Poopy in the Potty!!

Good morning, Bloggers!
My adventues this week involves potty training! The dreaded adventures!
When my oldest was a baby-- I could not wait until he was pooping on the potty. Peeing on the potty. Until, he was- then the spur of the moment shopping was put on poopy hold! Everywhere we went he had to pee in that store. We started only shopping at stores with clean potty's. Everytime we got in the car-- he had to go. It was like the favorite scences in a movie, where the child goes to the bathroom, gets completly bundled for snow play, and just as they were ready to send the child out to play-- they had to go to the bathroom. Now that is reality!
With my second child, he wanted nothing to do with being potty trained! He was almost going on 4 before he would successfully go to the bathroom. It was awful! And to make matters worse we had an infant-- I would never recommend two kids in diapers! That makes an expensive trip to the store. When Charlie was born I had already started working full time at the hospital. I would work 32 hours over the weekend, get up on MOnday, teach at a local homeschool co-op and then go back to work and work for another 8 hours. This made for Tuesday, to pray the boys would sleep in and try to catch up on putting everything back together from the weekend!
One particular day, I traveled to the Eastern side of Harrisburg, to goto Target! I love Target- and I love their deals! So we made the 30 minute trip. Just as I was getting the boys out of the Minivan-- I smelled Poop! Not just any poop, but poop from a 4 year old and poop from an infant! Yuck!! I grabbed the diaper bag from the back-- No diapers, No wipes! The worst thing ever is that I had just spent $50 the day before on diapers and wipes at BJ's. So that last thing I wanted to do was spend more money on diapers,but I had no choice. We rushed back to the diaper isle, looked over our choices. For Charlie, I grabbed Target brand-- the cheapies, cheap wipes, the kind your fingers go right through with the first wipe! Now, for Henry-- the one you would think would be potty trained by now! Ah-- a deal-- at the end of the row was pull-ups on clearance-- $5.00 for a box with a $3.00 coupon-- Now I do not feel awful buying these diapers. The only thing wrong with the pull-ups was that they were Hot PINK with princesses on them. Now one thing you don't know is that Henry-- loved Princesses when he was little. He was totally into them. He wanted to dress like them, act like them... oh- it just goes on from there! So when I had to deal with buying diapers and buying girl diapers-- I went with the price and who is going to see them,but me!
Well, this $2 deal would be the best deal ever! When I got them on Henry-- I told him--- "Now, Henry. Look at these Princesses! Now-- you don't want to pee on the princesses do you?" The look on his face was priceless! "Now-- if you really like princesses, you can't poop in the castle!" (which was the scence on the back!) He was so tramatized!
Later, that night we were at a baseball game for my oldest-- when Henry had to poop and pee. We were sitting on the bleechers-- when he told my husband he had to poop-- "Just go in your diaper!" Yeah--those are always words of husbandry wisdom! "I can't! I can't poop in the castle!" My husband just looked at me with confussion! He pulled down Henry's pants to see what the child might be talking about-- to see the Hot Pink Princess Pull-Ups! Well, anyone who has sons-- will know the look on his face to see his SON-- in pink!

Well-- to make the story shorter-- that is all it took to potty train Henry! I found that parenting will make you do things you never thought you would ever think of, do and or say! And our child's accomplishments are OUR accomplishments-- even down to pooping in the potty! You know--you where one of those Mom's who heard other Mom's jumping up and down calling poopy all kinds of weird names, telling everyone about the little poopy in the potty! And looking at the Mom and thinking "I will never do that!" Until, the day where out of days,weeks,and maybe months that precious little boy looked at you and said in your frustration, "I love the way you wipe my butt, I love it when you clean up my poopy," and the day they refused to poop in the diaper-- the excitment you get! You must tell the world!

That's No Baby!!

Now, this little story is a couple of years old-- however-- I felt it was worth the write!It came up at work the other day, as we were discussing the mere fact of how boys are so curious of their bodies and what their bodies do, how they make noise, how funny and how stinky they can be. And If i may say it-- once a boy has found his private area-- do they ever let it alone?
My Charlie, is the one with the most questions-- one day he asked me if I had a penis? I want to be honest, but... (long pause) I don't want them to know about everything! So I told him, "No, Mommy's have Pee-Pee's". And that was that! Until the day we were in BJ's. (and ever notice how loud a bathroom can be when someone say's something that you don't want others to hear?) I pulled him inside the stall with me, and all of a sudden, "Ah-HA-- you do have a penis--- I hear you peeing!" Yeah-- there we go! You know as we shopped that morning in BJ's-- I knew just by looking at the woman's face who was in the bathroom that morning!
Now, a couple of years ago--about 4-- I took my 2 boys and new baby to the Washington DC Zoo-- if you ever want to see a beautiful zoo-- this is the place to be!! I love Zoo's-- we are members of the Pittsburgh Zoo-- this way we can go to all the participating Zoo's in the USA for FREE!! You can't beat that! So-- off we trucked that morning to Washington DC to the Zoo. It is about 3 hour ride from PA! So, we get to the Zoo. There was hardly anyone else there-- the animals were out. The day was beautiful. Baby monkey's, baby elephants, panda bears, baby ducks,-- nothing beats watching Mommy's with their babies! It just shows how nurturing a parent can be and how we can all relate to each other. Some more than others, like I think the boys are a good combination of the Tazmanian Devil and Gorilla's! And their father is more like Big Black Bear-- stuck in the honey tree. Why move-- you got the goods all right in front of you!
So, back to the babies! Every baby we saw- I made a big ordeal about! The elephant nursing, the mommy monkey picking bugs off the baby's back and eating them, the baby ducks swimming all within reach of the mommy! Then we came to the Kangaroo's. The boys wandered around the side of the fence and I had the stroller on the other side. And right in front of me hopped a mommy kangaroo with her baby in its pouch! This was so exciting-- when eles do you see this. Only on TV. This is something the boys just had to see! I was so excited calling them back to me like the Mommy Duck-- "Hurry, Hurry, you have got to see the baby!" With all the commotion, a school group was passing by, and they too came running over to see the baby kangaroo inside the Mommy's pouch! I started teaching the children, oh- how small that baby was and how it had to crawl into the pouch and nurse for so long until it pokes it's head out of the pouch! What a miracle!
Now, a couple of these "City" kids started asking-- "Where's the baby"-- and I pointed-- look there it is-- and because we were all tring to see it the Kangaroo kept turning it's back!
Then it hopped right up to us! Now this is exciting.......... Until the Mr. Teacher of the group leaned up to me and said, "Mam, That's no BABY!" I just looked at him and looked closer at the "baby"-- Nope that was no baby.
Then my oldest son looked at me and said, "Momma, is that a penis or a baby?"
Now, how was I to know-- I have only seen baby kangaroo's on TV!
So, with that-- I gathered my children and drove home the 3 hours in the car as the boys' slept-- hopefully not dreaming of babies!

Hamster is Loose-- Again!!

For my younger son's 7th birthday-- he begged and pleaded for a pet hamster. I have issues with my children wanting things and myself remembering my childhood and giving in to their wants and needs! Now, I do have a limit-- but it is so overpushed when they look at you with those big eyes, and tell you how they will take care of it, clean up after it, love it, and never have to be reminded of it! This can get one in alot of trouble, I mind you!
So, when I talked to my husband about Henry's need for a pet- He did not even think twice, "Is it alive?" "NO!"-- "Are you out of your mind?". (He grew up with NO pets!) So, I took it upon myself to buy the cage for his 7th birthday.
The day of his party, we allowed that gift to be last, oh he was so excited about getting the cage, that it almost did not matter that there was no animal in it! We took him to the pet store and he picked out his pet hamster. She is a beautiful light tan color with beady red/pink eyes! We bought him a book on how to take care of her, what to feed her, what not to do with her! He named her "Angel".
Now let me explain to you about Henry-- Henry's name means "Ruler of the household, his kingdom! And he lives up to that without a doubt! He even has the favorite color purple--because purple is royalty! So that puts you in mind of where this is heading! My dear sweet, Henry!
Henry-- is the middle child. And everything you have ever read or heard about the middle child-- is SOOOOO-- true! At least, it is with Henry. Henry is super sensitive, smart (he is so smart), caring, and so wishes everyday that he was an only child. Especially, from his younger brother Charlie! Boy-- do the two of them go at it almost everyday! Charlie calls Henry "Dramatic"-- and that really sums up Henry!
So, we bring Angel home, place her in her cage! It was really fun to watch her, go round and round in the wheel. Sit up and listen to her at night, chew and chew through the cage and go round and round in the wheel. Did I mention-- chew all night on the metal cage!
Then a friend gave us some tubes for the cage-- now this was fun. I tried to turn it into an engineering lesson-- how can we make her cage more fun! And as if, 6 different tubes weren't enough-- we ran out to the store and bought--$50.00 more of tubes, an outhouse, look out stations, tube fasteners, a ball... And 3 more girl hamsters. The other boys realizing that I was in a daze, a bad place, looked at me with those eyes, and showed me 3 baby hamsters. So we left the place with over $100 worth of hamster stuff and 3 more baby hamsters. We did not tell my husband! No way-- I would let him in this surprise gently! I would let the children tell him as he came in the door. They would yell out in excitement has he would be tring to get in, pushing the dog out of the way, tripping on the toys in his path, and falling over the kids all at the same time! That to me seemed the best way to approach the situation!
So, now we have 4 hamsters. Angel in her cage, and Ruby (Teddy's hamster), Mary Jesus (Henry's),and Charlie (you guessed it-- Charlie's hamster). Now, the funny part is that Mary Jesus-- kept jumping on the other hamsters-- so by the end of the week I talked him into just Mary. There just seemed something wrong with having a sacred name on a "dirty" hamster who rode the others and she too was a female!
Now-- this story comes to a quick end-- within 3 weeks the stinky 3 hamsters all got ill and died with in 24 hours of each other. Those boys were cleaning their cages everyday-- and they bit them, and were wild little things-- they peed on everything-- yuck! And those tubes, they were off and out the door with in days-- once I realized how stinky they get, and how they drag the food up through them and pee in them (there are holes in them and everything falls through)-- they were off and out!
And so they died of some disease! And to make matters worse-- the dog dug them up and ate them right in front of the kids-- so we walked around after the dog for a couple of days, picked the poor soles out of her poop and reburied them outside the fenced in yard-- we got all of them back, but Charlie! So- for about a week-- they buried all her poop,, just in case!
So, now Angel escapes her safe little domain! She is gone. It was little over 2 weeks. We were putting little treats out for her. Putting her cage on the floor. Nothing seemed to work! Finally, we put her cage back down in the basement! And poor Henry, sobbed everytime he thought of her! It is all that one Mommy could stand! So, last Friday-- I brought home Koda. Koda is a little black bear hamster. I bought him at PetSmart. I went in looking for the $9 girl hamster and came home with the $20+ boy hamster. They know how to work the Momma! The sales girl showed me how you can do anything to this little guy, and how he would nuzzle the chin, and he never-- ever bites! (Angel bit everyone-- except Henry) She even bit Sammy on the nose when he got to close!-- So home came Koda!
Henry was so excited-- he ran to the basement-- set up the cage- the boys were so excited-- they were bonding with this little guy-- even Sammy was holding him (squishing him-- he is not gentle)-- and he never even opened his mouth to bite! We finally put the kids down to bed. They were so excited! And by this point--my husband is not even saying a word-- it was like he thought that I could not hear his head shake and see his eyes roll everytime he passed the cage!
Then we noticed something--- why, yes, there she was--- Angel-- she came up to see or smell what the new "hot" item was in the house! I believe "crap" was the word out of my husbands mouth. It was not the idea of having two-- it was the idea of the Two we had--- Angel-- a girl and Koda-- a boy! And with that Henry remarking of how we needed to get a preacher or priest to the house to get them married-- after all it is around Valentine's Day!
Angel-- now has a brand new chew-through (at least for the time) cage-- and Koda who is on the other side of room is in his!

Happy Valentine's Day!