Tuesday, November 13, 2007

"Maddie go potty"
















In the midst of the "Maddie go potty." "Maddie done." "Maddie go potty." "Maddie done." over and over again the last 5 days I think I am actually maintaining my sanity- barely, but I'm making it! I wasn't ready for this potty training thing! She just turned 2 on August 31st. But last Thursday I found her sitting on the potty naked twice and she screamed whenever I tried to put the diaper on. So I decided to go with it and see if it clicks. So far she is definitely making progress! She was even dry when she woke up this morning. She's growing up faster than I can handle- and maybe faster than she can handle. Yesterday her baby sister took over her high chair and she's sitting in a booster at the table now. She hasn't quite decided if this is a good thing or not! And this weekend we are moving the bunk bed we inherited from a family from church (they also had a boy and then three girls!) into the girls room. So Maddie will be in a big girl bed and Ella will be taking over Maddie's crib (rather than the inexpensive one she's been in that we aren't sure we trust with the jumping that is sure to take place in another year!) All these changes!

It's Ella's high chair now!






Maddie in her big girl booster


Well, back to keeping my sanity. I have never been a morning person. I used to be a night owl. Then I got married, had kids, and was neither a night owl nor a morning person. I was just tired! Now I have given in to the fact that if I'm going to be tired anyway I might as well be productive and tired. Also, I hurt my back a few months ago and decided that I need to commit to exercising or I'm going to be old before my time! So now the alarm goes off at 5am and I am on the treadmill by 5:15. I don't exactly enjoy exercising! BUT I do feel better- my back doesn't hurt, I feel stronger, and I do enjoy the quiet in the morning. So now I have nearly 2 hours before the kids rise in order to be prepared, mind, body, and soul. It really isn't a lot of time, but I try to make the most of it and it is so worth it! Now if one of the kids wakes up sick or crabby or peeing on the floor or whatever, I am ready for it! And last week I started reading a book called Taking Care of the Me in Mommy by Lisa Whelchel. She has some excellent, practical advice for, not "looking our for number one," but taking care of yourself so that you can serve God the way He desires- hopefully with a willing, servant like, joyful heart! And I just discovered that on her website she has templates for wonderful charts that are so useful! There are charts for daily schedules, chores, to-do's, etc that you can download!!! I love charts and anything that will enable me to be more organized, but I'm not very good at making spreadsheets so this is a great help to me! Now I have to just figure out how to maintain this early waking time without being so tired in the evenings! Poor Pete- tucks the kids in at 8 and the wife at 9!


By the way- last week all the kids were suffering from the "crabby bug." They fought and screamed and bickered and tortured eachother all week. I blamed it on the time change, but who knows? Here are some sweet pictures that are not a good representation of how they behaved all week. I guess they do love eachother though!

You wouldn't guess from this picture that they were monsters all week!

Kate and Ella












1 comment:

Middle-Aged Moi said...

YOUR children? Monsters? No way....:-)

And I am SO looking up Lisa Welchel's site...I love charts too....:-)