Ok. Well. I thought I had this figured out, but apparently I don't. I know how to upload pics and videos but for some reason I couldn't add text to the same posting as the pictures. So here we go.
The biggest event this week is that Whitney is showing considerable interest in the potty, sitting on the potty, the potty toilet seat for her sized bum and underwear. Mommy is not. Wednesday Whitney started saying "poop" and running into the bathroom, then wanting to get up on the big toilet. I didn't tell Jim. Thursday Whitney did this to Jim and he got really excited, coming to tell me that Whitney might be ready to potty train and was I going to go to the store to get her a seat so she doesn't fall in? And what about some of those cool underwear. Rats. So the next day we went to Target to get the supplies. And boy was Whitney excited. She knew that purchase was for her. All this weekend I've been playing along very half heartedly, thinking that it is excited to her because she gets attention, especially a lot of attention from Daddy. I was planning to put her off until January. You know. After the holidays and the travel and lack of schedule associated with it. But then I talked to a lady at church and she said her daughter did that. And she put her off. And then it took until she was four to potty train because after that it was Mommy's idea, not hers. Ok. So now I'm motivated. But I have a little bit of work to do, so we plan to start Tuesday. Whitney's cool underwear only comes in size 4 at the smallest, so I have to sew it a bit so it doesn't fall off too quickly. I have not enjoyed diapers, but now I'm thinking I'm not going to enjoy having to go only to places that have bathrooms within 1 minute running distances. Tucker shows absolutely no interest, just like Mommy. Stay tuned for next post for hilarious stories, I'm sure.
The other highlights of the week include the fire station, finding Whitney rainboots in her size (finally!!!), a bit of sunshine to visit some waterfalls, starting school, eating oreos, and working in the yard.
I absolutely love how much Tucker loves to clean. He loves to operate things that big people operate (luckily not toilets). This week he swept the dust INTO the dustpan by himself. I wish I had a video of it, it was so cute. Before he would just run around the house while I cleaned the floors, brushing the small hand broom at random, or sometimes over my recently swept pile of dirt to "make it go away". But this week, he met with some beginning successes. He also really likes to use the big dustpan that we have for raking up pinecones, pine needles and holly leaves in the hard. That would also make a great video. He fights Whitney to the point of pushing her over to hold the dustpan while I rake stuff into it. He is very adept. It looks so funny because this outside dustpan we have is about 1.5 feet wide, so big against his small body. And it looks even funnier with him squatting in his slightly-too-big rubber rain boots to help. He is very serious about this responsibility.
I bought mint oreos this week, as they were on sale. Which means, of course, you have to buy them. Jim came home and was so excited to have Whitney and Tucker try them. The first night they had them, Jim twisted off the top and gave the frosting part to Whitney and the cookie to Tucker. Tucker slowly ate his cookie part and Whitney obviously loved hers. So Jim went to get another for them. Whitney had only taken a few bites of her cookie when she saw Daddy going to get another. She got so fearful he wouldn't give her another, that she stuffed the whole thing in her mouth and asked for more, trying to get out of her seat. So this time Jim gave Tucker the frosting and Whitney the cookie. Tucker looked at that green thing, licked it, then proceeded to carefully eat off the cookie part around the frosting, not allowing any green frosting in his mouth. He then gave the rest to Whitney. No mint or green for him! But he was not so picky about the chocolate oreo pie Daddy gave them at the end of the week. No crumb left behind!
We started "school". I read this book about teaching kids to read, so I thought I'd try it and see what happened. It seems a little extreme to me, but I did like the part about not teaching kids any information that they are not interested in. It also made sense because Jim and I are pretty visual learners. I can't really learn a new Spanish word without writing it down to remember it, so I thought I'd try it with the babies. I was pleasantly surprised how much they like it and how many more words Whitney has picked up this week. I don't know of Whitney's vocabulary expanded just because she is in that phase or if it is what we are doing, but either way it's fun. It keeps me from going mentally bored during the day and we are using Daddy's dry erase board, so they get to erase the words off of it. I only write up 5 words max at a time and then we are done, but it's fun.
We did a lot of shopping this week, mostly for Whitney. Tucker has had rain boots for 2 weeks now and we are all happier. he splashes in puddles and I don't mind. But Whitney gets her pants wet really quick. So we finally found a store that had her size. She was so excited about that purchase, too. She carried the bag out all by herself and that afternoon when we got ready to go outside, she laughed and giggled while she ran to find her boots. Life is better for all.
yesterday turned out to be beautiful. I think it is my farewell day to sunshine. It was cold, a reminder winter is setting in, but at least the sun was out. My visiting teacher brought me flowers, just 'cuz from the last farmer's market of the year. I put them in the sunshine and took a picture to remind me of them later. We went to the fire station open house that day, too. They are too young to appreciate it. Tucker wanted to be held the whole time. Too many dangerous strangers. didn't like the hat either. He really wanted to squeeze the fire extinguisher trigger, but the helpful fireman was just too close and helpful. He did like the cookies and the flashlight he got. Not the hat. Stupid things, hats are.
We also went to some waterfalls nearby. It was great to be outside as a family. They had a blast swinging on the handrail. Duh. Much better than waterfalls you can't touch.
This week Tucker and Whitney also officially moved to eating at the table. I retired the high chairs after Tucker screamed for 1 HOUR because he couldn't eat snack at the table. Whatever.
This week I also did a little scrapbooking and happened to be on the trip to Auntie Jill's last fall. Man. Talk about great memories. I'm REALLY, REALLY glad I went. Great memories. It made me miss them Burnetts, though, looking at those pics.
Like I say. I'm sure this week will be wildly entertaining for all. may it rain all week so I don't feel like I miss anything.
