Yuk!

I had to reach into the bottom of the toilet yesterday. I had just put Carter on the potty. He insists on sitting backwards on the potty these days. He was holding a toy car in each hand, and I said, "Carter, be careful not to drop your car....." plop...."in the potty." Awww, not in the potty! The look on his little face was pitiful. "Yellow car in potty, Momma." And there it was, way down in the bottom of the potty - the yellow toy car.

Of course, Seth had magically disappeared as soon as this happened. How do they know to do that? So, I went to the kitchen to look for something to use in my fishing expedition, all the while yelling, "Don't flush the potty, Carter!!" Luckily, the shock of dropping a much-loved toy down the toilet was enough to quell his typically insatiable desire to flush. I came back with a long handled plastic spoon, but unfortunately, it didn't work. I never realized how sharp the angle is at the bottom of a commode. I could have lived without learning that one. Anyway, there was nothing that would do the trick in helping me retrieve the deviant car, so I had to bite the bullet and reach in. Once the car was safe and sound, Seth reappeared. When I told him that I had just had to reach into the toilet, his answer was that research shows that toilet water is cleaner than sink water. "Had a 2-year-old peed in it in this study?" I asked. Hmmm. Probably not. "Urine is sterile, you know," he tells me. Fine. I'll be sure to let him reach into the potty next time.

Carter's newest thing is announcing that he wants to go to a party. In Carter-speak, this sounds like, "I want to potty." So I have to ask him, "Do you need to tee-tee or do you want to go to a party?" Usually, it's a party. And he's decided that Julie's house is the place to party. He's also decided that there must always be cake at Julie's house, since he's had it there once. He makes plans for his parties. He says there will be cake, cookies, singing, dancing, and that we'll play trains. Sounds like fun to me.

Maggie is eating cereal now and loving every bite. She actually attacks the spoon. I have to try to hold her hands back so she doesn't pull the spoon away from me. Then she lunges at it with her mouth and gnaws on the spoon until I can wiggle it out. She's such a cutie pie!

Well, that's it for tonight. Hope you all have a good Memorial Day tomorrow.

A New Kind of Cool

I was driving down the road today with the kids in the car. Carter has a new obsession with having the wind in his face as we ride, so we had the sunroof open, the windows down, and the radio blaring - to the Blue's Clues soundtrack. Oh yes, I'm driving through town singing at the top of my lungs, "You've got to find the first paw print. That's the first clue. You put it in your notebook, cause it's whose clues - Blue's Clues!" It was at this point that I realized that I am now longer cool (if I ever was to begin with!). Then I looked back at Carter's face. He was smiling and laughing and singing along with me. To him, it's cool to drive down the street serenading passersby with music about a blue cartoon dog. Funny, the things that would have been embarrassing a few years ago are cool now, just because they make my kids smile.

Anyway, it's been a while since I've blogged. Things have been busy around here. Carter's out of preschool for the summer, so we've been having fun at home together. He loves to paint, glue, color - anything artistic. He's also grown quite fond of the park. He requests to go almost daily. Usually when Seth gets home from work, he takes Carter out to the swing set in the back yard to play. Last night I looked out the window, and Seth was working diligently on the slide. I yelled out to him, "Dear, it looks like you're waxing the slide. You're not, are you?" He looked up with a gleam in his eye, "Oh yeah, I am." Apparently, it had gotten a bit to slow for his taste, so he waxed it. Two coats. Now Carter goes flying down the slide, off the end of it, and straight into the grass. He, of course, loves it. Seth says he's putting another coat of wax on. At least Seth can sew him up when he needs stitches.

Carter continues to keep us entertained. He has a toy truck that he has decided is Birdie and Kevin's truck (these are two very good friends of ours). Not only does he have their truck, but he puts two crayons in the back of it - they're named Birdie and Kevin. He drives the truck all around the house announcing, "Birdie and Kevin are going to work. Birdie and Kevin are shopping. Birdie and Kevin are home." It's really cute. This morning, Carter was playing in his room and I kept thinking that I was hearing him say applesauce. This didn't make any sense to me. Then I looked down and realized what he was playing with - an abacus! Seth teaches him the oddest words! He also loves to talk about terrariums.

Maggie is doing great. She's rolling all over the place now. She gets her eye on something across the room, and off she goes, rolling until she gets to it and grabs it. She LOVES her big brother. Her face just lights up every time he talks to her. And she's a wonderful sleeper! Last night I put her to bed at 8:30 and she didn't wake up until 6:00 the next morning! We're so lucky! Well, that's about it for us. I'm going to finish watching the Dancing With the Stars finale. I'll try to do better with updating!

Who Needs a Pacifier?

Miss Maggie has found something even better - her toes!!

This is one of my absolute favorite stages of babyhood. She will just lay there and eat her toes forever! And she's gotten so active! I sitting here watching her play in her play gym. She reaches for toys, then kicks toys, then rolls to get to a new toy - all the while stopping to munch on her toes every few minutes, of course. She's a very happy, busy girl.

We got a new addition to our kitchen this week - the Learning Tower. It's a wooden platform that Carter can stand on to do things at the kitchen counter. He's been standing on it painting with water for most of the day.

When he got tired of painting, I let him "cook." I gave him some dry pasta and some bowls and spoons, which was good for another hour of entertainment. I'm thinking this was a good investment.

In other Carter news, last week was his last week of mother's day out for the summer. He's really going to miss it - he loved going to play, and he loved his teachers. We're organizing a weekly playgroup for the summer, though. The first week will be at our house. We're doing bubbles and sprinklers this Friday.

Carter has also started this fantastic run that he does around the house when he has no shirt on. He runs full speed around the house, slapping his belly and laughing hysterically. We've got to catch it on video - it is really, really funny. Also, Carter has a new found love for Maggie's exersaucer. He climbs into it and sits and plays, referring to himself as Baby Carter. "Baby Carter's playing exersaucer, Mommy!" Then he points at things across the room and asks me to bring them to him in the exersaucer. I'm thinking, "Hmm. At least I know where he is and what he's up to for a while." The funny thing is that his little legs probably fit in the holes better now than they did when he was a baby. He was such a chunk, and he's thinned down so much! Leaving you tonight with a sweet picture of Carter and Daddy that I took right before bedtime tonight. You think Daddy's crazy about his little buddy? Carter's pretty wild about Daddy, too!

Plotting

I'm pretty sure that Carter and Maggie are plotting against us when we leave the room. How else could my two wonderful sleepers have coordinated such a sleepless night last night? Here's how I think it went down:

Carter: Hey Mags, don't you think it would be funny to wake Mommy up a couple of times tonight?
Maggie: Mmm-hmm. Mommy's getting a little too comfortable with this sleeping through the night thing. Do you want me to just scream a lot?
Carter: No, that's too obvious. Let's make the theme pee-pee. I'll start.

And he did. At a little past midnight, we heard Carter come out of his room, crying, saying that he needed to potty. We put him on the potty, and we went and went and went. Then he actually fell asleep mid-stream. The kid fell asleep on the potty. Now that takes talent. Seth just scooped him up and carried him back to bed when the flow stopped.

So, back to the plotting:
Maggie: So, what do you want me to do?
Carter: Drink a lot tonight before bed so that you can leak out of your diaper later on. Then start fussing because you're uncomfortable.
Maggie: Not a problem. Do you want me to add in a little "I've flipped onto my tummy and I'm frustrated that I can't flip back over" so she knows I'm really upset?
Carter: Oooh! That's good!
Maggie: And of course, I'll have to nurse for at least 30 minutes once she gets me changed and dry.
Carter: Wow, I've trained you well. You're a quick learner.
Maggie: I'm learning from the pro.

So Maggie did her part of the plot starting at about 3:30am. I've been watching the two of them today, looking for signs of a plot for tonight. I didn't see any communication going on, but they're quite sneaky - you never know. I'm hoping for a peaceful night, because we have a really busy day tomorrow. The kids and I are going to meet my sister and her kids at the park in the morning. Then I'm going to try to get Carter to take a quick nap before we go to a Kentucky Derby party tomorrow afternoon. I'd like to squeeze in a little sewing time for my newest project - my first quilt - if at all possible. I've got it cut out, and I've pieced my squares together. Now I'm ready to get sewing. It's a little after 10:00 now, so I'm going to head off to bed. You never know when you're kids are plotting a sleepless night - I'm going to sleep while I can!

Mmmmm Cake!

After a crazy day yesterday, we decided to spend the day at home today. We did lots of laundry and played a lot. I was hanging a jacket in the coat closet this morning, when I discovered two stuffed animals that I had bought the kids for Easter, but forgotten to give them. They were the Sandra Boynton pig and chicken. I brought them out, and told Carter that he had to choose one for himself and then Maggie would get the other. At first, he said that he wanted both, but I told him he could only have one. So he chose the chicken and put the pig in the swing with Maggie. A few minutes later, he said that he wanted to play with the pig, so I told him he had to ask Maggie if it was okay. She, of course, said yes, so he took the pig out of the swing, and I went into the other room. When I came back, I found that Carter had put his chicken in the swing with Maggie. Then later he put both the pig and chicken in the swing with her. Awww, what a sweet boy! I was so proud that he shared without me making him!

We finally got out of the house this evening. The children's choir at our church had a musical tonight (Whoo-hoo! Great job with the solo Lindsey!), and there was a dinner afterwards. We all thought that the food was good, but no one enjoyed it more than Carter. He ate all of his chicken nuggets, doused in pepper, of course. Then he was ready for the cake. It was yellow cake with chocolate icing. He started with the icing. It got everywhere - his face, his neck, his arms, his clothes, his eyebrows - you name it, Carter had frosting on it. Then he proceeded to drop the fork, pick a piece of cake up in each fist, and go to town. By the time he finished, he had become quite a spectacle. I was so glad that other people had their cameras with them. I don't remember the last time I laughed so hard, so tonight I'm going to just post a couple of pictures of Carter and the cake. I hope it makes you smile, too.