notes

morning glories

Esme has been clean and dry for three days and two nights. That is no small feat. She has finally clicked with it. Last night and the night before she refused the diaper for bedtime, mostly because that MEANT bedtime, but she didn't wet the bed, either. I know it isn't 100%... won't tell myself it is, yet... but woohoo :)

Tiny notes on the garden. I would like to position the beans between the zucchini and pumpkins next year - so they get more bees. The bees LOVE the squash flowers with all their pollen and the beans are probably getting some 'love' but not as much. Keeping the zucchini and pumpkins further apart will help with that cross-pollination thing I learned about the other day. I did not know that zucchinis and pumpkins were still close enough to crossbreed, like dogs and wolves. They are! Since I am saving pumpkin seeds I don't want to end up with a squashkin .. or do I? I'd have to meet a squashkin to find out. Pumpkins ARE squash... so... Also, I saw the wasps going from flower to flower in the purple hulled peas, which the bees seem to be leaving largely alone. Those cowpeas are producing pods while the black eyed peas (also cowpeas, and planted earlier) are doing very little. I am wondering if the wasps are pollinating the purple hulled peas just enough (bees are better at it, according to the articles I've read) to help or if they are keeping the bees from coming near those plants out of territorialism? I've read some articles and forum posts about cowpeas secreting sweet nectars to attract wasps, in order to protect themselves from being eaten by certain other bugs that would be present if the wasps were not nearby.


Jarrahdale blue pumpkin

I am awaiting the Jarrahdale to see how it tastes. The stem on it is not hard, yet... so it stays out there. There is another baby pumpkin started, and one more small grapefruit sized one turning orange. I finally have a Butternut squash started - hoping it grows to maturity. I think the extra butternuts in the valley which are flowering, but not doing much else, have helped to pollinate the one that is in the garden. Butternuts and pumpkins/zucchini do not cross, and may need more of their own kind to pollinate well. I've been cracking and eating the seeds out of the big pumpkin and they have been wonderful. I'd like to try the Kakai or Lady Godiva breed of pumpkin next year as the seeds do not have that woody hull around them. I am geeking out a bit on this stuff.. because I can. I even ordered a used pumpkin cookbook from Alibris!


a morning Pollywog

Tiny PT update and reading

Two nights after we have settled in and are not going anywhere for a while I've put Esme in underwear and a t-shirt and she has used her potty most of that time with just needing a few reminders. I can sometimes get her to use it in the morning when she wakes up before putting on a new diaper or sitting around in pants without one for a while. We're making some progress.

We also had some preliminary 'functional' reading yesterday. I was driving and Esme was finally being good for once during the day. We had promised her if she was good at the last place we went she would get a 'tiny french fry' as she calls them, to discern them from hash browns, which are 'big french fry' to her. She was good, so I went to stop at the McD for her, which is across the street from the Burger King. Esme starts saying 'Buh-kuh Mama, Buh-kuh!'. That is where Daddy usually stops. I was already turning so I said we were going to get french fries there - and she says 'no mmmmmm.... Mmmm? French fry? fourteen sixteen? a Puh and an Aaaaa and a Kuh(C) and E (trying to pick out letters in the playplace sign)'. She is trying to pick things up but interpreting them in her own way. 'fourteen sixteen' is what she says whenever she sees a lot of numerals and doesn't take time to pay close attention, and also the drivethrough #s 1 and 2. Then she called them letter 1 and letter 2. Very silly, but worth recording for when she really does blow out picking things up accurately I can go back and look and see how it progressed :)

For Grandma: Here is where Esme first drank from a cup, back in July, 2010.. so it has been longer than I thought. She just recently has started asking for that kind of cup more and more often. She also asked Grandma to 'put cold' in her soup the other day, which meant cold water from the faucet because she thought the soup was too hot.

PT update

Esme has really been taking this at her own pace - and I decided to try to move things along a little faster by taking the obstacle of the stairs away. I should have done it a long time ago. Now the trainer is upstairs right next to her changing table - and she has been using it. Several days in a row I've had her without diapers but never for more than a few hours at a time - something else comes up like she falls asleep, or wants a bath, or we go to town etc. But - last time I tried this she would pee on the floor every five minutes.. and now she can hold it most of the time and the only accident we had the other day was when I knew it was time for her to go but she did not want to agree and I didn't push it as hard as usual. And then she came to me asking for new pants and was very sad about not having anything to put in the potty. She has also been using the 'big potty' a few times now with mama holding her because the trainer is upstairs.

And - a larger leap this morning! I've been asking her every morning before I change her diaper and at night before she gets the last one to use the potty before the diaper. And this morning I came up from making my coffee and found her sitting pants-down with her diaper on trying to use the potty and had made a grand effort at getting the diaper off but with no luck. Big progress!

She also likes peanut-butter M&M's ;)