the eternal run on sentence... Ian

Ian quote:

"One day I woke up at grandma and grandpa's house, and grandma took me to the potty and I made pee and poop in the potty and then I came out to the kitchen to see grandpa and I said 'Grandpa I made poop in the potty' and Grandpa said 'you did? I'm so proud of you!" So Grandpa gave me an ice cream cone and I said, 'Can we go out on the porch and eat it?' And Grandpa said 'yes we can. Sure we can!' and so we did and that's what happened at Grandma and Grandpa's house"

I just have to say this quote is notable mainly because it has no mention of Grandpa's tractor.

Progress report: In response to things that we've realized through our TV fast, Matt and I have instituted an ongoing "non-electronic" couples night at home once a week. We decided this last week and it has yet to happen, because his work responsiblities have yet to let up enough to allow it. The plan is good though. We hope that this will give us the time to connect and head off family problems before they become problems. We aren't really missing our TV at all.

Ian has apparently decided as of today, that it's once again okay to use the potty at home as well as elsewhere. (He was on a hiatus for a couple of weeks.) Thank God for the SpongeBob Squarepants travel potty seat.

Caleb is determined to walk... spending lots of time pulling us around with his hands over his head holding our fingers. Today he waved hi at his daddy when he got home from work. We try not to comment too much on his adorable curly blonde hair for fear it will make Ian jealous of all that attention but we can't stop everyone else commenting on it!

still fasting

I just counted, and it's been 11 days with no t.v.. As I said in my last post, there have been times it's been tough, but mostly, I'm loving it. I've gotten a lot more accomplished and I haven't really missed t.v. at all, except when "my show" is on. I've also gone to bed earlier many nights and that is a good thing!

One interesting side effect. I'm not sure if it's correlation or causation, but it seems Matt and I have been having more arguments in the evenings. We are not big fighters - typically just the crankiness that comes with hunger or fatigue. I am wondering if we've been using t.v. to not deal with things that we need to discuss without realizing it?? I don't like having conflict with him, but I am actually looking forward to the next few weeks to see what good is going to come from us working through these kinks.

Another interesting question - when is it okay to argue in front of kids? My parents very rarely had conflict in front of us. I was always thankful that we had a peaceful home growing up, but now I realize there can be benefit to allowing your kids to see healthy conflict and resolution... yet Ian was especially clingy last night at bedtime so I was concerned.

Grandma and Grandpa bought the boys new shoes over the weekend while we were visiting. Caleb: brown Robeez with elephants on them - size 18-24 months
Ian: green and black Reptilian Stride Rites with eyes on the sides - size 12

no worthless thing

We are participating in a month long fast from TV right now, inspired by FamilyLife's "turn off the tv fast" campaign. This is very timely in that my boys are now pretty consistent nappers from about 1-3 p.m. So... I can't believe it but I was actually falling back into "checking in" on a certain soap opera. What a waste of time. I typically don't get to eat lunch until the kids are in bed so when you are alone and eating TV just seems like the thing to do. I was doing well until I finished my latest book, and today I was feeling pretty tempted. This verse is what keeps stopping me (which is on the static cling sign that is now on our tv): Psalm 101:3 "I will set no worthless thing before my eyes".

I think I will make some kind of large sign with that verse to be put permanently above our TV. When we moved into this house we put the TV in the basement to discourage ourselves because we didn't want it to be a big part of our daily life. The couch down there is horribly uncomfortable anyway. In theory you really have to want to watch a specific thing in order to go sit in that yucky basement. Too many times we've been over at friends' houses and the TV and accompanying furniture and equipment basically creates a large shrine right in the middle of the main room. There's no getting away from it. It's especially bad when the kids are there. I typically like to watch shows on the food network and discovery health channel or the learning channel - most all of which aren't "worthless". It's the flipping channels just because I feel like being a potato where I find trouble. How many times have I watched CSI and come away with terrible thoughts of "what if that happened to my kid?" and also felt overwhelmed at how much housework I have yet to do, and there an hour or two has gone by in front of the set with nothing accomplished.

All of that said, why is it so tempting then?