Little Girl

I don't think I'm cut out for potty training! I'm such a wimp. It's been a half a day and I couldn't wait to put her diaper back on her for her nap! Ha!

I wanted to start out the first day with having Emily sit on the potty until she actually went so she would at least know what it felt like. I've spent the last few weeks listening to several other mothers tell how they trained their kids and took in any advice they had. It has been very helpful for me to hear all the different viewpoints. We did the whole excitement thing of picking out pretty big girl pants and all that . . . but she decided she didn't like the rubber trainer pants I put over them. I don't really blame her because they are so bulky and the elastic on the legs were tight. So the idea of her having accidents without it going all over the carpet or couch went out the window in about 2 seconds. Anyway, we had breakfast and I had her drink as much milk as I could get in her, and then after about 15 minutes we made our first trip to the bathroom. We read books and hung out for about 5 minutes. About the time I was going to get her up she went. It was fun to watch the look on her face when she realized what she was doing. Yea! We went a couple of more times with success . . . and then it all went down hill from there. I would take her to the bathroom. She would sit for a little bit and tell me she was all done and then 2 seconds later in the kitchen or outside she would flow a river all over the place. Of course those were the two times that she didn't have the trainer pants on because she kept begging me not to put them on. Anyway, we sat on the potty several more times this morning but nothing happened. She did have fun playing in the water in the bath because I had to hose her down after her accidents.

I kept telling myself over and over again this morning that parents all over the world for years and years and years have gone thru the same thing as me. I do think for Emily that trying to go so often isn't going to work out. And I'm going to have to break down and buy Pull Ups which I was trying to avoid. But I wanted to give this morning a shot just to see how it went. At least she knows what it feels like now to actually go. I'm not the kind of mom who can handle having accidents all over the floor and not be bothered by it. I can't do it . . . so I shall spend the money on Pull Ups. I'll also back off a bit and not have her go to the bathroom so much . . . I was just trying to get her to feel that sensation as much as possible this morning in the hopes that something would click. I wanted a potty training prodigy : ) : ) : ) I'm sure you can't blame me!

So we'll still make our trips to the bathroom but with less frequency and with Pull Ups on until it does "click" in her head what to do.

And so begins this new journey in parenting . . .

In happier fun news I got this cute video of Emily last night. I LOVE the way she says "Little Girl" and have been meaning to get it on video before she starts saying it correctly. The other day when she got up from her nap she asked me where Joseph was. I asked her who that was and she said Daddy. So I told her my name as well. So for the past few days she has been saying, Daddy is Joseph and Mommy is "Jiffider" and Emily is a "little geel". So cute. So I asked her if I could get it on video. To do that I had to help her out with the dialogue because she gets shy in front of the camera. And the second she was done she wanted to see herself on video. Enjoy!

2 Years and 4 months

Emily is 2 Years and 4 Months Old Today!!!

Today we took a lazy day. Emily didn't want to get out of her PJ's so she stayed in them all day long . . . sometimes you just have to do that : ). I showed her how to play tea party this morning with her animals. They all had a nice time!

We are going to start potty training later this week. Say a prayer for us!!! We'll see how it goes. I wanted to have several days at home to get Emily started so we will start on Thursday.

Emily is growing taller and is getting more opinionated as the days go by. She is a joy to us and makes us laugh!

End of School Party

Emily's school had their end of year party today at a local park. It was fun getting to talk to some of the moms while we were eating lunch. The rest of the time we were all spread out chasing after kids. There happened to be a big slide at the park that went straight down and the little kids would shoot out the bottom if you weren't there to catch them. Emily went down a few times and I had to physically grab a hold of her to keep her from shooting across the park. One kid tried to walk down it and nose dived into the dirt . . . I can't believe someone hasn't gotten seriously hurt on that slide yet. Emily LOVED going to school this year so I know she is going to miss everyone. Here are the festivities. As you can see the cupcakes were the kids favorite part of lunch:

Emily's teacher getting a last hug:

Emily and Jacob weren't quite finished with their cupcake and were already asking for more:

Changing Diapers

Lately Emily has wanted to change Elm0's diaper. Elm0 isn't a doll though . . . he's a big chair. She gets her wipes case, a diaper (sometimes 2 or 3) and some old rubber pants that I had in a basket. Here is what she does:

If you ever need a good laugh . . . just come over and spend a little time with us : )

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to everyone!

We have enjoyed our day together today. Emily gave me a sweet card this morning and after church we went to lunch together.

I have to share this picture. Emily loves climbing on our bed and saying she is going to sleep. She pulls the covers up and lays back on the pillows and says, "night night". Of course she only stays still for about 3 seconds. Joe was catching a quick snooze and I asked Emily to close her eyes for affect:

Teacher Gifts

It hit me on Tuesday that this was Emily's last week of school so I better hurry up and figure out what I was going to give as "teacher gifts". I had these grand visions a couple of months ago to make them all tote bags with their initials on them . . . and then I got all pregnant and tired and it never happened. So Wednesday morning Emily and I went in search of the insulated traveler coffee mugs that you can insert pictures, etc into. I wanted to avoid going to 50 different stores for the main reason that I didn't want to get Emily in and out of a car seat a ton of times. Oh the days when we were growing up where you could just throw all your kids wherever you wanted to in the car and go. Anyway, I thought I had lucked out by calling a store that morning who said they had them. So we went to the store and all they had were little plastic coffee cups . . . not what I wanted. So 2 hours later with a 2 year old that whined about needing to be carried everywhere (instead of her normal walking . . . what is up with that!!!), I finally found them . . . but they only had 2 in stock. So Joe got the other one for me at a store near his work. I called the store near Joe's work and asked if they had any of the cups in stock. She tried to get the person in the "craft" section to pick up the phone but he never picked up. She got back on the phone and said she was sure we had some but didn't know for sure because the cups were ALL THE WAY ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STORE. Oh my word . . . before I realized it, I said, "well mam . . . I'm all the way on the other side of town so do you think you could go check for me before I drive all the way over there". Wow . . . I was near my wits end at that point from all the whining. But the way she said it just made me blurt that out. She put me on hold again and came back and said they had a shelf full of them. I don't know if she was lying to me or mistaken in what I was asking about, because when Joe went to buy them they only had 2. Must be standard protocol for these stores to only carry 2 of each item.

Anyway, long story short (sorry for the long paragraph), here are the teacher gifts Emily will give them next week. I purchased some fabric and embroidered their first name initial on there and inserted the fabric. I know they aren't as professional looking as the cups you would buy in a fancy gift shop . . . but I think they will work out just fine. Voila:


I love the new font that I used for the cups. I bought it the other day on line. Here it is on a shirt I embroidered for Emily. Excuse her expression. I was interrupting her morning show:
The other day when I picked Emily up the teacher said she had to sit in time out twice because she kept taking toys and books away from the other children. So Joe and I have been reminding her every chance we get that she needs to share and never take a toy away from someone else. We were hoping it would settle into her brain and she would be nice again at school. Well this morning I asked her if she had any dreams last night. I don't even know if she knows what that means but she said, "Yes. I dream about Julia and Korrigan. I share my books with them." Yea! Her teacher said today that she had a good day.

Speaking of Korrigan . . . his mom has been telling me all year that he has a crush on Emily. The teacher tells me that he constantly wants to hold her hand and if she cries about something he comes over to give her a hug. He also wants to sit next to her at lunch time. The teacher told me that she comes up to her and says, "No Korrigan hug". Anyway, his mom told me this morning that her husband was talking to Korrigan about school and all the kids. When he got to Emily, Korrigan smiled and said, "Emily has pretty eyes and pretty ears." I got a big kick out of that! Here is their school picture. I thought this turned out pretty good for 2 year olds. Korrigan is the little boy in the yellow shirt right in the middle:

In other news, I found out yesterday that I failed my 1 hr glucose test so I get to go back tomorrow morning for the glorious 3 hour test . . . AAAAHHHH!!! I had to do this with my last pregnancy and sitting in a waiting room for 3 hours is not fun . . . so since a friend is going to keep Emily for me in the morning, I'm going to start a journal of my pregnancy for this 2nd baby. With Emily I started a journal the week I found out I got pregnant . . . with this poor baby I'm 16 weeks pregnant and haven't even bought the journal. So hopefully my 3 hours tomorrow will be spent productively.

Well this blog entry is especially long so I'll stop for now to give your eyeballs a rest : )

Trip to the Zoo

Yesterday on the spur of the moment we decided to go to the zoo. Emily had been cooped up all week running a fever and seemed better yesterday morning. I had just bought a season pass to the zoo which allows for 2 adults to go so we all got in for "free" yesterday. I think the threat of rain kept some people home because it really wasn't that crowded. We had a fun time and as we were getting on the interstate to head back home the bottom fell out so it also looks like we left at just the right time:

They had a new parakeet exhibit that's only been open a few weeks. You could buy a stick of bird seed for a dollar and the birds would come land and eat right off the stick. It was pretty cool to watch the birds eat. We didn't have any cash of course so we enjoyed watching the other people feed the birds:
This was a nice unexpected treat. It seems one of the birds caught him a snack that wasn't provided by the zoo : ) Can you tell what that is . . . yep . . . a mouse . . .


Emily saw the other kids putting their heads in the hole and walked right up there and did it before we realized what she was doing. I quickly grabbed my camera:We finished our day with a train ride and headed home. It was a fun day: