This is Nice, Just Two Brothers...

A couple years ago while I was up to my eyeballs in pregnancy, Carter started saying a certain phrase. It goes like this. "This is nice, just two {fill in the blank with friends, brothers, sisters, etc.}sharing a {fill in the blank with something they are sharing}. It all started when I would run to Utah for my doctor appointments. Sometimes just he and I would go, sometimes we would take Cali, but most of the time we met up with Bethany at Jason's Deli to eat before we headed back.

The first time he said it, he said it to Bethany. "This is nice, just two friends sharing a soda". We've used this Carter-ism consistently since then.

This is nice, just two brothers sharing a date to the swimming pool.

This is nice, just two brothers sharing their Halloween costumes

Changes

Changes around here change from day to day, sometimes hour to hour. Our most recent change came when Caleb decided that he was going to potty train himself. Yes, all by himself...He wants no help from anyone. He would rather be in charge of all bathroom goings on {for everyone}, then have me help him.

It sounds like a fairy tale, right? A 1.95 year old boy potty trains himself. This could be a national headline. However, it's not as great as it sounds. You see, he takes his diaper off at the first sign of any moisture...ANY. Then he discards the diaper, sometimes in the garbage sometimes he tries to flush it and it's contents down the toilet. This is an exhausting process...for me.

When it gets too quiet around here, I know that he's in the bathroom going potty...Or doing something potty related. So, I carpe diem(ed) and bought some underpants and a potty chair and we are going to follow his lead and hope that it leads us to a diaper free two year old. Stay tuned... this is exciting stuff!

Another major milestone for me and for Caleb was the dismantling and passing on of the baby furniture {and all other baby items for that matter} to my adorable pregnant sister. On Saturday she and Tyler came out to pick up their new baby gear. She isn't due until March 10th. but this girl is a super-nester...for real!

I tried to muster up some tears and get really emotional about this phase of my life passing by, but I just couldn't do it. I thought about all the nights I had laid tiny {and not so tiny} babies into this very crib. I tried to explain to Caleb that he was going to be having his last night in a crib. I thought about the day we put it together for the very first time. I thought of all the times we took it down, just to put it up a few years later. No tears. They wouldn't come out, I tried.

Instead, I felt a deep sense of gratitude at the opportunity given to me to have three healthy babies. It has been an adventure like nothing I could have ever imagined. It is special to me that my sister gets to enjoy the same crib we've loved for 8 + years. When I see her lay her tiny baby in his crib I will think of the big kids that used to be that small.

Not Quite...But, Kind Of...

One night Cali and Carter watched a few episodes of a Hoarders marithon with me. Was it totally kid appropriate, probably not. Was it terribly sad, for sure. Did it scare my kids into cleaning their rooms, you better believe it. Not only their own rooms, but other rooms around the house too. It's an anti-Hoarding miracle.

Today as Carter passed Caleb's bedroom on his way to the bathroom he paused--turned his head--and yelled down the hall, "Well, mom, it looks like Caleb's room is a hoard again." The best part of this story is that there were two blankets, three toys, and stack of clean diapers on the floor. This is what Carter calls a hoard.

Do my kids have an interesting percpetion of what a hoard actually is, obviously. Are they vigilant in making sure our house doesn't turn into a "hoard", oh yeah. Are they scarred for life, most likely. But at least they will be scarred in a house that they cleaned, right?

Disclaimer: I have never won a parent of the year award and do not endorse 90% of my parenting methods.

There He Goes

Carter's been working on learning how to ride a bike for a couple of months. And by "working" I mean staring at his bike in the garage. He's been riding a scooter with ease for years, and preferred being able to jump on the scooter and zip around instead of learning how to ride a bike. He got a cool new bike right after school started as a reward for doing his chores all summer. He wasn't that interested until he saw...A neighbor kid a whole year younger take off and ride like a pro. It was the inspiration he needed to jump on that bike.

He told me that he would try it three times, and if he didn't get it on the third try he was going to stop. Lucky for him, and for me, he got it on the second try. We're still working on the art of stopping, and he hasn't seemed to notice speeding cars yet, so we have some more work to do.

I Throw My Hands Up in the Air Sometimes

Especially when I shatter {by whole minutes!} my previous best 5K time at one of my favorite places in the world.

Thanks to my sister Bethany for the action shot here. I really really wanted to get that girl in the gray shirt just about to cross the finish line. I was hot on her tail for most of the race, passed her a few times, and almost got her at the end. The feeling must have been mutual because at the end of the race we felt it necessary to hug. Don't know why...Never met...But we pushed the guts out of each other that day.

Of course, Swoop was there to greet all of the race finishers. Funny story, when we were in college at the U Christian was playing basketball with the guy who was {at the time} Swoop. During some sort scramble for the ball Christian's elbow ended up on Swoop's head {no, he wasn't in his mascot suit at the time...I thought the same thing}, and Swoop {I'm sure he had a real name} bit down on his tongue nigh unto biting it off. From then on {and to this day} we call Swoop, Thwoop. Because that's how you'd say it if you had a problem with your tongue. Go ahead try it... {if you haven't already!}

More Than Once...That's For Sure

How many times have you and your sister appeared together in the same shirt? Well, for me and my sister, the answer is...more than once. It's not as awkward now that we live 200+ miles away from each other, but when we worked together it happened, well...more than once.

I guess we must have impeccable taste. That, or we have similar taste and can patiently wait for the $36.00 shirt to hit the clearance rack for $8.00. I'm just glad I'm NOT the pregnant one in this wardrobe match.