2 going on 16

Riley turned 2 years old today!

She has grown up so much in the past couple of months, becoming so much more obedient and crazy talkative. She loves to sing and jump and run and read and feed her baby and ride her bike. She loves to swing, take walks, watch Elmo & count in Spanish ("Uno, quatro, tres...."). She loves cheese, bubble baths, playing with kids older than her, her little sister Story, and her big brother Jed. She loves to draw moons and stars, search for paw prints, eat popsicles, and look at pictures.

She loves life!
And I love my little blue eyed girl...

The Simerton Girls

Growing up, Drew's friends affectionately referred to his family as the Simertons...Simons (mom Janis and step-dad Michael) & Capertons (Kent & Drew). Well, here are The Simerton Girls - all 6 of us.

Jessica is holding Julianne. In her belly. Just in case you were confused about the 6 thing...

It is finished...

Jed is finally completely potty trained!! For over 2 weeks now he has not had a single accident. (He had been pee-free for months, but till now refused to poop in the potty.) I don't really know for sure what changed his mind...but I think that it was that we adopted Sarah McGooden's punishment idea of taking away one prized posession every time that he pooped in his undies....and that he got to choose something back every time that he did it in the potty. He even lost his pillow at one point. I put everything taken away up out of his reach but to where it was constantly looking down at him begging/daring him to use the potty.

With the sudden change here, he also started gaining other independence. For so long he would complain that he couldn't dress himself & needed help. It was like pulling teeth to get him to put his own clothes on. Now he's dressing himself and get's very frustrated if you try to help unless he's asked for it. At nap time I'll find him in his bedroom changing his shirt. Multiple times.

He also wouldn't go the bathroom by himself b/c he needed help with his clothes. Now he goes and I wouldn't have any idea except for that he's told me and is now asking for his candy and his pants are twisted. (Yep, we still bribe since Riley is now on the potty training wagon...it's hard to break for one and not the other.)

All of this potty talk is just to say that my little man is really growning up...

Full Circle

One of the stories that is told often of my childhood involves my love for butter. My parents used to get so frustrated because they would always find little fingerprints (mine) in the butter. So one day my dad sat me down and let me eat an entire tub. I ate so much that I threw up.

Jed loves ranch dressing. "Branch" as he calls it. He drinks it from the little condiment packages from fast food restraunts. He sucks it off of his carrots & continues to double, triple, etc dip - like it's a Lik-a-maid. Well today, while I was not looking he poured about 1/3 of a cup of thick, homemade ranch dressing on his plate. Huge glob. My first instinct was to take his plate away and send him to get in the bath. But I passed on that one and, instead, gave him a spoon. I told him I wanted him to eat all of it. At first he was loving it. Saying "MMMmmmmm!" and smiling. But then I started having to 'encourage' him to keep eating. "But mom, branch is not for eating!" he started to complain. "That's what I always tell you, but you always eat it anyway, so keep going." After one more spoonful he was begging to go get in the bath (which NEVER happens these days). So I let him. No throw up - at least not yet. But he did complain that his stomach didn't feel very good. "Too much ranch, huh?" I asked him. "Yeah" he said with his head hung low.

Hopefully we are done with the ranch mustaches. At least for a while.

Thanks for the 'parenting tip', Dad!

I'll skip right to dessert, thanks....

Last week I brought dessert outside after dinner so that we could all enjoy chocolate mint ice cream sandwiches. After carefully unwrapping the paper to expose the bright green ice cream sandwiched between two chocolate cookies, Jed, exclaimed "Ohhh - It's beauuuutiful!!"

However, lately, you can almost bet money on this scenario at dinner time:
Mom cooks dinner.
Mom calls kids & hubby to come eat.
Mom fixes kids plate with a small amount of everything.
Mom places plate in front of kids.
Son, who was previously in a great mood, immediately starts whining that he does not "like that."

Oh what I would give to have him exclaim that dinner is beautiful and actually eat it with out complaining. Without being bribed by dessert to follow...