the joys of potty training..

       SO BIG!!!

James has done a great job of pooping in the toilet now for 3.5 weeks. Only 2 accidents. It's been awesome. But I have been dreading the potty part because you can't tell when he's going until it's too late..and he goes potty a lot more often in a day than he poops! So I have been putting it off.

We did the pull ups for a couple days and it did make it a lot easier to put him on the toilet, but he (and I) couldn't tell if he was pottying in his pants..so I felt like there was no difference from a diaper. So yesterday I decided to jump on in and go all the way. I put him in big boy underwear! I knew it was suppose to be nice outside so we could spend most of the day out there and not worry about accidents on the carpet

So first we started off by watching daddy mow the backyard. We had been out there for about 30 minutes so I asked him if he had to potty. He said no..and then I see a stream of pee running down his leg. I pick him up and run him to the toilet and we change underwear and shorts. I put a diaper on him for his nap and we started all over when he woke up.

We put some new underwear on and I told him to tell me when he needed to go. We were playing inside and I asked him if he had to go and he said yeah so I picked him up..and his pants were a little wet. So we got another pair of underwear.

 Then we were about to go to a playdate and he's standing in the kitchen..after we had just sat on the toilet and he didn't go pee...and a puddle is forming on the floor! So we got our 4th pair of underwear on at 1:00. The afternoon went great though. I was afraid that since we were playing with friends he wouldn't want to take the time to sit on the toilet, but he went for me easily and had no accidents.

Until Daddy got home. Then we went through another 2 pair in 30 minutes.

So today we started day 2.  He did great until lunch. He was in his highchair eating and said, "potty." I asked him if he had to go and he said yeah, so I was getting him out and saw his shorts were wet. So we went to the toilet and finished. We get back to his seat and see that there is a puddle under the highchair! He had gone quite a bit of potty! So I helped him clean that up.

Then we were sitting at the table at my mom's for lunch and he looked up at me with a worried face and I go, "gotta pee?" he said yeah..so I pick him up and we start heading to the toilet and I feel my shirt getting warm! We got to the toilet and he had definately peed on me.

But I have a litle hope because at least he knew he was going this time and could tell me. So that's a little bit of progress? This evening we went through another 3 pairs of underwear before we went to our night time diaper.

And then to top it off..I was feeding Eli and I feel my shirt is getting warm again! Yep..I was peed on twice today. It's been a long two days..with a lot of laundry! I pray it doesn't take too many more days before James catches on! I know we are doing this earlier than a lot of people, but I feel like he's capable. Please pray for us! :)

having fun..

I thought I'd post some pictures of what we've been up to lately. It's just the same as usual..just two little guys to get ready now. It sure takes longer to get out the door, but James is such a good helper that it doesn't stop us! James is sure a busy boy lately. Always figuring something out, fixing something, asking questions or playing with his toys. Eli is more alert everyday which hopefully means he'll be sleeping more in the night!

James is so funny..here is a picture of how I found him the other day during his nap! He has been sleeping like this ever since. I don't know if he wants it darker or quieter in his room, but the funny thing is..I sleep the same way! :)

Here he is "fixing" the door. He uses a beater to fix everything..his mower, trucks, the table, the door! He actually was putting it in each screw though..so funny.

I was looking through the toddler activities on pinterest and came across one that I thought James might like and was really simple. We put flour in a tub with a couple toys and brought it outside. He LOVED it. This kept him entertained for a long time! So here are some pictures of his fun..

A smile?!                                                                    And of course he had to taste it. Not so

                                                                                    sure about it

His new trick..trying to do a sommersault                  Of course my camera had to go crazy by the

                                                                                   end of our playing..but I wanted to get a picture 

                                                                                   of his face..sorry it's so blurry. 

I asked James to go get my laundry basket from my room so we could take it down after I had finished cooking dinner. He brought it out to me and then climbed in and said, "nigh, nigh. Sing." We sing "Jesus Loves you" every time he goes to sleep..so he thought this looked like a good sleeping spot!

3 weeks old yesterday..so strong already!

 He's getting ready to keep up with James!

 

Thanks for keeping up with us! More pictures soon!

18 months old!

James is a year and half! He is getting to such a fun age. He understands so well and is so interested in everything. He has started to get a bit ornery, but he has such a sweet heart, it doesn't take much to correct him. He is so funny and so smart

What he's up to this month...

* Sleeping in his own bed all the way through the night (only a once or twice has he woken up even since Eli has been home). In the morning he waits in his bed for us to come get him out. Today Mike and I were so tired we didn't even get up until 8 and when I saw the clock I was surprised we hadn't heard James say anything since he usually wakes up between 7 and 7:30 so Mike went in an checked on him and he was just sitting up waiting with a smile on his face! It was so cute. Who knows how long he was waiting! He loves the pillows in his bed too. He'll sometimes have a pillow on top of him during his nap like he's trying to make it dark so he can fall asleep easier. I need to get a picture of it. It's so cute.

*Progress on potty training! For the last 2.5 weeks James has been pooping on the toilet! He's only  had two times that he's gone in his diaper, so that has been so awesome. We use an M&M as a reward when he goes poop or potty in the toilet, and like his mom he loves chocolate! I ask him randomly throughout the day if he has to go and he'll say yes or no and then other times I just stick him on before/after a nap or running an errand and he'll go. We haven't made the full commitment of putting him on every hour and getting him on to go potty yet, but that will be the next step we'll need to take soon! My goal is to have him trained so we don't have to go on to size 5 diapers!

*Speaking very well. He will repeat most words you say and he can get the first or last syllable of the word. He has a couple two syllable words, but each day we can understand him more and more. He still uses some signs, but also says the word at the same time. The only exception to that is the word thank you. He will do the sign, but won't attempt to say it. I think the 'th' sound is too difficult for him.

*Loves the mower. It sits in the garage and he will ask all the time to go out to see it and say, "daddy, papa" because he knows they use it. He also loves trucks, helicopters, airplanes and motorcycles. He hears one while playing outside and is looking around to try and find it. He loves to chase the robins in the yard. He loves to give kisses and wants a kiss anytime he gets hurt.

Here is some pictures of what we've been up to lately...

This is our first walk with both boys. If you notice the picture with Mike in it Eli is in the stroller. We figured James could walk beside us because many times when we go on a walk with the stroller he prefers to walk. Well this time..since Eli in his stroller he had a little meltdown...a little bit jealous. So we let James have his stroller back. Eli ended up crying before we left the driveway so I went inside and fed him and Mike took James on a walk!

Here is James on his first Easter egg hunt. This is at Grandma Scheffert's house, but he also got to do one at Grandma Essink's and Great Grandma Anderson's. So he had a lot of practice searching for eggs. He loved it and wasn't quite sure why he was getting to have so many treats. He had one or two m&ms in each egg and he was shoving them in as fast as he could. My mom has the eggs in his toy box now and James brings the egg to me and says, "teets?" Wondering where the treats went and if he can have anymore!

James also got to dye eggs at Grandma Scheffert's house. He watched daddy so intently and then was ready to jump in. He loved it.

 His pretty blue and purple egg.

Daddy and his two boys on Easter Sunday..

It has definitely been an adjustment with two, but each day is getting easier and we couldn't love them more. We are just so thankful for all the support, help and love from everyone around us!

Pinterest Support Group

My church has started "community groups". Basically it's a group of 5-15 people in their twenties who form a group based on a common interest. The group lasts 12 weeks and we meet each Saturday for two hours. My friend, Amber, and I decided we wanted to start a group that let us make the projects we pin on pinterest. It seemed like I would pin so many cute things and never have time to sit down and make them.  We have 5 people in our group and we have a lot of fun each week. I thought I'd share the projects we've made the last couple weeks.

This was our first project. We each brought a vase, wine bottle, or beer bottle and wrapped it in twine or yarn. They turned out really cute and although it did take the full two hours to make them, they were pretty simple. It's not the best picture to see the details or how well they actually turned out, but I was really quite pleased with mine!

 

Here are the pictures we used for inspiration

image3.etsy.com                               nattynook.net

Here is the snack I made for group. It's peanut butter popcorn. It was really good. The recipe I had used called for corn syrup, but I would use this recipe next time because it doesn't call for the syrup. I used colby ridge popcorn instead of popping my own, but it was difficult to judge how much I needed for the amount of peanut butter sauce. I definately had too much popcorn, but I will make it again!

thekitchn.com

Our second project was a little bit more challenging..we had to use a drill! Not something that I have used very often, so I was happy Amber knew what she was doing. I thought these turned out really well also. Each person's looked different and were really cute.

Here is the pictures we got of our herb gardens:

   

And here was our picture for inspiration:

domestically-speaking.com

One of the requirements for the community groups is to do a service project at least one week out of the twelve. My sister, Lyndi, is in our group and she was talking about an even they are having for their high school and middle school kids. It's called "the oscars" and it's a big event they throw each year (they plan on serving 600 people at the event!). Lyndi mentioned they were making cupcake plates this year and needed help decorating them. We thought this would be a perfect opportunity to serve and still use our glue guns! :)

We glued the gold trim around these cardboard circles..so although it's a little difficult to tell what we did, here is a picture of what we worked on this week. I will try and get a picture of them at the oscars so you can see the end result.

The best part of this week's group was the snack Lyndi and I made. It of course was something we found on pinterest also! It was an apple cinnamon monkey bread. It was really simple to make and turned out super tasty!

Here is the picture from pinterest

eatbetteramerica.com

So if any of you want to come join our group some Saturday let me know..we would love to have you!!

He's here!

 Introducing our family of four!

A week and four days ago already. Eli Timothy made his entrance quite quickly, but definitely with some resistance. We went into the hospital at 5:30 on Monday and I was 3.5cm dilated. They got a baseline of his heartbeat and got the pitocin started by 6:30. At 8:30 they broke my water and at 9:00 I got my epidural. I was only 4cm at this point. I was hoping I would move along faster than that, but we waited around. My grandma came up and we played cards and we watched our lovely educational videos about breastfeeding and shaken baby syndrome. Around noon my mom, Ali, James and Linda joined us and I was at 6cm. Cada had joked earlier that I could plan on having lunch-meaning that I would have Eli delivered and be down in my postpartum room by noon! Well that didn't happen so my family was discussing if they should leave so James could take a nap and then come back in time for me to deliver. Well at 12:30 my nurse said my contractions were speeding up so she said they should wait and they'd check me at 1:00. I was 9.5cm! So they stayed and the nurses set up the room for delivery. I pushed 4 times (1.5 contractions) and he was out! Both my mom and Mike's mom were in the room this time for delivery and they couldn't believe how easy I made labor look. They put Eli up on my chest and I got to hold him before they cleaned him up ( I didn't get to do this with James because there was mecconium in my amniotic fluid so they had to check his lungs right away and make sure they were cleaned out well.) Because Eli dropped so quickly in that hour his face was pretty bruised, but other than that he looked perfect.

First pictures with Eli...

Overcome with emotion by his two boys..so sweet.

James wasn't entertained with all the picture taking

We had taken a vote on the weight of Eli. Most of my family thought Eli would be smaller than James, but there were a couple that thought he would be bigger. Linda and Jenna guessed he would be 8lbs 2oz (same guess even though they are 1/2 way across the country from each other. crazy.) My mom guessed 7lbs 1oz, I guessed 7lbs 10oz, Lyndi guessed 7lbs 6oz, Ali 7lbs 5oz and Baily 7lbs 7oz. And the verdict was 7lbs 8oz. So everyone was pretty close but no one guessed exactly right. Well my aunt colleen claims she guessed 7lbs 8oz, but I can't remember her saying that..so I guess the prize goes to her!

Eli was 20 3/4 inches. So he wasn't much different than James. James weighed 7lbs 13oz and was 21 inches long. It's so funny because I think each day they are looking more and more similar. I'll have to post a picture of them side by side.
                                     
                                          Eli

                                         James

Eli is doing well. Some nights are better than others of course, but he is such a sweet boy. He sleeps, eats and poops. Not much fussing. He cries when I change his diaper because he's not a fan of the cold air, but otherwise you don't hear a peep from him. James is also adjusting well. He's a proud big brother. At first he wasn't sure what to think. He didn't want Eli too close and was a little ornery in the hospital, but now that we've been home he loves to give Eli kisses and is always asking where Eli is and what he's doing. So sweet.

A friend of mine, Julie, from lifegroup, had her baby the same day as I had Eli. She has a little boy, Zach, who is 5 months older than James. And on Monday she had a little girl, Alyssa. So we got some sweet pictures of the boys with their new siblings..

                                                   Julie and I holding each other's babies.

                                                                   Proud big brothers!

Mike has been such a great help. He stayed at home all last week to help with James and this week he's been coming home by 3:00. James and him have had some good bonding time while Eli and I took our naps! :) I am so blessed to have such a wonderful husband and two sweet boys. I couldn't have asked for a better transition from a family of 3 to 4 or for a sweeter more perfect baby. I am so excited to watch us grow together as a family. Thank you so much to our wonderful friends and family who have helped it go so smoothly. Whether you took care of James, brought food, visited us in the hospital or kept us in your prayers. We are so grateful we are surrounded by such great support. We love you all.

Going home from the hospital!!

                




Here are some of the professional pictures that were taken at the hospital..The password is anoh402scheffert. They will  only be up til April 16th.  They turned out pretty cute. Thankfully I had showered when the picture lady came by..Mike on the other hand had not. So he's not a fan of those shots :)

We also did a photo shoot with a friend of ours this past Saturday. Abby did an amazing job. You have to check out her work on her facebook page. She has posted 4 of them and they are so adorable. I will share more of them once I get them!