Ketchup

"Matthew, you have everything I have!" I said as I pointed to his cut up chicken nugget, pieces of hamburger and french fries. To give me a break for Mother's Day dinner, Jason picked up Smashburger burgers, fries and chicken strips. It was a nice meal and we all sat down at the dining room table to enjoy our takeout. Matthew wasn't too pleased with our meal, though, and kept on complaining about what was on his tray. Eventually I figured out that he wanted ketchup. Ugh. I was hoping to avoid condiments for awhile longer as they make such a mess. But it was not to be. Matthew wanted ketchup and gosh darn it, he was going to have his ketchup. When Matthew says jump, we jump, when he says run, we run. For now he is still the boss, but someday in the near future, that will end and all our lives will become more contentious.

So I gave him a little drop of ketchup. He first of all dipped his fingers in it and made an icky face when he tried it. Then he daintily dipped a bit of french fry in the ketchup and proceeded to put the fry in his mouth, suck the ketchup off and spit the fry out. The process repeated with other fries. He eventually ate the food he dipped rather than spitting it back out. After awhile, he smeared the ketchup around on his tray and also on his face and his hair. Welcome to life with condiments. At least he hasn't found out about pancake syrup yet.

And Sam has been "the Boy who called pee" lately. He's using the potty almost exclusively for doing #1 (we're still working on #2) and that includes getting up during nap or prolonging bedtime routines to try the potty. He's figured out that we always respond when he says he has to pee, so he's been trying that rather than "Cover me up!" or "I need a drink" or "I have garbage"... He just keeps finding out new ways to procrastinate. And we keep finding new ways to adapt. We're just going to make trying the potty part of our routine after teeth brushing and see how that goes. When does all this get easier? Seems like just when we figure out one thing, something else comes along.

Oh, and today is Mother's Day. So Sam said to me this morning (coached by Jason, I'm sure) "Happy Birthday, Mommy!" then he paused for a second and said, "Happy Birthday Mother!" He's never called me mother before. Close Sam, I still appreciated the effort. As the day went on, he put together "Happy Mother's Day!"