Potty Training Tragedies and Triumphs!

My original goal was to get Boston potty trained during my two-week Christmas vacation in December 2009. With me being 14 weeks pregnant at the time, and him being a stubborn two and a half year old, we had to postpone it until Spring Break in March.

Well, at that point I was even more exhausted and Boston even more stubborn, that I just didn't have enough time (one week) to get him potty trained. So I had to wait until school let out at the end of May to try again. My goal was to get him potty trained before Blake came, so this gave me three weeks.

You better believe that those three weeks were busy and exhausting, and throwing potty training in the middle of it, YEAH RIGHT! I was afraid that Boston would never get potty trained, because once Blake was born it was a whole new ball game at our house.

However, I was sick and tired of changing a three-year old's diaper, so at the end of July we decided NO MORE DIAPERS. Boston is a very stubborn boy. He does things HIS WAY and at HIS TIME. This was very beneficial for me when he was an infant, because he pretty much put himself on his own schedule. HEAVEN! But it sure did backfire when it came to potty training. He did not want to do it and no amount of treats or gumballs could change his mind. He cried every morning for a diaper. But I didn't give in anymore. Underwear it was, and yeah we had our accidents, but eventually he had to learn.

Now pooping on the toilet was another story, and thanks to my husband and his patience he helped Boston get over his fear of pooping on the potty. Ian had Boston sit on the toilet for an hour and a half one day, with lots of tears shed, stories being read, and great father and son bonding time, until Boston pooped on the potty. Fortunately, the next day it only took 45 minutes, but it WORKED! Boston got over his fear of pooping in the potty and he was fully potty trained by mid-August.

There were quite a few messes to clean up during our potty training adventures, but being the mean mom that I am, I made Boston clean up his own messes!This is one that still happens from time to time...unraveling the toilet paper roll. The things that amuse him!This one he is cleaning up poop from his bedroom floor. He decided he was more comfortable pooping there instead of the toilet. I made him clean it up, because this behavior was not acceptable at our house.Don't worry, I taught him the importance of washing his hands too.
Now this is how he poops on the potty. CRAZY! He calls himself a frog when he poops.

His reward for finally being potty trained was going to be a fish. We went to Wal Mart and picked out a beta, a tank, and fish food. However, Boston wanted to look at the toys too. He quickly changed his mind from a fish to a toy (no surprise), and chose Moon Sand.

He loved and still loves this toy, but as a mother, not my first choice. Thank heavens for a vacuum and each time he plays with it a little more sand gets vacuumed up. This toy is slowly killing itself off!

We are all happy that Boston is potty trained. I think he is even happy too. Now, in a few more years we get to go through this battle again. Sigh. For now, we will just enjoy Blake as he is now though.

P.S. One of the best things about Boston being potty trained, was that he got to start preschool at the end of September! YAY! He loves it, and I am able to get some stuff done without having to cart two kids around. Double YAY!

Brotherly Love

Boston loves Blake. Blake loves Boston. I am so happy about how well they love each other. Within these past couple of weeks Boston has become very protective of Blake, and gets upset if other kids get close to him. He tells them, "Hey! That is my baby brother!" and tries to pull or push the kids away from him. Here, Blake is giving Boston a kiss. SO CUTE! Blake loves to watch Boston. He loves it when Boston gets down on the floor with him and talks to him, tickles him, and even "scares" him to make him laugh.

I was nervous of the three-year age gap between these two, but it looks like they will be the best of buds no matter what.

Spoiled?

Not sure if he is spoiled, but Blake refuses, REFUSES, to try and hold his own bottle. He is 6 months old (tomorrow) and will not hold his bottle. Every time we feed him, he lays his body back and puts both hands behind his head.

Most of the time I am okay with this because I like to hold and cuddle him. However, it would be very beneficial when I am busy trying to get stuff done. He will learn, hopefully, sooner than later.

Ghetto Swimming Pool

Boston sure was a trooper this summer! Boston had a few adjustments to get used to. First of all, mom coming home, which meant he didn't get to go over to his cousins house and play every day! Also, a new baby brother, which meant mom and dad were preoccupied/exhausted, and he had to hear a baby cry, and be quiet because the baby was asleep, and couldn't get out of the house as much as he was used to.

I did my best trying to keep him entertained, but there was only so much I could do, since I was the one that was preoccupied with the new baby.

I finally let him start to venture outside and play in the front yard. However, mid-July it is quite toasty warm here. So he created a ghetto swimming pool in the driveway. He kept cool enough to play a little bit, but we did have to "fill" it up a couple times since the water would evaporate quickly.He was EXTREMELEY happy to be outside, and loved every second of playing with his cars in water. In fact, he wanted to do this everyday. I was happy he was happy. I feel bad that he doesn't have a backyard to play in, but we get creative and make do with what we have!

(How sad! This makes me sad for what he had to go through this past summer, but hey he will be a better person for it, right? Right?)

My New Ring Tone

This is my new ring tone, so don't be offended if it takes me a minute to answer the phone. I can't help but just listen to little Blakers laugh!

(Sorry, the video image isn't the best quality.)

A Collector of Sorts....

Need I say more?

What a F-U-N Weekend!

This past weekend we went on our traditional Christmas Tree Hunt with Ian's brothers and their families. This is a tradition we all look forward to every year, and we all have so much fun.

In the past eight years that I have done this with Ian, this year seems to be the first year that there was snow on the ground. Not a lot of snow, Thank Heavens, but enough for the little ones to make a few snow balls and throw them at each other.

We took Ian's truck, so he could haul all of the trees off of the mountain as well as pull his brother's four wheeler. Ian's truck seats six, so we got to add a couple little ones to ride with us. Boston is always happy when his cousins get to ride with him.

Aunt Annie bought the little ones juice for the rode, so the only way I could get all three of them to look at the camera was by having them show me their juice and say "Bug Juice!" It worked!

We had Blake ride up front with us. He was quite happy being next to mom and dad and playing with his toy ladybug!

We drove up to Central this year. We have gotten trees here before. It is only about a 45 minute drive.

I spotted this tree from the rode. We always scout trees from the vehicle, and if we see one we like we mark it and come back to it as a last resort. Ian was on the phone when I told him I found our tree, so he didn't hear me. When we made it to our base camp, I told him I had found our tree. So we turned around to look at it up close. The entire back side of this tree is completely bare except for the top, but we new it was going to go in a corner, so we didn't need the backside anyway. We liked the tree, we marked it, but we couldn't settle for it just yet. We came to hunt, and hunt was what we were going to do.

We headed back to camp, where everyone else was, and got all bundled up in our warm clothes to go hunting for Christmas trees.

Blake was kept very warm. He was quite happy to be held the whole time and the Bjorn Backpack made it so much easier to carry him around.We first started our trek on foot.

Then we got to take a ride on this to cover more territory.

Boston loved the four wheeler ride. Ian took him on his own adventure so they could go faster without worrying about me and Blake.

We found some good trees on our hunt, but I was set on the first one. So we headed to camp to hang out and enjoy some lunch.

The rest of the family found and cut their Christmas trees. We cut ours down on the way out.When I say we, I mean Ian. I was more there to take the picture and moral support. I mean this is a family tradition!

Good thing there is only "half" of a tree, or Ian may have had some trouble carrying this load!The truck and trailer were finally loaded with the 7 trees. We were all ready to head back home.

The advantage of riding with the Little Ones. These three were zonked out just minutes after getting in the truck!The final result! The only way you know it's missing it's backside is because I told you that several times in this post. It turned out great. We had a good time. Boston is so excited for Christmas this year, and reminds me everyday that Santa is coming to his house.

We hope you all have a Very Merry Christmas!

Lovin' Life

Dear Family & Friends....

I know you all have lost all hope on me updating my blog. I pretty much lost hope too! I have a million pictures to share, stories too, and it is quite overwhelming. I have anxiety just thinking about blog updates!

I would like to get caught up, but don't have that much time in a day. Plus my computer isn't the fastest when it comes to uploading pictures to the blog. So, my goal is to do a new blog post every few days until I am all caught up.

I like to keep my blog in chronological order, so I will start with the most recent and work my way backwards. After a couple of days I am going to change the date stamp to put the post in the correct timeline order of when the event actually happened.

So please check back often, so you can see how life has been these last 6 months!

Halloween 2010

This year for Halloween Boston was a farmer and Blake was going to be a cow. However, the cow costume that I got from a friend was a little too girly, so Blake was a farmer too.

Both boys looked quite cute in their farmer get-up.

Boston went to a carnival with his preschool class. His teacher got four other preschools involved and held the carnival at a park. When Boston goes to a park, he wants to play on the slides and all of the toys at the park, so he was having a hard time at the carnival. He did have fun though.

He even got his face painted, which I was totally shocked that he would allow that to happen.

He requested a spider with it's web.

Turned out cute!

When it came time for the Halloween Parade, Boston was done for the day. It took some convincing to get him to line up with his class. He finally did get lined up, and his teacher put him in the front of the line with her. (Which seems to be the case for Boston at school. He needs to be watched closely.)

The parade finally began. Boston's class was the second or third class in line. I went to where the parade would end to take pictures, and that way I could just grab Boston and go.

This is how well Boston did in the parade.....

Needing to be carried by his teacher!

On Friday, our ward held their annual Trunk-or-Treat and Chili Cook-off. We also had our Sis-in-Law's annual Halloween Party at her house. It was a busy night, but a lot of fun.

What's a farmer without his TRACTOR?

Ian had spent all week making Boston a tractor to go along with his costume. The tractor turned out AWESOME! Ian mounted it to Boston's bike so he could drive it! He loved driving it around at the trunk-or-treat.




This is how Blake got around at the Trunk-or-Treat, and he was just as happy as Boston was!

At the family Halloween Party, Ian's Grandma and her husband Ray even got dressed up for the occasion! The party was a lot of fun and we walked away with a ton of candy from there.
On Saturday we went to my parent's ward Trunk-or-Treat. Again the tractor was a hit, and a lot of people in their ward kept asking to take pictures of it. After that, we crashed the party at Ian's brother's house. Boston was able to go trick-or-treating with his cousins, and play with all of their toys! He likes to do that.

It was a busy, fun-filled weekend!

Happy Halloween Y'all!

My Favorites....

The Best Big Brother

A lot of you have asked how Boston does with Blake. Don't get me wrong, I was quite nervous myself about bringing Blake home. Boston isn't the most gentle child when it comes to playing with other kids, let alone just playing by himself. However, he has been very gentle with Blake and loves his baby brother very much.

Boston doesn't ask to help, but when we ask for help with Blake, Boston is always willing. He will run and get diapers for him and get his blanket and binky when we ask. I even asked Boston one time if he wanted to feed Blake, and he was sure excited to do that!

Boston likes to hold Blake, but often times it only lasts a few seconds before Blake starts crying. But look at the twinkle in Boston's eye while holding his baby brother. Boston has done quite well with Blake, however, he can be a naughty boy when mom and dad are preoccupied with Blake and he really tries to push the limits! Most of the time he gets away with it because he knows our hands are tied. UGH! We love both our boys very much and are excited for when they can start to play together.