So I was surfing the net, catching some waves when I decided to visit one of my favorite blogs, Rocks in My Dryer. One of the first posts that I came across she was talking about her latest experience to a furniture store. When they were there, her potty-training-in-process child had tinkled on a sofa while they were out furniture shopping. Of course, it was not the sofa that they were thinking about buying, but a more expensive one. Her husband did the honest thing and bought the sofa. I really hope that if I am ever in that situation, I would do the same thing. But having not been there yet, I don’t know. There is that part of me that would just want to throw a pillow over it and leave the store. Quickly. And then, of course, all that I could think of is how when we go bed shopping this weekend, that that is going to be my son. I’m sure of it. And not only will he pee on something, I’m pretty sure that he will make sure that it is the most expensive thing in the store. I might just throw a pillow over it and die. As far as potty training is going around here, we are actually doing pretty good with it. Adin has only taken the baby’s diaper off once since my last post and luckily I caught it before there was any mess. If only I could be that lucky all the time.

Ugh, potty training. Part of me wants to be super lazy and just have my sons in diapers from now until eternity. I know that it sounds a little mean, but hey, give me a break. When we first began this potty training adventure, all was well. I call it an adventure, although at times it is more like a nightmare.

Take the other morning for example. Adin comes up to our bedroom to wake me up. He is naked. I know from this that it is going to be a long day. So I go down to their bedroom and not only is Adin naked, but so is the baby. It's going to be a really long day. Now Adin knows what to do when he has to go to the bathroom, but Arin does not. I'm going to let you all use your imagination as to the state of the crib. I sighed, and grabbed the baby and continued down yet another flight of stairs. When I tried to put clothes on the baby, Adin looks at me and says, "But mommy, Arin wanna pee in the potty!" Ahhhh, I was at a loss for words at first. Then I had to look at my three year old and try and explain to him that the baby does not know how to pee in the potty. I did think that it was kind of sweet though, he wants his baby brother to be like him. But oh, the mess. And of course, it is now a regular thing, if I leave the room, the baby ends up naked. I have even tried to duct taping the babies diaper on him. Seriously. But no, my 3 year old is smarter than that. He immediately figured out how to take the tape off. So now I am clueless as to what to do about Arin and the diaper sitch.

I thought that I might look around the Internet to see if I can find something to help me out. I found many mothers suggesting taping the infants diaper on. (See, it’s not just me.) I was shocked to see people out there actually potty training kids as young as 8 months old. It’s called infant potty training and to me it is just insanity. There a lot of steps to do this. One of the first is to switch to cloth diapers. After you do that, you start just holding your kid over the toilet until they go to the bathroom. When they do eventually go, you make a specific sound or say a specific word. This will help your baby identify what their body is doing. The more I read, the more I learned that this would take a LOT of time. Granted, I am a stay at home mom, but I am also a full time student, wife, housekeeper, teacher, doctor, therapist, you get the point. I barely have time to brush my hair every day, let alone spend a lot of time holding Arin over the toilet waiting for him to pee. “Many families who learn about this method a little late end up potty training two children at once, a baby and a toddler” (Boucke, Laurie). Where in the H-E-double hockey sticks do they get all that extra time?

Adin did do very good today with just big boy underwear on, he only had one accident. But as far as keeping the diaper on the baby? For now, I’m still at a loss. Suggestions would be great… :]

I love to cook, and one of my fondest memories from my childhood is cooking with my family. I remember making cakes and cookies with my Grandma. My favorite part of baking was getting to lick the batter. Since there were four of us kids (me, my two aunts, and my uncle), we split it up. The two oldest ones, (my aunts Kristi and Dolly) got to split licking the bowl, and then us younger ones (myself and my uncle J.D.), each got a beater to lick, which left Grandma with the spoon. I, of course, could not wait to pass this tradition down to my boys. I know that there are a lot of parents out there that do not let their children do this for fear that the kids will get sick because of the raw eggs in it. In fact, one of my good friends and my sister-in-law are like that. But me, nah, that was one of my favorite things, so I wanted to pass it on to my boys. And maybe it is a little reckless of me to do so. My philosophy is that I have been licking cake batter off beaters, spoons and out of bowls for the past 24 years and I’ve never gotten sick, so it’s okay for my kids. Eh, whatever, I eat my steak medium rare too.

Anyways, I decided that even though I have boys, I wanted them in the kitchen with me. I try not to play the gender roll in my house. Yes, my oldest son has a few baby dolls he plays with, and my baby has long curly hair. So I decided to put them in the kitchen early on. My three year old has his own little wooden rolling pin, apron and chef hat. He loves to help do anything in the kitchen that involves helping mommy. His favorite thing is when I make either tortillas or sugar cookies because he gets to sit on the counter with his own ball of dough, rolling it out. It’s kind of funny because his tortillas always come out more round than mine do! Arin likes to help out in the kitchen too. If I am standing at the counter making something, Arin will run into the kitchen saying, “mix, mix” because he wants to stir too. I think that by letting the boys help me out in the kitchen at such a young age will help instill in them a life-long love of cooking. That, and so they will know their way around the kitchen, so one day, they can make mommy dinner! More posts to come on this subject matter later...

"Art helps children grow and develop through creative thinking and feeling." (Spike Dolomite Ward) One of my favorite things to do with my boys is sit down and color with them. It’s great to see how they are moving along with their creative skills and motor skills. If you look at the picture on the right above, you can see that Adin is starting to try and color in the lines. Now I know that he is a long way away from staying in the lines, but it’s still exciting. Just a few months ago, his colorings looked a little more like how Arin’s look now (left above).

Up until a few months ago, I never even thought about doing artwork with my children. Then I was talking to a good friend of mine, who pointed out some wonderful things about art time. She started telling me about how just by letting them color, that is helping to develop the motor skills they will need down the road to write with. Now why didn’t I think of that?! So I thought I’d do a little research and was actually surprised at what all artwork can do for you kids. Spike Dolomite Ward, an artist and children’s art instructor, suggests that it is not necessarily the end product when it comes to art with your children. It is more about the process that they go through while doing the art. It is also a good idea to pick art projects that don’t necessarily have a “right” or “wrong” ending. That way the child doesn’t get discouraged by the end result or feel pressured by the need to have it a certain way. I’ve also tried finger paints with Adin. He has a blast with them, but it was extremely messy. Seeing how it was super messy with him, I don’t think I’m quite ready to try it with the baby. Although we could always finger paint in the bathtub… :)


Ward, Spike Dolomite. "Importance of Art Activities." A Place of Our Own. 2007. 5 Nov 2007 <http://www.aplaceofourown.net/question_detail.php?id=104>.

I just couldn't help but share!

Adin


Arin


The boys and Daddy

I think that one of the most important things we can do for our children is read to them. When parents read to their children at a young age, it helps to instill a life long love of reading. By reading to our young children, we are also helping to improve their little vocabularies and thus working their minds. It is encouraged that we read to our little ones at least fifteen minutes a day. California-bases Shae Homes is sponsoring an initiative to help parents do just that. "Setting aside 15 minutes a day is a very manageable time commitment for any parent or caregiver and the potential impact to our nation's future is phenomenal," (Pisetsky). Most days, we get this done not a problem, but there are a few days here and there that I don’t read to them at all. I’m trying to eliminate those days all together though.

I used to read this animal book to my boys. After each animal, I would ask them what that animal said. Having done this over and over again, the kids learned it. You can imagine my surprise when I walked around the corner into the dining room about a week ago and found Adin reading it to Arin. Adin will turn to an animal, look at it and say, “Pig, what’s a pig say Arin?” “Oink, oink” Arin will reply! Then Adin will tell his brother, “Good job Arin.” It just amazes me that by reading a book to my kids a bunch of time, I have helped my older son become a teacher to his younger brother. And not only that, but Adin is providing positive feedback and congratulations to the baby. Who knew that one could accomplish all that just by reading to your kids?!
Here is the video of Adin “reading” to Arin…

I try to feed my kids healthy foods all the time. But I am going to be honest; there have been a few days here and there that I have fed them something completely off the wall and totally unhealthy. For example, one day a few months ago, my boys had pickles and donut sticks for breakfast. Now I know that this is very unhealthy, but I guess I was just feeling lazy that day. They asked for pickles and donuts, and I caved and said OK. Oops. At first, I didn’t know that there were “brain foods.” I didn’t realize that food had any effect on your brain and how it performed. I was tooling around on the internet the other day and came across a pretty interesting article on the Dr. Phil McGraw website. In regards to brain foods, it talks about how children need a balanced nutritional diet with lots of vitamins and minerals to help their brains function. They did a study in New York and found that if they took out all of the fake stuff (artificial colors and flavors, dyes and additives) out of the kids lunches that their IQ’s went up by 14 points! And that was only lunch! Can you imagine how smart our children would be if we took out almost all of the fake stuff in their diets?! So I think that when I go to the grocery store next time, I’m going to look a little closer at the labels and try to buy more brain foods for my boys. Things like oranges that are high in vitamin C and that will help improve their memory and performance. Eggs are also considered a brain food because they are high in choline which is a memory boosting vitamin; so I think that instead of Pop-Tarts of Froot Loops, maybe we will start having eggs for breakfast! I guess that means no more pickles and donut stick mornings….

So didn’t start out that well. I woke up feeing like crap. I wanted to give them pickles and donut sticks for breakfast so bad this morning. But then I remember that I learned the importance of brain foods. Instead those pickles and donut sticks which are high in crap, I decided to go with something a little better for them like whole grain oatmeal. I knew that the whole grains would give them the carbohydrates are needed for sharp mental performance. After breakfast, I really wanted to just let them go watch a movie while I laid down on the couch and moped, but I didn’t. I thought that it was ‘school’ time. I remembered an idea that I had come across somewhere out there in lala land. I decided to start from the beginning of the alphabet with the letter A. I made a construction paper cut out of a capital A and taped it up on the wall. Immediately, my three year old son Adin yells at me, “A, Mommy, it a letter A!” After hearing that, Arin looks up and says, “A, A.” I knew that we were off to a good start then. Then we went around and found all the things that we could that began with A. Of course, Arin didn’t really understand, but that is one of the reasons that I include him in things like this, he has to learn sometime, and sooner is better than later. Adin on the other was a little confused, but he had a great time. What I did was tell them that something like apple begins with the letter A, then have them go find me an apple. When they brought it back to me, I would then, of course, tell them what a great job they did, and then ask them what letter apple started with. Adin would respond with, “A Mommy!” and Arin would chirp in with, “A? A!” After seeing how much fun they had, I am really glad that I didn’t just lay on the couch today and wallow in my yuckiness.

So I thought that I would touch on why it is so important that parents begin to educate their children early. According to the Ohio Department of Education, “The years from birth through preschool set the foundation for much of what children will learn in kindergarten, the first and second grade and beyond.” If you think about it, the majority of little things that your little ones learn before preschool are things that they will continue to use throughout their lives. We teach our kids to tie their shoes, clothe themselves, teach them their colors, teach them how to share, how to be polite, and a ton of other things when they are young. I know that I still use all of theses things in my day-to-day lives. Another thing that I think is super important to teach our children when they are very young is manners. It amazes me that my 18-month old son had better manners than some adults out there! My baby Arin knows that when I hand him something, he says “thank you,” if he wants something, he says “please,” and if someone says thank you to him, he says “your welcome.” When you build a foundation of good manners early in life, it carries with them forever. I think that is one of the most important things you can do for your children, teach them manners at a young age. Even if a parent does not think that it is necessary to begin education early on in the child’s life, I feel that it is a must for the parents to teach the child/children manners.

So I went looking around and I found a few sites that help me out both in parenting in general and will help with the development of this blog.

1. Dooce - This is just an overall good blog site. She has some hilarious things to say on her aspect of parenting and life.
2. Notes From the Trenches - Fighting the war on tantrums since 1994- that title says it all. This one is a well-rounded blog from all the aspects of her life, not just her children.
3. Rocks in My Dryer - She has a combination of scripture, good links, and stories on there, I love the variation.

Hey there everyone out in la-la land. To begin with, let me tell everyone a little about myself. My name is Jordan and I am a 23 year old NOVA student. I am an Army brat who was born in Ft. Leonard Wood, Missouri to two very dedicated soldiers. I was raised in central Illinois and am huge Illinois sports fan with the exception of the Chicago White Sox’s. I am a Cubbies fan through and through! I married a Marine in March of 2003 and we have two little ones, Adin (who will be three in December), and Arin (who is 18 months). I am a full-time student/mom/wife. Due to the fact that I am home with my little ones all day, I thought I would make my blog about how important it that education starts at home. Because I am in an online parents club with children all born in December of 2004, I know that there are many different views on how early education should begin. Some parents diligently teach their children things, some do it moderately, and then there are parents that have no concern when it comes to early education. Some parents feel that the time in a child’s life before preschool is for the child to have fun and just be a kid and that the time for learning comes when the child enters preschool. I personally disagree with that. Most institutional daycares now have an education program for all ages of the children attending. Seeing how I am a stay-at-home mom, I feel that it is my job to teach my boys things before they enter preschool. I realize that there are things that I could be doing better and maybe there are some days that my boys watch a little too much TV, so that is probably the main reason I picked this topic. I feel that need new ideas to help educate the sponges that are the minds of my boys.