Arlington: The Rap

A friend posted this hilarious video from YouTube on Facebook. I thought it captured our old hood so perfectly that I had to post it here. And sadly, it made me feel terribly homesick. Not sure what that says about me but I could make a couple of guesses.

Until I write again.

Add this to the list of things no one told me about parenting (May milestones, part two)

In addition to moving into a real bed, we also tackled the potty training issue once and for all in May. With surprising success, I might add. After nearly a year of casually "practicing" on the potty, Ian still appeared to be taking very little initiative on his own to advance toward being trained. So, with the clock ticking on a couple of different fronts at this point, we decided that it was time to push him off the deep end, so to speak. Enter Operation Potty Training Boot Camp (OPTBC).

We selected Memorial Day weekend for OPTBC because we knew that would give us four solid days where he was not scheduled to be in school and we could stay tethered to the house. (Adios annual Memorial Day day trip to Cannon Beach.) Now, Memorial Day weekend in Portland is known for its awful weather. Cool temperatures, rain, lots of clouds...according to local sources, it's been this way for years. Except, of course, the year we decide to stay at home all weekend. The weather could not have been more gorgeous, really. But was this surprising? Of course not. And to be fair, we did have a ton of beautiful weather in May - except the first week when Chris and Karen were visiting where it just so happens we had some amazingly soggy and dreary days. But again, was this surprising? Of course not.

So, we started warning Ian about a week beforehand that come Saturday morning, he would no longer be wearing diapers. Against my better taste, but going by my Good Mother Training Manual, I even took him to Target to pick out some underwear. He picked out Thomas the Train. Yippee. (Actually, it was better than some.) He also got to pick out his own candy reward. He originally picked out Snickers or something like that but I gently suggested M&Ms might be a better choice. (One for you...one for me. One for you...one, two for me!) In all seriousness, the M&Ms were another book suggestion because they are small and easy to give as frequent rewards. Versus say, a whole mini Snickers every time. I mean, I love Snickers and all but something didn't seem right about potentially feeding him multiple little candy bars in one day.

So, Saturday morning we all woke up bright and early with positive attitudes - ready to tackle OPTBC with zest! On went the underwear and away went the diapers. (Okay, well they were actually just in the closet, but whatever. You get the point.) By approximately 10 a.m. we had dealt with three "accidents." Luckily, all on the hardwood floor - which may have had something to do with the fact that he was banned from sitting on the couch or really going anywhere that didn't have a hard, easy to clean surface. Just kidding. Sort of. Okay, we did make him sit on a towel on the couch. Still, attitudes were positive. After all, accidents were all part of the OPTBC agenda. Then came another. And another. And another. And...somewhere between 2 and 3 p.m. and the sixth or seventh accident - Patty Positive left for the beach and Nancy Negative showed up. It was somewhere around this general time frame that, after cleaning up yet another accident and taking a few deep breaths, I recall that I got down on the floor with him, took him gently, yet firmly by the arms, looked him in the eye and said, "Ian, do you want to go on the potty?" He said yes. "Then you need to tell us and get to the potty before you go. We can't do this for you. You have the power to decide if you want to go potty on the potty or continue having accidents. So, just let us know when you want to start going on the potty." Or something profound like that.

Not all that long after that we were downstairs and I heard, "Mommy, I have to go pee peeeee!!!" We all jumped up and ran to the bathroom like our lives were at stake. He sat down. And he went! There was jumping. There was cheering. There was hugging. And most importantly, there were M&Ms. For all of us! Now, I can't recall the exact sequence of events at this point - but from the hours of approximately 4 or 5 p.m. and 8 p.m., and into Sunday - suddenly Ian was declaring his need to use the toilet about every five minutes. And a few times he went. But more often, he'd eek something out and declare that he was deserving of an M&M. We'd no sooner have him put back together, hands washed, stool put back, sit back down and the process would start all over again. Hmmm....now wait a minute here. It didn't take us long to figure out that we were being played like a fiddle. Barely one challenge conquered before another one began. Sigh. Later on Sunday - when we couldn't take being tied to the house anymore (minus one quick and frantic trip to Fred Meyer earlier that day) - we ventured over to the neighbors' house to check out their new margarita machine. Correction. One of us checked it out while the other one "enjoyed" a strawberry icee with the three, four and five year olds. (Are we having fun yet?) Our neighbor said, "Are you using the M&Ms as reward for going?" "Um, yeah." "Oh, we made that mistake too." "You have to reward them for staying clean and dry all day." "Oh, that makes much better sense!" I guess I missed that page of the manual. So after we got back home we informed Ian that there had been a slight change in the reward plan, which he seemed okay with.

By Monday morning, things were going downright well. The every five minutes thing had subsided and he hadn't had an accident since Saturday afternoon. Things were going so well that we even ventured out on some errands. On Wednesday morning, I happily delivered him to school where he proudly announced to his teacher that he was wearing underwear. Which reminds me that my child - who normally will not say a peep to strangers who try to be friendly with him - also out of the blue announced to the checkout cashier at the grocery store the day before that he was wearing underwear. Luckily she must have had kids or something because she seemed very excited for him.

Our accident-free streak continued, minus one or two nighttime issues that weren't Ian's fault, for several days until just this Tuesday. Just prior to his "rest time" we had a little behavior challenge where I let him get the better of me (bad me) and immediately after that he had a clearly on-purpose accident in his underwear (I won't go into the gory details). But then immediately ran to sit on the potty to finish up, so I guess he wasn't completely committed to it. But that seemed to be an isolated incident. So far, at least.

However, I won't say that the process has been challenge-free. Remember last time when I said that he complied with staying in his room despite his newfound freedom out of the crib? Um yeah, well we regressed on that front slightly. In an effort to help him advance to being completely trained (including at night) we told him that if he was ever in his room and felt like he needed to go - that he should feel free to come out and go to the bathroom, ask for help if he needed it and then go back to his room. I'm pretty sure I saw a little sparkle in his eye and a devilish grin on his face when we revealed this new detail to him. Because not long after he was suddenly needing to go potty an awful lot during rest time - and more surprisingly since he's always been a champ about going to bed at night - after bedtime. One night last Thursday or so he appeared in the living room half naked long after we thought he was asleep declaring he had gone potty! Upstairs we went to get cleaned up and ushered him back to bed, only for it to happen two more times before the hour was up. And it was during So You Think You Can Dance for crying out loud. The nerve!

Once again faced with a new challenge and really not sure what to do in order to continue to encourage him to go while sending the message that games are not acceptable - we finally went with our gut and imposed a consequence for every time he got up to go and didn't actually produce. It sort of worked because things slowed down right after that, but challenges remain. Last night I was out and Jeff found him wandering around upstairs after bedtime - not even under the pretense of needing to sit on the potty. Just out of bed wandering. You know, just because he can. And, we are having issues in the morning as well. Last Saturday he showed up by our bedside just before 6 a.m., which should just flat out be against the law. This, of course, was really the inevitable part of ditching the cage-like sleeping arrangements. And people wonder why we held out as long as possible...

Which brings me back around to the meaning of the title of this entry. For some strange reason, I was under the impression that potty training is, in part, such a huge milestone because no more diapers would equal much less work for mom and dad. But since we embarked on this adventure I have sadly learned that this is not the case. So far, at least. In fact, I could make several arguments to the contrary: that Ian being potty trained is actually MORE work now. First of all, he is far from being self sufficient now. We have finally started to put our foot down (again, and impose a consequence) for his tendency - and clear enjoyment - for pulling everything off, going potty - and then just running out of the bathroom to declare Mission Accomplished! with no clothes on. At which point we have to get him back to the bathroom, help with any necessary clean up, help him get his underwear right side out again, make sure he gets them on by himself without dawdling for 20 minutes, and make sure he washes his hands without throwing water all over the bathroom (or with the case downstairs, he can't even reach the sink by himself, even on a stool). Then there's the whole sleep disturbance (for all of us) and wandering out of his room issue. And I haven't even touched on the whole new level of anxiety associated with outings, especially ones where we know there will not be a clean restroom or sometimes, any restroom nearby.

Still, apparently I hear that this whole learning to use the potty is a good thing in the long run, so I guess we'll stick with it. And I have to say that I probably had more anxiety over how to tackle this whole potty training thing possibly more than any other part of parenting so far. While much of it has been about just going with our gut instinct, I must admit that there was many a day when I just felt lost on how exactly to go about training, despite reading about different techniques. I also had more than one person tell me that I needed to be prepared that OPTBC may not be successful because even though we were ready, he may not be ready. But we are very proud of him and looking back, I have to say that once we all pushed off the deep end and made a focused effort on mastering the core skills, if you will, it was a relatively quick and painless process. Hopefully I will not be eating those words any time soon.

Until I write again.

NOTICE: To protect the innocent, no pictures are provided with this entry.

May milestones, part one

I'd be remiss if I let too much time go by without writing about some big milestones that occurred in the Burpo house last month. (Which, by the way, may have had something to do with the fact that I did not post at all last month.) Of course I already mentioned the big first trip to Disneyland. In addition, we also had a very fun visit from Grandpa Chris and Grandma Karen who were, among other things, kind enough to help us get our front and back yard looking quite lovely for spring. However, there was other big news as well! Three "newsworthy" events, as a matter of fact. And, just so I don't make this one very long and boring post, I've decided to write about them in separate posts. So, here's a recap of the first event of the month:

At last, I'm very proud to report that we can now safely say that Ian will not still be in his crib when he starts high school. Or even kindergarten. Yes folks, as of mid-May he started sleeping in a real, full-size bed. After months of deliberation on furniture, bedding, wall colors, etc., etc. the room finally started coming together on a Saturday morning the second or so weekend of May. And let me say that it was a truly exhausting weekend at that. Grandpa Chris and Grandma Karen had just departed that Friday morning. With Maria still on the DL, the house was due for yet another cleaning, so - after picking up all the paint supplies for Ian's new room - I spent a good chunk of the day doing some manual labor. Woe is me. By Friday eve, as usual, my dogs were barking - which is exactly how you want to feel when you are about to wake up early the next morning to start painting and putting together furniture for a bedroom.

Without going through all the gory details of striped walls that later became unstriped or how perhaps it wasn't the best idea in the world to tackle an all-weekend project the very weekend the grandparents left and we had no time to give Ian any attention - not to mention that his room was torn up - let's just say that by that Sunday eve I was pretty sure that I had been flattened by a Freightliner (run on clean diesel, of course). And Jeff wasn't looking so hot either. It wasn't until a couple of nights later though that we actually put sheets on and Ian spent his first night in his new bed. (And about two weekends later - with the Disney trip in between - that we got the crib down and out of the room.)

The great news is that the transition went off without a hitch, which is I guess what happens when you keep a kid in their crib until almost 3.5 years old. He was so excited to sleep in a real bed and be out of the cage that he even willingly complied when we told him that he was not allowed to come out of his room at nap time or in the morning unless we came in and told him it was okay. Such a naive boy.

I know that a couple of you have asked to see pictures of the finished product. And honestly, I've hesitated to post them because in my mind, the room isn't finished yet and still looks pretty plain. The IKEA lamps I had hoped would work on the bedside tables did not - so that purchase is still TBD. There are picture frames on the dresser with no pictures in them yet (even though the PB signs that come with the frames are quite lovely). We bought knobs for the dresser that need to be installed (more from a functionality standpoint than a looks standpoint). And last but certainly not least - the walls are still strikingly bare. I have a couple of prints (from the Creative Thursday artist on Etsy) on order for framing along with some shelving ideas for above the bed, but it hasn't happened yet. I guess I needed a bit of a break from bedroom decor. So, below is what the room looks like now. I'll post updated pictures in the future when we eventually apply the finishing touches, so to speak.

And as an aside - eventually we'll be replacing the chair and potentially the bookcase since those items will be needed elsewhere before too long. Also, after going back and forth about ten million times on the paint color(s) for the room, I'm happy - no, relieved - to report that I was very pleased with the finished product, which ended being an accent wall of Benjamin Moore's Jalapeno Pepper and another BM more neutral green...of which the name is escaping me right now. Which just shows I'm definitely getting older because normally I would not forget such things. But I guess that's a post for another day.

Until I write again.