Four little words

I feel like lately my life and mind have been consumed with potty-training thoughts. I'm potty-trained out! Thankfully the Lord gives us Thursdays and Sundays as weekly reprieves from the process.

The fabulous news is that Chloe now enjoys sitting on the potty and will willingly do so throughout the day. She has had some recent successes and she gets so cute and excited when she actually goes pee-pee on the potty. (Forgive me if that's TMI for you! Pee-pee and poo-poo have become ingrained in our family's vocabulary lately. I even made up some songs to help Chloe with making pee-pees and poo-poos. Ok, that was definitely TMI. The funniest moment was when I overheard my scholarly husband using such potty lingo and trying to sing my homemade songs. I wish I would have gotten that on tape!)


The frustrating news is that her strong-as-steel bladder only relieves itself 2-3 times a day so we do a lot more potty-sitting than potty-going. Yesterday I gave her more playing freedom and she'd sit on the potty every 40 minutes or so. When it got close to nap time I shortened the intervals because I knew her bladder was ready. By the time she succeeded in going potty (around 2:30), she had sat on the potty TEN TIMES already. I was thoroughly pooped! (pun not intended)

When I reached my patience limit and was near tears, Chloe leaned over, put her head on mine and said sweetly, "I love you mommy!" That was just what I needed to hear at that moment. Thank you, God for sweet moments of refreshment!

Today at Bible study I was reminded of God's purpose in all things - even in something as silly as potty-training.

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. [Romans 5:1-5]

Trick-or-treating outing #2

Trick-or-treating in our city was Saturday evening. And it was a wet drizzly cold evening! Lots of Halloween ambiance. :)

Chloe didn't seem to mind the weather since she was purely motivated by her love of candy.

Not many kiddos braved the weather so our neighbors were incredibly generous with their candy-doling-out. So now we have oodles of candy to share! Anyone want a dum-dum?

Chloe's costume this year cost us all of $2. I snagged the outfit for a buck at a summer yard sale and then we spent another dollar on devil horns headband. I then sewed white and black felt over the evil red horns, removed them and put them on one of Chloe's fabric headbands. Her "milk" bucket was leftover from last Easter and I printed out the letters from the computer and taped them on.

What did your kids dress up as this year?

Life updates

Seems like my blog posts lately have been open-ended. Thanks to all of you for all your comments on portrait studios, potty-training, and Halloween candy excess. Here are some updates on those life issues:

• The best update must come first; Chloe went pee-pee on the potty twice yesterday!!!!! She definitely has some inhibitions about going on the potty because late in the morning (after much juice and two accidents) a few drops came out while she was sitting on the potty. She cried and screamed and tried to get off. I just hugged her and sang to her and a whole 5 drops went in the potty! After that, she was excited to be able to wipe herself, flush, and wash her hands. She raced downstairs to tell daddy (thankfully he came home early yesterday so he was around for the big event) and then he treated us all to ice cream at Dairy Queen. We went sans diaper for her nap which made for a short nap, but I'm thinking this is the way to go for her so she doesn't train herself to go when she gets a nap-diaper. The second potty success came last night. Chloe and Matt went off to run some errands after dinner and she kept her undies dry despite having a diaper on over top! So, I knew she needed potty-time when they got home. I was bound and determined to have her go before bedtime. It took almost an hour of me reading and playing with her while she sat on the potty but she did her tinkling! And this time she didn't cry or try to escape. YES! Thank you Lord for a small step forward!
• Stupid Sears won't give me any money back on my portrait purchase. I'm never going back.
  
• We've kept Chloe's candy stash out of sight and it's like she's totally forgotten about it! We'll recycle some tonight for our neighborhood trick-or-treat time. My mom already has dibs on any chocolate we have left over. :) She, grandma, and my sister are coming for Thanksgiving so I'm supposed to save the "good candy" until then.
  
• Had a midwife appointment yesterday and I'm still measuring 3 weeks ahead/big. The crazy news is I gained 7 pounds in the last two weeks!?! How can that be right? I've not eaten too much differently these past weeks though I know I've had a few uncharacteristic fast-food meals. She suggested lower carbs, higher proteins, and lower sugar. My glucose level is low so I'm not at risk for GD. Just carrying a big ole baby boy!
  

Trick-or-treat outing #1

Tonight we braved the costumed-crowd for Chloe's first trick-or-treat outing of the season.

I know I'm biased, but she was seriously the cutest kid out there with the most adorable costume (a green bay packer player and cute little girl bumblebee tied for second in my mind). Out of hundreds of dressed-up kids she was the only cow we saw! There was an abundance of witches, pirates, grim reapers, star wars soldiers and hippies though.

Chloe caught on to the whole put-candy-in-my-bucket scene. After each store she'd say, "Another one store, please" in her mixed up toddler grammar way. We've decided we'll let her have 1-2 pieces of her candy a day. How do you handle the abundance of candy your kids rake in for Halloween?

Enjoy the moo-ving photos. Sorry, cow puns are utterly irresistible to me.

Phone survey

Since I'm tired of posting about all-things-potty-training, thought I'd probe your brains for some information about phone usage.

For several years we've tried to save money by not paying for long-distance access on our home phone. Instead we purchase the long-distance calling cards from Sam's Club and then keep recharging them when we run out of minutes. We currently use SBC as both our phone and internet provider.

That system seems to have saved us money in years past but now that phone and internet providers have literally exploded on the market, I think it's time to change up our system. Even without long-distance on our phone we still pay 15-20 bucks a month for the phone. Plus we recharge our phone card ($26 a pop) about every two months. My mom is a vonage user and her $15 a month goes a long way - including lots of free long-distance minutes. Any of you use vonage?

I should also add that we do not own cell phones (I know, we're rare birds in this day and age). We have a cheap trac phone that we use for emergencies but that's it.

What do you do for phone usage and about how much do you pay monthly (if you don't mind sharing)?

Riding the potty-train again

This morning did not start out well. After two spankings and lots of subsequent Chloe-crying before 9 a.m. I thought to myself, "Do I really want to start potty-training again today?"

You may recall our intensive and enthusiastic start to potty-training back in September. Encountering much negativism and a case of diarrhea, we took a sanity-preserving pottying break. Then with our unexpected visit to Milwaukee, potty-training took a necessary backseat once again.

Since rain is forecasted this week, I thought we'd dive in and make a fresh start on this pottying adventure. My goal is to have Chloe trained by Thanksgiving. That gives us an entire month to work out the kinks. I know, I have must have the words "Naive First-time Mom" tattooed to my forehead. :)

Surprisingly, we had a pretty good day of training. Chloe is vvvvvvvvvvvvery good at keeping her undies dry. I'm so impressed with how she can control that little bladder of hers! She's way better at that than I (but I have a huge baby pressing on my bladder so there). After 6 times of potty sitting today, she never successfully tinkled. BUT she kept her undies dry all day. So this girl went from morning to naptime and then again all evening without an accident in her undies. (For those of you who care to know these details at naptime I left her undies on and then slapped the diaper on over top. That way she still felt the wetness but didn't make a huge mess in the bed. Good idea?)

Now we've got to get this girl to actually do her business on the potty. I certainly don't want to train her to just keep dry all day long and then relieve herself when she feels the familiar diaper applied. Any suggestions?

Oodles of fall activities

Last night we carved up our first family pumpkin: Bubba. I got Bubba for a ridiculous $2 because his stem was broken. I can't wait to go back and get more $2 beauties for cookin' and eatin'. Yum!

Matt did all the carving and guts-removal which was just fine by me. Chloe probably would have enjoyed scooping out the gooey innards for all of 30 seconds. Matt was quick and efficient. While he did the messy work, Chloe and I drew sample Bubba faces on paper. The best part was when we put the candle in the newly carved Bubba and set him on the porch. Chloe wanted to sit right next to him and kept looking inside to see the candle light.

Today we did some family shopping (I'm quickly growing out of my maternity size small/medium pants) and then stopped at a small harvest festival in a nearby city. Held at an historical park, the festival had a few kiddie activities, a craft barn, an old car display, and a few historical recreations (iron working and apple butter cooking). Chloe got to paint a pumpkin and she snagged a free firewoman hat. Score!

What fall activities have you been up to thus far?

NO MORE TESTS FOREVER!!!!!

Did my all-caps title with several exclamation marks sufficiently communicate the high-level of my excitement?!?

Yesterday Matt completed (drumroll please) . . .
HIS LAST COMPREHENSIVE EXAM OF THE PHD PROGRAM!

Hip hip hooray!

That means he only has two more requirements before being all done with school: 1) dissertation proposal and then 2) writing the dissertation. Mind you, those two items will probably take a year to a year and a half to complete. But it's such a relief to know that there are only two steps left to this schooling process.

Matt felt great about how he did on the test. In fact, he wasn't even nervous. Just overwhelmingly excited that this was his final test ever.

We celebrated with a very uncharacteristic pizza, chips and bottle of cherry coke. It felt positively sinful and yet so yummy to eat unhealthily like that. :) And I love doing the dishes after a pizza meal. We watched the first 1/2 of the Packers vs. Redskins game with Chloe (during which she learned a vital new vocabulary term - "Lambeau Leap") and then Matt and I snuggled up to watch a movie after she went to bed.

Another bonus about finishing this last test is that we get to steal Matt away from his books this weekend. In fact, he took Chloe grocery shopping this morning so I could have some computer work time and I'm relishing the quiet. Tonight we're planning to carve up Bubba, our huge pumpkin, and then tomorrow we're off to a farmer's market together.

We're proud of you Matt! We knew you could do it!

Total impulse buy

Back in my single days, the words impulse and shopping occurred together in my life frequently. In fact I had little or no restraint with my income when I was Miss Alicia Mendez. (I won't divulge how many pairs of shoes I owned during that phase of life.) Now that I've been married some years, I almost never buy anything impulsively. Unless it's 50 cents and hanging in a thrift store that is. :)

Today the thought lodged in my brain that Chloe NEEDED to get her 2 year old portraits taken. I mean, c'mon, she's already 2.25 years old - time's awastin' here! Last year we did Chloe's 1 yr. old photos at wally world and I was less than impressed. So we hitched a ride with Matt to Canton where he teaches and headed to the mall. I had a JcPenney's coupon all ready to use but the mall only had a Sear's. Surely, I reasoned, they must have the same type of deals. Turns out they don't.

Now that the whole experience is said and done, I think I got swindled. And sitting at home waiting for me in my latest edition of Parents magazine is a coupon for Sears that would have save us a bundle.

Next item on my to-do list is to call and ask them to apply the coupon code. Or just to cancel my whole order and re-do the photo shoot at JcPenney's. Think I have a chance? I don't see anything anywhere that states I can't cancel my order.

Chloe wasn't the smiliest 2 year old in history but the photographer still managed to get some cute shots. Enjoy!

Dressing distress

Chloe's newest dislike is getting dressed. I usually pick out two outfits and then let her choose which one she'd like to wear. Or I let her choose the pants and I scramble around to find a matching shirt. (That was tricky yesterday when she chose lime green pants . . . that's the disadvantage of buying things cheap here and there. Lots of mis-matchy things that don't go together.)

Anyhow, even with some choice in the matter, Chloe has been seriously crying lately when I put the clothes on her. She'll even say stuff like, "I don't like that" or "I don't want to wear that jumper". And of course there's no reasoning with her. Even if she chose the jumper to wear, she gets upset when it's physically put over her head.

I just endure the crying after a few attempts to calm her down and try to make the dressing process go as quickly as possible. If I distract her by telling her what we're doing next that seems to help stop the sniffles.

Any ideas or suggestions?

Always have a back-up

This week I've learned the hard way that you should always have a back-up pair of glasses in case something happens to your contacts.

I'm HORRIBLE about overusing my contacts and have managed to stretch out 2 boxes of contacts for almost an entire year! (I feel like in some weird way I'm helping save our family money by making my contacts last forever) When I got down to my last pair this week, I didn't think much of it. I told myself, "Add 'order new contacts' to your to-do list" but by the time I got downstairs the thought had flown out of my pregnant-absent-mind. Like I said, I usually use one pair of contacts for several weeks so I didn't really think I was in any vision danger. Until . . .

My left contact ripped on Thursday morning! I was frantically getting ready because Thursday mornings we all leave the house together at 7 a.m. I slapped on the right contact and away we went.

Let me assure you that life with only one prescription contact is very strange. I probably shouldn't have done any driving but I did. Mostly with my left eye closed. When I got home Thursday, I immediately got online to order more contacts. Come to find out there's a new law that makes your contact prescription only valid for one year! Grrrrrr.

I finally got in for an eye-exam today and my whole self rejoiced when I got to slip the trial pair of contacts in and see clearly out of both eyes simultaneously. YAY! And guess what, after 2 years my prescription is still the same. Stupid law.

Has anyone else ever been in my irresponsible vision predicament?

My Curly Chloe

Since most of our recent Milwaukee trip was spent in the hospital or at home with grandma, we didn't have many photo opportunities. :)

To celebrate grandma's home-coming, we all dolled up and went to a local steak restaurant. YUM! I ordered all my favorites: salad with crumbled blue cheese and sour cream, real cherry coke, and a nice little filet of steak cooked medium well. Chloe was the only one there under 30 so she got lots of attention from the other patrons.

For the occasion I spent 20 minutes doing Chloe's hair with a curling iron and hairspray. It turned out SO CUTE! I felt like a horrid mother for using such implements on her fine baby hair but the result put all my guilt at ease. :)

Enjoy our happy photos!





















Chloe and Luis at Nana's house. Don't ask me what Chloe's doing with the flashlight.





















Chloe and a smiley happy grandma.
















Nana styling some crazy shades.






















"Again, please grandma!"

Gramma update

Whew! It's been a long few weeks, hasn't it? Feels like forever since I've blogged or even turned a computer on.

Chloe and I were able to spend 10 days in Milwaukee helping out with grandma. The fantastic news is that grandma is almost 100% better! Turns out she didn't sleep for several days on her trip to China and that threw her into a delirium. After 6 days in the hospital, with the help of some powerful sleeping and calming drugs grandma's back at home now getting her rest and getting back to normal.

Though it was a rough and tiring time, I'm so thankful that we were able to go and help out! (Many thanks to my mom who used her frequent flier miles to get us there so quickly). Chloe was quite a trooper and even though I reverted to mommy-survival mode (increased passy-use and lots more tv than usual) it was a blessing to have her along. A two year old can be very therapeutic.

I'm also overwhelmingly thankful that God heard our prayers by healing my grandma and bringing her back to us safely. She's an incredibly special lady to us and to God.

Thanks to all of you who prayed!