Excuses, excuses

I've been extremely lax on the blog-writing front. First, we're in the process of revamping our study/guest room (YAY!!!!) so I was without internet for several days. So our weekends and evenings have been spent (at least partially spent) painting, organizing, and cleaning. Second, Paul, my child whom I love very much (as I have to keep reminding myself) has suddenly decided that 6 am is an appropriate time to wake up. Now, for some, 6 is not the end of the world. It is for me. I am NOT a morning person. At all. I never have been. And I need my sleep or I'm a total wreck. In fact, this morning when I heard Paul banging around at 6:10, I rolled over and told Aaron, "I'm seriously at the point of having a nervous breakdown." Paul then proceeded to come downstairs and whisper at the door, "Mom, I pooped in my underwear." I lost it. I just started to bawl because I could not deal with it any more. Luckily, I have the most wonderful husband in the whole world who got up and took care of it, even though it meant that he was late for work. Honey, I love you! MWAH!!! Which leads me to my third reason I have not blogged much. We're potty-training Paul, and he's actually doing really well. It's been a breeze compared with Katie. But it takes constant vigilance or you many wind up with a mess on the carpet. I really wish there was a potty-training boot camp that you could send your kids to for 2 weeks, and then they'd be mostly trained by the time they came home. I think there's serious money to be made in that idea. I can't remember if I mentioned before, but Averi is seriously getting around now. She is a textbook crawler. She's the only one of my kids that didn't start off doing the army crawl. One day she just figured out how to move her arms and legs in a coordinated fashion and she was off. But now we're in serious trouble. I went in to get her from her nap today, and she had PULLED HERSELF TO A STANDING POSITION in her crib and was playing with the blinds. When she saw me, it startled her and she flopped over backwards, but she thought it was quite hilarious and that she was hot stuff. Later this evening, she did it three more times! She can't be standing yet! She's only 7 months old! And she doesn't even sit! She can, but she's too busy getting places that she doesn't have time for something as stationary as sitting. But seriously. Now the baby-proofing will have to begin in earnest. I've already warned Katie that any Barbie accessories left on the floor will be eaten by Averi or thrown away by me. Fortunately, Katie is so appalled by the idea of Barbie having a missing shoe (shock! horror!) that I have no worries that they will be picked up. It's very nice sometime to have a child with OCD! And now for some pictures to tide the grandparents over until I can post again: