Today is Noah's birthday. When we first discovered him in Haiti, he had just turned a year old. Due to the chaos that Haitian adoptions tend to be, we've only had him home for just over 5 months. This was his first birthday with us and I'm sorry to say that it was pretty pitiful. Before anybody decides that I am the worst mother of all time, I need to let you know that we are planning a big party for him, to be held on some yet-to-be-determined date in the not-too-distant future. Remember my post about the snow from earlier this week? That's why. We woke up to falling snow again yesterday (grrrrrrr!!) and the weather forecast has been less than sunny. We want to have a big OUTSIDE party, so that we can enjoy some sunshine. And, let's be honest, I really don't want to have to entertain a bunch of kids at an indoor venue. I figure that if we go to a nice park, we can invite all of our friends and family and they can bring their kids and their kids can then entertain themselves and each other on the playground or where ever their parents decide it's okay for them to go. My job will simply be to invite everybody, Phil's job will be to provide the food, and Noah's job will be to be the center of attention. Sooo, don't hate me for taking it pretty easy on his actual birthday. Fun times will soon be had.
I took Noah to get his picture taken this morning and he was a total ham. I can't wait to get them back. He then ran some errands with me before we returned home and spent a good part of the afternoon at the park with Adam. The guilt got to me before bedtime so I ended up making a cake and inviting a few friends over to eat some of it with us. Noah didn't get a nap so he was extra pleasant by the time late afternoon hit, and I'm pretty sure if it wasn't his birthday I might have totally lost it on him. Here's one little nugget of fun than you might enjoy: At around 4:00 this afternoon, Noah needed his diaper changed so, as we always do when we change him, I pulled off his diaper and then asked him to go potty. For whatever reason (no nap, maybe) he had no interest in going into the bathroom so I had to coerce him a bit. Sue had given him his only presents of the day - a motorcycle and a car and he had a pretty good grip on them when I helped him to the bathroom. Because I have had to fish more than one toy out of the toilet that Noah has dropped, our rule is "no toys on the toilet" and he is usually okay with that. Today, he was completely not okay with it (again, no nap) and so the battle lines were drawn. I won't share all of the gory details, but after 20 minutes of both of us weeping and wailing and Noah not producing a single drop in the toilet, I finally let him down. I decided that I would put some underwear on him for an hour or two before bedtime since we are taking baby steps away from the diapers. We went through our "pre-underwear wearing drill:
Me: "Noah? Where do you go poo?
Noah: "Poo-poo on the to-let."
Me: That's right. And where do you go pee?
Noah: Pee-pee on the to-let.
Me: Good job. So you tell me when you need to go poo or when you need to go pee. Okay.
Noah: Okay mommy. Poo-poo on the to-let.
Me: Do you need to go?
Noah: No.
Me: Are you sure.
Noah: No go poo-poo
Me: Okay.
On go the underwear and off I go to work on my church lesson for tomorrow. Noah follows me to the office and as I sit down in front of the computer, he asks to sit on my lap. I try to talk him out of it, but that clearly wasn't going to happen, so I picked him up and set him on my lap.
Me: What the?!????
Noah: silence
Me: No you didn't!?!! Noah? Did you go pee-pee in your underwear?
Noah: Uh-huh. Pee-pee on the to-let.
Me: Get back in there!
I'll spare you the rest of what happened, because, quite frankly, I don't come off looking very good at the end of that story. He had sat on the toilet for 20 minutes and within thirty seconds (no exaggeration) of getting off and putting on some underwear, he let loose. I'm not just talking a little dribble either. They were soaked. I'm completely convinced that he held onto that so tight while he was sitting there simply because he had drawn the line and no matter what he wasn't going to go. This kid so works me.
With all of that said, it is his birthday so I decided to let him live. Since I have no story to tell about how great his birthday party was (yet) I thought I would honor Noah by putting up some of my favorite pictures of him from the past several weeks. If you look at any one of them, it is easy to see why we adore him beyond measure, even though he didn't go pee-pee in the toilet this afternoon.
March 22: With his mouth stuffed with Easter candy after his first Easter Egg hunt at Grandpa Bill's house. He just stuffed it in as fast as he could and worried about breathing after the fact.
Mar 23: In his new bike helmet that the Easter Bunny brought.
Mar 23: After his second Easter Egg hunt at Grandma Lo-Lo's house. Just TRY to take those eggs away from him. It was so funny watching him hunt for eggs. Anytime he found a real one, he would toss it back to the ground. Picky.
March 31: On the to-let. This is sooooo going to be used for blackmail when he's a teenager. And yes, socks have since been banned from the toilet too.
April 2: Adam playing computer games, and Noah stuck to him like glue. Shockingly enough, Adam didn't mind being used as a desk.
2 comments:
Oh my gosh! I could eat that kid up. Just remember that he's 3 and needs to feel that he has control. Kids never have control over anything, they have teachers and parents and church leaders and doctors and dentists and even bigger kids, etc. always being in charge. It's really no wonder that kids need to find a way to control something. I guess his something is "pee." It's frustrating, I'm sure, but he's three and it's only pee!
He's so adorable! Please let him live....
Happy Birthday Noah!!! He really, really is adorable.
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