Piggies

these actually stayed in for most of the day.. it was so nice to be able to see her little face.


And Jason wanted ponies too, but I recently cut his hair so this is all we could muster..


That's it.. that's all I got. Today was better than yesterday, but I am ready for Tom to come home. He probably won't be home until after the kiddos go to bed tomorrow night, but Tom has already been informed that HE will be putting them to bed on Sunday night... I'm heading out for WHATEVER for the afternoon on Sunday.. part of the evening will be a new strength training class for female triathletes. :) Oh, and happy hour afterward.. that's my kind of off season!

I'm doing a 10 mile 'test' run tomorrow. If I can hang I'm going to do a half marathon trail run at the end of October. I think I can do it, but we'll see.

Been a while..

Oops. It's been a while. I figured you were tired of hearing the details of the poops happening in the Mount household.

Anyway... things are still progressing. Lily seems to have it figured out unless she has had a lot of water or is really distracted. I can't remember the last time she pooped in her pants. Jason seems to be regressing the last couple days... I'm not sure what's up. He's either really tired from so many nights of interrupted sleep and a missed nap or he's just well not quite there yet. We'll get there.

Tom's gone again .. left on Friday night. I was lucky enough to get out for a nice ride w/ some friends yesterday while Lori Fons and her daughter watched the kids. It was wonderful! Today was a good day...

After my two weeks "off" to potty train the kids and to just be off and try yoga season I'm back in the saddle. I'm doing a test 10 mile run next Sat (provided I can find a sitter) to decide whether or not to run a half marathon on Oct 25th. Turns out when I'm not exercising I'm kinda cranky and just off.... so back in the saddle and working on my plan for the winter months... AGAIN, hoping for improvement on my swim, in my core and much strength training. I'm starting a women only strength training for the triathlete program on Sunday... it's every Sunday for 9weeks. I'm excited for some sport specific exercises and to meet other women in my area in the sport!

Here's a quick shot of the kiddos.. they HAD to eat outside tonight. It was so nice today. I'm proud of myself for making two things (so far) from scratch w/ whole foods from the book Feeding the Whole Family (I"m trying out this meal planning thing). So far both the chili and the pancakes were a hit! :)

Green Juice

My latest thing - though I'm still a big fan of the green smoothie - is green juice. Send all those vitamins and minerals right into your system w/o all the fiber to bog you down. And if you can't tolerate the taste of the green juice you can use it as the base for your green smoothie... then you don't have to put spinach etc in .. just your fruit and call it good!

My favorite green juice is 4 stalks celery/5 leaves to one head of greens (above are dandelion greens)/one cucumber/4 apples (the more tart the better)

I put some water in the bottom of the blender (preferably the vitamix) and add the celery. Blend those up real well. Add the greens and blend - sometimes you have to use the plunger thing to push the greens down. then add everything else - pre chopped of course.

Then I dump the mush in a nut milk bag and strain it. This makes enough for me to have an entire quart and the kids to each have a pint. They LOVE it. They were asking for it this a.m.



And some photos of the kids picking the last of my tomatoes that didn't get a chance to ripen... which unfortunately was most of them.

Is it 7:30pm yet?

I'm SO ready for Tom to come home. I"m not sure what's up here, but all was going well and suddenly the kids are just losing it every 10 minutes. Do they miss their daddy? I DO! Think Tom will be offended if I go to the coffee shop for like FOUR hours his first day back?

Breathe!!!!!

About lost it today...

both kids crapped their pants today... at the same time. Imagine.. one getting cleaned up and while you are up to your arm pits in crap the other kid is playing in the toilet the "washing" their hands all while you plead w/ them to just GET OUT of the bathroom. It's all you can do to not scream at the top of your lungs and grab the clean kid and toss it out of the bathroom...

Only sharing to 'keep it real' so you don't think my kids are all great at potty training and to not only share the good stuff as to paint a not so real picture.

I had a long day today... so that's all I got.

Oh wait, I'll share this. Jason woke up from his nap and I went up and grabbed him and took him in my room. We snoozed together for another 30 mins all snuggled together. Those are the good times... they make the poop tolerable. :)

No poops in the pants today!

I was getting really frustrated w/ poops yesterday, but am happy to say that all the Mounts pooped in the potty today! :) YIPPEE!!!!! Lily wasn't happy about it, but she eventually did it. Jason pooped FIVE FREAKIN' times today! I'm not exaggerating. He woke up saying his back hurt... didn't hurt by the end of the day! :)

No more updates really... it's gotten colder here.. in the high 50s. Tom comes home the day after tomorrow and the kids start their first art class tomorrow. :)

These kids are smart!

So Lily did her poop on the potty last night.. and I am still OH SO proud of her, but today she pooped on her chair.. :( A few minutes later Jason ran into the bathroom and pooped on the potty so I gave him a date and a sticker - more to incentivize (is that a word?) Lily than to reward Jason - and as I was giving him his sticker Lily asked for one and I told her she would get a sticker when she pooped on the potty .... her response: "I pooped on the potty last night."

Indeed she did... and she got no reward - besides my VERY EXCITED praise. So she got a sticker too...

So smart of her!!!

Wasn't going to blog tonight...

but I am so proud of Lily I have to document it.

We had a good day today.. lots of fun w/ friends and a pretty decent potty day. Lily had a couple of accidents and Jason only had one and well, a half I guess. :)

I had to wake them up to go to my hair appt today so I put them down for bed a bit early.. I heard Lily opening and closing her bedroom door and thought, "Crap she totaly isn't going to fall for this early bed stuff." So I went up there to check on her and she held her butt and had a pained look on her face. I assumed that she had pooped in her diaper and I started heading to the bathroom to get a diaper and she ran in ahead of me and went straight for the potty.. I usually make them sit on the potty after an accident.. when I took her diaper off NOTHING! She hopped right up on that potty like a pro and went poop. She wouldn't poop all day today. (after waking up w/ poops.) I am so proud of her for 'telling' me she needed to go instead of telling me she already went - as she had been doing. I just can't believe how quickly things can turn.. (well, both ways really).

Jason was great today. His one pee accident was right after I had him on the potty and he wouldn't do anything, but in his defense all the other kids were headed outside and he really wanted to go w/ them. He peed not moments after we got out there. Oh well. And I caught him mid poop and got him on the potty to finish.. his 1/2 accident.

All in all it's going well and we are getting out of the house... w/ many visits to the potty... all fine by me. I gave away the last of our diapers today so we wouldn't be tempted to go back when the going gets tough. :)

Watch out world.. we're big kids now...

I'm sure I will stop talking about this at some point!

Tom comes home on Wed and I'm sure he will be amazed!

We (well I) are excited to watch Ironman Wisconsin this weekend... our Sunday will revolve around naps and IM! The athletes run by only blocks from out house and I'm going to try to see the bike out portion w/ the kids. :) My TNT coach Chris and his girlfriend Jackie are both doing it this year so it will be fun to try to see them on their voyage!

Not so super fantastic...

but not awful.

I hit the gym for some yoga this a.m. and the kids didn't have any accidents in the day care... until I talked to L a bit too long about going to the potty so she just went. We almost got out of there in the same outfits we came in. :) J had no accidents today! YIPPEEE!!! but he didn't poop today so tomorrow could be ugly... a good learning experience for all! Lily had a few accidents. We are making forward progress! :)

Why is it that the days (okay there have only been 2 so far) that I do yoga I turn into an Ogre (ala Shrek) ... I thought I would be all zen and chill post yoga. I wonder if I get even more irritated b/c my zen is immediately snatched from me post yoga? ha

The kids were to bed late last night, up early, short naps... we were having such a good run, but it had to be broken eventually. I was up late listening to Palin and chatting w/ a friend on IM so we were all a bit cranky...

On to tomorrow.

Super Fantastic Day...

Lily wearing her baby on her back just like mommy.

We had a super fantastic day today. I still am dumbfounded by how much fun we are having. Tom's travel times are usually very hard form me, and I do miss him greatly this trip, but we are hanging in there pretty tough. Is it my lack of personal agenda??

Our friends Sam and Abbey came over today for a "potty party". Lily had just done a big poop on the potty (I know I said I wouldn't bore you w/ these details anymore, but I was just so darn proud of her!!!) when they got here and Jason proceeded to drop a big load on the floor ... twice.. which is not the example we were hoping to set for the other kids. Oh well. Sam and Abbey didn't seem to scarred.

After the potty party we had some lunch and the kids were down for their naps by 1:30pm... and here comes the piece of the puzzle that probably contributes the most eo our super fantastic day... Jason napped for 3 hours and Lily napped for 3.5 hours. I had to go wake her up at 5pm.. who knows how long she would have slept. Apparently potty training makes them sleepy!

And the best part of our day was going to a TNT send off party. It was a great party and all, but the best part was that this was our first outing as newly potty training kiddos. We went to Red Robin and they did GREAT!!!! Not one accident! :) Lily asked at one point to go to the potty, Jason flushed and was startled at how loud it was, but said, "I'm not scared anymore mommy.", and the last time we went to the potty before we left Jason even pooped in the potty. (I have to add that that boy is a pooping MACHINE! He pooped in the potty again before bed... EE GADS! Where does he keep all that stuff?) I am so proud of them I can hardly sit still. I also realized on the way home that this is the first time that I've taken them out in a situation like this all by myself. I felt pretty good.. okay not pretty good... I feel GREAT about 1. just doing it 2. being calm about it... so calm I didn't even really realize what I was doing and 3. that it was such a success. I've found w/ kids that sometimes you just have to take yourself out of your comfort zone. I have learned so much about my kids and myself through this whole process.

Tomorrow is another day and I know that it might not go as well as today, but we are making great progress... in more than just the potty training.

I am a lucky woman. Great husband, great kids and a sweet gig! :)

D4

It's 8:15 and I'm seriously getting ready for bed. FYI.. in the midst of potty training is not the time to skip your mid-day coffee!!!

I'm tired of talking about/thinking about/worrying about poop/pee. It really was a good day, but I"m tired of detailing it and rehashing it. Both kids pooped on the potty.. amidst accidents. I will spare you the oh so boring details.

It was 90 degrees again today... supposedly it's going to be in the 70s the rest of the week thus introducing us to an abrupt fall. I'm jonesing to turn over the kids' wardrobes.. don't ask me why.. it's part of the seasonal change I guess... brings on the next step.. I don't know.. it's just something I like to do.

Tom is in Germany now - he was in London. I love hearing from him and talking to him, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't jealous of his trip this time around. He called from a lake side eatery in Friedrichshaufen (no clue how to spell that and too lazy to look it up). He told me where he was and what he was doing and - as I always do - I responded, "I'm in Madison, Wi, it's 90 degrees and I was just about to mop the floors." I have a really sweet gig here don't get me wrong, but I am insanely jealous right now... I want to be in Europe! ha ha

Anyway... we had a lot of fun today.. here are some photos.

We made crowns and the kids put stickers on them. The activity only took about 2 mins, but they loved it and wore the crowns off and on all day. I'm looking for things to do around the house that I can do w/ them and not want to slap myself silly bc it's so boring! ha

Jason saying CHEESE for the camera




Sharing the monkey bars


Playing in mommy and daddy's room before naps. (Why do I look so disgustingly tan... I haven't been in the sun that much since training ended.)

Note that Jason got in on the nail painting today. :)

Potty Training day 3.

Happy Labor day folks...

things have been oh so exciting around here that I got out our winter stuff - despite the high of 90 - to see if we have stuff that fits the kids. I might be a bit stir crazy?????

Good news.. there stuff from last year fits. They had to try it on.



Does it get cuter than this?


This is my hat, but we tried his on too and it fit.


Today went pretty well. J and L are certainly not interested in being on the potty every 20 minutes. Today I just kind of rolled with it and I tried to at least get them on the potty every hour or so. Jason only had a couple of accidents (3) and Lily only had 2... well, she pooped in her pants, but I don't really count that. :)

Lily tried so hard today! She was running around w/o her undies for a while and she ran to the potty herself and peed. She tried REALLY hard to get to the potty to poop. She would get there then I think she was scared. She did this about 3 times before she pooped mid run. She was very disturbed by this. It really freaked her out. She wasn't successful at pooping in the potty. Oh well. She tried really hard. Bless her heart. She also woke up from a 2.5 hour nap dry.

Jason had a small poop accident, but that was it. He must have been holding it today. I got to see some more imagination development today. Jason and I were hangin' in the bathroom (our new favorite place to hang.. ha) and he started throwing an imaginary ball up in the air. We played w/ imaginary balls for a good 20 mins. It was so cute to see him show that level of imagination.. that is the first time he has done that.

We had another good day today.. though the kids did watch much more tv than I like them to, but hey we've been here in the house/yard for 3 days now. All things considered we are hanging in there. I don't have any outings planned until Friday... we'll probably start taking some longer walks before then. We took a short jaunt to Trader Joe's yesterday and a walk up the street today. They seem to be able to hold it for over an hour at least... before I put them on the potty. Maybe we'll have naked day tomorrow. Seems that's what might work for Lily.

It's funny to think that I originally had planned to just potty train Lily b/c she seemed more ready than Jason and I didn't want to have to be sequestered again later. Jason is doing such a good job. I'm so proud of them both!

I will say I'm EXHAUSTED. We're having really fun / good days, but I have to pay close attention to what they are doing and it's taxing to be picking them up and carrying them (often screaming and kicking on Jason's part) to the potty. Gosh that makes it sound dramatic.. it really isn't... he's just busy and doesn't want to take the time. I'm constantly negotiating w/ them.. if you sit on the potty we'll do xyz.. it's tiring. ha Welcome to parenthood huh? :) I'm actually kind of enjoying it.. just watching them grow up so much in a matter of days is great.

It was funny.. I looked at lily this evening w/ "that" look on my face and said, "What are you doing Lily?" and she said, "not pooping" made me laugh out loud.. guess I've been asking her that a lot over the last couple of days.