Growing Up

Now that Annie's three, we've collectively decided it's time to board the Potty Train again. The first full day of this was met with mild enthusiasm by Annie. The problem with mild enthusiasm, is anytime something comes along that warrants more enthusiasm (neighbor kids playing out back, tricycles or butterflies), the potty thing becomes a mere after thought. And something's gonna get peed on. So, we had mild success matched with our mild enthusiasm the first day. The second day was about the same. My carpet only had to be shampooed once, which was nice. Then last night, as I was getting Annie ready for bed, she commented, "No diapers Mom, I'm three now. I'll wear panties to bed now." Crap. We hadn't come up against this one before. I didn't want to discourage any initiative she was taking, and yet, I didn't want a ton of laundry in the morning. In the end, my desire to build her self confidence and independence (and wanting her potty trained one day) won out, and the kid went to be in panties.
And at 5:30 in the morning, she called me into her room, we walked her sleepy self into the bathroom, she peed then went back to bed. Both her and the bed were perfectly dry in the morning! Huzzah! I'm so proud of my little girl.
Although, my Mom so sweetly rained on my parade this morning when she commented, "That's great! You know, you were night trained by two and a half . . . it was a whole 'nother year before you were potty trained during the day." We're just gonna hope that for once my eldest daughter decides to be a little less like her obstinate, independent, difficult child mother, and more like her sweet, mild mannered, docile father who loved to please others and make his parents happy. One can hope, right?
And so far today, the potty training thing is on track, so who knows? Maybe it's starting to take . . .

Yesterday I was out pulling weeds while Ellie was napping, and Annie was riding her tricycle. Annie was watching me, at first with mild then building to intense interest. Finally she asked, "Mommy, what are you doing?" "I'm pulling weeds," I grunted, while ripping out some grass looking thing who's weeds were half way to China. Annie observed for a minute, then asked, "Can I try?"
I told her which ones she could pull, and she happily went to work taking the heads off of various weeds that's roots are laughing evilly because they've lived to see another day. Several times during this, she'd suddenly gush, "Thank you Mommy! Thank you!" Um, sure kid. If you clean your room and make your bed tomorrow, you can help me unload the dish washer!
If only I can find a way to keep this level of interest in weeding in the future . . .

Today we had Annie and Ellie's annual check ups. Both got a clean bill of health.

Annie's asthma medicine is being scaled back a dose (yay!) since her symptoms have pretty much disappeared. Ellie's skin is being watched though, since yesterday when her face touched the grass she broke out in a little red rash all over her forehead and cheeks. That kid has some seriously sensitive skin . . . we try to avoid using wipes, and will rinse them out as much as possible when she has even the little redness or she breaks out into horrific diaper rashes. Discussing the family history of asthma and allergies, the doctor kept shaking her head and muttering, "Oh my . . . oh my." Then she offered, "I'm so sorry." Kinda to be expected though, we did genetically screw our kids over with all the allergy and asthma genes floating around in our family. My sister gets bit by a bug and swells up into something resembling a Klingon, and Greg's sister is allergic to her own sweat. Then add in my asthma and allergies, Greg's excema, both family histories of severe seasonal and food allergies, and our kids didn't really stand a chance of getting through this life without using more than their fair share of tissues and Zyrtec.
Anyway, besides the triple threat of allergies (asthma, excema and allergies) plaguing the kids, everything else went really well. Ellie played Patty Cake with the doctor, and Annie showed off her address and phone number reciting skills (now including an area code!) to the nurse. Ellie was smaller than I'd expected. She's felt heftier lately, even looking chunkier. So I was kinda surprised when she weighed in at only 17 lbs. 1 oz. (3%). She's over 27.5" now though, leaving her in the 10th percentile for height. And in true bobble head fashion, her head is a whopping 83rd percent.
Annie weighed in with a fairly average 31 lbs, putting her in the 58th percentile. Her height is up to the 15th percentile, at just over 35 inches (which we already knew, since 35 inches is what it took to get her on the Matterhorn.) Her weight is falling on the charts a little each time, and her height is gaining (up from 9% just a little while back). The doctor said it looks like she's 'growing into her build,' and will probably reach a good equilibrium in the next few years. She's already growing out of the toddler look so much . . . she still has the baby fat in her face and belly, but I can't believe how much she's thinning out, as she's out there running around like a little person, and not a toddler.
They both got shots, but did really well with them. It was awful holding them down while they got repeatedly poked, but I think we're all already starting to block it out . . .