easy like Sunday morning

Remember these guys?

oh, hi.

I have decided to do a non-potty training post! Yay! But still, woe is you, because I'm too tired to write much (as if me writing a lot is a real treat for everyone). This week has left me a shadow of my former self (I'm a little dramatic because of too little sleep and the fact that even though we're well into Saturday morning I just finished the work week several hours ago) but I have decided to bulletpoint a few things I'm excited about right now:

I get to see my friend's new baby today. Can't wait. What's even better is the fact that she had a girl, so I can unload all of Jane's pink plastic shit on her when she's a little older. And by "shit" I mean delightful educational toys!

LOST starts on Tuesday. And I cannot stop watching this because it cracks me up. And if you want to see the first four minutes of the season premiere, here it is. (Stop being a baby, Shane, and just watch it.)

This blog about dogs. The photos are amazing. It's a good place to go to just be happy for a few minutes.

See - no potty training talk - even though during the time I wrote this I said "do you have to go pee pee?" no less than five times. Whoops - there I go again!

weekend update: potty training, part deux

I'm not going to rail on and on about my potty training experience this weekend like I did last time - and, you're welcome for that! What I will say is this - this has been yet another loooong ass weekend stuck in the house, but we are most definitely making progress. They have been working with her at daycare this week but, although she did sit on the potty there, she didn't have any success. She did really well with us in the mornings and evenings - although she is still COMPLETELY terrified of pooping in the tub. That part is awful, and so far, there is nothing we can do to fix it.

This weekend, the progress continued. There have been several instances when she would tell us she had to go (otherwise, it was just asking her and she finally deciding that yes, it was time). She's still in pull-ups and I think we will rely on those for some time. Today we all even left the house for about 40 minutes to go to Target - that was huge! Although I still dread the day she has to use the public restroom. That gives me the heebie jeebies like nobody's business. Especially because she really likes to grip the seat and watch the flushing.

I know you were just DYING to know how it was coming - so there you have it! My life - just like a celebrity's, only more pee-soaked.

do you have to go to the potty? (aka this is about poop and pee and don't read it if you are easily grossed out)

I have uttered that sentence, or another variation of it ('do you have to go pee pee?" "do you have to go poop?" etc) about one zillion times this weekend. Two zillion times. I am driving myself nuts with the sound of my own voice. And that's just the beginning of what has been one of the longest, most frustrating, most (mildly) triumphant weekends of my life.

So, that whole cold turkey potty training - with the no diapers, all of the sudden, after 2.5 years of wearing diapers - is for shit. Hey, maybe it works for other people, and God love 'em if it does, but it really wasn't our thing. After two days of watching Jane either pee her pants and get upset, or completely freak out and cry and scream when she peed in the potty (and this would be after sitting in there FOREVER) - oh, and then have her hold in her poop so much yesterday that she pooped in the tub, FREAKED, and oh my god STILL won't go in the tub because she's so scared and upset- yeah, this wasn't the method for us.

As an aside, I also have to say - the number one thing you are supposed to do as a parent while potty training is to keep it positive and not get stressed. Well, I was negative and stressed and I'm sure adding all kinds of vile energy to the situation as well. I'm really upset with myself for that, because I was really trying. It's just. so. frustrating.

Today (after yet another really rough and sad start to the day) I took a slightly more laid-back approach and put her back in pull-ups. I still constantly asked her if she had to go, and frankly, she makes it pretty clearly physically when she has to go (usually), and when she did have to go, I ran with her all excitedly into the bathroom, and sure as shit, we had some success today. Well, with peeing, not with pooping - I can tell pooping is going to be a huge issue for her -and oh God, I just remembered that someday she is going to read this blog so I am going to stop now (PS to Jane as an adult: Trust me, girl, all of your peers had trouble with this too. I know because their parents ratted them out to me on Facebook. Oh yeah, someday I'll tell you what Facebook was.).

But anyway, yes, we had some non-crying success today, with stickers, and M&Ms, and happiness. And I am proud to say I was very upbeat all day, no matter what she was or wasn't doing. Not that we are ANYWHERE EVEN IN THE UNIVERSE of having her trained. But it's a start. A decent start. We have made progress and for that I am very thankful. She will go off to daycare tomorrow in her pull-ups and they will incorporate trips to the bathroom into her day. They will in no way be as focused on her as I was this weekend, so she will have more accidents and hopefully will not a) be traumatized by that or b) regress to the beginning again.

But sweet Jesus am I glad this weekend is over.

potty training report, twitter-style

The tally for the day: four messes, four successes, tons of time on the potty, tears, treats, exhaustion for all.
less than 20 seconds ago from web

Up for two hours, three messes so far. I hate how frustrated I am already.
about 12 hours ago from web

um, I meant to say that she couldn't care less about being WET, not work. I'm still half asleep.
about 13 hours ago from web

project potty training 2010 has commenced. Already one mess, and as a I suspected, she couldn't care less about being work. FUN TIMES.
about 13 hours ago from web

weekend: potty edition.

If you've had the unfortunate experience of talking to me in person over the past couple of weeks, you are more than aware that I plan to cold-turkey potty train Jane this weekend. As in, no diapers, just pants, and what I am sure will be excessive puddles around my house, not to mention other messes. I in no way expect her to actually be completely potty trained by the end of this three-day weekend; in fact, I fear she will not care at all when she is sitting in cold, pee-soaked clothes (see, the wet clothes are supposed to make the kid want to pee in the potty. Jane has never really cared if her diapers are soaked to the max, so I am afraid wet pants will be nothing to her.). I do plan on using the tried-and-true-by-other-people M&M reward system - an M&M for every potty success. What I think will end up happening will be me stuffing fistfuls of M&Ms in my mouth and crying out of sheer frustration.

So, as you can see, I'm very excited.

We won't be leaving the house this weekend, so I'm not even going to pretend like I have a lineup of fun stuff to do. However, tonight I am going to my book club meeting, and, suffice to say, I expect it to be the highlight of my weekend (unless, in fact, Jane does get even moderately potty trained). We will be discussing Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and will be joined by our newest member, Alan. Oh yeah, Alan used to have a blog, but he has appeared to unceremoniously stop posting. Apparently he has trouble with goodbyes.

Have a good weekend!

date with myself.

So, there's this show. I think I've mentioned it before 'round these parts. Well, last week I had the chance to see it a couple of times. And I decided I wanted to see it just once more before the opportunity up and ran away to another city. So I bought another ticket, this time just for myself, for Sunday night.


I have absolutely no problem whatsoever with going to shows/movies/even concerts alone. I got really used to it when I used to report on that stuff when I was a journalist. And there is something really lovely about not having to worry about anyone else. You don't have to make small talk, you can leave early if you want without considering other people's feelings, you can bolt the second it's over without checking to see if so-and-so has to go to the bathroom or whatever. And, most importantly, you can just enjoy the experience for what it is.


But I so rarely get the opportunity to go out anymore, never mind by myself - so it was pretty awesome to grab the chance.

OMG

As anyone worth anything knows, the season premiere of the sixth and FINAL season of LOST is coming up on February 2. New to the show? You can catch up on one of the most complicated and mystifying shows EVAH in eight minutes. This is awesome.

it's all about the benjamins, baby

Yes, two blog posts in one short evening. Amazing. But I just opened up a particularly disturbing piece of daycare mail, and I thought I'd share.

It was just a summary of how much we spent there in tuition during 2009. And the grand total is (drumroll, please):

$14, 868.oo

FOURTEEN THOUSAND, EIGHT HUNDRED AND SIXTY EIGHT AMERICAN DOLLARS.

And I wonder why half of my wardrobe seems to be coming from Target these days.

It's not like I couldn't do the math myself, but I never wanted to, and now they just decided to shove it in my face.

Sigh.

back to the grind

Wow, so, yeah. Back to work. Back to life. The cocoon of vacation is gone and it has been super-busy the past couple of days. It didn't help that this week is a particularly busy week - oh, forget it - MONTH - at work. So instead I will leave you with a couple of pics from the holidays. Because I miss Christmas! (And I want to point out that I wore my new striped sweater on both Christmas AND New Year's Eve.) (Yes, that last picture is from New Year's Eve.) (Because we obviously know how to party.)

happy happy, joy joy

The trailer for Sex and the City 2 came out over the holidays, and I somehow missed it until today - CAN'T WAIT! (they won't let you embed, so you have to click on the link)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKQ5yRFkBnE

I was happy to hear that this sequel is a lot more fun than the first one - which I loved, although it was pretty dark, especially considering it was, well, Sex and the City the Movie. Just sayin'.

resolution.

I love New Year's resolutions. What I hate about them, though, is that so often they are about depriving yourself of something, like food and calories, or forcing yourself to do something loathesome, like exercise. I've gone down that road many times, with some success and lots of failure. Either way, there is something about a new year that feels like a fresh slate, although of course you are just carrying the same baggage/issues/habits/cellulite that you had the day before. (OK, I just Googled "cellulite" to make sure I spelled it right because it looked funny to me, and WOAH, don't do that. If I want to look at pics like that, I'll just look at my ass in the mirror.) (Sorry, guys.)

ANYWAY, my resolution for 2010 is this: to LIGHTEN THE EFF UP. I am taking myself and my problems and life in general way too seriously as of late, and I need to chill out. I've talked about this before but I am really going to make an effort to put my energy and focus into calming, centering, and lightening up. Sometimes life doesn't allow you to do this, I know, but as much as possible, this is my goal.

Do you have any resolutions this year? (Your resolution SHOULD be to comment more on my blog. Yes, I am talking to YOU.)