This is My Forties

Since we've been mostly home we thought we'd give potty training another shot (after a couple weeks of psychological warfare).  SOLD!  Brennan's going on his own now all the time.  He still has accidents, but not very often.  We didn't have to intervene much.  I just told him if he wanted to wear diapers like a baby, I'd have to treat him like a baby in every other way: no more helping, pressing buttons, getting dressed, feeding the dog, feeding himself.  He likes being a big boy so that's all it took.  Kids with OCD take a long time to knock out of a routine... so, while it may seem like it'd be confusing to go back & forth like we did, it's actually a way of relieving stress from a highly routined OCD child.  I wish I would have done it this way with Tristan instead of the "never look back" way.  All our boys are routined little obsessive compulsive children.  They're a different breed.

We've been working hard on getting the house (and ourselves) ready for the big move back to the States.  All last week Josh was on leave and we spent that time picking through all our possessions, deciding what to sell or give away or toss.  We ended up with 3 van-fulls of junk, half a garage of sell, and another pile of give away clothes & baby stuff.  I didn't realize we had so much laying around.  The playroom was by far the biggest contributor to our piles.  We needed to downsize since it's highly unlikely we'll be moving into a home with a large playroom with built-in storage like this one.  The kids were absolutely fine with everything, as long as they got to help throw it away. This is the "Punto Limpio".  It's a neighborhood DIY recycling center.  Everything is sorted into specific categories: small home appliances, woods, metals, mattresses, big appliances, chemicals, batteries, paint, motor oil, glass, clothing.  ...

The week leading up to spring break was fabulous.  We had sunshine and glorious mid-sixties temperatures.  The day spring break began, that all stopped.  As we all know, it takes rain for things to grow!!  I was worried everything was going to be dead this year following such a dry winter.  However, during spring break?! Non-stop rain and even snow until Easter Sunday (the last day of spring break... of course!).  We made do.  We watched a lot of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.  The boys were given full reign of the house basically.  I knew by the following week we'd be doing some hardcore cleaning and Josh would still be home so it didn't bother me. By Saturday it was time to decorate cookies and eggs, which is always an "inside" event anyway.  We had more than enough cookies and icing, and more than enough eggs to go around this time. Tristan didn't want to get his mitts dirty so he gave Josh orders on what to do with his...