Kids Love Dogs

When we took the plunge to buy a puppy 3 and half years ago, I gave into the peer pressure of Kris saying, "Oh, look how cute she is! Kyson would love her!"  I regretted getting Fran at first because puppies are a lot of work and we already had a baby.  Kyson and Fran are about 11 months apart.

Then a few years later, I once again gave into the peer pressure, but this time it was from the puppy dog eyes of a little dachshund.  Those big eyes were irresistible and once again we had a puppy with a baby.  Leroy and Kodi are about 6 months apart.  Like Fran, I regretted the torture I agreed to, but accepted the consequence of my choices.

Here we are years later with 2 kids and 2 dogs and they love to play together.  I'll admit that sometimes the kids get a little rough with the dogs and the dogs get annoyed by the kids, but I could never take the dogs away from those kids now.  They've formed a bond that can only be formed between kids and dogs.  I guess that in a sense, I have 4 children and there is no need to add to it.

 

The Big Guns!

About a month ago, I was using the restroom when Kodi walked in and practically pushed me off the toilet.  So I hurried and let her use it. She actually went to the bathroom.  We had done nothing as far as potty training was concerned and she figured it out on her own.  The next morning, she went on the toilet again, without me prompting her or anything.  At that point, I figured I'd better buy some pull-ups and get going on this, because I wasn't going to pass up a willing participant.

And that's where the going potty in the toilet ended.  For the last month, we've been taking her to the toilet and she has not gone once...until this week.  I decided at this point, it's time to pull out the big guns.

I bought her Rapunzel underwear and she LOVES it.  My hope is that she'll not want to hurt Rapunzel by peeing on her.  She wants to wear the underwear and she get so excited about wearing it, but she's still not peeing in the toilet.  I guess we're not going to get lucky after all.

Another Use for Scotch Tape

Kyson is a very helpful little boy.  He hates messes and always cleans things up, even if it's not his.  Earlier, I had heard him in the laundry room with his tape dispenser.  I didn't know what he was doing, but I wasn't concerned.  In fact, I didn't think twice about it.  Turns out that during his cleaning rounds, he noticed that part of the rug in the laundry room was curling up because the backing was coming off.  He used his tape to tape down the rug so it wouldn't look messy.  I told him I liked it so much I was going to take a picture - and I did. 

I Thought it was a Good Idea

Because I had President's Day off, I thought it would be fun to do something extra fun for Family Night.  I would have more time so I thought we could have a nice dinner and do a fun activity that would take more time than I normally have.  I decided to make sugar cookies and decorate them.  What kid doesn't love to be creative with food?

That afternoon I made the cookies and had them ready for the evening.  I also thought it would be fun to make some letter cookies and spell some words with them.  I still believe in theory it's a great idea, but my children rarely fit into the best case scenario.  When we got started with Family Night, Kodi turned on the two-year-old tantrum and I banished her to the couch.  I didn't want her spoiling our fun (even though it is "family" night).

Kyson, Kris and I went to the table where I showed Kyson pictures of things and he had to spell them.  I only did: Kyson, Kodi, Jesus, and temple.  he did pretty well, but then he started sneezing and coughing all over them.  Because he seemed to be coming down with something, decorating cookies was completely out of the question - eh'd contaminate all of them.  We made a change of plans.  I decorated all the cookies and Kyson decided it would be fun to give some to all of our neighbors.  So we made up 5 plates of cookies and delivered them to all of our friends on the street.  One house wasn't home and Kyson was thoroughly disappointed.  So while my original idea of cookie decorating didn't work out, I think something better came from it when a 4-year-old enjoyed sharing cookies with friends.

My Kids are Adorable

I know every mother is biased in regard to her children.  According to a mother, HER child is the cutest thing on this planet.  I'm no different.  While my children can be terrors: Kyson has a touch of oppositional defiance and Kodi has full-blown terrible twos, I can't help but look at them with unconditional love - even when I want to kill them.  I thought I'd share a few pictures of that remind me of how adorable my kids can be.

Kyson is a Very Important Person

Every student at Kyson's school has the opportunity to be spotlighted for one week.  Recently Kyson was the VIP.  Last year, he refused to wear the crown or anything like that.  This year, he's blossomed so much that not only did he wear his crown, but Kris didn't have to do hardly anything at the school.  Kyson explained his poster and told the class everything about him.  Apparently, Kris just stood there.  he did a little explaining afterwords, because Kyson spoke very quickly and called his cousins his friends, but Kris said, "Boy that was the easiest VIP EVER!"  Last year he was so nervous for it.  I'm so glad that Kyson has come so far in only a year.

Four Going on Sixteen

The other day, Kyson wanted to go to Grandma and Grandpa Tinsch's house, but we had no plans to go over there.  He told me that he was going to go by himself.  So I asked him if he was going to drive over there and he replied, "Yes!"  I teased him for a minute about how he could drive to Grandma and Grandpa's if he wanted.  Well a little later, it turned out that we needed to go over there, so when I told Kyson, he got really excited and said,"I get to drive!"  I went a long with it and when we got to the car, he opened the driver's side door ready to drive to Grandma and Grandpa's house.  When I told him I was teasing him and he couldn't really drive until he was 16, he got really mad.  He continually told me, "I'm really mad at you Mom," and he said it was such passion.  As we were driving there, I asked him if he'd call and tell them we were coming.  My dad answered the phone and Kyson bumped the speakerphone button so I heard everything.  Kyson told my dad that we were almost to his house, so my dad asked, "Are you driving?" meaning, "Are you in the car on your way here?"  Kyson took it literal and got mad saying, "No, Mom is driving!"  Even after the phone call he was upset, but then felt better when he created the idea that on his birthday he gets to drive.  Hopefully he'll forget all about it by the time April comes around.

Happy Birthday Handsome

Kris just celebrated his 35th birthday, and has officially joined the ranks of the "mid-thirties."  I'm not far from it, but boy it sounds awful.  Kyson and I decided we'd surprise him with a little party.  Kris's birthday was on a Wednesday this year, but he has a class on Wednesdays, so we decided to do a little party for Family Night on Monday.  Saturday, I took the kids to the dollar store and had them each pick out a couple of things for Kris.  Kodi got him air fresheners for his car and Kyson got him some fuel injector cleaner.  When I was leaving for the store, Kyson told me he didn't want to go.  I then explained we need to go get Daddy a surprise for his birthday.  Kyson told me immediately that Daddy wants cars and we should go get him cars.  I told Kyson it was a surprise and we shouldn't say anything, and he agrees.  So as we walked out the door he told Kris we were going to get him cars.  I ran out the door.

For Kris's party, we bought a giant cookie and I put 35 candles on it.  It was awesome - it looked like it was going to blow up.  Kyson kept getting near it and I thought he'd catch his hair on fire.  It took a couple of breaths to get all of the candles out, but what do you expect from a 35-year-old.  We had balloons and I hid a $20 bill in one of the balloons, so when Kris found it, he had to pop it to get it.  It was a fun evening.  I love the excitement of little kids - it's really contagious.

Personalized Bedrooms

For Christmas, each of the kids got a new comforter and a poster for their bedrooms.  It took a little time to find poster frames and get them up, but officially, their rooms are what they want.  Kodi loves Rapunzel.  She watches Tangled quite often and gets excited whenever she sees Rapunzel in the store.  Kyson is a huge Transformers fan.  He watches the old cartoons as well as the movies.  He only likes the first Transformers movie though, because he thinks the others are too scary.  

Both were pretty excited when they saw the bed- spreads go on on and the pictures go up.  It's amazing how a little decorating makes a room feel so much homier.