POOPY IN THE POTTY!!!

I know since I haven't written a day to day recap in ages that I haven't mentioned that we have started a bit on the potty training ordeal. I say "ordeal" because, for all of my years working in the medical field, I really cannot stand poop. Now you may think that that would be a great motivation for me to begin the potty training, but I've learned to tolerate poopy diapers by now so that is a known evil. Of course I would love to not have to do it BUT - the process of getting there is very stressful for me. I have visions of HUGE messes of poop all over the house and that thought makes me shake in my boots. haha That and I just don't really know how to approach this, how to get him to do it. Of course I've read what a bunch of the parenting books and web sites have to say about it, but every kid is, after different in what method works for them. I just don't want to screw up and scar the poor child for life. Aarrggh it's all so stressful. By the way, I do realize that I'm overreacting, but everyone has their quirks and mine happens to be poop aversion.
Still, Thomas is 2 1/4 now and everyone under the sun with the notable exception of his daycare provider have been on my case to start potty training. Emmett's Mom bought Tommy a new potty because she didn't like the one that we had. She also bought a book, a bunch of training underpants and some things that look like maxi pads for the early stages. I tried putting him in the underwear, but he peed in them almost immediately and they overflowed and there was pee all over the floor. This happened a couple more times when Emmett tried and, although I appreciate the idea of making him more aware of his body functions by not having him in the super dry, ultra absorbant diapers all the time, having him track urine all over the house doesn't seem like a great solution to me, either.
What we did finally agree on was to try Thomas on the potty for a little while in the evenings before he goes to bed. We let him sit on the potty while we read the potty book to him. We keep reading storied to him until he's tired of sitting on the potty and then we give up and head to bed. Well, about a week and a half ago (I'm guessing), Tommy was sitting with Emmett in the bathroom and while they were reading Tommy went wee wee in the potty. We made a big huge deal out of it and praised him and jumped around and I even gave him a new toy (a bought a big box of plastic animals a couple of months ago that I've been squirreling away for Christmas). On Tuesday night I was doing the same thing in the evening and he made a big wee wee in the potty. I was totally excited and once again we made a huge deal, complete with new toy. Still, I have been feeling like they were both kind of accidents and that he is not purposely going in the potty, so my enthusiasm has been buffered a bit by that thought. Well - last night Emmett took Tommy in to sit on the potty and hear his story, I was sitting on the couch reading the newspaper when I heard Emmett yell, "Melissa! Come here!" so I ran into the bathroom and Thomas stood up again and there in the potty was some wee wee and ONE SMALLISH (BUT OH SO SIGNIFICANT) TURD! Yup, that's right, our boy did poopy in the potty for the first time on Friday, October 22, 2004. We were outrageously excited. We were so excited I don't know if we scared him or encouraged him with our enthusiasm. He was definitely CRAZY about the big plastic tiger that I gave him.
On the down side, Tommy started wheezing again last night. This is his third bout of wheezing since July. Fortunately, we now know how and have the medications to treat him so at least we don't have to run to the ER all the time. But still, it bothers me. So far, he still only gets them when he gets a cold, so we will need to be that much more diligent about making sure he doesn't get colds and (I think) using decongestants when he does get them. At some point we are going to have to tell Olga about this and give her instructions on how to deal with it. We haven't done that so far because we haven't even been sure that he truly had asthma, but now three bouts in three months seems to confirm this diagnosis.
Back on the up side, Emmett got back his LSAT and scored a 164, which is the 91st percentile. I'm so proud of him! And, frankly, sort of amazed after he said he didn't think he did very well and also knowing that as we get older we are not quite as intellectually clear as we are in our teens and twenties (at least this is my belief). He, however, was grousing about how he scored in the 98th percentile on his graduate level business test (I think it's called the GMAT or something like that). He also was lamenting his mistakes and how he wished he could have done just a little bit better. Oh, brother. I think deep down he was relieved and a little bit happy for himself, but it wouldn't be Emmett if he didn't get down on himself about something.
I'm currently on a stretch of nights, so there's not much else to report about yesterday. I didn't get out of bed until the boys got home. We decided to order pizza last night (a rare treat) and I ordered a chicken caesar salad to go with it so I wouldn't be tempted to overdo it on the pizza.
Emmett and I watched a movie called, I think, "Vacuuming in the nude in paradise" by the same people who did Trainspotting. I hated Trainspotting, but this movie was great. I thought it was hysterical and although it definitely had tragic elements, it was just. Afterwards I went and checked on Tommy again to make sure he was breathing okay and then it was time to get ready and head to work.
Now it's almost 9am on Saturday morning and time to leave work and go home and get some sleep!
Love, Melissa

State of the household

Oh boy, where to start when it's been so long since I've written. Things have been incredibly busy - more so even than usual and it seems that when that happens the first thing that goes is this blog. Both my friend Vicki and now my Grandmother have been after me why I haven't written at all lately. Hmmmm - I don't want to just skip over the past couple of weeks since there has been so much happening, but not sure right now how much time I'll have. Tommy is awake eating his Cheerios and watching Sesame Street.

I think I last wrote on a Thursday or a Friday morning, so I'll try to pick up from there later with highlights.

But first, a few notes...I've lost 10 or 11 lbs., so I'm REALLY psyched about that!! Finally the effort is starting to pay off. I'm not sure exactly how much I've lost since (as I've mentioned before) I didn't get on the scale for the first couple of days because I was too afraid haha. From my first weigh in I've lost 8 pounds and I figure you usually lose 2-3 pounds the first couple of days (primarily in water weight, but hey, I'll take it!), so a total of 10-11 pounds so far. YAY! For the first couple of weeks or so I did basically phase 1 of the South Beach Diet, restricting my intake and eating 20 grams or less of carbohydrates per day. Since then I've been transitioning into more of a calorie counting thing. I've always said that calories don't lie and at the end of the day that's what really counts. It's just harder because you have to weigh and measure everything, keep lists and so on, so I think people like the carbs thing also because it's a lot less work. Oh well. I signed up for this Spark People diet - weird name, but it was cheap and makes a great diet aid. There's a web site: http://www.sparkpeople.com and I log in and can track everything that I've been doing. I find that it works really well for me because by logging my food every day I can tell how many good days vs. bad days I'm having. I'm starting to realize that that may be why I've been having such a tough time losing weight. It may sound dumb, but what I think I've been doing in the past is having only a couple of good days and then thinking that I should be losing all this weight and getting discouraged when it doesn't happen. My patience with dieting seems to be much less these days. Anyway, the Spark thing really lays it out for me and also tracks the amount of carbs, protein, and fat that I'm getting. I really like it. Now if I can just add some exercise and focus on drinking all my water (64 ounces, ugh) I'll feel even better. I probably won't focus on intense exercise until I start eating more calories. Right now I'm only eating 1000-1200 calories per day. My goal is to eat 1100-1400 but, surprisingly enough I'm not even getting 1100 every day so far. Part of that lately is working all these night shifts, it's pretty easy to not eat all night since I still feel like I'd normally be sleeping. Then I eat a light breakfast in the morning and sleep all day. By the time I get up it's time to make dinner for all of us and that's the only real meal I'm eating all day. Obviously, it's not the ideal way to get your calories. I've got every person under the sun wanting to lecture me about the best way to diet, it drives me crazy. I've been struggling with my weight for my entire life, or at least the last 20+ years. I KNOW how much, when and what you are supposed to eat, I KNOW how many calories are in things. I AM NOT FAT BECAUSE I AM STUPID, I AM FAT BECAUSE I LIKE TO EAT!!!!

Okay, just wanted to get that off my chest. Also, for the record, I think that however the weight comes off at this point is what's important. Right now I am medically obese and that's a much greater health risk than anything I can do to myself with a short term diet. I have to do what is best for me, and works for me. It may not be the best thing for everyone and it may not be the best thing for long term weight maintenance, but right now I've got to take whatever measures necessary to getting this extra poundage off.

Moving on from diet talk - I have been busy planning a Halloween party as well. We are going to have a big (?) 'adult' party - Tommy will hopefully be with a babysitter for the evening so we won't have to worry about how people behave when they're intoxicated. So far it looks like our turnout isn't going to be very good and that's really disappointing, but I'll throw it out to a couple of my mailing lists and we'll see what happens. Anyway, we've been working hard on figuring out decorations, menus, alcohol, costumes. Very fun and exciting, can't wait to see how it all turns out. I'm throwing the party jointly with Deb and Heidi, so it's bound to be interesting.

We may even all get so crazy that we sing karaoke. I hope not. :-) I got a karaoke machine from my parents for my birthday and just realized that I SUCK!! What a surprise - here I thought I was so good. I suck royally. It's almost been an incentive to stop singing, but since I usually don't abuse anyone else's ears, I suppose it's okay if I keep singing in private haha. Hearing my voice over that microphone I really do sound like a dying whale. Terrible. I embarass myself. haha I'm hoping if I practice more I can keep from sounding so awful that I hurt my own ears.

What else is going on currently? Hmmmm. Well, I'm thinking seriously about my own education. Our first priority right now is to get Emmett into law school, but I've been wondering lately if I might go to school also. We will have to figure out how the grants and financial aid go because obviously we can't both claim that we are 'single parents'. But I think that may not be as much of a benefit for Emmett anyway since he is going to be going to graduate school and I'm still finishing my undergraduate degree. So we have to figure all this out. But assuming that Emmett doesn't get much benefit from being a 'single parent', I could get a LOT of assistance to finish up my degree and, if that's the case, then I definitely need to do that. I feel a little bit guilty about that, since for all intents and purposes I am not a single parent, but I figure that I'm not reaping the benefits of being married (tax break, potential social security benefits, etc.) so I might as well reap the benefits of being single. It may be that all of my tuition, books and supplies would be covered and I may be eligible for subsidized student loans to cover my living expenses in which case I could basically go to school and work a couple of days a week to cover Tommy's day care expenses. We'll have to see, but I am definitely going to start the application process and see what happens. I really hate the idea of putting my education on hold for another four years. I'm trying really hard to be trusting, but I have to admit a part of me is still scared that I will wait 4 years for Emmett to finish law school and, at some point our relationship will falter and I'll be left without my education and a decent job. I'll be 37 years old with no education, no means to give my child the things I want for him. Not to mention that I'll be without my family intact and diminshed hope for having any more children. It would be horrifically depressing to find myself in that situation so I'm going to try like the devil to avoid ending up there.

Well, better run for now - Sesame Street is almost over and that boy has had MORE than enough tv already today (1.5 hours - ug - there is a new schedule on our local PBS station and it's been harder to time his television watching than it used to be because Sesame Street comes on like an hour and a half later than it used to). I've got to reconfigure our time to so that he's not watching so much. He's getting to be a real pain about tv - he throws an absolute fit when I turn it off and that's unacceptable. I'll throw the damn thing in the trash. Of course Emmett is the television watcher in our family so he might have something to say about that. :-)

I'll try to make time to do recap later tonight.

Love,
Melissa








salvation army - momma momma momma and then stop - musn't always respond to that

leap frog visit

Our Week

Time just seems to get away from me these days...part of the problem is that my work schedule feels like it's been more intense lately, I don't know, maybe it's just that the job is taking more out of me these days.

I haven't recapped the events in our lives in a while, some of it will just be lost to time, and I'll begin with last Sunday. Saturday was pretty much wiped out because I had to come home from work and watch Tommy until Emmett got home from taking the LSAT and then I had to get some sleep before going to work Saturday night. At least the weekend at work wasn't too bad, that helps considerably.

Sunday I was off, well at least I got off work at 8am and didn't have to be back until 6pm on Monday. I came home and hung out with the boys for a while and then we decided to go to the park for a while before I went down for my nap. We went over to Candlestick Park which is pretty cool, just across from the stadium and right on the bay. We walked around and let Thomas run around and explore, it was fun. Alex climbed down and went for a swim in the water, which seemed to make him very happy. We also brought Alex's toy football that he's had since the lake house and he enjoyed chasing that around, too. It was a great time. Some of my favorite times are those moments when the weather is right and I'm there with my favorite boys and everything just seems right. I felt happy and at peace. I came home and laid down for a few hours and then we got up and ordered food for delivery (too lazy to cook) - a chicken caesar salad for me and cannelloni for Emmett. Yummy.

My diet is going okay I guess. I don't know if I mentioned I'm doing the South Beach diet, or some bastardized version of it. I feel like such a sell out counting carbs like everyone else when I don't even agree with that. Oh, well. I guess I'm getting a little desperate these days to find SOMETHING that works, I'm so tired of being fat! I'm sticking to it pretty well - I did discover I was overdoing it on the peanut butter (not measuring it) and thwarting myself. I also have been slipping on the caffeine. I just LOVE to have a cup of coffee in the morning. Strangely enough, for me, it turns out that I miss that more than bread, pasta, potatoes or rice. I never would have believed that! Anyway, we'll see how it goes. I've been doing it for 9 days and I've lost 3.5 pounds. Not very much, but better than nothing. Only 49.5 pounds to go. Ugh. I can't even think about that right now, it's too depressing. One good thing is that my diet seems to be expanding Thomas's diet a little bit, too. He absolutely loves eggs now, so I've been cooking eggs for both of us in the mornings. Also, I bought him some carrot juice and he really loves that too, so at least he is getting a little bit more veggies, even if they are in liquid form.

Monday morning I finally had a chance to catch up with Ulrich, my friend who bought the farm (literally, not figuratively!) in Panama and has been living and working there in between jaunts to South American and Germany for the last 2 years or so. He sounds like he's doing well overall, his work is going well and he loves the farm in Panama and also his travels in South America. It's funny - we talked for about 2 hours on the phone and I don't think I heard any of his travel stories. We talked a lot about politics, the upcoming election, etc. etc. I am thinking seriously of taking Tommy to visit his farm sometime next spring. I think it would be a great opportunity for both Tommy and I, as well as very relaxing and fun. Something to look forward to.

I went to work Monday at 6pm, Emmett and I passed each other in the doorway, and worked until 2am. There are things that I love about this shift and things that are not so great about the shift. With three in a row Emmett and I were really missing each other by Thursday night. I woke up late on Tuesday, at like 10am, and was surprised to hear Tommy's voice downstairs. I listened for a minute and then I heard Emmett's voice too. Didn't know why he was home, but didn't look a gift horse in the mouth. I rolled over and went back to sleep until 11:30am, which was good since I hadn't gotten to bed until 3:30am and I was going back to work again that night. I got up and Emmett told me he was sick and had taken the day off work. I felt bad that he was sick, but it was sure nice to have him home during the day. We spent some time outside on the deck, relaxing. There were two funny incidents that happened out there. The first one was Thomas's interpretation of "daddy water", which I cannot explain here, but was pretty funny. The second was crazy. That boy is just so amazing to me. Thomas had set up a tupperware dish upside down on the railing of the deck. On top of this he had placed his little elephant jungle animal. Well, just below the railing is some shrubbery, so I suggested to Emmett that he should go and get the elephant before it disappears in that shrubbery never to be seen again. So Emmett went over and got the bowl and the elephant and set them on the bench at the other end of the deck. Thomas went over, grabbed both items, put them right back exactly the way they had been and then looked over and gave Emmett the dirtiest look. It was absolutely hysterical. We both just cracked up. That child definitely has a mind of his own.

I made some chicken for dinner and then split out for work at 6pm. Hate work, but no use lamenting that for now.

On Wednesday Thomas and I went and checked out a new daycare center. It's one that's open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, so I'm thinking of using it for occasional care when Emmett wants to go out in the evening or else we want to go out on a date, whatever the case may be where we need daycare but Olga is not available. It was definitely a nice enough place, the neighborhood is reasonable, right near where Emmett's sister used to live before she moved 2 weeks ago. The other kids seemed great, very sweet and nice, and of varying ages. There didn't seem to be any infants there. The place itself was kind of small and that impression wasn't helped by the fact that they had it a bit torn up for some remodeling this week. The woman who runs the place seemed very nice, very softspoken and gentle, but not without backbone. I liked her well enough and certainly felt Thomas would be safe with her. I wasn't completely sold on her or the place from the standpoint that I'm not sure I would want to have her watching him all the time - I prefer the space at Olgas and also the structure that they provide. This place didn't seem to have as much structured activity. Still, the advantage of the 24/7 availability cannot be overlooked, so I'm filling out the contract and will bring it back to her tomorrow. Did I mention that the place is just a little more than half what Olga charges? That also is hard to ignore. Again, I wouldn't substitute for Olga, I think she's worth every cent, but I am planning to leave Thomas there next Thursday evening for a trial run so that I can have dinner privately with Emmett on his birthday - time for romance!!! ;-)

He did take to the daycare lady (her name is Marika, I think she is filipino) right away. He kept calling her, "Mom", like he was getting confused. We don't look anything alike, but we both had ponytails in our hair, so maybe that was why. In any case, he really did seem to like her. Also, he seemed to like the other kids. When he leaves Olga's he has gotten into the habit of saying, "bye, friends," when he leaves. It's soooo cute, it kills me. Well, he said that on Weds. to the kids there as we were leaving and everyone just about died. It was adorable. "Bye friends," he said and waved goodbye as we walked out the door. Emmett thinks he's going to be a politician. :-)

After the daycare visit we ran some errands and then came home. I made roast beef for dinner, which had been marinating for two days and was incredibly delicious and tender, if a bit overcooked for my taste. I ended up being late to work because Emmett's bus didn't come and he had to take another bus and I had to go and pick him up at the bus stop. It was a bit of a cluster you-know-what and I was completely frazzled by the time I got to work. I just cannot afford to be late to work at this point.

I got to go home from work early on Wednesday night which was very cool. I was home and in bed by 1:30am. Emmett took Thomas to Olga's in the morning, since that was his only day this week of daycare and I ended up sleeping until 1:30pm. I woke up and I knew it was late, but I was really shocked when I saw the clock and realized HOW late. I must be fighting off a virus or something because I can't remember the last time I slept 12 hours. It's been YEARS, I think. Or at least since the last time we went and visited my Mom, haha.

I spent my day off (with Thomas in daycare) messing around on the computer, reading my book, and listening to music. It was kind of nice having a whole day off to myself. Pretty self indulgent and I'm happy that I didn't use it to do anything productive, like clean this pig sty house of mine. :-) But everyone deserves a day off every now and then. The boys got home and I was so looking forward to having an evening with them after having to go to work the previous three days all evening long. We all had dinner together - spaghetti with leftover potroast and marinara sauce, sounds weird but was yummy! And then time for Thomas to go to bed. Emmett and I sat around reading our books - he's reading Fast Food Nation and I'm reading The Dirt (autobiography of Motley Crue) before heading off to bed early for some 'cuddle time'. I had a hard time sleeping. I kept dreaming that I told someone I used to row in high school and so they put me on crew and I was afraid that I was going to be found out. Except that the racing wasn't on water, it was actually tobaggoning down a mountain in the snow with this little tiny oars to push you along at strategic times. Very weird.

Anyway, that pretty much catches us up to today. I better go see if that boy is up from his nap yet.

Love,
Melissa

Tommy update

Sometimes I get busy documenting the day to day stuff and don't do enough 'Tommy Updates' to give a snapshot of some of the things he is doing these days. Here's a few cute ones from the last couple of weeks.

He started saying, "I'm sorry". Well, more accurately, he is now at a point where he repeats whatever you say to him and I told him while we were visiting Calvin and Ann, Emmett's Dad and step-mom, that he should go and tell Emmett he was sorry after he misbehaved. He walked over and said, "I'm sorry". Oh wow it was so cute and heartbreaking....ughh. I've always been something of a cheeseball, but having a child really takes that over the edge. :-)

Thomas is also saying more sentences. His favorite is still "Where did [insert whatever item or person here] go?" or when you ask him where something is he'll say, "I don't know". The thing that is so cute is the inflection in his voice when he says these things. It's so cute, difficult to describe, accurate, but slightly exxagerated the way that kids do. Darling. Lately he has been putting together more sentences, a lot of which I have a hard time understanding. Still, he primarily is still communicating with one or two words to get his point across, but doing a darn good job of that, I must say. His vocabulary expands every day, it's so amazing to watch. He is now at the point where he repeats everything and wants to learn the word for everything and it seems that once you tell him, he remembers and it becomes part of his lexicon. So it just increases and increases every day. Almost mind-boggling.

We are also starting work on potty training. Emmett's Mom bought us all this stuff - she didn't like the potty I had bought, so she bought a different potty and some underwear, training pants a cover so that when he has an accident it doesn't make a huge mess and these maxi-pad like things to soak up some of the accidents. Still, it is very difficult and I think Thomas is close to being ready but not quite there yet. He is starting to have an awareness that there is something in his diaper that should not be, particularly in the morning. He will wake up in the morning and when I get to his room he will be standing in his crib and will say, "Poopy!" and then reach behind himself and say "diaper". It's a step in the right direction. But last Sunday night Emmett had him running around with no diaper on and then brought him upstairs where I was napping and we were playing on the bed and all of a sudden, without warning, I smelled it. Sure enough, there was poop all over the baby, all over his shirt and all over our bed. Gross!!! We got it cleaned up very quickly, but I felt discouraged that he just let it rip without even so much as changing his facial expression. So who knows? I guess we just keep trying to get the point across, but that made me feel like we're a long way from actually having him trained.

One of the other funny things that he's been doing is that he learned from his Dad and I that when he wants to go somewhere and we're not going there he will say, "c'mon". When we still don't go he will continue this louder and louder. Neither one of us go it at first, what he was saying, and when we realized that he was saying, "c'mon, c'mon", we laughed so hard.

He really likes to go for walks and has now gotten to a point where he is not so interested in going in his stroller for the whole time. He will say at some point, "I walk". And so I'll let him get down and walk but it is definitely an exercise in patience because he is distracted by looking at everything and it takes about 10 minutes to walk 1 block. Please don't misunderstand. I LOVE that he wants to explore everything. But there are times when we have 10-12 blocks to walk home and I really need to keep us on track and it makes me feel frustrated. I don't want to rush him all the time, I want him to learn to enjoy life and stop and smell the roses and all that, but I also don't want to get home at midnight. So it's something of a battle between the practical and the whimsical sides of me. The important thing at the end of the day is to balance the days when I have to rush him with days where we can just wander around the neighborhood and not be in a hurry to go anywhere. I think that these are both of our favorite days. Anyway, one of the techniques that I have devised to keep him moving on the days when we need to be on a schedule is to have him "run like Daddy". Oh, this is the most darling thing of all I think. Early on in Emmett's marathon training before he hurt his knee, Emmett was running with Tommy in the stroller. He ran that half marathon a couple of months ago with Tommy in the stroller the WHOLE time. After Emmett hurt his knee, they couldn't run anymore, but when Emmett would leave to go running in the evenings when he got home from work, Thomas would ask for Daddy, and I would tell him Daddy went running and he would say, "Daddy running". He also would say "Daddy running" anytime he saw Emmett in his running clothes. So Thomas is pretty clear on the whole running thing. So I started telling him when I'm trying to get home quickly and he wants out of his stroller to "Run like Daddy". Oh. My. God. It is the absolute cutest thing to see that little tiny 2 year old boy running as fast as his legs can carry him down the sidewalk, those little legs just pumping and pumping and yelling, "I run like Daddy". He's also my motivator because he then wants me to "run like Daddy" and isn't satisfied until we are both running. Perhaps while he is still young we can be training buddies since we both run at about the same pace haha.

Okay, a few more things and then it's off to rejoin the family. We had a cute experience the other morning. As I think I've mentioned before, Thomas has this collection of little tiny plastic animals that he LOVES. He plays with them so much that inevitably he loses them and at any given time we usually have 5-6 out of 12 of them around. The other morning I found the zebra under his bed and so he was really happy because he loves zebras. He brought it downstairs and while I was getting his breakfast ready, he walked outside onto the back porch. He must have thrown the zebra because by the time I got out there the zebra was gone. We both looked all over for it, but couldn't find it. Tommy asked me, "where did the zebra go?" and I said, "I don't know, Thomas, what did you do with the zebra?", to which he replied, "I don't know". We then proceeded to yell "zebra! zebra! zebra!" over and over and over again and I think we had the above conversation or some variation of it about a dozen times before I had to give up and distract him by giving him his breakfast. I felt really lucky that he allowed me to distract him because he seemed pretty focused on the zebra for a long time. Of course a couple of days later I found the zebra in plain sight lying in some of the groundcover near the patio.

Another fun thing we've been doing is lots of coloring. He is *starting* to get the idea that coloring is only done on the paper, but, just to make sure he gets the point, I have been either putting him in his highchair for coloring or else sitting with him at the table and coloring. Those are the best times of all. He loves to sit in the big people's seat and sit at the table and especially if I sit with him and give him my undivided attention. The other day (errrr, can't remember if I've already covered this or not) I sat with him and we colored and I drew little pictures of things and had him guess what they were. It was so much fun for both of us. I drew Daddy's car, Mommy's car, a duck, a cat, and a few other things and we had so much fun together doing this simple thing. It's going to be so great when he's just a little bit older and we can play with playdough and all kinds of stuff like that.

I also have instituted a new discipline measure. In the beginning we had been using his highchair as his "time out" chair, primarily because we could strap him into it when he needed to have time out. Now that he understands 'time out' I decided that I didn't want him to feel that he was being punished every time he got into his high chair, since that's where he also eats and colors, etc. I don't think that's the right message to send if you can avoid it. In our case we can because that child is eerily placid about accepting time out. I set up a chair in the dining room in the corner that he has to go and sit in when he is being punished. That otherwise rambuctious, crazy kid, will sit in that chair for as long as he's on time out, and NOT MOVE. It's CRAZY. He will just sit there, not squirming, fidgeting or trying to get into trouble, not trying to get down, nothing. Just SIT THERE, until you tell him he can get down. It is bizarre, but makes the whole discipline process SO much easier. I know that it probably won't continue to be this easy, so I'm going to enjoy it while I can and definitely use it to try to impress on him the difference between good and bad behaviors.

Well, better run, almost time for Thomas to get up and for me to get ready for work. Emmett is home sick today so I have his help, sorry that he is sick, but is nice to have him home and have his company on a day when I'm used to being alone with Thomas. It was also nice to get to sleep a full 8 hours after having gotten to bed at 3am (worked till 2am), to have some help this afternoon with Thomas, and also to know that I won't be late to work. That 5:30pm hand off for my 6pm shift is really dicey. The traffic between here and UCSF is just horrendous at that time of day and BARELY make it to work on time. We are going to have to work on that, but I'm sure it will work out.

Love,
Melissa