My new blog address is www.thepenguinlife.wordpress.com. There are lots of new posts over there, plus all the posts from this blog. It was time for a switcheroo.
We’ve been in our new house for a few months now, and it really does feel like home. So much, that for a while, I completely forgot all my decorating plans and ideas. We still have empty spaces and walls, and probably will for a while. Maybe even years. I didn’t ever finish decorating our last house by the time we sold it.
Anyway… You’ve seen the girls’ room and guest room already. But, I haven’t shown you the rest of the house.
Kitchen as it was when we bought it:
Kitchen as it is now:
Dining Room when we moved in:
The Dining Room now:
What these pictures don’t show is the absolutely horrid light fixture left over from 1984 that was in this dining room. We switched it out for the one you see in the “now” picture and we really love the new one. It changes the whole room. We haven’t changed the curtains yet, but they’ve got to go. I’m going to use the same hardware, but I’m just not into sheer, scarf-like, window treatments. I’ll hang the rod higher, so the window looks bigger, then do floor length panels in a more contemporary style.
Here’s an amazing challenge…
The Master Bedroom:
Can you say “grandma”? After the wallpaper ripping sessions I had in the other two rooms, I just didn’t want to tackle this masterpiece of purple and green, swirly goodness. But now I’ve forgotten how much work that was, and I’m ready to go again. First of all, the crazy green color on the ceiling doesn’t even match the green in the wallpaper. They have totally different tones. Second, there is no wallpaper border in existence that does not look stupid in a room meant for someone over age twelve.
We have some really cool ideas for this room. Get rid of the elderly vibe and bring in something a little more masculine. Why masculine? I don’t know… I just don’t think I like a feminine master bedroom. I don’t like feminine men either. If a man is living in it, it shouldn’t be all lady-like.
We’re thinking of doing a DIY or semi-DIY job on the ceiling and paneling it in cedar. Then we’ll rip off the wallpaper, and paint in a neutral navajo white. Also…Find something to use as a headboard, and whip up some window treatments. Then art. I might make my own. I have some ideas.
For our crazy long hallway, we have some fun ideas and I spent a while at Goodwill today picking up supplies. Goodwill is kind of awesome and gross at the same time.
Okay, gotta take girls to dance now. More later!
Here’s what we did this morning. Weeded, pruned, trimmed, swept, tilled, and all the other gardening words I can’t think of. It was dirty work! The cool thing was that the girls were actually productive helpers!
Skyler was a huge help! She loosened the flower bed soil and pulled out leaves & rocks. She also smashed a few spiders and pulled some weeds! That’s chocolate chip cookie all over her face, not dirt. In case you were wondering.
Sydney filled the buckets with weeds and trimmings I pulled, then threw them away. She was a good helper too!
Me – “Did you have a good sleep?”
Sydney – “I had dreams! It was about a princess and everything!”
Me – “I think I dreamed about a boat.”
Sydney – “I did not know that…”
Ping and I recently decided that it’s time to move to the next level on a few things with the girls. They’re getting older, and as much as I would like them to stay babies forever, they’re growing and learning and we need to be proactive in providing them with the lessons and challenges that they need. To that purpose, we thought it was time that they become active role players in our little family. They need their own responsibilities. We want them to know that as their parents, we are not here to serve them. All four of us are here to play an important role and make our contributions to create a positive, caring, and loving environment. That sounds like it comes from some motivational conference or something, but I promise, it’s just what we think!
So, fueled by my love of Mardel’s and school supplies, I came up with the idea to make a chart with each girl’s jobs listed under their name. I guess I assumed they would like charts, graphs, school supplies, and Mardel’s as much as I do. I thought it would be exciting to them. I bought a pretty poster-board, made a crappy looking chart, threw it away, bought another poster-board, took my time and made a pretty chart, and then put it aside to show the girls the next day.
I can tell you, their love for graphs and charts isn’t there yet, but they did like the pretty poster-board.
We started small. The chart says:
I’M RESPONSIBLE FOR:
SKYLER – Clearing the dishes, Picking up the books, Brushing my teeth
SYDNEY – Making the bed, Picking up the toys, Brushing my teeth
Then at the bottom, because there was extra space, I wrote out Colossians 3:23, Whatever you do, work heartily, as unto the Lord, and not unto men.
The next morning, I sat them down and showed them the new chart. My dialogue was something like this:
“Alright, this is something special for you guys. You have your own jobs that you are in charge of. It’s going to be your responsibility to take care of these every day.”
I read the title and each of their jobs, then I got to the verse.
“This verse means that whatever you do, no matter what it is, you do it the best that you can, with a cheerful attitude. Because when you do anything, you do it for Jesus. He wants us to have a good attitude and do a good job.”
They took it in without saying a word, then turned around and started playing with their Fancy Nancy stickers again. I thought they passed it off and we’d keep working on it. No big deal if they weren’t on fire to talk about it at the moment. And because their room was clean and we didn’t eat dinner at home, we really didn’t even talk about it again for the rest of the day.
The next day, we went about our morning. We had breakfast, lunch, smoothies, and countless drinks throughout the day. A pile of dishes was mounting, until finally Skyler sweetly turned to me and said, “Mama? Isn’t it time for me to do the dishes for Jesus?”
My sweet little girl was listening. She listened, she got it, and she wanted to do it. I absolutely stinking love her! So I said, “Yep! It’s time.” And then we went and did the dishes for Jesus.
Today we were on our way to a doctor appointment, when I stopped to run a long overdue errand. The store I needed to go in was right next to a Books A Million. As I was getting Skyler out of her carseat, she goes, “Mama, I see a letter B!” So I said, “You’re right, that is B! What’s the next one?” She says, “An O, and an O, and a K, and an S, like a snake!” She’s so dang smart! She can also write a capital A. Genius!
All of my favorite songs right now are by a former Hootie and the Blowfish member. What’s up white people! Class is in session and Darius Rucker is giving lessons in country. Pay attention!
I just noticed in some emails to a friend, that I referred to the stinking germs in our house as assassins no less than three times. I can’t help it. That’s the way I picture them: As miniscule, green globs of goo wearing masks and holding Chinese stars, which they are hurling at us every chance they get. Sort of like the Mucinex commercials mixed with Bruce Lee.
Dear Snow,
You are a turd. I’m sick of you. Go away.
To everyone else:
Here are some pictures from the one day out of all of this horrible winter junk that we actually got to go outside and play. (We did go sledding on the first day, which was fun, but it was bitter, bitter cold and I didn’t have cabin fever yet.)
For a laundry list of reasons, I’m immediately going to start a new routine for myself. It’s time to get going! I didn’t make any new years resolutions, at least that I can remember. Er… Actually, I think I might have made one not to eat any french fries in 2011, but Ping pulled into a drive through on New Years Day, and Whataburger just has really good fries. Honestly, I think the idea of resolutions is great, but to suddenly stop or start doing something for an entire year is really unlikely. Instead, I think I’ll take the lead from another blog I read, and do them monthly from here on out. That way I can make them big, and not feel like I’m doomed to fail from the start.
February Resolution #1 – Change my diet. In fact, I think I’m just going to pretty much eat the same thing every day.
February Resolution #2 – Finish this potty training crap. Pun intended. And that’s not going to be easy, because the initial novelty of potty training has worn off and now they think it’s not that fun. I think I’m going to get the book pictured below though. I love some of the author’s other books, because they’re really funny. At least if I’m going to have to be sitting on the bathroom floor for half my life right now, I can be entertained.
February Resolution #3 - Go get my hair cut and dyed. I despise going to get my hair cut, but it’s way overdue, so I guess I’ll do it. It’s getting kind of hard to decipher what part is the bangs and what isn’t.
Well, there you go… I warned you. A big load of stuff nobody cares about but me. Enjoy!
Day 2 went much better than day one. We went from no successful potties in the potty on day one, to two potties and one #2 on day two. However, neither one has told me they needed to go. I’m not sure they even know when they need to go. I just caught them when I thought they needed to go and stuck them on the potty. Since it was luck and not psychic ability that prompted me to plop them in there at the right times, I’m not seeing that as a permanent solution. However, we made progress and I’m not complaining.
Day 3 is off to a bad start, but it’s my fault. I forgot to set my alarm and they were up and around for a while before I was. That gave them plenty of time to unload in the diaper, so I missed the one opportunity when I knew they’d have to go. Oh well, we’ll see what happens today. Luckily there’s another morning tomorrow!
Before I tell you about the events of our first 1/2 day of potty training, I feel like I need to share my feelings about potty training, in general. Of course, I know they have to be potty trained. I do feel a little odd dropping them in the church nursery with diapers. Despite those things… I just don’t want to do it.
I don’t think life is going to improve once they’re potty trained. In fact, for a while I expect it to be more of a pain. It’s already hard enough to go grocery shopping without having to ditch the cart and make potty runs. I have no desire to interrupt my errands to wrangle them into a public bathroom, keep one from laying down on the floor, or something crazy like that, while keeping the other one on the potty and not in the potty. Then as I’m sure will happen plenty of times, I’ll hear, “I don’t really need to go.”
Our pediatrician suggests not potty training at all. He says you’re wasting your time, and they just sort of do it themselves one day. The average age for girls to be potty trained in 2009, was 35 months. The average age for boys was 39 months. I would love to follow his advice, but I know my daughters, and I do not expect them to want to potty train for a good long time. Why should they? They’re perfectly happy the way they are now.
So this morning, as soon as I heard them moving around, I rushed them to the potty. They didn’t go. They woke up at 8:00, and by 9:45 I had five total wet pairs of panties and no pees in the potty. That’s five floor mopping sessions, five short rinse offs in the bath, and five “we’ll try again in a little bit” lines.
I’ve been setting a “potty time” timer to go off about every 20-30 minutes so we can run to the bathroom and try to potty. They love the timer! Right after lunch, we went in and they sat on the potties for quite a while, but neither could go. So, I let them get up and they both immediately ran off and peed. Sydney actually ran to reset the timer and peed right there in front of it. Skyler didn’t even make it out of the bathroom.
Potty training probably marks the first time where I feel like I’m in over my head as a mother. If anyone wants to come show me a good potty training method, I’m completely open to all help and suggestions. If anyone wants to just come take over, I’m happy to oblige.
Since I’m 99% sure no one is going to come rescue me… If you need me, I’ll be here holding some 409 spray and a trash bag full of wet undies, pretending to be patient, and resisting the temptation to slap a diaper back on them. If I’m successful this week, I’m treating myself to something awesome. I’ll deserve it!
