What You've Missed

Money Saving Attempts Result in Headaches

• We switched phone services from AT&T to T-Mobile. This didn't save as much money as we thought because we ended up having to buy new phones through T-Mobile. Being without a phone for three days and the four different trips to T-Mobile could be a blog posit in itself, but my irritation has since calmed. The day after we bought new phones, I dropped mine and over half the screen formed a spiderweb of cracks.
• We cancelled our cable through Time Warner and bought a Roku so we could stream Netflix and Hulu. This is significantly cheaper than paying for cable. We won't be able to watch anything live, but we never did anyway. The "simple switch" required us to either buy a new upstairs TV or an HDMI converter because our television was so old the Roku could not connect to it. Jesse ended up finding a $20 tv on Craigslist that worked.
• The bottom line is we are still saving over $100 a month with these two changes and we've been able to upgrade phones and our TV upstairs. 

Fully Potty-Trained

• Through no effort from Jesse and I, Jackson no longer wears a pull-up at night. Jackson was potty-trained during the day since December. We had noticed that Jackson's pull-up has been dry for many weeks now. Jackson asked if he could wear underwear to bed. It's been over a week now and he hasn't had any accidents. He even woke up to pee at 4 a.m. one night and went back to bed.

Neurologist

• Maddie had her neuro follow up last Friday. When she first went to the neuro in March, she was 4-5 months behind. She is now only 2-3 months behind. The doctor was very pleased with her progress and commended us for spending so much time on Maddie's physical therapy exercises. 
• Despite progress, the neurologist could neither confirm nor rule out CP. Maddie still displays mixed muscle tone by tightening and extending her leg (even while crawling) but hyperextending her back and loosening her trunk. When we return at 15 months we hope Maddie is at least cruising around furniture; then walking at 18 months. She will likely schedule an MRI at 18 months.

Social Opportunities

• Lunch date at Firehouse Subs sans kids. 
• Our local mommies group started a Bunco group. (Technically, they resumed Bunco after taking several years off.) This Bunco group was significantly more alcohol friendly than others I've attended. I somehow became known as the OCD/Type A personality of the group because I've always played where there is one scorekeeper per table. They have each pair tally points. I met a lot of new moms (new to me, most of them had school-aged children). I encountered the typical gawking over the fact that I have triplets. 
• Jackson attended a birthday party at the park for one of his classmates. All but two of his classmates attended, as well as one of his teachers. It was so fun for the kids and moms to meet up in the summer. We exchanged numbers to meet up again this summer. All of the kids will move up to the same "3's class" in the fall. The triplets stayed home and Jackson was busy on the playground. It was a rare treat to actually converse with the moms beyond the few rushed minutes during drop off and pick up.

Yeah...THAT really happened.

Over this past week there have been several incidents where I've done a double take or thought to myself, "Is this really happening?"  Some were good moments; others were bad.  Either way, there's never a dull moment with these kids.

The week began with a few days of sunny, 60° weather, which meant we had to spend as much time outside as possible.  We went to the park and attempted a walk around the neighborhood.  Neither outing went according to plan. 

On Monday I planned a picnic lunch at the park where we could also feed the birds.  Winter is clearly the best time to go as there were hundreds of ducks, swans, geese, and other birds swarming us.

We fed the birds, but our outdoor lunch was postponed as soon as Jackson declared, "I need to poop!"  Ah, the joys of potty training.  Jackson hasn't had any accidents in over a week, but when he feels the urge to go, we've got just a few minutes to find a potty.  Luckily, I had thought ahead and brought the little potty with us since I knew there weren't easily accessible restrooms at this particular park.  We spent over ten minutes sitting in the van while Jackson used the bathroom.  By the time he was finished I had buckled all the babies in their car seats so we just ended up eating in the smelly van.

Tuesday was another day of warmer weather.  Jackson wanted to go for a walk after we picked him up from preschool.  I loaded up in the wagon and strolled away, just like I've done dozens of times before.  Two blocks from our house, I heard a funny sound and saw Amelia suddenly flop down in the wagon.  Somehow the wheel completely fell off.  I knew how to fix it, but it required me to turn the wagon over on its side.  I couldn't very well lay the babies on the sidewalk, so I trudged forward.  Only, the rod came out and the other wheel was no longer in the correct spot.  I tried to lift the wagon like a wheelbarrow to push it back home, but the babies kept sliding with the slightest angle.  The only way to safely get home was to either crawl on my knees while holding the corner of the wagon upright or to hold up the corner with my back bent completely and shuffle.  I alternated between the two.  I don't know how many times I stopped or how long it took, but we got home eventually.  All five of us were crying by the time we entered the garage.

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On a lighter note (pun intended), I've been making conscious efforts to eat better.  For dinner last night we had brown rice pasta with a homemade lentil tomato sauce and a spinach cucumber salad.  Even while cooking it, I questioned if I really wanted to eat it.  Turns out, it was fairly tasty.

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Since the babies have been wearing footy pajamas, I hadn't really noticed how severe Maddie's eczema had gotten until bath night.  We've been slathering her up in steroid cream and lotion.  My poor girl!

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Another double take was seeing both of my sweet girls rocking it during tummy time.  Of course, Amelia has been doing this for many weeks.  Maddie, on the other hand, has struggled to lift her head. 

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The final "What am I doing?" moment was when I decided to carry the 84 pound box up the stairs and assemble our new exercise spin bike.  There were some foul words said and I may or may not have taken my skirt off in the process, but we have a newly assembled bicycle upstairs thanks to Jackson and myself. Jackson was quite the cheerleader, shouting, "You've got it, Mommy.  Good job!"  He also got his toolbox and helped me.



Potty Training

Jackson began showing interest in using the potty when his older cousin started potty-training last year, long before the babies were born.  However, we didn't want to push anything because we didn't know if he would regress once his siblings were born.  For the past several months he has preferred diapers, but wants them changed immediately.  When he pees, he takes off his own cloth diaper, pulls the insert out, puts it in the wet bag, and then lays down on top of a clean diaper waiting for me to snap it on.  After putting it off long enough, Jesse and I decided to enforce using the potty during Christmas break.  Jesse had two weeks off work.

We chose to go the quick route where Jackson spent three consecutive days entirely naked during the day.  (We aren't even attempting to go without a diaper at night right now.)  We started potty training the day after Christmas.  He only had two accidents while naked. We had portable potties in the living room and his bedroom, and a toddler toilet seat in the bathroom downstairs.

To encourage Jackson to use the toilet, we implemented a marble jar.  (Can you tell I'm an elementary school teacher?)  Jackson earned a small marble every time he peed and a big marble every time he pooped.  Once the marble jar was full, he was able to select his reward.  Nothing happened when he had an accident, other than a reminder that "Big boys pee and poop in the potty." He was able to fill his marble jar after four days. 

Not surprisingly, Jackson chose to go eat pizza to celebrate using the potty. 

While there, Jesse took him to the bathroom and he successfully used the small urinal.  Jesse texted me this picture while I was eating my pizza.  Ha!

I don't want to end the post making reader's think that this experience has been without stress.  In the last week since beginning potty training, Jackson has had four accidents.   Jack had one accident while at a restaurant.  He started to cry "I pooped" while we were eating.  Another accident was at our New Year's lunch with family where he had an upset stomach. 

He has difficulty using large toilets, which is our only option in most public places.  He also takes a good 5-10 minutes to use the bathroom and is shy to go if we have company over.  I'm not sure how I'm going to juggle potty training while going out and about with all four kids by myself.  I don't want to become a shut in or skip out on weekly trips to the library, museum, or long car rides to visit family.  I think I'm going to order this seat to help Jack use public restrooms.

I also worry about how positive our potty training efforts will go at preschool next week.  If Jackson doesn't need to use the restroom, he's not going to sit on the potty and "try".  He knows when he has to go and he needs privacy and time to do so.

Hopefully this will get easier each day.  I don't even want to think about doing this with three kids!