Sewing

I've got several sewing irons in the fire. I am working on a blanket for Alice's new arrival (LSU motif, natch), aprons for Mother's Day gifts, embroidered pillow cases for a wedding gift and a doo-dad for some matching work at school. The doo-dad is a black velvet pouch (similar to a jewelery roll) for storing decorative ceramic spoons that my lead teacher got on a recent trip to Ukraine. The spoons have delicate flowers in different colors painted on them. There are three of each, four different kinds in all. The idea is that the children look at the colors/patterns and match the spoons accordingly. They are very beautiful and are sure to be a big hit. I'll have to post pics, because I doubt this makes much sense to anyone but myself. :-)
W did some fingerpainting this afternoon. I had tried to get him to do it before, but he never had much interest in getting his hands messy. Today, however, he really got into it. Crayola makes some nice fingerpaint that is actually more like a gel. It is very, very washable. I rolled out some brown kraft paper on the living room floor and squirted the paint onto the paper for him. I showed him how to do it and he took to it like a duck to water. I have two masterpieces from his efforts. One will be used as wrapping paper for a birthday gift for a co-worker (Rita, the lead teacher in my classroom). The gift is a book called "Rita and Whatsit" and it's about a little girl (Rita) who is unhappy with her birthday presents... until she discovers that one of the gifts is a dog. The book was published in French several years ago and was just recently published in English. The name/subject matter was perfect, so there you go.
I got W a copy of "Ten Little Ladybugs" today. It's a wonderful book that works through numbers 1-10 with a lovely catchy rhyme. The pictures and words are simply delightful.
On a side note, it is supposed to rain every day this week. Of course the plants are happy, and everything is greening up nicely, but it sort of means we can't go outside and enjoy the green-ness! It also means that we have dozens of stir-crazy toddlers at work, unable to run out their energy on the playground. And, of course, it means that I have a stir-crazy toddler at home. Seriously, how many trips to the Chick-Fil-A indoor playground can one tolerate?

Potty Talk

So I talked to W's teacher yesterday about the Toileting. She recommended that we really wait till the summer, as she doesn't think he's quite ready. To be honest, I agree with her. I was just worried that we'd miss the "sensitive period" for toileting and mess up the whole process. She suggested that we encourage, encourage, encourage him to use the toilet whenever possible, so that he gets used to that aspect of it. She said to check his diaper frequently, and once we notice that he stays completely dry for two hours or more, he is ready, as it indicates a greater degree of control on his behalf. So that's where we are on that front right now. He is, for sure, excited about the prospect of underpants, but I think he "gets" (as much as a toddler can!) that he isn't quite ready. We just want him to be successful and not get too frustrated with the process.
This is a really great article about Toileting. We are pretty much using it as a guideline for the process. Of course there are some things we sort of brush aside, but the majority of it is very practical and useful for our family.

Things We Do

• standing diaper changes (actually, quite easy!)
• elastic-waist pants (no buttons, snaps, zippers, overalls)
• encourage water play (outside of the bathroom, of course)
  
• teach our child appropriate vocabulary for body parts/functions
• no lock on bathroom door/toilet
• have small toilet seat that can be put on regular toilet

Things We Don't Do (and Probably Won't Ever Do!)

• use cloth diapers
• avoid having a potty chair (we do, in fact, have one upstairs)

There you go.

Good Day

"Good day!" That's what W says when he's happy. If he's super happy, he'll say, "Good big day!". Well, today was definitely a good day. In my opinion, it was a good BIG day. We had a normal afternoon after school--ran by Target, where we happened to find BIG BOY underpants for a really fantastic price. A package of 7 Disney (Cars, Wall-E, Buzz Lightyear, Incredibles, etc) underpants marked down from $9.99 to $2.49. I got two packages, even though I wasn't anticipating starting the toileting process for a few more months. Well, so we get home and he does a little "fishing work" that I set up for him...


He's got a bin of water with a tiny bit of blue food coloring in it (the ocean!) with some sea critters hanging out. He uses a kitchen strainer to "catch" the critters and set them on the tray (actually the lid for the bin) beside the bin. He loves this kind of thing. It really builds his concentration.

So a little bit later, he has a big poop in his diaper. He wants to go get rid of the poop, and when I get a fresh diaper for him, he REFUSES to let me put it on. He insisted on putting on underpants. I explained to him that he had to tell me when he needed to tee-tee or poop so that we could get to the potty. He said "Okay!" He was so proud.Ta-da!
Love this pose.
So anyway, he had two accidents in a 10-minute time period. He was not happy when I insisted that he take off his own shoes, pants and underwear, but he made an effort to do so. I assisted when he needed help. After the second accident, he was fine for about an hour. When we went up for his bath, he sat on the potty and peed. He stood up, all excited, then sat right back down to pee some more.
He's in a diaper for bed, of course, but we are now done with diapers in the daytime. From what I've seen at work, with the toddlers in my class, you cannot go back and forth between diapers and underpants in the daytime. The child gets confused and doesn't know when he can and can't poop/pee. It's going to be a tough thing, I think, for the next few weeks, but hey, we'll only have to go through it once (with him, that is!). So say a little prayer for Mike and me! We're gonna need it!

For your viewing pleasure...

Here are some pictures from our various adventures over the past few weeks. Enjoy!
Here are the daffodils and tulips in my front garden. Notice the slate--a friend of mine was re-doing her front flower beds and got rid of the rocks--I snagged some for our yard!

Yay spring!

I liked these tulips in front of a church in Princeton.

Grrr! Here are Mike and W on top of one of the bronze tigers on the Princeton campus.

I had to include this one, just because W is just hilariously adorable with his finger stuck up his nose.

Ahh, now that's a nice family picture!

What is he looking at?!

Yup, that's a squirrel eating a donut out of a dumpster on the Princeton campus. A coconut-covered donut.And here's a different squirrel from a different dumpster in the same area eating a French fry.

Now that's a big door (Princeton campus).

Last weekend we went to an Earth Day celebration in Hopewell, a community about 15 minutes north of us. They had lots of activities for kids and neat stuff to see/do. W got to pet a chicken. I was really surprised at how soft the bird's feathers were. Seriously, they were velvety. I was also impressed by how muscular the wings on the bird were... Mmmmm... Hot wings....

They also had baby ducks. W enjoyed looking at them and "peeping" at them.
This was perhaps the coolest part of the event--Nomad Pizza. It's this company based out of Hopewell that makes wood-fired pizza right there in a truck. We got one for lunch, and it was absolutely delicious.

Eureka!

I took my dad to the train station yesterday (he takes the train to the airport--sooo much easier than driving to Newark!). It was sad to say goodbye, but he and Mom will be up to visit again in June. It's tough being so far away from family. I do, at times, envy folks back home who have family nearby. It would be fabulous to get to see my parents on a whim, or to even have a regular (free) date-night sitter. That part I do miss. But there are things that I don't miss, and there are opportunities both Mike and I have here that we would have never had back home (yes, I still call it "home", believe it or not!). In spite of the commute, Mike likes his work. I enjoy my work at the Montessori school--I think it's helped me become a better mother for W. I learned, long ago, not to try to predict the future. I have to remind myself to live in the moment and enjoy the life that I have, for it is a good one.
Our pastor's message yesterday was spot-on for me. The title of the sermon was "Eureka!" and the Gospel lesson was from Luke 24:13-35. Don't run for your Bible--it's the passage about the two men on the road to Emmaus who encounter the stranger (Jesus) and walk the 7 or so miles to their house without recognizing with whom they are traveling. They talk about the "strange events" that have happened over the past few days, still none the wiser as to whom their companion is. It's not until they get to their home, invite the stranger in for a meal and begin to eat that they catch on. At the very moment they realize who's with them, Jesus disappears. In their excitement, they go find the remaining 11 disciples (remember, Judas is dead at this point) and share their story. So the gist of the pastor's message was this: What you're looking for is usually right there in front of you, you just have to really want to see/believe it. He talked about how many great scientists (Archimedes, Einstein) made their great discoveries in a similar fashion. He broke down the process into three steps--

1. Rigorous study/preparation (searching for the answer);
   
2. Period of rest (that's when the discovery happens);
3. Joy (Eureka! I figured it out!).

From my own experience, that's how it is with God. After years of questions, doubt, denial, study, exploration, etc, I began to get God. I say "began to" because I don't think finding God is a one-time, one-shot thing. I think it's a process, a process people of faith work with on a daily basis. I don't think we're supposed to get God, really, because to do so would induce complacency. Instead, I think we're supposed to marvel at God's wonder and grace, and treat each day as yet another chance to experience God's power. So I suppose Step #3, for me, isn't a snapshot in time, but rather an ongoing experience. As in, each day should be filled with joy and "eureka's".
Thoughts?

Talkin' 'bout a heatwave!

The temperature has gotten up to 90 the past two days. This is highly unusual weather for us here in The Jerz. Usually we don't hit 90 until July. We had part of the power cut off in our house because of a "light installation project" in the kitchen (I'll explain the quotes later), so the fan in our bedroom wasn't working last night. Mike and I just lay there for what seemed like hours until he said, "Are you asleep?" "No," I replied. "I'm hot," he says; "Me too," I say. "Wanna turn on the AC?" he says. SHOCK. Usually I am the first to open up that can-o-worms, and usually I hold out till late-May! "Please do," I said. Thank the Lord he did, otherwise I don't think I would have gotten a wink of sleep.

Installation

Mike, my dad and our kind neighbor Matt are installing our new countertops today! Mike and Dad ripped the old ones out on Thursday. They had a little trouble with the new ones at first, as one of the pieces wasn't mitered correctly. They bought a new one at Home Depot and the new one seems to be a bit better.
Keep your fingers crossed!