"That's Not Food!"

Getting the boys to bed is an hour long task, sometimes longer.  First, we start with the bath.  I have been giving Andy and Alex the same bath now that Alex is able to sit up on his own.  Of course, Alex likes to suck the bathwater up through a wash cloth, so doing this in a shared bath becomes doubly disgusting- that's two sets of genitalia floating in the water, two butts, the possibility of two little boys leaking out a little pee, etc.  But, in the interest of just getting the bath over and done with, it's better and faster if they just bathe together and ignore the obvious health hazards involved when the baby decides to ingest as much lukewarm penis water as he possibly can. It's all cute and adorable having the boys together in the same tub, but Andy hates to share the tub toys.  I have tried to explain that the tub toys belong to no one.  That they are to be used by anyone who sits in the tub- be it Andy, Alex, or a traveling band of gypsies that...

The nurse at Alex's pediatrician office didn't know how to spell the word "diarrhea" as she updated Alex's chart.  "How many R's?"  she mused.  "How many H's?"  I found this incredibly suspect considering that, as an alleged pediatric nurse, this has to be a word that she is forced to write down at least six times a day.  I tried to help her out but I think she may have just incorrectly attempted a few spellings before shrugging off the whole thing and just scrawling out "the shits." Breaking news.  This baby's ass is disgusting. Alex has had severe diarrhea from the antibiotics that were given to him after he developed a pus-filled abscess right in his buttcrack.  He's off the antibiotics now and the abscess seems to be shrinking, slowly, but also seems to be regenerating more pus.  The doctor today, on Alex's third follow up visit, finally gave me the number to a pediatric surgeon who may have to remove i...

I'm starting to think this potty training thing is overrated. Andy hasn't peed in his pants in a full week.  He has gained complete control over his bladder and even woke up this morning with a dry diaper after being asleep for TWELVE hours.  Of course now, he wakes up, runs into my room, and urgently states, "Bathroom" immediately upon waking, instead of fooling around in his bedroom for a little bit or just sneaking downstairs to cause a little early morning mayhem.  So, that's fine- I drag myself out of bed and take him to the bathroom.  The other morning, he did his business and then I went and just peed after him, before he had a chance to flush.  It was super early, and I too had a full bladder.  Andy started SOBBING, though. "No Mommy pee pee on Andy pee pee," he bawled, big fat tears rolling out of his eyes.  I haven't seen Andy cry his sad cry in some time, and it was disconcerting, especially since I was barely awake.  I guess he thoug...

Chris and I have this way of encouraging Andy to call things by their incorrect name.  Whenever he refers to something improperly, and it's funny, we just go along with it and kind of egg him on.  For instance, Andy calls his teddy bear his buddy bear.  We heard him asking for his little buddy bear once, and we thought it was so adorable that now we don't have teddy bears in this house, only buddy bears.  We call  pancakes "cancakes."  Lotion is "rub rub," and now Andy's even got me calling Alex "Ollis," which is how Andy has taken to pronouncing it. The biggest thing, though, is crab rangoon.  Whenever we order Chinese food, we order crab rangoon- or, as we now all call it, wicky woons.  The first time Andy tried to pronounce crab rangoon, it came out more like Rob Maldoon, which sounds like a good name for, say, your tax accountant.  Well, Rob Maldoon morphed into Robby Maldoon, and before you know it, Robby Maldoon became wicky woon, and...

Perhaps the problem is that the library does not stock picture books about potty training that are relatable to Andy.  Why, for instance, can't I find a book entitled "Caillou Takes A Dump?"  This is the kind of literature that would fast track Andy right to the potty.  Instead, we're stuck with "Once Upon A Potty," about a self-important mother and her milk toast little boy whose one redeeming quality is that he has a butthole, which he is quick to bend over and show us.  Surprisingly, this does not keep Andy's attention.  I mean, where are the trains in this book?  The buses?  Is this kid Caillou's neighbor?  How am I supposed to make this interesting for Andy? So, we've introduced underwear.  It's getting to be about that time.  Andy will be two and a half in a week, and he has all the signs of readiness, including my favorite, which is "knowing where things go."  Ha.  So far, we're not doing all that great.  I mean, ...