My Birthday in photos and Videos

I had a great birthday today. Nik stayed home from work and I got to hang out with my two favorite kids and my favorite husband. Nik and the kids let me sleep into 9:00am! Probably wont sleep that late again for a LONG time. Dougie ran in to give me my card and he was so proud to show me his "monster" and his "snowball".

We hung out this morning and Dougie and I played with my camera...you can see the video he took if you promise not to make fun of my morning hair, crooked glasses and double chin...promise? Okay.



Yes, I made those faces on purpose to make him laugh.

Here's another video showing how excited Dougie was to have cake!



Yeah, looks like that kid needs MORE sugar!

Pics from today!







And that's it! I'm 29 and I'm FINE. Liz promises it's going to be a good year.

Email

I got an email today that made me think of writing this post. One of the things I hate about email is you can't tell what tone the person sending it is writing in. I've compiled a couple of examples.

#1: The "baby" issue.

I recently got an invitation to a party. The party is over two hours away and it's a girls party. Nik and Dougie are going to come with me and hang out at a family members house while I'm at the party, but I figured, since the party is so far away and Kate is still nursing that I would bring Kate with me to the party. I RSVP'd via email, asking if she minded that Kate would come with me and got this response:

"If there are no other arrangements you can make for your daughter, then
yes, bring her along."

So technically, that's a yes, but the way I read it, it's a no...and I've asked around, other people think she just doesn't want to tell me to "leave the kid at home!"

#2: Mom

I get these ALL THE TIME from my mom. I know she means well, but I can never sense her tone. I have a lot of examples...here's a couple:

"Let's talk about this later, k?" Is she busy? Is she annoyed with my email? or does she really want to talk about it later?

And before I post this one, let me tell you that I just recently had a baby and got A LOT of presents. I didn't have time to send out thank yous (to ANYONE) and got an email asking me to send one out. About 20 minutes later, I got this response:

"FYI: I sent one this morning with a photo of your whole family."

I was confused...she sent one? and yes, she did. After a couple more emails, I could tell she didn't think I would send one, so she did it for me. Even though I'm about to turn 29 (ugh), she didn't think I would send one, even though she asked. (Mom if you are reading this, I love you!)

#3: The Colleague

I don't have any examples, since I regularly clean out my school email. But one of the things I really can't stand about work email is the person who hits "reply to all" when someone sends something out to the district. It happens ALL THE TIME. We get emails that we don't need to read or shouldn't read even. I know one of the biggest culprits is when we offer flu shots...people hit reply to all and we learn all about their medical history, why they can or can't get the shot...blah, blah, blah.

#4: The Mistake Email

Have you ever gotten an email that wasn't meant to go to you? Have you ever sent it to the wrong person?

A couple years back I was having an argument with a friend. She accidentally sent me an email that was meant for her husband...in the email she said some pretty nasty things about me. We aren't friends anymore.

Sometimes people hit "forward" and forget that all the responses to previous emails are contained in that forward...that's embarrassing too. I've gotten a couple...probably sent a couple.

That's all I've got for now. Time to watch Nip/Tuck with Nik...oh, and check my email. :-)

I'm all about videos these days...

Here's more Dougie. I promise to get one of Kate up here soon! :-)

My kid is WEIRD

Today, while conversing on the internets with y UBF, Liz, my son decided to amuse himself by taking a sip of milk, running to the bathroom, spitting it out and then doing it all over again. For some reason, I found this to be hysterical and secretly took a video of him doing it. What you get is the masterpiece below!





Special prize to whoever can tell me what movie is playing in the background!

Potty Training 101

I've been worried about this since I gave birth to Dougie...potty training. I don't know how to do it, when to start it or how hard to push it on him. Positive reinforcement or negative reinforcement? No diapers? Pull-ups? Potties? Potty Seats? It's all too much for me.

This past summer, while I was on summer vacation (and pregnant with Kate) I tried to potty train Dougie. He wanted absolutely NOTHING to do with going on the potty or the toilet. We had two potty chairs in our bathrooms and we literally had to BEG him to sit on them. He did pee a couple times on them, but both times were MONTHS apart and probably an accident. Both times he was naked already and started to pee on the floor before we picked him up and threw him on the potty to finish. I made a HUGE deal about him going on the potty those two times...HUGE. I jumped up and down, gave him candy, sang the potty song, the whole bit. He could have cared LESS. The kid just didn't care. Over the summer we got nowhere with the potty, but at least he was telling us when he had a messy diaper (no one likes to change a poop that's been sat on). I though we were headed in the right direction....but then Kate was born.

When Kate was born, he was very interested in her diapers. We tried the whole "Only babies wear diapers, aren't you a big boy? Don't you want to wear your big boy underwear?" to no avail. AND, he stopped telling us when he went and started RUNNING AWAY from us when we asked if he had a poppy diaper. I know that most kids regress when siblings are born, so my dreams of Dougie being trained by his third birthday (March) were being thrown out the window.

I was also getting mixed messaged from everyone. My family would tell me not to worry about it..."Boys take longer!" they would say. Meanwhile, my niece who is only a few weeks older than Dougie was fully trained. Others would wonder why the heck he was still in diapers! "Have you tried buying him special underwear?" Yes. "Have you tried giving him a reward when he sits on the potty?" Yes. "My son was trained when he was 18 months...have you tried having him pee outside with Daddy?" YES!
"Have you tried naked time?" YES, and that only resulted in me having to clean up pee and poop off the FLOOR instead of of his rear end.[;

In November and December, I just gave up. I didn't do ANYTHING. Nik tried with naked time, but it yielded the same results. While I was Christmas shopping, I decided to try one more thing. I bought a potty seat (It goes on the toilet, instead of being a separate thing) and I found Red Sox underwear. I had bought fancy underwear before with no luck. Lightning McQueen and Mater sat in his top drawer for months...it didn't motivate him at all. I bought the Red Sox underwear, hoping he'd still fit in them once he was finally trained.

After I bought those two items, I decided to try ONE MORE TIME before my maternity leave was over. I told Dougie, "After Christmas, no more diapers" he said okay and went on his business...I had a feeling I'd been cleaning pee and poop from underwear in a few weeks and it would fail again.

Well, Christmas came, he opened his potty seat and his underwear and he was excited, but didn't want to try them. Christmas left and the next day we went to see Liz in Natick. So, I lied. It was after Christmas and he was still in diapers, but I refuse to not see my friend when she's here just because I'm potty training my son. So, day after Christmas he wore a diaper.

Fast forward to the next day and he was in underwear....he peed in his underwear a couple times that day, didn't understand and I thought it was going to be a LONG week. The next day, he peed only a little bit before trying the potty, but wouldn't go pee to save his LIFE. BUT on the 3rd day...he POOPED on the potty. He still wouldn't pee, but he pooped! I was THRILLED! He still wore a diaper to nap, and would pee the minute it went on, but the thought of no poopy diapers was enough to keep me going.

Fast forward again 5 or so days. He WANTS to wear big boy underwear. He WANTS to go on the potty. He can pee on the potty, he can poop on the potty (he doesn't like to poop, but he will eventually go) and he's SUCH A BIG BOY! I really don't think this had anything to do with me, rewards, charts, candy or fancy underwear. I just think he was ready. He did it, I just helped.

And he loves his sticker chart that I made him last week, and it's fun for us...so here he is with his chart! (Notice the thumbs up here.)



Oh and Ireland is going to be so much easier with a potty trained three year old! Yahoo!

My new hobby...

Since I've been home on maternity, I've picked up sewing. I saw a lot of things online that I wanted and they were SUPER expensive, so I tried to make them myself...with some success. Here's a couple that I made this week!






I have orders for at least two more...I'm having fun! I might even sell them on the internet! :-)

Happy 2009!

31 days...31 days left of my maternity leave. A part of me wants to go back to work, see the kids, get back into the swing of things. But a HUGE part of me doesn't want to leave Kate. I know she'll be fine with our sitter. She be looked after very well and loved there. I know that she'll sleep most of the day and hardly even realize that I'm not there...but I don't want to leave her. I wish I could be a stay at home mom, but it wouldn't work...for one thing, I'd go out of my mind at home all the time. I know I would. There is only so much you can do with two kids, one that is potty training (Thank GOD) and the other that naps twice or three times a day. Plus, there is the money issue. Who, in their right mind, would give up a well paying job in this economy? We have so many things that we want to do...so many things that we can do, if we have two salaries. 2009 will be FULL of new experiences.

Okay, Okay, rant over. Kate is doing wonderfully, sleeping through the night and smiling, cooing and laughing all the time. She is such a joy, I just love her! Dougie is potty training and doing very well with it. He's been out of diapers since last Saturday and hasn't had an accident since Monday! He's taking to it quite well, and he's so very proud of himself. He should be! We are!

Last week I got our passport applications and had the kids and my pictures taken. I am SO excited about going to see Liz in Ireland this year. Liz is my very best friend and I miss her. I can't wait to see the life she has created for herself with her husband in Ireland. I hope they're ready for us! The Starkey's are coming!

Back to the kids! Happy 2009 Everyone!