Do I have to?

This Saturday I started Potty Training Sam. 

My whole attitude toward this has been, "Do I have to?"

My reasons for not seeing the point in all this are as follows:

1. I already have to change Luke's diaper. Whats another one?

2. It seems like a huge nuisance to have to ask him 1,000,000 times a day if he has to pee, and then go find a bathroom...in HK the least user friendly place of all time. 

3. I've never met a grown adult who isn't potty trained, so I'm sure if I leave well enough alone he'll figure it out


4. I have been unsuccessful in getting him to sit still at a restaurant (see previous blog regarding his intelligence), give up his pacifier, or sleep past 5:30 am. Honestly, I'm not feeling good about my odds or my parenting skills.

But, I decided since most of his friends are potty trained, I'd give it shot. We started out early and Sam wasn't sure what to think of his new attire......

(Note, he's waring Cars underwear. Really? Like he's going to think to himself, oh these are cool underwear, maybe I won't poop in them so I keep them nice & clean.....)

Luke was also interested in being a big boy....

Bravely, I decided to take both boys to Ocean Park. 

Hey, if he's going to have feces running down his leg better there than on my couch right???

First stop, wrestle the alligators....

Second stop, check out the pandas.....

Third stop, blow bubbles in puddles on concrete steps while mom harasses Sam about peeing in portable potty.   

Step 4, plane ride.....

(Hopefully he'll sit this still on our flight to Beijing in a few weeks.)

Finally, Say adios to the giant Red Panda and hit the road.....

We made it the whole excursion without ONE accident!!!! Whew!

Back home, pre-nap....diapers securely in place. 

Sam's first day of PT. He only had one accident. And it was at the beach, in his bathing suit so I'm not sure it counts?

Unfortunately, he was up until about 11pm. 

Lesson learned. 

Reward with caffeine free& sugar free food rather than chocolate.

Earlier in the week, Sam had his first field trip. 

We walked from a beach about 3/4 mile away all the way to school.....

 Several different classes participated. Here's a group pic......

Afterward, he was rewarded with a BIG BLUE cookie!

Luke's most recent favorite 5:30 AM activity .....

Grabbing one of the too many tike bikes we have in our house and driving it from wall to wall banging into things. 

Neighbors? What neighbors??

And here are a couple pics of the boys from a play date we had at St. Stephens Church in Stanley on Thursday. 

 Luke's favorite- snack time!

Sam and his "best friend"....The infamous Milo...

Good Parent or Bad Parent?

We had our fair share of bad health this past week.

 Phil was gravely ill Friday & Saturday

So, Saturday AM I took the boys to the playground...

which looked like this after a week of pouring rain....

I was so proud of the self restraint both boys exhibited. 

YEAH RIGHT!

(It's ok, you can think it. We know we're white trash)

I was debating while watching them play blissfully....

Does this make me a good parent for allowing them to embrace their childhood and play in here and not worry about what the bath tub will look like in about an hour...

OR

Does this make me a bad parent for obvious reasons....

I'm pretty sure it makes me a bad parent.

Oh well, there's always tomorrow.

Back to Rugby

This week, Sam not only went back to school, he started the very violent sport of rugby up again.....

(btw- I'm pretty sure Kean, the coach, is in more blogs than I am now. Not that I'm complaining as I'm usually looking rather undone.)

I love this picture. Everyone in this picture is laughing at how hard Sam is laughing.

Two seconds after I took this picture, Sam fell down from laughing too hard.

Then, we played some video games

(Sam and Luke will play this game FOREVER without realizing that you need to put coins in to active it.)

Then, we crashed a birthday party.

It may be the first, but I seriously doubt this will be the last party these two crash.

Best Buds

It's days like this that remind my why it was such a good idea to have these two 16 months apart....

Sam demanded "Hold my hand baby" until Luke agreed.

Boys 2 Men

This is how you watch Cars when you're a preteen 2 year old.

Luke, drinking from his new water bottle and imitating a pirate at the same time.

Sam started "real" preschool today.

His previous class was 2 days a week for an hour and a half. Technically it was a preschool preparatory class.

He's now going to "real" preschool 3 days a week, for 3 hours each day.

Before class.

After class....loved it

(Apparently there was water play. Good thing I packed extra clothes)

When his teacher said good-bye and that she would see us on Wednesday I could tell by the inflection in her voice that, of course, what she really meant to say was "Sam is the cutest and smartest kid I have ever met".

There were other people around so she couldn't say it out loud...but she definitely implied it.

And Last but not least....Wednesday was Pada's Birthday.

Happy Birthday! We love ya....

Good Morning

Sam woke up this morning at 6, walked out of his room, came directly over to me, gave me a hug and said, "I just wanted to see you."

SO SWEET.

Then he said, "Pick my big boogers. I want to watch Lightning McQueen."

I'll take what I can get.

My Highly Intelligent Americans

My kids don't sit still.

EVER.

If they are not riding a bike, running or climbing they are sleeping...and sleeping only accounts for about 6 hour a day.

So, needless to say family meals at a restaurant are pretty much out of the question.

For my boys sitting in a high chair is unthinkable.

And we have tried EVERYTHING.

Needless to say, sitting through a 90 minute Easter service was no exception.

Once while talking about my active babies with Aunt Anne (soon to be mother of 5!) she informed me that only stupid kids sit still all the time.

One of the many reasons we LOVE Aunt Anne!

And the other day at a book store while hunting for a cookbook that would contain such delicious recipes my children would be happy to sit through a family meal, I saw a book called French Kids don't throw food.

That's when it hit me.

My kids are Highly Intelligent Americans.

Feeling good about my recent revelation, I bought a murder mystery and moved on.

Happy Easter to my Geniuses....

Feeling a bit guilty for moving my boys across the world and taking them away from friends and family I think I over compensated in the Easter gift department.....

For the reasons stated above I didn't want to give them any candy....

Yes, that's a drum.

Finally an Update

I've been lax in updating the blog and taking pictures as I have been getting woken up lately around 5am by one of two things:

Sam's face one millimeter from my face whispering "I'm awake"

or

Sam waking up and after thinking of his options deciding not to go play with his toys quietly or read his books but rather to crawl into Luke's crib and scare him to death which results in large amounts of screaming.

Friday was Good Friday and Sam got to go to work with Phil!

They took a break from making all kinds of important deals and went on a boat ride together.

They Wined & Dined at Grandpa Thompson's favorite Irish restaurant...McDonald's.

And saw the Noon Day cannons go off.

I think both boys had fun.

In preparation for Easter we dyed Easter eggs with the kit Grandma T. sent us.

Thanks so much Grandma, we had a blast.....

Soon after Baby Bear discovered the eggs we had to put them out of reach.....

In other news, Sam now prefers to be fed via his matchbox car fork lift.

And thinks he may need a few more matchbox cars.

Saturday morning we headed to a beach we read about in a book called Hong Kong for kids.

It's supposed to be super fun...one of the best on the island.

This is how you get there.....

SO, we went to Stanley instead and got in on a pick up game of soccer.

After naps, we gave a different & closer beach a try.

SUCCESS!

Here are my boys failing to read the rules clearly printed on the side of the boat.

And Luke has a new nickname... Baby Bear.... due to his amazing ability to get into EVERYTHING, make HUGE messes & eat ANYTHING

In other news,

Apparently when I want the boys to do something I use the term sweetheart too much.

As in, "Sam, sweetheart, please put your shoes on" because last night around bedtime he came over, sat on my lap and said, "Mommy, sweetheart, please take me to bed."

I'm just glad he didn't ask for a puppy.