A New Bathroom?

Will and I are sitting in bed, I am working on a baby quilt and Will is watching television. It is 10 pm. We hear little footsteps coming down the hallway. We hear Allie doing her semi-awake-cry-fuss that she does when she wakes up to pee at night. We hear her footfalls go past the bathroom and continue down the hall. We look out our door, and Allie has pulled down her pajama bottoms and is perched on the edge of the laundry basket, which is full of clean clothes and proceeds to pee in it. Will loses it and cannot function through all the tears and gales of laughter, so I get up and help her to the actual toilet and tuck her back into bed. She falls asleep immediately, and I take care of the laundry. That was a great laugh, I am sure she will love this story when she is older!

Lucky Girl

Maya: (trying in vain to see over her belly) "Momma, what kind of panties I have on?"
Mommy: You have Nemo panties today"
Maya" Oh, I have Nemo and you don't have Nemo and Ryleigh don't have Nemo panties, only I have Nemo panties. I the luckiest girl in the world."

I hope it stays this easy to make her feel lucky.

Jinxed

So the other day, Joanna asked if the girls ever fight. Honestly, it is a rare happening that they do. I don't know why or how, but they all get along pretty well. They always have. They do have disagreements about toys and space occasionally, but generally they are fairly agreeable. However, not three hours after I read Joanna's comment, I heard this:

Allie: THAT'S NOT FAIR! LILLY! I SAID THAT IS NOT FAIR! YOU ARE BEING A BIG MEAN MEANIE!

Lilly: I AM NOT A BIG MEAN MEANIE! YOU ARE A BIG MEANIE, YOU SAID I COULD USE THAT, AND I AM. YOU SAID IT WAS FINE!

Maya (in the background) Meanie, meanie, big mean meanie meanie meanie meanie....

Allie: YOU STOP BEING A MEAN MEANIE!

Lilly:YOU STOP IT RIGHT NOW I AM NOT MEAN!!

And it continued on from there. So, yes, they fight, but they never get physical with each other. They know that is unacceptable, and have yet to try that with each other because they know that. We are very lucky they get along so well, and we know that, and are super thankful for our girls who get along well but are a little nuts.

Outtakes

These were some of the gems we ended up with while trying for a good picture while we were locked out of the house. Will took the house key off the key ring and didn't put it back...Why do we have only one set of keys? We don't. We have (had) two, but they were misplaced by my dear sweet husband who claims he had nothing to do with their disappearance. Whatever. Every time they have gone missing, he has put them somewhere they shouldn't be. I figure they will turn up eventually. In the meantime, we took pictures. I even got some of Allie riding a flamingo, but I'll save those for another time.

Responsibilities for the Girls

We have been having trouble lately with the kids sort of slacking on their chores. Truth be told, we have been slacking on the enforcing of responsibilities. We just have so much fun playing and going on adventures that we got lazy. All of us. I tried going back to the way it was before the slacking, but that was a hard sell. To all of us. I decided I needed to shake things up a bit so I devised a plan. I went to Target and bought each girl a 16" by 16" colorful, magnetic, dry erase board. Then I went to the craft store and bought cardboard scrap booking decorations from the dollar bin and some magnets. I attached the magnets to the decorations to make pretty magnets. I then broke down the day into three parts; before school, after school, and after dinner. Each girl has different things to do listed in each part of her day. For Maya and Allie who don't read yet, there are pictures to describe the chores mixed in with the words. After each chore is completed, they get to use a dry erase marker and check off the chore for the day. This is something they love to do, so it works well. It looks like a lot of things, but they are things like, put your lunch box in your backpack and carry your backpack to the car. At the end of the day if everything is checked off, they earn a magnet. After they earn 10 magnets, they get to have special time doing the activity of their choice with the grown up of their choice. Nana is the chosen one so far. This method has worked so well, I wish I had thought of it sooner. It really helps with the cleaning of the playroom, too. I gave each girl a few specific jobs in there, so now once her specific job is done, even if the room is still messy because the others have not done their jobs, that girl can walk away and know she has done her part. Lilly is a lot happier, too because she doesn't end up doing the whole thing anymore when her sisters are slacking. All I have to say to them is, "your job is ________ " and they get right to it. I wish I had thought of it sooner.