Royal and I don’t like coffee one bit. We don’t ever drink it, the only reason we own a coffee maker is for people in our family who can’t live without it when they are over…like grandma’s and Royal’s dad who averages about 12 cups a day…well actually I think he’s cut it down to 6 now, and I’m not talking measuring cups, I’m talking gigantic coffee cups full. And really, we only own a coffee maker now, we don’t have a pot. Jayden managed to break it awhile back. You see, Jayden is obsessed with coffee. He pretends to make coffee ALL the time, numerous times a day. He was carrying “coffee” outside the time he managed to drop the coffee pot on the cement. I didn’t care so much, other than I had to clean all the glass off our front porch. Now, Jayden just put his cup under the coffee maker and pretends it’s dripping into his cup instead of the pot. At Royal’s parents house, Jayden gets to grind the coffee beans with grandpa and then scoop the grounds into cups and then back into the jar and on and on until the counter tops, floor, and Jayden are covered in coffee. At my parents house, Jayden gets to help nana make her mocha’s in the morning with nana’s espresso machine. He gets to scoop the chocolate into the cup, turn on the steamer, watch the thermometer to tell nana when it’s ready, and help stir. And then when Aunt Jojee is working some coffee magic down at Riverside, Jayden gets to stop in and order a mocha. Jojee makes him a hot chocolate in his own cup and he gets to sip a mocha just like a big kid. Well, Jayden got a Halloween package from Papa and Nana a couple days ago. And in it, was a Halloween coffee cup full of candy. While Jayden was excited about the candy, once I told him his cup was for mochas he hasn’t been able to stop asking for one. So today, I found some hot chocolate and Jayden got to have a mocha in his new coffee cup after naptime. Boy is this kid lucky. :)
J: Mmmm, Mocha
J:What do you think mom? Do you like mochas?
Me: no, no I do not. thanks for asking though…
J: Oh mom, you’re so funny. I LOVE MOCHAS!!!!
J: I think I’ll have some more
We finally carved up those pumpkins we picked up at the pumpkin patch. It took Jayden awhile to touch the pumpkin guts, he thought they were pretty slimy and gross and he preferred to remove them with a spoon. He’s a strange one, but I really like him. :)
Jayden wanted to sleep with the lit pumpkins. I think he might of been a little cold since it’s getting down in the 20’s at night.
Jayden also got a new pair of boots tonight. He would of liked to sleep with those too.
Filed under: Life
Ok, when Royal and I first came here for his interview and were looking at houses and stuff, we mentioned something to the realtor showing us around about the Arkansas River. We pronounced it Ar-kan-saw, like a normal person. The realtor said, ‘oh you can tell you’re not from around here, we call it the Arkansas’ Pronounced Ar-kansas, like the state of kansas with an R in front of it…R-kansas. I was like, ‘ha ha, good one’. I seriously thought it was a joke. I figured that people around here really did call it the r-kansas river, or the state of r-kansas, instead of like ar-kan-saw, like a normal person, but I thought they knew better. Then tonight, Royal and I were watching the news and something came up about a bridge that got taken out by flooding, and the news anchor pronouced the river, r-kansas. I was like, ‘what did she just say? are you serious? people actually think that’s the real name of the river??’ Royal was like, ‘yea, i told you’. I was like, ‘I thought it was just a joke’. Royal’s like, ‘nope, when the river leaves colorado, it’s called the ar-kan-saw, but when it comes through kansas, they call it the r-kansas, and then when it leaves kansas, it’s called the ar-kan-saw again’ This place is freaking retarded….
Ok, so it’s been awhile. Kaylee keeps harassing me, telling me I’m way down on her blog reader and I need to get it together. Sure there’s been things to blog about that would at least let people see something other than AppleJack Pumpkin Patch, but come on, I’m ginormous and pregnant and sometimes it’s just too far to walk across the room and get the camera and who wants to read a post with no pictures? Because let’s face it, you’re really not interested in my stories, it’s the cute pictures of Jaydo that make it all worth while.
I could of posted some pictures of Jayden’s new drawings of Jojee. He’s been sitting at the table drawing Jojee over and over and over again. He even drew Jojee with her owie - her big nasty oozy burn on her arm. Jojee gets drawn with blue eyes and black eyes and green eyes and orange eyes, I have more pictures of Jojee than I know what to do with - they don’t look anything ike Jojee of course, but that’s what he’s calling them. I’m thinking of putting them together in a book and giving them to Jojee (Merry Christmas! ha ha). I could of written a post about all the food I made last weekend to freeze in preparation for the baby showing up, because if this one is anything like Jayden, it’ll show up early when I least expect it, which means I only have a couple weeks to go - I need to make it about 10 more days until I get to week 37, so I can have this baby at home like I want to, otherwise to the hospital I go. (come on, early baby! small and slippery! i’m just sure this one is gonna shoot out like it’s covered in crisco. i’ll let you know how that turns out for me) I could of written a post about how when Jayden and I are singing Old McDonald and I ask him what animal lives on the farm, he says, ‘ummmm….roast beef’. What the heck kind of a sound does roast beef make? Anyways, you’re not going to get to read about those little things we’ve been doing, I’m going to tell you all about poop.
Royal and I decided back in July that we were gonna get Jayden potty trained. We spent one weekend with him running around naked, pumping him full of fluids, and getting him to pee in the toilet. And wouldn’t you know it, for the most part it worked. He was wearing undies, not having too many accidents, and we were pumped to not have to do the whole diaper thing. However, poop was another issue. Jayden REFUSED to poop in the toilet. He would hold it and hold it and hold it and eventually poop in his underwear. I HATE poop in underwear. So, after a couple weeks of fighting that battle, I decided to give up. Jayden needed to decide that he was gong to poop in the toilet, there’s just not a whole lot you can do about forcing someone to do it besides slipping him a little exlax and I really didn’t want to make it more traumatizing then it needed to be. Jayden was very consistant about when he would poop and would only do it if he had a diaper on. So, I’d put a diaper on him right before naptime and right before bedtime and let him do his business. He’d run off to some room in the house, close the door, and do his business. Every few weeks, we’d try and get him to go on the toilet, but he refused. Royal made him sit on the toilet for 2 hours one night, nope nothing. We promised treats, presents, whatever he wanted if he would just do it. Jayden still refused. There was nothing he wanted, until September rolled around. When the Wagner’s came to visit and we had a birthday party for Wyatt, Wyatt got a bunch of Cars toys. Jayden suddenly realized that he could have a Lightening McQueen all his own that he could play with and he kept asking for one. So, I decided to use it as leverage. I told him if he pooped in the toilet, I would go buy him his very own Lightening McQueen. This got him to sit on the toilet a couple of times, but in the end, even Lightening McQuen wasn’t a good enough reason to just do it. So, as this last package of diapers has slowly widdled away, (yes, i was using disposables at this point. he’s too big for the size of g-diapers i have and i didn’t want to buy the next size to just use for a small amount of time. i know, i feel guilty….the poor toxic landfills….sorry my future great great great grandchildren…i was using it as incentive to convince Jayden to poo in the toilet) anyhoo, i was saying, as this last package of diapers has widdled away, Jayden and I have been talking about what we were going to do when they were all gone, where was Jayden’s poop going to go. Jayden came to the conclusion that he was “gonna have to poop in the toilet…ALL…THE…TIME!” (his words) Well, Tuesday was d-day for me. The diapers were all gone and the poop was going to have to go somewhere, I was praying it wasn’t going to be in his underwear, and I was really praying that I wasn’t going to have to break down and buy more diapers. So, we started getting ready for nap about an hour ahead of time, and Jayden asked for his diaper, we went to his little cupboard to look and there were none, so off to the bathroom we went. It took about 40 mins of jumping between the little toilet to the big toilet to no i’m not pooping i’m going to bed to no i’m not taking a nap i’m pooping. Hallelujia, after 40 mins he drops a bomb in the toilet. The minute he was done, he looked at me and said, ‘I get a present!’ Guess he remembered. :) So, after naptime we went and bought him his very own Lightening McQueen. I also bought a few extra cars incase he needed incentive in the future. Well, 3 days went by and Jayden was refusing to poop in the toilet or anywhere for that matter again. I was starting to get a little worried. I mean, you don’t go to the bathroom, it just gets all plugged up and then it’s really hard to go. But he refused and was throwing major fits about it, and Jayden is my little battler. He makes his mind up about something, he will pretty much just stare you down, so I knew I was going to have to wait this one out. So this morning I took matters into my own hands. I knew he had to go…who the heck doesn’t after 3 days??? and he wasn’t eating very much which made me think his stomach was starting to hurt. So, I made him a fruit smoothie and I put some Arbonne Fiber shake in it. About 20 mins afterwards, I told him it was time to go to the bathroom and I pulled out the big guns. I got a little Lightening McQueen car from my stash and told him he could have this car to play with as soon as he pooped in the toilet, then I put the car up on a high shelf where he could see it but not reach it. He sat on the toilet for about 5 seconds, then decided to get all the stools from around the house and see if he could climb up and reach it himself. After he determined he couldn’t reach it, he told me he didn’t want the car afterall and went downstairs to play with his toys. 15 minutes rolls by and he comes up stairs, grabs his stool to get on the toilet (it was under the shelf where the car was sitting) and walks into the bathroom. Like 30 seconds later I hear, ‘mom, i pooped’. Hallelujia! I win!!! So what, I have to pay my kid to poop in the toilet. It’s cool, at least I’ll get a couple week break from having to deal with poopie diapers before the next one comes along.
It was a good find, there was a ton of stuff for little kids to do. First off, Abby and Jayden had some water races with ducks.
Next up was the train ride. It was a little windy here at the farm, check out Abby’s hair, it’s not because the tractor train was going so fast.
Then Jayden and Martha hit the swings, while Abby raced a tricycle around the racing track. The girl was ferocious, rubbing tires with other trikes practically knocking other kids over, she ran her trike off the track in order to pass someone, and she practically was sliding around the corners.
Next we headed over to the big slide, Jayden was pumped! He went down once with Royal, than after that, went down all by himself, which was a pretty big deal as he is usually pretty cautious.
After checking out the animals - pigs, goats, llamas, rabbits - we headed over to the corn maze.
This is what Jayden thought of the corn maze.
Sadly, this is what Martha thought of the corn maze and all my picture taking.
Then finally, we hopped on the tractor pulled wagon that took us over to the pumpkin patch to find our perfect pumpkins! Jayden found one for himself and his little sister.
Filed under: Life
I have been working on getting the nursery done for a few weeks now. I thought I’d share my progress. :)
Our theme for this room has been Hungry Caterpillar, which has ended up creating way more work for me than I intended. I love it when I come up with these great ideas, without really thinking how I am going to get them done, or even without an idea on how they are done…thank goodness for the internet! So, my mom made this great quilt out of Hungry Caterpillar fabric, which that in itself was not easy to find…we ordered it off the internet. And once my mom had the fabric, I knew I couldn’t back down. So, off to the paint store I went to find a color to paint the walls. Jayden and I decided on a lovely yellow color called lemon meringue. Really I choose based on the name, lemon meringue pie sounds delicious, so why wouldn’t it look good on the walls??? Being that I have just been getting larger and larger, I knew that I had to start on the room ASAP, and sadly, Royal, who hates painting, had to help me paint the room. He didn’t complain too much and we had it finished in 2 evenings. Then began the hunt for how I was going to paint a caterpillar and a butterfly on the wall. I traced them both out of the Hungry Caterpillar book I have onto paper, but I needed to get them enlarged. After Royal and I searched around Wichita for an easy to get them up on the wall - kinkos, office max, finding a projector to rent, or finding an overhead projector to rent - and coming up empty handed, I knew I was going to have to do it the hard way. So, since I don’t trust my free hand skills to enlarge the pictures and actually make them look like what is in the book, I decided to grid them. I traced a grid on my paper, then I put a grid up on the wall with string and tape, and drew my pictures on the wall with chalk. I then have spent the last week or so, painting them. I finally finished tonight and got the room put back together. All I’m waiting on now are the curtains and bedskirt my mom is making out of the Hungry Caterpillar fabric. It pays to know people who know how to sew!!! :) So, here are some pictures for those that want to see what it looks like now!
My caterpillar paper grid and wall grid
Jayden and I drawing the caterpillar on the wall. I’m sure it was probably a mistake to let him watch me draw and paint on the wall. I know I’m going to come around the corner someday and he’ll have drawn me a masterpiece….hopefully it will be with something washable…. :)
The finished caterpillar
The finished butterfly
The room - notice the lovely picture on the wall that Amy Cooper just sent me today!
We went to the farmers market this past weekend to pick up some “happy Kansas” cow and chicken - can you believe that the farmers market actually sells meat? You can get buffalo and emu too if you so desire, however, I do not. We also placed our order for a “happy” turkey for Thanksgiving, which I’m so excited about. Royal went and got a turkey hunting license, but I’m not betting my Thanksgiving turkey on Royal actually getting out there and shooting something. Plus, I’m not real excited to have to defeather and gut the thing - or even watch Royal do it - and who knows if he’ll get out hunting before Thanksgiving happens and I want turkey gosh darn it! Anyways…. while we were at the farmers market, I was planning on getting some pie pumpkins so I could puree and freeze the pumpkin guts for pumpkin pies and for hiding vegetables in our food - you can hide pumpkin in just about anything - it makes the best cakes incase you want to know. Well, anyway, the pie pumpkin person talked me out of getting pie pumpkins and getting this instead.
It’s a rumba squash, or I believe is also known as a cinderella pumpkin, and I was told it makes the most delicious pumpkin pies, has less water and barely any strings to deal with. So now I have this big squash to cut up, cook, and puree. The problem with this pumpkin at the farmers market was Jayden wanted to carry it and it was way too big for him, and as it was the last rumba squash on the table, I couldn’t have Jayden drop it and bust it open. So, we went to a different booth and Jayden picked out a bunch of small decorator pumpkins. Who knew these were going to be the best purchase of the whole day! Jayden carries and plays with his pumpkins all over the place. In the car on the way home, he had to have all 5 of them in his lap and he kept showing us which one was the biggest. Once we got home, he carried them around, lined them up, counted them, brought them to us one by one, and then we brought the dump truck upstairs. The pumpkins didn’t know they were going to be so loved!
“Hello, pumpkin?” - the pumpkin telephone
I’m CRAZY for pumpkins!
Not a whole lot has been going on, or maybe there has and I’m just getting too tired to take pictures and then tell stories about it, but you guys will never know the truth! :) So, here are a few pictures of Jayden from tonight, just so you guys have something new to look at. You can’t really tell he’s naked, but he is. He was outside with Royal in the backyard when the sprinklers came on, so after running through them and screaming for awhile, Royal stripped him down and he came inside, and he ran around naked for the rest of the evening because lets face it, I’m tired of putting clothes on that kid. I was sitting at the table practicing what I am planning on painting on the walls in the nursery - don’t worry when I’m done I’ll post pictures - unless it turns out ugly and then well, I’m not sure what I will do, it’s getting too close to “pushing” time for me to have to start over, guess the kid will just have to live in Jayden’s cute room with him. Anyways…of course if Jayden sees me doing something then he needs to do it too - however I did have clothes on, so don’t think I’m part of the naked painting party. Since acrylic paints are far too permanent, I brought out some watercolors for him to do, and Jayden sat down and whipped out a lovely abstract watercolor painting. He said in the beginning he was painting Lightning McQueen, but then when he was finished I asked what he had painted and he said, ‘Oooohhhh, it’s just beautiful’. So here you have it, Jayden painting his beautiful pictures.
