dids and didnts

Today I've been busy, busy being nonproductive. Don't you just love days like that, I don't! First, AK woke up with snot...everywhere...even the hair. Eeewwww! It was nasty. She's been sneezing all day. I think her allergies got stirred up from the long walk she took with her Granny yesterday afternoon, plus it was pretty windy. I hope she feels better soon, we have a long weekend ahead of us. Watch out Wachsmanns, here we come!


Now, what I didn't do today. I didn't wash dishes. I didn't get out of my pj's. I didn't go ANYWHERE-not even outside-not once. I didn't make dinner-just heated up leftovers. I didn't watch tv-which is a good didn't today. And I didn't make my bed.

I DID take some pics of the kid today-even though they were terrible because she didn't feel good. I did spend a lot of time on craigslist looking for the perfect deal on a slide-I've been minutes too late everytime!. I did find my sister a changing table/dresser combo on craigslist for her upcoming addition. I did spend way too much time on photoshop. I did eat a cup of delicious icecream. I did feed my child a pb&j sandwich for dinner with bananas and pb too. I did take a shower, even though I got right back into my pjs-atleast they were clean ones. I did do nothing very productive today.

Although I did do this:
I love this, it's so fun! I bet the grandparents will enjoy this.

and I bet her Aunt April will adore this!

and as you can tell, I was losing steam by the time I finished this little project. But hopefully her youngest auntie Shannon will love it all the same.

ANYWAYS, those are a few things I DID get done today, you know, aside from wiping my child's nose raw :(.

bell training

I forgot I wanted to tell you this story.

When we got our (then) puppy we decided we'd try a non conventional potty training technique. We placed a little bell at the bottom of the door and everytime we took him out we'd ring the bell. In turn, that taught him that ringing the bell lets us know he has some business to do. As he grew into a fairly large canine we had to go with a bell that hung around the door knob. We often had to repo his bell because he would abuse his privileges. ANYWAYS, even though we put a bigger bell around the door knob we still left the little one near the floor, mainly because it was nailed to the door frame and I never found the energy necessary to remove it. Well, one day while the dog was outside I heard the bell ringing. In my head I was wondering how it could be ringing because he was outside. I walk in to find my nine month old like this:
(excuse the leg chub and dirty socks-don't judge)
I don't know why, but this is so hilarious to me! I guess because we WERE in the process of ATTEMPTING to potty train the gal herself. Internally, I was wondering if I should put a bell around the bathroom door. HAHAHA! By the way, I have momentarily discontinued potty training Anna-Kate because I didn't think it was doing any good because she would cry when placed on the toilet. I partly felt as though I was traumatizing her and forcing her to do something she wasn't ready for. I hope I'm right and not just allowing my daughter to be lazy and passive about doing HUMAN-LIKE things. She has time.

Today I decided to head to McDonald's earlier than usual to see if we could beat the rowdy crowd. I guess we got there around 9:45, maybe 10. It wasn't too bad, maybe 8 kids or so-the not so rowdy ones. By 10:40 it was time to bolt. I guess this was the group of parents and kiddos that try to beat the lunch time rush-the ones that want to really wear their kiddos out before naptime-the ones that have worn off their morning fog and are ready for some action. So with that, I've decided from experimentation that the early morning bunch is the best and less noisy crowd to go with.

I have a mega grocery list to compile so I'm off for now.

don't be one

Today, I had an experience at McDonalds that I must make note of here...for you to read...

The hubs and I took AK to play indoors today because the weather has been iffy, plus, she loves the little slide at this certain location. As I'm ordering, Sean walks up with AK and says that we're not going to be able to play here because there are too many kids and they won't let her slide. Oh boy, did the Momma come out in me. I refused to leave...and I refused to allow some kids to determine whether my child was going to enjoy her playtime. She WAS going to slide and whoever was preventing her from sliding WAS going to move. One kid was laying at the bottom of the slide and one was laying down it from the top. We get our things settled and I walk AK right over to the slide and ask the kiddos to please move down the slide so my little one can play. They just looked and me and slooowly got down. As I look around to see where the parents to these.....children are I see one woman sitting at a table with what looked to be homework. So I think to myself, "okay, she's obviously got lots to manage here". I look around some more and see three women sitting at a table chatting away, not paying any attention to what was going on all over the place. It was SO frustrating. I know it's not the kids fault that they are behaving this way because they obviously got the okay from somewhere-and I guess it's from these high maintenance looking gals with nothing better to do than sit around a table and talk about birth control (as I overheard while I was keeping my own kid in line). I'm not trying to cut anyone down or make fun of mommy groups but if you're going to be a part of a mommy group please enjoy yourselves WHILE also giving your munchkins some clear guidelines before you enter a public place and actually enforce them. Oh and another tip, make sure your crawler isn't posted at the base of a slide.

I think I'm going to come up with a mommy group that allows good mommy to mommy time but also makes it a point to clearly direct and discipline the children-EVEN in public. GASP! I'm sure there are some out there who do this but when I go to these little playgrounds with Anna~Kate I'm appalled at the parents who just allow their kids free game. Noooo ma'am. Spankings are still in order even out and about...that's what the bathrooms are for. And if not spankings, they can sit their little heine's in a booth and watch everyone else play.

So please, don't be one of those parents who allows there kid to make the whole experience a bust for the others who are trying to really enjoy themselves.

On another note, I did find some Bush's the other day and it was SOOOOO good! Glad I got my fix. It'll probably be another year before I have it again...since my husband hates that place.

toilet training tuesday

Located to the left of this text is the reason for this title. I was innocently greeted with the realization today that toddlers and toilets don't mix and if you choose to allow the two of these in eachother's company you are destined for a distaster.

I decided lastnight that I was going to go for round two in the potty training business. I tried a couple months ago and lasted a whopping 3 hours (if that). Well, I got in to two hours of wake time before I remembered that I was going to start trying again today. Whoops. So, I busted out the cute little panties, the potty topper and was on my way to success...so I thought...until I found my 18 month old monkey fingers making no-no's in the bathroom. Lets see, she got under the cabinet and pulled out some things, made quit the splash with a full can of hairspray that you can see here IN the toilet (i'm assuming it made a great splash because at my little monkey's feet you can see a puddle of water) and a soaking wet shirt. I couldn't discipline her because it's my fault for leaving the door open and allowing her to roam unattended. I thought the racket she was making was her playing in her tupperware cabinet in the kitchen. No, I guess that noise was the hairspray clanking in the toilet instead.

So after I got all of that cleaned up I led her to her room where she was SUPPOSED to be playing and turned on a brainy baby video where I allowed her to chill and drink some milk...you know, to move forward in the potty training stuff. After she drank her milk I paused her video and took her to the potty where she wasn't too excited to be sitting while her video was waiting on her in the other room (bad method-check!). So that was a no go. About 10 minutes later I went back to take her to the potty and low and behold, she peed in her panties. AH! So I ask her where she tt'd at and she takes a couple of steps forward towards her bookshelf, lifts her foot off the floor as if to say, "oh why, right here mom!". And just now, as I'm typing this she came in with another wet pair of panties on! She just got done peeing! And I just got done taking her to the potty! OOOOOh brother, I don't think I'm going to last much longer. This is way harder than I thought. I can't even find the second tt spot. Crap. My MIL will probably not be too thrilled about that. We better get some carpet cleaner FAST.

I'm atleast going to give it a few days before I totally give up again. But from now on, she's wearing pullups!

it's a monday

Mondays seem to always be long for me. I think it's because I spend a lot of my time on the computer uploading and working on pics from the weekend. I do not spend my weekends on the computer much so the camera fills up pretty fast.

This weekend I was in Waco. We left here at 7:30 am and my mom met us on the highway in Waco because we were running a little behind and the hubs needed to get going to work. So, she picked us up and we went to the grocery store where we spent entirely too much time. I spent the day just hanging out with my mom with NO ONE else around. This rarely happens because it seems every weekend we come there some other family member decides to drop by whether it be my sister-in-law and two kids or my aunt with one kid and they usually end up being there the WHOLE time we're there. Sometimes this is fun and sometimes it's way too hectic. I was glad to have a low key weekend.

We took AK to the park and let her exert some energy, we "did up" the play room so it would be more fun. My mom took AK walking up and down the street on my Granny's walker. HAHAHA. It's so hilarious because Annakate sits on the little seat part and my mom pushes her all over the place. We went to smarty pants (which was super exciting because they've double in size) and got her some little white sandals.

Saturday afternoon, around 5, my sister came and picked us up and we went to our littlest sister's birthday party. That night we stayed at my sis's place and I was super happy about getting this picture of my newest little neice Nevaeh Alycia (Heaven spelled backwards and Uh-lee-c-uh ,not Alisha) due to arrive June 1st. We stayed up way too late watching a movie and chatting about labor. It was fun and much needed.

Sunday morning mom came and picked us up and we got breakfast and went back to her house for a day of play. Annakate played on the slide, that we put in the middle of the living room, mostly all day. What can I say, she loves to slide. Sean got there around 3...or a little after and we stayed until around 5, then headed south. Traffic was terrible! I kept thinking about what holiday it could be that I was missing but it turns out that SPRING BREAK was ending for lots of folks. Annakate slept the whole way since she refused a nap that day. It was a peaceful, stop and go ride.

If you have the time please go over to MckMama's blog, read about and pray for her baby boy.

I'm now off to find a Bush's Chicken. I KNOW I saw one one day and I AM GOING to find it!