Tinkle, tinkle, little star...

How's potty training going, you may ask?
0630 hours. Vasco trods over to our room. "I'm hungry. I want Bumble Bee Cheerios" (Honey Nut Cheerios: there is a bee on the box!) Bumble Bee Cheerios are consumed.
"Let's play with the clown!"
"Sure, honey, but we have to put on your big boy underwear first!"
0712 hours. New Spiderman underwear on. Mommy's level of enthusiasm: 100%. Vasco's level of enthusiasm: 100%.
0742 hours. Clown has been discarded, and we are playing with bubbles.
"Vasco, do you need to go potty?"
"No...."
0748 hours. "Vasco, let's go sit on the potty". Level of enthusiasm down to 91 percent, but no fight. No tinkle either..
0812 hours. Queen Justine wakes up. Now there are two. Time for Justine's nebulizer and an episode of the "Little Einsteins". Still no tinkle from Vasco, so I sit him on the wooden chair.
0831 hours. Einsteins complete their mission. I take Vasco to the potty yet again. "Moooooommyyyyy, I want to try laaaaaaaaaaater". Level of enthusiasm down to 81 percent and falling.
0832 hours. We have pee! In puddle, on living room floor! Justine perks up, "Mommy, Vasco peed on himself? On underwear? Vasco peed on the floor?" And, against all rational thought, I put her in underwear too...

It is now 2106 hours. Kids are asleep. Tally for the day:
Number of successful potty trips: 4 total (2 pees each)
Number of potty trips with no result: 184 or so
Number of potty trips where either parent races to the nearest bathroom with either child hoisted up on top of shoulder: 5 (all between 6:15pm and 6:38 pm, aka, while attempting to eat dinner outside)

Oh, no, wait, a real time update!
2108 hours. Vasco's up. He pooped. In his diaper.

So, if someone can do the math and tell me how many pairs of underwear and shorts I should bring in to daycare tomorrow, I would be most grateful. In the meantime, Mike and I are going to go eat obscene amounts of chocolate (me) and ice-cream (Mike), and finish off the bottle of wine from last night.

Can you sign a lease with a picture of a lolipop?

No, seriously, can you sign a lease with a lolipop-like squiggle? Because if you can, I think Justine may be looking to move out! She picked up this Real Estate free magazine as we were leaving the diner after dinner tonight, and was leafing through it rather carefully as we were walking to the car.

Mike asked if she would consider getting a two-bedroom so we could stay with her every now and then. I think she'll consider it... How is that for having a ... what would that be... a reverse deja vu?

"Daddy, I put corn up my nose!"

Vasco was so proud of himself. I was, well..I had no idea what to do. The tweezers were no where to be found and the corn was seemingly drifting upward, so I called Aunt Sue, who calmly asked if Vasco could blow it out. Indeed, he did...for a split second the tiny piece of corn turned into a rocket, which shot across the table to the humor of both kids. Although I explained to Vasco that he shouldn't put corn up his nose, I think the only lesson learned was to serve corn only on the cob!

Flying Solo

Well, Ivanna is off to Chile for three days (for work). She'll be returning Saturday morning. In the meantime, Vasco and Justine have been told to take it easy on me. So far, so good. They helped make dinner (sort of), played nicely after dinner, didn't complain about taking a bath, and even went to bed relatively easy. And no, I didn't have bribe them with ice cream, cookies, or candy...wait, are chocolate chip pancakes for dinner considered a bribe?

Signed,
Super Dad

Future Soccer Champs and Big Kid Beds

We were at a birthday party for one of the kids in Vasco and Justine's daycare, where we went on a nature hike through a path in Rock Creek Park. In other words, picture 15 almost 3-year olds careening downhill in a rather uncontrolled manner, with 15-25 huffing parents trotting behind them, rather fruitlessly yelling "Stop there. Stop now. Stop: this is your last warning!" until a few parents with good shoes and some degree of fitness succeeded in catching up with the wild pack of kids and more or less establishing leadership of the situation. After the hike, thirsty and hungry parents and wild kids were treated to a barbeque and cake. Being an entirely international cast of characters, a soccer match inevitably happened: here are some of the really cool pictures.

The next piece of news is more of a culmination of a 7 week effort to turn the current guest bedroom into the new kids bedroom, complete with "big kid" beds. Mike and I have been priming, painting, putting beds together and hanging shades for..well..7 weeks, and we made the final push today when we moved the carpet, dresser and shelves into the "new" room while the kids took their nap today. The good news: the room turned out really cute and we think the kids like it. The bad news: the guardrails that we got to keep the kids from rolling out don't fit: we'll have to pad the floor with pillows and keep our fingers crossed all night. They did start out bedtime with a mutiny, during which they laid down on the floor, but eventually I found them back in their beds. Amazingly, they didn't try to escape the room (with the door wide open!) and are now sleeping like little angels :)