Ethan's Christmas Activities at School

Working weekends paid off once again because I was able to help out at Ethan's Christmas party at school. He loves when I get to help out in his class so I'm going to soak it up while I can! There are 4 kindergarten classes and they all took turns rotating through each classroom with different activities. Ethan's classroom was cookie decorating. We helped the kids put icing and sprinkles on their sugar cookies then hurriedly reset the room for the next class. It was a wild time but I'm so glad I was able to help!

The classroom before the little monsters came in to make their cookies.

That's Ethan's teacher. She's probably saying, "One two three, eyes on me." I heard that a lot!

Icing his cookie.

Ethan and Mommy. :-)

He wanted to be silly and put icing on his face. This is the crew he sits with during class.

Another Christmas activity was the sing-a-long one morning right after school started. Unfortunantly, Caleb was sick so I stayed home and Mondo went. It looked like mass chaos! The entire school was squished into the cafeteria and the parents lined the walls. They all sang a bunch of Christmas songs. Luckily Mondo took some videos so I could feel like I was there.

My little reindeer.

Ethan's class.

So cute!!!

This one is my favorite!

Code Brown All Clear!

Oh what a difference a week makes in potty training! Last week I was so done with potty training. As you read previously, he was kind of getting it but I was running out of patience. Well, pray for patience and what does God give you? A scenario to be patient about!

I was on the verge of quitting but decided we had come too far to turn back. I'm so glad we stuck with it. This week has been great! He has only had one or two accidents and has gone poo poo in the potty every time! Yahoo! That was a HUGE hurdle to overcome. He didn't go for several days and then he finally did with Mondo's encouragement when I was asleep after working. He earned a KitKat for that. Then every time he went after that he immediately demanded a KitKat. Haha! Now he will settle for the "poo poo in the potty" song and dance.

He has even decided to use the big potty...and flush it! That is another HUGE hurdle for him. I stressed over that stupid potty chair trying to find the right one for days and now he uses it as a step stool to reach the sink!

We have been keeping him in underwear all day, even when we go out. He still refuses to use the potty in public. He has learned to hold it. Poor guy. He went to school twice this week and had no accidents. I thought he might go potty at school since they have little potties and he is comfortable there. I won't stress about it as long as he can hold it!

I'm so proud of him and he seems so big to me now. Where did my little baby go??

Gaylord Texan

Every year we take the kids to Gaylord Texan to see the lights and trains. I also hope to get a good Christmas card photo out of the photo opportunity filled place. This year was just as tough if not more tough than last year with Caleb. He was NOT into photo ops. He was really excited to see the lights and trains but would not sit still and pose for ANYTHING. I invited my parents to come with us since my dad likes little train sets ups and to give the kids some special Nana/Papa time.

Photo op #1...not gonna happen. Ethan's face is pretty cute though.

Not smiling even in Nana's arms.

Look at the trains!

There is actually a pond behind him but it's too dark to see it. The pic we took before this one was Ethan posing all cute and Caleb running away.

Ethan...alone...again. What a trooper.

Ethan looking at the trains with Papa.

Ethan was really trying to make him stay put for this one. Look at Caleb's little mischievous eyes!

I love that Ethan loves having his picture taken.

The gingerbread house was a bit hit. It smelled yummy!

Our one decent family photo. Caleb's not smiling...he's whining to get down.

The three amigos.

Yep, there's Ethan again.

He was posing himself by the end and saying, "Mommy, take a picture!"

The boys checking out this cool gingerbread house castle.

Love that kid.

Ahh...that's what he wanted. The perfect scenario: eating chippies with Nana and Papa.

Check out that giant cookie!

Oh look, I was there that night too!

Another failed attempt at a pic with Caleb.

Yep, he posed himself again with the penguin's arm wrapped around him. Haha!

They entertained each other by dancing around this Christmas tree while Mondo went to go get the car.

So sweet. They were listening to a lady play the piano and sing.

Bass Pro

Part of the Hernandez family Christmas tradition is going to Bass Pro to see Santa (or the "fish store" as the kids call it). They absolutely LOVE to go there and get on all of the boats and look at the fish. This year we must have picked a busy night to go because we had to wait a long time to see Santa. Luckily there is so much to see in the store that we had plenty of ways to kill time.

This year brought on some questions from Ethan: "Daddy, why do people like to kill animals?" Uh....we were at a loss for words. We told him it was for food but he still looked puzzled as to why people enjoy stuffing them and putting them in stores. Me too Ethan, me too.

Writing their letters to Santa. Ethan asked for a skateboard with a handle on it which was good since that what Santa thought he wanted. Caleb wanted Buzz. He already has a hundred of those.

Putting their letters in Santa's mailbox.

They also decided that they would like this tent. It was pretty awesome. We went camping with church when Caleb was around 18 months and Ethan was 4. Ethan loved it and asks to go all the time. Maybe one of these days we will invest in a big tent.

Caleb didn't care about the giant polar bear in front of him. He wanted the "coke coke".

We stopped for a chippie break in front of a little pond with fish.

Riding on the reindeer carousal.

Caleb opted to sit next to mommy...while eating a candy cane.

Not too terrible. Caleb was all excited to see Santa...until it was our turn. We shoved him up there and he had the big lip and wanted to cry but he never did. It's progress!

Trimming the Tree

We finally gave in an bought a fake, pre-lit tree...and I'm so glad we did! Every year we fight with the real tree and forget to water it and spend most of our time vacuuming up pine needles. I think I was most excited about not having to wrap lights around the branches! There is no theme to our tree. Growing up, our tree was filled with decorations from over the years like photos and home made ornaments. I like to carry on that tradition. Sure, a "themed" tree is probably prettier but I like that there is a story to almost every ornament on our tree that we can reminisce about.

Isn't this what everyone wants their tree to look like?? I was cracking up at Caleb's decorating skills. He put everything from the Christmas tree box on the tree. I started taking it down and he got mad and said he was decorating the tree! I had to sneak it off later.

I just realized that this is the only full body shot of the tree. So you're gonna have to look at me adjusting the star. Whoops...next year I will get a full on shot!

Caleb "adjusting" the ornaments. I found ornaments daily around the house, some broken. I think the tree was pretty bare by the time Christmas came around.

Ethan was a big helper like always. He loves to help us do anything. He feels very important.

He really loved standing on this ladder to put the more breakable items at the top.

But of course he still had to be silly for the camera. :-)

The Potty Diaries

Man. How many times have I asked myself, "Why did I ever decide to potty train Caleb this week?!" I know I'm not supposed to compare kids...but Ethan was strangely easy to potty train. Just a few pee pee accidents and we were done. Then there is my sweet Caleb. Here is week one of potty training. I think there will be several more to come.(The potty chair he wanted...couldn't find it anywhere!)

Day 1: We went to the store and bought a potty chair and underwear and went cold turkey. He had about 10 pee pee accidents and one poo accident. By that night I thought he was clearly not ready and wanted to give up.

(The potty chair we ended up with. Still cool but he isn't really into Cars.)

Day 2: It's a miracle. He woke up with a dry pull-up and we went straight to the potty...and he peed! I don't think I made him sit long enough because he had an accident about 5 minutes later. He still refused to use the potty chair to poo.


Day 3: He woke up dry again and went straight to the potty and peed a lot then I put him in his underwear for the day. About 30 minutes later he finally pooed...in his underwear. Disgusting! I won't go into any detail but it was a bad scene. I tried to stay positive with him and told him where he needed to go next time and he looked at me like I was crazy. The rest of the day he was accident free in his underwear. Then we decided to go to Six Flags. He has a huge fear of using public restrooms. Just walking toward the door will send him into a huge screaming fit. So I decided to put a pull-up on. I asked him several times at Six Flags if he needed to go pee pee. He said he needed his Cars potty. Then we went out to eat. I tried to force him into the restroom and showed him that no one was in there so it wouldn't be loud. No flushing. It resulted in screaming. Later, he came up to me at the restaurant and whispered in my ear that he went pee pee and I needed to change him. Ugh! I told him that he would have to wait until we got home and that's why he should've gone in the restroom when I took him. As soon as we got home he went straight to the bathroom and peed a ton.

Day 4: Woke up a tiny bit wet then went straight to the bathroom and peed a lot. Stayed dry the whole day and we even went to the store with his regular underwear on. Once we got home he had a poo accident. Gross. I was a little tougher on him and we had another discussion on where he is supposed to do that. He looked like he didn't care.

Day 5: Woke up pretty wet but went straight to the potty and peed a lot. We were planning on being out of the house most of the day so I opted for a pull-up. We went to the movies and he seemed uncomfortable like he needed to pee but he refused to go to the restroom. Then we went to a restaurant. He was really cranky and didn't want to eat...or go to the restroom. I had to take him out while Mondo and Ethan finished eating because he was screaming. He fell asleep on the way home so maybe he was partly tired. We woke him up about 30 minutes later and his pull-up was wet. I put him on the potty then changed him into another pull-up. Then we went to Six Flags. After we were there for about 45 minutes he had about a 10 minute screaming fit. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with him. Then I noticed he was sitting weird in the stroller. He had peed. I took him to the restroom (which was nasty) and had to take off his shoes and pants to put another pull up on. I was so frustrated at that moment I told him he was going back in diapers because Mommy was not going to do this every day. (Of course, I now feel extremely guilty about that.) The rest of the Six Flags trip was uneventful. We went home, he peed a lot in his potty, then we put his regular underwear back on. I could tell that he needed to poo but he refused. He went to bed without going so we will see what happens tomorrow!

So in summary, he is doing well...with the peeing...at home. He is probably 99% trained in peeing at home. I guess the poo with just take a while. The main issue I have with him is his crazy fear of public restrooms. I really don't know how to make him get over that. He has been that way his whole little life. Every time I take Ethan into a public restroom Caleb cries and freaks out. This isn't a new development. Any suggestions???

Caleb's Birthday "Party"

Poor Caleb didn't get a "real" birthday party this year. His first one was cancelled because Ethan was sick. So we re-scheduled for the next weekend. Then Caleb was sick. So we decided to scrap the whole thing and try again next year. Luckily we could get away with it since he is still young. That is, if Ethan would stop asking when Caleb is getting his birthday party!

We started a tradition for the kids on their birthdays that they get to go out to eat wherever they want on their birthday. Luckily we took Caleb on birthday because that turned out to be his party! He chose to go to Christina's. It's a yummy mexican restaurant where he always gets tacos. Strange request from a kid who now only eats bologna.

Ethan tried to go to the restaurant like this. That request was denied.

Coloring like a big boy while waiting for the food.

He also played a little drum solo with the silverware.

This is how he eats his tacos...with Daddy feeding him. He gets so mad if he holds the taco himself and if breaks. He screams, "It's broken!" and he won't eat it. Also, it's much cleaner.

We also feed him the rice. Yes, he can feed himself but eating rice is a disaster on his own! More of it ends up on the floor or in his lap than in his tummy.

Ethan needed a pic of him eating his mexican food, I mean, mac & cheese and fries. That's what he gets every time we go there.

Blowing out his birthday candle. They gave him fried ice cream that he didn't eat. We didn't eat it either. It was covered in coconut! Way to ruin ice cream!

He did sample some whipped cream off the top.

He got a new Buzz Lightyear!

He was so excited! He has been playing with an old beat up one that doesn't have all of the features that this one has. He is a Toy Story maniac!

I made him a cookie cake for his birthday celebration at home. Good thing I did since that was the only "cake" he got. Poor thing.

He barely even ate it. Just picked at it. He was probably too full of tacos!

Ethan gobbled it up!

Here's a video of the pitiful mexican restaurant version of Happy Birthday.