The Dance

No, not the romantic dance or that song by Garth Brooks or even (in Will's case) the potty dance - we're talking about the silliest, goofiest dance that gets requested over and over - The Poo Poo Dance. This is what it came down to. Adults doing any silly dance they can in the bathroom and calling it The Poo Poo Dance. The 2 1/2 year old sat on the potty off and on for most of an evening and repeated his request for The Dance throughout. Daddy started it and then Sarah and then Mommy. The result (along with 3 adults and 1 sister dancing together, thanks Aunt SuSu) is below:

I DID IT!!!!!

Now we just have to see how this success translates to the rest of the week. He might be done with potty training and be on his way to honing his skills. On another note, the crazy man has been dry 3 nights in a row (and naps for that matter). Do you think we scared his bladder that much?????

So proud of you little man!

First Day of School for Sarah

Sarah's first day of Pre-K was today at her new school - the one she'll most likely stay at until 8th grade.

I love the uniforms but she is not thrilled with them. She loves pink and

the only pink on her is her undies and her toenails. Her hair is now more important which I'm not thrilled about but we'll see how that goes.

Here are some pictures from the day. She is at an age where she tries to "pose" to take a picture so I can't get a good picture. The blurry one is as close as I got to a true smile and she would not hold still when I tried at home before leaving for school!

10 on Tuesday

1. Top: Last year's house from school.... Daddy helped a bit (cancel that, A LOT!)
2. Bottom: This year's house. The only assistance was that I bought her tape and ordered/picked up the pictures she picked out. My favorite parts: The office chair at the top obviously has a special place in her heart. She captured her bright pink room perfectly. The fact that only KC (in a dress no less) made it on the house but our other dog PJ is nowhere to be found.
3. Potty training is moving along. It's a very, very long tunnel but I think I can see a pinpoint of light.
4. On that same note, I found a way to get me to jump out of bed at 5:30 am - Will yelling I have to go!!!! He didn't actually go but I was up.
5. This should have been at the top probably but I have a nephew!!! My niece's little brother is still waiting on his name but he arrived last night to join our family. Hooray!
6. Play doh = silence but also bits and pieces on the floor. I find it's better if I don't sit with them and do it. They like to mix colors and it drives me mad!
7. I love my little boy's voice. It's sing songy and just adorable. I love how he gets so excited when he finds gominoes (dominoes) and when he asks Which path should we take? and just when he gets so excited. I love when he sings too. It warms my heart.
8. I also love Sarah's newest thing: "Mommy, I know something really, really, really true...." This is usually followed by some random fact or comment. It cracks me up because she gets very serious about it.
9. Is it possible to enjoy the beat of a song but really hate the lyrics. I had that happen last night. I was bobbing my head and dancing in my seat and then started to listen. Yeah.... pretty raunchy song.
10. School starts tomorrow for Sarah. She's nervous. I hope she enjoys it and I'm very excited that she's starting.

So impressed

My parents have been staying at the Desert Ridge Marriott for the past few days and like may of the local resorts, they are doing all they can to bring in guests. They partnered with Nickelodeon this summer and while we thought the Dora and Sponge Bob visits were only on weekends, my dad found out that they offered snack time with a visit for $10 per kid. He signed them up and we stopped by the kid place yesterday afternoon.

My kids were the only ones there!!! They gave them little metal lunch boxes with Sponge Bob Cheez-Its and fruit snacks and apple juice. The kids watched a few minutes of Sponge Bob while we waited for our special guests. At first, I was worried it was just that - eating a snack and watching the show but NO! Here come Dora and Sponge Bob. Will is talking to Dora through the window, telling her to come in and color with him. Sarah is, well, scared. She took awhile to warm up which is why we have some pictures with her at my side and tons of Will giving everyone hugs. He LOVED it. He treated them just like real people, bringing them crayons and wanting them to come to the little table with him. It was very cute. Sponge Bob played Hi-5 with him and the kids got to dance in a circle, do a kick line and give/get tons of hugs (including a group hug). Sarah finally got into it after watching Will for a bit. She was giving away hugs by the end and then colored a picture for Sponge Bob. The people who run the kids center and the wonderful girls who are in the costumes did a fantastic job. All of this for just our kids.

Did I mention that the only time the costumes come on during the week is for this 30 minute snack time? So in this case, all that for just our 2 little ones. Kudos to them for giving my kids the best snack they've had and not making us feel like it was a waste of their time! (Did I also mention that the lovely young lady who works the kids programs took my camera halfway through the visit to take a group picture and then just continued to take pictures for us! Awesome!!)

PS Please excuse the crazy clothes on Will. We came straight from the pool so we're all in bathing suits and the only shirt I had for him was the shirt he wore with his shorts on the way to the pool! Woodies and surfboards don't exactly mix with Spiderman but oh well!

Here are more pics:

Sarah's not so sure about this.

Will hugging Sponge Bob.

Sarah was still scared.

Will was thrilled.

Sarah finally got into things!

One last goodbye hug.

10 on Tuesday

1. Sarah moved up a level in her BOB books. She is now reading VERY basic sentences. It's so exciting and I love the look of pride on her face when she's reading the little books. It has also led to some funny moments like when she tried to read, "Shhhhh! Sit Jip! She was focused on the Shhhh so much that she forgot to pronounce the S in sit. I wasn't sure she actually said it so I started to laugh. She said it again and again because I laughed so we had a little talk about how S*&^T is not a word we use, etc. Then we had to sit down and it took several read throughs to get the 2 sentences down. It was really hard to keep a straight face though.
2. Sarah now has the bug that seems to be going around. Will had a mild version over the weekend but it's affecting her a bit more. So, today is movie day for Sarah. I put on Barbie: Island Princess and noticed that it's been sitting in TiVo for almost 2 years now. It is, by far, the oldest thing in there!
3. It's amazing what you can find when you clean things out - all kinds of summer activities and a million coloring books. Also makes you not want to buy anything for ages upon ages.
4. Is it bad that I make decisions on which grocery store to go to not only by what's on sale and how close to the house it is but also what their grocery carts for kids are like? I can't stand the ones at one store so I only go there if the kids are not with me. Bless Fry's for just about the only cart with a "car" on it that I can maneuver. The kids actually behave, sort of, when they hop in it.
5. Andy is teaching Sarah how to play Mancala and it's actually fun to watch. She gets it to some degree and he helps her along. Will gets very angry though because he is not allowed to play the "jelly bean" game as he calls it.
6. Apparently I wasn't the only one who wanted to get knee socks for Sarah's uniforms. After 2 stores and only finding the largest size available. I finally found some on the 3rd try in the right size.
7. I was asked twice at Target over the weekend if I needed help finding something (very politely I might add). I can't figure out if they are just trying to improve customer service or if I really looked lost. I visit that Target probably more than any other store (including grocery stores. Maybe it was the fact that I was looking at some new stuff they have in and I had no children with me. They were confusing the peaceful look on my face with "lost".
8. According to Sarah, former Hurricane Felicia (now Tropical Storm) is going to Hawaii to see the volcanoes. I think Sarah is jealous.
9. After last week's round of "I wanna be a girl" from Will and this past weekend's dancing with Sarah in her ballet shoes and "I wanna be a princess", Andy insisted on a visit to Toys R Us, as if the boy doesn't have plenty of boy toys. He and his little man settled on a little barrel of Army Men toys. I have to admit it's pretty darn cool and old fashioned. :)
10. And... to end this list today - Happy Half B-day to Will!

Will at a 1/2

Will at 1 and a 1/2

Future Horror Film Fanatic

It must be genetic, the horror film gene. Andy has it, my sister-in-law has it and so do lots of other people. Andy has, apparently, passed it down. Sarah begged him last night to let her watch something scary. I believe there were a million pleases and probably some kisses and hugs involved. He tried to think of something non gore/blood and came up with The Mummy. (Note: Other than volcanoes and outer space, Sarah is very interested in Mummies. She had me look up pictures of real mummies a month ago.)

I was pretty surprised 1. that she agreed to this and 2. that she slept all night. He showed her 2 parts - both a bit scary and she informed me this morning that she wasn't scared 1 bit. Crazy!!! She told me it was Cool and is asking me for another scary movie this morning. I asked her if the stuff Daddy showed her was pretend or real. She said pretend. I'm a bit impressed. For the record, Andy and I had a small chat this morning about avoiding any people on people violence, blood, gore, etc.

Andy is a huge Nightmare on Elm Street Fan. My wedding present to him was the complete movie collection. He told Sarah last night while they were picking a movie that she could watch Freddie when she was 15. She negotiated him down to 10 years old after trying for age 5. Please tell me I don't have a future lawyer on my hands! We have enough of those in the family already.

10 on Tuesday

1. You know it's hot when you feel like you should put on sunscreen just to walk down the block to get the mail.
2. I'm more appreciative of our north south exposure after watching our neighbor's son trying to open their front door with his shirt because their door knob was too hot to touch.
3. We have a new stack of old books thanks to room changes at Andy's job. Hooray for new books.
4. Speaking of books. My kids have toys but I don't feel like they have tons and tons of toys. On the other hand, they do seem to have tons and tons of books. I love buying them books but we're starting to run out of room. When Will gets a bed and his room gets all changed around, we will have to get him a big bookcase (anchored to the wall of course, because we all know he'll try climbing it at least once!).
5. Sarah is a children's book illustrator's worst nightmare. She's detail oriented. So she asks me things like - Mommy, why does the pie on the pony's plate have a spoonful of whip cream on it when it should have the end of the smile on it because that's where they took it out of the pie??? Ummm.... Ummm..... Because whoever drew the pictures was not thinking of kids like you. It happens all the time and it amazes me what she notices.
6. Which brings up Sarah's slight obsessive behavior that I LOVE. She picks topics every once in awhile and wants to know MORE. It's that 4/5 year old curiosity and then some. Awhile back it was planets. Now it's volcanoes. She insists on doing research (we taught her the word and now she uses it all the time!). I have 4 library books and a video on volcanoes. Her favorite part..... the music at the beginning of the volcano show with Peruvian pipes. Go figure!
7. We went to the pool on Sunday and Andy convinced Sarah to try to the water slide since she's tall enough now. She was nervous but she LOVED it and ended up going down 5 times. The lifeguard at the bottom was great. She caught her on the red floaty thing every time so she didn't go under. That was probably why she loved it so much.
8. I love that Costco has Rachel's Exotic yogurt now. Yummy! 3 different flavors (orange/strawberry/mango, black currant/cherry, and pomegranate/blueberry), all natural ingredients, omega 3 and a decent size. Yogurt for grown-ups. I'm not sure if the kids like it because I haven't shared yet!
9. I went to the gym a bit last week and plan to go more often this week. It's one way to beat the heat and the kids actually love to go play. I also forgot how good it feels to get some exercise and at the same time, have some peace and quiet away from the kids (despite the workout music!).
10. We had a scare over the weekend. OK not really a scare.. I let Sarah wear her new sneakers to IKEA on Saturday. They are for school but she's worn them a couple times since I got them a month ago. The minute she put them on, she said they're too tight! We had her wear them to see how it went. I guess they were OK but I have a feeling we'll be buying new shoes pretty early into the school year. It was bound to happen sometime - growing out of shoes before school even starts.