Where does the time go...?

Carter checking out the really large bath tub that men share?

Chad taking a shower in the husker locker room

touching the lucky horseshoe

running on the practice field (apparently this is really expensive grass)

waterfalllocker room

The tunnel walk

Camden's view

picture in the end zone

laying at the 10 yard line

The *s* of Huskers

the kids reading to Camden

he loves his hands

kiss from Xander

kiss from Grace

kisses from willreading time

helping feed his brother

His life is just ducky!

He stood here for hours watching the construction trucks across the street.

In the potty. At least that is what the answer usually is. We always ask Carter "where does the pee pee go? or poop? His answer. In the potty or as he says it "pawdy" I guess that is a nice segway into my update on potty training. It is going well. I have to say it has gone way better than I ever anticipated after that first day. He seems to be doing better and better but every now and then he has a set back. He is pooping in the potty at least 75% of the time now and I would say he is about 90% on pee. He has done really well when we have gone places which was my biggest fear. He does have a problem when confined to a space such as the pack n play or wagon or something he can't get out of. I think he feels trapped and therefore just pees. He has also started to tell as (at times) that he has to go but usually does a potty dance or starts walking to the bathroom. We are praying that this gets better soon and he starts tell us all the time. He is waking up dry from naps a lot of the time but not in the morning. We are going to keep pressing on and hope it just keeps getting better.
On to other updates. Carter's vocabulary has really taken off. He is repeating a ton of what we say and is saying most words we ask. He is also saying some sentences. Some examples are "I want down", "I want it", and "hold it." He can say names of almost everyone I ask him about but when I say "can you say Camden" he says "baby". Funny. His favorite thing to say right now is Abby. My friend Abby came up a few weeks ago and ever since she was here he says her name all the time. He also says "Ahnu" for Aunalie every time he sees a baby. He also perfected the art of screaming and he can throw himself a pretty good tantrum these days. You gotta love it. You can see him start to assert his independence. I can't believe he is going to be 2 in a month.
Camden. My sweet little Camden. Wow have things changed with him. He is a happy baby now. He is spitting a ton less and eating better and more. This has resulted in him sleeping till 3:30am. I am hoping he keeps pushing that feeding back. He loves being in his jumper and exersaucer and just being able to interact with us more. He is super smiley and is fairly happy but still gets crabby if he is tired. He is an expert roller and is working on sitting up. He has out grown his 3-6 PJ's (sniff sniff) and is now in his 9 month ones. He looks so long. I am curious as to how tall he is now.
We got to go to my work picnic this past weekend. It was pretty blah for a company picnic but whatever, you can never expect a hospital to *wow* you. Anyway we got to go to Memorial stadium and take a little tour and then eat pizza. we did get some good pictures. Otherwise we had a great 4th of July and will post some pictures of that later. Enjoy!

5 months

Another milestone of the week was that Camden turned 5 months. I need to take him to be weighed but he seems like he is getting huge. He is turning into such a little man.

Things I have learned about my 5 month old...
He loves to laugh with his brother. He adores his brother. His eyes are turning colors, probably to brown. He loves taking a bath in the big tub, with his brother. He ate rice cereal for the first time. He likes to play in the jumper and exersaucer. He is rolling over. He loves sleeping with his blanket. He has been a pretty happy baby during the day. He is still not sleeping thru the night. He usually takes a good afternoon nap. When he is crying at night and we go in to give him his pacifier he cries even harder when he sees us as if to say "where have you been." He purposefully takes out his binky to cry. He has a favorite toy. It is a butterfly that makes different weird noised when you pull on it. It's eyes also light up which always catches his attention. He is starting to smile when the camera comes out. He still spits up, but he has his good and bad days. And yes, once again, he has not peed on me when changing his diaper.

*I updated with 2 other posts below. be sure to check them out.

Potty Training 101

The 5 things to remember when potty training...

Make sure you look good in your Hulk underoos

Don't forget to pull up your underwear after peeing

Always make sure to have something to keep your mind occupied, in case it takes a while

Always clean up after your messes
Then throw the evidence away

Well as you can see we took the plunge and started the dreaded potty training. The funny thing is all these pictures were taken the first day, the day from hell! We started last Wednesday, and stupidly I had a good attitude going into it thinking it couldn't be worse then I thought. I was very wrong. My first mistake was to give him a ton to drink. It just meant he peed that much more on the carpet. I am pretty sure there isn't a spot he didn't dribble on. The funny thing was even if he made it to the potty he usually wasn't pointed down enough and pee went everywhere. At the end of the day I was so exhausted and he had very little success. I thought to myself "this is never going to work." But we all woke up with a new attitude and a new day and Thursday was better. Less juice = less pee. So we got rid of the juice and just stuck to water. He drank less and peed less plus he started having success on the potty. He hated being wet so he would start to fuss when he would start peeing so we were able to get him to the potty and he would pee. He did still have quite a few accidents the second day but was making progress. We also found out that he hated going on the little potty so we starting putting him on the big potty with a little seat and that was a huge hit. We then had trouble getting him to stay on the potty long enough to pee. He would say "all done" the second he got on. So we tried lots of books and toys and that worked sometimes but the key was when he didn't want to sit we would count to 10 and stopped fussing and just sat and at times would pee. By Friday we were doing really well with only one accident I think. Saturday he had a 1 and Sunday and Monday I think were accident free. (pooping is still an issue but he has been pooping in his diaper in the morning before he gets up) It is a lot less stressful now. We take him about once an hour during the day and before meals. He has woken up dry from his nap the past 2 days and pees right after nap and before bed. We can see that he is learning to hold it now. Tonight after dinner we played in the neighbors pool and we were out there for over an hour ( in water) and he held it until we got home and he peed quite a bit. He isn't telling us quite yet when he has to go, but he started to walk towards the bathroom or point at times. Otherwise we watch his cues. He has a little potty dance that we can see and now that he can hold it a little we don't' have to run like maniacs to make it. We hope in the next few weeks things will only get better and he will start to tell us when he has to go. Chad and I both said we feel so proud right now. It feels so good to start something that was complete hell to be where we are today ( in less than a week). He is such a big boy. He seems proud of himself but most of all I think he realizes that this is just a thing we all do. We hope it will just become a natural thing. We will keep you posted as things progress. Please pray that things continue to go well.

Lots of new firsts

The swingset with stain on it. (sorry, it was raining so the pic is blurry)Nase after his surgery

Playing on the floor

Carter showing camden his feetHe likes to make Camden *jump*

loving his bumbo tray (thanks grandma and grandpa S)

learning to jump

Carter spends several times a day putting my shoes on

here he is getting on the kitchen table all by himself

Camden LOVES being in the big tub. Plus we can now wash them together in the same tub and it is much easier.

squeaky clean

playing nicely together

first bite of rice cereal

yum

not his favorite

The kids wrestling

ready to eat dessert

It has been such an eventful week here at the Scribners. I am going to save the potty training for it's own update so I will tell all the other things we have been up to in this post. First off we spent a fun Sunday night with Brian and Erin and kids last weekend. We ordered pizza and let the kids play. It is so fun now that Carter can *play* with the triplets, although I am sure they beg to differ. He is learning to share and play nice, but it takes a lot of work. He really loves to wrestle around the boys, and even Grace if she lets him. Camden took his bite of rice cereal this past week. We are not doing it on a regular basis yet but we wanted to see if it would help him sleep better. He wasn't too fond of it, but I am sure he will get there. Camden has also really started to enjoy the jumper, walker and exersaucer. He can maneuver a little so he enjoys it more. Carter has learned to climb up on the chairs and then onto the table. The first time he did it I took a picture, and then told him to get down. The next time he did it I told him that we don't do that and to get down and he said "cheese". I guess I need to stop taking pictures of the *bad* things he does. Carter is still being a huge help around the house. He always puts the wet clothes into the dryer for me and will take all the laundry hampers back to their place. He likes to swiffer and throw away trash. He doesn't love picking up his toys which we wish he did. He is however getting better at it and can actually be a bit of a help, at times. Also I think we finally hit a break through when it comes to Carter loving Camden. This week Carter has seemed to find a love for his baby brother. I often catch him doing nice things for him and playing with him. He still likes to be a little rough but Camden always interacts with Carter so I think he is realizing that Camden is a real person. I really wish I could get on tape how the boys will make each other laugh. It happens at least once a day but they never do it for the camera. It is so sweet. Even though Carter is loving on his brother now and not killing him, he now thinks he needs every toy that Camden has. We now have to teach him that he can't take his toys but if he wants to play with something that Camden has he needs to bring him another toy. This is tough concept for Carter but I have faith he will get it soon. The weather has been kind of gloomy lately so we haven't been outside much, but we did get to swim in the neighbors baby pool tonight which Carter loved. I also have to tell you that Nase had to have surgery this week. He has luxating patella. He has been limping for awhile now and we tried asprin for a little while but finally asked the vet. After she looked at it she said it was pretty bad and if we didn't fix it he would be able to walk on the leg and be in a lot of pain. So Nase had surgery and is doing well. They shaved him so much that he looks like Mr. Bigelsworth from Austin Powers. Alright I better end this post so I can write more about Carter and potty training. Enjoy the pictures!

Identical pictures

Maybe not identical but pretty close. They are both right about the same age in these photos. Tatze is just missing in the one with Camden. She didn't want to stay for the photo.

Playing with goats

Carter with his best friend Nase

Camden doing his favorite thing, tummy time -enter sarcasm-

My cute little chubby bubby

sleeping with his blanket

making Camden laugh *getting* his belly

On daddy's shoulders at the zoo

Camden's zoo view

his favorite part of the zoo. park benches

feeding the goats

This is what a long day at the zoo will do to you

This was what I found after turning my back for a second to get the camera. he started out on his back and flipped over to his belly and looked at my like "hey mom, i am stuck under this bouncy chair, can you put the camera done and help a guy out"

Carter with his play dough

Sorry for such a late post. We have been super duper busy. Last weekend I got to have a day of scrap booking with friends and we went to the zoo for the first time. Carter had a good time walking around and it was nice and shaded to make everything more enjoyable. He loved feeding the goats and llamas but of course his most favorite was playing on the benches. That is something we can do for free at the park. Kids. We actually went back to the zoo this week as well because I had a MOPS function there. We have logged quite a few hours on the new swing set as well. Carter's favorite word now is outside. He can maneuver the whole set pretty well except for getting on and off the swings. The weather hasn't been the best so we have also spent some time inside playing with homemade play dough and wrestling around. Carter has been making Camden laugh on a daily basis which makes my heart melt every time. As you can see in one of the pictures Carter is getting Camden's belly and he is laughing. Carter has finally figured out how to get onto our bed and let me tell you he thinks that is the best thing ever! It is probably really unsafe how he gets there but he is very determined. Carter is also hitting the terrible twos it seems. We have heard more than our share of no's plus some pretty good tantrums. You can see the frustration growing as his language just isn't quite up to par with what he needs and wants. The whining is at an all time high as well. By 8:00am I have already had enough (we get up at 7am). I am hoping that as his language gets better so will some of the whining. I know we need to sit down and enjoy the ride of the terrible twos cause it has only just begun. Camden has been doing pretty well. We still continue to think that the new medicine is working fairly well. He seems to be overall happier which is great for us. He is STILL not sleeping through the night and there seems like no end in sight. We are however trying something new for 6 days. Since he is still waking several times between 11-2am we are giving him 2oz of breast milk from a bottle for 2 days and then 1oz for 4 days and if we have to we will do 1/2oz for a few nights. What we are trying to accomplish is to get him to sleep sound from 7pm to 2am. What puts him back to sleep is eating (even if he isn't hungry). So we are trying to trick him a little bit by feeding him, just a little, to get him used to sleeping thru this time period. (for over a month now he wakes up several times between 11-2am, and no amount of crying it out or *binky giving* is working) BUT the whole key to feeding him is just to get him used to sleeping more during that time. We are giving it 6 days (we are on day 3) and we are slowly reducing the amount of food. We are hoping that at the end he will just sleep thru. We are desperate right now. Other than co-sleeping we can't think of anything else to do. If he just woke up at 2am we would be happy. That would mean he would sleep from 7pm to 2am (7 hours) straight, which isn't too shabby. (Also I am not breastfeeding at this night time feeding(11pm) because we don't want him to have the comfort of nursing) Wish us luck. We will do anything at this point. I think that is about all that has gone on with the kids. I was able to clean my whole house plus have a cleaning crew come in and do the bathrooms and bedrooms for me (a gift from Chad). It was amazing. I LOVE having the whole house cleaned at once. Plus the bathrooms are spotless. Thanks mom for watching the kids! I had the best day ever that day. I also went to get my hair cut which had not been cut since before Camden was born. It is amazing what makes me happy these days. I don't think being able to clean the whole house (without kids at your feet) would have ever been a *great* day before I had kids. Man how times have changed. But I wouldn't change any of it, I love my little stinkers!