potty, potty, where on earth is the potty?

Hi All-

Sorry it has been an age (again) but life is busy! Lets see what is new:

1) The pictures above are from Grandma's big Seder and from Easter morning when the Easter Bunny came. As you can see one event was civilized, with dresses and books and the other was a candy free for all lying back in Pajama's with eggs filled with jelly beans. I think this is probably just as it should be. :) 

2) Jane and I FINALLY went on our girl's night away this past weekend and it was soo soo soo fun. It was just what the doctor ordered- Mama was getting a tad cranky between too much work and too much of everything else and spending 26 hours shopping, spaaing and drinking expensive wine with my darling twin was just what I needed to recharge those batteries. Now if only we could find time every 6 months- that would be ideal. :) 

3) The kids are excited that it is finally warm out- we have been riding bikes alot and we opened up the sand table in the backyard. Mama forgot how much dirtier they get in the summer! It is hilarious to see them after they have been in the sand- I am not sure how they get it everywhere but they do! They are so cute and growing like weeds still - I literally think they grow every day. And Nas's hair is turning sort of red which is exciting because as many of you know red hair runs in my family in some blonde shades so I think it is fun that her hair is also turning a bit red. Sasha is still a blonde blonde just like I was when I was little and they both have cute new haircuts. 

4) We are still having some issues with Sasha at swim class. He is not terribly interested in getting in the pool without a parent and last week when Papa went alone he didnt venture in at all. This week we are back to 2 parents going and I am pretty sure I will get him in there but he may not be 100% thrilled about the idea. He just really prefers it if one of us goes in with him but the whole point of this class is for him to actually learn to swim, not to have him float around on Mama so it is important that he moves forward with it. Nas is doing well in her class- last week she floated all by herself and is working on kicking. :) 

Now the big issue (disclaimer: if you are not yet a parent this may be too graphic and TMI for you). 

Sasha is in the midst, still, of potty training. When we came home and he was 27 mos old he was trained, the baby home way- meaning they limited their liquid intake and 3 times a day they sat on potties for 45 minutes and went then or not at all or suffer the consequences, think training by fear. Once home when he realized nothing terrible would happen if he didnt stay dry he decided quickly to revert to being #1 not trained. He has ALWAYS been #2 trained- that goodness. We figured, okay, he is a boy and he is young, no problem and into pull ups he went. This worked well but as he aged we started talking about how he couldnt wear pull ups forever and we decided on his 3rd bday the pull ups would be history. he said he was okay with this and for the last couple months in pull ups he never even went in them during the day- at all. We thought he was sooo ready. We talked about it, read about it, sang a little song about it etc. So on his bday into big kid underoos he went. It has been both good and bad. This kid will stay dry for 3+ weeks and everything will be going swimmingly and we will think, well YAY, we are finally done and then all of a sudden (yesterday) he will have 3 accidents in one day. This has happened a couple different days since we have gone to underwear FT- multiple multiple accidents in one day. Thankfully all of his accidents are #1 accidents only - I would not know what to do if otherwise....It is so weird- he knows what to do, literally he will be completely trained for a month or so and then boom, all hell breaks loose. We talk about it and he says he doesnt know why he goes in his pants sometimes and doesnt know why it happens multiple times in one day and he doesnt feel bad about it in any way (though I have tried to make him understand it is not cool, he doesnt seem to care)- it is incredibly frustrating. A couple times he has even said he has to pee, gone into the bathroom and stood there and peed in his pants - so it isnt that he is getting distracted and doesnt realize he is peeing or something like that. Any ideas? And candy doesnt work for him - he could care less about that too. I am not sure if it is some sort of control thing or some sort of plea for more attention those days or what - we have tried everything- snuggles, talking, demanding he stop, pretending it was not a big deal, making a huge deal out of it- everything! Any advice? 

Happy Holidays!

Hi Everybody, 

So we are deep in the Passover/Easter season here. Today we are off to Mercer Island for a big big seder at Grandma and Grandpa's house. People have even flown in and it should be very fun. Then tomorrow the Easter Bunny will come (I have this on good authority) and we may go to church down at that nice Episcopalian church on First Hill that would be our church if we ever went enough to be officially affliated with a church--  as well- that plan is still up in the air due to some other commitments.

 

As many of you know we are a blended family and we are not exactely the most observant in any of our religions but it is good to expose the kids to everything and see what they like and so they can learn more about the various faiths that make up our family. 

Because they dont watch much TV the kids dont know about the Easter Bunny but I am pretty sure they will be psyched to get baskets tomorrow and I feel that it is important to also do that as it was always a big part of things in my family. I will always remember the Easters spent in Chicago at Bar and Bob's (my grandparents) where Bar individually wrapped jelly beans in 5 different types of tissue paper (each child only was able to find their own color/pattern of wrapping) and hid them all over their house. I am pretty sure the people that live there now are probably still finding petrified individually wrapped jelly beans! Talk about a lot of work for Bar- I dont have that kind of time but I can at least get a decent basket together for the kids. :) 

The kids started swimming class again this past week. It was pretty interetsing. They were in 2 different classes because Sasha had to be in the 3 yr old class while Nas was in the 4yr old section. This was hard on her- she was very worried about him and kept watching his class rather than paying attention to her teacher. Towards the very end of the class she seemed to relax a bit and listened more which was good. Though she did say she did not like it because they were not together. This is something we expected- they are very very close and it is time for them to develop a bit more independently so this is a good first step. Hopefully this week it will go more smoothly- she was pretty cranky about the whole thing and I would prefer to not go through that again. Sasha was nervous at first but the minute they pulled out the pool toys for his class he said, "see ya" and was off into the pool without a look back. This coming week Papa has informed me that perhaps it would be better for me NOT to meet them at the pool, that perhaps she was feeding off that and my anxiety over it all and he is probably right. So I guess I will just hear the story afterwards. 

Well the dog is barking, the kids need a snack and we are all still in our PJ's so gotta go. 

SKB

Sunny Day, washing the cares away....

Here are some cute pics from the beach and yard yesterday- an abnormally warm and sunny day here in Seattle. Snow on Weds, 70 and sunny on Sunday- crazy town! 

So I have the theme song from Sesame Street in my head. The kids have "discovered" Elmo - and now instead of Caillou they like to pick Sesame Street about 1/2 the time for their TV hour. They watch one show a day usually, usually when mommy gets home from the office and needs to make dinner while papa deals with stuff around the house (I know, bad, but umm, hello you try to make dinner with 2 toddlers buzzing around or skimishing constantly- it is hard). So there has been a fair amount of Elmo in our world this week and now that it is finally sunny I really have the theme in my head. 

Things are good, lots of stuff going on. Gymnastics class is still going strong and now this Weds we are adding swimming (the next in the series of classes) to the schedule. I know it isnt much to have 2 activities, especially while they are still not in school, but I dont want to over schedule them too much! I think this will be fine though - dance class has ended and we did not "re-upp" there. 

I am a bit bitter having received our ridiculous tax bill though. We were unable to take any of the adoption credit because we sold stock to fund the adoption, which made our "earned income" too high for the credit. The result is a ridiculous tax bill based on Capital Gains. Yuck and Ugh. Oh well, at least I sold the stock before the fall so that is good I guess. And apparently as long as we do our WA State re-adoption this year- which we are planning on doing but simply never got around to in 2008, we can claim the full credit next time around, which is good. But still painful to see all those numbers add up and think about the size of the bill. I need the sunny day to wash away those cares! 

My sister Brooks is coming to town this week which should be fun and I am very interested to see how the kids react to her. They haven't seen any pregnant people really (not in person, just on the street or whatever so who knows what they think of them). Anyway, they think all babies come from baby homes apparently- or so they told me. I havent actually disavowed them of this notion- I was waiting until I had to because I am a chicken when it comes to the 'adoption' talk stuff but I am pretty sure they will say something to Brooks because last time they saw her she was not noticably pregnant so they have no idea and here she will show up VERY pregnant so....We shall see!