Well, at least I won't have to have salad for dinner to compensate . . .

I can't believe I'm going to tell this story. It really makes me look bad in soooo many ways. But after reading Laura's post-I figured I could share too.

So-this week we've been potty-training and Josie's been wearing underwear to daycare. Well-the first day wasn't great-right off the bat she had a BM in her underwear. So-I've got two plastic baggies of clothes from daycare to deal with. I didn't get to them until today. Yeah-you see where this is going, right?

I had gone to the store earlier to buy a sled for the upcoming snow and passed by a Doritos display. Now I love me some Doritos-so I bought some. I went home to kill an hour before picking up Josie and indulged in said Doritos and People's Court.

Before heading out-I decided maybe I should start a load of laundry and was greeted with the plastic bags of grossness on the washing machine. Oh yeah . . .

Open the nasty bag and realized that the undies hadn't been, uh, "scraped" . . .(man i don't know how folks with cloth diapers do it). Anyway-I headed to the bathroom to deal with it and immediately started gagging. Now-I can deal with poopy diapers. Not a huge deal-not fun, but better than PUKE-but to clean off the underwear that's been sitting in a plastic bag is disgusting. Because you get to see it all real close and personal. (OMG-am I really writing about POOP?) I kept gagging until soon-back up came the Doritos. At least I was standing right over the toilet.

so yeah-this potty training thing is going to be dandy.

Today-not a single accident at daycare. But then-she hasn't done the deed yet either. . .

Snowy Day in the PNW

it was snowing pretty hard the other day-so I picked Josie up early from daycare and we went for a walk in the snow. She was pretty excited. But not about the new hat, gloves, boots and coat. Threats were involved. She really didn't know what to make of the gloves-she kept holding up her hands with her fingers splayed for the longest time.

I can't believe how big she looks in these pictures.




We decided to walk down to the little lakes on our property and see if the ducks were okay. It is so weird to see lakes freeze up in the Willamette Valley/Portland area. Beautiful but weird. The lakes had a coating of ice on them in the morning and then another layer of snow by late morning.




Where's the ducks?



There they are! The poor things came barreling out of the water when they saw us-no doubt hoping we had food. We're not supposed to feed the ducks-it's a natural area-but obviously some people do since the ducks followed us for about 5 minutes hoping . . . .








We were out for about an hour and Josie did great til we headed back up the hill for home. She whimpered and whined the whole way-not even wanting me to pick her up. She was so tired. I wanted to laugh at her-cuz it was really kind of funny-but thought she probably wouldn't appreciate it too much. Hot chicken noodle soup and a nap did the trick.

Thanks sweetie!

We've had unusual weather for the Pacific NW this week-several days in a row of sub freezing temps and snow. I'm a complete wuss when it comes to driving in the snow. Normally, we get very wet snow that melts within hours. So-the conventional wisdom of us webfeet is to just stay put til it melts.

Well-that was difficult this week. Unless you completely put your life on hold-you gotta figure things out. On Tues I drove into work and had no problems so on Wed-I took Josie to daycare. It started snowing pretty hard so I left early and picked her up (I have an escort, no chains). Anyway-when I got her in her carseat I looked back and said-"So-do you think Mama can do it? Can I get us home safely?" She nodded with her thumb in her mouth.

When I got home I pulled in the garage and said "Yay-we made it!"

Josie piped up from the backseat, "Good job Mama!"

Stalling . . .

Scene: Mom and I hanging out in the living room after I've put Josie to bed.
Time: 9:15pm

Voice over the baby monitor: "Hey guys? Whatcha doin?"

December wedding . . . .

On Saturday, the son of my parent's neighbors and also the kid I used to babysit got married to a lovely girl I hadn't met until then . . . Josie did great during the ceremony. My nephew Josh was the ringbearer and Josie seemed to be a little jealous that he was walking next to the flower girl-a little girl she didn't know. "She's too big! She's too big!" she kept saying. Not exactly sure what that meant or what was going on in that little mind of hers . . . but I think she was jealous.

I dressed Josie up all in red with a really cute dress and ribbons in her hair. She hated the ribbons-we had to retie them a million times, trying to keep them out of her face. The dress unfortunately was a little big on her-but still very cute. She looks wonderful in red.

I had the hardest time getting a good picture-the lighting in the place was dim and there were lots of twinkle lights. When I could get a decent picture-she wouldn't smile. Oh well . . . .






Josie and Josh-whenever these two are around each other there is lots of tussling and touching. Josh just can't keep his hands off of her . . .



My niece Marina with Josie.




Josie with Grandma.


My brother Jeff and my SIL Marie.



Jeff and Mina.


More Josie and Grandma (she's going to kill me for this!)




Josie on the dance floor.


Josie and Josh dancing . . . yes I know it looks like they are wrestling . . . .

Playing in leaves

Sesame Street Live!

couple of weekends ago-Josie and I went down to Eugene and attended Sesame Street Live with Shula and Anh and Shu's sister.

The kids did great-Anh was mesmerized during the whole thing and didn't appear to move a muscle. Josie fidgeted more-but did really well. She sat on my lap for most of it. The look on her face when the curtain went up and Bert and Ernie came out was priceless!

It was a pretty long show-2 hours with an intermission. The performance was at the Holt Center and we went to the 10:30am show. When we got there we were surprised and amused to see a bar serving beer and wine. But, by the time Bert came out in a white disco pantsuit-I was longing for a beer!


Waiting around before the show . . . .


Shula and Anh



Josie getting excited.



"leave me alone mom-I'm trying to watch Elmo!"




During intermission-they came out with this insane bundle of Elmo balloons. The lighting inside made it difficult to get a picture-but I'm showing it anyway. Josie and I spent intermission watching the Elmo balloons that got away float up to the top of the ceiling.




The aforementioned disco outfit (pic doesn't do it justice. Plus you can't see him dancing.)


The kids with their Elmo balloons (Thanks Tamara!) Luckily-these didn't sing!

For those of you who think I don't post enough pics of Josie . . . .

Here you go.

They were all so cute, I couldn't help myself. And I didn't even post all of them either. I was a little camera happy that day.

After the playground on Saturday-we met up with Shali and Priya (another little girl adopted from Vietnam.) They were born in the same month. Priya is a little firecracker! They both had a blast running around the rest of Laurelhurst Park.







We told them to "smile" for the camera. This is what we got.




The duck pond





All the LEAVES!








TA DA! (What she is celebrating-I have no idea. She's generally always proud of herself.)



Taking a break . . .




"Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going? " Or maybe she's just messing her pants.

Yeah-I'm betting on the pants . . .




"Hey-is your mom driving you nuts with the camera, too?"



Hugs!



TA DA! (Obviously, neither of them seem to have any self-esteem issues!)



Shali and the girls.

There's probably a dog in the vicinity . . .


"Hey-on the count of three-let's make a break for it!"



I love how putting a photo in B&W makes you feel like a professional photographer.







It looks like their own little version of Follow the leader. . . .


WooHoo! A big PILE of leaves!