Wayno and Potty Training

Shalom ya'll,

This past week my Mom's brother, Wayne, came through town for a 3-day visit with us.  He's been known as "Wayno" for decades and that is how I remember him as a child.  I've only spent time around him a handful of times over the course of my life.  Even so, I was more than happy and willing to welcome him into our house.  Kendra and I spent his entire trip in conversation.  Easton and Layla were understanding of our need for "adult conversation" so it wasn't too difficult juggling parental responsibilities with hosting interest.  He has a background in photography and journalism from back in the dark ages.  Well, maybe not the dark ages, but back when an afternoon in "dark room" was the equivalent of 3 minutes on my computer with Photoshop.

Well, well, well...   look who made it into a picture interacting with the twins!  me.

I'm always the one taking the pictures so it was a pleasant surprise to have Wayne in the house with an interest in taking pictures.

He reviewed my blog and gave me specific examples of how I can take better pictures.  It's ON now!  I have a new challenge of taking better pictures so let's see how it goes.  Instead of taking 10 pictures in hopes of getting one usable image I'll be more intentional to get the main three aspects of a picture rights:

Is the "main thing" the main thing in the picture?
Is the lighting right?
Is the background neutral or adding value?

If the answer is yes to all three questions then an image has a better chance of turning out well.  We'll see.  Don't judge anything yet since all these pictures are pre-Wayne...  And some of them are from my crappy iPhone or Point-N-Suck pocket camera.  Like this one:

Easton sent me out the door to work one day with a request to hang his masterpieces in my office.  Of course I'm more than happy to brighten up my drab cube wall with his colorful drawings.  The Stealth Fighter isn't all that stealth with multi-colored rainbow flare, but there is no reason to call that out to him.

Sunday afternoon Kendra said, "Let's have a few people over for dinner."  After a few phone calls and time at the grill we had 12 people sharing a meal and conversing.  Layla wanted to dance for some of the crowd so we put on some music and turned her loose.  Her special moves are towards the end of the short clip.




Potty Training for Easton is COMPLETE!
Phase 1 is pee in the potty
Phase 2 is poop in the potty
Phase 3 is self-wiping
Phase 4 is holding it all night

One morning Easton pointed out how his diaper was dry.  We gave him permission to get out of bed if he needed to go to the potty.  He misunderstood and came in my room at 2:00 AM one morning asking me what to do because he had his diaper on, but needed to go pee.  I zombie-walked my way to his bathroom and took his diaper off.  The next night he agreed to wear his big-boy underwear to bed and woke up the next morning with a dry bed.  Yeehaw!

His accomplishment earned him the final fuzzy needed to fill his jar and he excitedly accepted his good consequence.

Here's the video clip of the smallish ceremony to commemorate the accomplishment:



Layla and I held hands while we walked to the mailbox today.  I give her the highly coveted role of mailbox opener to entice her to go with me, which usually works.  We passed a Calla Lily on our way back into the house and I captured the moment of my lovely flower observing and smelling the Calla Lily flower.  She is sweetness defined.

Layla sat on my lap as we looked through some old photo albums.  She easily convinces me to do this from time to time because I love to talk about our adventures together.  I grabbed the Flip Video camera and listened to her explain how much she misses her Ouma.

Little does she know that Ouma and Oupa are flying in TONIGHT for a week stay and will be waiting for her tomorrow morning when she awakes.  I enjoy surprises and I can't wait for her and Easton to see them in the morning.

See you soon!