Personality

My goal has been to not write too much about potty training, because no one wants to hear gross specifics, but there has been one funny aspect of Ethan's personality demonstrated repeatedly that I have to share, and in order to do so, there will be some potty talk, so please excuse me (or stop reading now).

First of all, we weren't done after the 3 day program.  Two days after we finished that, Ethan got a stomach bug for the first time.  A few days later we went on a 5 day trip to Grandma's in St. George (no accidents in the car!!!) and some time in that window he got a new molar.  These are the reasons I'm giving him for regressing on potty training two days after the big weekend. 

Anyway, one of the areas he really regressed in in St. George was going #2 in the toilet.  His schedule is to go #2 during bedtime or nap time, so it has always been a concern.  We heard him wake up from his nap at Grandma's and went in to find him without any underwear.  Upon further investigation we realized that he had independently done exactly what I would have done had I found him with dirty underwear: he took off his underwear, put the poop in the toilet (although I wouldn't have used my hands), and then put the underwear in the tub to wash them.  He was very proud of himself for having his poop in the toilet.  He did this again yesterday morning.  We heard water running in the bathroom and found him cleaning up poopy underwear in the toilet.  We're making sure to be very clear now that it only counts as going in the toilet if he goes straight into the toilet, keeping his underwear clean.

His efforts at cleaning up #2 may not always be helpful, but if he goes #1 by himself, he is very good at dumping and cleaning out his little training toilet all by himself, even though we've never asked him to.  He can be very independent and tries to be good and helpful.  Now if he would just get the motivation to put underwear on all by himself rather than have me do it he could be so much more independent (he takes his underwear all the way off every time he goes to the bathroom, but won't put his feet back in by himself).

London Bridge is...

 

This one is worth clicking to enlarge!

In Lake Havasu City, AZ!  We took a slightly longer way to St. George
so that we could see the London Bridge and Lake Havasu.  Ethan LOVED
getting out and running around for over an hour.  The fountain was
very exciting, but not as exciting as the army man he found in it
(he's holding it up in one picture)!  He calls it Toy Story.  While I
took pictures of the bridge he chased pigeons underneath it.  I've
never been to London, but chasing pigeons seems like it would fit into
a mini London experience, at least a Mary Poppins one.  Overall, we
were unimpressed with Lake Havasu City.  Maybe we missed something,
but it seemed run down and kind of dirty, including the lake water.
It was also frustrating that it took us three tries to find a
convenience store/fast food place that had a drinking water spigot to
fill up our water bottles.  It was a good break for Ethan though, I
got to check a site seeing spot off my list, and we got a really yummy
shaved ice as we were leaving, so I'm glad we went.  It was 107 while
Ethan was running around for so long, so we all needed a cold treat!
The high is 113 in Phoenix today; I guess summer is here!

--
Sent from my mobile device

-Mike

Happy, Not Tired

Ethan quickly picked up on me saying that when he is cranky I can tell he is sleepy. Now I really know when he is tired because he starts talking about how, "Ethan's happy! Time to play!" and "I'm not tired!".

Those were the types of conversations we were having on the way to the car after hiking at Zions National Park, and this is him in the car: happy, not tired!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Correction

This was our first road trip with Ethan in *underwear*-not diapers.

No accidents on the trip up! Yesterday we went to Lake Havasu on the way up, but the pictures are on Mike's phone and my blog post isn't sending from his phone. Today we went to Zions National Park!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Roadtrip!

To Grandmother's house we go! First road trip with Ethan in diapers, pray for us!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Lincoln and Douglas

Last year I read a nonfiction book every month, but I never finished December's: Lincoln and Douglas: The debates that defined America. I finished it tonight.

There was no reason it should have taken me to finish this (besides reading other things in the meantime) because it was really interesting. It would spark some really interesting conversation in a book group. The only cumbersome part was reading summaries of each debate because they were somewhat redundant. The epilogue had really interesting commentary that I could have read more of.

"But at the deepest level, what Lincoln defended in the debates was the possibility that there could be a moral core to a democracy. The fundamental premise of Douglas's popular sovereignty was that democratic decision-making, in order to be free, has to be unencumbered by the weight of factor's which are nonpolitical in nature, such as kinship, ethnic identity, or moral and religious obligations."

Francis Fukuyama discussed this idea in saying: "there is no struggle or conflict over 'large' issues, and consequently no need for generals or statesmen...what remains is primarily economic activity". I like the commentary on this: "But to what end? To sit at the end of the historical tracks, free, but only free to indulge one's personal preferences? Fukuyama's...nightmare was that the 'last man' would turn out to be the 'comfortable burgher, blinking stupidly and wondering about dinner...cowardly, greedy and self-absorbed' a society 'with no ability or inclination to defend itself or anyone else.'"
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Self Portrait 6 months

I'm a little over 6 months now. 27 weeks 4 days to be exact.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Select Strategies

I should also write down a few strategies we used.  One idea I got from our camping trip.  Before we went camping I wanted Ethan to be excited, but also understand what "camping" entailed, not just associate one of our activities with the word and think that anytime we walked through trees that we were camping, for example.  So, we went to the library and looked up and checked out camping books together.  Those were pretty much all we read for a while.  So, we did the same thing with potty books, and we've read them a lot.

Also, we decided not to do candy as potty training rewards.  I wanted to try a sticker chart.  Ethan was able to work for a "bribe" through a whole swim lesson, so I knew he could understand working for a reward later.  We thought of some toys we wanted for him and went to Big Lots, where they were even cheaper than online.  Through the course of his potty training he earned, by means of sticker charts increasing in number of stickers required, a Disney's Cars Mac hauler truck, Lightning McQueen, The King, Sheriff, and Chick Hicks.  He also got Hiro, a wooden Thomas engine (main character from one of his favorite movies).  We had been wanting to buy him Legos, so we bought a lot on Craigslist and he is currently getting one every time he goes in the toilet.  Sunday night I wanted one more big thing that I could use to reward him for the specific act of telling me he had to go and then going (he was still only going when I noticed he needed to).  I started looking around the house for something I could reuse and found a flashlight!  He loved our flashlight while camping and I remembered seeing one that we had "lost" for several years, so now it belongs to Ethan and he LOVES it!

Diaperless

I was skeptical when my friend said all three of her kids potty trained in 3 days with a program she knew about, but I was hopeful. I spent Monday-Friday of last week periodically taking Ethan to the bathroom, talking about dry underwear, etc. He surprised me by only taking a few hours to figure out how to "go" on command. On Saturday morning, after getting the 3 day details, we threw away Ethan's diapers (and then pulled them out when he wasn't looking because who wastes that kind of money?). Saturday, Sunday, Monday were potty training ALL day! I'm glad Mike was home Saturday and Sunday and willing to take shifts with me because it was really draining. I started to lose hope, but at 430pm Monday he started going into the bathroom and sitting on the toilet without me being there! And he has continued to go on his own or at least tell me so I can take him. We are now on day 5 without diapers! Yesterday we went to Joann's, saw a movie in the theatre, and shopped at Costco; no diaper, no accident, 6 trips to the bathroom (I'm pretty sure Ethan requests to go when he is bored with what I'm doing). Today he went to Kids Klub at the gym diaperless for the first time and did fine.

I know most people don't want to hear about potty training, and I don't want to go into too much detail, but I want to remember some big moments, and those more detailed accounts are below.

Night time was a concern for me because he's never woken up dry. I tried waking him up at night and/or in the morning for a potty break, but it was really hard to wake him up (he can sleep sitting independently on the toilet) and he was always dry when I woke him up. We decided he must be going when he wakes up. I talked to him about this a lot, but he just couldn't get over the idea of leaving his room while the blue light was on (which has been against the rules to keep him from getting up really early). I plugged in a monitor and started rushing in as soon as I heard him wake up, and he quickly got the idea that he could go potty and then go back to bed (the night time wake ups and nap I took with him helped with that too). His first nap after he realized he had the golden ticket was preceded by 12 trips to the bathroom-he really loves the power over mom that comes with the word "I have to go potty". Through all this time though, we have not had to change his sheets! Once or twice at the beginning he had an accident, but he got out of bed first. We are slowly decreasing the number of trips he takes to the bathroom before he falls asleep and every morning he takes himself to the bathroom when he wakes up.

The other concern was #2. Ethan is not one of those kids who squats in a corner. Almost without fail his dirty diapers came after a nap. I took a nap in his room to try and catch him, and I did, while he was sleeping/stirring! Then we could tell for a while on Saturday that he needed to go, but anytime he was about to on the toilet he would squeal/cry and stand up. Eventually I intervened by putting my hands on his thighs as he started to stand and telling him to sit down, he could do it, and it worked! It took him a day or two to get over the feeling of going #2, but he would at least always tell us and go in the toilet (while fussing). Now he will get up, even if he's sleeping, and do his business on his own without any complaints.

I know that we are not done with accidents, but I am amazed and excited with how potty trained he is in such a short time. We are committed to no diapers, not for road trips or anything. So next weekend, his little froggy toilet will be driving to St. George with us! :)
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

A Thousand Words

A picture is worth a thousand words, so how I wish we had a waterproof camera! We went to my mom's pool again today and stayed for an hour and a half before Ethan got too cold (it was 630). He put his toy snakes on the step and even when they were on the very shallow step, he would put his face in the water to get them. Of course he spent a lot of time jumping in, and is really starting to spring up and out as he does.

Tonight he also started "swimming" on his own. He had arm floaties on, and he would launch himself off of one of us or the steps, lay flat with his face down in the water, and kick to someone else (or the steps) 5-7 feet away. He would then immediately turn around and do it again. He must have done that for AT LEAST 30 min straight.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Little Fish

There are a few pictures at the bottom.

As I've mentioned, this was Ethan's 3rd summer of swim lessons.  Each year "Miss Erin" has expanded on similar skills and/or taught him a few new ones.  After the first few days this year, Ethan would fight me on some of his least favorite skills, but mostly because he didn't like repeatedly practicing them.  The day after his last lesson we went to my mom's pool, and he did all the things he fought me on, but happily and voluntarily.  Now I just hope I can keep these skills up throughout the summer without a pool or a nearby public pool.  If any of you with private or neighborhood pools want to invite us over, we'd gladly accept! :)

For my own record, and because it's pretty amazing, below are the skills Ethan has learned and a bit about his progression.  I love how these skills are helping him to be a bit safer and giving him a great foundation for learning to swim.  I also love that he now has lots of "games" to play in the water.  After 2 hours at Nana's pool we had to drag him out.

At 2 years, 7 months:

Floating: He can float on his own, especially with floaties on his arms (he could do this last summer too).

Dipping: He's totally fine being dipped under water and dips his toys in the bath and pool after singing them Ring Around the Rosie and counting to 3 like we do.

Grabbing the wall:  We put him under the water, push him towards the wall, and let go; he grabs the wall and hangs on.  He didn't like practicing this at swim lessons, but at Nana's pool, he always put his face in the water and reached out when we brought him near the wall.

Monkey Walk:  Ethan has always hated this, but this year he decided to really like it.  At Nana's pool he monkey walked for at least 10 minutes straight and liked playing chase with us.  (Monkey walking means he holds the side of the pool and moves his hands to slide along the wall).


Picking up toys:  Ethan could do this the last two summers as well.  We'll put diving toys on a step and he has to lean down, put his face in the water, and pick up the toys.  This year, after the first few days of me throwing back every ring he picked up so that he could keep practicing, he utterly, and loudly, refused to pick anything up until it was time to clean up.  Then he would happily pick up several toys and put them away.  At Nana's, he liked putting his toy snakes down and picking them up.  He even let me put them on a deep step and swim him down to the bottom where he would pick them up.

Eyes in:  While I am holding him and asking him to kick, I'll say "1-2-3 eyes in!".  I actually only have to count and he puts his entire head about .5-1 inch under the water, not just his face.  There were a few days of swim lessons that he fought me on this, but usually he would complain until I counted and then dunk himself.  At Nana's pool he put his eyes in frequently and without me asking.

Multitasking: Ethan now uses his arms and legs while "swimming" (I still hold him up).  During swim lessons he would stop kicking to put his eyes in when I asked, but at Nana's pool he did all three together.  We'll keep working on this because he needs to be able to put his eyes in and swim to be ready for the next class level up, which we may do at the end of the summer.

Jumping in:  We started this at the end of his swim session and I thought he would be too scared, but he LOVED it!  He jumps in, I let him go under, and then turn him around to grab the wall when he comes back up.  His main problem now is waiting for us to say 1-2-3.  At Nana's he counted to 3 on his own and jumped in next to me when I was turned away talking.  Mike and Nana don't turn him back to the wall when he jumps in, but Ethan stills says "back to the wall" and turns to reach for it.

Passing under water:  We practice in swim lessons putting Ethan under the water on his tummy, pushing, and letting go as his momentum takes him to another person.  After Mike and I had thrown him back and forth for awhile at Nana's pool, I started passing him under water instead (good practice and to avoid another foot to the stomach like he accidentally gave me once).  Then Ethan started requesting to only be passed under the water!

Wearing goggles:  Ethan now wears goggles the whole time he is in the pool--2 hours last weekend!  After we got out he convinced me to go back in for a few minutes, and after about a minute without goggles he was requesting to put them on again.  They sure help with all this under water stuff!

There are probably other things I'm not thinking of, but basically Ethan is doing great in the pool and having fun doing it, hooray!  Oh, I should mention that his favorite thing about swim lessons is every day we would throw a rubber ducky and he would have to kick and swim with his arms to go fetch it.  He loved that rubber ducky!


Miss Erin has a playground that Ethan got to play on every day.  He surprised me by climbing up this rock wall by himself.

 On the last day the kids got Otter Pops.  Ethan was excited about the idea, but didn't really eat it.  He still hasn't really embraced the whole popsicle idea.

 I bribed him the last two days of swim lessons to stop crying and fighting me and it worked quite well.  The last day I bribed him with a scoop of ice cream (we had a free pass from the library).  So here he is with an ice cream cone.  This may be the first non-soft serve he has had on a cone.

He is the slowest eater ever if I don't push him along.  He would get a little tiny bit on the tip of his tongue with each "lick".  Even with me taking several big bites of his kiddie cone to help the process along, it still took him 20 minutes just to get the ice cream flat with the cone.  I let him take it in the car then.  When he got home he started eating the side of the cone like it was corn on the cob and got melted ice cream all over as it dripped out the side/bottom.

Camelback Mountain

For the sake of being punctual with this post, I'm sending it from my phone, so sorry I can't match the captions to the picture. Our temperatures here in Phoenix conveniently dropped 15-20 degrees for Memorial Day (to the mid-80s), and a generous friend loaned us a hiking backpack, so we went out to Camelback Mountain. I've been wanting to hike it, so I'm glad we finally made it happen. Camelback is a large sandstone mountain that looks like a camel's back from far away (see picture below). I didn't believe that the 1.2 mile (each way) hike would be as hard as it said online, but the 1,264 ft elevation gain in that short distance was pretty darn challenging! I can't believe Mike did it with Ethan on his back!

We started at about 9am, but had to walk in a ways (mile or so) because there is very limited parking at the trailhead. We pulled Ethan on the backpack's wheels (picture with him in sunglasses).

The picture with Ethan on Mike's back is mid-hike. We took a rather leisurely pace and made a few stops to let Ethan out and evaluate each time if I felt like I wanted to keep going.

The picture of all three of us is at the top. Hooray! Mike found a squirrel and he and Ethan had fun feeding it. I also saw a few big brown and orange lizards. I should look them up to see what kind they are...

We walked down separately because Mike needed to keep his momentum going and I needed to be very sure of my foot placement. I walked much of the way with a lady who was there to place a memorial for her husband who had a heart attack and died on the mountain three months ago while they were hiking it; so sad!

As pictured, Ethan finally gave in and fell asleep as we walked back to the car. Unfortunately, he stayed awake on the drive home.

Now we're all recovering at home: Ethan napping, I'll shower and nap, and Mike is at the gym swimming out his muscle tension (probably in the hot tub too). What a great way to spend our extra weekend day and be grateful for this wonderful, free, land.

Thanks to all who have served to keep it that way!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Water!

We're at Enchanted Island again tonight and Ethan's interest in the splash pad has long outlasted ours. That, and running up and down the ramp to the splash pad. But that smile is the whole point, so a successful evening!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

For the Baby

There's not a whole lot this baby will need, but receiving blankets is one of them. Our family always makes these blankets, and Ethan still loves them. That means his are all worn, especially where he has chewed all the corners to bits. So, this is a way for me to actually put some fun preparations in place for our new little guy!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Camping Weekend

Camping never goes as planned for us.  Last year I stressed a little too much about having a spot and paid extra to have one reserved, which was completely unnecessary.  Our ward campout this year, I took over the food, which was hot dogs and s’mores, and didn’t even remember condiments, because I don’t eat them.  Then it rained all night and we didn’t have an air mattress, so I barely slept.

For our first independent trip camping this year, I planned a trip up to Sedona.  We checked out camping books at the library and talked about it all week.  The food was ready Tuesday, Ethan’s stuff Wednesday, and everything else, including packing the car, Thursday.  Friday morning I went to the gym and then we drove up to Mike’s work to pick him up at about noon. 

The plan was to camp in Sedona near two state parks.  We were going to stay two nights, which would be a first for me (hence all the advanced preparations).  We arrived in Sedona about 2pm and every single campsite was full!  There are over 100 and only about 10% of them can be reserved (they all were ahead of time).  We ended up having to drive an hour further north to the next campground by Lake Mary.  This site was not nearly as pretty as Sedona with its red rocks and creek running through, but at least this one had space and it was nice enough, so we set up camp.  I was really disappointed to have my plans not pan out, especially since I felt responsible for the success of the trip, but Mike was nice enough to be positive about it all.

This area (near Flagstaff) was about 15-20 degrees cooler than Sedona, so we broke out the jackets right away.   

Ethan helping “knock” to set up the tent (hammer).

Don't forget that clicking on the pictures will enlarge them. Many of Ethan's facial expressions are worth a closer look!

Enjoying snacking on watermelon while Dad got the fire going.

 

 That night we had hot dogs and s'mores before putting Ethan to bed.  We sat up by the fire for awhile.  Because of the colder weather, none of the food I brought was thawing as planned (the chicken for dinner, water bottles to drink, etc.)  We actually had water bottles sitting by the fire hoping they would melt enough for us to drink them. 

That night we actually had an air mattress-hooray!  Unfortunately, it did not stay very firm.  The tag says that happens from the material stretching and to just keep inflating it, but we couldn't just turn on the pump in the middle of the night!  I was sleeping with my sleeping bag as a blanket so I could use my pregnancy pillow, but I was freezing!  Especially my side on the mattress.  At some point in the night, Ethan, who was in his little Thomas tent and surrounded in blankets, started coughing.  We brought him over with us and he slept for awhile in Mike's sleeping bag, and then in mine, which I zipped up.  He slept like a rock until the sun came up (5:30am or earlier).  At that point Mike went out to get a fire started and Ethan and I huddled in my sleeping bag.  The camp host said that at 6:00am (when the sun had been up for a bit) it was 27 degrees!!!  We definitely had not prepared for that!  It was supposed to be in the mid 40s in Sedona!

We had a nice relaxing morning experimenting with different breakfast foods, taking an early nap (all three of us), and walking around the campgrounds.  Of course none of our food thawed in the freezing temperatures, so we had to boil water and put our milk jugs in it to thaw.  As much as I would have loved to do a second night of camping, we were not up for another freezing night, so we packed up camp.

One of the parks I had planned on in Sedona is Slide Rock Park.  We decided we could still spend the day there, and I'm SO glad we did!  It was beautiful and fun and if you come visit me in the summer, I want to take you here!

Basically it is a creek with a smooth rock bottom.  It has a large (80ft?) natural slide as the main attraction.  The sides are these wonderful red rocks, perfect for perching yourself or your stuff on.

 Most areas are quite shallow, but some are deep enough to jump into from a "cliff", maybe 10 ft tall?  The sign at the entrance said it was 72 degrees outside and 52 degrees in the water, so I wasn't sure if Ethan would want to go in, but he couldn't wait!  We had a duffel bag of stuff and our nice camera, so we took turns going in the water.  Parts of the bottom had moss, so I was really paranoid about falling with the camera or just being clumsy with my weird pregnancy balance (all the books warn about balance...).

Here are the boys trekking down the creek.  Mike planned on staying nearby, but Ethan would not hear of it.

 Mike found little "slides" for Ethan to go down.

 And of course Ethan loved climbing around on the rocks.

 We found an old water pump shed.

This would be a good one to click on and enlarge!

 Here's a little proof I was there.  Not many flattering pictures come from a sun dress over a maternity (tent top) bathing suit.

 Look how clear the water is.

 

Another "slide".  Click to enlarge and see his smile.

 Check out the view!!!

None of these pictures have been edited, although I'm sure they would be even more stunning if I took the time!

 As we were leaving, this man was sitting up high and Ethan really wanted to go up there too.  The man offered to lift Ethan up, and Ethan gladly let him!

 Neither one us went down the famed slide.  It ends in deep water, so I was scared of the cold and scared of not knowing if I "should" because I'm pregnant.  Plus, we stuck to the less busy areas of the creek.  I mentioned as we were walking out that the deep part made me want to get in and swim around.  Mike said I should do it, so I slowly made my way in.  Oh my goodness it was cold!!!  I eventually convinced Ethan to let me hold him.  I dipped his hands, then feet, then his tummy (I had him laying flat so just his tummy touched).  He thought it was hilarious!  He was laughing his deep belly laugh really hard.  Then I started dipping the back of his head and he loved that too!  When I got out the baby was bouncing around a lot; I'm sure he could feel the cold!

While we were in the swimming hole, Mike went to the other side to the bathroom.  That just so happened to be by the "cliff" people were jumping off of.  Mike stood on the edge contemplating a jump, so Ethan and I yelled "jump!" until he did.  It's definitely Mike's way of getting into cold water to just jump, but he was pretty shocked when he hit the water.  Between his heavy clothes, tennis shoes, the cold water, and not knowing ahead of time where he would get out, he wasn't sure how he would get out, but the red rock sides proved easy to climb.

Once we were all dry and a little warmer, we headed home.  We got back at about 8:30pm.  Although I was diappointed to not make it for the 2 days, I definitely appreciated having a warm night's sleep.  Plus, we got all unpacked, did about half the laundry, and were showered and ready for bed by 10:30/11pm.  I love recovering so quickly from a trip and having the house immediately back to normal.

The next morning Ethan was still acting quite tired, but we braved Stake Conference anyway.  He made the whole two hours playing with puzzles and drawing.  He has gotten very good at puzzles recently, so he'll spend a lot of time putting his more challenging ones together over and over again.  He also has a little wipe-off alphabet book from Nana that keeps him busy for a long time.  I  want to start looking for more drawing and craft variations for him because he enjoys them so much.


I'm trying to plan more fun activities on the weekends so we don't just let them slip by, and this was definitely more fun than sitting at home!  Maybe someday I'll be able to plan activities that are fun and work out the way I meant for them to!