About three weeks ago, we made a great potty breakthrough.  It’s been a great three weeks, if occasionally a little harrowing and frustrating and only slightly icky.  BUT…. we are fairly well potty trained!  Sleeping times will come later, and I’m not even going to worry about those.  Waking hours, however?  Mina is a CHAMP!!  We’re down to a couple accidents a week.  Most of which are times when we’re very busy playing and can’t be bothered to stop to make a potty break.  We’re super excited, and super proud.  Mina likes to tell us that she’s proud of herself, too, which is pretty freaking wonderful.

AAAAAAAAAND…. as of yesterday, we’re officially enrolled at Manhattan Beach Nursery School for the summer!  It’s two days a week, 9:30-12:00 for the summer.  If we’re still in Manhattan Beach come fall, we’ll enroll then, too.  I’ll be there with her, working, at least one of those two days.  Once she’s settled and comfortable, that’ll give me 2.5 hours a week to GTFO!  School starts on Tuesday, so we’ll report back more details on that next week.

Seriously… potty and school?  In one month?  I told you it was exciting!

Sitting on her sit and spin this morning: “so far so good!”

Some days we can tell where they come from (eventually.)  For a while she was walking around saying “More or less” – that came from watching too much Special Agent Oso.  Another time it was “What’s the big idea!?” – and that was Donald Duck.

I’ll be curious to see where this latest one came from.

“Looks pretty fun to me!”

Otherwise, all is well here.  As expected, Mina’s vocabulary and grasp of language just keeps growing every day.

Here’s one our Peoria readers will like.  The other day, walking out to the car, Mina turns to me and says:

“Momma, Mina like Daddy better.”

Uhhhh huh.  Thanks.  Go make your own lunch, kid.

And one of my new favorites, that’s starting to be a recurring thing:

“Two more minutes!”  Seriously.  We were at Jenna’s not long ago, and it was getting late, and it was time to go, but Mina wanted to hang out with the dogs a little longer, of course.  So we told her it was time to get into the car and she turned to us and stated very matter of factly, “two more minutes!  Two minutes, please!”

Mark said she did the same thing to her the other night when he took her over to the playground and it was time to come home.

*sigh*

Mina and I had a blast this morning at The Art Zone.  I’d been meaning to take her here for a while, but on those days we were bored and looking for something to do, it just didn’t occur to me.  My friend Danielle and I went today (she’s an old pro at Art Zone, but this was our first time) and boy am I glad we did!  Two hours of paint, clay, good, stamping, gluing, sticking, dressing up, cars, toys, squirting, squeegeeing, mud, water, and whatever else!  Holy crap was that fun.  Mina wouldn’t even stop to eat, she was having too much fun.

We’ll definitely be going back.  Pics are up, and videos are coming.

I, on the other hand, will probably be a nervous wreck all weekend   But that’s ok!  It’ll still be fun.  I think after 2 years, I have earned this!  Hopefully it’ll go well enough that I can do it again!

So, one day we were watching a movie, and one of the characters was going to be “out of a job.”  Mina looked at me for explanation.  She thought about it and then, looking at me, all very matter of fact:

“Mama, Mina big kid.  Mina job.“  With the hands outstretched as if to say “well, it’s only logical.”

She’s also using lots of complete sentences now.  “Mama help read this book, please.”  That one’s always a favorite.  Books AND manners!?  Yow.

Lastly, I’m standing in the kitchen washing dishes or something, and Mina kinda prances in, starts spinning around, then holds onto the counter, stretches her leg out behind her and starts chanting “Baway!  Baway!”  She was, of course, dancing ballet.

I know there’s more, but this is just a token offering to you two readers.  If you’re lucky, you might get more!

She got a couple booster shots (Hep A, and HiB, and a flu-mist dose.  Hooray for nasal vaccinations!)

So here are the stats:

Height 36″ (90th percentile)

Weight 34lbs (97th percentile)

And once again, the doc said “she’s probably one of the healthiest kids we see in our practice. ”

Hooray for healthy kids!  And hooray for no scheduled visits until next year!

Well, I’ve lost track of the words she’s been picking up, as there are new ones every day.  However, there are a couple fun ones:

Please.  Yes… seriously.  She says please.  And she says it with this big grin when she wants something from you.  Sometimes she’ll even say it without your having to remind her!

Cheese.  She’s been eating a lot more cheese lately, which is good!  The lactose thing seems to have resolved itself over time, which is what we were hoping for.  But the really funny thing is when you go to take her picture, she says “cheese” (well, sounds more like tseeeez, but its pretty clear what she’s saying.)  I’m still not sure where she picked this up.

Play.  Sometimes we’ll have this discussion:

Me: Mina, should we go eat lunch?

Mina: Play

Me: Eat?

Mina: PLAY

Me: EAT??

Mina: Plaaaaaaaay

And on and on.  This one cracks Mark up.

She can say things like moon, guy, out, up, down, more, bounce, pooh, potty, pretty…

She can (with help) say her ABC’s as far as E.  After that she just gets bored.

She can (with help) count to ten!  Ok… by help I mean a LOT of help.  But she’ll repeat all the numbers after you, and when you say “Seven” she actuallly just moves on to “eight.”

I’m sure there’s lots more to tell, but she’s demanding I do the Pooh puppet for her.  Well, it’s really a wash cloth, but she doesn’t seem to mind.

Tonight: dinner at the Redondo Beach Cafe!