Suns Out Buns Out...10 Things I've Learned About Potty Training

Hello again! H here and just wanted to share some interesting facts I have learned about potty training while working with L & B. Definitely a 2 steps forward 1 step back process! Huge shout out to the kids' daycare who have been allowing us to send those little walking messes to school in underwear from day 1. They deserve 90% of the credit for our successes (I think that you know where the failures probably lie).

Be forewarned....there will be lots of references to #1 and #2. This will not be a sophisticated, well-vocabed post. The word poop is used 47 times. Not for the faint of stomach. Turn back now if needed! 

Here it is!

1. Boys will be boys.... these days I can't turn my back for 10 seconds without turning back to discover L 'watering the lawn'. Seems great, until you are in a park along side a highway. I just stood in a strategic spot that shielded him from as much traffic as possible. "Oh, hi neighbors!"

2. I estimate 78% of my at home time is now spent in a bathroom. I have taken to multitasking so if you receive a text from me, I just might be sitting on a stool waiting for the 'magic' to happen (who knows...I could be in a bathroom right now.....). This leads me to #3.

3. Apparently going to the bathroom is a group activity. I think my kids must follow the tree-falls-in-the-woods philosophy, if I'm not there to see it, then it doesn't exist. Never been so excited to see a 'log' drop in my life. "Mom, get in here!"

4. Little boy tip: sit them backwards on a grown up sized toilet...this has saved me an estimate of 387 hours of clean up time.


5. My kids lie.... "Did you poop?"  "No." "Then what is that laying on the ground?"  

6. Bathtub peeing is the best. L purposely holds it so he can pee in the bathtub. Gross? Yes. Do I allow it? Hey, I never claimed I was going for a mom of the year award. In my defense I do remind him 'Just don't pee on your brother'. That's got to count for something.


7. Bathtub pooping is NOT the best. Luckily this very rarely happens in my house. But, a couple days ago B was taking a shower and I noticed 'something' clogging the drain. I said, "Oh no, is that poop?" He notices it, screams, and runs to the other end of the tub. Um, why the surprise? You made it. #doody!  (This is the 2nd time I've told a story like this on this blog...I hope you are impressed with the maturity of content I am providing you.)


8. They lie (did I mention that already?). Do not believe them when they say "But I'm potty trained, I can wear undies to bed" and than pee in your brand new bed that you don't even have a liner for yet. Not that I'm bitter.  


9. Buy LOTS of undies!!!! We are constantly on the last pair, it's like they can sense it "there are more clean underwear in this house, I must pee in it!"  Also, I got each boy a clearly different style and that helps a TON when sorting laundry.

10.Which reminds me.... Laundry. Minimum one load per day...minimum. And I'm ignoring the fact that almost all of my clothes have now been washed with pee or poop. Well, I was ignoring it and now I'm thinking about it. I might have to go shopping. For cleanliness purposes only of course. When does my next Stitchfix arrive?


Well people, there you have my 10 totally useless tips on potty training. When you see me next you can thank me, hope I'm wearing new clothes, or notice I am strategically blocking a bare butt.

Denver Trip

Mr. M and I just got back from a fantastic trip to Denver filled with sights, drinks, friends and laughs. I wish I could take credit for the planning but had a lot of help from a friend of ours who I have discovered is my traveling kindred spirit =)

*Since I’m not sure how my friends feel about their lives being posted on the internet I will keep the pictures and stories vague (to protect those who may have eaten 2 gallons of ice cream, had a small slip on the dance floor, ordered Canadian bacon pizza, ruined a chipmunks life, forgot to scoop a dog poop, or other such random non-specific examples).

 

Wednesday:

3:30am 3:45am Leave for the airport

5:13am Arrive exactly 2 minutes before they stopped taking checked bags. Whoops!

7:00am Greeted with hugs, donut holes, and a ride from one of my bestest of friends who drove an hour to pick us up at the airport on her birthday….did I mention she is one of the bestest? 

10:00am Mr. M and I enjoyed a delicious breakfast at Over Easy and both discovered new favorite drinks.

Fresh lemon, Colorado honey, and Cucumber--three of my favorite things!

11:30am Hike the Seven Bridges Trail in Colorado Springs

Shady and beautiful, perfect for an August day

2:00pm Much needed drinks (heavily caffeinated for this girl!) and lunch at Brother Luck’s 

3:30pm Mr. M naps while I catch up with said bestest friend

7:00pm Birthday dinner at a restaurant that happened to be hosting a Trivia Night. This involved several rowdy debates I.E., Which country has the 5^th largest land mass in the world and takes up a little over half of its continent? Hint: it’s not Canada (I will never let Mr. M live that down)

 

Thursday:

9:00am No one woke me up because they had to go potty (or already did), wanted watermelon, or threw their binky out of the crib = heaven!

11:00am Hit the road

11:25am Stopped so I could pee (sorry!) at Krispy Kreme..Spent 5 minutes watching the donut conveyer belt

1:00pm Arrived at Ameristar Hotel in Black Hawk, did some sightseeing in Central City, Mr. M eats $7.99 Prime Rib and we drink $3 beers—love the prices here! Waitress gives us the senior discount—I try not to be offended

2:00pm Meet up with some more friends and proceed to drink, gamble, and laugh WAY too much. (Note to self: ‘Let’s just split a bottle of wine at dinner’=NOT a good idea)

11:07pm Discover pool closes at 11:00pm

 

Friday:

6:30am Drink 24 glasses of water and head up to pool on the 36^th floor—gorgeous view!

9:45am Set out with Starbucks in hand on our way to Fort Collins

10:15am Wonder aloud whose idea it was to drive a windy mountain road after a late night in the casino (turns out it was mine…)

Driving through a mountain

 

11:00am Meet MORE friends at Smokin Dave’s BBQ in Estes Park. Yum!

12:30pm Stop for ice cream…spend 5 minutes watching the dry ice ice cream maker

Note the 2 galloon tub of ice cream in the forefront of the photo-PROOF!

5:30pm 6:30pm 5:30pm Shuttle to wedding arrives to give us a ride…long story involving road construction, getting lost, and holding up the ceremony…but I won’t get into that!

7:00pm Dance and laugh the night away with great friends at a terrific wedding

 

Saturday:

11:00am Crash romantic bride and groom brunch at Fort Collins Brewery. Stop at Odell Brewing Company and even get a private tour of New Belgium from the new Mr. and Mrs.!

Just what the doctor ordered!

4:00pm Head back to Denver, Mr. M buys grossest looking burrito at super shady gas station (I feel like that should be documented incase he gets food poisoning or something)

6:00pm Relax at hotel, watch Pitch Perfect (NOT Sports Center) and pack for the way home

 

Sunday:

3:30am Shuttle to the airport

9:00am Land

12:00pm Home to squeeze the world’s cutest little men!!!

They wanted to feed this small bale to the chickens #chickenlovers #justlikegrandpaQ

 

H's race day recap--a very different story....

In honor of D's beautiful pre and post-MedCity recaps I thought I would walk you through a couple weeks ago when the kiddos and I ran the Cresco 10k. First just want to give a big shout out to the CFC for putting together a really well organized and fun race...also thank you for the photo documentation!

7:00am Decide to run the 10k 

7:30am Arrive to register with enough snacks and toys in the stroller to camp for a week. As soon as we pull in L (freshly potty trained) announces 'I Poot', which means we need to get to a bathroom ASAP. Everyone knows how important the pre-race 'Poot' is so I'm pretty impressed that L has mastered that skill so early in his running career.

7:40am The kids are out of the stroller running around like wild animals. Everyone comments on how cute they are while discretely moving away.

7:59am They announce the race will start in one minute. The race hasn't even started and I am sweating profusely from wrangling the kids into the stroller. Everyone is fortified with drinks, snacks, books, and stuffed animals--the stroller is getting a little crowded.

8:00am The race begins! WOW these kids are heavy.

We're off!!!

Mile 1: L plows through his entire supply of cherrios, starts trying to steal B's, first fight ensues.

Mile 2: I THOUGHT IOWA WAS FLAT--I was wrong.

Realize that B's binky was dropped sometime in mile 1--he is inconsoleable, also L won't stop touching him.

Mile 3: Pull out emergency back-up snacks for L, he eats half the container, says yucky and throws the rest at B.

Turnaround! Hurray!!!!!! I am smiling--both children are crying: L is mad we aren't going to grandma's house, B is still mourning the binky. 

'He's touching me!'

Mile 4: A raceday attendent brings us the binky on a Gator--apparently they could hear the crying at the mile 2 waterstop. L and I recite 'Little Blue Truck' from memory.

Mile 5: I start walking up the hills when I realize it has no effect on my pace..... L sings us Mary Has a Little Lamb which puts B to sleep.

Mile 6: L has to pee--we are on a trail on the side of a busy highway.... we go up into someone's yard and pee behind a bush, better him than me! L notices B is asleep so starts poking him until he wakes up and cries. A bout of 'he's touching me' ensues. Just as this happens, the 15k runners are passing us...super morale booster! 

Finish: We finished! I didn't even look at our time because I'm sure it was terrible, but who cares! We did it and it was an adventure. 

Post Race: The boys are ravenous (as if they hadn't just eaten enough snacks to feed a football team during the run). B sticks a half banana in his mouth whole, wipes what doesn't fit on my leg. L keeps trying to raid the snack table for more 'nacks'. B is throwing an apple all over because he thinks it is a ball. I guess we can have applesauce when he is done? I take this as our cue to leave...I'm pretty sure they won't be calling our names at the awards ceremony anyway =)

 

Chowing down bananas

B was super thirsty from his hard work

 

Where are they now? My kids...

 

Do you ever see those cute little monthly updates that other moms do with their children? 

John

10 months, 1 hour, 54 minutes

Fun fact: Crawling everywhere!

Favorite food:  Bananas

Favorite activity: Reading books

I am in awe that people can be that put together! When L was a baby I tried to take a picture on his monthly birthday. Just any old picture not even with a cute sign or shirt—just on that day.  I failed about month 2 and his 5 month and 6 month pictures are about 3 days apart. With B I didn’t even try. #2ndchildproblems Sorry kids! You will not know how you grew in perfect one month increments.  Who am I kidding, your photo books probably won’t even be in the right order.

However, I have been thinking of some pretty creative (and true) statements I could say about these little men that will probably horrify them at their graduation; which, lets be honest, is basically the whole reason you take photos (or is that just me?).

 

B

8(ish) months old

Fun Fact: Loves to be growled at. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve found myself saying, “L, go roar at your brother so he stops crying”.

Favorite food: Monkey

Favorite activity: Gnawing

 

Gnawing on his monkey--he's in heaven!

 

 

L

22(ish) months old

Fun Fact: Loves deodorant. We find him hiding all over the house putting it on his hair and once I caught him biting it—don’t worry I'm still using the stick with the bite marks.

Favorite food: Deodorant (see above)

Favorite activity: Stuffing toilet paper down my legs while I’m trying to pee.

 

Yum!

 

There may be another update like this in a month, maybe six, maybe never. So L may never know when Deodorant stops being his favorite food.... I just hope we aren't serving it at his graduation party.

Next week: let's organize something!

Perma-nesting

There are few things that I enjoy more than organizing, it's like I am in permanent 'nesting' mode. This became a real problem when I was actually nesting...but that's for another post.

I can't get enough of list making, re-arranging, and timelines/timetables/calendars.

Isn't there something about making a list or calendar that makes you feel like you are on top of things? Is it just me? I think it is similar to 'pinning' a workout on Pinterest...you may not have actually done anything but you feel a real sense of accomplishment.

Some would say it is a problem (J), but in her defense, I once told her that I was so excited that I was completely overwhelmed because I've got to make like 20 different lists to deal with it.

I should clarify: I have a love for organizing, NOT cleaning.

Here is the difference:

Organizing--Putting up a family calendar complete with

1. A monthly calendar-color coded for each family member

2. A daily calendar divided into columns for morning, afternoon, evening, and babysitting plans for the boys if necessary

3. A 'To Do' List ; and as if that weren't enough

4. Pockets with the To Do list items broken out into a more detailed 'To Do' list.

(Thank you Thirty One https://www.mythirtyone.com/441495/)

Color coded calendar

Family calendar=list-making heaven

Cleaning--While attempting a workout yesterday, I almost impaled my foot on a piece of pretzel on the living room floor. After that, every time they told me to 'focus' all I could focus on was how I should really be vacuuming. This got really distracting when I was doing pushups and felt like I was about to fall open mouthed onto the dirty old pretzel. How's that for motivation! Let this be a lesson--working out only leads to more work! That will teach me.

Update: I still haven't vacuumed, BUT I did pick up the piece of pretzel: mostly because L spotted it with a hungry look in his eye and I prefer he only eats food off the floor that he throws off his highchair thank-you-very-much.

The culprit

My workout partner-not very motivating, but pretty cute!

Well, I better be off, I have a vacuum to locate.

Lenten Tales--I hope that is how you spell Lenten!

H

So I know last week I promised a week of B's life...but I have discovered that it would be a very short post:

1. Sleeps--I could post countless photos of this, here are a few



tummy time sleeping

pack'n'play sleeping

outdoor sleeping

2. Eats--No photo available--this is not that type of website!

3. Diaper changes--I'll will also spare you the photos of this...just know that we are emptying our diaper genie once a day between L and B and I often fight the urge to sing the 'Smelly Cat' song from Friends. Seriously though, WHAT has L been eating?



Looking innocent--don't be fooled!

So instead, with Easter being this last weekend, I decided to write a couple of silly stories involving some family Lent-related moral dilemmas. I feel that its necessary to preclude this story with a little background: Coming from a very Catholic background, our father spends every Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday re-iterating that we give up 'everything good'. Example: Are you eating a cookie?!?! But its Lent!  Are you enjoying that soda? But its Lent! Are you smiling?!!?! You get the point.



*Obviously not taken during Lent since dad is smiling

Needless to say there is always a lot of pressure to give up something that really is difficult, but not so much that you can't do it. (This means when D gave up watermelon for several years in a row it was heavily frowned upon.) Because of this--we have all discovered a system of giving up something we love but being VERY technical in the execution.

Here are some of the struggles that have resulted.......

J--a known shopaholic--gives up buying clothes a couple of years ago (notice she didn't give up shopping--these small nuances make all the difference--Be very careful when crafting the wording of your Lenten promise.) J, A and I were at the mall. J found something that she HAD to have and couldn't wait, A and I tried to talk her out of it, 'But Easter is next week! You are so close.' But by this point, J's resolve was gone, she was going to buy it. A and I went to the next store while she waited in line. 5 minutes later, J SPRINTED to us with a look of sheer panic on her face and here's why: When she got to the register the cashier tried to check her out but something was wrong with her card. As J explains 'It was an intervention!' and due to fear of smiting (see above reference to upbringing) she grabbed her card and ran from the store without so much as an explanation, leaving her potential purchase and the bewildered salesgirl behind. This, needless to say, was a near miss.



'That was close!'

Once I gave up candy. I went to a party at a friend's house, and she was serving Monster cookies....I have never looked a sweet in the face and turned it down....this was going to be hard. As the night progressed, I finally caved and ate the cookie BUT I ate around the M&M's. Questionable? Yes.

Technically cheating? No.



L shares my love for candy. Very similar to what I looked like on Easter Sunday that year.

One year D gave up purchasing (key word) coffee and while visiting her I asked her, what if I bought a coffee and offered it to you than could you drink it?....D's answer? Yes. Tricky tricky.



Of course, the majority of the time we actually follow our Lenten promises and the last couple of years we have tried to add something of value instead of giving something up but those stories don't allow me to post silly photos of my sisters....good thing I didn't give up teasing for Lent!

H: Weekly Adventures

H

 

As I mentioned in my bio, Mr M and I were just blessed with our second child a few weeks ago. I will be lucky enough to spend the first 8 weeks home with my boys.

We decided it would be best if we sent L to daycare one day a week. I'd like to say this is so he can stay on a routine and see his friends and other appropriate thoughtful parent things...but really it's to preserve my sanity and give me a 'snuggle and nap' day every week with B. This has been my second week and definitely a learning experience for all. What we have learned:

L: how do I wake up from my nap precisely the moment mom starts feeding B

B: who keeps poking me and throwing binky's in my crib

H: when two babies are crying which do you pick up first (similar to the chicken and the egg dilemma- and I still having figured out the answer!)

That said, we have had lots of fun this week! Here are some of the highlights:

Day 1: Pinterest fail

PINTEREST: 'Put your child in a box with crayons and they will be entertained for hours and no mess!'

REALITY: Your child will eat the crayons, smile at you with a purple tooth, than will tip over the box and escape, leaving half-chewed crayon all over the floor

Day 2: Discover cereal cupboard

Stomping and spreading quickly follows

L was put to work cleaning his mess.

 This proved to be even more fun because the broom is very effective at distributing the cereal across the floor.

Day 3: Mom got smart

Loaded cupboard with empty cereal box: HA! I felt so smart until I realized I still had to find somewhere to put the full cereal boxes, rats.

Day 4: Daycare (to visit his friends and keep him on a schedule of course)

L's friends made cards congratulating him and welcoming B, so sweet!

Day 5: Hygiene is going out the window

*not shown--my hair--which is significantly worse off than L's, probably why he is laughing

Next week: What has B been doing???