Toilet Training Progress

Dominic continues to do well...

(Ok, I have to break here. I'm typing this while DominicsMom listens to the weather on Channel 9. The weatherman is John Coleman, a fixture at the station for however many years. He's an older gentleman who has developed his own, particular, style of delivering the weather forecast. "Kay Youuuuuu S I...." he intones as he delivers the station call sign. Then his annoying delivery and lately he plays music which he dances to... Often, before the weather forecast begins, he gives a weather teaser before the TV goes to a break. He usuallys says, "No flipping!" I immediately change the channel when I hear this... DominicsMom likes to watch this channel to just annoy me as she loves the pained expressions that I make when I'm forced to watch.)

Sorry, had to get that off my chest as I sit here getting dummer as I listen to the weather. (EDIT: see? I was getting dumber as I listened as I forgot how to spell...)

Ok, after our big push this weekend, we were worried how the little guy would do at pre-school. Monday, DominicsMom talked to his teachers and they said just send him to school in his little boy underwear (we had him in diapers on this day.) So today (Wednesday) was the first day he went to school without a diaper. He made it the whole day without an accident! Dominic came home wearing the same underwear and sweat pants he left in! We were so proud of him. He also did really well when he came home this evening, going pee twice on his own (once was to delay going to bed...)

He's getting to be such a big boy now! We still put him in a diaper for bedtime, but hopefully we can begin to work on that one soon.

Joss is doing really well too. She is crawling like a demon (except for the few times that we put her in a dress and she keeps tripping over it - then she just sits and demands to be held) and she should hopefully be walking soon. She is eating more and more solid food and has taken a dislike to baby food (it may be that she prefers to feed herself now and does not want us to do it, we are not sure.) It's great fun to watch her expression as she tries something new. She seems to like a lot of different things, hopefully she keeps that up and does not get as picky as Dominic is.

Must go, there are bottles to wash and sippy cups to put in the dishwasher.

DominicsDad

Toilet Tribulations - the Sunday Edition

Well, another day of toilet training. It actually went really well, only one 'accident' and that one stayed inside of his jeans and did not get on the rug. It is now safe to walk around the couch as all the wet spots are now mostly dry... The only one who still notices that there is a problem is Joss, but she hangs out nearer the ground than the rest of us.

Dominic is doing really well and is making great progress. He still has a problem with the whole pooping thing (see my previous post about two weeks ago...) When he needs to go and goes into his 'stance', we have to grab him, move him to his toilet, pull down his pants and his underwear, and then position him over/on/nearby his toilet. Of course by that point the urge to go is gone and he is generally just very pissed. So some more work is needed here.

This evening he did make us very happy ("Mommy proud Dominic!" "Yes, Mommy is very proud of Dominic!") We were getting him ready for a bath when he walked over to his toilet, raised the lid, leaned over it, and began to wee. That was the first time he did everything on his own (it helped that he didn't have any pants on because we were about to toss him into the tub.)

Today, back on the throne...
"What are we watching?"

DominicsDad

More Toilet Tribulations

Well, if you drop by the house this weekend, try to avoid some of the wet spots by the couch. And don't worry about the small spot of discoloration on the couch. No really, please ignore it...

This weekend we have ratcheted [DominicsMom – ‘stepped’] up the toilet training efforts with Dominic. We’ve been working on it for the last couple of months, but not wholeheartedly and he has been resisting a bit. So this weekend we decided to really get serious. We purchased the plastic-lined underwear and mentally prepared ourselves for the challenge. This morning we did not put him in diapers, but in underwear (cute Bob the Builder, Lightning McQueen, and Thomas the Tank Engine underwear.) The results have been mixed and he has gone through several changes of clothes. Mostly he has just wet his pants, but there are a few large wet spots on the carpet (and a small one on the couch…), but for the most part he has pee’d in his toilet.

We have been giving him more than the usual amount of liquids to drink, so he has had to go quite often. About every 15 minutes we ask him is he has to pee. Usually he says no, but we drop him on the toilet anyways and he ends up making water after a little bit. The accidents occurred initially when we actually listened to him and did not sit him on the toilet. For such a small guy, he has a pretty big bladder…

A few times he was squirming around like he was uncomfortable and when asked he said he had to pee. On these times he made a lot of wee-wee in his toilet and received a LOT of praise.

So overall we think he made some progress. He had a few big accidents (expected) but was always apologetic about it. He knows what he is supposed to do, but is now learning what the sensations are. He is getting used to going to the bathroom instead of wearing a diaper. He only wore a diaper when he passed out for a nap.

Here are a couple photos of him on the toilet and one of Jocelyn playing with a puzzle.

I'll let you all know how Sunday goes...

DominicsDad

The Truth from the Devil's Own Mouth

DominicsMom was at home today and she gave me a call at work. In the background I could hear the kids playing. At one point, I heard Jocelyn start to cry. DominicsMom asked Dominic, "Did you make her cry?"

"Yes!"

I heard the whole thing over the phone. He was so proud!

Mmmmmmm...Yum

Mmmmmmm.....Yum. DominicsMom has been holding out on me. Last week DominicsMama Pat and DominicsPapa Frank came down, and they stopped at Tom's Farms, located in Corona just off the I-15. They brought back some Chocolate Dipped Peanut Brittle. Yum. Of course, she failed to tell me about it and I didn't find them until the next day.

DominicsMom wanted them all to herself... You can't tell me that it doesn't look good!

Now, I like peanut brittle, but I won't go out of my way to get some. This stuff...Mmmmmm. Yum.

We will now make a point of stopping at Tom's Farms each time we go north to see DominicsMama & DominicsPapa. If anyone wants me to pick them up some Chocolate Covered Peanut Brittle, let me know. I just can't promise I won't eat it all before you get any.

Perhaps you ought to just order some online....

DominicsDad

The Tale of the Silver Pen

Some background…in mid-December DominicsMom’s family had a Christmas party and a gift exchange. I picked pretty early and received a bottle of champagne and two toasting flutes. Pretty cool. So that was stolen. I picked again (and cannot remember what I received) and towards the very end of the gift exchange, this gift was also stolen. I could either pick a new gift or steal someone else's gift, but I did not feel like doing that, so I grabbed the last gift bag. It was very promising, a Brookstone “gravity defying magnetic pen.” Brookstone uses plain, two-tone blue and white packaging so you could not really tell what was in it beyond the box description and a simple line drawing. However, I was rather excited to get it and decided to take it to work with me. The following is an e-mail I sent DominicsMom after I opened the box.

(NOTE: Please take the following in good humor! I wrote the following to be humorous and I actually enjoy the pen, it sits on my desk and I use it on occasion. When someone comes into my office and needs a pen, I usually offer them that one.)


Hey sweetie,
How has your morning been? Get off ok with Dominic? I dropped Joss off ok, although she did not initially want to go to Leonie. That little girl is funny!!

Just about the first thing I did when I got in the office was unpack the “gravity defying magnetic pen”. Truth in advertising must not be a big Brookstone concern. The box also says “strategically placed magnets suspend this amazing pen in its base.” Hmmm, yeah.

Ok, to begin from the beginning: When I pulled the pen out, it had a nice solid heft and feel to it as did its donut shaped base. Good initial impression.

Then I tried to place the pen in its holder to watch it float. It dropped point down into the base and flopped over to the side and fell out. Not good. So I turned the pen upside down and it fell out of the donut even faster…hmmm. Time to read the manual. I pulled apart the box and found the pamphlet, which is really more marketing brochure than instruction manual, which just repeats the junk on the box, plus some silly crap about exacting quality control standards. Quality control my @$$, the thing keeps falling over! It did give me some really good instructions on how to replace the ink cartridge, something like, “Grab the bottom, twist the top and replace the ink cartridge.” Dominic could do that…And the pamphlet has 8 pages where they really only have 1 page of material. I’m starting to feel gypped!

Ok, so the manual did not help. Looking at the box, my initial orientation of pen down was correct. So I tried again, but a bit more carefully. Nope, still won’t float over the base, but the pen tip did fall into a nice little indentation in the middle of the donut, and then with a little balancing action on my part, stand straight up in the donut. The pen appears to float!! Or more actually, it appears to rest inside the donut (at least not touching the sides) and wobble gently as my typing minutely shakes the desk. Wobbling is not floating and I really feel gypped now!

Well, with the very polished & shiny silver exterior of the pen and its base, to the uninitiated, it could appear to be ‘floating’. To me it looks like its resting in the base.

But I took a moment to ponder it and try and feel “the pen that ‘magically’ floats in air”. A slow nagging feeling began to take shape as I looked at it. Yep, it looks like a bright silver dildo sitting on my desk. So here I am, pondering the ‘floating’ pen as people wander by my office and sometimes came in to speak to me. They must all be wondering why I have a dildo sitting and wobbling on my desk….

Have a good morning!

Love,
DominicsDad

Locked Out - A Tale of Dominic

Not too long ago, I picked up Dominic, drove home, getting there about 15ish minutes before DominicsMom was due to arrive home with Jocelyn. For whatever reason, I unlocked the front door and walked outside, leaving Dominic inside to watch TV. When I had finished, I came back to the front door, depressed the door latch, and tried to open it. Uh-oh, it was locked. I’ve been a little forgetful lately (Ok honey, very forgetful) and so I paused a moment to confirm that I had come out the front door. I definitely had. (Our door only has a deadbolt and does not have a lock on the door knob.) My keys were not in my pocket, I had dumped them on the counter. The garage door was closed as I closed it after parking the car. The sliding glass door was locked…

At that moment, I heard movement behind the door, “Daddy?”

Yep, the little guy had locked me out.

“Dominic, did you lock the door?”

“Lock the door Daddy!”

Great…”Dominic, can you unlock the door?” At this point I heard him playing with the door knob and the deadbolt. He is just at the height where he can throw the deadbolt when he stands on his tippy toes, so he is not consistent in unlocking the door. I again asked, “Dominic, can you unlock the door?” I heard some more noise behind the door and then,

“Ahh caan’t do it…” (Great, he’s given up and I get his British accent to boot…)

“Dominic, try again.”

“Ahh caan’t do it.”

I went around to the window and could see the top of his head by the door. He eventually noticed me and climbed up on the couch and stared at me through the window with the biggest grin that I’ve seen. He thought it was funny that Daddy was locked out!

So I went back to the door and called for him to try again. He tried for a few moments and then gave up. I moved around to the sliding glass door and called him over. Our door has a small black lever that locks and unlocks the door. I told him to lift it up. It took a bit for him to find it, but then he couldn’t reach it as it was too high for him. I was beginning to wonder if I should walk to the street and wait for DominicsMom to arrive, but inspiration struck.

“Dominic, move your blue chair to the door!” Dominic has a blue lounge chair sized to fit him and it was sitting on the floor, somewhat near the door. He walked around it and then began to push it to me. After a bit of effort, it began to slide towards me and I began to rejoice. Then fate peed on my celebration as a corner of the chair caught on some books and it came to a stop. “Ahh caan’t do it…”

“Dominic, move the books! Good boy! Now push again!” He eventually moved the chair to within 6 inches of the door, enough for what I needed him to do..

I convinced him to stand up on his chair and reach for the black lever. He flipped it and I was in!

DominicsMom got home about 10 minutes later and had a good laugh when I told her the story.

DominicsDad

Recent Pictures

Did I say that I liked my new camera? It takes great shots and is really quick to start and to recycle between shots. ..

Joss giving Dominic a kiss.
Joss in her new, cute outfit.
Good picture of Jocelyn. DominicsMom took about a dozen photos of her sitting on the floor.
Huh?
Dominic and Penelope. Both kids adore the cat and she has started to return the favor.

Future blackmail material. Joss loves to play with Dominic's training toilet, so we have started to store it off the floor.

Joss received her flu shot this last weekend and is feeling some of the side affects now. She isn't too sick, but is feeling poorly enough to let us know about it...constantly. She is very clingy right now and does not want to be put down. I stayed home with her the other day and she napped on and off all morning in my arms. Everytime that I thought she had fallen deeply asleep, I would try to lay her down. She would then realize it and start to cry, so I had to pick her up again. Late morning she felt well enough to play, but after that I had to hold her for the rest of the day. She is keeping us up at nights too so staying awake at work is tough...I think she is getting better so hopefully all will be well soon.

DominicsDad

At the Park

The day after Christmas we went to our local park.

Someone did not quite make it up the slide...

DominicsDad

Christmas Morning

It was a rough Christmas Eve. Poor Jocelyn was sick and would wake up every half hour and sometimes would require five or more minutes of persuasion to go back to bed. Eventually, at around 4am she wouldn't go back down so I made her a bottle and hoped that she would fall back asleep in my arms. Two hours later, she finally did and I also passed out. DominicsMom snapped this photo about 7am.

Dominic was very excited for Christmas morning, we opened one gift and then DominicsMom made breakfast. After a quick breakfast the orgy of gift openings began. Both Dominic and Joss received a lot of great stuff (as did DominicsMom and I). Dominic was a big help, passing out gifts and generally helping out.

Dominic got a lot of Thomas the Tank Engine stuff (trains, track, puzzles, and books), a couple of videos, and clothes. Joss received a huge dragon/ball toy (more on that in another post), electronic books, and clothes. Dominic was funny when he received a box of clothes, he would look at it for a moment, drop it in disdain, and move on to the next gift.

Some pictures:

Joss & I asleep.

Joss plays with wrapping paper.

Dominic opens a Backyardian video (he loves them).

Joss plays with more paper.
Joss in the baby chair.
Joss pushing the walker.

It was a great Christmas. Thank you to all!

DominicsDad