The Progression

Of the little baby as evidenced by the growth of my middle section...

Above: 6 weeks...This is the view out of our living room window. I love it!

10 weeks. In front of our Charlie Brown Christmas Tree...Mental note: Wear make-up for next picture.

14 weeks. Obviously did not heed the mental note at 10 weeks.

18 weeks. The bump is in full effect!

20 weeks. Halfway there!

Tales from the Toilet...Week 1

Week 1...check.

This will be a long process for me and the little man.

You see, I was trying to potty train him in 3 days...although I knew with his issues that it might take longer, but it might take a really long time, seeing as he is still terrified of the toilet (although he has sat on it a couple of times)! We have had no success at all. I think what I have on my hands is a stubborn little man who is tugging hard on his end of this power struggle. He can hold his tinkle 'til the cows come home, and only lets himself have accidents if I'm not around. I think his fear is associated with the many enemas we have had to give him over the past 6 months...He says, "no tooshie medicine, peeeez!" He does stay dry all night and during most of his naps, though. What can I say, he's quite the boss of his bladder!

The first few days I was so, so discouraged. In tears. He was ready for this 9 months ago, but with all the transition that was upon us, I couldn't handle it. Now I'm kicking myself! This has definitely been my hardest experience in motherhood so far.

Somehow, over the last few days, I have been okay with his fear of the commode (and strangely enough, Brett is gone, which made me think I would be miserable by now). Some people have told me it took them a year to train their kids...a year? Really? Well, however long it takes, I don't own a single diaper, and don't plan to buy anymore until July, so hopefully we will get through this misery in a few weeks! If you pray, please pray for me in this!

But, seriously, how cute is he in that terribly ugly Diego underwear??

Potty Training, Day 2: Tales from the Toilet

5:30: Mommy wakes up hoping that the boy will not wake up in the 5 o' clock hour for the 5th time this week.

6:15: The boy wakes up...unfortunately Mom had not fallen back asleep. But, lucky for her, Dada had mercy on her tired soul and got up with the boy.

6:15-7:45: Mom dozes in and out. During her awake times she is terrified for her life that her son will take 3 months to learn how to go to the bathroom...How does she face the day?

7:45: Finally gets the courage to get up and face the music

8:45: Accident #1...this is actually encouraging to Mom since it's early in the morning. Takes boy to potty. He screams "I don't wanna go potty", thus confirming his fear of said object.

All morning: Encouragement and annoying questions to boy..."are your undies dry?" "Mommy's so proud of you....tell me when you have to go!"...every other minute. Boy not responding. Mommy talks about how fun the potty is. Boy not believing a word. Boy drinking more today...but Mom thinks he's pacing himself because he's smart and knows that drink=trying to go to the bathroom...the room he fears most at this point in time.

1pm: Boy asks and pleads for rest time as opposed to hearing Mother ask him if his underwear is dry one more time. Mama gladly concedes.

1:30: Dad shoos Mom out the door for some much needed time outside of the house.

3:30: Mom returns to find accident #2 occurring during nap time.

3:30-6:30: Grand old time is had by all

6:30: Mom and Dad suddenly take an evil turn and give Boy an enema. Misery at its finest. However, it was a good move on the part of the evil villains, and although Boy has yet to make it to toilet (yes, it was on a towel), he needed it.

7:00: Bath and TV time. All is right in the world.

7:30: Bed....and right before, Mom asks for the 100th time if his underwear is dry. For the first time, she hears "yes".

It's the small victories, people. This could take awhile.

Potty Training, Day 1

Potty: 0

Mom: 0

Sick kid: 1

Today was the dreaded first day of potty training in Dooley World. I'm not sure whether I'm encouraged or discouraged about it...Harrison only had 1 accident, and before we queue the hallelujah chorus, let me just say that he only had 1 accident because that was the only time he peed all day...He woke up with a fever at 5 am. Well, I had already given the majority of my diapers away, so I decided to stick with the plan, tired as we both may be. Well, he didn't want to drink much, or eat much so he didn't want to go...and when he did pee on the floor and I scooped him up to go to the bathroom, he screamed when he saw the toilet (even though we had many formal introductions up to this point...trust me, the toilet has been super talked up this week). I'm also a little discouraged because ever since we moved here for the past 6 months, as mentioned before, he has been terribly stopped up. I can't even count the number of times he has gone at least 8-9 days without doing the smelly deed, or the number of enemas he has received. He's also eating terribly which stops him up, which is my fault. I digress.

Anyhow, we made it through Day 1...this gig is only supposed to last 3 days (ish), but we shall see about that since we have a feverish, non-eating, non-drinking, constipated little boy on our hands. I did love snuggling with him on the couch as we watched movies all day, but snuggling while he holds his pee for 10 hours (how can he do that?) does not keep urine off of my sleeves.

Here's hopin' that he really does have the bladder control of champions.

Thailand

We recently spent almost 3 weeks in Thailand...oh, how we love this place! It's such a special place for me and Brett as it's where he first asked me to be his girlfriend in 2003, and in 2004 it's the place where he asked me to be his wife! Every other year we have a conference here for all the staff working in our country. This year it was in Bangkok, which is, in my opinion, a fabulous city, although extremely interesting. We spent about 10 days in Bangkok partly for our conference, partly to get caught up on doctor's appointments (the healthcare is great there). We really enjoyed our conference, and although I can't write much about it on this public blog for security reasons, I will say that one of my favorite things was how different it was from years ago. In 2003 and 2004, at these staff conferences, there were mostly Americans there. Americans who longed to see more East Asian staff raised up to serve here. That is why I wanted to be here. Now, 7 years later, this conference was made up of mostly East Asian staff with our company who love and serve their people no matter the cost. The meetings were mostly in Chinese and we sang more than half of our worship songs in Chinese. It brought so many tears to my eyes to get to see what I longed for and prayed for so many years ago come to fruition.

A downside was that we all got sick...it seems it might be a habit for us to get sick while out of town this year. I got plagued with a stomach bug that was being passed around childcare. Thankfully Harrison did not get it, but I got it bad. I could not even keep gatorade down! Brett got a mild form of the bug, but he got bronchitis as well, which he passed to H, which doubled into laryngitis for our poor little man...his voice was GONE....again, we were so thankful to have a wonderful doctor to take him to to put him on meds ASAP. We all got better to enjoy our vacation after the conference! Phew!

And while there, we got to check on the Dooley Babe...which was SO FUN. We got an ultrasound and it was probably the nicest one I've ever had. It was very extensive, and she asked "Do you want to know the sex of your baby?" I was only 15 weeks, 4 days, so I didn't even know if she could tell. However, we said "no", because we are crazy like that and don't want to know (we let ourselves be surprised with H and it was truly the best surprise of my life, although I know it's not for everyone). And not even 45 seconds later, she said (in a very singsong voice), "I just saaaaaaaw, I know what your baby iiiiissssss!" I grabbed Brett's wrist and was like, "do you wanna know? we could find out right this second!" However, my planner husband stuck to the plan and told me to stay strong, but it was SO tempting! That makes a lot of our friends here think it's a boy...thoughts??

So, here are just a very few pics of our time there. They don't really do the beach justice...It's one of the most beautiful places I've ever been for sure!

Brett and his little twin chasing the birds...this was Harrison's favorite thing to do!

We found a local aquarium with a singing mermaid...she obviously did not want us to touch her! I was still recovering at this point so I look rough, but my belly is about 16 weeks in this pic.

Brett's little helper in the airport (I need to calculate how many airplanes H has been on for my records...I think it's close to 40 now...he's quite the little flyer).

We spent some time vacationing at the beach in Phuket...during that time we checked email a couple times at an internet cafe. We paid for H to use his own computer so he wouldn't be pressing all of our buttons...he loved it!

Paradise

One night a bunch of us got baby-sitters and celebrated this guy below. Nate and Lori are such a fun couple to be around and I am SO glad to live near them and get to know them. This night was his birthday and we all went to a cocktail party on the beach and had a great dinner.

Then we lit traditional Thai lanterns and flew them off into the sky. I think this is actually a Buddhist New Year's tradition and they wish away their sins with each lantern in hopes of a fresh start in the new year (I think). I would probably need to light one every 5 minutes in that case!

H loved feeding the fishies (or foo-eys, as he likes to call them).

We entered a sand-building contest. And although there were only 8 families competing and 5 prizes given out, our not-so-stellar crab did not place. I can't imagine why...and just between you and me, the man in the middle was a bit bummed about it.

And here we are all bundled up for the flight back to COLD China just in time for Chinese New Year. There have been fireworks every night for 2 weeks! It's nuts!

More soon!