Organized Chaos

Excited about…POO!!

Oh yea! I’m excited about some poo. When it is in the potty that is and not on the tiles around the pool!!

Lil Mister has done SO SO amazing this weekend. I would never believe that I’ve only been potty training for two weeks!

I got home late from Hubby’s work Friday but he had done very well at school and even came home from school in his underpants!! YAY…at least that is one battle down! It wasn't so bad because while Hubby was working I got some great photo's of the storm moving in!

Saturday he asked for his potty the moment he woke up! He sat on it and watched some cartoons while I debated whether I truly wanted to get out of bed! Next thing I hear is ‘Momma, poo poo!’ And sure enough he had done his business in the potty! I squealed with delight and immediately woke up Hubby. He obviously was not so impressed at being waked up before 7 am on a Saturday to be told about such things!

Afterwards we proceed outside. Coffee and some tea and another go in the potty! He’s getting very good about asking. This time he comes to me to tell me he will pee pee in potty and then runs (literally at sprint like speed for a 22 month old!) to the potty in the bathroom.

Now, Lil Mister has learnt a new trick. He will ‘uit gooi’ his own potty. He takes his inside part from the potty goes to the big toilet and throws in it. Then he flushes and is very proud of himself! At least he is helping out! He also is starting to get used to washing his hands EVERYTIME! This makes me a proud mommy!

The washing the hands is especially fun for him because I got this awesome gift at my baby shower! It is a automatic soap dispenser. Lil Mister loves that Mommy doesn’t have to give him soap anymore. He runs his hand under and out it comes!

After this we had to put a nappy on to go to town and Lil Mister was passed out before we got home!
We spent the rest of the afternoon being extremely lazy and swimming in the pool! It was GREAT!

We had plans for a braai with Mr & Mrs P that night and overall I would say the potty was successful there too! He had a couple of accidents outside but was very good about asking Papa to take him to ‘pee pee on grass’. He even did his business in the BIG BOY toilet that night!! (Imagine a cheesy grin from this Momma!)

Sunday we ended up staying home because Lil Mister had woke up just before midnight at the braai and only fell back asleep around 2am! Tired is an understatement! The screams evoked from him not getting his way and pure exhaustion Sunday morning could have woken George Washington from his grave! Eventually Hubby Dearest and I took a drive with Lil Mister to get him to nap.

BIG MISTAKE! Lil Mister took about an hour and half nap yesterday morning and nothing…I repeat NOTHING the rest of the day. At 7 pm last night he falls asleep between Papa and Oupa while talking to them!

Only one accident really yesterday and that was Mommy’s fault. He did ask to pee pee in potty and I was just too slow! I could tell he wasn’t impressed with me either!

I only had to change his nappy once in the night verses the normal two times! He’s going dry longer. We got two potty’s in this morning before school and made it to school with no accidents!

I know we have a long road ahead of us. But I feel that we deserve to pat ourselves on the backs! My goal is to have the potty training well ahead before Boetie (LJ) comes in the next 3 ½ weeks. I figure the six weeks I will be at home will give us a good amount of time to work out all the kinks and I will have a potty trained kid by the time he returns to school! (Cross your fingers!)

So what do I think has been the overall keys to success???

1) I didn’t read a bunch of books! I read maybe 2 or 3 articles on line but otherwise just dove in. Every child is different and what works for one doesn’t necessarily work for others! When I was pregnant I read EVERY piece of information I could and when things didn’t go the way the “experts” claimed I freaked. This particular extravaganza I have been much more relaxed.

2) Take away nappies. I cannot stress this enough. Explain to your little that they are a big boy/girl and that they don’t need nappies anymore! The only time Lil Mister is in a nappy right now is when he sleeps or if we will be in town for more than 20 minutes. If we are at friends or in the car he is in his underpants. In and out of nappies confuses their minds. Nappies are for DUDU time ONLY!

3) Praise, squeal, jump, clamp, sing, or whatever it takes to make sure your little knows how proud you are when they do use the potty! At first it was just us getting excited that he’d sit. Eventually they come around. Make sure they know they’ve done good!

4) Don’t punish when there are accidents! Don’t even let them know you’re frustrated! It makes it so much harder! They will make mistakes but they already feel bad themselves (they really do! Lil Mister says sorry each time!). Only praise…no punishment!

5) Do it in the warm weather where you can spend lots and lots of time outside. Take a potty outside too! They wee less in warm weather AND the mess is easier to clean up. When they’re playing is when they forget the most.

6) Ask them constantly. I’m talking every 15 minutes I’m asking Lil Mister if he wants to potty. Eventually he says yes. Leads for less accidents because I’m constantly putting it on his mind.

So yea…that is it. I’m a proud mommy today! Are any of you potty training? Have you potty trained? What’s your top tip?

Shana

I apologize in advance...this turned out really long! Read it though! It's great!!

One of the hardest things about having relocated across the world is the loss in friendships. Since living in South Africa, my husband and I moved quite a few times. We have been blessed to have finally settled in the small town we now are in. We’ve been here for two and a half years. Unfortunately, strong bonded relationships with other people do not just spring up over night. It is a process. It is trial and error.

As a young adult single woman in America, I had so much going for me. I didn’t realize it at the time, but now I see what I left behind. I do not hold regret to this. I left my life there because God showed me that He had more planned for me and that it was here. I thank God for molding me to be a God fearing and God trusting woman.

I had a strong church that believed in me and my faith in God. This was a church that had taken me the first 17 years of my life to find. It was a church where the worship fed my Spirit and the pastors and spiritual leaders fed my Soul. I developed for the first time a personal and deep relationship with Jesus Christ at the steps of that alter. I had friends with whom I conversed and spent time with daily. Friends in Christ with whom I could tell when I was unsure and uplift when they were lost. We could worship together, pray together, and sit unmoving in the awe of the Spirit together. This church taught me to embrace my spiritual gifts and to not be ashamed in the face of others who did not understand. This church prepared me for a relationship with Christ when one day that church wouldn’t be there.

I have a family there who has known me since birth. This doesn’t seem like much until those people are no longer a daily part of your life. My family was my solid ground. No matter how we fought or disagreed I always knew they wanted what was best for me even if they didn’t know what it was. I knew that I was never disgraced in their eyes and I was always accepted even when I didn’t believe it! These people knew the ins and outs of my personality like I knew theirs. Nothing caught us off guard. There was no “learning” period. This family taught me to appreciate every moment with the people you love.

I had friends with whom I had spent years getting to know. Some of these friends we’d come from elementary school together while others were relationships that developed once the freedom of the open road hit (in other words once I was 16 and freely mobile between schools!). These were friends who’d seen me at my worst and at my best. They were the ones I had crazy memories with, some of which we couldn’t even tell the story because we’d laugh to hard. They were the ones who knew in a moments notice that something wasn’t right with me. They were a small group that was thicker than blood at the time. They were friends that taught me what I wanted and NEEDED from a friendship and that which I did not.

I had a culture that I knew. I didn’t have to question what was acceptable. I didn’t have to think about how I might not be able to find something that I was so used to being a normal part of life. I knew the history and I knew what to expect. I wasn’t the odd person out. This culture showed me how to be comfortable being myself in a very judgmental world.

When you make a choice to step into a new world, you make a decision to leave these comforts behind. Sadly, these are all people, places, and things that I took for granted because they were a part of my everyday life for as long as I could remember. They were me and I was them. I’ve now been in South Africa for 3 years and 7 months. I’m married with a child and a second on the way. I work and study here. I have a church here. I am still the different one. I am still the outsider.

In the small town where we live I am The American. This is genuinely the title given to me. If talking to someone you know, you would say I saw Shana, The American, at Spar yesterday. In America I was still an American, but I was just Shana. I wasn’t the one with the accent. I wasn’t the one to ask questions to compare football and rugby, baseball and cricket. I didn’t need to defend my stance on inter-racial marriages or my views on the war in Iraq. I never got asked to describe differences in family life between a boyfriend and my family nor the foods that his mom cooked and my mom cooked. These are all new territories. I NEVER thought I’d have to defend just being me and explain that I WILL NOT ever completely change and leave who I was to become complete in the views of a different culture.

Let me just note that Hubby Dearest and I do work very hard to blend our cultures. A person will think that we cannot be so different, both Christian and that our children do not face animosity here as we are both white (South Africa is still a very race oriented country as so much of each culture is centered around their race!). However, we struggle with the differences of our cultures, values, and beliefs. We differ on discipline and political stands. There are even family values that we’ve both had to merge. And yes even our children are questioned as to how do we raise them, English or Afrikaans. Again, I will not completely leave who I was but I do give. We find our medium.

Almost 4 years down the road, I’m still the outsider. Now my husband and I are placed in a new and VERY SMALL town and we’re both outsiders. The only difference is that we’re like celebrity outsiders (insert Miranda Lambert’s Famous in a Small Town). This brings me to the point of meaningful relationships outside of our immediate family that is here with us. I had forgotten the ups and downs of this road. When I first came to South Africa it was quite simple. My husband and I lived where he had lived for 7 years. He had the friends and I just joined in. Some I liked and some I didn’t and that was that. I didn’t need to search. They were provided for me. In a sense this was great because I had enough transition as it was! But when we both moved, we had to start from scratch. This can sometimes be quite tiresome and even painful.

It is a lot like dating. You put your best face on, get out there and give it a go. Sometimes it is stale. These are ‘bread friends.’ Like bread that your brother left the bag open on. It would still fulfill its purpose but yet you walk away still feeling like you’ve lacked something.

Other times it down right burns! You meet a couple of friends and they seem wonderful, great at first! Much like that wonderful looking burrito that the person at the table next to you ordered in the Mexican restaurant. So you tell the waiter you want that! It looks great and smells great. It even has some really cool name that makes you drool as it rolls of the waiters tongue. That is how the ‘Chili friends’ are. At first they seem like the perfect ones. They are fun and exciting and that first couple of times you do something together you walk away having a feeling of fulfillment. This could be it! But just like that burrito something sneaks up. Sometimes it’s early on, other times you’re half way through before you realize that your mouth is ON FIRE!! You quickly reach for the bread, ‘bread friends’, to drown out this burn. What is it? Oh, yea, that word that sounded so great was translation for ‘burn you’re a$$’ chili. You immediately regret ever ordering it. Nothing takes it away. That is how these friends are. They seem perfect but sure enough you end up in pain.

Sometimes your husband finds a friend that he feels is great. They can hang out and chat and whatever men do, but you can’t stand him! It happens vice versa too. I call these Avocado friends. Typically an avo is something one person loves and the next hates. This is also terrible because it usually ends up in fighting every time said spouse will be around that friend. There are the single friends whom are great in small portions (like dark chocolate) but they never mix with your daily life as milk chocolate would. And the list goes on.

This has been our experience over the last couple of years. There have been all out wars over whom we’re going to be around. Each of refusing someone for some or other reason. There have been couples whom it was great with for a time until one of realizes what the other one has been trying to show us…that they’re ‘Chili friends.’ There have been tears as I realize that a female I thought I could trust was the one trashing my name around town. There have been laughs as we go home having felt so awkward like on a blind date!

I’m thankful for my husband because he has stuck by through this transition. Some of you will say well obviously but heck it is a long road!! It is a dark tunnel at times. So dark we couldn’t even see each other was our misery of loneliness. As humans we need friends. It is in our nature. No matter how much I can tell my husband I need a girl friend to spill it out too and he needs a guy friend to just be a guy with! But at the end of this dark tunnel is light, ‘Sun Friends.’ (They’re called this because they are light and warmth on cold days, they are a reason to frolic and have fun. You always leave happy you were there.) That is what I realized last weekend at a wedding….

Us on the left, wedding couple, more friends and in the all black is Mrs. Paramedic (Mrs.P)

There was a wedding for two friends. It has been a long road with this couple. My husband and I both are having been at fault for some dark times. But at the end the friendship has carried through and we are all adult enough to turn our backs to the past and look forward. For this I am thankful because I truly cannot imagine life without these people any longer. These friends are the light. Two couples in particular. The other is getting married next weekend. I am blessed to have been friends with them to witness these magical days in their lives!! Last weekend there was laughter, there was a little nudging (okay I’m pregnant and at a wedding maybe I wasn’t the best attendee! My poor husband sometimes! :-/) and there was honesty. We were all ourselves. At the end of the night when we were all ready to make the 30km drive home, we were all too good of friends to allow friends to risk the drive. Even if it meant 30km took us 2 ½ hours, 5 stops, a tow, brake failure, and quite a bit of fighting. We knew that is what friends are for…doing what is right even in the face of threats. Even if it wasn’t what the particular couple wanted.

Oh yea we're that cool (notice the time!)

As we drove home that night, all the couples mixed up in each others cars, we all realized one very important fact. We’re willing to go just about anywhere and to any length for each other. For the first time since being in South Africa, I finally felt ‘home.’

I was told a story from the night before. One couple in particular (the ones getting married next weekend!) was one of our very first friends in our town. The man is a paramedic and so he and Hubby Dearest met on duty at accident scenes and struck a friendship. The wife is an amazing, God loving, woman who always seems to bring out the best in me! I’ve enjoyed their company since day one. I’ve also been blessed to be so close with them at a time when my son was very sick! Mr. Paramedic has even promised to ride with me when I go into labor if he is not on duty (hospital is an hour away without traffic) as Hubby Dearest will need to follow in our vehicle and I don’t want to be alone! The night before the wedding this couple and some others were having a braai. Another friend asked Mr. Paramedic where I was from. After an hour of confusion and running every place he could think of through his head he finally stated he didn’t know what she was talking about because ‘Shana is South African.’ Mrs. Paramedic laughed and reminded him that they were talking about my accent and that I was from America. We are so close that they don’t hear my accent any longer as others do. To them I am ‘Just Shana.’ Secretly that night when I got home I cried tears of joy. For me this was the ultimate acceptation. To them I am no longer an outsider.

That is the groom listening to LJ and the one behind him is another friend (who used to be my boss!!)

At 3 am, two of the wives/fiancés and I sat in the lounge together waiting on our men to finish the chauffeur job. We laughed as we discussed how wonderful it would have been for a McDonalds to be in our town (or anything 24 hours!) and how much the next that morning was going to suck as we all had to be up in 4 or less hours. I looked into the faces of these women and realized their love for each other, their men and us was what mattered. We don’t have the history of years together, but one day we will have. We have the future together. We discuss the fears and joys of raising our children (or future children). The hopes we have and dreams. We promise to be there and uplift each other.

It’s been a long hard road to get here today. I don’t have the numbers of friends I had back in the States. I don’t have my birth family at hand. I don’t have all of the familiarity. But I have true friendships now. I have understanding friendships. I have family who’ve been there through some pretty rough waters. And I have a family and a home that we’re working to make our own. For me, I’m pretty appreciative.