The Tyler I. identity

We named Tyler knowing his name was becoming a popular name and my plan was to give him a nickname. It never happened. When I text people I sometimes refer to him as Ty but I never call him that in person. Others have tried calling him TJ, Lil T, Tman, and a few other atrocious nicknames. Nothing sounded right. Sure we call him funny nicknames like bubs, buddy, midget, little boy, cutie, and so on but none are appropriate for a school setting.

So because of this we are stuck with the "I'm Tyler I." identity. I was a Sarah A. my whoooooole life. I never had a nickname except for a few nasty ones I would rather forget about. Mike started calling me Lee and it's nice to be the only Lee I know. I hated roll call at school and answering to Sarah A. or when there was another Sarah A. because yes that happened, then I was referred to by my full name. I never got to be Sarah. If my parents had intended for my to be called Sarah A. I'm sure they would have mentioned it. 

I don't want my kid to be referred to as Tyler I. But what can I do? Really? Can I start a nickname now? And what would it be? Certainly not one of the horrible ones people tend to use for a Tyler. I've tried asking him if he wants to be referred to as Tyler James which we do call him occasionally, or something else at school but he says no. And now when he introduces himself to people outside of school he calls himself Tyler I.

I know that he wont always refer to himself as Tyler I. but he will forever be just one of many Tyler's. Sure its our fault because we knowingly named him a popular name. No I wouldn't change his name but I would like to be able to skip the first name and last initial faze. Mike was probably a Mike I. and he of course is so easy going that it wouldn't bother him but it bothered me when I was a kid. It may never bother Tyler but what if it does?  What will he do? One day just come up with a nickname for himself? And how long will that take to stick? Or am I supposed to start something now? Nothing cheesy or lame, just something simple yet different. Not a name he must always be referred by but a second name to use like I do. 

What kind of nickname could I give him if I choose to do so? Any suggestions?

First sick day

I figured once school started within a week Tyler would be home sick. He's never gotten sick much just minor viruses here and there. When it didn't happen the first or second week I was surprised. Of course it finally caught up to us and today Tyler had his first sick day from school.

I gave my little man a choice of going to school today or going to the doctor... he picked going to school but his cough was just to bad so I had to make the choice for him. He wasn't happy about that but too bad. 

We have always been really careful about germs with our kids. We try to keep them away from sick kids but we knew eventually we wouldn't be able to control that anymore. And that day is here. Now we get to look forward to the next 14 or so years of crazy sicknesses from school. What have we gotten ourselves into??

12 things I do just to bother my kids (so they would say)

1. Set a bedtime
2. Enforce bedtime
3. Not let them have candy for dinner
4. Ask them to be quiet while I'm on the phone
5. Request that they not pee on my floors
6. Make them get dressed each morning
7. Demand they stop hitting and kicking each other
8. Make them try each type of food on their plate before they can have something else
9. Ask them to not run away when I open the door of the house or car
10. Tell them to put their dirty dishes in the sink
11. Say because I said so just because I was tired of answering their repeating questions
12. Push them to the side of the bed when they climb in my bed in the middle of the night

Micro chipped

I've said his before and I'll say it again. When my kids start going out on their own I will have them micro chipped. I don't give a fuck if people think it's in humane or whatever. I'd rather be the parent known for still having their child with a micro chip than the parent who's child went missing out of their fucking driveway!!! When my kids come of age they can take the chip out themselves for all I care but it's not happening before 18.

We were walking by the missing child board at Walmart the other day and I glanced up like I always do and it hit home. There have been more than 11,000 missing children on the Walmart missing child board since 1986! That's almost 400 kids that went missing in a year! And that's just Walmarts page. I'm scared to know what the numbers are for children who have gone missing since then. Hell I'm scared to know the stats of how many kids go missing a day! I'm sure these numbers are scary to most parents. Obviously some are part of why those kids are missing but for the normal parent that's frightening!

I know I make jokes a lot about how much I can't stand my kids and for someone to just kill me but I would rather give up a limb or an organ than to know that some monster is out there doing god knows what to my kid. I do not know what I would do if my kids went missing. I'd probably break into every house or building and search every inch of the ground until I found them that's for damn sure.

I don't watch or read the news because every time I do it's about someone dying or missing. It's an awful awful world we live in. There are so many monstorous disgusting abominations out there it's hard to look at what's going on. If I knew a way to change all that I would, in a heartbeat but I can't. That is why I want to take extra measures to make sure my kid is safe. I'm not sure why other parents aren't already doing this. Maybe they are and they just want to keep it to themselves, I don't know. All I know is that when I have to start letting my kids actually grow up away from me you bet your ass I'll be taking precautionary measures! 

What are you? A dog?

You know those people who have to answer their front door with it cracked open and their head is sideways so the rest of their body can stay behind the door to keep it closed because they have a pet that might escape? Yeah, that's me. Except I don't have any pets! Just 2 kids It's like the second the front door opens they shoot for it and try to see who it is and then once they see that then they decide it's time to escape. I have to push Lil back like a dog because she tries to squirm through to get out.

If the front door is left open you bet your ass she will run down the end of the street like a dog and you have to chase her down. And she runs fast so it's like chasing a friggin dog!

 

I mean they are good kids but what the hell? Is the stop sign surrounded by poop at the end of the road that interesting? Is going over there to take a squat to claim her territory? She is caught everytime so wouldn't you assume she would have learned not to run away by now? You'd think so right? Well apparently not. Maybe I should just get her a shock collar so she gets shocked if she leaves the property. But in sure there would be a day when we were in a hurry and I forgot to take the collar off her. Now that. THAT would be funny.

No of course I wouldn't actually do that to my kid... Or would I?

Potty training in reverse

Tyler was doing so good for a while with going on the potty. Now all of a sudden he is back to peeing and pooping his pants. It's so frustrating! Half the time he does it the second after you ask him if he has to go on the potty because he is holding himself. I don't know what caused this back tracking but it's pissing me off. I am so tired of doing laundry every day and cleaning up all the floors and furniture from pee stains. I swear if he doesn't fix it soon I'm putting him back in diapers! I just can't take it anymore!!

Good job Mommy

Tyler is the sweetest little boy ever, sure he has his bad evil moments but most of the time he is very sweet and loving and forever praising us. His newest lines are good job mommy or I'm proud of you mommy.

Mike and I have joked with each other saying you just don't appreciate me like Tyler does, and its true. Tyler will tell you that you did a good job for going to work today, or for unloading the groceries, or helping him fix a toy. Everything you do he is commending you for it, and since we started the potty training and we kept telling him how proud we were of him he now lets us know he is proud of us by just randomly telling us that.

It is so rewarding to see what an amazingly sweet boy he is, when his sister is in trouble he stands up for her and tells us not to yell at her, he hugs her and tells her it is going to be ok. I have seen these acts of kindness from older kids but never one as young as him and it touches my heart every time he does something so sweet. He is a gift, we are so thankful to blessed with such an amazing little boy!

Potty Training

So we have been doing the potty training thing with Tyler for about three weeks now. I finally decided it was time to put my foot down and get him trained. I put it off for so long because he gets these weird panic attack things and I didn't want to set him off and then wind up potty training at 5 or 6. I must have really hyped myself up to think it was going to be so miserable, when in all reality it was actually really simple.

We started the training on Tuesday and by Wednesday night he had it down. He was going on the potty and at one point he started to pee but stopped himself and ran to the potty to go. I think he was doing so good because he got candy, stickers, chips, donuts, as many drinks, as he wanted and he got to watch tv all day for a few days. He was in heaven and all he had to do for this was sit on the potty, what a great thing for him, he didn't even fight it!

I thought because things went so well with him that I would work on Lily the following week, and then when that week came I realized how crazy I was because its Lily and she likes to make things difficult. Although she has gone on the potty a couple of times she has of course peed next to it just as much. She has also fallen into the toilet, put the portable potty seat on her head, put her hands in the pee and licked them, and she tries to pee on the furniture. If you were thinking she sounds like a dog you would be right! Somehow everything she does tends to be more along the lines of what a canine would do. She is smart but very animalistic with lots of things which makes her so difficult to handle!

I know I cant put off training her forever, and I will probably suck it up in a few days and train her, but for now until I can find the right amount of energy to deal with that I have to keep her in onesies otherwise she strips naked and pees on things. Oh the life of owning a human dog!

  

  

Enough with the bragging!

So clearly Lily does not like me telling people nice things about her. I guess she likes being known as the trouble child who does nothing good. Last night I had dinner with a few friends and her sleep habits came up. I expressed how much easier things are with Lily when it comes to naps or feeding or anything that we made a bigger deal about with Tyler. It happens, you put so much effort into making sure your first child is happy all the time and by the time you get to the second you just want it to be as easy as possible even if that means they don't get as much attention in something that the first child did.

Well Lily decided she would show me for saying what a good sleeper she was. She woke up screaming bloody murder at 2:20 and refused to go back to sleep till after 5:00. Mike and I were up with her at different times trying to rock her or pat her butt or do anything to get her to go back to sleep. Finally after 5:00 she fell asleep clinging to me while I laid down in my bed. I have now learned my lesson and will no longer brag about anything she does so that I won't have to risk having another terrible night like last night. Thank you Lily lesson learned, but I will be keeping track of times like that to hold over your head in the future... Just saying.

The vacuum is now a toy

It used to be that when I would turn on the vacuum the kids would scatter. They were afraid of it. Well now it seems that it isn't so scary anymore and they have deemed it a very fun toy. Yeah, so you can only imagine how difficult it has become for me to vacuum the house!

The cord is now a jump rope, and it is also in a game called who can pull the cord out of the wall first. They run in front of me while I'm vacuuming so that they can get chased by it, of course it chases them! And I become to busy trying to prevent certain games or making others happen that vacuuming takes about an hour longer than it should. It is a pain in the butt to push that vacuum around but at least the kid enjoy the game so what more could I ask for?

Party all night

The other night I went out and had dinner with a couple of my girlfriends. On my way home I got the picture that's below saying your buddy is up waiting for you. I get home a few minutes later and see this cute little face bouncing around the room like I have never seen! I was sure she had been given some adrenaline but she wasn't she was just so excited to be up past bedtime that she was bouncing off the walls!

She would not let Mike put her to bed that night so he thought she was waiting for me, she has been difficult like that in the past. Well she wouldn't let me put her to bed either, she is at the age where she thinks everyone is doing fun stuff without her so she doesn't want to go to sleep, EVER. Nap time is a battle and so is bed time, and as much as it hurts my ears I just let her cry it out because I need a break from that little girl because she is just tooooo much sometimes!! And I am so happy she is still in her crib because if she had a regular bed she would be such a nightmare!

I just look forward to this faze passing FAST! Good luck to anyone else who is going through this faze with their kids, it is no fun!

The "playground"

It is nice that we have a house now with a screened in porch. I think this is on my list for a must have when we go house hunting next year! Tyler refers to this area as his "playgound" because all his outside toys are here. It is very convient to let them play out there while I work on cleaning up this dirty house. And it is nice to see them having fun outside without all the actual bugs that are outside outside!

 

Are your ears broken?

This is something I have to ask Tyler sometimes. But now I seem to be asking Lily this question more than I ever asked Tyler. I thought that children startle when you yell no at them, I thought that they learned from their mistakes (like ouch that hurt so I won't do that again). Well this does not seem to happen with Lily. No matter how many times she will get hurt doing something she never seems to learn. No matter how many times she has to sit in time out, get yelled at, even butt pats, she still does it again and again.

I am very afraid of how she may be when she gets older. If she has such a  problem listening and learning how not to do things now then I can only imagine what she will be like as a teenager. I do not look forward to those days at all.

And what happened to kids not getting terrible until they were 2 or 3? Since when do they become terrible before 1? Somebody needs to work on getting the right information out there, I may have rethought things if I knew it would be like this. It is possible that one day she will be sent off to military school if she keeps on this track...

The demon was here yesterday

Lily was inhabited by a demon yesterday.

The day consisted of many temper tantrums and a lot of physical accidents from doing things she isn't supposed to and has gotten hurt doing in the past. Somehow she just never seems to learn, or just doesn't care.

Although she was being a naughty girl a lot yesterday I couldn't help but feel bad for her. She had a terrible diaper rash that just kept getting worse and worse. Her teeth are driving her crazy popping up all over her mouth, Finally! And then in between all these naughty acts where these cute little smiles and giggles that just made her naughty unforgivable behavior so forgivable.

And although this behavior is happening more often it does not mean it is cute each time. And it does not mean it is ok, but sometimes I just can't help but sit back and watch her and just smile or laugh. She is a strange little creature and she drives me more insane then I could have ever thought possible but days like yesterday make me think its so worth it.

Clearly this is not my day

I had originally planned a very different blog for today. After all I am going wedding dress shopping for the very first time today. But of course the night before cant ever go smoothly when I have things planned for the next day. Mike went out with his friend which usually means the kids all of a sudden start waking up and not going back to sleep in the middle of the night, and of course last night was no exception. Last night consisted of 4 torturous hours of on and off crying from Lil.

And then this morning I am up at 8 with Tyler even though Lily kept him up some of the night too. After all why would he want to sleep in on a day that I its my turn to get up with him. Yesterday was Mikes turn to wake up with the kids and of course they slept in till after 9:30, but luck is never good so I knew this was coming before I even went to bed last night and I was ok with waking up early. I would have even been ok with Lil waking up in the middle of the night, but waking up and refusing to go back to sleep for 4 hours is another thing!

It is obvious that next time I have something important going on the next day that I ask Mike to reschedule his plans to another time where I don't have things going on so that we can split the time we are up with the kids. But that wouldn't even happen when he is here, it only happens when he is out, every time. Its like they know he isn't there, which is impossible because he leaves after they are asleep! It is just the fate I suffer through every time, but if I am being honest I don't know how much more I can really take...

 

Another Party success!

Thank you to everyone who came to Lily's first birthday party! We are happy we could celebrate it with our close friends and family! <3

 

 

This is the cupcake from her actual birthday

Obviously she enjoyed it!

 

My princess

 

 Leopard print undies

She loves her big present!

Who knew air could be so much fun!?

Tyler helped Lil blow out her candles

Eating cake on her throne!

The only thing Tyler would eat was chips... go figure!

She should be the duck face model, or just a model

 My sweet Lily was in our local paper the Palm Coast Observer. They captured her in one of her funny face moments at last weeks Easter Egg Hunt.

This one is of Mike and Lils "mean mugging" the camera

This last is the famous "duck face" which she enjoys making on a daily basis. She will totally be a model one day, maybe soon.

Breakfast with the family

This morning I will be going to breakfast with my two kids, my mom and my brother. The last time they went out to eat with us was my birthday in October. When Lily was still little and would sit on your lap. Now she struggles to get out of the high chair and Tyler is always as miserable as ever. He doesn't like sitting still for more than five seconds and he hates to eat! So going to a restaurant for him is no fun. But of course it always takes an hour because Lily eats like a beast and so do I so it takes a while to feed the two of us. Plus all the movement between the two kids and trying to get them to sit still and be quiet takes up some time. These two are in for a rude awakening eating breakfast out with my kids. Wish me luck that they don't walk out on us...

Mediocre mom

I sometimes do just the bare minimum with my kids.

There are just days where I am too exhausted from the day before to do tons of learning or playing with the kids. I will just turn on the tv and monitor the kids while they run around and I just try and keep them from killing themselves or each other. Today is one of those days.

 

Don't have kids Thursday, or you life will be like this...

The events of Lily on Wednesday that I was able to capture. This is only a 10 minute span. Now you can understand how my day each day goes.



She climbed over this chair to get from this room to the train room...

...to sit here and destroy the train set...

...to get put in baby jail...

...only to escape minutes later.