"Ash" Wednesday

1. During one of our mild weekends recently, my parents had taken Carter to drive their golf cart, so I took Asher outside to play. I hadn't broken my camera out in awhile, and the boy was full of smiles, so I just snapped away. That smile is highly contagious.

2. Last weekend, it got really quiet in the house and Asher was nowhere to be found. I heard some rustling from the entryway...

Peek a boo!

3. Irene told us last Thursday that she thinks she can potty train Asher. I, on the other hand, had no intention of starting this task until he was like FOUR. Considering his "spirited" personality, I just thought we'd save a few grey hairs and wait awhile. But I wasn't gonna' argue if she wanted to get rolling on it. She started gung-ho on Friday and he did both #1 and #2 on the toilet several times that day. Monday she sent me a text saying, "In all my 16 years of daycare, I've never had a kid this easy to potty train."

I nearly dropped my cell phone.

My kid, EASY? She must have the wrong child. He's certainly made up for that with other difficulties. Regardless, he's stayed dry two days this week and is starting to actually tell us when he needs to go! I'm floored, but really proud of him. He's lovin' the M&M potty treats.

But keeping with Asher tradition, he's gotta check out his progress...up close and personal. The real accomplishment will be whether I can keep his head and his hands out of the toilet after the deed is done. Boys are nasty.

4. One last Asher story. Saturday morning, Chris let me sleep in a little bit (7:30am is sleeping in at our house), so he and the boys were in the living room. Pretty soon I hear, "Asher, no no! What did you get in to?" So much for sleeping in. Chris bursts into our room carrying the culprit and brings him to me saying, "Asher decided to do some artwork." He had black smears all over his face, nose and forehead. My immediate thought was magic marker. How on earth would we get that off his face? Nope, "mascara," Chris informs me. How in the #*&$ did he get into my makeup? Oh no, it wasn't MY makeup. It was the brand new Mary Kay mascara that I had laying on our island, ready to deliver to my sister-in-law. He had swiped it off the counter, opened the box (and thrown the box away, mind you), unscrewed the cap and applied it like camouflage all over his face. No pictures of that lovely sight, but he was lookin' dandy. Never a dull moment.