March

Another random, out-of-order post about an entire month! March is such a weird month. It's not really spring yet but also not winter.  We did some fun stuff in March, now that I look back through all the pictures. 

I found this picture from a couple of years ago when I was uploading the pics for this post....

Look at those babies! Aw. And just a few days ago we took them to the zoo together, now all big 3 year olds (with the addition of Kyra and Addison, and missing Bryce!)

We went to the zoo with a few friends. So fun! We have a family zoo pass but we have only used it once since like October. So it was fun to go again, and the weather happened to be perfect!

We tagged along with Lindy and her kids to the YMCA one day to swim. It was so fun, it had been a long time since Ashlyn went swimming. She of course didn't get her face wet or anything phenomenal like that, but did go down the little slide a few times! It gives me hope for swimming lessons this summer.

She had  a fun time walking around with a "Box Head" one day.

Pretty girl with a cute new dress.. and Daddy's shoes of course!

Ashlyn finally got a trike! She still (a month later) hasn't really caught on to actually pedaling along.... but she does like to scoot around on it. Anyways it's fun to get out in the front and play in the warm afternoons. She loves it.

Figured out a new type of hair bow to make, had some fun with it!

Lucy.... this is a picture from a day she got in trouble! She was banished to the backyard because she ate my whole Subway sandwich while I was helping Ashlyn go potty! oooh I was FURIOUS. The one lunch out I got like all month. I may have beat her if Ashlyn wasn't right there watching. :) She just got banished outside. And I scavenged for something else to eat. Double boo.

 A trip to Cost Plus World Market..... the worst place to take a kid! I only do when there's something I absolutely need. Like designer soda or hot sauce for Collin, ha ha. Anyway, she insisted I take a picture of her sitting in every chair we walked by on this particular trip. They're all eyes-closed smiles just like this one so I figured one was enough to share!

Had to use up the last of our Jamba groupons! I absolutely love when Jamba does deals like that, we go like once a week. Love that place, STILL. :)

Here we have the eyes closed smile. It's either this or a grimace while saying "cheese" that I get when I tell her to say cheese for a picture lately. Maybe we will practice saying cheese in front of a mirror?!

Playing with the sticks in the gutter.... she brought one in that day and when I wasn't looking flushed it down the toilet! agh! She still asks me about where the stick went like every time she's in the bathroom. That was like 3 weeks ago. I hope she will remember that flushed things don't come back next time she's considering doing that!

Enjoying a movie while snuggling with her special blanket. She finally will sit or lay during movies for part of it! Not constantly wandering around like the previous 3 years of her life.

And on to some hair pictures.... I think I have already posted all these on other social media outlets, so sorry they're not new to anyone who reads this! But lately I've done a few hairstyles we hadn't done for a long time (or ever) and it's so fun to see how different they are with her hair being so much longer! 

This is her hair "banded"-- it has terrycloth pony-o's about every half-inch down each ponytail. This stretches it out so that when it dries it looks like this:

A big fro! I had never really picked out a big fro for her hair before, at least not in a couple of years! It was so awesome to comb it all out and see how big it can really get! We did this for church, then it really stayed in pig tails most of the week because we didn't even go anywhere and I do not care to spend an hour each day combing that hair out. I still spent like 15-20 minutes combing it each day to keep it from getting insanely tangled. It was fun though! She is a lot more aware of her hairstyles these days, which is so fun. She kept commenting on how "soft" and "big" it was. We called it her "big pretty hair" and she liked that a lot!

Another style I haven't done in like a year...and it looked so cute! This one lasted us 3 weeks. 

The biggest thing that consumed most of our month was.... Potty Training. (gulp)

This was one of the first days! Love that cute bum in undies.

Thoughts about potty training: (for those wanting the details....which is probably no one ;) )
(I guess my point in sharing this is that I would always have a little jealous rage when someone would just randomly post " (insert kid's name) is totally potty trained!" like it was no big deal. Because I felt like I had no clue what to do and that it is a big deal! Thus I will take you through our journey. Scroll on if you don't care!)
I was not gung-ho about potty training! I have heard so many horror stories from friends and people who it went terrible for. I was in no hurry to bring that upon myself. All those posts about cleaning up poop and pee and the terrible public places accidents happened... who wants to deal with that?! What I think is most annoying about ever talking about potty training with other parents who have done it is that everyone says "wait until they're ready." (everyone says that but my parents, that is. They were constantly bugging me about potty training her from age 2.5 on!). I would think to myself, well that's easy for you to say but really, when do you know they're ready? I would ask people this. They would say things like, "when they hide to poop." or "when they start waking up with dry diapers." or "when they ask to sit on the potty." or "when they want to be clean." Well, that is a lot of different things. Some of those, my kid has been doing since she turned 2. But some, she was like the furthest from doing and I didn't see it magically changing overnight. For example, she has been hiding while she poops forever but she pees sooooo much during the night it has been an issue for us for years. We use the strongest diapers and have plastic mattress covers and everything. So, pretty opposite. Basically I felt like all that "wait till they're ready" stuff was crap that only people who have actually ever potty trained a kid could understand!

The biggest motivation I had for getting Ashlyn potty trained were 3 things--1. It was the hugest fight every time we needed to change her diaper. She just did not want to stop whatever she was doing. (she struggles with transitions like that in all areas anyway) So I was excited to end that!  2. The whole peeing like crazy every night. I have had enough of changing sheets 2-3 times a week and running out of clean pajamas all the time.  And 3. not having to buy diapers anymore!! duh!!
We tried a few things here and there starting about 4 months ago. I bought a little potty seat that fits on the toilet. Even has Sesame Street guys on it. But well, she is terrified of that thing. She would cry and scream if I ever tried to get her to sit on it. But she wouldn't sit on the toilet without the little seat either. Boo. There's $10 wasted! So at the end of December we bought a little potty chair, much to my chagrin. (not enthused about cleaning pee and poop out of it every time!) We got it at Target and didn't even know when we bought it but it plays a little song and says "YAY!" every time pee or poop goes into it. That turned out to be a huge help!! But anyway, the very night we bought it, we opened it up and let Ashlyn sit on it. She peed on it right then! I was over the moon. Wahoo! I thought she would be potty trained within a few days! Welp, didn't happen. We tried underwear the next day and by 10am she had peed in undies twice and also pooped in them, one right after another. Forget this! At that point I decided to put it all away for a while.

I ended up deciding to wait until the end of wrestling season to try again. I realized there was no way we could be consistent with it with her having babysitters 2-3 days a week. That was fine! (besides the constant comments from-ahem-my mom and dad!) My plan was to try it again a couple weeks after wrestling ended, once things had kind of gotten back into a routine. Well, just the week after it ended, she asked to go on the little potty like 3 times in a day, and actually did it. So Collin and I looked at each other and thought, well let's try it a little! The next day she kept her underwear dry almost all day! And even went into the bathroom on her own and pooped in the potty! what! I was amazed. That for sure told me SHE WAS READY! (ha ha)

So from then on potty training began and went on. Ashlyn and I were hermits for a week, luckily it was a good time we didn't have much going on and could just hang out at home and work on getting the potty thing down. I learned after the first week that I needed to lower my expectations in some ways. Some days she'd keep her underwear dry all day, and some days I changed it many times. At first when those accidents would happen I was so frustrated! I would second guess if we were trying this too soon. But then I would think about how well she was really doing with it over all and realize that, just like every other milestone she has hit, she is one who does well and catches on, but takes a while to really get used to it. So once I was ok with the fact that it would be a little longer-term we have been happy. She would get one m&m every time she peed in the potty, and two every time she pooped in it.

So now, about 3 1/2 weeks out from when we really began, I would say she's pretty solidly potty-trained as far as peeing goes. I still put her in a pull-up when she goes to a friend's house or the daycare at the gym, because I don't know what she'll do with someone else watching her. But she has kept her pull-up dry almost every time we've done that, which is awesome. Then there is the pooping thing..... she doesn't quite have the hang of that yet. But with all her constipation issues pooping has been an issue around here for a long time anyway! She is like 50/50 pooping in undies or the potty! ugh. Usually we can tell when she's about to poop and we'll herd her in and she'll do it on the potty. But so far she hasn't been actually telling us and doing it on her own. But I understand that's not super uncommon, so I will put up with it! She still has a pull-up or diaper during nap and bedtime too. The naptime one is usually dry when she gets up, but I haven't taken that plunge yet! And then the most recent development in the past week or so is that she has figured out that she can get up from bedtime and naptime if she "needs to go potty." ugh. Driving us crazy. It's like having a baby again who wakes us up when they're supposed to be sleeping! ha ha. But I'm glad she's getting the hang of it, and glad it so far hasn't been the terrible nightmare I was planning on it to be!  (whew, that story ended up being insanely long. And so boring. Sorry people.)

And besides, who doesn't absolutely love a cute little bum in undies?? Here are a few pictures of just that, for everyone's viewing pleasure!

"all the single ladies!"

This was a day I realized: I have reached that point in motherhood where I let my kid play outside in the cold in water with no coat, no shoes, and not even pants...... 

SPRING BREAK!

Spring break was about 14 days long for us! Collin left the Wednesday before it actually started for a 5-day trip with some of his brothers to Oklahoma City to watch the NCAA Wrestling Championships. He had a great time being the ultimate wrestling fanboy. ha. I decided kind of at the last minute that I didn't want to just stay home alone the whole time he was gone, so we made a trip to Idaho Falls. My buddy Linday's hubby was in China for 10 days at that same time and so jokingly I suggested she load up her kids and bring them along (she has family in Rexburg)--well she really decided to do it and we had a fun road trip!

Ashlyn and her buddy Addison--they were friends for like 20 minutes of the trip and then started fighting like siblings! ha ha! We also had Addison's baby brother Joey and both our dogs along too--full car! It was so fun though!

We had a lot of fun visiting in IF. We were just there for about 2 days, but it was fun to hang out. We went to Chick fil A with Grandma, I got to run on the greenbelt and work out at the infamous Apple Athletic Club my mom finally got a membership to, I went to the temple with my mom, got to visit with my cousin Sheena I haven't seen in forever, and went to visit Great Grandma at her rehab center. Busy but fun!

We got home late Saturday night, and Collin wasn't due home until the next day. That meant I was up late getting essentials unpacked, preparing a YW lesson, and a solo for church the next morning! We somehow made it to church on time (purely through the bribery of smarties), and my solo went ok. Definitely won't agree to do one for 9:00am church with my husband gone again though! Stressful!! 

Anyway, so Collin got home Sunday afternoon, and then Monday afternoon I packed up and headed out on my OWN trip, to Ogden! It was weird driving away from our house all by myself, with no kid or dog, and thinking I wouldn't be back for 4 days. But also fun! I went to visit Tara who had little baby Lauren about 3 weeks before. I cleaned for her and cooked dinners and breakfasts and got to spend time shopping and chatting and snuggling with Lauren. Oh and watching like 20 episodes of 30 Rock, always a good time. :) I also headed to Kaysville to visit with Lyssa for a few hours one night, which was great!  It was so fun. And now you get to see lots of pictures of Lauren.

I made this just for Tara. 

Getting back home from my trip was rough..... going from being on my own for a few days back into mom-mode was hard for some reason, I think I was just tired. Collin and I argued like the whole rest of the day after I got home. boo. I think we both were tired from the busy past week and both feeling under-appreciated, even though we both really appreciated everything we had done for each other during the busy time! If that makes sense. But then it was fun to have the weekend together before school got back in. We had a date night to Shiige's for sushi---ahhhh! So so good and it has been way too long since we had been there, it's one of our favorite places. Then I went to the women's broadcast with my buddies and afterwards we celebrated both Jacqui and Lindy's birthdays at Bardenay in Eagle, and of course ended with what is becoming our traditional Target trip, ha ha! How did I get so lucky to have such good friends here? I love these ladies. They are our "family" away from our family and have helped us out through thick and thin. We are very blessed to know them and their families! (ok end "roommate love" type mushiness, ha ha!)

Stay tuned for all the fun that will be happening in April! And congrats if you actually read all that!!