OK, for those of you who don't live on the southern coast of the United States, I'm not trying to make anyone jealous.  I was just having one of those incredibly blue sky/perfect temperature with just a gust of wind/I can't believe I get to live here kind of days. 

It started last spring.  One day in March I was driving down US-1 to the car dealership when I was struck by how blue the sky was.  I grew up in Fort Worth, TX, and lived about 25 years of my life there.  It's not exactly New York City or Los Angeles, but we get our share of smog in the Metroplex.  I didn't realize how much until we moved here last year.  Anyway, I was just about moved to tears and I stopped to thank God for His beautiful creation and for letting me see it.

 Besides the blue skies, we regularly get to see huge rainbows, we have 4 palm trees in our yard along with 3 birds-of-paradise plants, and one thing I think I'll never get over is seeing these 4 foot tall sandhill cranes just walking around in our neighborhood.  I've been clothes shopping for the winter- I had to get some capris!  Our electric bill here is less than it was in Texas in the winter AND the summer.  My girls can play outside almost year round (Ann Marie is constantly brown).  I can go to the beach year round.  I mean, as soon as they finish building the Kohl's down the road from my house, my world will be complete!!

 Of course, there are the hurricanes/tropical storms, and the fires, and the floods, and the mosquitoes (I don't want any of my inland-bound friends to feel too bad).

 I'm not going to sermonize, but I'll say it quickly that any place, as beautiful or ugly or hot or cold or flat or hilly or dry or humid as it may be is an especially awesome place when it's right where God has put you! 

Just kidding... I'm not going to do another whole entry on pee and poop.  But I will give an update.  We started last Thursday, and by Friday afternoon I wanted to give up.  However, sometime in the wee hours of Monday morning, I woke up thinking, "Stickers- I forgot about stickers!"  So we started with determination on Monday morning putting a pretty heart sticker (donated by big sis) on a chart in addition to 2 M&Ms every time she went potty.  It worked!  By last night she had filled an entire chart (20 stickers total), and Thursday she went the whole day without wetting her pull-up.  Woo-hoo!!  Miracles still happen.  Of course, she's not really telling me that she needs to go yet, but she can usually go within a minute of sitting down now.  One step at a time!

Jim went to Atlanta this week for the Catalyst conference put on by NorthPointe.  Old friends would be interested to know that he ran into Boyd Pelley, Michael Fernihough, and Keith Fortenberry (for REALLY old friends).  He was re-energized and re-inspired to return to re-al life as hubby, daddy, minister, and friend.  And Ann Marie, Susanna, and I made it through girls' week alright.  I didn't cook (except for pizza and sandwiches) or wash dishes from Tuesday until last night.  We were running out of sippy cups and the house was starting to smell like Chinese take-out.  Remember, I was being a single mom and I'm pregnant, too!

OK, who needs a picture? or two?

WARNING!  This entry contains graphic information about children and the toilet!

Yesterday, we started potty-training with Susanna.

I have been saying for a year that it can't possibly be as hard as Ann Marie, the girl who would have stayed in a poopy diaper all day if we hadn't smelled her, the girl who had been "going potty" at church for 6 months without really doing anything.  She thought going potty meant you sat on it, played with the toilet paper, played in the sink, and went back to class.

To cure Ann Marie, we started potty training like this- I promised her that she could drink as much as she wanted of whatever she wanted and that she coud watch TV all day (this coming from the sugar- and TV-nazi) as long as she sat on the potty.  Her potty chair had a cushioned seat and we set it up in front of the TV with a trash bag and several towels underneath just in case.  The simple theory was that she had to pee-pee sometime, and she's such a TV-head that it worked!  Needless to say we made a HUGE deal of it, kept it going for a few more days, then switched to more traditional methods.  Oh, and she got a lollipop every time she went.  Now to get her to go #2 took at least 4 more months and lots of kicking and screaming.  It was almost 7 months later, on my birthday coincidentally, that she finally made it a whole day without pee-ing in her pull-up, and this spring she finally made it 30 days without an accident.  We went to Sea World!!

Fast forward (only a few months) to Susanna and we've had a rough start.  She only pee-peed twice yesterday and not at all today so far.  On the bright side, one of her successful trips yesterday was at Ann Marie's dance studio on a big potty, and this morning she kind-of pooped in the potty.  I had stepped out for a few seconds and I heard, "Mommy, there's poop in the potty!" as if she didn't know it came from her own body.  The next thing she said was, "I don't want it in there.  Get it out!"  It was the tiniest little plop of poop but it was poop so we made a big deal about it- wiped, danced, flushed, high-fived, and washed our hands.

I have to say, as tiring as it can be, I'd rather be doing this 3 months pregnant than with a 3 month old baby like last time.  Hopefully it won't be too long before she gets the hang of it because we're taking the next step to big-girlhood next month- the big bed.

Pray for us!!!