Come, Mommy

I was outside tonight watering the roses. Through the window I could hear the rumbling of our clothes dryer. There’s nothing unusual about that sound, especially in a household with small children, of course, but it turns out that this load of laundry was indeed just a bit special. We were drying, for the last time ever, a load of diapers.

Three weeks ago we started potty training with Kieran. The first couple of days we weren’t sure he was going to take to it at all, but once he had a couple of successful visits to the bathroom, the lightbulb went off in his head illuminating for him the idea that using the bathroom is ever so much easier than waiting for Daddy or Mommy to change his diaper. And it’s been smooth sailing ever since. We had him in diapers at night initally, but he’s been so dry in the morning that we’re switching to training pants for now, and I don’t think he’s going to need those for much longer.

We are so proud of him, and so happy to have our diaper bag toting days behind us! And Kieran is loving his new freedom. The only downside is that now he wants to visit the bathroom any time we go to a new place just to check it out, silly guy. Sometimes when children reach a new milestone it’s a bittersweet moment, but not this time. This one has everyone here doing the Happy Dance!

In other news, today was an extra fun day for the boys and me. Despite getting a late start out of the house, we managed to make it down to South Jersey to visit Suzanne, Sean, and Allie of Mimilou fame. We hit some road construction going down and back but actually even that worked out well since spotting graders and excavators kept the boys busy and minimized the number of times the famous, “Mommy, are we there yet?” question was asked.

It’s been a couple of years since we’ve seen our friends – Kieran was still crawling then, and it was lovely to see them all again. The kids picked up where they left off last time, and even in the heat, the boys enjoyed a walk to the park and playing spies on the climbing equipment with Sean and Allie. Allie was also very sweet to Kieran by taking on the role of his little Mommy and carefully shepherding him up a ladder, and then pushing him on the swings. Wjile the kids were playing, Suzanne and I got to catch up, which was wonderful. All the way home the boys kept asking when we could go back and play some more. Thanks for the fun playdate, guys! We definitely need to get together soon, perhaps to do some apple picking.

So that’s the latest news hot off the Menagerie House presses. It’s a good to be ending the summer with fun and friends, and we’re planning to make the most of our remaining weeks of summer break.