Today, Isaac announced that he had to go peepee and proceeded to take off his pajama pants and diaper. Now, we've been here before, and I was hardly thinking anything would come of it. He told me that he wanted to sit on the potty, which, ok, knock yourself out. So he took his bare little hiney up the stairs and the next thing I know, I can hear the unmistakable sound of tinkling! (One perk of toddlers never closing the bathroom door is the ability to remote monitor.)
I looked at Mikayla and said, "I think he's going peepee on the potty!!" Her little face lit up and we raced upstairs to celebrate. We jumped up and down, we clapped, we made all the fuss. Isaac was SO PROUD that he sat there and insisted on trying again which of course did not happen.
So basically he managed to use the potty without any assistance or prompting from his lazy momma, who didn't even move from the couch when he headed upstairs to the bathroom. (In my defense, I was working on a simple homeschool calendar.) I am so curious to see where this will go! He asked to wear his big boy undies which...what's the worst that could happen? A little extra laundry?
Stay tuned! For today we have one very proud two year old, who got to pick popsicles for morning snack. And I printed off a Cars-themed potty chart for him. Potty training 16 days before moving to our new house is the best idea ever, amirite?
Showing posts with label Isaac Milestones. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Isaac Milestones. Show all posts
Goodbye, Sweet Baby Locks!
This is the story of how our baby boy received his first hair cut before his older sister required so much as a bang trim.
We had never run into this issue at our house before, seeing as how our sweet daughter still doesn't have enough hair for a proper ponytail, let alone need a hair cut. But Isaac has regularly been sweating through his thick mop of hair. You might not know it from the front, but this kid can grow a mullet like nobody's business. His poor neck was getting heat rash from all the unwanted insulation!
Something had to be done.
And that "something" involved a kitchen chair, booster seat, backwards bib, and dadda's hair clippers. We are very serious about giving our children the professional-grade salon experience.
A few before photos, in which Isaac's shorts appear to be mistaking him for an 80 year old man and are doing the slow climb.
Do you SEE the flowing mane gracing the rear of his head? And Isaac's hair is getting long, too. Not to mention his ridiculous two-inch cowlick that I never noticed til reviewing these photos. You'd think I would have noticed a giant lock of hair pointing across the room, but no.
I know, that's a lot of "before" photos, but some of them were too cute to exclude.
Isaac enjoyed, or at least seemed unfazed by, his salon treatment. He hardly blinked an eye the entire time. Dadda entertained him with some photos on his phone, and big sister cheered him on, but he pretty much sat like this the entire time:
Maybe he was as thrilled as we were to be rid of the baby mullet?
Can you believe the amount of hair in these clippers? I was stunned at how long his mullet had grown. I mean, I could tell there was a party in the back, but this was a serious hair carnival.
And my precious baby boy looking suddenly grown up:
Seeing the "after" photos (and all the hair in the trash can!), I am realizing how deceptively long his hair was. Doesn't he look so dapper and clean-cut now? If the young ladies at church loved him before, they will be absolutely gaga now. I think his big blue eyes really pop now that his hair is more understated. Also, hopefully this lets his neck breathe a little better and cuts down on the head-sweat when we are out enjoying summer.
Ugh, I just LOVE my little guy! His new look will take some getting used to. I can't wait to see how long it takes me tomorrow morning while, half-awake, I try to figure out who the handsome young man in the crib is.
We had never run into this issue at our house before, seeing as how our sweet daughter still doesn't have enough hair for a proper ponytail, let alone need a hair cut. But Isaac has regularly been sweating through his thick mop of hair. You might not know it from the front, but this kid can grow a mullet like nobody's business. His poor neck was getting heat rash from all the unwanted insulation!
Something had to be done.
And that "something" involved a kitchen chair, booster seat, backwards bib, and dadda's hair clippers. We are very serious about giving our children the professional-grade salon experience.
A few before photos, in which Isaac's shorts appear to be mistaking him for an 80 year old man and are doing the slow climb.
Do you SEE the flowing mane gracing the rear of his head? And Isaac's hair is getting long, too. Not to mention his ridiculous two-inch cowlick that I never noticed til reviewing these photos. You'd think I would have noticed a giant lock of hair pointing across the room, but no.
I know, that's a lot of "before" photos, but some of them were too cute to exclude.
Isaac enjoyed, or at least seemed unfazed by, his salon treatment. He hardly blinked an eye the entire time. Dadda entertained him with some photos on his phone, and big sister cheered him on, but he pretty much sat like this the entire time:
Can you believe the amount of hair in these clippers? I was stunned at how long his mullet had grown. I mean, I could tell there was a party in the back, but this was a serious hair carnival.
And my precious baby boy looking suddenly grown up:
(No you cannot have him, HE'S MINE!!)
Seeing the "after" photos (and all the hair in the trash can!), I am realizing how deceptively long his hair was. Doesn't he look so dapper and clean-cut now? If the young ladies at church loved him before, they will be absolutely gaga now. I think his big blue eyes really pop now that his hair is more understated. Also, hopefully this lets his neck breathe a little better and cuts down on the head-sweat when we are out enjoying summer.
Ugh, I just LOVE my little guy! His new look will take some getting used to. I can't wait to see how long it takes me tomorrow morning while, half-awake, I try to figure out who the handsome young man in the crib is.
Attempted Independence
I guess it's kind of a big day around here. Lunchtime caught me by surprise (seriously? both kids are hungry right at 12:00? is that, like, a "thing"?), so Isaac went into the highchair with a handful of cheerios in front of him. Mainly because Mikayla is louder than him, and you know what they say about the squeaky wheel. Anything to achieve the sanity more quickly, I always say. Mind you, Isaac has never actually eaten cheerios before. We've gotten him onto those little dissolving Puffs things in the past week or so, but otherwise he is all, "Put it on a spoon, peasant." So the cheerios today was purely a move of "hey, he can at least throw them around and amuse himself."
Much to my delight, he seized upon the opportunity to refine his pincer grasp and CHOWED those things. Fast. I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't searched his bib pocket and the secret hiding place in the corners of the high chair. So cool! My sweet Isaac is a little self-feeder now!
The backfire: He proceeded to reject all of his normal lunch foods, eating only when another handful of cheerios was dumped onto his tray. Even the sippy cup was immediately launched. I did briefly interest him in a graham cracker, but I soon realized that forcing variety for its own sake only resulted in a lot more crumbs to sweep up. Cheerios really are the perfect, bite-size baby/toddler snack, aren't they?
So Isaac had like three cups of cheerios for lunch. Can't wait for the old digestive process to grind to a slow, grainy halt over that one.
And then? Mikayla announced she was done eating and ready for a nap. Cue her insistance that she is capable of putting herself down for a nap all by herself. I'm all about less work (see above), so I told her to just come back down when she wakes up. She went upstairs, I heard her door close, reasonable quiet ensued. Then I remembered the whole potty/no diaper thing. Shoot. Mental calculations suggested inevitable naptime "incident" based on most recent tinkle. Also, I began to hear strange thumping.
My freshly reheated pizza snickered at me as I jogged up the stairs to intervene. Turns out, Mikayla had the same thought, and was in the process of leaving her room to go potty. I'm sure that would have gone well, but I was obviously happy to help. Various potty time shenanigans followed, but we eventually got her back into her room (Isaac was, naturally, wailing for more cheerios by now).
I only had to threaten spanking twice before she stayed in her bed for good. That girl knows the cards to play, too. Will her good Christian momma refuse to read her the Bible before naptime? Yes, yes she will. Don't judge.
It got easier from there, though. Isaac let me know he was finished with a hearty, "All done, momma!" (Waving his arms wildly and making Donald Duck-like sounds. The fine art of interpretation.) And he has spent the last 15 minutes while I've been writing this post, doing this:
That boy loves him some outside! He could stand at a window for...well, at least 15 minutes, until his momma interrupts his workflow to snap a poor-quality backlit phone picture.
He currently has located another window and is working on raising the blinds. It was going so well until he noticed the leftover cheerios on his highchair footrest:
I wish that had better lighting, because the sight of him next to the cock-eyed blinds, munching on old cheerios is really one of the cutest things ever.
So, self-feeding and self-napping. I might just go book myself a vacation because obviously my kids barely need me anymore!
Much to my delight, he seized upon the opportunity to refine his pincer grasp and CHOWED those things. Fast. I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't searched his bib pocket and the secret hiding place in the corners of the high chair. So cool! My sweet Isaac is a little self-feeder now!
The backfire: He proceeded to reject all of his normal lunch foods, eating only when another handful of cheerios was dumped onto his tray. Even the sippy cup was immediately launched. I did briefly interest him in a graham cracker, but I soon realized that forcing variety for its own sake only resulted in a lot more crumbs to sweep up. Cheerios really are the perfect, bite-size baby/toddler snack, aren't they?
So Isaac had like three cups of cheerios for lunch. Can't wait for the old digestive process to grind to a slow, grainy halt over that one.
And then? Mikayla announced she was done eating and ready for a nap. Cue her insistance that she is capable of putting herself down for a nap all by herself. I'm all about less work (see above), so I told her to just come back down when she wakes up. She went upstairs, I heard her door close, reasonable quiet ensued. Then I remembered the whole potty/no diaper thing. Shoot. Mental calculations suggested inevitable naptime "incident" based on most recent tinkle. Also, I began to hear strange thumping.
My freshly reheated pizza snickered at me as I jogged up the stairs to intervene. Turns out, Mikayla had the same thought, and was in the process of leaving her room to go potty. I'm sure that would have gone well, but I was obviously happy to help. Various potty time shenanigans followed, but we eventually got her back into her room (Isaac was, naturally, wailing for more cheerios by now).
I only had to threaten spanking twice before she stayed in her bed for good. That girl knows the cards to play, too. Will her good Christian momma refuse to read her the Bible before naptime? Yes, yes she will. Don't judge.
It got easier from there, though. Isaac let me know he was finished with a hearty, "All done, momma!" (Waving his arms wildly and making Donald Duck-like sounds. The fine art of interpretation.) And he has spent the last 15 minutes while I've been writing this post, doing this:
That boy loves him some outside! He could stand at a window for...well, at least 15 minutes, until his momma interrupts his workflow to snap a poor-quality backlit phone picture.
He currently has located another window and is working on raising the blinds. It was going so well until he noticed the leftover cheerios on his highchair footrest:
I wish that had better lighting, because the sight of him next to the cock-eyed blinds, munching on old cheerios is really one of the cutest things ever.
So, self-feeding and self-napping. I might just go book myself a vacation because obviously my kids barely need me anymore!
Isaac Walks With His Car
This morning, as I was folding socks and underwear on the floor of the playroom amidst my two kiddos (the metaphor of brushing one's teeth while eating Oreos comes to mind, if you're wondering about how productive that endeavor was...), I suddenly noticed that Isaac was walking around with one of the riding toys.
Yes, you read that correctly. Walking. Pushing the car around like he was born to do it.
When did this kid grow up, again?
I think he now has most of the basic skills required for mowing the lawn. Joel will be so thrilled!
Yes, you read that correctly. Walking. Pushing the car around like he was born to do it.
When did this kid grow up, again?
I think he now has most of the basic skills required for mowing the lawn. Joel will be so thrilled!
Mikayla Turned 2!!
Wow, I haven't blogged since the apple sauce? I know things have been busy around here, but that seems ridiculous. If I may be such a wuss as to blame teething and holidays and a two-year birthday for my writing sabbatical - please don't judge me. Today, I am blogging only because we hit said two-year mark and there are milestones and updates to be memorialized. Also, Isaac is in the worst, most clingy mood ever and discovered he can climb up the stairs. This might be just a teensy bit of avoidance as a coping strategy, as my kids are watching Care Bears and I find myself with some actual space to breathe and recuperate from my gig this morning as a human jungle gym and baby wrangler.
More importantly than all my excuses, though, happy 2nd birthday, Mikayla! If you're on Facebook, you've seen most of these, but I like to formalize events into an actual blog post for posterity.
Mikayla baked tuptakes for her birthday. What color? Pink, pink, pink, of course!!
When she woke up on her birthday, I entered her room singing "Happy Birthday!" and gave her the sparkly birthday headband she had picked out at Target. Naturally, she wore it for breakfast.
When Momma got home from Young Ladies' Bible Study, we made pizzas for lunch, one of Mikayla's all-time favorite foods. Mikayla looooves to help me in the kitchen these days. She usually wears her apron, and she always stands on the ladder. I can't tell you how often she runs into the kitchen saying, "Help momma! Ladder! Aprons!" and proceeds to try to drag the ladder to the counter, and forces me to put on my blue apron while she wears the little half-apron up under her armpits. She is so proud of her work, too!
We made two pizzas, one pepperoni and one white chicken and spinach. Apparently, my white chicken and spinach pizza didn't live up to the standards set by our local Dominos. Usually she devours it, but this time she stuck to pepperoni. You can't win them all, eh?
And for dessert, of course, the pink cupcake. I think Joel got video of the candles and singing, but here is our big girl with her birthday treat.
We followed up the birthday celebration with a visit to a new doctor for Mikayla's two-year checkup. Our old doctor was just too far away for me to load up both kids and get over there for every checkup and illness. We saw Robin at our new family doc's office, and she confirmed that Mikayla is one tall girl! She was 36" tall, and weighed in at about 29 pounds. Robin said she would have guessed Mikayla is 3 or 3 1/2 based on her height.
Robin was also super impressed with Mikayla's verbal skills. She about died of the cuteness when she asked to look inside Mikayla's mouth and she responded with a "No, pease!" Just for tracking purposes, and because I am super lame when it comes to maintaining the baby book, I'm going to note some of her verbals here. She knows the words for most items in our house and readily learns new one, so nouns are a breeze. She uses lots of verbs with -ing to talk about what she's doing, and she recently started with past tense as well. Her possessive pronouns are sharp, though we are working on "mine" instead of "my's" (because we say "yours", right?). She is excellent at listening to and completing multiple tasks; for instance, "go to the playroom and get your doodle. Bring it back, and we'll draw a hand!" She can answer catechism questions 1-8 and is learning number 9. The most precious is to hear her say "Made me and care of me" in response to the question about why she should glorify God.
Mikayla's favorite songs are "Fishers of Men", "This Little Light of Mine", "Holy, Holy, Holy" and others from church. She asks for "Praise God" and the "Glory Be" and we often hear her going around singing "Holy Ghost, Amen!" She requests momma's "Night Night Song" (Come, Thou Fount) and "Jamma's Song" or "Sunshine" (both refer to "You Are My Sunshine"). Also "Table", which is her name for the 23rd Psalm because she apparently remembers the last verse about having a table prepared before us. In church, (where we "worship Gog!") she sits beautifully and participates in worship up through the offering. She stands and holds our hands most times when we are singing, and she loves to flip through the hymnal and pretends to sing from it. She prays when we do, and we whisper-pray with her during the silent confession of sin and explain the Lord's Supper each week. It has led to really cool conversations with her about sin and Jesus outside of church - one day, she totally connected that Jesus died for her sins because he is perfect. Be still my heart! She reads her Busy Bible or draws during the sermon. I am so blessed by her desire to participate in worship, and how few "corrections" she requires (every so often Dadda has to take her out and, er, remind her to obey).
Potty training is ramping up, though I am still not pushing it very hard. But we had an awesome Sunday morning - Mikayla went potty at home, and then was dry after Sunday School when I usually change her. She pottied at church then, and stayed dry through worship! She didn't want to use the potty again afterward though, so that ended the winning streak. Still, I am optimistic that perhaps soon we can start this in earnest and get her out of diapers. She usually tells me when she has to go #2 but not with enough warning to, you know, do anything about it. We'll get there.
Overall, Mikayla is super obedient and responds well to discipline. When we do have to correct her, we talk about God telling us in the Bible that we must obey momma and dadda. So then we ask, "Who must you obey?" and she gives us a tearful "Momma Dadda". It is so precious. And after discipline, she is usually all smiles pretty quickly and ready to go try again. While there's no such thing as the perfect toddler, her little heart really loves her family and friends and harbors so much creativity and humor already. I am hard pressed to complain very long or loud about her behavior because she's just so darn sweet!
And don't even get me started on little brother. His post will come, but yesterday he ate his first cracker (I had nothing else to give him at the doc office!) and today I found him halfway up the stairs. Good grief!
In closing, precious baby girl, you continue to bless our lives with so much love and laughter. I watch you play, and you have so many ideas and opinions. Everything about you just makes me giggle and want to eat you up. Right now you are vigorously rocking on the horse you got for Christmas, in between watching Letter Factory and imitating the letter sounds. There is so much that a simple blog post fails to capture about you. But know that your Dadda and I love, love, love you! As soon as I hit the publish button here, I'm gonna gobble you up with a big tiss!
More importantly than all my excuses, though, happy 2nd birthday, Mikayla! If you're on Facebook, you've seen most of these, but I like to formalize events into an actual blog post for posterity.
Mikayla baked tuptakes for her birthday. What color? Pink, pink, pink, of course!!
When she woke up on her birthday, I entered her room singing "Happy Birthday!" and gave her the sparkly birthday headband she had picked out at Target. Naturally, she wore it for breakfast.
When Momma got home from Young Ladies' Bible Study, we made pizzas for lunch, one of Mikayla's all-time favorite foods. Mikayla looooves to help me in the kitchen these days. She usually wears her apron, and she always stands on the ladder. I can't tell you how often she runs into the kitchen saying, "Help momma! Ladder! Aprons!" and proceeds to try to drag the ladder to the counter, and forces me to put on my blue apron while she wears the little half-apron up under her armpits. She is so proud of her work, too!
We made two pizzas, one pepperoni and one white chicken and spinach. Apparently, my white chicken and spinach pizza didn't live up to the standards set by our local Dominos. Usually she devours it, but this time she stuck to pepperoni. You can't win them all, eh?
And for dessert, of course, the pink cupcake. I think Joel got video of the candles and singing, but here is our big girl with her birthday treat.
We followed up the birthday celebration with a visit to a new doctor for Mikayla's two-year checkup. Our old doctor was just too far away for me to load up both kids and get over there for every checkup and illness. We saw Robin at our new family doc's office, and she confirmed that Mikayla is one tall girl! She was 36" tall, and weighed in at about 29 pounds. Robin said she would have guessed Mikayla is 3 or 3 1/2 based on her height.
Robin was also super impressed with Mikayla's verbal skills. She about died of the cuteness when she asked to look inside Mikayla's mouth and she responded with a "No, pease!" Just for tracking purposes, and because I am super lame when it comes to maintaining the baby book, I'm going to note some of her verbals here. She knows the words for most items in our house and readily learns new one, so nouns are a breeze. She uses lots of verbs with -ing to talk about what she's doing, and she recently started with past tense as well. Her possessive pronouns are sharp, though we are working on "mine" instead of "my's" (because we say "yours", right?). She is excellent at listening to and completing multiple tasks; for instance, "go to the playroom and get your doodle. Bring it back, and we'll draw a hand!" She can answer catechism questions 1-8 and is learning number 9. The most precious is to hear her say "Made me and care of me" in response to the question about why she should glorify God.
Mikayla's favorite songs are "Fishers of Men", "This Little Light of Mine", "Holy, Holy, Holy" and others from church. She asks for "Praise God" and the "Glory Be" and we often hear her going around singing "Holy Ghost, Amen!" She requests momma's "Night Night Song" (Come, Thou Fount) and "Jamma's Song" or "Sunshine" (both refer to "You Are My Sunshine"). Also "Table", which is her name for the 23rd Psalm because she apparently remembers the last verse about having a table prepared before us. In church, (where we "worship Gog!") she sits beautifully and participates in worship up through the offering. She stands and holds our hands most times when we are singing, and she loves to flip through the hymnal and pretends to sing from it. She prays when we do, and we whisper-pray with her during the silent confession of sin and explain the Lord's Supper each week. It has led to really cool conversations with her about sin and Jesus outside of church - one day, she totally connected that Jesus died for her sins because he is perfect. Be still my heart! She reads her Busy Bible or draws during the sermon. I am so blessed by her desire to participate in worship, and how few "corrections" she requires (every so often Dadda has to take her out and, er, remind her to obey).
Potty training is ramping up, though I am still not pushing it very hard. But we had an awesome Sunday morning - Mikayla went potty at home, and then was dry after Sunday School when I usually change her. She pottied at church then, and stayed dry through worship! She didn't want to use the potty again afterward though, so that ended the winning streak. Still, I am optimistic that perhaps soon we can start this in earnest and get her out of diapers. She usually tells me when she has to go #2 but not with enough warning to, you know, do anything about it. We'll get there.
Overall, Mikayla is super obedient and responds well to discipline. When we do have to correct her, we talk about God telling us in the Bible that we must obey momma and dadda. So then we ask, "Who must you obey?" and she gives us a tearful "Momma Dadda". It is so precious. And after discipline, she is usually all smiles pretty quickly and ready to go try again. While there's no such thing as the perfect toddler, her little heart really loves her family and friends and harbors so much creativity and humor already. I am hard pressed to complain very long or loud about her behavior because she's just so darn sweet!
And don't even get me started on little brother. His post will come, but yesterday he ate his first cracker (I had nothing else to give him at the doc office!) and today I found him halfway up the stairs. Good grief!
In closing, precious baby girl, you continue to bless our lives with so much love and laughter. I watch you play, and you have so many ideas and opinions. Everything about you just makes me giggle and want to eat you up. Right now you are vigorously rocking on the horse you got for Christmas, in between watching Letter Factory and imitating the letter sounds. There is so much that a simple blog post fails to capture about you. But know that your Dadda and I love, love, love you! As soon as I hit the publish button here, I'm gonna gobble you up with a big tiss!
The Chunky Monkey Eats! (So does her little brother)
Technically, Isaac's first cereal meal was last week when we were on vacation with Joel's family. It was very exciting, and he did fantastically with the spoon and ate a few tablespoons of rice cereal. Everybody clapped, tears were shed, etc. etc. However, because I don't have any photographic evidence of that precious event, we recreated his first meal today. And by "we", I mean Mikayla and me. She was ALL about showing Isaac his high chair, putting his bib on him, and then "helping" him with his spoon.
It was all well and good until I discovered raisins in the rice cereal. I guess we can't blame a helpful big sister for wanting to share her favorite foods with her baby brother. But I did start to look more carefully at the spoon before popping it into Isaac's mouth!
This was such a neat little time for all of us, so I grabbed my phone and caught a few pictures. A video is forthcoming, as soon as I upload it. Incidentally, I bought myself a few minutes to write this post by allowing Mikayla to watch the video repeatedly on my phone. I'm even letting her hold the phone. Momma magic!
It was all well and good until I discovered raisins in the rice cereal. I guess we can't blame a helpful big sister for wanting to share her favorite foods with her baby brother. But I did start to look more carefully at the spoon before popping it into Isaac's mouth!
This was such a neat little time for all of us, so I grabbed my phone and caught a few pictures. A video is forthcoming, as soon as I upload it. Incidentally, I bought myself a few minutes to write this post by allowing Mikayla to watch the video repeatedly on my phone. I'm even letting her hold the phone. Momma magic!
So excited to eat with her little brother!
As Mikayla would say, Isaac is ready to "eat!" because he's wearing his "beeb!"
"Bowl, Ikey, more!"
Isaac was just amazingly chill through the whole experience. He is already showing good progress in slurping food off of his spoon and swallowing it easily, even a slightly thicker puree. He didn't cry or show much of any emotion, even when Mikayla poked his empty spoon repeatedly into his mouth. He did, however, giggle at her as she did tricks with her sippy cup and crackers. It was something of a guessing game to determine when he was finished. No spitting up, and he had a great nap after breakfast this morning, so I think he enjoys having a fuller belly!
Now off to rescue my phone from toddler hands, and to put Isaac down for an afternoon nap where he will no doubt spend the first twenty minutes doing acrobatics in his crib. What a roller! And he is SO close to sitting up - he is fairly stable, but slumps forward.
Thinking back to last summer, I can't help but think...isn't this about when I was announcing another pregnancy? Six month old baby, just starting to sit and eat...what are we waiting for? My goodness. I don't think I even realized at the time just how crazy that was. But our cup is so full with these precious little ones who so obviously LOVE each other! Speaking of whom...gotta run!
Thinking back to last summer, I can't help but think...isn't this about when I was announcing another pregnancy? Six month old baby, just starting to sit and eat...what are we waiting for? My goodness. I don't think I even realized at the time just how crazy that was. But our cup is so full with these precious little ones who so obviously LOVE each other! Speaking of whom...gotta run!
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