Itty Bitty Dress success

Last night I made my second Itty Bitty Dress from http://www.madebyrae.blogspot.com/. I made some additional adjustments to the pattern and walla dress number two fits my daughter. It is such an easy pattern and really doesn't take that long to make, so I expect I will be making many more!! Still need the tweak the pattern a little more so the straps aren't falling on her shoulders. Also plan on shortening the next one some so she isn't having problems going up the stairs. At almost 17 months my daughter is always on the go, so it's hard to get a good picture, especially one where she is smiling. Stay tuned for the next Itty Bitty Dress.

Itty Bitty Baby Dress

I frequently visit http://www.sewforum.com/ to see what others are sewing these days and to get ideas. There has been an Itty Bitty Baby Dress challenge, so I decided to join the pack. I haven't done any sewing since we moved until this past weekend and the only thing I got started was a tag blanket for a friend's new baby. I finished it up this morning and started printing and cutting out a pattern for the Itty Bitty Baby Dress from Made by Rae, http://madebyrae.blogspot.com/2008/04/free-itty-bitty-baby-dress-pattern.html. The pattern was only available in NB and 1-3 months from Rae and a 3T from
CraftingInspiration.blogspot.com, so I had to make adjustments for a dress for my almost 17 month old daughter. My first attempt was a little small, so tonight I will try again. See the picture of my first attempt, what do you think?

Frustration...

Ever since I married my husband I've been doing most of the work around the house, even when I worked full time and most weeks I worked more hours then him. He helps out occasionally and every once in a while surprises me by doing something without being asked, but most of the time I have to ask him to do things inside the house. Even when I ask him to do stuff he sometimes decides not to do it and it just gets me so mad!! In the last house we hired somebody to take care of the lawn, which included mowing and trimming and also hired a company to fertilize our lawn. It always looked nice, so no complaints. We knew once we moved into our new house we would have to do the lawn ourselves because it would be too expensive to have somebody take care of two acres. We bought a zero turn riding lawn mower and my husband had to also buy a trimmer. The idea was for him to take care of the lawn with occasional help from me. Of course I will be taking care of everything else outside (i.e. gardens). I told him if he picked up some work inside the house I would be happy to help him outside with the mowing/trimming.

Saturday was lawn day. He said to me that it was time I learned how to use the trimmer. I replied I know how to use a trimmer (Growing up I shared lawn duties with my two brothers). He said, good, then you can do that this weekend. My response was NO, not until you start helping out around the house more. He comments that he does a lot around the house (what, I don't know!). At this point I was pretty mad because he helps out VERY little around the house. I commented that this week when I was at the old house cleaning (I spent around 6 hours one day cleaning, 3.5 while also tending to the kids) one evening he didn't even clean up after the kids ate dinner. I had set them up with dinner, so all he had to do was clean up the dishes and wipe off the table and high chair. His response to me was he was taking care of the kids. All he had to do after they ate was get them ready for bed, read a story and tuck them in! Then he had the rest of the evening to do as he pleased. Does it sound fair that every day I should have to take care of the kids, do the laundry, clean the house, etc., but when he has the kids he doesn't have to do anything, but take care of the kids???? On top of this, I spent about 5 hours at the old house Sunday touching up paint and asked him to fold some laundry while he was watching TV and do you think he did it? NO!

Kiddos....

My little big boy is doing great on potty training and my little 16 month old girl is working hard on potty training too! It is amazing how much more interested girls/2nd children are in potty training. My son showed a little interest before and around 2, but we never made much progress until just a couple weeks ago. I don't know if it's due to the focus on potty training with my son, but my daughter wants to sit on the potty any time I ask her or any time she sees big brother sitting on the potty. She's pee peed on the potty twice now, but there have been a couple times I know she would have gone if I just got her on the potty quickly after getting her diaper off. We are now trying to set a routine of sitting her on the potty before baths and bedtime. She's so cute when I ask her if she wants to sit on the potty. She runs to the bathroom and impatiently waits for me to get the potty seat out to put on the toilet. She doesn't like sitting on the potty that sits on the floor.... probably because big brother won't use it anymore either. Big brother continues to do well. He had a few accidents over the weekend when my in laws were visiting, but I'm going to guess it was because he was so distracted by his grandparents visit. After a couple days we are back to no accidents. He even woke up dry Tuesday morning and I'm guessing if I got up when he woke up at 7:45 this morning he would have been dry again. When I asked him to take his diaper off, sit on the potty and then put underwear on he refused and I was just too tired and achy to get out of bed and deal with him!

Big Boy...

My big boy continues to amaze me. I still can't believe less than a week ago he still needed to be reminded if I wanted him to go pee pee on the potty! He continues to do great with potty training during the day! He hasn't had any accidents during the day and seems to know exactly when he needs to go. I periodically ask him through out the day if he needs to go if it's been a while, but he goes when he needs to. He is still have trouble at night. We went without a diaper last night, but woke up wet. Although I had a bed to change at 8:00 this morning, he did at least go poop on the potty after he got up. The advantage to no diaper at night is he at won't poop in his underpants. Tonight is night number two without a diaper at night. I'm hoping with a few reminders before bed he will make it to the bathroom before he actually pees his bed. Keeping my fingers crossed!

Success continues...

Today was a great day in potty training. My big boy didn't have to be reminded to go today and he pooped on the potty for the first time, and on his own. He is still in a diaper at night, so when I heard him around 8:00 a.m. this morning I jumped out of bed (barely awake!!) to catch him before he filled his diaper. His diaper was wet, but no poop!! Yippee!! This is a HUGE step for him. The goal for tomorrow is for him to go potty on the toilet before he fills his diaper. He's done so well in a short time and I have high hopes for tomorrow!! I'm so proud of him!!

Success....

As you may know, my mom was visiting this past week. She was here an entire week and was a HUGE help!! You may also know my 3 year old has not been potty trained. Waiting to move in the new house has delayed the process by a year, but this past week, with a lot of help from my mom, we worked on potty training. It went great and he is now in underwear during the day and diaper at night. Up until today it was still up to me to make sure he sat on the potty when he had to go. He still hasn't pooped on the potty because he does it before I'm actually out of bed in the morning. Finally this afternoon he jumped up when we were watching the Olympics and said he had to go to the bathroom. I sent him to the bathroom on his own. He chose to use the downstairs bathroom, which doesn't have a potty sit and he did GREAT! He really did have to go and I was so proud of him!! Now, we just need to get him to tell us every time he has to go!! Tomorrow is a new day, so I'm hoping he will tell us each time he has to go. Wish us luck!!

Finally moved..

Two weeks ago we FINALLY moved into our new house!!! We are so excited to be here and LOVE the new house! Even though the mortgage company didn't have everything ready on there end for us to convert the loan from a construction loan to a conventional loan, our builder was kind enough to hand over the keys and remotes. We were thankful for his kindness!! We got most things moved in the first weekend, but still have a few things over at the old house. It is a slow process getting those last few things, but we made a lot of progress this week with my mom visiting and the extra large vehicle to load things into, plus having her around to watch the kids so we could have a night out and run errands without the kids. Mom left on Friday, so it is back to the usual routine!