Mine mine mine, all mine

We pee pee on the potty...

Ah yes, potty training. I admit, I've thus far, and probably will continue to be, very laissez-faire about this whole milestone.

In a perfect world, Drew's daycare would fully potty train him for me, and I wouldn't have to do anything except cheer. I mean, sheesh, I'm paying them $500 a month. That's not too much to ask, is it?

However, what's ended up happening is that he goes in the potty perfectly at school - no mistakes at all. He even tells his teachers when he needs to go. But when he gets home, all bets are off. He won't tell us when he needs to go, and when we tell him to go, he resists. I think he's decided that going in the potty is a school-only thing.

Yesterday, for example. He's at home after school, wearing his "big-boy" underwear, and since we've been home for an hour, I figure it's time for him to go.

So I say, "Drew, do you need to go potty?"

Silence. He's playing with his Power Rangers action figures, and is much too busy to answer me.

"Drew!" I say, louder. "Let's go to the potty and go pee-pee."

"Mama," says Drew, very patiently. "Just leave me alone."

Fine. Whatever. Guess he doesn't need to go.

Except that, less than two minutes later, I hear the phrase that is dreaded by parents of preschoolers everywhere...

"Uh-oh, Mama. Uh-oh."

Yeah. You guessed it. So, I handed him a paper towel and told him to get busy.

"Mama, I not want to clean that up."

"Yeah? Well, neither do I, which is why I asked you to go in the potty. From now on, bubba, you pee on the floor, you get to clean it up."

There were many long-suffering sighs and much complaining (from both of us), but he finally gave the pool of pee a few token swipes with the towel. Hey, at least he went on the laminate flooring, and not on the rug. (I've said the same thing about my cat several times, too.)

Bye-bye crib

Yet another milestone this weekend for Drew. He spent his first night in his very own big-boy bed.

He would have been in it last weekend, had the incompetents at Simmons sent us the correct nuts and bolts for the bed rails we needed to convert his crib to a full-size bed.

But after much swearing and cursing by his dad, Drew has his bed. In an effort to help him feel empowered (and thus much more likely to go to bed at night without kicking and screaming), we let him pick out his own bedsheets and covers. I was hoping for something really cute, with perhaps a nice, subtle train or car design - something I could easily find some tasteful matching fabric for, out of which could be made curtains and lampshades and the like.

Drew, however...not so much into subtle tastefulness.

No, he went straight for the searingly bright blue and red Spiderman print sheets.

"Piderman!" he cried, exuberantly. "I want piderman for my big-boy bed!"

OK, admittedly, it's tacky, but as Charles says, it's not about me. (even though I have to look at it every day, but never mind...)

The bed, however, is comfortable in the extreme. Drew's first nap on it, yesterday, lasted almost four hours. When I sent Charles up to wake him, this is what happened instead...

I think the bed is a hit, don't you?

The circus!

Unlike last year's trip to the circus, there was no mid-show nap this time around.

There were still a lot of inappropriate comments from my husband about the trapeze artists and female contortionists, but I told him he could go ahead and run off to join the circus because they always needed people to scoop up elephant poop. And you know the elephant poop scoopers aren't getting all the hot girls.

Here we are down on the floor at the pre-show, with friends Kelly and Alex.

Drew especially enjoyed getting to try on the circus costumes.

As you can tell, he was madly in love with himself.

This hunched-over crouch was Drew's idea of sitting down in his seat and acting like a big boy.

Fortunately, the person behind us also had a young boy about Drew's age, who also refused to allow his bottom to touch the seat, so he wasn't blocking anybody's view.

On the other hand, Alex sat rather calmly in his mom's lap pretty much the whole time. I like the "Mom, sheesh, quit huggin me" look on his face here. Boys.

And, of course, it's not a circus until you feed your child big wads of sticky colored sugar at $12 a bag. Next year, we're bringing our own cotton candy, which we can buy at the corner store for a buck.

When asked to tell us about their favorite part of the circus, both boys responded the same...

The elephants! Whenever the elephants left the stage, they both asked repeatedly, "When the 'efelants' coming back?"

The tigers also sparked a bit of interest...until we told them that the elephants weren't coming back because the tigers ate them.

No we didn't. What kind of parents do you think we are? Seriously.

And here we are leaving the circus; both Kelly and I looking very happy that we managed to escape without having to spend $20 on a light-up glowy toy that would break as soon as we got it home. Notice the dazed look on Alex and Drew's faces; sensory overload, you think?

Chip Off the Old Block

MyHeritage: Family tree - Genealogy - Celebrity - Collage - Morph

ugh...vote schmote

So. I can't decide who I should be cheering on for the Republican nomination. And you know, my support is what's gonna make or break someone, so this is obviously crucial.

My answers to the survey on this site say I should be supporting John McCain.

This one says I should support Ron Paul.

And this one says I should be supporting Mitt Romney.

Maybe they're all three the same person! I mean, have we ever seen Romney and Paul in a room together? Hmmm...

UPDATE

I have found my perfect candidate in Sunny Lucas. I especially love her views on...

THE ECONOMY
“Flat tax. Capitalism. No hand-outs...In nature as God made it, the harder you work, the more you have. This is right and good. "

She's my hero. I'm going to go buy bumper stickers right now.

Snow Day!

Yesterday, it was time for South Carolina's annual Day of Snow - a once-a-year phenomenon that shuts down most businesses and sends people scrambling to the stores for milk and bread.

My place of work was actually open, but Drew's school was closed, so alas, I had to take a vacation day to stay home and frolic in the snow with him. It was a sacrifice, truly.

First, we bundled up and headed into the backyard for some general tromping about.

And of course we had to climb up on the "snow fort" - you know, to check for danger, possibly in the form of yeti.

Then we adjourned to the front yard for some snowman construction.

We call him "Gigantor The Strong." Isn't he fearsome?

Drew kept insisting that we needed to find a 'magic hat' to make him come alive.  I had to distract him with chocolate.

Happy Snow Day, everyone!

you may call me Queen Nerd

and a happy new yeaaaaarrr.....

For New Year's Eve, we went with my sisters and their respective significant others to this fantastic little Irish pub called Paddy's. They made the best dirty martini I've ever had, ever. I want to go back there today and have another one.

Is it crazy to drive 100.67 miles for a dirty martini?

Then we adjourned to my parents' house, changed into our PJs and proceeded to play Munchkin while getting silly on champagne.

I liked to chase my champagne with Diet Coke.  Charles preferred to stick to water, while my future brother-in-law Eric preferred to chase his champagne with, well, more champagne. And a Benadryl. The results of which, no doubt, you can imagine for yourself.

Good times!

Tea for Two

A couple of weekends ago, Drew had a playdate with his friend Dakota. These two get along great, in part because of Dakota's even, calm temperament and in part because we've drilled into Drew the idea that when a girl tells you to do something, you by God better jump to it.

OK, I've drilled that into Drew. Not so much from Charles.

At any rate, it's always fun watching these two play together.

This is their "tea party." Yes, that's what they called it. It was actually a blueberry-donut-and-sippy-cup-milk party, but I think they thought "tea party" sounded more elegant.

You'll notice that Drew ended up with the pink cup and Dakota with the blue. These are two kids who are very secure about themselves, yes, indeedy.

Then Drew told me it was time for them to "go to work", and they set off together on the pink humvee.

Until the battery ran out...

at which point Drew exhibited that chivalry is not dead...

Or maybe it is.

Christmas fun at 70 degrees

Because, really, nothing says "Christmas" like record-high temperatures in the mid-70s.

Faced with such depressing weather, we decided to go to the Pickens Christmas parade and then go get our Christmas tree.

The town of Pickens is the closest actual civilization to our house in the middle of nowhere. For such a small town, they had a seriously long Christmas parade.  I was expecting a couple of pickup trucks and a Santa and maybe some cloggers, and we'd be out of there in half an hour. But the parade was actually closer to an hour long, and yes, there were cloggers and pickup trucks, but there were also marching bands and fire trucks and some pretty floats.

Here's Drew with me and Charles. In the first picture, he's waving at the Homecoming Queen. He's a sucker for pretty girls, especially ones who are throwing candy out of a convertible.

Some dancers...you know, dancing.

It's not Christmas in the country without a pink tractor.

Santa on the fire truck. Notice the firemen wearing short sleeves. Yes, it was that warm.

Here we are back at home, where Drew decorated his playroom Christmas tree first. He was very excited to have his own tree. (even though it's somewhat lopsided)

He took his job of decorating very seriously.

All finished!

Then we moved into the living room to put up and decorate the big tree. My dream was to have a fire in the fireplace while we decorated the tree and drank our eggnog and ate Christmas cookies, but yeah...76 degrees outside...so we stuck with the eggnog and cookies sans fire.

Drew found it most interesting to use the Christmas decorations and ornaments as playthings, so we hung all the glass ornaments at the top and all the non-breakable plastic ones at the bottom.

And finally, Charles climbing a ladder and holding Drew while he attempts to place the star on the top of the tree. Who looks like they're having the most fun here?

When we got it all decorated and stood back to admire our handiwork, Drew commented, "Mama. There are no presents under that tree. It needs presents...Now."

Yes, but we're too busy using the "If you aren't good, Santa won't bring you any gifts" threats to keep Drew in line. Hey, we only have three more weeks before that stops working, so you better bet we're milking it for everything we can.