Toilet Training

A couple weeks ago, I told Riley that she was going to wear underwear instead of diapers from now on, and she said "Okay, Mom". And it was pretty much that simple. She's had a few accidents here and there, but for the most part, it was really easy. Not wanting to be left out, Bowden also likes to tell me when she needs to go, though she's only successful about half of the time. And because she doesn't really talk, when she wants to go, she just grabs her diaper and says "eh, eh". Not really very lady-like. Though Riley isn't so quiet about it either, recently yelling "Where's the bathroom!" in the middle of the grocery store, and (my personal favorite) calling me into the bathroom to tell me that her poop looked like a snowman. Good times.

Here are some recent photos.

Kids in the new wagon

At the Duck Pond

Climbing Trees

At the Splash Park

Let's Try this Again

Okay, for real this time, I'm going to start a blog about our kids. I've kind of gone back and forth about doing it. I tried once with the now defunct rileyriley.com, but got too pregnant and too tired to keep up with it. Plus, I don't want to blab on and on about how wonderful (or not so wonderful) my kids are. But, I also am absolutely horrible about documenting their lives in any way. I'd like to think I'd be a scrapbooker, or a fantastic photographer, or one who keeps locks of hair from the first haircut and similar items in some special box (just found those first locks of Bowden's in the bottom of an old backpack. Sorry, Bowdie.) But the truth is that I am not. You'd know it if you came over and saw zero photos of our kids adorning our walls. So, maybe the blog is a way of documenting something, in some form, so that in 20 years the kids don't completely hate me. Also, better to spend time on this than screwing around on Facebook. So, on to the kiddos...
Summer finds Riley at 3 and Bowden at 17 months. Great ages for them to really start playing together and become great friends. And sometimes great enemies. For the most part they get along quite well. But, oh, the sharing issues. Bowden is tiny and only says a few words. However, her most common phrase is "I WANT THAT". Very loud.

For Riley's third birthday, I took her into Boston for her first ride on the swan boats (and her first ride on the train). She's definitely a suburb girl - she thought all the buildings were castles. She loves to read, can spell and sort of write her name and is psyched to start pre-school in the fall. I recently asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up, and she said "a creature". Dream big, Ry.


Bowden is turning out to be tiny but, as someone recently said, she has a "strong personality". She's loud. She lets you know when she's pissed. But she's also sweet and loves to hug and kiss us. She doesn't say many words yet, but in her limited vocabulary are "poop", "butt" and "yuck". Awesome.
Hopefully I'll keep up with the blog this time. And figure out how to do this better. It is driving me crazy that there are two different fonts in this post but I have no idea how to fix it. More from our corner of the world later...