Wrap-up

Well Folks. It's done.

Spencer is "potty" trained.

Kind of.

Maybe.

Ask me again tomorrow.

From Jan 2010

He is THRILLED to be in "unnerwear" as he calls it. He NEVER wants to wear diapers again.

He drank a ton of diet coke. And it turns out, he has a bladder of steel. Henry used the bathroom 12 times this afternoon when I cracked open the bubbly.

But I wasn't potty training Henry.

Spencer went 4 times and drank twice as much as Henry. Two times on the floor, two times on the potty.

From Jan 2010

My head hurts and I want to go to bed.

But I'm so proud of my boy. We had our potty party tonight with Daddy. It was the highlight of Spencer's day.

From Jan 2010

But like I said, ask me again tomorrow.

From Jan 2010

Here we go again

The time has come.

Oh, how I want to cry.

The time has come. To potty train Spencer.

I can not believe we're here again. I JUST POTTY TRAINED HENRY.

Okay, fine, it was a year ago, but still.

Spencer is not quite 2.5 years old. Henry was 3 years and 3 months before I even considered it. I firmly believe that I could not have been successful if I had ever tried even one day earlier than we did with Henry. I have a brain block about potty training 2 year old boys. They need to be 3 before you even try!!!!

But.

Spencer wants to SOOOO bad, and how is it fair, that I, his mother, keep him from going #1 and #2  respectably in the toilet, rather than embarassingly in his pants???

It's not fair. So, I have to.

Henry took exactly 1 day, 1 2-liter of Diet (caffeine free) Coke, a baby doll who wet himself, a bunch of presents, a chart, stickers, candy, and some underwear to potty train. He used the toilet 17 times that day.

I am planning a Toy Story themed potty party for Spencer-man, starting at 0dark30 tomorrow.

I'm already tired just thinking about it.

If it doesn't work, I don't think I'll ever have the energy to potty train him again. So, it's now or never. (Or Derek can try again later.)

But if it works??? ONE KID IN DIAPERS!!!! Oh my, the thought is so sweet, I can barely stand it. It's what's getting me through the fear of tomorrow.
What I'm choosing NOT to think about is how many potty trips we'll be making with Spencer AND Henry, (who still whizzes in every single public bathroom we ever go near, ever) whenever we leave the house.

But I'm not thinking about that.

POTTY! POTTY! POTTY! WE CAN DO IT! YEAH! (YAWN!)

Wish us luck!!!!!!!

I wrote it in a letter...

To those of you who don't know we spent a very QUICK weekend up at my parents' house for my niece's baptism. Crazy doesn't even begin to define it. So, in response, here are my letters to my family.

Dear Parents- thank you SO much for hosting this weekend. It was great to be amongst family. Sorry about the dog's accident on your carpet. LOVE YOU!

Dear Oliver- THANK YOU for sleeping through the night the past 3 nights. If you continue doing this, I shall buy you a pony.

Dear Kelsey- Don't ever give up. You're strong, you're awesome. You're an 8 cow woman.

Dear Erin (and Isaac)- We missed you.

Dear Alice- 55 GOLDFISH IN A SERVING! OH.MY.GOSH!

Dear Caleb- See you next week.

Dear Nana- I'm so glad we got to see you!!!

Dear Henry- Thanks for barely talking to me all weekend.

Dear Spencer- Ditto. Cousins are the BEST!

Dear Josh- If you go get me my phone, I'll give you a nickel.

Dear Derek - Thanks for taking time off work to come play with us. You're my FAVORITE!

Dear Sarah- What can I say? You missed funny stuff every time you went to bed!

Dear Jason and Alisha- thanks for squeezing in time for us. Sorry my children are insane.

Dear Jordynn- Congrats on your baptism! We love you.

Dear Camera- Sorry I forgot you at home, and therefore took no pictures of our weekend in Utah.

Dear Dog- Thanks for having getting in the trash, and then having diaherra in my car.

Dear Sandy Police Officers- I'm extremely impressed with your response time. Henry calling 911, while not planned, made us feel safe, knowing if we ever DID need you, you'd be there, knocking down our door. Oh, and sorry about stepping in that dog poop on the sidewalk.


Love,
Morgan

Quoteable quotes

So, we all know the adage, "Kids say the darndest things." And I completely agree. Most of the "darndest" comes from overhearing adults in their lives say things they shouldn't say. It's a fact.

For example:
Henry, "Mom, I'm sorry you're too fat for your pants." (said out of the blue whilst driving. Yeah, he's definitely hearing things I don't say to HIM!)

Spencer: DANG IT! (at least it was 'dang' and not other choice words I am wont to say on occasion.)

Henry and Spencer have been both been heard saying, "Crap!" as well. Hmmm....

I keep wondering when one of them is going to say, a-s-s because I say it more often than I should... it's kind of a problem.

I should repent and stop doing that, don't you think?

NYR

Ya'll, my thoughts are a bit discombobulated at the mo'. I'm trying to siphon it all down into comprehesible drivel rather than ridiculous drivel.

You know how that goes, right?

ANYWAY! Want to hear about my NYR? (New Year's Resolutions, get the with the program!) No? Too bad.

So, I read these articles. (Sidenote: ANYONE who knows me knows that I read things, I commit them to gospel-truth and then my life is changed. Seriously, my poor grandmother begged me to STOP reading and START parenting when Henry was a baby. I can't help myself. The written word is truth to me. Like I said, it's crazy.)

The articles discussed two points that are basically the same: FOOD vs CRAP and EDIBLE vs FOOD.

The dealio is (the Reader's Digest versions for you all) is just because something is edible does NOT make it food.

For example:

Butter= FOOD
Margarine= Edible crap.

Cheddar Cheese= FOOD
American Cheese= Edible crap.

Get it?

So, for our New Year, we have banned ALL (okay, fine, MOST) EDIBLE CRAP from our home. It's going pretty well too.

The main downfall is (and will forever be, worlds without end, amen)
Diet Coke.

Don't judge me, I'm only human.

But, it's nice. We're cooking more, we're eating healthy, the boys are learning about healthy vs not so much vs occasional treat. I'm actually really enjoying it.

So, there ya go. Our NYR. The rest of them are things like, "Exercise" and "Get un-fat" and they are going okay as well. But I will not bore you with the details.

And in closing, an "ONLY IN VEGAS" tidbit for you:

Please, imagine  a man, a woman and chimpanze coming out of Sam's Club with a cart full of bananas.

I am not making this up.

Heartbreak, 4-year-old style

Last Sunday (not yesterday, but the one before that) Henry brought home an invitation to the PANCAKE PARTY! It was for the children to meet their new Sunday School teachers. It was to be held on Saturday at the church.

Well, trying to explain to a four-year-old that Saturday was FAR away wasn't the easiet thing in the world. Henry was beyond excited about this party. Something about putting the words, "pancake" and "party" together got him all worked up.

Every day he would as me, "Is today the pancake party?" Or "Is today Saturday?" We talked of almost nothing else for nearly a week.

On Friday (the day before said PANCAKE PARTY) I had a funny feeling about it all, and decided not to tell Henry that the next day was Saturday and therefore the day of his much anticipated party. He asked when it was, and I reminded him "Saturday" but didn't clarify beyond that.

Friday at dinner, Derek declared joyfully, "TOMORROW IS SATURDAY HENRY!" and well. I'm surprised Henry was able to sleep for the thrill of it all. I was a bit apprehensive for some reason about it all. But, I figured, "Meh, it's fine if he knows it's tomorrow."

So, it was all arranged that Derek would take Henry and possibly Spencer if he threw a fit about being excluded. Seriously, it was akin to Christmas Eve at our house that night.

Then. 9:38pm. My phone rings. I figured it was a client. It was not. It was the 2nd Counselor in the Primary calling to inform us that due to a schedule issue, the Pancake Party had been cancelled.

CANCELLED!

I literally said to her, "You do realize you are breaking my four year old's heart, right?" She apologized again. It just couldn't be helped. BLAHBLAHBLAH.

I teared up. No lie. I was SO frustrated. I KNEW we shouldn't have told Henry it was in the morning. I KNEW this was going to happen. I was just so bummed that I was going to have to be the one to tell him his dreams had been dashed.

The next morning, Henry asked when Daddy was going to get up and take him to his party. When I broke the news, it was not pretty. To add insult to SERIOUS injury, Derek had signed up to clean the church that morning, so he took the boys and went only to find that ANOTHER WARD was having THEIR pancake party. Derek had to leave because both boys were completely hysterical.

So, we had our own pancake party at home.

Moral of the story: CHECK THE CALENDAR before you schedule parties for little children. It's NOT fun to have to tell them they don't get to go.

Oh, and another random little tidbit: If you are an employer, and payday comes and goes, please don't "forget" to pay your employee. It's likely the employee's wife, who needs to go to the store, will hunt you down and shank you.

Love,
Morgan

A frustrated genius

Don'tcha hate it when you have a fantastic idea for something in the middle of night and wake up and it's just GONE????

Totally happened to me. I was dead asleep after doing two births (kind of, I missed one) in one night/morning, and so when Oliver woke me with piercing screams into the baby monitor, I was like, "GENIUS!"

And now, I don't know why. I know it was an idea for a new blog. And it was a good one, an award-winning one. But like I said, no clue what it was. SO SUPER FRUSTRATING!

Anyone know what it was?

It's a Small World Afterall

I'm always amazed at how small the world is. Specifically, when you're LDS, it tends to take WAY less than 6 degrees to close the gap between people.

Such was the case today.

I was sitting in Sunday School, lalalala, learning about Moses, lalalala, and in walks one of my VERY BEST FRIENDS from college whom I hadn't seen in 3 years. I had NO clue what she was doing there. Turns out, her sister lives down the street from me and is in the ward that meets after ours. She was visiting from Boston and just happened to run into my husband in the hall. We still keep in touch but hadn't talked in a few months and she "forgot you live in Vegas." HA!

We whisked her, her husband and cute baby girl away from church (I know, bad) and made them have lunch at our house. It was wonderful to catch up and just see her. SO awesome.

And it really made me think, like a lot, about how fantastic it is to have friends. I have lived a lot of places in the last 26 years and have made friends along the way. I always keep a couple close from each place I've lived and that results in me having dear friends that date back 19 years! It also means I have to spend a lot of time keeping in touch, if I don't want to lose these friends.

Thank goodness for Facebook. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I mean it! I have moved a ton and left very very dear friends, and Facebook allows me to know what's going on with them from a distance. I'm also thankful for cellphones and email which also allow me to stay in touch with people.  With three busy boys and various time-zones it makes it even harder to SPEAK with friends on a regular basis. But social networking is a blessing if at the very least for reconnecting people.

If letter-writing was the only way to go, I'd be screwed.

And I'm grateful that Laura, my very dear friend whom I saw today for the first time in three years JUST joined facebook. :) It's about time.

Mostly, though, I'm just very very grateful for friends, who add variety, advice and understanding to my life. Thanks friends. I love you. All of you. :)

Cheesy post.... OVER!

Guess what?

Happy New Year Dear Friends!

I'm posting today at Mormon Mommy Blogs all about New Year's resolutions and my secret to success (that I'm not good about doing at all!)

http://www.mormonmommyblogs.blogspot.com/

GO! Leave a comment about your New Year's resolutions. :)

Thanks!