Roll up to the Splash Pad 10 am...

Anyone else singing "It's a Dad's Life?" That's a favorite song in our house and I can't help but sing it every time I hear the words "splash pad."

The kids and I tried out a splash pad near our house with some new friends that we met through Kid's Kamp. It was a hit, and even I had fun. It was one of the few days we've been outside that I've actually felt cool. I think we'll definitely be making another visit there before the summer is over.

Poop Issues

I would apologize for writing so much about poop lately, but it's just such a big issue right now, that I don't think I will.

Huston pooped in the potty (the normal one - not the little potty) for the very first time on Saturday, July 23rd. Write that on your calendars, people. I might just celebrate that day every year. It could be bigger than Halloween. Probably just under Thanksgiving, but for sure bigger than Valentine's Day.

This poop occurred after a week of holding it in. I really don't think he had gone the entire week. Scary, I know. He had multiple incidents of little poopy smears in his underwear that were driving me crazy and on Saturday at a birthday party he let a little poop come out in the kiddie pool. These are the things they don't tell you about when you sign up for motherhood. That one day you will have to scoop your 3 year old out of a pool at a crowded party while he's screaming "Some poop came out! Some poop came out!" and leave your one year old in the hands of someone else while you rush him to your nice hostesses' bathroom and scrub his swimsuit out in her sink and try to rejoin the party as if everything were perfectly fine.

I was so fed up with all the poop that was coming out at inconvenient and inappropriate times and places, that I put Huston on the potty when we got home and told him to sit on it until the poop came out. I may or may not have been mildly upset and yelling in the car about how he was going to poop on the potty, which caused Arden to happily repeat "No, No! Poop! Potty!" and other words that I was saying in all seriousness, but that on her tongue sounded hilarious.

So he sat. And sat and sat. Think two hours or more. He screamed and cried at first, wanted me to join him in the bathroom, said no poop was coming out, etc., etc., etc. I was feeling incredibly defeated. Eventually I just told him I had to take a break and I walked out of the bathroom. Literally 30 seconds later, he yelled, "Mommy, the poop came out!" I didn't know whether or not to believe it, but I ran to the bathroom, and sure enough, there was poop in the potty!

And not just any poop. A big, loooooooong poop. Clarke said it looked like it came out of an NFL linebacker. I guess that's what you get when you hold your poop in for a week. As I was giving Huston his bath that night, he was talking about how great it was that he pooped in the potty.

And then he said, "It kind of looked like a beanstalk."

And it kind of did.

Red River

We just got back from a weeklong vacation with Clarke's parents and grandparents in Red River, New Mexico. The cool temperatures were so refreshing and we made some great memories! Here's a rundown of our trip:

Saturday (July 9th): We were on the road by 6:30 am. Huston got excited before we even got on the highway, yelling "Look, a new gas station!" as we passed a very familiar, not at all new gas station. About 1.3 minutes into the drive, he said, "This is taking a long time," and I thought, "We have more than 11 hours left. This might have been a bad idea." Huston, however, ended up doing great on the drive. After we got back he told us that he liked the long long long ride to New Mexico, and indeed, he did seem to enjoy just looking out the window. He never really played with any toys, but on the way up he held his new bubble machine (seen below) for almost the whole trip and kept saying, "I can't wait to get to New Mexico so we can play with my bubble machine." Arden was mostly awful on the drive. Nothing kept her entertained for more than 30 seconds, so there was lots of screaming and unhappiness. It was a relief to finally make it, and much joy and giggling ensued when we arrived to find Mimi and Grandpa and Granny and Papaw, and when the bubble machine was finally opened.

Sunday (July 10th): Relaxing day around Red River. Huston immediately became fascinated with the ski lift and he loved watching it go up, watching the wheels move, talking about why it was stopped, talking about what time it turned on and off. He figured out that he could see it perfectly from our bedroom window, and spent the rest of his nap times just staring at it. We kept telling him we were going to go on it and he seemed scared and didn't want to, but his fascination got the best of him and at the end of the day Sunday he finally announced that Bear Bear wanted to go on the ski lift, which was the plan for the following day. We had lunch in Red River at a not-very-good place called the Old Tymer's Cafe, walked around to a few shops, and I went with Clarke to a park nearby to play a few holes of disc golf. Unfortunately, he couldn't play most of the course, or the course at the top of the ski lift, because the mountains were closed due to extreme fire danger. There's a random picture below of Arden with her shoes off. She kept saying "rocks, rocks" and "dirt, dirt" and wanting to play in the random piles of dirt and rocks. She stripped her own shoes off so she could really experience it.

Monday (July 11th): We rode the ski lift in Red River! It was all going so great. Huston was being brave and holding on to Bear Bear. Arden was not squirming too much, which was good because I was terribly afraid of her falling. The weather looked beautiful and we were having a really good time. Then, as we approached the top of the mountain, the freezing rain hit. And I don't mean freezing as in cold (though it was), I mean actual frozen pieces of hail. We were stuck on the lift for a few long minutes, as our children screamed and cried and as we got good and drenched and there was nothing we could do about it. It was a relief to make it to the top, where we got out and had lunch at the restaurant at the top while we semi-dried out. After lunch, Arden pooped and I hadn't brought any diapers (not having anticipated these events), so I cleaned her up and put her pants on with no diaper. I told her, "Arden, don't pee," and she said, "K." The next thing I knew, I was picking her up to go back down the lift, and she had peed all over her pants. It was quite an adventurous morning to say the least. In the evening we took the kids back to the same park where Clarke had played disc golf so they could play on the playground. There were tons of adorable chipmunks running around, which Arden started calling "munk chips."


Tuesday (July 12th): Clarke and Truitt and I went on a white-water rafting excursion. I begged not to go, but Clarke really wanted me to, and I'm glad I did. For some reason, I was really fearful about it, but it turned out to be fun. No pictures of this event yet (though I might buy some).

Wednesday (July 13th): All-family excursion to see the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge and then to have lunch and go shopping in Taos. Arden was not that impressed with the bridge or gorge, but Huston seemed to like the view as he said, "I've never seen this before."

Thursday (July 14th): Date day! Clarke's dad went on another rafting trip, and we left the kids with Melinda and Granny and Papaw and headed off to Angel Fire, where Clarke had discovered there was a disc golf course that was actually open. We rode the ski lift up (so much more enjoyable without worrying about holding onto your small children) and I had fun following Clarke around while he played. It was just gorgeous. It ended up raining on us most of the time, but it wasn't too bad until the end. He had to give it up around hole 16 and we had to take a bus down the mountain because we didn't want to wait for it to stop raining. We had lunch in Taos and a delicious triple chocolate pie for dessert, found a cool toy story called Swirl where we spent a long time, and saw a movie (Horrible Bosses) before we headed back. Such a fun day!

Friday (July 15th): We ended up going back to Angel Fire to play the same disc golf course, this time with Truitt and Melinda tagging along. Huston got a bit exhausted from all the walking, but Arden loved touching and examining every tree and rock and flower we stumbled across. She is such a nature lover! As we were finishing the course, Melinda got a call from Granny saying that we were being kicked out of our condo, even though we had expected to stay until Saturday. Silly me somehow didn't make the right reservations or forgot what day we were supposed to leave or something, so we had to drive back to Red River, pack up the condo in a huge rush, and get out of there. I felt absolutely terrible! We ended up eating lunch around 2:30 and not leaving town until after 3. The kids took a nap, which was nice, but we were trying to make it to Abilene before we stopped and Arden wasn't having it. Just outside of Abilene she screamed so hard and worked herself up into such a fit that she threw up all over herself. We had to stop and clean her up and then we stopped at McDonald's for dinner at 9:30. Praise the Lord that after all that mess, both kids slept the rest of the way home. We didn't end up getting back until 3:30 in the morning!

One of my favorite parts of this trip was the good family time. Huston loved waking up and having breakfast with Granny and Papaw. Arden loved playing with some beads and jars that Melinda brought and reading books with Granny. Clarke and I loved playing "fishbowl" with his parents and grandparents. It was just good, quality, slow time together. When Huston woke up at home the Saturday morning after our trip, he started crying and saying that he wanted to go back to Red River. He keeps talking about going back there someday and playing with "the three remotes - the one from my room, and the one from Mimi's room, and the one downstairs." Apparently our remotes just can't compete with Red River's.

We interrupt this program...

I was going to do a post with our fourth of July pictures, but didn't have time to go through them, so decided to post this important info instead: Huston pooped on the potty today! And Arden pooped on the party for the first time, too! Yes, I am still trying to get Huston to poop on the potty after all this time, and no, I'm not trying to train Arden. She just wants to be like Huston and seems to just naturally know what to do on the potty. Praise the Lord for that! Last night she peed on it for the first time, and she followed that up with a pee and a poop today. No fuss, no crying, no exhortations or pleading, or threatening, or begging, or encouraging, or screaming. Whereas Huston required all of the aforementioned in addition to fiber gummies, a suppository (yes, indeed) and HOURS and HOURS of sitting on the potty. I was so exhausted by the time he did it that I cried. And let it be known that I would have given in around hour 2 of this fiasco today, if it hadn't been for my mom's help. I'm convinced Huston would have kept holding it in just to spite me, but Grandma was the one with him at the end and coached him to success! We'll see if today's success will be repeated...

Huston had a hilarious conversation with Clarke at bedtime tonight. They were talking about the things God made, and when Clarke said, "And God made you!" Huston replied, "And you! And Mommy and Arden. It must have taken God a long time to make all the people." Then came this random question:

Huston: "How many people are there?"

Clarke: "Well, about 6 billion."

Huston: "Six?"

Clarke: "6 billion."

Huston: "Why are there 6 people?"

Clarke: "6 billion."

Huston: "6 blelillion?"

He is awesome.

Swim Lessons Week 1

This brave boy just finished his first week of swim lessons. I could not have hoped for a better reaction from him, and am so proud of the way he's tried his best and battled through his fear this week. Here's a run down of the first four lessons:

Day 1: Huston let me put his swim suit on him and spray him with sunscreen without a fuss. He didntt cry at all, but in the car ride on the way to his lessons I hear him taking big, deep, loud breaths in the backseat, as he tries to calm his nerves. It just made my heart melt hearing him try to be brave. In a completely answered prayer, he got a sweet, young teacher named Miss Madeline who is perfect for him. I dropped him off (you're only allowed to watch the last five minutes of the lesson) and when I came back to observe I could see that she was pouring water over his head while he made a fishy face to practice holding his breath. You could tell he didn't like it, but he wasn't freaking out. It was absolutely amazing to me considering that he cries and screams if a drop of water so much as approaches his face during bath time. Miss Madeline said he was really fearful of the water, but that he was obedient and did everything she asked him to do. Hooray!

Day 2: Huston was calm on the way to his lesson and let me drop him off just fine. When I came back for the last five minutes and watched from around the corner, I could hear him crying "I want my mommy! I want my mommy!" and I thought for sure he was just done for the day and wasn't going to cooperate anymore. But then Miss Madeline held him and talked to him quietly, and the next thing I knew, he was putting his face in the water again, just like she asked. I was so incredibly proud of him for obeying her even though he was scared! I got to see him float on his back while she supported his head and practice his kicking a little, too. When I picked him up, he told me, "I told Miss Madeline I love her and she said she loves me too." I think the process of having to trust her with one of his biggest fears has made him really bond with her. That, and the fact that he just really likes sweet, pretty, young teachers! He wore his goggles during his lessons for the first time, and I was talking to him about how great it was that goggles keep water out of our eyes, and he said, "Yeah...but it still gets in my mouth!" Guess he's still working on holding his breath!

Day 3: Huston threw quite the fit about swimming lessons in the morning (I think he was confused and thought he was going to see Mimi and Grandpa in the morning and not have swim lessons, and when I explained that swim lessons were in the morning and he was going to see Mimi and Grandpa at night, he went to pieces). After he quit screaming, we prayed together and talked about how God wants us to tell him when we're scared and that it's okay to be scared and how God will always take care of us. His lip was quivering when I dropped him off, but he took Miss Madeline's hand and away they went. The last five minutes I saw him make "rocket hands" (hands clasped together over head) and then Miss Madeline would grab his hands while he kept his head in the water and kicked for five seconds. She said she had to hold his head down the first few times to get him to keep it in the water, but then he started doing it by himself. It seemed like such amazing progress for a boy who was so scared of getting even a drop of water on his face!

Day 4: He did great again! This time he made his rocket hands, kept his face in the water and kicked, but Miss Madeline didn't hold on to him at all - he just kicked all by himself. You could tell he was pretty freaked out to not be holding on to anything, because he could hardly remember to kick, but I was still so proud. He also practice floating on his back without Miss Madeline holding his head, and even though he didn't like it, he did it! She said he did really good, and I just couldn't be any prouder of him. It has truly been amazing to see him overcoming his fears and battling through in obedience and determination.

Here's a random picture of little sister, clutching flowers she collected while we waited for Huston to finish his swim lessons the first day.

And here's Huston, sporting the ouchie he got from wearing his swim goggles around the house on Monday, and then falling and having them cut into his skin. Poor guy!