And nothing seems to slow Maddox down...

102.3 has always been Faye's breaking point. She's generally happy and perky until she hits that temp.

A Conversation between Faye and Myself

Me: Are you going to take a nap or are you going to sit on my lap and play Starfall ABC's?
Faye: Sit on your lap and play starfall ABC's.
Me: Are you going to pee on my lap?
Faye: Noooooo, I'm going to pee in the potty! You pee in the potty.
Me: Yes, I do.
Faye: PokeBall's do not have butts.... So they don't pee in the potty.

I KNOW that she is "Normal".

With children, "Normal" has a million variations.  I know that my daughter, Faye is normal, but I ask myself a lot, "what on earth is wrong with this child?"  I love her dearly and would never change a single thing about her, but I'd pay you a hefty million to know what goes through this kids mind on a day-to-day basis.

We've been working on potty training since Wed, February 23rd.  It was not planned, Faye has been having rash issues because she refuses to let me change her diapers.  Wednesday evening, Faye came into the kitchen on her tiptoes, in a squatting walk, like she'd been riding horse all day and begged me to change her.  I put her in underwear for the evening, changed her bed linens to waterproof and she's been in undies ever since. 

We started out with your basic potty training stuff, about 2 accidents a day.  She stayed dry every single night.  She pooped in her undies once, she went in her little potty once without any guidance, she pooped in the big potty once with my encouragement. 

Then we started going down hill.  We've had 3 other poop accidents.  This is frustrating because she KNOWS when she has to go.  We've had a lot of resistance with sitting on any potty.  Fits and tantrums, begging to wear a diaper.  We have two options.  The first, she continues with potty training and successfully learns and practices this ability.  The second being she cries and begs for a diaper for days in a row and we decide to try again at another time.  If she isn't constantly throwing tantrums for a diaper, we stick with #1.

Things started to look up the other day, Monday, when her butt did not leave the potty.  She just sat there for half a day, peeing in her potty.  Then came Tuesday.  Accidents and resistance and she pee'd on me and told me that she wanted to do it again.  She also woke up at midnight with wet PJs.  The first time she had wet her bed with 6 previous nights being dry.  Wednesday was another light.  She was wearing clothes, pulling her pants down, peeing, pulling back up, etc.  She didn't wipe, but I was letting that go!  As long as she was taking care of everything else, I was ok with not wiping, for now.  She did really well all day.  Just one accident; she sat down to go potty but forgot to pull down her underwear.

Now there's today...  She wet the bed last night around 10-11pm, then I woke to a wet bed this morning.  She wet the bed twice in one night.  Her second night in a row.  The next time she had to go, she sat on her potty and proclaimed, with arms crossed across her chest "I'm going to pee in my pajamas!"  I told her that if she pee'd in her clothes that she would not be getting any princess fruit snacks or any other treats.  She said fine and pulled her pants down to go.  She did pee in her potty a couple times, but she threatened to pee ON hr brother and then later this afternoon, she, again, sat on her potty with arms crossed and said she was going to pee in her pajamas.  When I went to tell her that was not OK, she announced "I'm not listening to you!" and proceeded to pee in her clothing.  I sent her in the bathroom to take her clothes off, she went in but didn't take them off.  She told me she couldn't.  I asked her if she pooped in her underwear (it smelled like it) and she got angry with me and told me she did not.  Of course, she DID poop in there...

Now that she is all cleaned up and she is not getting any treats for the day, she claims she is going to go in her potty and NOT in her clothing.

I need to come up with a different incentive program for her.  A calendar progress report?  An accumulative treat jar?  I don't know.  She's perfectly capable of going in the potty and going without being told to or asked, however she is randomly resistant with ALL techniques.

We're using the Potty!!!

I'm actually afraid to even say anything about it...

We've been having some issues with poop.  Faye poops and then refuses to have her diaper changed.  By the time I am able to force her into getting her diaper changed, she is bright red and sore.

Wednesday evening she came to me on her tiptoes in a walking squat and ASKED me to change het diaper.  I didn't even know she had pooped.  It had been a half hour since I last changed her and even less time since the last time she was on my lap.  When I changed her, she was in a lot of pain.  I had Maddox go downstairs and get Faye a pair of underwear, so that she could air out a bit.  I decided to keep her in them overnight. 

I put a water proof sheet on her bed, brought a diaper, wipes, and pajamas next to my bed and put her to bed in just her undies with just an extra blanket.  I sat her on the toilet.  I was going to brush her teeth and read books while she was on the potty, but she threw a huge fit about having her teeth brushed.  I had to bring her into her bed (underwear still at her ankles) and brush her teeth.  Then we went back to the potty.  We got halfway through her first book (Baby Da Vinci, My Body) and she started to pee.  Her entire face lit up!  We finished books in bed and did our normal routine.  At midnight she crawled in bed with us.  I checked to see how wet she was and to my surprise, she was still dry!  I brought her to the potty (unhappy child) and she pee'd after a couple minutes.  Her entire face lit up again.  I lined our bed with my tie fleece blanket (folded in half) to catch her pee in case she pee'd on our bed.  She woke up dry in the morning and pee'd on the potty again.  She gave Daddy a high five and we went upstairs.  After that we had 2 accidents (one involving poop in training underwear) and a couple successes.

She wore underwear to bed again last night.  She pee'd before going to bed and when she got up in the morning, but she wouldn't let me bring her when she came to our bed in the middle on the night.  We have had no accidents so far.  One pee, before Dad left for work and then this morning when I was in the kitchen, Faye yelled that she had pooped in her potty.  She did!!!  All by herself, no prompting, no encouraging, nothing.  She just went, pulled her undies down, and pooped in her potty!

Now wish us luck for the rest of the day!  And pray I didn't just jinx myself!

Happy Valentine's Day!

What a special day! I have such a wonderful family!

My husband was gone by the time that Faye and I woke up. Maddox was upstairs. Faye and I went upstairs and both the kids collected the little boxes of Valentine's Day chocolates that Dad and I had left for them to find on the kitchen table. Maddox had to show me the special gifts that they got from Grandma and Bepaw Miller. Dad came in the door, he had already gotten up, showered, got ready for work, and went to the grocery store to get juice boxes from Maddox's class Valentine's Day party.

Dad told me that Maddox had brought us both a Valentine's Day surprise. Dad had Maddox bring the surprise back upstairs until Faye and I woke up. He said it was in the refrigerator. I opened the door and there was a chocolate covered strawberry (Faye & I made them yesterday evening) in a cute little strawberry shaped bowl. I completely teared up. He is the sweetest kid on the planet!

A short while later, I went to go look up something online for my sister and I noticed in my gmail an email from my mother-in-law with the subject title "Your Son", it said:

I know you already know this but your son has the sweetest soul!

This morning he was so surprised by your valentine candy on the table for him that he had to come in and tell me about it. Then he said "I really want to surprise mom and dad". I asked him why and he said "For Valentines day". Then I asked him how he wanted to do that and he said "I don't know that's why I'm asking you for help". I suggested making a card on the computer or maybe bringing you each a chocolate covered strawberry. He jumped right on the idea of the strawberries. He was so excited to bring them down to you two. He just couldn't believe you would give him chocolates on Valentine's Day!

As I was leaving he runs up the stairs out of breath and said "Whooh, I thought you left already and I wanted to say goodbye to you", and he gave me a great big hug.

He is such a special little guy!

Yep! Definitely the best kid around!

Later on, I pulled out a Valentine Print Out from Starfall.com. Maddox had decided he wanted to make a Valentine for his cousin Kaden. He wanted to make one for Kaden, Dante, and Ariana. I told him that he could only make one Valentine and I told him that he could make one for one of his cousins, someone on his bus or at school (other than in his class, who are getting Bakugan valentines!), or someone at home. He says "Oh! I know who I'm

going to make one for! It starts with kah, kah, kah, but it's not Kaden!" He decided to make Kelsey a valentine, and here it is!

Unfortunately, Kelsey was not on the bus today. Maddox said she is sick, so he is saving the valentine. Hopefully she will be feeling better tomorrow!

Kelsey likes Maddox

Maddox got off the bus and yelled "GUESS WHAT MOM?"  Apparently Jimmy talked to Kelsey and Kelsey likes Maddox and not Jimmy.  Jimmy said not to look at her but Maddox did anyways and Jimmy was going crazy.  The entire walk home from the bus he was going on and on about how amazing it was and he just couldn't believe it.

I was trying so hard not to laugh.  He kept saying that jimmy was trying to make him not look at Kelsey but Maddox "won the battle".

I don't think Maddox understands that Kelsey thinks he's cute.  I think he'd be less excited if he realized how she liked him, Haha!  I think Maddox is in for "the battle" against jimmy...

Its not the need to potty train, its the resistance and purposeful defiance that gets me. Why do you LIKE poop smooshed all over your butt? Pee IS gross, BTW!

Talking Back

Just want to document this. Faelyn has been doing this for months, but I didn't realize that I hadn't told a single person (including my husband) about it and that nobody has ever seen her do it.

Now when you think of a child Maddox or Faye's age (2-6 years old) talking back, you think of sassy, maybe? You think of them getting smart with you, shooting back clever remarks when you're talking to them about something they've done wrong... Here's an example of what my 2.5 year old daughter does.

Faye: Climbing onto the top of the kitchen table.
Mom: Standing behind the kitchen counter getting lunch ready.
Mom: Faelyn, please get off of the table.
Faye: please get off of the table.
Mom: Faelyn, get down off of the table.
Faye: get down off of the table.
Mom: 1
Faye: 1
Mom: 2
Faye: 2 (almost in complete unison with me)

Of course then we move to me just going over and getting her and putting her into a time out.

Time outs are supposed to be breaks for kids to regroup themselves and to think about what happened. For Faye, I just do not know what to do with the kid. I do not know what an appropriate discipline for a lot of her actions would be.

Time outs work OK for her. They do give her a break and they act as a distractment from what is going on. I can put her in a time out (after a few warnings) and go back to her after she's been there for a couple minutes. Before letting her out, we talk about what the problem is, why she's in time out, and what can be done to correct and prevent the situation from happening again. That does work for her.

I wouldn't say she is in TO a lot. I would say she is in TO a lot compared to Maddox. Faelyn has been in TO at age 2.5 years 2-3 times more than Maddox has been in his entire 6 years. Time outs are not every single day. Sometimes they're not even every single week. Maybe for now it is a good enough form of discipline. For Faelyn.