Potty Training & New Diapers

We have been attempting to potty train Noah for quite some time!  We bought him his first toilet for Christmas when he had just turned a year old.  That was a big mistake because he was teething and the one we bought had a foam seat.  He decided one day to chew on it and bite large pieces off...needless to say, the seat was a bit worthless after that point.  He had been interested in training, but he didn't fully understand the concept at the age of one either.

Noah has always showed that he knows when he is about to go to the bathroom...if he was running around naked he would look down just before he was about to pee!  I actually have a video that is quite hilarious of that happening, but I don't think it would be appropriate for me to share here unless I were to have the appropriate editing tools!  If he was wearing a diaper and was about to poo he would just stop in his tracks, stand still and make silly faces while pushing.  Then once he started talking more he would tell us every time he was dirty, because he would want changed immediately.

You would think with him hating being dirty (he is a bit OCD about this..not just with diapers), that he would want to learn to potty train!  It is the cleanest way to go to the bathroom that I know of!!!  ;-)  So, now we are into our third year with our son and I decided he wasn't going to have it his way anymore.  It was time, he knew when he was going and that was that.  Diapers are quite expensive and I honestly didn't want to pay the price for them anymore!

I took away the diapers, hid them in a closet, and told Noah they were all gone.  He accepted his underwear just fine when he knew there were no diapers at hand.  I would still put a diaper on for nap, bed, and if we were going out for a very long time during the day.  Slowly I took the diaper for outtings away and soon enough he was telling us when he had to go!  Of course he did have his accidents, but Mommy always packed a spare clothes bag so it was no issue and was always told IT IS OKAY TO HAVE ACCIDENTS!  He would get so upset!

About a month ago I bought some cloth diapers (that had been my original intention for Noah, but I didn't have the money upfront for them...).  We invested in two different brands, Bum Genius and Lovely Pockets.  They work differently, but overall are PERFECT!  He LOVES his new diapers and I love not having to buy any more diapers!  Plus it is better for the environment which I am huge on!  We have a total of 21 diapers and have no issues rotating dirty and clean of course because he only wears them twice a day!

Now, the issue that we have run into is that Noah has randomly started to hold his bowel movements until when we put a diaper on him.  This wasn't a previous issue and we are curious to know if it is to get out of sleep time.  Usually if he goes once he has already layed down it is extremely difficult to redo his normal naptime routine again with it actually having him fall asleep.  I am certain this phase will pass, but for now it is what it is!

I am certainly happy that he is potty trained by day!!!  He also has taken a few naps in the car without urinating and one nap in his bed he had a dry diaper as well.  So, possibly we can take away the diaper for naptime soon too!

GOOD JOB NOAH!

It's Been A While

We have had time pass before our eyes and watched our little baby boy grow from a small fetus to a handsome three year old.  He has attitude, tantrums, and makes our house look as if a cyclone hits it on a daily basis.  But the truth is, as every other parent would say, "it's worth it!".

Our son has had a delay in his speech, some would voice their opinion as, "he's autistic", "what's wrong with him," and so forth.  We decided to wait it out and see what happens.  He has never attended a daycare, been with a regular babysitter, or around multiple children every day.  We joined a playgroup a few months back to see if the interaction would help and sure enough it has.  We have since left the playgroup after finding some amazing friends to keep for life. 

Noah now has interaction with his friends, which he enjoys and his speech has come along phenomenally!  Every day that passes there is something that comes out of his little mouth that I have never heard him say before.  When I pulled up to the gas station the other day he said, "mom, you need gas?". I had no idea he knew "gas".

Of course, with the speech coming along he has many more opinions about what he should get.  So, as his parent, I have to work on not giving in to his every plea!  Also along with these verbal changes comes a bubbly happy boy with a funny personality! 

He makes my spouse and I laugh every day!  The other day Daddy wouldn't let Noah take his big truck out to eat...leading to a very disappointed child who wailed for about 15 minutes.  When we got into the car he said, "No pizza!  I can't smile, smile's broken, I'm sad!". Steven and I just looked at each other and tried so hard not to bust out laughing.  (Noah is uber sensitive so we have to be very careful of that!)

Okay folks, I think that is enough for you to read today, but there is plenty more to come!  :-)

~Snowtober~

Earlier in the week it was predicted that we were going to see some flurries over the weekend.  Yesterday, the forecast changed to a winter storm with a chance for 4-6 inches.  Last last night, it updated to 8-10 inches!  I showed Noah before he went to bed that it was snowing and he was thoroughly excited!  He definitely wanted there to be some accumulation.  It had already begun covering the grass by the time I actually was heading to bed late last night. 

 This morning Noah woke up at 6:00 AM, "MOM!  DAD!  SNOOOOOW!!"  He ran for his shoes, "Boot, boot, go outside, snow!"  He was desperate to go outside and play.  We had already accumulated about three inches at this time.  I definitely did not want to go outside when it was still dark, so, I convinced him to lay in bed and watch some Halloween cartoons.  Seven-thirty rolls around and he couldn't wait any longer.  He had been patient with us and allowed us a little more time in bed, but it was far beyond time to go play in the snow...now over four inches accumulation.  It took me forever to find everything because I was most certainly not prepared with his snowsuit and gloves during October!  Unfortunately, I realized his snow suit and jacket are 2T (he wears 3T), but luckily enough it suited him just fine!  He was dressed and ready to go by 8:00 AM!  He was immediately frustrated when he realized it was much harder to "mow" when there was a couple inches of snow on the ground!  But, he managed to content himself with grabbing snow and throwing it at me.  He is much better with snowball fights this year than the last!  Oh my, he got me good!  Right in my face!  He was giggling and playing so hard!

Then we went to the store to pick up some flashlights in the case our power went out.  When you have snow in October the trees are not able to hold up all of that snow!  Soon we realized there were trees everywhere...on houses, cars, in the street!  I guess that is the price you pay when you tick mother nature off with all this lack of conservation our society has grown with.  We had planned on taking Noah to "Halloween on the Square" downtown this morning, but obviously the festival was cancelled!  We were fortunate to hear that they were still hosting the trick-or-treating at the local businesses though!  So we got home and got Noah dressed in some layers and his Halloween costume.  Noah was much more excited to put his costume on this time because he thought we were going to another Halloween party like when he had it on the other day! 

We got downtown and immediately Noah was being complimented on his costume....I mean really, who couldn't compliment my one-eyed monster with orange spots on his belly?  He is adorable!  He was extremely shy and nervous to walk up to strangers, but once he realized they were giving him candy he was fine.  Some of the places he would hide behind me and push me over to the person with the candy; I just laughed.  Aiden was definitely bringing his Husky to town today; he just kept pulling and pulling Steven everywhere!  He also got a lot of compliments for being a beautiful dog.

By 1:15 PM we were done and ready to go home for naps.  I told Noah, "when we get home it is nap time."  He didn't seem to have any issue with the phrase today.  Thank goodness because Mommy and Daddy were exhausted!  He is gratefully napping peacefully right now and I am currently raiding his candy!!  Yummy!

Oh...and it has finally stopped snowing with about 8 inches in our yard.  What a lovely Snowtober it is!

Harrisonburg Playgroup Hosts Noah's First Halloween Party

Hello everyone!  I hope you are enjoying any fall festivities in your own towns!  This week is full of adventures for Noah and he is absolutely loving every minute of it!  Last night we attended our first meeting with the Harrisonburg Playgroup.  We joined about a week ago and it was well worth it!  Steven and I got to meet a ton of great parents in the area while Noah got to meet some new friends.  We even recognized a friend from Kinetic Kids Gym!

We arrived a little skeptical about how the event was going to go and wondering if we would "fit in" with other parents.  Often times we are judged because we had a child at the age of twenty.  Well, the first step into the door all worries were set aside!  The head of the group came directly up to me and knew who I was from seeing a picture beforehand.  Noah was extremely clingy and wouldn't let me put him down.  He got excited when he started to realize there were children with costumes on.  Slowly pointing out, "a bee, dog, horse, a bee..." and so forth.  There were many ages there as well:  infant through four years I believe.  The head coordinator's daughter is just a week or two off from Noah!  

Eventually Noah warmed up and started to interact with the other children.   They went outside and played in the leaves for a bit, running around and throwing them at each other.  Indoors, there was a craft table where they could color pumpkins or ghosts and use foam stickers to decorate!  Noah was immediately attracted and spent most of his time there. While Noah was doing his crafts Steven and I got to talk with some of the other parents and realized how nice it was to talk to people who had children!  We have had such a hard time meeting people in the area since all of our college friends left and it seems this group is the perfect fit for us!

Needless to say, the Halloween party was a blast!  We even won the jar of candy corn to take home....but, of course that led to Noah wanting it for breakfast this morning!  Oh, toddlers!

Cox Farm

When Steven found out his next job interview was at Tysons, we decided to plan to meet up with my family to go to a pumpkin patch.  I didn't know what would be best and on the way to his interview, but I knew that my family was on the way.....

We decided on Cox Farm, about 30 minutes away from where Steven's interview was to take place.  Perfect.  They opened at 10 AM, closed at 6 PM.  We arrived at 10:45 and soon found out that the GPS had taken my sister and mother to the wrong area.  After waiting for the GPS to behave itself...we finally got to enter the farm around 11:30.  While we waited, we walked Noah around letting him chase after some geese!

  Noah was getting very anxious and didn't want to wait to go into the farm.  He could see way too many exciting things and was beyond overwhelmed joy!  Since it was lunch time when we entered, that came first :)  My sister had driven quite a long way to get there and was starving.  

Noah got a hot dog with some french fries with apple juice.  I was really excited that he took to the hot dog with it on a bun, because normally he will only eat a hot dog plain....but after a second bite, I realized he was adorably only eating the hot dog in the middle!  I started busting out laughing and making sure everyone in the family stopped talking just to gawk at how Noah was eating his hot dog!

Shortly after this, a friendly bee decided to stop by our table.  Most children are afraid of bees, but my little man is not.  He thinks bugs are fun and nice creatures...that he can squash!  It landed on the table and Noah didn't think twice!  He took his pointer finger and squished the bee flat!  My mother, Grandma, was in complete awe!  She couldn't believe that Noah just blatantly killed the bee without being scared, flinching, or thinking.  It was funny!  

After we ate, we moved on to fun events.  Noah had done a little bit of walking around with his Uncle Gregory during lunch.  The farm had stuffed animals walking around....and Noah decided to hide in between Uncle Gregory's legs saying, "scared, scared" when the pig walked up to him!  Very cute!  We went down multiple slides and had a blast!  Noah got to see many animals, goats, pigs, cows, chickens and more.  There was a pig probably the size of a cow that was there and Noah called it, "cow pig" because it was so large!  He liked it a lot!  I think he was in shock!  

At 1:30 it was time for Steven to leave for his interview and Jennifer (my sister) to leave to head home for work.  Steven was very nervous about driving into McLean by himself, but I assured him he would be fine and the interview would go great!  

While Steven and Jennifer were gone; the rest of us continued to have fun at the farm.  Noah was begging and crying to go on the hay ride, "tractor, tractor, tractor!"  We waited in line for that, but it was well the worth the short wait!  I think it was about a 12 minute ride and they had all sorts of set ups for you to look at along the way.  

They had interactive parts where you talked to trolls on a bridge and clapped your hands to music through a tunnel!  Noah loved the hay ride so much that he did it a total of three times.  The third time was when Steven had come back and Noah had everything down, he started clapping before everyone else in the tunnel because he knew the music was about to come on!  It was precious!  We also went through the corn maze...which had some places that were a little too scary for Noah, but mostly it was a lot of fun for him to do all of the interactive set ups that they had throughout it!  Shortly after the maze Grandma, Pop, and Uncle Gregory had to leave....so it was just Noah and I waiting for Steven to get back from his interview.  Which didn't take long, I was quite surprised to see he had arrived back with enough time to do the hay ride (the 3rd time for Noah), along with slides and other activities. 

 I hope you realize this is the very short tale of the story, so be grateful this post is only this long!  Enjoy the few photos attached and if you would like to see me more just let me know!  We had a great time at Cox Farm!

Also....Steven's interview went great!  So hopefully something will turn up very soon!  As for now...it is back to chores and such for me!

Update on The Little Guy

It has been a while once again, but I assure you that I will tell you as much as I can!

Noah has his ups and downs with his behavior.  Now, we are having problems with him going outside then running off to our neighbors house.  We have tried explaining to him that this is unacceptable, but he still seems to just go any opportunity he sees.  So, once again we are trying to figure out a way to board up the doors...and now....windows!  I had left the upper portion of Noah's window open about two inches, he decided to climb on top of his toy box (using a stool to get on that) and pull his window open further, then pushed the screen out!  This is some dangerous stuff!  So, Noah's window is to never be opened again unfortunately, no matter how nice the breeze may be!  But...we are working on them and with his communication becoming much better they are slowly subsiding as he understands when something is does is wrong.

Now, for some good behavior!  Noah has been going in his potty every now and then!  It's a start!!!!!  He is pretty nonchalant about it though!  The first few times he got really excited and now he is just like, 'eh, I got this.'  It's actually pretty good.  He always says, "all done" with the sign language to go with it!  Yup, he is pretty awesome.  His speech is been coming along marvelously!  He has reached the point where he attempts to copy everything you ask him to say, unless he is in a mood of course.  My absolute favorite word of his is kangaroo, "Kai-na-noo!"  It is adorable!

Noah is still attending Kinetic Kids Gym with his Kinetic Discovery class.  He has aged out of his "walkers" group into the "runners" one; so, now his classes are on Thursdays instead of Fridays.  Last week they learned about shapes and how to make them with their hands.  I think his favorite is triangle.  He still watches his Baby Einstein movies as well; which he learns a lot of sign language and new words from.  I am really surprised at how long the Baby Einstein's have lasted for him!  I think they are fantastic!  I would much rather have him watching those than some of the brain-damaging shows they have on the television these days.

Also, Noah has been slowly opening up his diet.  We have gotten a few things here and there that he has been willing to try!  It is quite funny when I take Noah to work with me...he always opens the fridge, points at the eggs, and says, "chick-e," which is 'chicken.'  He has learned that eggs come from chickens and now calls eggs chicken!  I laugh every time he does it and I correct him!  Then he says, "yea, egg."  Too cute!

Well, I think that should be enough for the moment and I will give you more soon!  I hope you enjoyed it!

Kids Are Funny

Yesterday we went out to eat at Chili's with one of my best friends, Danielle.  At first Noah didn't want anything to do with sitting in the booth to eat, but after a while he warmed up.  Then...all of a sudden he is standing up and puts his arm around my neck.  Then his other arm comes around the other side and he is just hugging and squeezing me like no tomorrow!  It made me so happy and Steven was even able to snap a quick picture.



Of course after that Noah decided he wanted to be adorable....we were sitting in a back booth near where the servers come in and out of the kitchen.  Well, Noah turns his back to us and has both hands on his cheeks, elbows resting on the back of the booth and just watching them work with a smile.  It was so cute!

Lastly, we were trying to leave and it was raining a decent amount outside.  Noah, who recently got a pool, knows that usually when he is getting wet he has his shirt off...shower, bath, pool time....all have no shirt.  Well, as soon as he feels a drop of rain hit him, he strips his shirt off and starts running in the rain.  All of the strangers were laughing as I tried to explain we don't take our shirt off just to walk in the rain :)  Kids...they sure are funny, aren't they!?

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