Adventures in La La Land

1. This week I attempted to potty train Levi. He's almost 2.5 so I figured it was time, even though I'm still scarred from training my last child. I bought him some cool Thomas the Train undies and a new ring for the toilet. He was mildly interested the first day. He refused  to wear the undies, so we went outside and I let him run around naked and sit on the potty chair every few minutes. He peed twice, just a tiny bit, and got a sucker. Once he figured out there was candy, he was much more interested. The problem is I don't want to sit at home all day hounding him to pee. I have places to go and things to do. So I'm probably not being nearly consistent enough. By the end of the week, he didn't want anything to do with potty training. At least until Justin and I left for the weekend. He was obsessed with my mom taking him to the bathroom. When she started texting me about how much he was sitting on the potty chair trying to go, I told her to have him trained by...

1. This week was water week! We went to 4 different places to swim 4 days in a row! It was horrendously hot all week, so we were grateful for the many opportunities to cool off! On Monday, we joined a bunch of our friends at "Grandma Jan's" pool. It's a small 3 ft. deep pool, so it was somewhat crowded with all 13 of our kids and 4 moms, but it was a blast! I mean, don't get me wrong - we each spent a lot of time counting heads, telling kids to stop splashing each other in the face, drying off wet wiggly bodies to run inside and go potty, and handing out copious amounts of snacks. But we also spent lots of time floating in the water, laughing with our kids, and chatting. 2. On Tuesday we joined my extended family at Uncle Joel's pool for an early Independence Day party. Levi has gotten so good at swimming with his Puddle Jumper life jacket that I don't feel like I have to be right  next to him. Don't worry, though. I never take my eye off of him....