The Big Day

October 21, 2013 was a momentous day in our house. Meili went three days without having an accident, and got the coveted Rapunzel doll. 

Potty training is a big deal in any household, but as my life goes, I think it was even harder than it should be. And now that I have potty trained (as I'm saying this I am crossing my fingers that she is actually potty trained, and there isn't some huge event, that sends her reverting right back) I will share all I know about potty training for all those who are wondering...

...

There. That's it. That's all I know about potty training-absolutely nothing.

I worked with parents for years, talking to them about potty training, and answering their questions. And this is how it usually went: they mentioned that they wanted to potty train their child, I would go over a checklist of how to know if your child is ready, then I would bring them a cute personalized potty chart, and a week later their child was potty trained-end of story. Well, now I know that either they were lying when they made everything sound so easy, or their is something "different" about either me or my child, because that was not life in our house. 

Here's how it went in our house (and I guess I'm keeping record of this so that I can show Meili in years to come, how much she OWES me, or maybe so that I can give hope to some other parent who is also dealing with a "different" child, or maybe just because this was such a big deal in our lives for such a long time, and I am so proud that we made it through to the other side.)

In February, (yeah, you heard me, February!) I decided that Meili wasn't necessarily ready but she was probably capable of being potty trained. She had the verbal ability, and patience to sit on the potty for several minutes at a time etc. However, it didn't necessarily bother her when she had a dirty diaper, and she didn't tell me when she had to go etc. But I thought I would just introduce the concept. She got a potty chair in October a year ago, and we had checked out a couple books from the library. So I printed up a chart and decided that we would just sit on the potty at regular times everyday. I had heard that once kids were successful once, for a lot of them it just clicked. I bought pull-ups, and she got to put a sticker on the chart every time she tried, and a prize every time she was successful. On day 2, I believe we had 3 successes-and I was so excited, and was imagining Meili being the easiest child in the world to potty train. We also got her a Rapunzel barbie and told her that if she had a dry diaper for 3 days (not including naps or bedtime) then she would get the Rapunzel doll. On day 3, Meili started to fight me. I had already decided that I was not going to turn potty training into a battle. If she wasn't "ready" then I wasn't going to make her hate going potty-it wasn't worth it.

So I took a step back, talked to a few people, and had several people say "I don't think my kids ever would have potty trained in diapers." 

Ah ha! So that was the key. The next week, I bought underwear and we tried again. And we had A LOT of accidents. So I started setting the timer, and we would sit on the potty every 30 minutes. And every 29 minutes-we had an accident. So, instead, I set the timer for every 20 minutes, and every 19 minutes we had an accident. We also tried diaper covers, which may as well be renamed "useless covers."

Obviously the problem was that she didn't recognize the "urge," so I took a step back again. 

The number one thing I had talked with parents about was consistency, so I hated the idea of going back and forth, but it just wasn't clicking, and more than hating going back and forth, I hated making Meili feel bad for something that she just truly didn't understand. 

Over the next couple of months, it seemed like things did start clicking though. Every time I was getting Meili ready for a bath, she told me that she needed to go potty, and she did-so apparently she could recognize the urge. So over a matter of months, we tried every so often for about a week, and then life would start back up again, and we couldn't continue having accidents because we had to leave the house.

Obviously it wasn't for a lack of trying that Meili wasn't potty trained. These are the attempts that we actually remembered the sticker, but that doesn't even begin to describe how much time was spent in the bathroom. And she also had A LOT of successes. Off the top of my head, I know that she got 7 princesses, 6 rings, 4 notebooks, 6 stamps, 6 nail polishes, 4 trucks, 3 bracelets and the list goes on and on. So with so much trying, and so much success, I couldn't understand why we weren't progressing. And Meili was trying-she was a trooper, and I felt as bad for her that it wasn't clicking as I did for myself.

Again, I had friends who said that they waited until their kids were BEGGING to be potty trained, and that worked for them. So I decided that the idea had to come from Meili, and she needed to want it herself. I didn't mention anything about potty training for a couple months, and Meili would decide every once in awhile that she wanted to try or that she wanted to wear underwear, but I just didn't push it. I also decided that it would be easier if I just made peace with that fact that Meili was probably not ever going to be potty trained. I take that back, I promised that as my gift to her future husband, I would have her potty trained before she got married-but that was really the only guarantee I could make.

Around August, it seemed like she was more ready but we were going to San Francisco, and I didn't want to get her potty trained just in time for us to go on vacation, so I decided that when we got back, we would kick it back into full gear.

However, we had been trying for so long, that I decided we needed a new system. She didn't necessarily care about the prizes anymore, and there were so many stickers on her chart that they were meaningless. So I thought that she needed something that mattered to her. We had tried saying that she couldn't watch TV until she went potty, and she kind of cared about that but she would eventually get distracted with a different activity. So my new system was this: I made a chart of her very favorite things to do at the time, and figured that each activity would take about a half an hour. So if she went potty, she picked an activity, and when we were done with that activity, we would try again, and she would could pick again. If she tried but wasn't successful, she got to pick a treat to keep her motivated. And we did that ALL day long for 4 days straight. Keep in mind that every activity, I did with her. So we were side by side ALL DAY LONG, because I also decided that what she would like more than anything would be lots of attention. However, doing a different activity every half an hour for 4 days is exhausting-especially when you are 19ish weeks pregnant, and it meant that work, housework, hobbies, everything got put on hold. So anyone who says that I didn't want Meili to be potty trained bad enough, can try that system for themselves, and then tell me that. We also went back to pull-ups, because I decided that I could keep going a lot longer if I didn't need to clean up so many accidents. I didn't keep track very well, but I know that on Day 2 we had 14 successes, and 3 accidents. And we just kept with it as much as possible. (Obviously weekends would get harder, or when I absolutely had to work, and she had someone watching her etc.) But we just kept with it... for a month and a half. Now, you would think that for most kids if they had 14 successes in one day (not to mention that she did for days on end) that they would eventually get it. Plus, Meili was motivated. She wanted her Rapunzel doll, she was willing to sit on the potty countless times a day for months on end. But it still wasn't sticking.

(I don't know why this is still crooked. I rotated it, and it doesn't look like this is IPhoto.) Meili's choices were going on a bike ride, Little Einstein's, painting, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, PlayDoh, pick a movie, a picnic, a tea party, bubbles, and going for a walk in the stroller.

Then the middle of October, for whatever reason, it seemed like she got so close, but would still consistently have one accident a day. She went 2 and a half days without an accident, and then pooped (sorry-gross) and it was within 5 minutes of me asking her if she needed to go potty. UGH! I was so mad! I tried to be so positive about potty training all along, but after that, I almost started crying! I think I wanted the Rapunzel doll more than she did. We were going to my parents' house the next day, and I was so bummed that we had finally made so much progress, and now she was going to regress because we'd be so far off our normal routine.

However, from then on, she stayed dry! She stayed dry through driving to Bountiful, and through going to Gardner Village, and through going to my nephew's birthday party, and through all the craziness of playing with her cousins. She even came to me in the middle of the birthday party and told me she had to poop. I also could have cried then. (Tears of joy.) But I didn't. Instead, I just shared the news with my entire family. (Sorry about that as well.)

 So that Monday, we got the long-awaited prize: the Rapunzel doll. There is no question that I was more excited than she was. 

I was so nervous that once she had the doll, the motivation would be gone, and we'd have to start over again, but she has done AWESOME! For the most part she wakes up from naps, and bed dry as well, and has only had one true accident-which Josh blames himself for. 

 Ahhh.... Let's all breathe a collective sigh of relief, and pray for many more dry days ahead! (and that we can enjoy no diapers in our house for at least a couple months.)

What's Up

Here's what we've been up to...

In September, Meili started dance. It is possible that I was even more excited about it than she was. But, seriously, have you ever seen anything cuter than that in your life? Oh wait, after the first week, the dance shoes we ordered came in. So yes, her in this outfit with actual dance shoes is even cuter.

 After watching her first week of dance class, I decided we may have some behavior issues on our hand. She's not "naughty," she just has her own agenda. Besides dance, this has come up in other places. I went to pick her up from nursery one week, and noticed that she hadn't colored her picture. When I asked her about it, the nursery leader overheard and said, "She had other things to do.... Her words."
In dance, it's clear that she's a smart little cookie, and caught on to what her teacher was asking quickly, but she would rather run around the room, and jump, and look at her own reflection in the TV. After a few more weeks, I've noticed improvement and she's listening better-which was half the reason I wanted her to take some kind of lessons this year anyway. She's been an only child for a little too long, she's too used to being the center of attention, and she's a little too smart for her own good.

 I decided to go through all of our bins of clothes and see how many gender-neutral things we could salvage for our little man. I've always felt like Josh and I were pretty good about buying things that both a boy and girl could use. I thought we were being so smart. But this was just depressing. All the piles you see are the things that are "girl specific."

 And this pile is what we have so far that our little boy can use. Let's just say we've got some work to do.

In September, Meili had her first part in the primary program. I wrote the program, and thought it would be fun if the 2 kids that will be coming in to primary had a very small part. However, the parents of the other boy said there was no way he would do it. So Meili did it herself. The theme for the program was "I Am a Child of God." Meili's part was "My name is Meili Elizabeth Anderson and I am a child of God." We worked on it all month, and had her practice a few times in the microphone. My worry was that she would get stage fright and wouldn't perform the day of. The thought did not cross my mind, that it would make me cry to see how big she's gotten-which is exactly what happened. The day of, she was so excited, Josh walked up to the podium with her (because I was sitting with one of the classes), and without him even prompting her, she said her part better than she ever had before-clear as day. And my eyes immediately welled up with tears. I can't believe in a few months she will be in primary! (And she, of course, can't wait to talk in the microphone again.)

 We're getting into the spirit of Autumn and Halloween. First off, by doing some fall crafts-namely, painting leaves, and coloring their impressions on paper.

 Between the two sessions of conference on Sunday, we made an impromptu trip to first dam to feed the ducks. Meili is developing a style all her own these days. Today, in nursery, she insisted on wearing glasses the entire time. (Note: her hair was in a side ponytail and she was wearing a cardigan. That might actually be the cutest thing I've ever seen. Our little librarian in training!)

 That night, we also made sugar cookies. Meili is getting more and more helpful all the time. Sometimes it would be okay if she wasn't so helpful :)

 Notice how all the cookies she frosted are pink. We are currently in THAT stage. Three of those cookies she rolled out the dough herself (several times) and cut them out all herself. (Which is why no one was allowed to eat them. I'm sure they weren't sanitary.)

 Yesterday, we went to the USU/Boise State football game. 
The good: Meili now loves saying "And it's another Aggie FIRST DOWN."
She also loves singing both the Scotsman and the fight song.
It was really fun, and thanks to the tailgate that Josh helped with before, we got lots of free food.

The bad and the ugly: The cold.
The game. Enough said.

 This is the only profile shot that I have of me being pregnant with Meili. I was 26 weeks along. 

So I decided to recreate it, so we have something to compare.

To be honest, I thought I was a lot bigger in comparison than I am. So I guess that's a good thing. We've still got a long way to go though!

Labor Day

Labor Day in our family equals getting together at Cherry Hill with the Hendricks side, lining all of the grandkids up on the wall and attempting the impossible-getting them all to look at the camera at the same time. (Don't even think about smiles-the planets would have to align for that to happen.)

So here are the annual torture pictures! (Just kidding! I'm really grateful to Karen for taking the pictures and posting them, because I, of course, took my camera and didn't even get it out of the case.)

 This is our whole family. And getting everyone in our family in one picture together really is a feat. I think the last time this happened was before Audrey was even born. In fact, maybe our wedding! The boys may hate it, but I would say once every seven years is not too much to ask! (Again, getting all the adults to look at the camera and smile is as hard as getting the kids to look at the camera.)

Sleeping Beauty

The road to baby #2 has been a tough one for us. I won't go in to a lot of detail, because we are just so grateful for where we are now. Again, I had a perfectly crafted plan to run a marathon last summer, and still get pregnant just in time to have a baby this spring. As happens so often with my best plans, I hadn't taken into account all the factors.... like God, and His timing. We had two miscarriages that have forever changed my perspective on a lot of things-pregnancy, children, life plans etc. After the second miscarriage in March, I told Josh that I wasn't sure what to do because I didn't want to put off running all summer because we were trying to get pregnant, but I also didn't want to sign up for a race that I couldn't complete. However, I thought having a goal would take my mind off things. As luck would have it, a couple weeks later I got a call from a woman in my ward who said that they were looking for one more person for their Ragnar team. The timing was perfect, because even if we got pregnant immediately, I would only be about 10 weeks along when I ran Ragnar. Then I could have my ultrasound right before the race to make sure everything was still going well.

A couple weeks after I found out I was pregnant, I was SURE that I was headed for another miscarriage. I had been feeling all the symptoms for weeks, and then all of a sudden, they just... stopped. And I have been down this road A FEW times, so I thought I knew all the symptoms. 

I had a friend tell me to go in for my ultrasound just a few days early, just to put my mind at ease. When I got to the doctor's office and they asked me how many miscarriages I have had, I had to stop myself for a minute, because I almost added this pregnancy in without even knowing the outcome yet. But on June 6th, when I was almost 8 weeks along we still had a heartbeat. I don't know if I was excited or relieved, or just really flabbergasted. I guess I don't know anything. When I think there's a baby, there isn't, and when I'm POSITIVE there isn't, there is. So I ran Ragnar, and scheduled the official ultrasound for the week after, so that we could check on baby-post jarring.

 Josh has told me for a long time that he wanted to wait until I was 20 weeks, to announce that we were pregnant. That all sounds well and good in the middle of the winter, with your first pregnancy, when you can hide your bulging belly pretty well, but on the second pregnancy, in the middle of summer, when I can only wear shirts and t-shirts, it's harder to hide. Plus, keep in mind, that by the time I was 20 weeks along with this pregnancy, I would have been pregnant for 40+ weeks in the past year. And with each pregnancy, I gained some weight, and lost less of it. So I was already bigger than my normal weight. When I was almost 17 weeks, we couldn't hide it anymore, it was starting to get ridiculous and people were figuring it out on their own.

Josh's brother and sister-in-law announced their pregnancy by just leaving a picture of the ultrasound on his parent's fridge and making letting the family figure it out for themselves who the baby belonged to. Josh has said for awhile that that's how he wanted to announce our next baby, but when his other brother announced they were pregnant just a matter of weeks before us, it was a done deal. We had to leave an ultrasound on the fridge. On August 3rd, we took family pictures at his parents' house. Josh snuck the picture in the house-but "Mr. We're waiting until 20 weeks" couldn't wait 15 minutes for his family to find the picture themselves. He started mentioning it the first chance he got. I tried to convince people it wasn't me, but the possibilities in the family are slimming, so it was pretty obvious. However, we are excited that our little one will have a cousin about a month younger. (Who are we kidding, we all know that I will go longer than full term, and my sister in law will have her baby early-so they'll probably be even closer than that.)

The next day, my brother blessed his baby. So I got permission from his wife in advance to tell everyone at the lunch afterward.

 My mom had told me that she needed another picture of Meili because she had an empty frame. So I gave her this picture. She looked at it and passed it on to my sister without saying anything. (I know she was thinking "Why did Kaleena give me such a crappy picture? (Not crappy, just the lighting's a little weird, and Meili can look better.)) My sister looked at the picture and smiled. Then I pointed out that my mom hadn't noticed. So she looked again. As I said, at that point, it had gotten pretty obvious, so when we were talking about it after the fact, my mom said, "Yeah, Dad said earlier, "Why does Kaleena have a baby bump that she's not saying anything about?" No way we could have waited till 20 weeks. That day in our ward, people started asking Josh about it as well.

Our next surprise came on August 29th. In my family there are 9 grandchildren and 8 of them are girls. Plus, we already have a girl, so Josh was sure that we were having another girl. And I think he had kind of talked himself into wanting another girl. For some reason, I just really felt like this was a boy. I have no motherly intuition whatsoever, and I kind of thought Meili was a boy too. But, I don't know. I just felt like it was a boy. Plus, I've been way hungrier with this pregnancy. So I was hoping there was a reason for that. And at our 15 week ultrasound, the doctor said the heartbeat was a little bit slow. 

So the night before, Josh and I made a bet...

 And I won.

I wish we had a picture of the very first image the tech pulled up. Because there it was, clear as day... Boy parts. This baby, so far, is opposite of Meili. The tech had to search for her gender the entire appointment, but this baby is proud to be a boy. And whereas Meili moved the whole appointment, this baby was just kind of content to sit there. Therefore, we didn't get a ton of great pictures of him.

We asked Meili what we should name our baby, and she said "Cinderella." So we said, "What if the baby is a boy?" (Before we knew the gender) And she said, "Sleeping Beauty." So here is our Sleeping Beauty Anderson. We are so excited for you to be a part of our family!

San Francisco

August 19th-23rd, we decided to take a trip to San Francisco with my parents. It's one of the few places that I've been that Josh hasn't and I LOVE San Francisco. It's usually pretty easy to convince my parents to go on a trip-especially if it involves cooler temperatures in August, and Josh isn't going to pass up a vacation where he can see 2 baseball games in one week. (Especially if he finds out about super cheap airline tickets.) So off we went!

 The flight was just long enough that Meili could enjoy it, but not so long that I had to stress about how to keep her occupied.

 We did get her a new set of horses for the trip. Can I just say, "Money well spent!" She loves them and it was so cute seeing her set them all up on her tray table.

 We wanted to spend as little time as possible in Oakland, since I keep hearing about how it is the third most dangerous city in the US. But, we at least had to see the temple. And Josh loved it. He said that was one of his highlights of the whole trip. 

 Talk about the perfect location!

 Finding a dog statue on temple grounds is rare. Maybe that's why Josh was such a fan.

 That night we went to an A's game. If I didn't record this story for future posterity, Josh would be mad. So here goes... We stopped at a Burger King to get some food, and Josh noticed a man standing in line. He said that because he was wearing a Boys and Girls Club shirt and had a young man with him, Josh thought he seemed like a good guy. (I think that you don't talk to strangers in Oakland, end of story. But whatever.) Josh started up a conversation with him, and asked if he knew a good place to get cheap A's tickets. The guy hesitated, and then said, "Well, how many do you need?" It just so happens that the Boys and Girls club gets free nose bleed seats all the time, and he had some back at the office that he was willing to give us for free. So we ate our food, and he went back to the office, came back, and gave us free tickets. And Josh had a smile on his face for the rest of the day!

 It was a good game, but we left a little early, since it had been a long day already. Of course, we missed the A's winning with a walk-off homerun. Oh well!

 On Tuesday we decided to check all the "sites" off our list. We went to Fisherman's wharf, the Golden Gate Bridge, Lombard street,the "painted ladies" (houses from Full House, and finished off the day with China Town.)

 Meili would have been satisfied most of the trip with just chasing the birds. One of these days she's gonna catch one I tell ya!

 It was kind of foggy like this the whole time we were there, but the weather was still pretty nice.

 So funny story. It was so crowded to park by the painted ladies houses, that my dad and I just decided to jump out of the car really fast while Josh, Meili, and my mom circled the block. My dad asked me to pose for a picture, and when I got my camera back ...

 This was the picture he had taken. Do you see me in that picture? When I asked my dad, he pointed to that asian boy in the plaid shirt.

 So this is the second picture he took. Right... now I see the resemblance.

 As cool as Lombard street is, I just can't for the life of me figure out who would choose to live there. It seems like a nightmare to me.

 In China Town Meili got this little umbrella, which we then had to convince her not to play with the rest of the day, and a little Asian outfit. (Her name is Meili. How could we resist?)

 Then we ate dinner in China Town-which I would not necessarily say I recommend. 

On Wednesday, we went to Alcatraz.

 My mom told Meili that we were going to ride on a ferry and Meili said, "I get Tinkerbell!" From then on we had to call it a "Ferry-boat," to avoid any confusion. I think she still liked it, even if she didn't get to ride Tinkerbell.

 The American Cup just happened to be the day that we took our ferry ride, so we got to see some pretty cool sailboats.

 Someday I will get a picture of Meili in her sunglasses, where they are not crooked. But still cute right?

 Alcatraz was cool, but as usual with me, I left with more questions than when I came. So now I need to read some books and learn a little bit more about some of the stories. Also, Meili fell asleep in Josh's arms on his hike up to the building, so that changed our plans a little. The biggest downside: apparently, it's fly season.

 D Block, or solitary confinement. Josh went in one of the cells, for a few minutes while they turned off all the lights. He agrees that he would probably go nuts.

On Thursday, we decided, rather last minute, to take a drive to Santa Cruz. I'm so glad we did, because I think that was a highlight for a few of us.

 Meili, of course, loved all the mechanical toys, and playing arcade games.

 Then we played on the beach for a few minutes. I was so excited that I could finally let her run and do whatever she wanted, and I didn't have to tell her not to touch something, or not to walk over there. We could just play!

I think she and I could both live pretty happy lives as beach bums!

 I don't know what it is about this child and horses, but real horses, fake horses, big horses, little horses, they are her happy place!

 Half the reason I was in favor of going to Santa Cruz, was so that Meili could get a nap on the hour and a half drive back. Let me ask you; the child was EXHAUSTED the entire trip, going to sleep later than usual, waking up earlier than usual, falling asleep in her daddy's arms. But do you think she slept in the car on the long drive back like we planned? Of course not! Instead she talked and talked and talked and sang and talked and sang some more. I started laughing and crying from exhaustion on the third round of "I looove balloons! I love balloons! I love them, I love them, I looove balloons." (If you're thinking of the tune from Elf, you're on the right track.)

 Thank goodness for the slide at the Giants Stadium so she could run off a little more energy.

I knew that San Francisco weather is no Southern California weather, so we all came to the game prepared with our jackets. We did not come with our parkas, and winter hats, and gloves which we apparently should have, because it was freezing! Meili stayed warm in Josh's jacket though. And because she was finally all tired out, we could all sit back and enjoy the game a little. (Until our toes almost froze off.)

We left Friday morning.

A few more details I want to remember. Meili called our hotel, our "show and tell" and called the elevator, an "alligator." So every time we were in the car, she would say, "Are we going back to the show and tell and ride the alligator?" Can she just stay this cute forever?

One of her highlights, which we didn't get a picture of, was her air mattress. I brought it for the purpose of her sleeping on it at night. That was not what she had in mind. Instead she used it to barricade herself or other people into/out of rooms, to jump on (of course), and her favorite, was putting it on top of our bed and watching tv.