Weekend in the City

Mr. Busypants is totally into cities these days. He loves the towers and the skyline. Every time I pull out my debit card, which pictures the Chicago skyline, he has to take a peek.

So it was no surprise to me when I told him we were going away for a weekend in the city that he was pumped. We talked about it in early May and he made a schedule in his mind: first school all done, then cabin, then a field trip in the city as he liked to call it.

Our field trip to the city involved staying in a condo owned by my husband's boss at Lake Point Tower. The condo overlooked Navy Pier from the 64th floor. The view: spectacular.

The Place

This one-bedroom condo is decorated elegantly, so you can imagine the pains we went through to keep it that way. The second thing the kids discovered (second only to the view of the Lake) was the wall of mirrors in the dining area. While we adamantly watched the kids at meals to be sure they didn't walk away from the table all grimy, Miss Chattyshoes did manage to hand paint the mirror with the remnants of macaroni salad a time or two, her weekend staple. We worked vigorously to keep the noise to a minimum as they screeched and laughed at their own reflections.

One of the agreements we had with the owner was that we clean up the place after we left. The scary thing about having little kids in such a set up is the work it takes to make sure they don't destroy anything. The upside for the owners--when it was cleaning time, we detailed the place like no other guest.

The Pool

We arrived downtown on Wednesday evening. The plan was for Scott to go down to the building department in the morning, then take Miss Chattyshoes off my hands so I could explore with Mr. Busypants. So while he was away, we checked out the pool. This was Miss Chattyshoes' pool debut as a two-year-old. At first she was timid, but eventually she was jumping so fearlessly that I had to catch her mid-air to prevent her from cracking herself on the side of the pool.

The pool at LP Tower is on the third floor; it's an outdoor set up with grass, a playground, a small walkway that leads to grills and picnic benches and the pool. There are generally two kinds of pool attenders: moms or nannies with kids and leathery old people in Spedos and bikinis.

The Pier

Mr. Busypants was mesmerized by the view. Every morning he'd look down at Navy Pier and wait for the people to arrive, an indicator in his mind that it was time to go play. He obsessed over the "whole wheel" as he called it (the Ferris Wheel). On our first of many trips down to the Pier, Thursday late morning, I purchased a 20-ride family pass. His first mission: the whole wheel. Unfortunately, it was down, so instead we explored the other attractions and Mr. Busypants discovered his love for mini-golf.

Thursday evening is free at the Children's Museum, so after exploring Navy Pier from 11:30-3, we headed back to the condo where Mr. Busypants promptly fell asleep until 6. Then we headed to the museum for our free evening, which was a blast.

The Parents

On Saturday, the family came for a late celebration of Miss Chattyshoes' and Scott's birthdays and Father's Day. The guest list included Scott's parents and two sisters, Becky and Jennie. Becky mostly hung out at the condo because last month she broke her foot while in Boca. She was stuck down there for 5 or 6 weeks, enduring multiple surgeries before she was cleared to be driven home the week before.

Mr. Busypants, being the bossy observationalist that he is, noted to Becky that she couldn't come to Navy Pier because "she has a broken foot." He and Miss Chattyshoes spent part of the day making fun of her "big boot," pointing and laughing.

The Party

Saturday evening we grilled and chilled. Miss Chattyshoes inhaled macaroni salad, which she again managed to use as fingerpaint on the mirror (those grubby little hands). After dinner we had cake. Miss Chattyshoes used those enormous baby blues to coax various family members into giving up their whip cream--afterall, she was the Birthday girl.

The evening wrapped up with watching fireworks from the condo, a spectacular even that we all enjoyed. Mr. Busypants, who is otherwise terrified of fireworks, enjoyed them on our first night there, but fell asleep just shy of 10:15 when they started. Miss Chattyshoes, on the other hand, snuggled with me in bed, her eyes wide open in awe at the beginning, but passed out at the end.

Presents were opened into the evening. One of the favorites: the Fisher-Price Princess Castle. Don't even get me started on the newly redesigned people that actually have arms and legs.

The deParture

We spent Sunday morning cleaning and had planned to hit the beach after, but the kids were both exhausted and crabby. Over one weekend, Mr. Busypants had managed four games of mini-golf, four or five whole wheel rides, several merry-go-round rides, a game or two on the motor boats, three trips to the Children's museum (one night free, and two days I paid for Mr. BP only because teachers are free :)

This is our fourth Field Trip to the City. We love LP Tower and are grateful for the generosity of the owners.

Do Not Say Booty, Do Not Say Butt

Mr. Busypants woke up the other morning and made an announcement: "Mama, I'm not saying butt." This is part of our on-going struggle to not look at our younger buddies and say "butt" just for the sake of saying "butt." It's amazing how 3-6 year olds can derive such joy from the exchange of one simple word: "butt."

It's not just about the word, it's also about the pronounciation and rate of speech. It's more like "boouuuuttttttttttttttttttttttttt!" dragged out over several seconds as if to savor the sheer pleasure of the word and everything it represents. If you don't believe me, listen to his podcast on his Dinosaur book, where he celebrates with joy and delight the dinosaur's butt in the middle of the recording.

I know it sounds like he's making an excuse to say butt, but (no pun intended) he's just working out the dos and don'ts in his mind and well, there's no internal filter. What he thinks is what you hear.

What Mr. Busypants loves almost as much as saying "butt" is the show Little Einsteins. We record them every weekend on Playhouse Disney. They're all lined up on our DVR and each time we watches an episode, I first read through the episode titles until his face lights up and he chimes: "Yes mama!" Whenever there's an episode we havent' seen in a while that records (yes, we've seen them all), he excitedly proclaims: "That's a new one!"

Last year he had a different routine down. He memorized the order in which the episodes appeared, so every time we'd search for one to put on, he'd give list of no's before he'd give the empahtic "Yes, mama, yes!" It didn't matter how long it had been since he'd watched the last one, he always remembered where he left off. And when he was through with the 15-episode rundown, I'd have to read each and everyone before restarting with the first.

But now we're always on the hunt for that precious "new one." Recently, as I went through the rundown, we discovered yet another one. For some reason, I read the description along with the episode title. It ended with the Little Einstein racing someone for treasure, which the description referred to as booty.

With my internal filter on slow, I read the entire description unedited. As soon as I said "booty," I regretted it. "Why didn't I replace it with the word treasure?" I thought. Immediately, I was chastised: "Mama, do not say booty. Ok? We do not say booty. That's not a nice word Mama."

At least something is sinking in.

The Girl who Cried Potty

Lately Jorie has inundated me with "I gotta go pottys" that prove to either be false or recreational. I say false because to date she hasn't squirted a drop or released a plop into that bowl, yet she's constantly chiming "I gotta go potty mommy." I say recreational because, let's face it, it's something to do.

Eventually she's gonna drop or plop, so she cannot be ignored. I think she knows this and is shamelessly exploiting me for the attention.

She has the ritual down: grab the white with pink handled potty seat and place it on the toilet (although it's almost always backwards), grab the little stool, get assistance in getting naked plus a free ride onto the pot, then attempt to drop some unused TP. I say attempt because the opening to that potty seat is currently incompatible with her chunk, so finding access to a drop zone unassisted is virtually impossible.

Even though the bowl is empty save for three squares of TP, she still has to flush and say "bye bye poop" as if she actually accomplished something. I cringe every time she beats me to the flush handle. While she may produce green from time to time, she certainly isn't green when it comes to TP and flushing.

The other day we had Miss Sassypants over to play. We were in the kitchen when I noticed Jorie in that hunched over, grunty-faced position. Those cheeks were beet red (the ones on her face, that is.)

I quickly grabbed her, prepped her, and landed her on the throne. I even pushed her back a bit to create a small opening where I could see what I thought would be her first successful mission completion.

There I stood, the light shining through the opening like a boulder rolled slightly from a cave, observing her own little boulder, hanging mid-cheek (yes, now the other ones).

I made all the faces and noises that suggested grunting and pushing. She laughed.

Mr. Busypants and Miss Sassypants peaked over my shoulder, waiting for the tiny brown mass of yesterday's lunch to release. Behold, it was stuck. And my little angel sat there clueless, giggling at all the attention she was getting from us three.

"All da," she proclaimed proudly.

I was left with the dirty task of dislodging the soft, stinky mass and dropping the toilet-paper covered creation in the toilet, then dressed her Majesty in a princess pull-up.

"Bye-bye poop," she chimed.

Bye-bye poop indeed.

Related Posts

Jorie Costanza: Climber, Antagonizer, Garbage Eater
Black Eyes, Diaper Changes, and Chocolate Easter Eggs
Brown Showers Bring Trained Bowels
Monkey See, Jorie Do: The Proof is in the Pudding

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Giant Bird and Outer Space

Above we have a giant bird. Apparently it's going to eat Miss Chattyshoes first (far left) then Mr. Busypants, then Mommy (trust me, my hair is not that big in real lisfe), then daddy. Nobody appears to be happy about this.

Above we have outer space. I think the location of the Earth is rather obvious.

Blog Love and Awards

Autism Insights posted the following award to the Autism Sucks webpage, of which I am a contributor.

Autism Sucks is a site that allows many voices to speak about their perspective of having a child with autism. I've only written for the site a couple of times; however, I do enjoy reading the insights of other moms who struggle with having a child with autism.

Two blogposts that I've contributed include Perspectives of a Guilty Parent and The Word Doesn't Change the Kid. The Word Doesn't Change the Kid is one of my earliest blogposts and one of my favorites. It puts autism in my world in perspective.

I am so grateful for Mr. Busypants and all of his accomplishments. While autism can suck for us some of the time, I am thankful that he is growing, learning and enjoying life. He is entering that age where he's going to start noticing he is different, so autism may start sucking a little more, but as all trials in life, we'll take them as they come and deal with them the best we can.

Thanks Autism Sucks, for allowing me to contribute to such an amazing blog; it's a wonderful outlet and place to find support and encouragement.

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I must say, I've been behind on blogging lately and was remiss in acknowledging a blog award I received in late May. Thank you sooooooo much, Orion's Mom, for the blog award. Pop on over to her blog and check her out.

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I'm trying to figure the whole Technorati thing out right now. If you feel so inclined to visit my Technorati profile and give me some love, I sure would appreciate it.

Link love: http://technorati.com/blogs/mamabusypants.blogspot.com

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If you have the chance to check out 5 Minutes for Mom, please do so. There's so much great stuff on this site; I can't even begin to describe it. But it's one of those must-see sites for moms. Their sister site, 5 Minutes for Special Needs hosts the much-loved Magic Marker Monday.

And while you're there, check out a recent interview they conducted with me.

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And finally, here's a little love for some of my favorite sites:

Welcome to My Planet, written by Alicia, aka Dr. Mom. Alicia is a Clinical Psychologist turned SAHM of young 4 girls. Her oldest has Autism and other special needs.

An Attempt, is written by Tiffany, a not-so-old childhood friend of mine. She moved away when I we were in junior high and we lost track of each other until I found her (or did she find me) on Facebook. I'm so happy to get her back in my life, even if it's just online.

Calling the Shots and Hemi'sPhere are written by a great friend and colleague. Beth and I are both writing instructors and the same college and she is one of my favorite people to bounce ideas off of. Anyone who needs help navigating the medical field should check out her Calling the Shots blog. Hemi'sPhere is her creative side coming out as she blogs from her cat's point of view. And for those of you wondering how lame that is, trust me, she's hilarious. I hate these kinds of blogs and I can never wait for her next installment. Beth is about to bring home her daughter, who she is adopting from China. I have a feeling Hemi's gonna have a lot to say about that.

Confessions of Moody Mom is a down-to-earth blog hosted by Alisha aka Moody Mommy. She's a homemaker/ pro-blogger/ answerer of all questions. She has been through the ups and downs of infertility, her bipolar diagnoses, and life in general.

Sarah over at Real Life My Blog is hosting a new, live show on Mom TV. Sarah is a 33-year-old Don't-Stay-at-Home Mom of 3 beautiful girls (6/4/2). Real Life My blog is called Real Life for 2 main reasons: 1. She has found "real life" in Jesus Christ. Well, actually, He found her and she wants to share the joy and hope she has in Him! (Psalm 40:1-3) 2. Life is not perfect, and neither am she (her words, not mine). You won't find many stories about how her house is perfectly decorated and cleaned, her children are dressed to the tee and behaving like angels, or a four-course meal is ready for her husband when he gets home from work.

And how can I not relate to blogs called Scary Mommy, White Trash Mom and Writer Mom at Home--all worth checking out as well.

Now the writing instructor in me must confess, I am quoting parts of these descriptions directly from the blogger's profiles. They are not cited properly I'm sure, but it's my blog, and I'll cite how I want to.

Share the love, people, and stop by these cites. They're worth a read. Tell them Jeannie @ The Adventures of Mr. Busypants sent ya.



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Travel Advice and Resources from BabySafeTravel.com

Summer is here. I started to feel it throughout my panic-stricken nervous system as it anticipated the ending of the school year June 8. After passing the buck to the Kane County School system for the last nine months, I am again finding myself wondering what I'm going to do with TWO kids 24/7 until August.


Summer, of course, is divided into three categories for most: day trips, vacation trips, and trips to Insaneville courtesy of the kiddos. Now Insaneville is unavoidable. The kids are bound to get on each other's nerves (and thus yours) no matter how occupied and entertained you keep them. It's in their DNA.


One sure way to stay on track with the out-of house experiences you'll be planning for your summer travels is to check out a new website called Baby Safe Travel, an excellent resource for all your traveling-with-kids needs. (Let's face it: few of you escape to vacationland without them. If you're one of the lucky few, you are ordered not to pine over your little ones during me-time. They're just fine with grandma! But for the rest of you, if ya can't leave 'em, enjoy 'em.)


Baby Safe Travel is a site born out of the traveling experiences of Megan Radke, mom to Keegan and expecting double trouble in the form of twins. Megan requested a hotel crib and got a gnarly old stink box accompanied with a king-sized bedsheet/makeshift noose. After that experience, Megan realized the importance of a travel website created for parents, babies, and small children and created this awesome website.


On the home page, just plug in your destination, dates, and number of rooms you'll need and the site does a search of hotels in the area. You get the average price per night, a list of hotel details, amenities and room options, and both a star- and rattle-rating (rattle ratings appear on parent-reviewed hotels). You can help make travel better for babies and kids by reviewing hotels you've stayed at as well.


The site's Baby Boutique is full of all kinds of travel-friendly products for parents including bath gear, sleep gear, and travel gear, among other things. My readers will receive a 10% discount on all merchandise by using the coupon code 'summertravel' at checkout.


My favorite part of the website is the Baby Travel Tips section, which is filled with helpful advice for traveling with infants, crawlers, walkers, and multiples. I love that there's a list of toddler-proofing supplies. I never would have thought about that--and I consider myself a seasoned veteran when it comes to traveling with my kids. Remember, Mr. Busypants has been to Florida no fewer than 10 times in his short life and saw both coasts and the Smokey Mountains by the time he was a year old. I sincerely believe that if I handed him his ticket and dropped him off at the airport that he'd make it onto his plane just fine.


Another great section of this site is the Baby Blog section, which includes blogs for Beach Babies, Adventure Babies, Snow Babies and the Wild Child. Parents are invited to blog about their own travel experiences under these four categories.


Traveling with kids can make or break you and traveling with babies has the potential for disaster, but with the resources available to you through Baby Safe Travel, your chances to actually vacation on your vacation increase significantly.


Related Links:

Traveling with a Child with Autism
Public Urination in Boca
Water, Water Everywhere

Monkey See, Jorie Do: The Proof is in the Pudding

Miss Sassypants, who is Jorie's best, best friend, loves to strip. One minute, she'll be clothed, the next--naked.

One morning while at their house, for example, I ran across the street to grab something from mine. I got back 90 seconds later and--naked.

Jorie has picked up on this phenomenon. One morning recently, I watched Miss Sassypants while her mom ran errands. I was dutifully cleaning the kitchen while the girls were playing n the dining room. One minute Miss Sassypants was clothed. The next--naked.

J-boy, another neighbor that I was watching, frantically shouted and pointed: "Poop! Poop on the floor, Jeannie." I looked at Jorie, who was wearing a nightgown at the time, and checked underneath it to find that she'd stripped her diaper and underneath was, yes indeed, she was naked.

I asked Jorie, did you poop on the floor?

She said, "Nooooo. Meeesaaaaaa" (her name for Miss Sassypants.)

I asked Miss Sassypants, did you poop on the floor?

She said, "No. Dorie."

As I diapered each girl, I checked for evidence. The proof was in the smears of pudding: it was Jorie.

I spent the rest of the morning looking for steam protruding throughout the first floor.

Later that afternoon, I put Jorie down for a nap. After twenty minutes, I heard the frantic, I-just-threw-all-my-stuff-out-of-my-crib-and-I-demand-it-back-now cry. I went in to check calm her down and there she was . . .

Naked.

Related Links
Jorie Costanza: Climber, Antagonizer, Garbage Eater

Black Eyes, Diaper Changes, and Chocolate Easter Eggs

Say Hello Chuckie Sue

Mommy, Do Your Homework

This is a homemade worksheet that Mr. Busypants created. You can see on the top he wrote in my name, Mommy. He calls this "Mommy's Homework" and its a replica of a worksheet he was given in his Kindergarten class.

True, I was busy the day he presented this to me, but I had no choice but to comply as he forced me to "do my homework." First I had to count the starfish. Then I had to color them. Then I had to write a "2" in the grid on top. Next, I was forced to color 1 blue whale, 4 orange fish, and 4 purple shells. There's one last purple item on the bottom right, but I must have accidentally colored the star purple.

I'm sure I got points off. But I did get a nice, frog sticker and a heart "Good Job, Mommy. Good job on the homework."

Mr. Busypants is fond of Google searches. One evening, he had me searching images of couches, which I printed for him as he IDed the ones he liked. Then he cut them out, glued them on this orange piece of paper, and drew people sitting on the couch. The blue box is a TV cabinet and the white square is a television.

So the creepy stick people are watching television, I suppose. They're watching the "Washing Machine" Movie. I think he created this masterpiece right after we got home from Marco Island. Our condo had a front-loading washing machine that, you guessed it, Mr. Busypants totally obsessed over.

Mac-N-Cheese Please

Got Mac-N-Cheese? Alicia @ Welcome to My Planet and New Jersey Mom's Blog does. She's written about the trials of choosing that cheap and easy staple over a healthy, well-prepared, organic meal for their kids in her blogpost, Confessions of a Culinarily Challenged Mom.

Mr. Busypants eats more than his fair share of mac-n-cheese. He's loved and hated it his whole life. I say love/hate because he eats food in cycles. He'll eat one food obsessively and daily for six months straight, then he'll completely hate it and thus abandon it as a food he no longer likes.

I first noticed this occurance when he was 19 months old. One minute he was eating mac-n-cheese, and the next, he wouldn't touch the stuff. At one point, he was back on, but would only eat Auntie Annie's organic brand. Later he switched and will only eat Kraft.

For a while there, Kraft was great, but only if it wasn't "different." And God only knows what different meant because I sure couldn't figure it out. It got so bad that I would measure water to boil, cook the noodles for exactly seven minutes, and measure the milk and butter to ensure it would be the same every time.

Of course, it wasn't. Sometimes, it was still "Diiiiffffffferentttttt!"

In addition, under no circumstances were we allowed to re-heat and serve mac-n-cheese to the little king. That was also too "different." So I was reduced to dividing each 74 cent box of mac-n-cheese evenly and cooking them one serving at a time. It was a bone of contention in my marriage as my husband would ask: "Is there some reason why you're making an entire box of mac-in-cheese when you're going to throw the rest away?" He was right, it was a waste, but some days that extra step seemed monumental. Others, he was happy to eat his son's leftovers.

Lately Mr. Busypants has loosened up. Not wanting to see his sister get all the leftovers, he is now open to reheated mac-n-cheese. And since she'd gnaw your arm off if there wasn't anything else to dig on, I predict that the brand, cooking method, reheating controversy will be lost on little Miss Chattyshoes.

The irony of this post as that my two kiddos have just polished off a box of mac-n-cheese that I started making when I started writing this post. They've moved on to Oreos, but at least they're drinking milk.

Happy Birthday Miss Chattyshoes

On Monday, Jorie, aka. Miss Chattyshoes, turned two. They say that the twos are terrible, and I concur. This year, I'm very afraid.

As for this week, though, Miss Jorie has been a joy. On Sunday we went to Grandma and Grandpa's house for an informal party (the real family party will be later this month when everyone can be together.) She's starting to catch on to the open presents thing. My favorite gift reaction was to the mini Princess CD player that came with three plastic rings that look like little CDs. Every time she turn on that player, she'd hold it with two hands and shake it up and down to the music with her mouth wide open and smiling in pure joy. Her expression never changed. Just happy and fun-filled.

On Tuesday, we had the neighbors over for a mini-party--just brunch for the moms and maniac basement time for the kids. Since there are so many neighbor kids, we decided to simplify. Each family pitched in $10 and the group bought one big gift. This was great because it eliminates the excess spending (think of the junk you can get for $20), it makes gift-opening less chaotic (kind of--they still go nuts to open just the one gift), and each kid gets one great toy that they can fully enjoy instead of a bunch of random items that tend to break early on, overwhelm, and get lost in the shuffle.

This was a two-kid party since Miss Sassypant's big sis had a birthday Sunday. We all pitched in and got her a $50 gift card for the American Girl Store (huge hit!) and little Jorie got the Step 2 Fun Flow Play Sink.

The neighbors are looking forward to this kind of simplified celebration in the future. It beats spending $300 on Chuck E Cheese or the like.

Might As Well Face It: We're Addicted to Podcasting

I just launched my first online class at College 2 and I've been working like a crazy woman to get this class up and running.

During all the training I've received to get started teaching online at this college (College 1 isn't as advanced in it's Blackboard capabilities, so I'm learning a lot), I discovered Podcasting. After recording several lessons, I decided it might be time for Mr. Busypants to jump on the podcasting bandwagon.

When Mr. Busypants came home from school, I pulled up blogposts that had his artwork and interviewed him about it. He also narrated the books we have published on this blog.

He totally got into it, and like his mother, he couldn't stop podcasting.

Check out his first podcast, which goes along with Dinosaur Book.

Dinosaur House

Mr. Busypants built a house of DNOSR (Dinosaur). It looked like this.

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Ocean Wonders
Add Puzzle-Maker to his Resume
Dinosaur Book