Since your last letter, 10 months ago, you have finally been totally potty trained. You’d been trained to pee for a long time, but you were holding out on the poop. I don’t know why, but thankfully, we are over that and we are 100% diaper free in our house.

You will get yourself totally dressed, including your socks (slowly), and only for Mommy. Somehow you totally forget how to do it when Daddy is getting you dressed.

Several months ago, you got your 2nd bad haircut. Your first bad haircut coincided with your first haircut. This bad haircut wasn’t nearly as bad – but the hair cutter took the bangs too far back – making you look like you had a little toddler mullet. Now we have the fun adventure of trying to grow out some of your  bangs, while trying to keep others. I have been experimenting with a variety of hairstyles that take the bangs out of your eyes – most of them fail, but I try really hard.

In the Spring you started to learn how to write letters and have been able to write your name by yourself (even the spelling) since the summer time. Clearly, you are a genius! You have learned a couple of site words to start to learn to read, but that is slower. I will take writing genius for now.

For reasons unclear to Daddy, it is very important to me for you to get a picture with Santa every year. I just can’t wait to see them all together when you are taking your kids to see Santa. Every year to date, you have refused to get near Santa – Last year, my arm pushing you closer is visible in the picture. This year – our second trip – was a success! You stood next to Santa and while you wouldn’t tell him what you wanted, you did say “thank you” several times. I have high hopes for next year having you actually sit on his lap.

We got through Christmas when you seem to have received every toy under the sun – except those you got for your birthday. We will be getting rid of some older toys that are less played with soon. You have agreed that we can do this – I am crossing my fingers that you realize what it means to share our toys with people who won’t be returning them.

In the last 10 months, we have had a wonderful time with cousins coming to our house to visit, we went to the beach with our good friends (where you refused to actually get in the water, but had a grand time playing in the sand. This picture is from the big sand dunes, but the bones were added after the fact – I love this picture because you were having such a great time with your best friend.

You got a big girl bike (as a prize for both giving up the binky and pooping in the potty, along with a princess desk). You learned to swing all by yourself (from a stop all the way to pumping yourself as high as you want to swing). You are still very shy and hesitant to try new things (especially food), but you are very thoughtful and excited to do things you have thought through (except food). You hosted your first New Year’s Eve party (early in the evening) and we had your 4th birthday party with a Dr. Seuss theme.

In the fall we went to a corn maze and they had giant hay bales that you jumped from and had a BALL. For Halloween you were both Tinker Bell at school, then a witch when we went trick or treating with all of your friends.

I realize this is a random smattering of facts over the last year – and I am sorry for that. Daddy and I love you so much and I hope to have more time to dedicate to your letters as you grow. However, if I don’t make it every month, it is because you are my priority – not writing about you.

Now that you have celebrated your 4th birthday, you are getting more and more excited at the chance to go to Pre-school. Most of your buddies you have known for so long are going to Kindergarten  next year – they were born a few months before you, making them eligible for the cut off – and you are making new friends all the time. You are beautiful, you are so smart and you are going to do amazing things. We love you more than you know.

Love, Mommy

The trip involved a 2 mile hike, much of it was UP hill, followed by a few water slides (natural), jumping from a 15 foot rock into 8 feet pool of water, then rappelling down THREE waterfalls. It was AMAZING!!! Highly recommended and totally awesome. Here is a video (mainly of eldest boy).

This year’s Christmas card will not suck

I will not forget about this one – we have a long history that I won’t give up. This blog will be the everything else blog it has always been, but the only kiddo related entries will be the letters to the bean. I have been trying to figure out how to focus my blog writing without giving up my dear sixofclubs – so had to jump on the band wagon.

Now you can read me over here too – NextMommyOfTheYear.com. It is a tongue-in-cheek title in which other Mommies and I know that we are doing the things we swore we would never do, fixing the mistakes of our parents and making all new ones. We may not be the Mommies of the year, but our kids are still happy and healthy – in spite of our best efforts.

It finally snowed outside this month. You have been very excited about making a snowman and finally it snowed enough to stick. It snowed overnight, so there were about 4 or 5 inches by morning. We got bundled up and ran outside. I was quite worried that this Mommy from the desert had a lack of snowman-making skills, but as it turns out, it was the “wrong kind of snow” – I am still not clear on what that means, but I couldn’t make the snow into a ball to even get started. Thankfully, you had a ball just knocking snow off everything and making snow angels.

You are having random memory recall now. For example, you (randomly) one day, recalled every detail of our experiment day in which we removed the M’s off of M&Ms. You said “We did a “speramint” (aka, experiment)! My friend shared his bike! I liked it!”

Your friends at school are a few months older than you, which means they are going to go to pre-school next year. But, in that cute way you have, you didn’t get the words quite right. You say: When I turn 4, I get to go to “pretty school” And when I turn 5, I get to go to “garden school”. I have been trying to find out what happens after that, but so far, you don’t have anything more to add.

The dirt from daycare continues. You have now started to fill your pockets with dirt and rocks. I cannot express to you how much I love this new habit (because I don’t). But, you play outside the way kids should and you come home happy and worn out. I can’t complain. (Don’t judge the dirty purple coat in the picture – I swear it gets clean regularly)

Potty training is going well. Still no “#2′s” at home, but all in all, going well. On the last day of this month, you even got yourself dressed. I picked out the clothes, but you took off your pajamas and dressed yourself – everything except the socks.

In the comments, post your answers and another good question.

1. What is your favorite word?

2. What is your least favorite word?

3. What turns you on?

4. What turns you off?

5. What sound do you love?

6. What sound do you hate?

7. What is your favorite curse word?

8. What profession other than yours would you like to attempt?

9. What profession would you not like to do

10. If heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly gates?

Which part of the brain most describes the toddler in your life?

OK, I am not really “old”, but I felt it after trying snowboarding last weekend. I took the lesson. I fell, then fell. Then fell. This continued for the length of the lesson. As a matter of fact, the only time I made it only 1/2 way down the lesson “slope” (aka, slight hill they teach toddlers to ski on) is when I was actually going backwards. I never did figure out how to turn around or really do anything other than fall. Four days later, I can walk up and down stairs without remembering every time I fell. The bruises are still there, but they are healing.

In all honesty, I did have fun. It was VERY hard and I gave up and switched to skis after my lesson. I was not about to spend the rest of the day trying to do something on my own that I could not do with professional supervision – except steeper hills. It was fun, and I will try it again. After I forget how many times I fell. OUCH!

3 years old is bringing out an attitude that I was expecting at 2. It’s as though the big hairy “terrible two’s” is to woo us into believing it isn’t that bad. Then three happens. All I have to say is WTF??

OK, it isn’t ALL bad. There is still a lot of great stuff, but this month the attitude has been a doozy.

To start this month, we started with your birthday. Because you are my girl (and I do love birthdays), you got two parties. The first with all of Daddy’s and my friends (and your friends too), then another with your friends. You got some great gifts that you love, but the biggest hit was a Princess dress up outfit (as seen in the photo). It comes complete with tiara, clip on earings, a “dress” (aka, skirt) and a purse to carry (what else?) cookies (plastic cookies that were not that interesting before, but now is the only thing to complete the princess ensemble). We have come to an agreement that you can wear it after you eat, and before you play with anything else that is sure to get all over it. This thing is not made well, not sure how many trips through the wash it can handle. I appreciate your cooperation in keeping it as clean as possible.

The next biggest topic for this month is that poop is an issue for you. There is some block in your brain that refuses to let you poop in the potty. You will only do it with a diaper. Even worse, this was a challenge for a while also. There was a period of a couple of weeks in which you didn’t want to poop in the potty, so you just went on strike from pooping. At all. Of course that didn’t end well. Daddy and I spent those two weeks trying to convince you to eat the natural laxative foods. Convince a kid who won’t eat much of anything at all. That also didn’t end well.

Finally, we got to the point where you would poop with regularity, but still refused to go in the potty. So we thought. It seems the at home potty is problematic, but the one at school is totally fine and you poop there all the time. I ask again, WTF?? We are stumped about how to handle this one, since trying to convince you ends in pooping strike, so if you could just fill us in on the problem, that would be great.

Speaking of the digestive system – you are eating! Not a ton, but with regularity. I will choose to ignore the fact that when I stopped obsessing over your food intake (because doc said you are on track and growing perfectly), you started eating as I expect a 3-year-old kid to eat. Instead, I am going to credit our superior parenting skills. (go with it, it is better that way.)

I was also really hoping that you would give up the binky. Daddy and I have discussed various methods of getting you to give it up with the lowest amount of drama. You only get it in bed and to date it isn’t effecting your teeth – but I now wish I made you give it up at 1 like the doc suggested. This is going to be much harder than I planned. The plan we developed is that you can exchange the binky (which babies get) for freedom (we will remove the baby gate from your door while you are in there). You are VERY excited at the prospect of being able to come into our room any time you want – but not excited enough to give up the binky. We are even using peer pressure against you. We know which of your friends have given it up and remind you of this at every opportunity. When you are a teen, I will appreciate your lack of willingness to bend to peer pressure, but for now, it isn’t working for me. If you have any tips, that would be grand. I am not against bribery with M&M’s.

Back to bragging. This month there were HUGE strides in your writing/coloring. You can color a picture in the lines (when you choose to – which is not always the case) and you can write the first 3 letters of your name and the last several. You can read 6 “sight words” in addition to recognizing your name, Mommy and Daddy. You can type your name (when we let you touch the computer) and I am certain you are a genius! You also drew a picture of Daddy. It had a circle for his head, eyes – something like a nose, and something like a beard. Not only a genius, but an artist – I am so proud!

On weekend mornings, you are usually found making breakfast with Daddy. Two weeks ago, you measured all the dry ingredients of pancakes by yourself. Your favorite activity is still swinging  and you will swing for as long as someone will push you. I look forward to the time when you will be able to swing on your own.

This month had a lot in it. Daddy and I love you more than you know and we wish you the best. If you can help us out a little in the attitude and pooping departments, that would be great.

Love, Mommy

If you are not already aware, I don’t like beer. I could be more precise with reasoning, but it doesn’t change that fact.

However, I married a brewer. A pretty good brewer (according to the public and actual critics). So whe he opens his brewery, I would like to have a beer at his opening (without the “eww” face). To do this, I had to find the gateway into craft brewing. For me, it was Woodchuck Hard cider, spring release. It tastes like a pancake in a bottle.

I am still working on finding a beer I can drink with regularity… but I have cider to keep me entertained on the journey.

I would love to attribute it to something better than “Facebook” – but no idea where it started. I thank you, whomever you are.