Me(wondering where Tucker is and why he’s so quiet):  Tucker, what are you doing?
Tucker(who is 3 1/2): Playing with my penis.
Me: Why? 
Tucker: I want to.  (Long pause.)  Emmie doesn’t have a penis.  Isn’t that sad?  I think we need to go to the store and get her a penis.
Me: Girls don’t have penis’; they have vaginas.
Tucker: Do you have a china?
Me: Yes
Tucker: Do chinas make you want to go to the store?
Me: Um…I guess so.

I kind of can’t believe it!  Tonight will be the last time Marshall sleeps at the children’s hospital!!!!  After 5 years of him being gone at least once a week, it’ll be almost weird to have him home every night.

The end of residency is all but here (only 10 more days!!!!!!!!!!), but it still seems to be light years away!  There are parties planned, dinners to attend, boxes and boxes and boxes to pack, and a house to clean.  (It helps that I have an over-abundance of things to do, really.)  But, as much as I’m trying to enjoy this time, all I can do is think about how much time is left!  Almost all of my friends are on vacation right now, so there’s no one to chat with or meet for lunch or roam around Target with me. 

**Although last night my one in-town friend and I discovered a new restaurant called Crums on Central.  If you’re in the area, it’s over on Central(duh) where Cafe du Teau used to be.  The chef is formerly of Takosushi, but it’s not Takosushi-ish food at all.  It’s southern comfort food with a fancy flair, and it’s quite delicious!**

Anyway, back to the “Poor Marsh…” part of my ramble.  He is aware of how much he works…and he hates it.  He hates that he’s gone from the house so often.  He hates that he frequently misses bed time.  And he hates that on call nights leave him so exhausted that he’s not worth much the whole next day, even after a nap.  But, as we keep telling each other, it’s almost over!  But he tries so hard to make up for his absence when he is around.  He gives baths, does bedtime, plays at the park, reads books, acts like a monster, plays train and tea party, all the things the kids love!  So I know that-since he can’t help it, and since he tries so hard to make up for his time away-it really hurts when the kids seem to notice that he’s away so much.  The hardest part is that Emmie has started to make little comments.  Ones that are kind of cute, but heart-crushing for him.  Poor Marsh…  A few weeks ago the kids woke up and Tucker asked if Daddy was at home.  Emmie said, “No…Daddy at woah-k(read: work).  Daddy a-ways at woah-k.”  Poor Marsh…  Then today we were headed up to the hospital to have lunch with him.  As we pulled into view of the hospital, Emmie squealed, “We going to Daddy’s house!!!  YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!  We going see Daddy at Daddy’s house!!!!!”  No, he doesn’t live at the hospital, but it does sometime seem like it, sweet pea!  Poor Marsh…

So, to Marshall(I know you read this), I just want to say:  We love you.  And although we do miss you when you’re not here, we appreciate all you do to make time for us.

• We love coming to eat lunch with you.  I assure you that it’s not the cafeteria food that brings us back again and again. 
• We love post-call days when you can nap with us.  There are very few things more wonderful than all piling in the bed and taking a nap together. 
• We will miss coming up to visit you in the resident’s lounge when you’re on call.  Once again, it’s not the box of toys which are missing half of their parts or the huge TV or the free drinks from McDonald’s; it’s fun to see you in your element.  You are a good doctor.  Not that I should be surprised, but it always makes me proud to see how awesome you are.
• Thanks for napping with the kids post-call so that I can run child-free errands.  I know you work hard when you’re on call, but it leaves me as a single parent for 2 days(how do single parents do it????).  And I appreciate that you understand that after 2 days I need a break from being a mommy, just like you need a break from being a doctor.  You nap, the kids nap, I get errands done-it’s a win-win situation!  Thanks for doing it so often!!
• And the best part:  You only have TWO MORE CALLS after tonight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Hurray!!!

Ok…my computer is STILL DEAD and still at the computer hosptial, so I’m borrowing a computer to pay my bills.  And I figured since I was online anyway, it couldn’t hurt to just take an hour or two a few moments to check out all I’ve missed in the blog world.  Wow!  A lot happens in 7 days!

A lot has happened at our house, too!  We have a (nearly) potty trained child!  He has done really well with peeing in the pot.  If any one has any magical solutions on how to get him to poop in the potty instead of his nice, new, wonderful Lightening McQueen underwear please speak up!

It wasn’t easy going at first, I assure you.  On Monday I probably cleaned up 40 puddles of pee, and 2 poop accidents.  After Monday I gave up on Em(she’s still a bit young, really).  The main reason I gave up on her is because she was completely traumatized by a poop accident.  We were in the living room and she pooped a little on the floor.  I said, “That’s ok…just run to the potty and you can finish.”  So as we were rushing to the potty, another bit of poop came out and she turned to me, with a look of sheer panic on her face and said, “OH, NO!  I’m falling apart!”  So I decided it wasn’t worth my child thinking that she was falling apart just so I wouldn’t have to deal with diapers anymore.  She’s not even two…give her time, right? 

But Tucker, oh, Tucker…that took some finagling!  On Monday and Tuesday we tried(again) stickers for peeing, stickers for pooping, toys for success, singing songs and dancing, pretty much anything I could think of.  But by Wednesday I knew we needed a new plan.  This was just not working.  Without the help of my friendly Google search to guide my way in the potty training world, I was up to my own devices.  (What did people do before computers??)  What finally seemed to work was not getting some sort of reward for actually using the potty, but getting a reward for staying dry and clean.  So…each time we went to the bathroom, if he was dry and clean, he got a sticker…just for not peeing or pooping in his pants.  It seems to have worked fairly well…if you take out the 2 poop accidents per day!  The only downfall now is that instead of asking to go to the bathroom when he needs to pee he says, “I need to go get a sticker.”   Guess I should let the nursery workers at church in on that little code, right?

You may have noticed that recently I joined the “Wordless Wednesday” bandwagon.  But I’m not very good at being wordless.  So, I’ve decided that I’ll rotate between “Wordless Wednesday” where you get a picture with no words, and “Why do I…” Wednesday.  On “Why do I…” days I’m going to try to address reasons I do things.  Like why do I blog, take so many pictures, want to have so many kids…things like that!  So…for starters, I’m going to focus on something that’s been travelling around the blog-o-sphere:  Why do I blog?  Through the website of my friend Kate, I found this post.  And a few days later I ran into this blog by my friend over at CityStreams.  So after seeing those, I started to wonder…why do people blog?  Why do I blog?  Well, a quick Google search will give you thousands of responses to that first question.  My favorite thing I saw while perusing the results from my Google search was this.  I don’t know this Anne Matthewson person, but I like what she has to say:

Herman Melville put it best when he said, “We cannot live for ourselves alone. Our lives are connected by a thousand invisible threads, and along these sympathetic fibers, our actions run as causes and return to us as results.” A perfect description of blogging, don’t you think?

I started blogging some years ago largely to pass time and share experiences. A small part of me, however, was selfishly hoping for admiration and affirmation; a shallow attitude I’ve long abandoned. Eventually, I discovered the joy found via “invisible threads” and “sympathetic fibers” – those human connections made along the way. Blogger tend to be a lovely comfort of strangers.

So after I tried to avoid the question I’d posed for myself by reading about other people, I figured I might as well take a stab at it.  I now know why other people blog, but what about me??  I don’t have a big “following”, although I’m finding out that I have a few “lurkers” out there! 🙂  So it’s not the feedback I’m searching for (although it is nice).  (Hint, hint: leave a comment.)

I think, for me and for millions of other people, blogging is just theraputic.  Typing out all my thoughts is much cheaper than paying a therapist!  You guys get to hear things that I would otherwise often only tell my bestest buddies or Marshall.  I would never probably never admit that I was in over my head to you guys if we were face-to-face. And I know that I would never bring up this topic in polite conversation. (Well, maybe I would…but I wouldn’t talk about it to just anyone!)  But here in bloggyland, there’s a freedom.  Freedom to speak freely.  Say what I think.  Talk about what’s on my mind.  And there is so much more on my mind, but it is time for me to go to Vacation Bible School with the kiddos…so maybe more on this another “Why do I…” Wednesday!