Potty time!

Over New Year's Eve, my Mother-in-Law Ruth shared with me that she basically potty trained Ben's little brother in a weekend (out of necessity) by putting the potty in front Saturday morning cartoons. Thanks to TIVO, we've got more flexibility! We decided to try it, and it worked! Owen's been peeing on the potty all week! It's still not fool proof. If he's got no pants on, he'll run over to the potty and go. We need to work on keeping underwear and pants dry. He's also a little constipated at the moment (it's been traumatic for us all, poor guy cries in pain when he goes) We're going to work on poop after we've got peeing down. Very exciting, though!

As proof that he's clearly doesn't need Mommy anymore. Just tonight I was making dinner and heard Owen flush the toilet. He had peed on his potty in the living room (despite my swearing potties would stay in the bathroom, oh and that he'd only have a big potty...) He then picked it up, emptied it into the toilet and flushed. He was in the process of rinsing it out when I got to him. I swear I'm not a slave driver!

I guess now I just have to teach him to drive! Oh, and poop in the potty!

Many of my original potty training thoughts have gone down the toilet (so to speak) this week. One is that I wasn't going to bribe with candy. HA! He gets one M&M for sitting, two for peeing, and 3 for pooping. We've kind of done away with one for sitting, but we're still making a big deal of two for peeing! Every time he pees, we say something like "Good job Owen! You get 2 M&Ms for putting your pee in the potty!" He says "uh, no. One."

Way to be hardcore, buddy!

This post actually mentions New Year's AND the Western Slope!

I have a lot of catching up to do, and I guess I didn't get there last time!

This time I'm starting at the more recent pictures and working my way backwards.

I'll starting with convincing Owen to play outside today!
Owen hates wearing his snow boots and snow pants, but I'm not going to send him out there to freeze his ass off. Usually going outside in the snow sounds something like this.
"Owen, do you want to go outside to play in the snow!"
"Uh, YUP!"
"Ok, let's put our snow clothes on! Come on, here are your snow pants!"
"Uh, no. Outside!"
"Ok, then I guess we can't go outside. How sad!"
[he comes over to put his snow pants on.]
"Great, let's put your boots on!"
"Uh, no. Shoes!"
"No, we wear boots in the snow to keep our feet warm."
"Uh, no. Shoes!"
"Ok, then I guess we can't go outside. How sad!"
[he whines, then he comes over and puts his boots on.]
We continue until we get the rest of his clothes on.

We finally get outside, and then he wants me to carry him everywhere, so he doesn't have to walk in his boots.



I left him standing on the deck while I built a snow man and he FINALLY decided he could come check it out if I held his hand.

Good Lord. I thought kids LIKED to play and fall down in the snow!

Maybe, just MAYBE falling in the snow would be less traumatic if you'd keep gloves on for more than 30 seconds, kid.

So speaking of New Year's.... on New Year's Day we met up with Ben's Mom and Dad in Olathe and spent a couple of days in a hotel mostly hanging out, swimming, eating, and seeing the Fletchers.

Here's Owen playing with Great Grandma Lukie:

Here's Owen and Ben playing in the pool at the hotel. Owen insisted on running back and forth from the freezing pool to the hot tub. I think he was trying to give Ben a heart attack! Sadly he bumped his head, but not until he got to jump in the pool a few times!



New Year's EVE (remember, I'm going backwards here), we spent at Blue Mesa. I unfortunately had the stomach flu (which I passed on to Gary and Steph), but we all had a good time nonetheless.

Here's Owen's cousin (and my first niece, woot!), Goldie, in all her chubby cuteness. I thought Owen was laid back as a baby, but I think Goldie takes the award! She's as laid back as Owen was PLUS, she'll got to anyone! (Unless she's hungry or tired :)




This picture came out decently (pretty mountains anyway!) despite Owen's tantrum over wearing boots.


Steph and Goldie:

Owen was a little wary of Goldie. He didn't want her to touch his toys, for one. I think he secretly liked her, though, see?


All was fine until she dared look at his toys. After that he was OUTTA THERE! Goldie looks strangely satisfied about it!

New Year's on the Western Slope

In 1988, my parents and good family friends bought this cabin together outside of Estes Park. It's rustic--no running water, an outhouse out back, really just one big room with a lean-to kitchen, an enclosed porch, and a loft. Since 1988 when we stuffed the cracks in the walls with newspaper for insulation, we've spent a LOT of Thanksgivings up there. Then all of the younger generation got married, had kids, and it just got a lot more complicated. Well this year we braved it again and had Thanksgiving at the Cabin. There were 15 people in that little cabin over Thanksgiving weekend. Fortunately there was some rotation so we weren't all staying there at once, and it turned out really well. Owen is generally a TERRIBLE sleeper when we travel, so I had been worried about the cramped quarters for about a month before going, but it was fun! He miraculously slept pretty well (could it be he's getting older?), and we had a great time. :) Here's all of the Keller half of the gathering.


I don't remember what we were making here. Brownies, maybe? Anyway, I let Owen lick the bowl for the first time, and he LOVED it.... as you can see from the evidence!

Here are a few pictures of fun playing in the back yard with the no-longer-raked-into-a-pile leaves. I love how the second picture makes it look like there's a ceiling of leaves over his head (we were throwing them on each other, much to Owen's delight.)




Ok, blogger is incredibly slow tonight, so I'll have to leave the update back in November. Check back soon for Christmas and New Years pictures!