I Poo Poo?

We had a big moment at the Bright house this weekend. Ellie has finally gotten to the point that she realizes that she is about to poop and tells us. This is big because she was telling us after she went and now she's telling us before she goes. I celebrated this big event by buying Ellie her own potty. And no, I don't seriously expect to start potty training her because she's only 18 months and she can't get her own pants off yet, but I wanted to buy her a little potty so she could get used to seeing it and it wouldn't be a big event when we finally do potty train. When I brought the potty ("pah-ee") home on Sunday afternoon, she was very interested in it. We told her that it was "Ellie's potty" and that big girls poo-poo and tee-tee in the potty. She pointed to it and said "poo-poo". I told her no pressure - she didn't have to use it yet, but she wanted to take it for a test drive, so I took off her diaper and let her sit on it. Nothing happened, but Lee coached her on how to relax and I half expected him to give her a newspaper to read.

We went about our afternoon activities of going to the park, feeding the dogs, and eating dinner. I was in her room making her bed (which takes 15 minutes and is harder than passing a camel through the eye of a needle) and she was in her chair reading when she looked at me and said, "I poo poo?". I asked her if she poo-pooed and again she said, "I poo poo?". I checked her pants and there was nothing there. I told her that she hadn't gone yet, but reminded her that big girls poo poo in the potty. With that, she ran out of the room. I continued making her bed and when I looked up, she had carried her potty into the living room where Lee was watching TV. Then it went a little something like this:

Lee: Tiff, she just brought her potty in here.

Ellie: I poo poo?

Me: Yeah, she just told me that she went but there was nothing in her diaper.

Lee: Well, maybe she has to go?

Ellie: I poo poo!

Me: I don't want to pressure her. Maybe we just let her sit on the potty and poop in her diaper to start out with?

Ellie: I POO POO!

Me: Or maybe I should take it back into the bathroom? I don't want her to think that she can poop on her potty in here.

Then Ellie stood up, let out a loud, frustrated scream, and started stomping her feet. I checked her diaper, and there it was - the poo poo. Poor kid. And you know she was thinking something along of the lines of, "Okay, let me get this straight - three hours ago, you buy me a toilet so I don't have to soil myself anymore, but when I tell you I have to poo poo and physically BRING you my toilet, you stand there and discuss me taking a dump with each other until I crap my pants?! I am starting to think I am the smartest person in this room." I guess she's going to have to potty train ME.

More from the weekend:

Reading her book

I was "that mom" at the grocery store. Man, those things are hard to steer!

At the Zoo with Grammie and Grandi

As I mentioned in my last post, my mom and dad looked after Ellie while we went to Wurstfest two weekends ago. Their big outing was to the Fort Worth Zoo. I've attached some pictures from the zoo and from their house. She looks like she had a great time!

Grandi and Ellie look at the giraffes

And elephants

(The elephants were very interesting)

Ellie and Grammie play in the sandbox

A movie and drinks with Elmo before bed

Wurstfest is the Bestfest

When Lee and I got married, someone gave us a book called 1001 Things to Do Before You Die. Wurstfest is not in there, but it should be because it's the best festival ever. I've never been to Octoberfest, something I've always wanted to do, but I'm pretty sure this is the Texas version of it. As we did 3 years ago during our first trip to Wurstfest, we stayed in Das Flus Haus #3 at the Gruene Mansion Inn. It's a cute little bed and breakfast overlooking the Guadalupe river. My parents were nice enough to keep Ellie for the weekend so it was just the two of us. On Friday night, we walked around the stores in Gruene, which is all of about two blocks, ate some Mexican food, and saw Cory Morrow at Gruene Hall, the oldest dance hall in Texas. If anyone remembers the movie, Michael with John Travolta, there's a scene from that movie that was filmed there and pretty much every Texas country star has played there. It's a cool piece of Texas history.

On Saturday, we did a little more shopping before meeting up with some of my college friends. Marcie's parents retired to New Braunfels and have a great house along the river. If I was retiring, it's exactly where I'd want to retire because the Texas Hill country is so beautiful. This year we spent most of our time in the Wursthalle kicking back with pitchers of German beer, dining on all things German, listening to "Czech and Then Some", chicken dancing, and watching professional clogging. It's more fun than it sounds. I think Ellie would have had a really great time because all of the little kids are running around and dancing and playing on the rides... but I think she still may be a little too young to enjoy it. We also bought a 48th anniversary commemorative beer stein and some outstanding new aprons. Something we totally didn't need, but had to have.

Around 5PM, we headed back to the Ahren's house for dinner. I always enjoy time with Paul and Judy especially because Paul was an engineer and we can talk about all things engineering together. Our topic de jour this time was global warming, which we both agree is a load of crap but that's a whole different blog. I guess a few hours of German beer drinking will do strange things to you because all of the guys decided to try on the bark collars of the Basset Hounds that were there. I think there was some weird peer pressure at play because all five of the guys did it. It was entertaining to watch and it reinforced my belief that women are the smarter sex. That night, we met the group again at Gruene Hall for more Cory Morrow.

My parents brought Ellie back on Sunday and we all went to the kick-off party for Deck the Hall together. I was the kick-off party co-chair so I had to attend. It was a fundraiser for the upcoming event and for my Dallas readers with kiddos, it's a must-attend Christmas event at the Meyerson so please consider supporting the Symphony and attending. I think that Ellie had a spectacular time with Grammie and Grandi. Their big event was a trip to the Fort Worth Zoo. My mom also took Ellie to mass and endured the first hand torture that is taking an 18 month old to church. The only difference is that her church has a luxurious "cry room".

In other news (because I have failed to blog in several days), Ellie is officially obsessed with Elmo. This is great for me considering that she's getting a new Elmo for Christmas, but it's also bad news because we have an "Sesame Street Greatest Hits" CD and we have to listen to the Elmo theme song nonstop in the car. When I ask her if she wants to watch Elmo, she starts singing "La-La-La-La", the Elmo's World Theme Song. I guess that's a milestone because it's the first song she's singing. It's a good thing I like Elmo so much. It finally clicked with her this week that "more" can translate to things other than food. I read to her every night before I put her in bed and now after I tell her that we've read the last book, she gives me the sign language for "more" (she uses her left index finger and points to her palm" and says "more!". Then I usually give in for another book or two before putting her down.

We attended the Dallas Junior League's Auction and Casino on Thursday and I think that we were the highest bidder on the trip to Florida silent auction item. We left without checking out so I'm still waiting to hear. All of the items were a steal because of the economy. There was a $5500 Valentino leather jacket for bid in the live auction that went for $250. It was nuts. On Saturday, Ellie, Beth and I toured the Luxe Home. It's being billed as the most expensive house ever built in Dallas at $40 Million and at 21,000 square feet, it was every penny of it. I kept on thinking what an outstanding party I could host at the house. We'd better start saving up for it!

Beer Goggles

Seriously - beer goggles.

I Couda Have Been A Contender"

Greetings from Wurstfest

Budding Artist

Halloween 2008

I must say that we had the cutest poodle on the block on Friday night, and getting Ellie into her costume was not as hard as it was two days before at the Lakewood party. I think that's due in part to the fact that I snuck up behind her and pulled it over her head before she could see it coming.


She had a really great time on Halloween. Aunt Elizabeth came over to help hand out candy with Lee while I took Ellie around. We started out atour next door neighbor's house where Gracie - also babysitter to Ellie - was handing out candy before the football game. Ellie took the piece of candy from her and then gave it back. Gracie told her she could keep it and that made Ellie very happy. Ellie then ran from house to house collecting candy saying, "tick teet". Her trick was that she would run up to the house, collect her candy, run halfway down the sidewalk, and then return for a second treat in hopes that she would not be recognized. The pink poodle costume gave it away because there were not many running around in the neighborhood.

About halfway through trick or treating, Ellie met up with a group of girls from the neighborhood who were about 3-6 years old. When they'd go to a door, she'd be in back at first, but by the time candy was being handing out, she was in the front row. We ended the evening with some pizza from Campizis. There weren't as many kids out this year as there were last year. I think that was due to the fact that there was a home football game being played.

On Saturday, Lee and I had plans to go to a Barnett Vineyards wine dinner at Lakewood. We'd plans to go for about three months. We love Barnett wines and it was our favorite winery when we visited Spring Mountain when we visited there in 2006 so we were really looking forward to the wine dinner. Our babysitter, who had never sat for Ellie before, was scheduled to come at 6:00. I started getting nervous around 6:10 when she hadn't shown up so I started calling and texting her. Nothing. She no-showed. Honestly, if she'd called two hours before and faked an illness, I'd be somewhat forgiving... but no-showing? That's inexcusable. When I realized we were not going to have a babysitter, Gracie from next door came over immediately. Thank goodness she was home. We wound up having an awesome time... the wines and the dinner was fabulous. The onlyproblem was that Saturday night was daylight savings so Ellie woke up at 4:30. I stayed in bed while Lee got up to check on her. He changed her diaper and maybe due to the wine dinner, he put her diaper on backwards. It could have been worse, he could have put it on inside out.


Ellie got in her first fight this week. That's right - fight. I picked her up on Tuesday and Irma told me she, "wasn't too good today". According to Irma, she didn't see the fight start, but when she looked up, Ellie was clawing at some girl and pulling her hair. My girl is smart to go for the hair since it's not an advantage any opponent has on her. Irma said she pulled Ellie off the girl (they don't name names at daycare) and then Ellie ran back to for more. Ellie usually plays well and shares better than I ever did so I'd like to think that the other girl started it, but who knows.


In other news, the election was this week. I didn't vote for the guy who won, which was Obama. I recognize that the election was historic in that he will be our first black president, but I don't think that he was the right person for the job, and I think our forefathers are rolling over in their graves because of the ideas and beliefs that he espouses. I'm a worker and I always have been. I went to work on the day of my 16th birthday because that's the first day I could legally go to work and make money. I believe that hard work is the way to get ahead in life and the government has no right to step in and redistribute my wealth. If you want money, work for it. I didn't get here by sitting on my butt and collecting welfare checks. I got here by spending thousands of hours studying. If you looked at McCain's resume versus Obama's it was a no-brainer. People wanted change and they're going to get it on my dime. I'm trying to look at the bright side and that is that many people were motivated to vote in this election. My hope is that this makes more people interested in our government and that they become more active participants.