The State of Toddleropolis

Happy Monday ever-ee-buddy.  I know I’m a stuck-at-home, no wait, that came out wrong…stay-at-home mom and all so really I shouldn’t be that affected by Manic Monday and her infectious drab but, I am.  Every Monday I sit down and make a list of things I want to get done that week – which room I want to deep clean, which project(s) I want to finish, and what posts (lately it’s been post, singular) I want to get up on the blog.  That all really never amounts to much when I figure I have a whole seven days and roughly about 15+ hours of nap and bedtime to complete it all.  But then you throw in making sure we get in our one big grocery run, keeping the rest of the house fairly livable, and, oh yeah, making sure the three tots are busy, happy, and nourished.  Throw in the random incident here and there and sitting down to plan on Monday morning becomes sitting down to make a list and just getting really overwhelmed.  Why am I telling you all this?  I haven’t the faintest.  I guess I just thought you might all like to know what a ball of nerves I was this morning and hope that someone can relate even though most will probably just check off the “Sheena’s crazy” box.  I won’t deny it.

But, let’s move on, shall we?

I like to give updates on how our diy projects are hanging in there and so today, let’s zoom on in to two of our biggest diys to date.  These two:



First, let’s get down and dirty with an update on potty training. 

You might remember we used a three-day method to potty train the girls when they were 25 months old.  If you don’t, now you know and if you want to read all about it, you can check out this post.  Well, we went cold turkey with diapers day and night and while we considered the girls officially potty-trained after those three grueling days, they still had accidents.  Daytime wasn’t bad and rarely did the girls have accidents then, but night-time?  We were averaging almost 50% there for the first few weeks.  Both girls’ bed-wettings got fewer and fewer over those first few weeks though and a month out, they were waking up dry every day.  Actually, Cecilia has gone every night since then with a dry bed but Seraphia is another story.  A month after training, she was doing great.  She’d maybe wet the bed once a week.  Maybe.  And then January rolled around and she started wetting the bed every night.  This is after three whole months of barely ever wetting the bed.  We were dumbfounded.  There weren’t any big changes happening in our family, no traumatic events to speak of, and no difference in personality.  We finally caved after about two weeks of changing sheets every night and bought pull-ups.  She’s been in them ever since and ever since she’s woken up with a wet one, with the exception of maybe ten nights.   It’s just so bizarre.  Please, someone tell me what the deal is?  The only thing we’ve thought to blame it on is her very heavy sleeping.  But did that heaviness just increase one night?  Doubt it.  Just, seriously, dumbfounded.

Whatever the reason, potty-training in three days worked and let me tell you how nice it’s been to just have to worry about one in diapers.  I do still wipe the girls after they’re done doing their thing only because I don’t feel like they do a good enough job but I’m thinking we’ll probably start teaching them that in a few months. 

Side note:  I mentioned above that we ended up putting S in pull-ups overnight to curb the sheet cleaning and, while it’s been great to not have to clean sheets, I feel like they inhibit the overnight learning process.  When we ask her if she’s “dry” while she obviously wearing a wet pull-up, she says “yes” because she can’t feel the wet.  Needless to say, we’re not big fans of using pull-ups to train and we’d encourage the cold turkey method any day! 

Next up, toddler beds.  We’ve finally made the switch.  We went to Denver a month ago and, knowing that the girls wouldn’t be sleeping in cribs there, we took the opportunity a month before that to convert the girls’ cribs to beds so they could get accustomed to the change.
 

Well, we’re still getting accustomed.  While they sleep great in their beds, they don’t go to sleep so great in their beds.  We’ve moved their beds every which way in their room and still, they’d be up and playing .057 seconds after we laid them down for the night.  To be expected?  Probably.  A hindrance to our post-bedtime life?  Surely.  Should I stop whining about it?  Definitely.  So goes life, right? 

We ultimately decided to keep their beds open towards each other so they’d be close minus any crib railings since it didn’t matter where in the room the beds were and just because we love that they can look at each other at night.  For a week after the switch, we’d just let them play until they finally stayed in bed after the 40th time we went in and put them back there but they were staying up hours after their bedtime with little to no intention of ever sawing logs.  Their play kitchen is really the only toy in their room and even when we removed the play food and utensils, there was still invisible food and utensils courtesy of little imaginations.

     

So, for the past several weeks, we’ve just been taking turns sitting in their room, between their beds, rubbing their arms or heads or backs (whichever floats their boats) until shut-eye is attained.  Thankfully, Sebastian has no qualms about being set in his crib and going to sleep on his own (as of two weeks ago) but before that, it was a little rough balancing the three kids by myself at sleep times…a little rough as in fairly traumatic for mom here.  It was either, leave the youngest to cry himself to sleep while I coaxed the girls to sleep or lay with Sebastian until he fell asleep while the girls roamed free (and usually loud) in their room during naptime.  Hello rock.  Hello hard place. 

At first it was really hard for me to sit in their room with them during that precious chunk of time I had to myself everyday, but now I love it.  I love sitting in there with them and rubbing their heads; having some quiet time all to ourselves.  No matter how rough mornings are with them, being able to sit with them while they are nice and sweet and relaxed is so redeeming.  And the view ain’t too bad either:

Unconsciously, I think I hung a huge gallery wall on the wall opposite the crib for mine and Anthony’s sake.  Our eyes needed anything but a blank wall.  :)

Last on the agenda, the “adult table”.  We just moved the girls from their high chairs to the dining table.  I know, we’re a little late to that game.  Cleaning up the food messes one kid makes is tough enough; add two more and it’s even more fun.  (You moms of even more kids than me are my heroes!)  High chairs are great at containing messes to one area so we milked those as long as we could.

But, surprisingly, moving the girls to the table has been super easy.  Nothing like what I thought.  I pictured smeared food all over the table and upholstered chairs, puddles on the floor, and crumbs in every single crevice.  I have Nuby and Vero Chef to thank for the ease, of that I’m sure. 

Right before we made the high chair-to-table switch, Nuby sent us plates, cups, and utensils from their Flower Child line (link is our affiliate link but you can also find them at Buy Buy Baby, Kohl’s, and diapers.com, online and/or in store).  The day they came and after I saw how cute they were, I was so excited to give them to the girls to use.  But I didn’t because bribery is the name of the game folks.  I told the girls that if they ate at the big table and didn’t make big messes, that I had a surprise for them.  A couple of days later, after several meals at the big table without incidents, the girls got their Flower power.
 
I love everything about their new stuff!  The utensils have bigger handles and they’re not too long – two critical things I look for in kiddie utensils.  The plate has an edge on it that keeps food on the plate and not on the placemat/floor/table/clothes…  And the cups, they’re no-spill and they really mean it.  They’ve been dropped (and thrown) multiple times with nary a spill in sight.  On top of that, they are so cute!  What else could you want?  :)

I also bought these baking mats from Vero Chef (affiliate link) off Amazon to use as placemats.
 
Our table has two seams where a leaf is inserted and one of those seams happens to be right where the girls eat.  The thought of getting food stuck down in that seam is not a clean one, so the mats have been amazing to prevent that and overall to keep the girls places clean.  I ordered these baking mats because I wanted something inexpensive and the only regular toddler placemats I could find that fit my silicone placemat wishes were $10+ each.  These mats come in a pack of two and the pack cost us $13.  And they are seriously awesome.  We highly recommend them if you’re in the market for toddler placemats.  They stick to the table since they’re silicone and hold utensils and dishware in place.  Also, they’re super easy to clean (dishwasher-safe when a simple rinse won’t do!) and when we want to store them, they just roll up.  Ten thumbs up from the Tobins!

Goldfish anyone?
  

On another note, they say that mannerisms are inherited.  Funny though because I’m pretty sure that when Anthony and I eat, we look graceful and becoming.  So, I’m not positive where these -isms have trickled down from:
 

And then there’s this kid:
 
I’ll have more on him one of these days, including how he needed me or Anthony to lay on the floor next to his crib to fall asleep (which he just grew out of thanks to this toy [affiliate link], stolen from the girls!) and how for a week during that time I built a fake “me” with pillows and blankets to lay on the floor and then skipped out when he wasn’t looking.  Worked like a charm.  

:)

Disclaimer:  We don’t endorse lying to your kids but a little deception with the best of intentions is never really that bad……………right?  ;)