After school

3:30 in the afternoon is a tough time around here.   We are just getting home from school and everyone is starving and cranky.  We have what seems like an eternity until bed time.  Homework…baths…dinner, and oh, the dreaded bed time rituals of brushing teeth, everyone go potty(!!), and prayers.  We have a groundhog in our family who gets out of his burrow about 3 times before falling asleep.  “I need to go potty.”  “I heard something.”  “Can you tuck me in?”  It’s endlessssssssss.  Isn’t there some sort of saying, “The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.”? 

 

I’ve started giving a star to the person who does something the first time I ask.  If you earn 10 stars you get to pick anything you want at the dollar store.  The first time they reached 10 stars Lucy picked out lipgloss, Emilia picked out blue eye shadow, and Christian picked out a pack of gum.

 

The second time Lucy picked out a 6 pack of pastel toothbrushes, Emilia glitter nailpolish, and Christian Arid XX dry deodorant.

 

There was a break in the flag football game.

 

Oh!  Back to the conflict/triumph thing.  Here’s a triumph.  For the first time in almost 5 years I bought ONE SIZE of diapers.   Yes, it’s true..big thumbs up!   Emilia and Christian are no longer in pull-ups!  Although, side note, pull-ups are more expensive and prove to be a waist of money in our family.  I never used them with Christian.  Diapers work just the same at night and the “ kind of like putting on undies” thing didn’t work for us.  I finally had Emilia go cold turkey and by night 3 we had no more accidents.  Christian was dying to wear his bigboy undies to bed, so he had to give me 10 dry nights.  Little go-getter got it done.  It’s so intriguing to me how different each of my children are and what motivates them. 

 

So, it’s just sweet little Mary’s toosh in diapers and I’m loving every second of this stage.

 

EXCCCEEEEPT during dinner.  I usually time everything perfectly wrong.  It’s like she sees me get out the cutting board and thinks, “oh yes, I’m going to get her right about now.”  Wail! I can usually buy a few minutes if I let her chew on my thumb.  It’s clean, promise.