Hilarious!

Have I mentioned Anderson keeps us in stitches?  Since he's parroting like crazy (yay!) we decided to teach him our first names on a whim today.  I was calling for Bri in the park and Anderson just started spouting "Bri, Bri"...so it began.  Well he took to it quickly and now I feel that if he were to get lost and someone asked what are your parents names he would say Brian and Dawn, with enough clarity someone could figure it out. 

Cut to bedtime.  Bath time ends, nekkid Anderson runs to his room, hops on his bed, looks around and says, "Dawn, where's my lovey?". Brian was in his room at the time so I thought he told him to say it. Turns out if was unprompted.  Bri and I were dying. It was so cute and funny at the same time.  Okay, a bit of a tear of relief too - the last month has been AMAZING in terms of speech. His SLP told us that since he started to finally parrot we're out of the woods, he should pick speech up quickly.  Bri and I have been chuckling all night.

Preschool

Today was Anderson's first day of preschool! He loved it. We walked into his classroom and off he went.  Kids were crying with the teacher and Anderson just wanted to get started.  On the way in Bri spied a dad totally crying.  Too Funny. Not us.  We are happy he's in school, learning and playing with more peers.  

While dropping him off at daycare exactly two years ago today, we fretted and tied to wonder if we could/wanted to make one income work. What have we done, we can't spend time with him etc... Seeing him run off and play with other kids without missing a beat today helped get rid of any left over newborn guilt I had. Anderson was really social and the teachers commented on how easy it was for him. When Bri picked him up from school they said he talked a lot (yay!) and even showed everyone, in his words, "cool shoes". Cool shoes were picked out by Anderson - we went for new sneakers and this was the only pair he wanted to wear. Bri said he didn't want to leave. He showed him around the room and pointed out a lot of fun things.  Anderson went to bed at 7:30 on the dot, after asking for "night-night".  Amazing. I'll take it.  

Some pictures from the morning:

Cool Shoes? Check!

CHEEEESE

PS. I have a bunch of blogs I subscribe to but can't comment for some reason. I get directed in a circle where I add a comment and it asks for my password, then I have to add the comment again, it asks for my password...repeat.  It is so annoying - does anyone know how to fix this glitch?  

Photo Download

We've been so busy this summer just doing a bit every everything and nothing at the same time. Enjoying the weather and each other's company.

Liana came to visit from MD

Terrible 2's are here for sure!

Steam train!

Redwood Growth Chart

Just getting some work done

Sh*t kids say

In this edition of kids say the darndest things -

Dad: Anderson what do you want to be for Halloween?

Anderson: hmm, a potty!

Mom & Dad: Huh?

Mom: Anderson, what do you want to be for Halloween?

Anderson: Poop in the potty.

Ha ha ha - we were rolling!  We asked him again this morning and got the same answer.  Gee, I wonder what we talk about all the time at home?

Potty Training - Part II

Tools of the trade
 (I didn't notice my wine until after I took the picture -
I didn't see a need to retake!)

I've lost count on what day it is and am too lazy to look at a calendar. I'm exhausted. I love my son, but for all that is holy we need some time apart.  I blame toilet training - this kid has sucked down more juice than I care to admit.  All in the name of underwear. 

See, part of this 3 day potty training entails filling him with liquid - enough to make his eye balls float. I do want him to eat, so milk was kept at the breakfast, lunch and dinner intervals.  Water worked for the first day or so but then I had to bribe him with the J-word.  We rarely give A juice, I am even more convinced it won't happen after this week.  Yes we water it down, we even start with fairly low-sugar Coconut Juice, which he loves.  It's 7:45pm and he is hyped beyond belief and hasn't had a sip of juice since about 2:30.  Yikes! This has gone on all.week.long.

Okay enough of the downside. What's the up? Well - we have been in undies, as A likes to call them, all week.  Today we only had 1 accident and we were at the park, so while he said he had to go it was tough to get back home so quickly.  We've made small trips out of the house, to the park, the mall, in the car, to speech and back etc...he's been a champ.  He's a pro at going on a pubic toilet, after a scary first time (luckily it was at speech, where they have the pre-school size toilets). All he needed was the confidence to do it once and no he's fearless (as long as you're holding him, of course).  

I spoke with daycare today and we promised her a little extra green if she helped us out in this last month prior to preschool.  She seemed supportive so we look forward to Monday. Tomorrow is our first big adventure.  We have Teagan's 2nd birthday party in Golden Gate Park, so it will be a test of a longish (20 min) car ride and playing in the park.  Fingers crossed! 

Our "reward" chart

The bike is here.  We are debating when to give it to him. As you can see his poster is filling up! He likes to place like stickers on top of each other so you can't actually see but there are a lot on there - not following the road. If this was the Kentucky Derby of potty training all the stickers like to hang out in the infield. 

Bri's pumped to take it for a spin!

I only added this because our backyard looks great in the photo! HA HA

Potty Training - The first 2 days

So we're in the thick of it.  Bri and I are using a the "3-day potty training method" but I have taken the full week of work off, as the challenge of Anderson not being too vocal leads to mostly parent-led bathroom trips.  I want to get it down pat before I put him back in daycare, because to be honest, we're not going to get much support on that front.

How are we doing? Not too bad. We've gone through many pairs of underwear, as they get the tell-tale dampness before he figures out he has to go, but not once have I had to clean the floor up today, nor did we go through any sheets at naptime. Yesterday we went through two sets of sheets, and 1 pillow in efforts to nap without undies. Tonight is our first venture into bedtime without a diaper.  In fact Anderson has not seen a diaper since we took it off of him this morning.  

It exhausting - all we think about is pee and poop. I have to step back and remind myself how far we have come even since Friday as it's slow moving to the target.  On Friday Anderson would "pee" in his potty right before bedtime.  I say "pee" because it was more like a drop. Enough to get us excited and praise him but he did not empty his bladder at all.  Well we stopped praising him on the little ones and just kept placing him back on the potty even has he screamed in protest. It seems to have worked. Today he's filled the bowl each and every time - which is A LOT because part of this method is too fill your child with non-stop liquids.  This helps you able to catch him in the act as much as possible. Again, exhausting. However, we took a break last night and saw Harry Potter. It was our little reward.

Speaking of rewards, A really really wants a bike. So we got a piece of poster board, drew a terrible rendition of a road complete with a bike at the finish line and use this as his incentive.  We repeat no less than 50 times a day - pee pee and poop go in the potty. If Anderson does all of his pee and poo in the potty he gets a bike.  So each time we get a potty full of either A gets to place a sticker on the road.  The red balance bike is on order and arrives later this week.  I have a good feeling he might make it to the end of the road by Sunday. If not, the long term goal is the day after Labor Day. I'm not going to jump the gun earlier than necessary. It's an uphill challenge. I'm so proud of our little guy already.

Summer fun.

Good times caught on camera.

Splashing with Griffin

yum!

The watermelon photo is my new all time favorite. Love.