We are home

We got home at 8:30 ish last night and I cannot tell you how good it feels to be back in our own bed with Bear in his OWN bed and not in a pack-n-play by our bed. I am not complaining b/c I put him there, BUT... here at home he gets up super early and just sits and plays in his crib so no biggie. Around 7:30 I get him out and feed him. THERE... we heard his every conversation starting at 5:15 in the morning (it is 1 hour earlier there). I would look up and see his silhouette over the top of his p-n-p and just laugh to myself and roll back over after shushing him. He would get real quiet and then after about 30 min do it all over again. It was good but now I am getting back in the swing of things here on the home-front. Not an easy task when you have my OBSTACLES...

Glad to be back among all my bloging family/friends... more to come.

Getting ready..

Here we are on our final "launch day". We are to be leaving at 1AM (technically Saturday morning). For me, I don't usually go to bed until around 11P so 1A seems like a longer part of "tonight". At 11P tonight we are going to be getting everything into the car and crossing all our "t's" and dotting our "i's" ( and hopefully minding our p's and Q's)... late night with a slumber bug (J) can be kinda "groggy" if you will. Not easy for a high-speed-get-it-done-queen (yep, me)! So we need lots of grace! J is working this morning and then again tonight and will be getting off around 9P so he can get a quick nap and then we can load up and head out. Right now he is getting tires put on the car and an alignment, we got the oil changed and all the fluids checked the other day so we should be good to go.

We are going to transfer a sleeping bear into his reclined car seat (love that thing) and strap him in and bundle on top of him his blankets and bear. We are anticipating him sleeping through the "night" until at least 6:30 or 7ish... He is a good sleeper when he has been asleep already. (I will let you know how that really goes... something about 4AM keeps popping up in my mind...hmmmm) Ü

I got Bear out of bed this morning and put his little sweat pants on from yesterday and his little legs are sticking out of the bottom... GREAT he grew over night and now I am going to have to make an emergency trip to ON to get him some more warm cotton pants. Uggghhhh. It never fails right! HA! that's okay b/c J and I were going to have to go get a couple warm outfits for us too. Seeing that it is finally getting cooler and we get clothes like once/twice a year (if even that) when the weather finally changes. I did this for summer and of course when I finally got my "summer" clothes it was getting "cooler". hmmmm maybe someday I will stay up with the times instead of running behind on time. It won't be today though! I am behind today again. And I have a headache to boost. Not a good packing day. LOTS OF GRACE!!!

Fare-thee-well blogger friends. Love and Peace to all. Hope you all have a wonderful Turkey Day and remember ALL that you are thankful for! I will bring to you a post later of all my Thanksgivings; think of all yours and be sure to post about them too.

Updated potty break

To answer the age question... Bear is 13 months old. It seems to be going great. We got in last night from lifegroup and I put him on the potty and he went tee tee. He got up and clapped. This morning I put him on again and he went both in the potty (sparing you the pictures there; I did have half a mind, I was so excited)... He again started clapping but did not get up until after I wiped him clean.

Again, he is not fully "training"; he doesn't come to me yet and let me know he has to go. I am just being consistent with taking him every hour or so and letting him sit there for a couple minutes. And when he does succeed (about 3 out of 5 times) he claps and gets a BIG REJOICING reward. He thinks it's fun and is really thrilled about it when we are all clapping and cheering in the bathroom together. He is too young yet I think to understand material rewards so for now he will get the loud cheerful kind that push a child's "happy button"... hehe.

I think we will probably never go to material rewards for this. It is just another phase in life that he will learn and we will encourage him in and REJOICE when he succeeds. We love the idea of rewarding and such and believe that will be a part of older teaching but for now he loves social enteraction and excitement. No need to make rewards/gifts a bore so early on in life. right?... He is happy with sticks and rocks and I am satisfied with that! Love my boy!