Chicken

The idea of eating chicken devastates Ava to no end. She puts it her mouth, chews, and then leaves it there. Finally we had conquered the 'Olivia eating issues' and now have to deal with 'Ava eating issues.' Wonderful.

Ava sat and sat at the table, chicken mush in mouth. We tried everything to get her to swallow it so she could leave the table but to no avail she wasn't budging. Exhausted with trying and giving her any further attention Dave and Olivia announced they were on their way to scour the backyard for dog poop. Would you believe this child screamed a muffled high pitched 'dog pooooop...' then choked and swallowed her food just to go find dog crap? Dog crap. Whatever works.

I Know You Are Enjoying This...

Ava stink-fingered me. Typically this happens to Dave and I laugh but she got me today.

Ava stuck her finger down her poop filled diaper and brought back out a finger covered in what I only could have wished was chocolate. Maybe in a dream world, but in reality it was a poop covered finger shoved right into my face followed by an, "EWWWW." Uh ya, ewww and thanks for sticking it right in my face.

It is funny when this happens to my husband. Why I don't know, maybe because most of the potty stuff happens on my watch so any opportunity for something crappy to happen on his watch is relieving (no pun intended) to me that I get to be the one to hear about it instead of the one dealing with it. OR maybe it just is funny. Who knows.

Enjoy it Dave. I'm sure yours is coming.

The Amazing Olivia

Olivia rode her 2 wheel bike with training wheels yesterday all the way to the park. She rode with super fast lightning speed and the grace of an angel. Ok some of that statement might be a wee bit extreme. Liv did ride her bike exceptionally well and fast, but as far as graceful... not so much. She was looking all over the place and basically zig zagged her way to the park. When she got there she made a lap around the playground before jumping off to play on the slide. She was super proud of herself and we were too. It had been awhile since she had been on her big girl bike. When we left the park, she put her helmet on and rode home in a straight line. It was amazing. She just got on and took off. I freaked out that she was going too fast and thought she might eject herself over the handlebars so I caught up to her and slowed her down. I guess she has inherited the speed demon traits of her father. All the way home Livy chanted, "Mommy I go fast..." Yes Olivia you sure did!

On another note, Ava wore her panties to the park and came back dry. Good job big girl! AND....before we left for the park Ava told us she had to go potty so Dave put her on the BIG potty and she made a GIANT poop. Everyone screamed and clapped for her. You would have thought she had just won the lottery.

The Weekend of Sickdom

Is there such a thing? Sickdom? Our contaminated house would say yes. Ava started us off with this round of illnesses. She woke up Friday with a fever, a lot of sneezing (mostly in my face), and then the massive snots brigade. I washed both our hands after every sneeze and sanitized practically every thing that I could but sure enough the sickness spread to Olivia by Saturday night. It really sucked too because Ava was much better by Saturday night and we thought we had escaped any big drama.

Saturday night the neighbors kept letting off fireworks which in combination with Olivia's inability to breath clearly it kept her awake. After repeatedly going into her room we decided to let her sleep with us. By morning it was obvious that that wasn't the best decision as we woke up to a puddle of urine in the bed. I am guessing that her diaper shifted since she usually doesn't pee in the bed. Does it really matter? No. We still woke up today in a puddle of pee.

So Olivia is feeling miserable. Snot has engulfed her face and hands. She has a fever and has been somewhat crabby. Ava is better with little or no snot so I'm hoping by tomorrow Liv is feeling better.

On the Ava front: She made a poop in the potty. This is our first one in recorded history. Some did make it into her panties but hey we can't expect miracles and I certainly wasn't expecting this so soon. Dave found her pushing and rushed her to the potty. Way to go Daddy Dave and Avacakes!!!

Potty talk & the museum

I realize I may not need to jot down every little thing about Ava' s potty training but it helps me remember what worked and what didn't from day to day and to track her progress so far. Today she woke up with a wet diaper but it was far less filled than usual. Maybe it was due to her cold but yesterday after her nap she woke up with a completely dry diaper so I'm thinking that she may have made a connection with liking the feeling of dryness and of panties. I hope so. I really really really hate the hot smell of pee in the morning accompanied or unaccompanied by the waft of crap she usually has. Somehow I don't see my life working out that easily since it hasn't yet but we shall see.

Today Dave went to the doctor to get his x-ray. Yes this month 3 of the 4 of us have been x-rayed! Yeah we filled the quota!!! For those of you who don't know me that was total and complete sarcasm. How many other freakin' families have to be x-rayed, on weekends of course when the hospital is half staffed and at their VERY slowest? Apparently just us. Because we are that cool. Ugg. No more visits to the ER, the x-ray room, the pharmacy, or the doctor. We are taking September off...a vacation let's say. Ok I'm done. I'll stop.

While Dave was off doing his thing, Ava made her first potty, then ate breakfast, made a few more potties, and then Dave was back and ready to go on our outing. Ava had been completely dry all morning, minus the monster dump she took in the panties (sucks big time to clean). Dave sat her on the potty one last time before we left for the wildlife museum. She peed, we clapped, and away we went. We were gone for about two hours and when we returned her diaper was completely dry. We sat her on the potty and she made a huge pee and off to lunch she went. What a great first half of the day Ava had potty training! Yeaa Ava!!!

On a side note: The wildlife museum we went to was very interesting. It serves as a rehabilitation place for wildlife as well as an educational facility. Olivia loved the hawks, owls, and falcons. She and Dave are always bird hunting so that was wonderful that they got to see them together and up close. Ava enjoyed the bunny, the opossum, and the fox. We happened to be there during a feeding time for the coyote so we watched it devour a small rodent and a few vegetables.

The place wasn't very big so Olivia was able to run around without holding my hand and I think she felt like a big girl. Ava wanted to be free too so most of her time was spent struggling to free herself from her father. After we looked at all the animals and played in the exploration room we went outside and found a huge playground filled with kids. Liv took off running for the slide and Ava played on the train tunnel. Usually at our park there are very few kids if any when we go so it was nice to let the girls mingle with other kids their own age that they don't know. Livy really soaks up what she learns from other kids quickly.

Now we are back home and the girls are napping. Dave's cleaning the turtle tank, and I'm paying the bills...yeah that's it- paying the bills online.

Potty Talk

Today's potty experience went amazingly. This was the first morning Ava woke up and went straight to the potty. She sat for about a minute and exclaimed, "pee pee, pee pee" and pointed into the bowl. Sure enough there was urine in the bowl.

We all waved goodbye to the potty and Ava ate breakfast. Immediately after she finished and was cleaned up she sat on the potty again. When I removed her diaper there was a small wet spot so I wasn't expecting any miracles so if something happened in the next five minutes great. If not we were going shopping. Wow! One minute later Ava was eating her candy and I was washing out the bowl. She is getting really good at this. Dave and I are so proud of her.

On a side note...Livy is teaching Ava how to poop right now. Ava is clapping, "yeah Livy" and trying to look into the bowl from behind. Livy is saying, "listen to the poop." These two crack me up!


Quick update to this post:

We went shopping, came back, ate lunch, and put Ava on the potty in one last attempt before nap time. That little rascal knows exactly what she is doing. She sat for maybe a minute and pointed to the bowl of urine and then up towards her bag of candy. Congratulations Ava...I think you are becoming a big girl.... :) I love these two little cuties to pieces.

One Poop, Two Poop, Three Poop, Blue Poop???

Never in my life did I think I would see blue poop. But it does actually exist out there in children everywhere.

Olivia exclaimed in delight, "Mommy poopie. I need to make a turd!" Yes, thank you David for introduced our sweet daughter to the word turd. I get to hear that every day now. She sat on the potty and pooped. I wiped her and noticed that the paper was blue. That seemed awfully strange so I look deep in the bowl and there it was- the big blue monster.. What the hell? I called the sitter who had been over in the morning. As I started telling her what happened I began to open Ava's diaper....

Wow!!! Now that was gross. Blue poop everywhere. It stained her skin. I started remembering back to what they ate yesterday...what could they have eaten that was blue? Oh yeah, I had given them some fruit snacks after their nap. Huh. Tomorrow we'll be eating an apple.