My child must think I'm bored...

I was packing some stuff in our upstairs bathroom yesterday morning. My son came in and wanted to sit on the potty. (I guess I should provide a warning with this post--it involves potty training. As a mother of preschoolers you had to expect it to come up at some point. So if you are adverse to potty training stories, you should probably quit reading now.) As I was saying, my son wanted to sit on the potty. Maybe I should clarify--my youngest son Nathan wanted to sit on the potty. I figured, why not, I'm in here anyway and anything that keeps him entertained that doesn't involve bodily harm while I'm packing has to be a good thing. Well, he sat down, got a very concentrated look on his face, and he went, um, shall we say, number 1. (I used to always wonder why they numbered them--now I know!). I was mildly surprised and kept trying to convince myself that it was an accident even though he was very obviously trying when it happened. He decided to hang out there for quite awhile, and like I said, as long as he was entertained I didn't mind. So, then, a bit later we sit down to eat lunch. About 3/4 of the way through lunch, Nathan has a funny look on his face. Kind of on a whim--probably out of habit since we just not too long ago potty trained John--I said "Do you need to, um, go number 2" (I actually said the word. He's not two yet so I'm sure he doesn't know what number 2 is, but I thought you might appreciate the number.) He immediately starts repeating what I just said along with "down, down, down". So I get him down and he proceeds to run upstairs to the bathroom. And, not 30 seconds later, he goes number 2 on the potty. This time I couldn't really convince myself that it was an accident. So then, I say "all done!" . He gets down, we do our thing, he flushes, and then he wants to get on it again. I kept telling him he was done and he kept insisting. I didn't want to discourage him so I let him sit on it some more. I got distracted by one of the other children and left for about a 1 minute. When I returned I found that he had gone some more!!! He knew he wasn't done! Unbelievable! So now I am in a dilema. I really do not need anything else to do in my life right now. Do I potty train the child??? My child must think I'm bored...

My afternoon

I had been putting something off for awhile. It involved the phone and as you can imagine I don't have a lot of time to speak on the phone with a quiet background. I needed to get our utilities set up for our new house. Anytime you are dealing with utilites at some level you know you are in for an interesting experience. This afternoon did not leave me disappointed--or, I guess maybe it did. In any case, here are some of the questions/comments that I received (FYI, our new street name is William Dr.)

• Was questioned 6 times (3 by the same person)--are you sure it isn't "Williams" Dr.?
• "Oh, maybe it will accept the address if I put 2 "l"s in William" (by the same person who was sure it was Williams Dr instead of William Dr)
• "Do you know if the seller will be at closing? I really want to make sure her water bill gets forwarded correctly. Maybe you could talk to her?"
• Was asked 4 times "What is your phone number?" by the phone company; when I replied that I was inquiring about a new line, I was then transferred--yes, 4 times
• The internet guy wouldn't even attempt to pronounce the name of the town I was moving to. He just repeatedly said "the place that you are moving to"
• I called the internet place to see if I could get a list of their offers and packages (I was shopping around). I was on hold for at least 10 minutes. The guy who finally answered (Ben) seemed really nice, but also really young. Who knows, maybe he just had a young phone voice. Anyway, it took him at least 5 minutes to get my new city down so he could verify that they have service in that area. Once he verified that they have service in that town, he had to verify my new address. That proved to be a task that was beyond him. Evidently he was going to have to send a service guy out to the house to verify that the house is "servicable". Here is the punchline--I have to call them back in 5 days to see if the house is servicable. Okay--so I asked him "Well, can you go ahead and give me your current special offers." His response "I can't tell you until we know if you are servicable, but I can tell you that right now they are really, really awesome." Gee, thanks. I'll be sure to call you back in five days. As I was getting ready to hang up, Ben asked me "Do you have any other questions? I see you were on hold for 10 minutes and I want to be sure I get all your questions answered to your satisfaction." It was all I could do not to say "Your joking, right?"

It's the most wonderful time of the year...

Okay, so I know that song is talking about Christmas and, I have to admit Christmas is one of my favorite times of the year. However, sweet corn season definitely has to come in a close second. We had it fixed my favorite way tonight--grilled! It tasted awesome. Sweet corn was one of those delicacies that I missed when we lived in Texas. When we came back to the midwest I promised myself that I would savor every bite of sweet corn that I took each year. I definitely savored it this evening. I even had a chance to teach my youngest daughter how to properly shuck it.

My view from the kitchen

We got rid of some furniture today. Our stools next our half wall between our dining room and kitchen are going to be too big for our breakfast bar at our new house. And so we dropped them off at some friends for their garage sale. I took one last picture of my girls sitting in them. This was pretty much where they hung out for the last year or two--especially while I was in the kitchen which is pretty much where I spent 90 percent of my time.

So long Hoke

We said goodbye to our family dog Hoke this past weekend. Actually, who am I kidding, he wasn't our family dog. He was Joe's dog. None of the rest of us really liked him. He was big and scary to the kids and I thought he was perhaps one of the grossest dogs created. He was a great hunting dog for Joe, but where we are going doesn't have near the number of birds that we have here. He is nine and needed to spend his last years on a farm and looking for birds. A funny thing happened though. As soon as we decided to give him away, we all were suddenly taken with him. The kids were in tears and I actually found a soft spot for him as he nuzzled up next to me before he left with his new family. Daddy comforted us all by promising a new family dog after we move and I truly do think this one will be for the whole family the whole time we have him--not just when we say goodbye.