Blog | 2011
I think it is safe to say that Jason got a pretty awesome Father’s Day present today when Brianna finished her potty training sticker sheet and earned the coveted Mack! Here she is putting the last sticker on her potty training sticker sheet:
The completed sticker sheet!
The highly coveted Mack!
Daddy & B figuring out how to put McQueen in the back of Mack.
She is growing up so fast!
This past weekend Brianna had an extra special weekend visiting Thomas the Train with her best buddy Hawke. I assure you, Thomas came in a distant second to spending the day with Hawke! Can you tell they were excited to have finally arrived??
The day was jam-packed with fun new experiences. Brianna played her first amusement park game (some kind of ball toss) – and won! She also rode on her first ride without us – a kiddie airplane ride where Hawke was the pilot.
Way up high!
That was fun!
She also got to drive some cars (Daddy operated the pedals) – sorry, but those pics didn’t turn out very well. Of course, life just is not the same without riding the merry-go-round!
At the end of the day, we got to ride the train being pulled by Thomas!
Thomas sure is loud…
The kids didn’t quite understand why we didn’t go home after that, but they were pretty excited to see each other first thing the next morning. While we all got ready, they played all kinds of games, including Uno.
After breakfast we took them to a local park to play and toss the ball around.
Getting ready to throw…
She likes to put her whole body into it…
Hawke is an excellent jumper!
We had an excellent weekend – so much so that Brianna was quite distressed to see it end. Until next time!
We have tried off and on for about a year to potty train B. She is not interested. At all. We tried every trick we could think of, and every trick everyone else told us about. NOT INTERESTED! So, we did what we always do when we are faced with a question we can’t answer. We did some research. Apparently, our little angel was engaged in a power struggle with us. As several sources pointed out, this is not and never will be a power struggle we can win. Only she has control over her body.
So, with that in mind, we set our sites for Memorial Day weekend and set up the following plan/rules: She has to wear underwear when awake (diapers only used for sleeping and pool time). She is responsible for her pee and poop. If she needs to go, she is to stop what she is doing and go. If we are out and about, she is to ask and we will take her to the potty. If she has an accident (akkident in B speak), she has to clean it up and change her clothes. We will not remind her. We do not go in and sit with her or otherwise keep her company. We will only help as needed. She gets one M&M for pee, two for poop, and if she stays clean and dry all day she gets to add a sticker to her prize chart:
As you can see, there are four prizes on the prize chart: Guido, Luigi, Doc, and the creme-de-la-creme: Mack! The first day (Saturday) she did o.k., but not great. I had visions of having to do a load of underwear everyday just so she would have clean underwear. But the next day (Sunday), she did GREAT! She had one accident, but we did not fault her for that because I was in her bathroom, she did not really know what to do, and she held in the poop until I got out. In our book, that was my bad and not hers. So, Sunday night she earned her first sticker and prize!
Adding the sticker to her prize chart:
Showing off her prize (Guido):
Since then, she has done GREAT. She has already earned Luigi, and if she stays clean and dry today and tomorrow, she will earn Doc by tomorrow night (Wednesday)! In case you are wondering, that means she has only had accidents on 3 of the last 9 days, and on each of those days she only had one accident. Even better, all accidents have been of the wet variety!
We are hopeful this means this power struggle is now over. I know…there will be more… 
It is HOT out there. So, rather than deal with all that heat, we decided to head to B’s favorite museum for some fun. I think she spent more than 30 minutes playing in the kitchen section – mostly making smoothies and cutting up fruit and veggies.
Then at least another 30 minutes was spent playing with the giant leggos. Here she is with her “house.”
But the vast majority of time was spent in the pizza parlor – just call her Chef B!
Tossing her pizza crust way up high…
Putting her pizza in the oven…
All done!
This past week Brianna participated in a linguistics study regarding comprehension of passives in 3-5 year old kids. This study will help Halley (a co-worker’s fiancee) get her masters degree in linguistics. Brianna’s part involved listening to a series of short stories with pictures (not surprisingly, the stories had lots of passives in them). After each story, Halley would ask Rex the puppet to tell something he remembers from the story. After Rex answered, it was Brianna’s job to say whether Rex was correct or not by giving him the small blue sucker if he was wrong and the big red sucker if he was right. Her comprehension of passives is measured based on whether or not she correctly assessed the accuracy of Rex’s sentence.
B checking out Rex (Mommy – he has big teeth!):
ROAR!!!
Ooops! Rex – you got that one wrong…
Brianna did GREAT! As you might expect with a study involving 3-5 year olds, the older kids tend to do better than the younger kids. Brianna, however, got most of them correct, which is pretty remarkable for a 3 year old (so I am told). Yeah, well, we all know she is pretty remarkable!
There was so much going on Easter weekend, that we did not get to make the suckers Uncle Matt and Aunt Carrie gave Brianna. BUT, that just meant we had them available on a rainy afternoon! The sucker part was pre-made, so Brianna just had to decorate them – I think she did great!
Her suckers (one for each of us per her instructions):
The proud artist:
B and I took advantage of some cool, cloudy weather (with rain a possibility any minute) to have the entire strawberry patch to ourselves and pick tons of strawberries, literally without having to move much.
YUM!
Most people say Brianna looks like me. Even strangers on the street will comment on it. You be the judge.
Here is a picture of me when I am roughly two and a half (give or take a few months) wearing my strawberry dress.
And here is a picture we took of Brianna today wearing the same strawberry dress.
The last of our visitors left when Mimi flew away in “the BIG airplane” (as B put it) this past week. We had a wonderful visit with everyone! Here are a couple more pictures from the last days of Mimi’s visit. First, it was a little crazy around Easter, so we made our Easter cookies a week after the fact. Still fun, still yummy, and oh so much more relaxing!
B also has been having a lot of fun with our new iPad – currently, Miss Spider’s bedtime story is her favorite, but she also likes playing the game Jason got her.
When we set off for the airport, B was not in a particularly agreeable mood. She did not want to take Mimi to the airport – in her mind if we didn’t take her, Mimi would not leave. In the end, however, she cooperated and even had a little fun.
So much Easter fun – what is a girl to do? Why, hang out with friends, and grab as many eggs as she can of course! We started our Easter weekend fun on Maundy Thursday with an Easter Egg hunt at her school.
The Loot – round 1
On Good Friday, we gave her one of her Easter baskets – an Esther Price basket from Great Grandma! It had a stuffed bunny, froggy sunglasses, and lots of yummy chocolate (of course). Yummy!
On Holy Saturday, we went to an Easter Egg hunt in our neighborhood with her buddy Hawke.
Before the kids descended…
On the go!
Showing Hawke her loot.
That afternoon, she decorated Easter eggs (and we discovered she LOVES the white part of hard boiled eggs).
She declared these two were her favorite…
On Easter Sunday, Brianna opened the rest of her Easter baskets
and made chocolates with Mimi
After nap, it was time to go to Hawke’s house for Easter dinner (the two of them were SOOOOO excited!).
We planned an Easter egg hunt, and that was fun,
but not nearly as fun (apparently) as jumping on the trampoline.
It was a fantastic weekend!
