water was too hot, but it was the normal temperature. She was just screaming and saying, "Get out! Get out!" So we tried to figure out what the problem was, and she said, "Go potty! Sit on potty!" Well, like I said, Lily has never pottied on the potty, nor has she ever told us that she had to potty before she actually did the deed. But what she has done is thrown a fit whenever we make her stop doing something she's enjoying and make her do another thing. We figured this was just such an occasion, and that she just wanted to keep playing with the potty chair and didn't want to take a bath. So we put our foot down and started the whole speech about how it's bath time and not play time yadda yadda yadda, when suddenly Lily started tinkling in the tub! Well that's right about when we felt like the worst parents in the world for not listening to our daughter the first time she told us she had to go potty. So we drained the bathtub and praised her for telling us, and apologized for not listening, and ran new bath water. Well, she was all scrubbed up and into the playing phase of her bath and I decided to give Jim a neck rub. Well, as we're sitting there I notice that Lily has gotten really still, and then I notice.... two little turds floating in the tub!!!! Lily has NEVER pooped in the tub before, and now here she is on the eve of her potty training kickoff doing all the bodily functions she can possibly manage in fifteen minutes!
So I'm still a little undecided on the implications of these events. On one hand it could mean that she's not at all ready for potty training because she is free-wheeling with her bodily functions. But I like to think that she did tell us that she had to potty and just wasn't given the opportunity to do so, and that it means she is ready for potty training. Who knows. But either way, I think every parent will probably get a poop-in-the-tub story. And that was ours.
And for a special Funny Story Friday treat, here are some funny/cute pictures and a video.
There was some debate as to whether M&M's would be an appropriate reward for Lily's pottying endeavors. All I have to say is, "With a name like NumNumNum's, it has to be good!"
Lily got a box from Gaga and Geezer today. She's pretty excited!
Bunny ears, an apron, and play dough! You shouldn't have!
Thanks Gaga and Geezer!
Tonight is Girls' Night! Katrina's sister is in town for the week and in her honor we're having a girls night and eating (probably) pizza and watching "Twilight" and "New Moon." So I made Werewolf Cupcakes for the occasion (Go Team Jacob!). I know the "fangs" look more like a fu manchu, but my frosting was a little on the warm side :) Anyway, I'm going to be watching to make sure nobody turns this picture into Cake Wrecks!! :)
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Potty Training!
Next week is the big week! I haven't yet decided how I'm going to do it, but since it's Spring Break at CCS and I can stay at home and not leave the house for a couple of days, I'm going to bite the bullet and potty train Lily.
I've looked online to find some advice for potty training, and I have to say that a lot of the advice people give is not useful at all. Their advice will be things like:
Step 1-Make sure your child is ready
Step 2-Make sure you're prepared
Step 3-Be patient
Step 4-Expect setbacks
Step 5-If it doesn't work the first time you try, wait a few months and try again
What? What kind of steps are those? I can do all of those steps in my head while Lily is taking a nap. I want to know HOW TO DO IT. Do you go cold turkey on the diapers? Do you give them potty treats? Do you use Pull-Ups? My question is "What are the actual physical steps you take to potty train a child?", and not "How do I get all geared up for it?"
Actually, I looked again today, being more specific with my Googling and found some good advice. I also found some perfectly opposite advice. One site said "Do it matter-of-factly. Don't over-praise them, just act like sitting on the potty every 20 minutes is what is expected of them." The other site said, "Make a HUGE deal of it when they sit there and when they potty!" Some sites said to work it into your routine, and others said to take two days (or a week) off and do nothing but potty train. Here is my plan of attack:
1. Go to Target and get a book about potty training, another low-to-the ground potty chair, (we have the kind you can set atop the toilet, but Lily can't get up there by herself... I'll move the portable one to her diaper bag for out-of-the house pottying), some Pull-Ups (just in case I decide to go that direction), some undies of Lily's choice (I've scoped it out and they have Fancy Nancy and Sesame Street and Dora undies, so I'm sure Lily will find something she likes), and a bag of M&M's.
2. Over the weekend I'll talk to Lily about using the potty and we'll read the book and talk about how you only get an M&M if you go in the potty.
3. Starting Monday Lily is going bottomless. I can't decide if I'll do undies or nothing at all on her bottom, but I've heard from other moms and from some of these websites that going bottomless works better than Pull-Ups because they can still soil themselves guilt-free in Pull-Ups. But I'll have the Pull-Ups on hand for when we leave the house for the first few weeks post-potty training.
4. Put Lily on the pot every 20 minutes. I'll probably have to set a timer. When it dings, you go sit on the pot. If you potty in the potty, you get an M&M. I should also buy some more Spot Shot I think. :)
And that's how it will go. The website I read said that this should take 2 days. Mothers I've talked to says it takes about a week. Of course we'll still do diapers at night. Anyway, I may or may not take your advice, but feel free to give it if you have any :)
In other news, Steve and Linda made their great escape back to Connecticut early this morning. We had a great time visiting with them, and I know that Lily loves seeing her grandparents. We call them "Grandma Linda and Grandpa Steve" but Lily calls them "Lala and Grandpa Steve" or sometimes just "Steve" which is hilarious. Last night I was having her give them hugs and kisses goodnight/goodbye and I had her give Lala a hug and kiss and told her to say, "I love you Lala" (which she did) and then she immediately turned and pointed at Grandpa and said, "Steve!" But don't worry, she calls Daddy "Jim" sometimes too. :) Lily is also making leaps and bounds putting sentences together. Yesterday we went out looking for some ladybug hair clips (with no success) but Lala found a fun puzzle that she got for Lily. It's a wooden puzzle with fishes and each fish has a magnet, then there's a magnetic fishing pole so you can fish for the puzzle pieces. Cute! So when we got home and I was changing Lily's diaper, I coached her to thank Grandma Lala, and when we went downstairs I said, "Lily, tell Lala what you wanted to say." And she said, "Thanks much Gamma Lala fishy puzz-oo." It was adorable. (And who needs little words like "for" and "the" anyway?) I also like that she's started saying "Thank you" of her own accord sometimes. And when she does say it, she usually says "thanks much" which is totally her own creation because I never told her to say it that way. She's just speaking from her heart! Anyway, we hope Lala and Steve had as much fun as we did. We hope to see you again soon!
I've looked online to find some advice for potty training, and I have to say that a lot of the advice people give is not useful at all. Their advice will be things like:
Step 1-Make sure your child is ready
Step 2-Make sure you're prepared
Step 3-Be patient
Step 4-Expect setbacks
Step 5-If it doesn't work the first time you try, wait a few months and try again
What? What kind of steps are those? I can do all of those steps in my head while Lily is taking a nap. I want to know HOW TO DO IT. Do you go cold turkey on the diapers? Do you give them potty treats? Do you use Pull-Ups? My question is "What are the actual physical steps you take to potty train a child?", and not "How do I get all geared up for it?"
Actually, I looked again today, being more specific with my Googling and found some good advice. I also found some perfectly opposite advice. One site said "Do it matter-of-factly. Don't over-praise them, just act like sitting on the potty every 20 minutes is what is expected of them." The other site said, "Make a HUGE deal of it when they sit there and when they potty!" Some sites said to work it into your routine, and others said to take two days (or a week) off and do nothing but potty train. Here is my plan of attack:
1. Go to Target and get a book about potty training, another low-to-the ground potty chair, (we have the kind you can set atop the toilet, but Lily can't get up there by herself... I'll move the portable one to her diaper bag for out-of-the house pottying), some Pull-Ups (just in case I decide to go that direction), some undies of Lily's choice (I've scoped it out and they have Fancy Nancy and Sesame Street and Dora undies, so I'm sure Lily will find something she likes), and a bag of M&M's.
2. Over the weekend I'll talk to Lily about using the potty and we'll read the book and talk about how you only get an M&M if you go in the potty.
3. Starting Monday Lily is going bottomless. I can't decide if I'll do undies or nothing at all on her bottom, but I've heard from other moms and from some of these websites that going bottomless works better than Pull-Ups because they can still soil themselves guilt-free in Pull-Ups. But I'll have the Pull-Ups on hand for when we leave the house for the first few weeks post-potty training.
4. Put Lily on the pot every 20 minutes. I'll probably have to set a timer. When it dings, you go sit on the pot. If you potty in the potty, you get an M&M. I should also buy some more Spot Shot I think. :)
And that's how it will go. The website I read said that this should take 2 days. Mothers I've talked to says it takes about a week. Of course we'll still do diapers at night. Anyway, I may or may not take your advice, but feel free to give it if you have any :)
In other news, Steve and Linda made their great escape back to Connecticut early this morning. We had a great time visiting with them, and I know that Lily loves seeing her grandparents. We call them "Grandma Linda and Grandpa Steve" but Lily calls them "Lala and Grandpa Steve" or sometimes just "Steve" which is hilarious. Last night I was having her give them hugs and kisses goodnight/goodbye and I had her give Lala a hug and kiss and told her to say, "I love you Lala" (which she did) and then she immediately turned and pointed at Grandpa and said, "Steve!" But don't worry, she calls Daddy "Jim" sometimes too. :) Lily is also making leaps and bounds putting sentences together. Yesterday we went out looking for some ladybug hair clips (with no success) but Lala found a fun puzzle that she got for Lily. It's a wooden puzzle with fishes and each fish has a magnet, then there's a magnetic fishing pole so you can fish for the puzzle pieces. Cute! So when we got home and I was changing Lily's diaper, I coached her to thank Grandma Lala, and when we went downstairs I said, "Lily, tell Lala what you wanted to say." And she said, "Thanks much Gamma Lala fishy puzz-oo." It was adorable. (And who needs little words like "for" and "the" anyway?) I also like that she's started saying "Thank you" of her own accord sometimes. And when she does say it, she usually says "thanks much" which is totally her own creation because I never told her to say it that way. She's just speaking from her heart! Anyway, we hope Lala and Steve had as much fun as we did. We hope to see you again soon!
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Birthday Extravaganza!!!
WARNING: This post contains A LOT of pictures. If you are not a grandmother, proceed with caution!
Yesterday our little Lilypie turned TWO! I can't believe how these last two years have flown by! It seems like just yesterday we were celebrating her first birthday, and the day before that she was born. Time really flies!
To celebrate Lily's birthday we threw a party and invited about 20 of her closest friends. We ate pizza and cupcakes, played games, and opened gifts. We were all crowded into our smallish middle level and it was absolute craziness. First of all, it was a princess theme so I decided to get some tiaras and wands for the little girls. Then I had to think about what to get the boys that wouldn't be girly. Well, swords of course! What prince doesn't have a sword? So upon entering our house, every child was armed with either a wand or a sword, or in most cases, both. Then we ate pizza. (I totally forgot to put out the cheese tray and veggie tray that I had planned on and prepared. So Jim brought them to work today.) Then we painted cupcakes! My friend, Jen, found these cupcake painting kits on sale a while back and gave them to me to use for Lily's birthday. You frost the cupcake and then put on an edible decal, and then use edible paint to paint the picture. It was really cool looking and the kids enjoyed it, but the frosting looked pretty gross. Luckily I had made "real" cupcakes for the more discerning palate. :) Then we played two games; a cake walk type game (except it was a toy walk), and pin the crown on the princess. Then we opened gifts. Boy, what a change from last year! Lily was going nuts ripping through her gifts. It was a whirlwind frenzy of wrapping paper and kids and swords and toys flying here and there. After that we just let the kids play until everyone decided to leave. And then we crashed. Anyway, I have so many pictures that I should stop typing here and you can just read about it as you go along.
Happy Birthday Lily, we LOVE you!!!!
I figured I should hurry and take a picture of Lily with her hair done before it got all messy.
Lily playing with a piece of streamer.
She's excited for her birthday! So excited that she is too fast for conventional cameras.
Playing with her balloon.
When I busted out the wands and swords and crowns, Lily was in heaven... and there went her hair. :)
Right before I took this picture, she said, "fighting!"
The decorations...
More decorations...
More decorations...
The cupcake towers. Thanks Kathy Taylor and Linda Bruner for loaning me your cupcake stands!!
Lily and Owen hanging out.
Lily and Mommy waiting for the party to start.
Jim, Lily, and Paul. Pretty, pretty princesses. :)
We had to bend Gisele's crown to get it to fit her little bitty head. But look how cute she turned out!
Lily chowing down on pizza.
These were the paintable cupcakes. They looked like a lot of fun. And here I have to give a shout out to all the moms who helped me with this. Some of them even didn't have their own kids at the party (Kara and Linda) but they jumped right in and frosted whatever needed to be frosted and handed out and applied decals and paints and brushes and cups of water. They were all super troopers! (Well, technically Linda's own kid was at the party, but he wasn't painting a cupcake... his daughter wouldn't allow it.)
I was running around taking pictures and helping out kids, but Jim said that Lily would not let him help one bit. "Lily do it self!"
Decorating/Eating the cupcakes.
Chay was happy with her cupcake and went back to munching on pizza.
Lily did a great job blowing out her own candles!
Mmmmm.... pink frosting!
Pretty yummy, there mom!
After finishing the frosting, Lily made it only a couple of bites into the actual cupcake before she was done.
Jesse showing of his frosting face as well as his FIVE missing teeth.
I don't want to get my dirty hands on my cup!
This was the cake (toy) walk.
Mylea won the "pin the crown on the princess" game. It was kind of a terrible game because there was no outline of where the crown was supposed to go. So we had to get some impartial judges to determine the winner.
The presents begin! First, a crazy flower sprinkler from the Harlans. This is sure to create some great summer fun!
Elijah and Owen got Lily a felt CareBear coloring board. She is going to LOVE this.
The Magnadoodle (it's not that brand, but I don't know what else to call it) is from Jeff and Kara. Jeff, who will be the new youth minister at our church starting in May, and his wife Kara were up from Carlsbad, NM for the weekend for our youth rally and to house hunt. How sweet of them to bring a gift for Lily, and a great one at that!
It's the simple things in life. Jen and Gisele got Lily a sandcastle "kit" with a pinwheel to go on top. Lily adores the pinwheel.
The sandcastle bucket.
One of the gifts from Gramby and Geezer was a sock monkey. It was love at first sight.
Nuanna and Chayana got Lily this great Melissa and Doug cookie set.
This picture epitomizes the gift opening process last night. You see how Lily has barely opened the car keys from Bob and Holly when she is mentally (and somewhat physically) onto the next thing. I'm telling you, it was a whirlwind!
A fun toy remote also from Bob and Holly.
Lily ripping into the tricycle from Gramby and Geezer.
Despite her deer in the headlights look, she loved it. Notice how the children are closing in, as if for the kill...
This one was fun to open. She took a big chunk of paper and tore the whole thing open.
It's a train set from Grandma Linda and Grandpa Steve!! We'll probably have to wait until we rearrange some furniture to set up the table part, but Lily loves trains, so this one will be fantastic.
Lily and Katrina blowing on her pinwheel. *Somehow I managed to miss getting a picture of the gift from the Swaims, but they got her these awesome magnetic books with all these different eyes and noses and mouths that you can swap around. Lily loves magnets, and they'll be a GREAT quiet church toy!
Jen and Gisele. She's getting so big! (Gisele, I mean.)
The Happy Klein Princess Family.
After everyone left, I remembered that I'd forgotten to give her a book that I had upstairs. So here are Lily and Grandpa Steve reading Little Miss Birthday.
Steve and Jim got the trike put together while I played with all of Lily's other new toys.
The next morning, Lily enjoyed playing with all of her new toys. This Magnadoodle type thing was a favorite.
These Melissa and Doug cookies were awesome. They have Velcro to keep them together or on the cookie sheet. Then you can "cut" them apart and decorate them. Lily has been playing with them all day today.
In this video, you can see how cool the cookies and the Magnadoodle are. Also, at the very end Lily is scribbling and she makes a design that looks like the letter "P" and she says "P!" As you will see, I was amazed.
Lily trying out her new tricycle.
Here is Lily pedaling her trike outside for the first time. She gets a couple of pedals in, but I think it will be a while before she can really ride it on her own.
Just yesterday one of my friends asked me if Lily has "goofy smile" yet. You know, like when you ask her to smile and she makes some kind of weird face that she thinks is a smile, but is really just a weird face. I said that no, no she didn't. And then the next day she pulled this one out when I told her to smile. Sigh.
Ah much better :)
When Lily got tired of riding on her trike, she ran around like a crazy person.
Yesterday our little Lilypie turned TWO! I can't believe how these last two years have flown by! It seems like just yesterday we were celebrating her first birthday, and the day before that she was born. Time really flies!
To celebrate Lily's birthday we threw a party and invited about 20 of her closest friends. We ate pizza and cupcakes, played games, and opened gifts. We were all crowded into our smallish middle level and it was absolute craziness. First of all, it was a princess theme so I decided to get some tiaras and wands for the little girls. Then I had to think about what to get the boys that wouldn't be girly. Well, swords of course! What prince doesn't have a sword? So upon entering our house, every child was armed with either a wand or a sword, or in most cases, both. Then we ate pizza. (I totally forgot to put out the cheese tray and veggie tray that I had planned on and prepared. So Jim brought them to work today.) Then we painted cupcakes! My friend, Jen, found these cupcake painting kits on sale a while back and gave them to me to use for Lily's birthday. You frost the cupcake and then put on an edible decal, and then use edible paint to paint the picture. It was really cool looking and the kids enjoyed it, but the frosting looked pretty gross. Luckily I had made "real" cupcakes for the more discerning palate. :) Then we played two games; a cake walk type game (except it was a toy walk), and pin the crown on the princess. Then we opened gifts. Boy, what a change from last year! Lily was going nuts ripping through her gifts. It was a whirlwind frenzy of wrapping paper and kids and swords and toys flying here and there. After that we just let the kids play until everyone decided to leave. And then we crashed. Anyway, I have so many pictures that I should stop typing here and you can just read about it as you go along.
Happy Birthday Lily, we LOVE you!!!!
I figured I should hurry and take a picture of Lily with her hair done before it got all messy.
Lily playing with a piece of streamer.
She's excited for her birthday! So excited that she is too fast for conventional cameras.
Playing with her balloon.
When I busted out the wands and swords and crowns, Lily was in heaven... and there went her hair. :)
Right before I took this picture, she said, "fighting!"
The decorations...
More decorations...
More decorations...
The cupcake towers. Thanks Kathy Taylor and Linda Bruner for loaning me your cupcake stands!!
Lily and Owen hanging out.
Lily and Mommy waiting for the party to start.
Jim, Lily, and Paul. Pretty, pretty princesses. :)
We had to bend Gisele's crown to get it to fit her little bitty head. But look how cute she turned out!
Lily chowing down on pizza.
These were the paintable cupcakes. They looked like a lot of fun. And here I have to give a shout out to all the moms who helped me with this. Some of them even didn't have their own kids at the party (Kara and Linda) but they jumped right in and frosted whatever needed to be frosted and handed out and applied decals and paints and brushes and cups of water. They were all super troopers! (Well, technically Linda's own kid was at the party, but he wasn't painting a cupcake... his daughter wouldn't allow it.)
I was running around taking pictures and helping out kids, but Jim said that Lily would not let him help one bit. "Lily do it self!"
Decorating/Eating the cupcakes.
Chay was happy with her cupcake and went back to munching on pizza.
Lily did a great job blowing out her own candles!
Mmmmm.... pink frosting!
Pretty yummy, there mom!
After finishing the frosting, Lily made it only a couple of bites into the actual cupcake before she was done.
Jesse showing of his frosting face as well as his FIVE missing teeth.
I don't want to get my dirty hands on my cup!
This was the cake (toy) walk.
Mylea won the "pin the crown on the princess" game. It was kind of a terrible game because there was no outline of where the crown was supposed to go. So we had to get some impartial judges to determine the winner.
The presents begin! First, a crazy flower sprinkler from the Harlans. This is sure to create some great summer fun!
Elijah and Owen got Lily a felt CareBear coloring board. She is going to LOVE this.
The Magnadoodle (it's not that brand, but I don't know what else to call it) is from Jeff and Kara. Jeff, who will be the new youth minister at our church starting in May, and his wife Kara were up from Carlsbad, NM for the weekend for our youth rally and to house hunt. How sweet of them to bring a gift for Lily, and a great one at that!
It's the simple things in life. Jen and Gisele got Lily a sandcastle "kit" with a pinwheel to go on top. Lily adores the pinwheel.
The sandcastle bucket.
One of the gifts from Gramby and Geezer was a sock monkey. It was love at first sight.
Nuanna and Chayana got Lily this great Melissa and Doug cookie set.
This picture epitomizes the gift opening process last night. You see how Lily has barely opened the car keys from Bob and Holly when she is mentally (and somewhat physically) onto the next thing. I'm telling you, it was a whirlwind!
A fun toy remote also from Bob and Holly.
Lily ripping into the tricycle from Gramby and Geezer.
Despite her deer in the headlights look, she loved it. Notice how the children are closing in, as if for the kill...
This one was fun to open. She took a big chunk of paper and tore the whole thing open.
It's a train set from Grandma Linda and Grandpa Steve!! We'll probably have to wait until we rearrange some furniture to set up the table part, but Lily loves trains, so this one will be fantastic.
Lily and Katrina blowing on her pinwheel. *Somehow I managed to miss getting a picture of the gift from the Swaims, but they got her these awesome magnetic books with all these different eyes and noses and mouths that you can swap around. Lily loves magnets, and they'll be a GREAT quiet church toy!
Jen and Gisele. She's getting so big! (Gisele, I mean.)
The Happy Klein Princess Family.
After everyone left, I remembered that I'd forgotten to give her a book that I had upstairs. So here are Lily and Grandpa Steve reading Little Miss Birthday.
Steve and Jim got the trike put together while I played with all of Lily's other new toys.
The next morning, Lily enjoyed playing with all of her new toys. This Magnadoodle type thing was a favorite.
These Melissa and Doug cookies were awesome. They have Velcro to keep them together or on the cookie sheet. Then you can "cut" them apart and decorate them. Lily has been playing with them all day today.
In this video, you can see how cool the cookies and the Magnadoodle are. Also, at the very end Lily is scribbling and she makes a design that looks like the letter "P" and she says "P!" As you will see, I was amazed.Lily trying out her new tricycle.
Here is Lily pedaling her trike outside for the first time. She gets a couple of pedals in, but I think it will be a while before she can really ride it on her own.Just yesterday one of my friends asked me if Lily has "goofy smile" yet. You know, like when you ask her to smile and she makes some kind of weird face that she thinks is a smile, but is really just a weird face. I said that no, no she didn't. And then the next day she pulled this one out when I told her to smile. Sigh.
Ah much better :)
When Lily got tired of riding on her trike, she ran around like a crazy person.
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