Growing Up

If you're not a parent, (or at least work with small children) you probably want to skip this one. Just not interesting unless you've been through it!

There are some things I have to try not to think about, or I stop having the desire to ever add to our family.  "Morning" sickness. Labor. Extreme sleep deprivation. Nursing. (not in general, I just have to work really hard at it to make it work!) Teething. (TEETHING!) And yes, potty training.
I was so stressed about how to go about it with Reilly that I waited until he was 3. The first day of potty training with him slightly traumatized both of us, but in reality, it wasn't that bad over all, and he caught on pretty quickly after that.  Jaina seemed ready a little earlier, but we delayed about 6 months after that due to having a new baby and then moving across the country. (also new baby=sleep deprivation and very little time not spent nursing) She was almost 3 when we started. She is now 4.75 and I think we're finally dry 95% of the time. (Not counting nights. We haven't even gone there) I have eliminated cow's milk the last 3-4 weeks and it seems to have made a different in her ability to stay dry all day. I might try reintroducing it in a month or two and see what happens.
Katy has been showing readiness (her verbal skills are much higher than the other two were at this age, she tries and sometimes succeeds in getting clothes off and on, etc.) for a while now, and has been asking to go on the potty even more lately. It's usually when we're out and about though, and everyone's taking a bathroom break. She turned 2 in June, and now I've finally gotten around to jumping into potty training with her. We started yesterday and had 5 hits and 3 misses. And neither of us were super frustrated at the end of the day, which is nice. So potty training is super boring for me (the way that works for me is I stay with them pretty much ALL day long to watch for cues and respond appropriately to successes and accidents... and to try to keep accidents to a minimum.) but this time around not too stressful. I wish I could have figured out to be a little more laid back with my first ones instead of freaking out all the time...
Today was decent. Three quick misses all together at the beginning, but then mostly hits, and she even went over and went potty herself twice when she needed to. She is an independent one.  With the other two I tried to do the "Potty training in one day or less" method, and then modified it as we went. With Katy I put her in underwear, we potty trained the dolly, and had treats and praise ready, but I haven't pushed it. At all. She's not one you can push; it has to be her idea.  The only thing I've insisted on is that she mostly stay in the kitchen area (unless she's just gone) because I am SO not interested in scrubbing pee out of carpet. One reason I didn't start her in VA before she was 2 (she seemed ready then!) is because we had about 9 square feet of uncarpeted area...  Anyway, things are good so far. Hopefully she'll catch on quickly, especially since Jeremy's mom is watching her Saturday afternoon/night while I go pick Jeremy up.
That's right - he's finally moving to Arizona too, and we are beyond thrilled! We're not sure when we'll be moving up to the Mesa/Gilbert area yet, but he's looking for some work (seasonal or otherwise) for the next several months in that area while he works on getting a practice going, so if you know of anything good... ;-)

We interrupt this our otherwise normal life

...to bring you a terrible phone-pic taken out the window as I was leaving the parking lot of the stake center today. The center subject (that you can't quite make out,) who is about to get in the car is Elder Ballard, who did a special stake conference in Pima today. Did you know that he is Joseph F. Smith's great-grandson? We had a great conference, and I'm grateful to Jeremy's mom for taking Katy for us so she didn't have to sit and try to be good for 3+ hours this time. (We sat for about 4 when we heard from Elder Nelson in May, but thankfully didn't have to wait any extra time for a "soft seat" to hear Elder Bednar speak in July - both in VA) Feeling pretty spoiled the last few months, but it's been really neat! It's too bad my kids are too young to really care...

Blog Neglect

Not that anyone's probably noticed, because I don't think people read blogs as much as they used to. (It was "the thing" for a while, right?) It's just so easy to put stuff on Facebook, especially when I want Jeremy to get to see pictures of the kids somewhat soon. So that's what I've been doing. And there are a LOT of recent pics on Facebook. But that's no excuse to never blog, because it makes up about 90% of my personal journal entries for the year too, so...
We've stayed fairly busy the last 3 weeks. The kids have gone swimming at Grammy's pool several times,  (and even spent a night or two!) we've been busy with Reilly and Jaina being in school,  (though I'm loving the 4-day school-week, and will really miss it when we relocate!) we've been going to story time at the library, and spent Labor Day at the cabin. All very fun. The girls play all morning while Reilly is at school. We got the dress up clothes box out (which wasn't intended to travel all the way to Pima, but they're glad) and they've been playing with that a lot. I also just bought some fresh Play-dough, so we've been scrubbing that off little fingernails more than once a day. I've been working out a lot, trying to get my pre-baby body back (it's been lost for about 6 years now). It wasn't that impressive to begin with, but it would do my self confidence (not to mention my health) a lot of good to find it before trying for number 4.  The weather seems to be easing up some days, and there's a hint of fall in the air here and there.

The raspberries we picked at the mountain

Princess talk

With Jaina at her pre-school on Parent Day.

I've also been scanning a bunch of my Grandma (Cluff) Cohn's old pictures, which has been time consuming, but a lot of fun. Here are some good ones:

My Grandpa

Wasn't he handsome?

My Grandma - she reminds me of my mom in this pic

My mom as a teen with her oldest niece

A bunch of cousins when I was 5 or 6.

 Last weekend was great because Jeremy got to come home and visit for a few days. He flew in Wednesday night and did some business-starting-thingies until we joined him Thursday evening (we left when the kids got out of school). It was SO good to see him! A week is not a huge deal. A month (4.5 weeks, actually) is just way, way too long. We got to meet up with some friends from Iowa that evening (the ones we shared a duplex with for 2 years) which was really nice. We have missed them and hope we'll live close enough to see each other from time to time. It was also fun to stay the night at Phil & Sophie's. Our kids hadn't seen their's since March, and it was fun to watch Katy and Kinzi together especially. Friday after lunch we came down to Pima/Thatcher and spent some time here together as a family and with some extended family. The kids were so happy to have their Daddy here! The built a Harry Potter lego set together and played and enjoyed each other a lot. It was really hard to have to take him back to the airport Sunday, but at least I know he'll be back by the end of September. And then life will get really interesting...

Katy and Kinzi (born the same night!)

For the most part they got along better than I expected. :)

Jaina and Reilly are still enjoying that Lego set!

We finally remembered to document that Daddy WAS here just before I
had to take him back to the airport.

Can't wait for our little family to be together (permanently) again!

Whoops

Did I really never blog about this? In a few weeks I'll move it to a more chronologically correct place, but I have to mention it. The week we moved here we got in Wednesday evening and spent one night here before Jeremy had to leave the next afternoon to drive down to Mesa. He had to take his state boards (which he passed, and hopefully he'll be licensed in Arizona really soon here, if all else goes well!) and he also had to meet the truck that was bringing the rest of our worldly possessions to Arizona. I left Pima Friday evening with David & Nicole and met up with him there to help unload things. The reason I went down is because my brother David had gotten a sweet Sunsplash deal and all of my siblings (minus us) were going to do a Sunsplash fun-day. This was before we knew we were moving to Arizona, but as luck would have it schedules changed so that we were able to do it the same (only) weekend that Jeremy was still there, and all my siblings and siblings-in-law got to spend a day at Sunsplash. Can I tell you how much fun this was? An amazing amount of fun was had. Even with a fairly busy day and even with the "toilet bowl" that I cracked my head on and was subsequently almost drowned on. That was the first slide though, so things went up from there. :) We had such a good time. It's been a long time since we've been able to have fun like that. Even when Jeremy and I went to Disneyland 3(!?) years ago it was just us, and I enjoy hanging out with all of my siblings so much. I love my children, and my nieces and nephews, but it would have been a very different kind of fun with them, and it was fun to just be adults that liked each other instead of mommies and daddies for part of a day. :) I look forward to doing something similar in the future, since we all live fairly close for now!

At lunch beforehand. A flattering picture of all... ;-)

Back: Jason, Spencer, David, Jeremy, Phil. Front: Emily, Nicole, Me, Sophie.
Despite their "before" faces, Jason & Spencer really did have fun, too.