on the twelfth day of potty training...

So... potty training. For anyone interested in our progress, here is a rundown of things so far:

1. I can sing any and all lyrics to songs from "Elmo's Potty Time". Some of the songs about perseverence, I'm convinced, were written to parents rather than two-year-olds.
2. We have gone through two containers of Clorox wipes, a roll and a half of toilet paper, daily loads of laundry, and 38, 424 toilet flushes. I'm a bit scared to see our water bill this month.
3. Teaching your toddlers to "stand on their heads" (with feet still on the ground) is VERY helpful when wiping little bottoms.
4. From its association with dozens of accidents, I now have PTSD from the word "Uh-oh!" Full-on flashbacks, hypervigilance, irritability, and bad dreams.

In short, potty training hasn't gone exactly as I had planned. (Me and my nice, planned, perfect world--why won't real life cooperate?) To be fair, Lily has done pretty well. A few days ago she had an accident-free day, and today she had only one accident. But then, she loves praise and encouragement (and candy), and hates to do things wrong or get into trouble.

Noah, on the other hand, has decided that right NOW would be a great time to start the terrible twos in full force. Tell him to do something--ANYthing--and he won't. Won't, won't, WON'T!! And he'll have a grand time just staring at you, willing you to make him do it. Applied to peeing in the potty, this translates to... well, accidents. Or purpose-ents, or something. Because the kid KNOWS what it feels like when he has to go, and he just refuses. And you can lead a kid to the potty (and hold him down), but you just can't make him pee.

Anyway, that's enough potty talk for now. I have a couple more tricks up my sleeve and if those don't work... well, I don't know many adults who wear diapers. He'll probably learn eventually. Until then, I'm going to be severely jealous of any parent I see with kids in diapers.

The visit with my parents was fun--true to form, I didn't take very many pictures. At least events this week weren't exactly photogenic anyway.

Grandpa loves grapefruit. The kids were fascinated, until they tried some...

A much bigger hit were the purple-icing-coated cupcakes that my mom brought home one day. They were decorated with Dora the Explorer, and since that particular cartoon creation is the subject of Lily's current frenzied obsession, she thought they would make a nice celebratory dessert. They were also extraordinarily messy.

It would have been nice if they could have pooped purple or something exciting like that, but I was again disappointed.