Adventures in haircutting...and beyond

Let's recap the last several days in the life of the Louwerses, shall we? Friday, dawning clear and beautiful (at least I think it did. That was a long time ago.) promised to be a day of fun for the boys and me. We were accomplishing much with our errands and had a lunch with daddy to look forward to. Of course, before we could get to that exciting event, we first had to endure...the haircut. (dum dum DUM - believe me, it warrants the suspenseful music). We go to a place that is especially for kids because I figure they're trained to deal with my haircut-phobic son. We're on -what- haircut #10 of his lifetime at this point, and each time I pump myself up and do a lot of positive self-talk about how this will be the time that it will finally click with Jeran that it does NOT, in fact, hurt him but is actually a pretty darn good time! He gets to watch a Thomas movie while it's happening, for Pete's sake, and cute girls are bribing him with suckers and bubble-blowing. Alas, 10 is not the magic number. There was the usual amount of screaming, squirming, and tears. Generally, if there are other patrons around, I feel that I get the look of sympathy, but this time the other mother in attendance looked at my son in a rather horrified fashion, and because I still have a hard time putting aside what other people think, I grew judgementally angry at her supposed judgement of me. At least the stylist tried to make me feel better by telling me about the kid who clocked her one in the jaw just the other day. As soon as the clippers stopped their buzzing and the cape was removed J.J. was, of course, fine, hair-covered lollipop aside.

Following our lunch with Dad (which is always a treat) and thinking our drama was over for the day, we headed home. About 10 minutes into our 25 minute drive, Jeran suddenly started crying and saying "uh-oh! uh-oh!". Next thing I know he is emptying the contents of his stomach all over his shirt. And this continues...and continues... So I'm desperately trying not to gross out while also calmly finding a spot on the side of the road to pull over. Long story short - I did a quick, crappy roadside clean-up job, got the boys home and tucked into bed for naps, then proceeded to toss the car seat and his clothes into the garbage and wipe up what remained in the car as best I could. I mean, what is with this kid? Carsickness? Lactose intolerance? (There was a lot of dairy at lunch.) It just seems so wierd that 2 weeks in a row he suddenly, with no other symptoms, gets ill like that. Thankfully, it was a one-time deal, but Saturday we laid low anyway, just taking care of details like mowing the lawn (James) and another haircut (me - NOT crazy about it).

Saturday night about 9 p.m. James went to take a look at the bathroom (as he's been doing frequently since he began the dreaded bathroom project - again I say, dum dum DUM!) and noticed more mold growing around the bottom of the bathroom vanity. NOT good. Apparently moisture was trapped under this (very old) vanity and wasn't getting a chance to dry out. So, following some angry outbursts, James proceeded to rip up the vanity and some flooring underneath, and we made a trip to Lowe's the next day for a new bathroom cabinet and sink. Currently, then, the bathroom is looking like:

Seriously, renting or at the very least, townhome ownership, is looking like a really viable option for our future.

I'm happy to say the last two days have been uneventful. After our zoo plans for yesterday got rained upon, we lunched at the train restaurant, and today had a great morning playing with some friends (thanks for a great time, Sal!) and James & Jeran got fitted for tuxes since they'll both be in a wedding in a few weeks. J and I breathed a sigh of relief when Jeran was totally compliant to the measuring process (having his own tape measure and some peanut M&M's along helped probably).

Potty training update: not much to say there. Good days and bad. We're not at a point where Jeran will tell us when he has to go (although that's happened a few times), so it's still just a guessing game, or, rather, a sit on the potty every half hour game.