A Step in the Right Direction

My little artist

Amelia loves to help me give Phillip a bath. Usually by the end of his bath she's in the tub. He loves it!

Amelia is "sighing" in complete raptures over the waaaaa-rm water. Bliss!

Yesterday, Amelia surprised us with a step towards potty training! Hooray! I was nursing Phillip at the time. Amelia decided her pants were dirty (they had a little smudge on them) so stripped off her pants, shoes, socks, and diaper. She was dancing around to her own version of "I am a Mimi of Reindeer" (yes, she makes up her own lyrics like Justin) when all of the sudden she stopped with a funny look on her face. I quickly asked if she needed to go potty on her princess potty and she said yes! All by herself she ran into the bathroom, peed, and used the rest of a roll of toilet paper in the process. She even washed her hands! Boy were we excited. She was rewarded with two potty treats and lots of fun phone calls to tell her good news. While on the phone with Miekka she ran in with a horrified look on her face screaming about something brown and her bum. That put the kibosh on her desire to use the potty and wear pannies. At least we are a step closer to potty training. I know some people would push the issue, but I know Amelia. She is pretty much me in miniature. If pushed we will just butt heads and have a battle of wills. I refuse to engage that battle with her. I figure one day she will just do it all by herself. Just watch...

Our washer is now fixed. I am also better educated about front-loading washers. The problem came from 7 Phillip and Amelia socks sucked into the pump, a quarter and change, and a plastic clip in between the two washer bins. Apparently, front loading washers are notorious sock monsters. The rubber sleeve around the door is not attached to the inner washer as I supposed. Little floating items (like socks) and other small accessories can become snagged under the rubber sleeve and get sucked into the machinery below the washer. It took the service guy two hours to sort out all the kinks. He pulled out items from 4 different locations in the suction system. I found out the guy is very interested in genealogy. He has photographed over 7,000 grave stones and uploaded them to the internet. We had a fun discussion about the Mormons and Family History.

Justin came home at lunch like usual but unusually he came in the front door. Around 11 Amelia and I heard a loud pop in the garage. I thought something fell over. Turned out the garage door springs snapped. After a couple phone calls we have a guy coming over in the morning to put a temporary patch so we can open the doors until the springs can be replaced. Bummer.

I finally decided the basement needed to be reorganized yesterday. It looks much better and should flow more smoothly. My "studio" is located by the bank of cabinets, the TV and couch are arranged a bit differently, the toys spread out in three stations, and my computer table is more efficient. So hooray! I will take some pictures tomorrow. In the meantime enjoy some pictures of my newly cleaned craft room. Unfortunately, it is rarely clean because creativity for me is a messy process. I made several cute creations this week which you can view next week. One day I plan on having my entire craft room in black and red. The guest bed sticks out like a sore thumb to my color coordinated eye.

PS: Yoga is not for sissies. I did a long yoga session yesterday with my muscles screaming in pain as I followed contortion after contortion. The day before was a core synergistic workout that was so brutal I nearly lost my cookies from nausea. Phew, those were awesome workouts. Pain is a green light, right Dad?! The good news is that I am down 1.5 pounds. Not much but any progress is, well, progress!