Our Moments

Mary Louise has started to call us "Mom" and "Dad" (rather than the Mommy and Daddy which David still uses). Every time I hear her say it, with out fail, my heart sinks just a little bit. It's happening. They're growing. Though inevitable, beautiful, amazing, wonderful...it hurts in the most profound and intimate way. I'm so aware of it - for which I'm both grateful and groaning. My own growing pains...I never thought I'd have them in my 30's.
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David. People. Our David is POTTY TRAINED!!!!!! Oh my. He made it through a few errands - AND the park yesterday. He made it through a stroller ride, feeding the ducks at the lake, and working on projects in the back yard - ALL in his "big boy" underpants of choice - and ALL with asking for the rest room as needed. We are over the moon proud of his hard work, his personal choice, his progressing with comfort.

Even on my most frustrated day of "potty training", I went to bed disappointed in myself - not David -
NOT David. I knew I was our limiting factor. David would, as he always has, do as he felt comfortable, without regard to external pressures; he would progress as he knew his body was ready. Today, he knows himself, he knows his body, and he listens accordingly.
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A while back, we went to a local fire station. It was. amazing. We went with our "field trip friends" Christi, Benjamin, and baby Sophia. The firemen, though Christ called and confirmed, were not expecting us. However, they rose to the occasion and made our visit fantastic.

We got a tour of the fire station. The kids got a chance to play on the fire pole (that is just there for show - it's a new house with everything on the bottom level - no need for a working pole). They gave the kids coloring books and showed them how to "stop, drop and roll"...

Then we went to the truck bay...oh my.

David wasn't too sure when I plopped him on the front bumper of the HUGE shiny fire truck...(Mary Louise wasn't having any of that and stayed hooked to my hip)


But when the fire man showing us around offered to take us around the block?! we were ALL absolutely giddy!!


(Mary Louise spontaneously slid off the sofa a few days prior to the tour - her glasses smashed against her face, splitting her brow about half an inch. I cleaned and glued it - but only a princess bandaid made it actually FEEL better. Ha - she sported that look for 3 or 4 days while it healed.)

Once back from riding around the block, (so fun!!! - lights and horn blowing...I'm sure the neighbors weren't quite as excited...) the fire men took out all of their gear and offered for Mary Louise, David and Benjamin to try things on, touch as they wished and even suited up completely for the kids to see.




But they weren't done yet...those sweet men let our babies play with the heat seeker, shoot the fire hose and pulled the truck out (again) so that we could all see the ladder completely extended. They took all of the saws and heavy tools out of the truck one by one and told us what each of them did, they explained how they rode, how they worked as a team, and again let everyone look around as they wanted before answering final questions. Amazing doesn't do the experience justice. David is still talking about it; and Mary Louise and David have both asked numerous times if we could go back and see everything again.

From Fire Station field trip March 2013

As we were leaving, Benjamin asked to go to the airport. We opted to tag along. We have a local airport  where one can see private, military and mail planes land...
We went:

We saw:

We got hungry and headed off for lunch where the kids played some more before beginning melt downs (really, as if that wasn't expected...). Christi's little ones needed a nap. The LeBlanc kids? yeah. They needed a chocolate milk and a ride in a police car buggy:


When Brent got home, I stayed out of sight and just listened to the kids try to tell him about their day:
"We rode a fire truck!!"
"I want to be a fireman!"
"I want to be a ballerina and a doctor!"
"We saw a plane!"
"I want to be a fireman!"
"We played alot!...in a police car!"
"I want a fire truck!" - (David is WAAAAAY into the whole fire truck / station / fire man thing and has been for quite some time)
"Da house is on fire!! Yet's put it out David!"

Yeah - I heard, "The house is on fire!" at least 32 times in the 24 hours that followed that day. No matter how many times I heard it, my heart sank and I instinctively did a kid and pet inventory every. single. time. Sigh. My panic button is far too easily pressed.
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We also had some family photos done. While the actual pics came out great, (and I will post a few later), I tried to set the camera to take a few when we got home...and the following ones are funny for a few reasons:

1. Everett's face? yeah - he pooped. Like massive HUGE call a full code brown because no way can a diaper hold this kind of poop...poop.

2. Brent? of course didn't notice (why?!?!) and used the awesome crotch hold - because what could be more family picture friendly than a kid dangling by his crotch?

3. Mary Louise? I have no idea what was so funny...maybe she was the only one "in the know" about E's full diaper.



4. You think David's laughing? He might have been...but it was a scary hysterical "I'm so tired and I don't even want to look up much less smile for a picture" kind of pre-fit laugh.

5. I'm probably uttering some sort of profanity under my breath which one of the kids inevitably heard and saved in their "for the public only" memory box.
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Which brings me to a final story:

Brent walks in after work one day. He asks the kids how their day was. I can't remember what I was doing but I was within ear shot.

Brent: Hey Mary Louise! How was your day?
ML: It was fun! We went to the park! The big one and we were going to ride our bikes on da road!!
Brent: Really? That sounds great!
ML: Yeah. But den David crapped in his pants so we had to yeave...

and that, my friends is what I call "a shining Mom moment". A+ and pat on the back self. NOW will you clean up your mouth?

Now, in my feeble defense, I was helping Mary Louise in the bathroom, David was next to me. He said he had to poop. I offered him the toilet. He refused, walked around the corner, pooped in his diaper, came back and told me he needed "fresh pants". So, we left - even though I'd taken them a half hour away to a state park and had a wonderful time planned. UGH. I was just done and needed to stick to a consequence I'd laid out earlier: if you choose to poop when we're out, we come straight home.

Apparently it worked a bit.

(oh and it's been a few days now - David is still awesomely potty trained!!!!)

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AAAAAND: Mary Louise music class montage (because that's also what we've been doing!)


xo,
Heather