Potty Training, V. 2.0

Well, Ridley is finally wanting to wear "big girl panties" on her own. She has officially made it 24 hours without accident, but now that I've said it, she'll probably have one :)

It's been a struggle to get her potty trained. She's definitely at an age where she's not sure what she wants. Sometimes she wants to be just like all the other big girls. Other times she wants to go back to being a baby, like Harper. It must be very frustrating for her.

With a little luck and a lot of patience, we may get her potty trained yet!

Silly Girls

Tub Time!

Christmas 2008!

This year was probably the most exciting Christmas I've ever had! Ridley is old enough to know what is going on, and she was very worked up about it! She knew that Santa was coming and went to bed super early, which was very helpful to us! Here's some pictures...

The video is too big to upload. Let's just say, Ridley FREAKED out.

Ridley is figuring out how to draw!

She is currently obsessed with drawing herself. :)

Phase 1 - The Beginning -


Phase 2 - Ridley - Big Head, Arms, Legs, Forehead, Ears, Hair, and whatever else she decided to add on -


This is an extremely fun age!!!

Tag.

Before you touch me,

I will run.

If I touch you, you

must stop.

If I lose you, we

won't stop

and must run on

as two

forever.

Try to touch the larch's

bark,

try to call it

home.

If you go beyond

the grass,

you'll have no

voice,

you'll have

no one.

Beyond the grass

time stops;

try to touch

the larch's

bark,

try to

touch me,

we can stop,

we can try

to call it home.


red rover

red rover, red rover, why can't

you come over?

toward morning, toward evening,

why not let go;

and come over, come

over, why can't you

come over? red rover, red

rover, decider, permitter,

red rover, red rover,

why won't you let go?

My Mother's Garden

I lost my copper key

in my mother's garden

I lost my silver knife

staring at a cloud

I found my wooden boat

hiding in the rushes

I found my wishing stone

hiding in my shoe

I lost my copper key

hiding in the rushes

I found my wooden boat

staring at a cloud

I lost my memory

when I learned to whistle

If you find my silver knife

hide it in a stone

The Happy Friend

How the happy friend became
a study in rigidity whose eyes
I closed quite carefully, I'll never know.
The long day's last surprise
meant nothing was the same.
Outside, snow turned to rain and back to snow.

The window framed a night
of soundless traffic passing in the street,
bare trees grew from the pooled light into dark.
The friend's life was complete.
Having no proper rite,
I rose and looked out on an edge of park,

slowly becoming me,
my vigil ended in a simple room.
Who was that husk inhabiting the bed,
the part left to inhume?
In speechless company,
I stepped out for a breath to clear my head.

A lamplit cloud escaped
before me as I walked without an aim.
I wondered if my friend had traveled far
now nothing was the same,
and falling snow had draped
a passing bus, a car, another car,

until the muffled street
was full of gliding ghosts. Those other lives,
anonymous to me, were everywhere
a person could arrive,
in houses, dark or lit,
in taxis cruising for another fare,

in shelters and motels,
in hospitals, on heating grates below
grid-plotted canyon walls of corporate towers.
Only a snowball's throw
from disappearing trails,
the living kept on breathing through the hours.

Fire In The Doll's House

The paper house ignites
with an alchemist's bellows.

Golden-finned, arched, dying, re-aroused,
encircling every human and thimble-sized object —

Love, with the tiniest, red torch branded to your heart —
will you come now?

Blood blooms lie decked on the mounted beams,
devouring the scabs of tissue roses.

They follow the crumb paths
through little halls and rooms

no larger than the width of a child's hand:
tablets for worms, baskets for a litter of mice,

gnats swim in the pool
of a toy teacup —

Inside the sleeping tents,
vapor unwinds the dolls from the dolls' beds.

Acid ash snowcloud
little white sails

Voyage

I feel as if we opened a book about great ocean voyages
and found ourselves on a great ocean voyage:
sailing through December, around the horn of Christmas
and into the January Sea, and sailing on and on
in a novel without a moral but one in which
all the characters who died in the middle chapters
make the sunsets near the book's end more beautiful.

And someone is spreading a map upon a table,
and someone is hanging a lantern from the stern,
and someone else says, "I'm only sorry
that I forgot my blue parka; It's turning cold."

Sunset like a burning wagon train
Sunrise like a dish of cantaloupe
Clouds like two armies clashing in the sky;
Icebergs and tropical storms,
That's the kind of thing that happens on our ocean voyage

And in one of the chapters I was blinded by love
And in another, anger made us sick like swallowed glass
& I lay in my bunk and slept for so long,

I forgot about the ocean,
Which all the time was going by, right there, outside my cabin window.

And the sides of the ship were green as money,
and the water made a sound like memory when we sailed.

Then it was summer. Under the constellation of the swan,
under the constellation of the horse.

At night we consoled ourselves
By discussing the meaning of homesickness.
But there was no home to go home to.
There was no getting around the ocean.

We had to go on finding out the story
by pushing into it

The sea was no longer a metaphor.
The book was no longer a book.
That was the plot.
That was our marvelous punishment.

Undid in the Land of Undone

All the things I wanted to do and didn't
took so long.
It was years of not doing.

You can make an allusion here to Penelope,
if you want.
See her up there in that high room undoing her art?

But enough about what she didn't do —
not doing
was what she did. Plucking out

the thread of intimacy in the frame.
If I got to
know you that would be

— something. So let's make a toast to the long art
of lingering.
We say the cake is done,

but what exactly did the cake do?
The things undid
in the land of undone call to us

in the flames. What I didn't do took
an eternity —
and it wasn't for lack of trying.

Kingdom Come

When it's finished, and I have regained
the present, the bedroom recomposing
itself around the pulpy grapefruit-colored
air of first light, of not quite May,
each atom briefly discernible as herself, a daughter
separate from her scheming family, each dizzy
planet plucked from her refractory solar system
and singularly loved before retrograde;
when myself has been returned to herself,
and I have emerged from that closed-eyed
kingdom of spit and jerk, the emergency
over, called off, the ambulance delivered
to the station sedated, empty, disappointed,
the dumbfounded stadium of my body being
rebuilt, panting bulldozer, conveyor belt
of sodium and tablespoon of bleach;
then I ask what other women blinking awake
alone in this apartment building? How
many fluid ounces filling this spilt city?
What other illegible autographs drying
invisible across our exhausted chests?
Exactly what kind of mercy is this?

A Poem Is Not A Prayer

When the evening enters water,
the clear interior stained
and all in fire its minor sky;

when the sun like melted solder
burns into the green,
delineates the bones of each leaf;

the tree feels nothing,
the lake is not in pain,
this strange light is not a cry.

Nor does darkness bring relief.

Willow

Okay, willow, breathe on me
from the sunless opening in you
crescent of gouges and breezes slope
on which beetles stumble and are
flushed out.

Traffic, human traffic with its rinse
of promises and pauses is coming
for keeps.

And look there goes a swallow transplanting soil.

Me (let me think it)

I can sit on this bench longer than nature
and not know or crave a thing
about this bench, bottle cap dented into its plank
and initials scratched beside it, beside
the point: two raw letters forward to back just
as rare as any combination.
And now the date, plume of digits, daily
statistic.

This is behavior, willow, this
drone, it accompanied you once
in your grove of which
you have a memory a lush one don't you?

Was there no breath of you there?

I crossed the arc of your silhouette and lapped
your leaves' signature.

Things grew from you -
beneath you in the patched grass
and not far away sat a man on
a bench.

You take it in or you don't.

You hide the sky or else.

Things lived in you.

You, stranger.

Let This World Endure

I right a broken branch.
The leaves are heavy
With water and shadow
Like this sky now, before

The dawn of day. O earth,
Clashing signs, scattered paths,
But beauty, beauty absolute,
The beauty of a river:

Let this world endure,
In spite of death.
The gray olive
Clings to the branch.

Let this world endure,
Let the perfect leaf
Halo forever
The ripening fruit.

Let the hoopoes, when the sky
Opens at dawn,
Fly forever from under the roof
Of the empty barn,

Then alight over there
In legend;
And all is motionless
An hour more.

Let this world endure,
Let absence and word
Fuse forever
In simple things.

Let word be to absence
As color is to shadow,
Gold of ripe fruit
To gold of dry leaves:

Not parting until death,
Like a snowflake on a hand
The water vanishes,
So does the gleam.

Let so pure a presence
Never cease
Like sky that fades
From water as it dries.

Let this world remain
As it is tonight:
Let others, beyond ourselves,
Partake of the endless fruit.

Let this world endure,
Let the shining dust of summer eve
Forever enter
The empty room,

And the water of an hour's rain
Stream forever
In the light
Along the path.

Let this world endure,
And words not be one day
These graying bones
That birds will peck,

Screeching, squabbling,
Wheeling apart,
Birds that are our night
Within the light.

Let this world endure
Just as time stands still
While we clean the cut
Of a weeping child.

And then returning
To the darkened room,
We see he sleeps in peace:
Night that is light.

Drink, she said,
Bending over him,
As he wept full of trust
After his fall.

Drink, and let your hand
Open my red dress,
Your mouth consent
To its good fever.

The hurt that burned you
Has almost drained away.
Drink of this water, which is
The mind that dreams.

Earth, who came to us
Eyes closed
As though to ask
For a guiding hand.

She would say: Let our voices,
Drawn to the nothing
In each other, be
All that we need.

Let our bodies try
To ford a wider time,
Our hands not know
The other shore.

Upstream, let the child be born
From nothing, and pass
Downstream in nothing
From boat to boat.

And again: summer will last
No more than an hour.
But let our hour be
Vast as the river.

Forgetfulness has power
And death does its work
Only in desire,
Not in time.

4th in my 4th

Ok Heather, this one's for you. ;)



Haha! Heather, you'll probably actually remember 2 of these people too! So, we were at a work sponsered Salt Lake Bee's baseball game, and I got this picture of some work people, (left to right) Camille, Wendy, and Nick. They're pretty awesome.

So that's the fourth pic in my fourth folder. Anyone else want to give up the 4th in their 4th?

Ridley's Hurty Thanksgiving

I have quite the precocious three year old. Here's a cute picture of her.



She loves to do crazy things, like jump off our coffee table to our couch...






Thanksgiving Day was one such occasion. However, instead of jumping, she decided that crawling would be a better option. This, unfortunately for her little head, ended in disaster...



It's really too bad you can't see the gnarliness that was the back of her head. She was being way to hyper for a good shot. However, here is one of her at the hospital, where she thought she was just super awesome.



I guess being doted upon and allowed candy and car rides will do that to a 3 year old. :)

This is another one where she had just gotten the numbing medication stuck to the back of her head (I wasn't allowed to get any pictures of her from the front after that last one - she was ticked)



Anyway, here are a couple of pics of the double staple aftermath. They're not super clear, but on the first one, you can definitely see the staples.




The back of her head is currently a war zone. Not allowed to be: touched, itched, scratched, brushed, scrubbed or otherwise looked at for any significant period of time.

She thinks it's all better. However, the medical staple remover she'll have to see in just shy of a week will have a different story.

haha - Halloween pics, finally

I didn't get many good ones, so you'll just have to deal with it Shannon ;)

Me, being the spaz that I am, forgot to bring my own camera to work with me on Halloween, so I got a couple of pictures from some co-workers of my cuties.





As you can see, my Patrick costume just didn't happen, due to said spaziness. Oh well. Ridley's costume came and it was a kids size large instead of a toddler size large, so I had to do some last minute quick thinking, but she didn't seem to mind how enormous the costume was, so it's all good.

The Trip to Oregon

Ok, so, we drove 1713.3 miles in 3.5 days to make it to Andrew's Aunt Margaret's funeral in Forest Grove, Oregon. Lots and lots of driving. I have figured that we drove for about 28 hours total. Well, when I say we I really mean me. I drove all but about 100 miles of it, because it was my car, and Andrew follows people really, really closely.

Part of this drive was out to Seaside, so that I (and the girls) could see the ocean for the first time. Now, I've seen the ocean, I've just never been to the beach. So, without further ado, here are some pictures of the beach.

On the way, we stopped at Multnomah Falls (mostly for a break from the car). Here's a couple pics...







All in all, a good trip, outside of having to go for a funeral.

Margaret Cressa Tilden

Andrew's Aunt Margaret passed away on October 4, 2008. We drove to the funeral in Forest Grove, Oregon over this past weekend.



She sounds like a really great woman. I wish I could have known her. She led a very interesting life, and I hope that I and my girls can have as full a life as she did.

Some funny Halloween Cartoons

Halloween is Coming!!!

So, Ridley is extremely excited about Halloween this year!

Contrary to last year, where her pirate face looked mostly like this...



But this year....

Ridley's going to be Spongebob!!! Here's a picture of her costume...



In the spirit of winning my work's costume contest (hehe), Harper will be Gary...



I'm going to be Patrick Star, (Similar to this costume, except home made, of foam, and for a big kid like me...)



And Andrew is (supposedly) going to be Mr. Krabs...



It's very exciting. I'm very excited. We're all very excited. Can you sense the excitement?

Potty Training - The bane of my existence

I'm frustrated. Potty training sucks. Seriously. It's rough when you know your kid can do it, and she just won't. Ridley is said kid.

She's so darn stubborn!!! She knows when she has to go potty. She knows how to use the potty. She'd rather pee-pee in her pull-up than go to the bathroom.

Grrr....

Here's proof that she can do it.



So why won't she do it when she's supposed to?!?

My mom bought quite the neat little invention. It's called the Potty Watch. It plays music every 30, 60, or 90 minutes, depending on what you set it to. And it won't play music any other time, which is cool because it is supposed to remind her to try and go potty.

We'll see if this works. In the meantime, give me some suggestions. I need all the help I can get!

Bob the Beta

Our fish, Bob (after Spongebob, of course) has moved on. In memory, here is his picture.



He will be missed.

Ridley Claims She Hates Me.

So, recently, Ridley has taken to telling me two things.

1. She HATES me (yelling it usually).

2. She wants to watch me die.

This is, needless to say, somewhat depressing. I realize that all kids go through this stage, some longer than others. But...

It still hurts.

Work has been a total drag lately. Our house is way too small for the four of us and our cat. And our fish. (The fish takes up a lot of room, I know.)

I don't need to be coming home to her "hating" me all the time.

We were at the store today, for instance. I wouldn't buy her some M&M's. She was already way too hyper. So what does she do? Screams at the top of her lungs that I'm a mean mommy and she wants me to die.

Where do kids get this crap anyway? It's not like we're running around all the time telling people how much we hate them, least of all the girls.

I've decided that every time, from now on, no matter how frustrating the situation is, I'm just going to tell her how much I love her.

"Well, I love you and I'm the only mommy you have, so deal with it."

Or -

"Well, I love you, and you hurt my feely goods, so you'd better say sorry."

Or (My personal favorite) -

"I love you and that's all there is to it."

Do you have any other suggestions? Because I'm listening.

Harper said "Hi!"

Not the hugest deal in the world. But, when you had a day like I did, it was awesome!

I walked into daycare to get the girls today, and she'll always crawl right over to me with a huge smile. But today, accompanying the smile was a big "Hi!"

It was great!

So, in the fashion of my last blog, here is a slide show of the youngest of Youngs, The Harper.

Missing the Monkey Chow

So, I have really random nicknames for my kids. Stinker, curly, baby-babe, funky face... Monkey Chow is my personal favorite.

I was told today by Ridley that she doesn't want to be Monkey Chow anymore. She's just Ridley. "Mommy, I'm just Ridley Young. Man."

Bummer.

It got me to thinking about when she was younger, and as such, here is a little slide show to drown my sorrows in.

BTW - I think it's really funny that the only differences in Ridley and Harper's looks right around this age are chubbiness and eye color. hehe.