Potty Training Prodigy

I substitute my blog for a journal/scrapbook. For me, blogging is the easiest way to document pictures and stories. In looking back a previous posts, I realized that I never blogged about Jacob's potty-training. Even though it is old news now, I thought I better post for posterity's sake.

Jacob was starting to show signs of potty training readiness leading up to the Holidays. I noticed the signs, but chose to ignore them. I had pushed the girls too early and as a result, they protested and the whole process was horrible. Besides, the Holidays were at our door and everyone knows that potty-training and travelling aren't the best mix. On top of that, I was stressed with preparing for the RS Christmas dinner. The first week of December he started changing himself after wetting a diaper. He wouldn't tell me, he'd just take care of it himself. I would find wet diapers discarded in corners throughout the house. I still wasn't ready to full out train, but I thought it was ridiculous. Anyone who could change himself could surely use the potty in the first place. So, out came the potty chair. I showed it to him in the restroom and told him to use it when he needed to go potty. Again, without telling me he would randomly do his business. I would go in the restroom and find little surprises in the potty chair. When we finally started "potty training" it was a snap. I won't claim that we never had accidents or setbacks. But all in all, it was the quickest potty training adventure with the least amount of accidents of all 4 kids. And in reality, I didn't do ANYTHING! If only all babies came programmed like that.......

Drama Club

Katy was in the Drama CLub this year. The practices were before school once a week. Being as I cannot fit my kids and the two neighbors in my car (legally at least due to carseat laws), I wasn't going to let her participate. Luckily for her, she found a friend whose mom was willing to pick her up. She had a lot of fun, but I'm glad it over now. At the end they were having rehearsals everynight and it was starting to wear her down. They put on a play called Character Matters II. It was a really cute spin on Fairy Tales with the importance of having good manners. I never got a really good picture but I wanted to at least document it.

Brainwashing

Nope, there's no indoctrination going on in this home !
(you can't tell but the socks are also BYU)

As Jared says, Jacob has his agency. He's free to choose BYU OR Ohio State.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

My little Leprechauns!

The Leprechauns were up to their tricks as usual. This year's pranks included:
1)Dying the milk green
2)Dying the toilet water green
3)Hiding mom's purse on top of the cabinet
4)Hanging Katy's lunch bag on top of the Dining Room light
5) Hanging Xandy's necklace from the ceiling fan
6) Putting Jacob's hat on the candle on the mantle
7) Turning the toothbrushes upside down
8) Switching their clothes around
9)Turning Bella's B-day cards upside down
10)Hanging the front door decoration upside down
11)Turning a picture frame upside down
12)Leaving a "Piece of gold" for each child that was in reality just chocolate

The neighbor girls were upset that the Leprechauns hadn't visited their house. I told them it must be because I'm part Irish. Luckily that seemed to appease them. Alexandra was ecstatic to learn she had some Irish in her and couldn't wait to get to school to tell her friends.

I played with our typical dinner recipes this year. I added some carrots and onions to the cabbage and potatoes. I also found a Dijon mustard spread for the cornbeef. Jared was a little wary of this so I tried it the day after with our extra cornbeef. We were planning on having some friends over for dinner so I bought two roasts but plans were changed. We did have the missionaries come eat with us. They really loved the shannon cakes so I sent them home with some extras. The less leftover, the less I'll eat!

Children's Museum

We have a Children's Museum right here in town, but somehow I've never made it there. My friend Amy started a monthly playgroup back in the fall. (She is the best fitness instructor ever and used to teach preschool.) In addition to quality playtime, we try to provide educational activities, stories, crafts, rhymes, etc for the kids. This month we went to the Children's museum. Amy actually sweet talked them into opening early so our group could have it to ourselves before the morning rush hit. Jacob and Bella had a blast!! Jacob loved the upstairs that was set up like a library, firestation, and policestation. I wasn't sure I'd ever get him out of the fireman costume (I guess I know what he wants for his B-day). Bella enjoyed playing in the hospital area, the grocery store, and the postoffice.

Great Grandpa B would be so proud!

Locked in jail. They really loved locking the Moms in jail!


Fireman Jake to the rescue

A funny side note: Bella's shirt says Justice on it. There is a little boy in our ward named Justice. Therefore, she was convinced it was a boy's shirt and did not want to wear it anymore. I had a hard time convincing her that Justice is also a clothing store/brand for little girls.

Signs of Spring?

Today is cold, rainy, and dreary but.........................The last few weeks have been BEAUTIFUL!!! I have loved the return of warm weather and sun. While I was running on Friday I could hear the frogs' mating calls and I saw a snake. Yep, I think spring is coming!! Here are some signs of spring from inside and outside my house.

Bella's Very Fairy B-day

Can you believe my baby girl is 5 already??? That yesterday I registered her for Kindergarten?? The Family Fun magazine came right about the time I was starting to think about her B-day party. It had the cutest ideas for a fairy party. I though it was perfect we could have a Tinker"Bella" party. When I first presented the idea to her, she wasn't convinced but when I showed her the ideas in the magazine she became excited.

We found a cute little poem online, tweaked it a little, used lots of glue and glitter, and delivered invitations to her friends:

"Fairies and Pixies, we need you to fly, get your wands and your wings and take to the sky, fly to Tinker"Bella"'s birthday, there will be plenty of fun, with lots of games, cake and pixie dust for everyone! At half past twelve on Saturday to Bella's house make your way. Dressed in all your fairy stash, for an hour and half B-day bash"
(I had to way scale down the invite list. Her original list consisted of most of the primary, along with neighbors and other friends. You shoulda seen the list, I about went into cardiac arrest! I limited her to a few neighbors, the kids in her actual primary class, and her closest friend.)

These are the cookie star wands and "pixie" flowers from Family Fun. The flowers have pixie stixs taped to them. While sorting through the cookie cutters in search of the perfect star cutter, Bella found an angel and was insistent that we make fairy cookies also. We also made strawberries dipped in pink melting candy(another idea from Family Fun) but I didn't end up with a picture of that.



Bella didn't like the cake in the magazine, much to my relief. It looked pretty time consuming. It was an entire fairy village. We looked at a few pictures of cakes and she combined her favorite parts to come up with this:

She wanted everyone to dress up which meant that the older girls had to set the example, much to their dismay.
We made Fairy Houses and read the book Fairy Houses by Tracy Kane. We also turned the living room into a garden fairy and hid treasure for the little Tinker fairies to find.

We played pin the star on Tinks wand and watched Fern Gully. Any of you who are aware of my limited artistic skills will be shocked to learn that I drew this freehand by myself. (Although I did use a picture for inspiration) I couldn't quite get her fingers to look right so I solved it by tucking her hand behind her.

All in all, I think everyone involved had fun. Bella loved being the "Birthday girl". That how she referred to herself for several days. "The B-day girl can't finish her food" "Mom, Dad got mad at the B-day girl!" "The B-day girl is tired" "The B-day girl doesn't want to clean" etc etc etc.

I-SATs

Last week was ISATs for Katy. She decided they should be tested every week. In addition to no homework all week, they had fun activities every afternoon, snacks, and themed days. Katy's teacher let them vote on a crazy thing she would do. They voted to make her do the "Thriller" dance. They also had Cassens Idol among other fun activities. This is Katy sporting her new haircut on Spirit day.

Sock Hop

Xandy had a family sock hop at her school last Friday. The girls were all excited to go and we had found poodle skirts for them all. I was going to try to make some, but we found them for such a cheap price online that it was more cost effective and much easier on my sanity to buy them. Unfortunately, Bella came down with the stomach flu a few hours before and had to miss it. (It was a fundraiser so in addition to paying to get in, we had to buy any food we wanted. I'm normally not opposed to supporting the schools, but I have had a HUGE problem with the way the current PTO has been spending money. Not only have they made some frivolous, ridiculous, non-educational big purchases, but they have not followed proper procedures for getting parent approval beforehand. I refused to support them any more than absolutely necessary, so I bribed my kids with a sock hop themed home dinner if we could forgo the food there.)

Pre-hop dinner

A visit from Elvis

Xandy and friends

Katy with our neighbor

Boys will be boys

Enjoying the beautiful weather yesterday by riding outside

Jacob chillin' while watching a movie with his sisters

I found this picture from a few months ago. I love how excited Jacob was to have some little boys over to play with for a change