Bigger and Bigger

It’s not been a bad week, but it’s been a hard one. Things don’t feel at all right with Sid gone, and the Mommy has had herself at least one good cry each and every day – sometimes more. In the midst of this sadness, we’ve experienced more illness – Jay felt left out since everyone else in the family had a round with the flu, so he succumbed too. On Monday, when Josiah spiked a 104+ fever we figured he’d caught it for the second time, but a trip to the pediatrician’s nixed that theory. We’ve had great help, and everyone is on the mend now, but I feel tired and somewhat melancholy.

In the past several weeks, amidst the various ailments, Josiah has shown very obvious signs of wanting to potty train. I have purposely ignored them, hoping he’d just hold off, and wait till things got calmer. As I said to my sister earlier today, “I am in no mood to potty train right now!” But when your child gets out of bed each night because he’s wet his diaper, and is immensely bothered by every “soak-ey” as they are called around here, then I guess it’s time to go along with his wish to be a big boy.

So this afternoon, out came the Diego Pullups I’d stashed in his closet last time they were on a super sale. Josiah was so pleased with his “Dalago Unnerwear” and strutted around all afternoon proudly. My potty-training ritual, which has worked pretty well for three children, just consists of putting the child in a pullup and setting the kitchen timer to beep at short intervals at first to help him learn the drill. Those little bladders are tiny so I start out by taking them every 10 minutes at first, then 15 minutes, then 20 minutes, you get the idea. Rewards are given for having dry pants when it’s time to visit the potty. The idea being that we don’t just give a treat for every drop of tinkle the child can squeeze out over ten minute intervals, and that ultimately I want the trainee to learn to keep those pants dry!!

Josiah really liked the potty thing today, and got the knack of it reasonably well. After two accidents, he stayed dry the rest of the afternoon and evening. At one point, a few hours into it, while I was busy with supper prep, he heard the kitchen timer beep and on his own dutifully derobed, leaving his dry “Dalago unnerwear” on the kitchen floor, scaled the too-tall-for-him-potty, and performed perfectly. So cute.

I have never doubted he is ready to train, I just wanted to wait for warmer weather, and maybe a sense of more normalcy. But really in a household like ours, what is normal, exactly?? Here is a picture from back in September – as you can see, he’s been enjoying trying out the potty thing for quite some time now!!

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My First Haircut

Daddy decided it was high time I stop looking so shaggedy around the ears, so a couple weekends ago he got out that scary Flobee toy (you must check out the pictures of the funny-looking grown-ups vacuuming off their hair on this site) of his and told me he was going to cut my hair. For my “before” shot he made me stand in front of this very red wall, so you can’t really see my sort of reddish hair too well, but ok, here is my “before” pic anyway:

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Really, I don’t see what the fuss about a few sweet curls at my neck is all about, but hey, he’s the big guy so I went along with it.

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I sat nice and still during the entire procedure despite being scared for my life – here is a shot of me praying that the Flobee monster won’t eat me:

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And here is what I looked like afterward:

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Still cute, eh??

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The Jo-Brella

Yesterday afternoon it was warm enough for me to finally turn my attentions to our neglected shrubbery, and I trimmed ’em all up till they were looking pretty again. Jay got home from work early enough to take advantage of daylight and attack several larger plants in our yard which also needed some serious taming. The kids played nearby while we worked, but Josiah must have been watching us more closely than I’d thought. Because as I pulled stray leaves off of the large Elephant Ear in our front bed, he ran over to me, and started yelling something unintelligible all the while jumping up and down and waving a very large stalk from the plant.

“umbLella, umbLella!!” was what he was saying, and he insisted that I watch while he very carefully stood under the huge leaf looking as if he was ready for any rainstorm that might suddenly appear out of the sky. He reminded me of little Nicholas under the toadstool in one of his favorite board books: I am a Bunny:

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What do you think?

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A Confession…

Yesterday, when I told you that Josiah won’t each much of anything, I mis-spoke. Because there is one thing he really does love to eat: butter. So what I should have said is, “won’t eat much of anything except butter”.

Preferably in stick form, and preferably slightly soft, like after Mommy has left it on the counter for a couple of hours to make it easier to use in the baking of cookies. Or even better, with wrapper off, and beautifully presented on a plate on the table, because it was supposed to be used as a spread for the dinner bread.

I have caught that sweet child of mine twice in the last three days hungrily gobbling up the better part of a whole stick of butter. So strange…

” ‘Ooot Dack”

which when translated for normal ears, means “fruit snack”…is the only name Josiah knows for construction vehicles. And all because he has grown accustomed to and fond of the little packaged fruit snacks from the grocery store with Bob the Builder’s various crew members inside. So now whenever we ride around town and spot a cement mixer, backhoe, or basic work truck, Josiah points excitedly and yells, “ooot dack, ooot dack!!!”. Unless of course it is a particularly large contruction vehicle, in which case he will very seriously add the qualifier, “BIG ooot dack!!!”.

Snuggle Buddies

Josiah the big two year-old seems determined to grow up as quickly as possible, and leave the trappings of babyhood behind. A few months back he started hollering each evening about sleeping in a big boy bed. Upon realizing that we were determined to keep him in his crib for awhile longer, he took matters into his own hands. And has now made it a habit to park himself in one of the big kids’ beds each evening when he knows it is time for him to go into his crib. His adoring big sibs think this is hilarious, and will usually play along by tucking him into their bed and kissing him goodnight, but often they jump into bed with him, and try to convince me how wonderful it would be to let him sleep with them “just for tonight”.

Last night, Josiah climbed into Abigail’s bed before I could even get his jammies on. As if to proactively communicate to me how serious he was about staying in her room. While he snuggled under her covers, and yelled “sleep!! bed!!” over and over, I got some pretty cute shots with the camera. Which should tell you what a great parent I am at this stage of things…while my child willfully disobeys and hollers at me, I smile and take pictures of him. Ah, how the mighty have fallen!

But now, since I have taken all these cute pictures, I must share a couple with you. Please note big sister’s cheerful new bedding which finally went on clearance at the same time as an additional 20% off promotional coupon was in my possession, so we were able to get a fantastic deal on it. How nice that after a year and a half in her ginormous bed, she now has bedding to fit it.

Here is the very cute but disobedient little boy:

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Along with his mischievous partner in crime:

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