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Home › Diaries › Donna › September 6, 2006

Donna's Diary Entries

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09/05/06 - Labor Day weekend, television 101, and Build-a-Bear party

September 6, 2006

We had a nice long weekend.  I had to take off work on Thursday and Friday because Justin's school was closed to get ready for the new school year, and we were already off on Monday.  Thursday, I got my errands done, went to visit the girls at work, and then cleaned the bathroom, and Friday I got some presents wrapped for a couple of birthday parties.  I bought Justin some new crayons and coloring books and a preschool workbook about colors.  He knows all the colors so he was pretty interested in doing this with me, and we had fun.  My husband surprised me with Domino's pizza and brownies for dinner. 

On Saturday, Daddy set up a television in Justin's room.  I knew this would happen eventually – it was inevitable.  As I've mentioned, I am not much of a TV watcher (although I did get to watch a couple of Lifetime movies this weekend!) and my husband is a big TV watcher.  Justin is kind of neutral about it I think – he likes playing with the remote control more than anything.  He will say he is looking for something to watch, usually sports, but he doesn't actually sit and watch anything.  He has never been forbidden from watching it, but I never encouraged him to either, so I guess that is why he doesn't really care about it.  Anyway, I was a little concerned that this new TV in the room thing would quickly turn him into a couch potato (or bedroom potato), but it turns out I need not have worried (at least not yet).  He played with the remote for a few hours the first day, then he pretty much forgot he had the TV after that, except to periodically turn it on and then leave the room.  He would still much rather play outside than anything else.

Sunday, we went to a Build-a-Bear birthday party for a 4-year-old girl.  This was perfect timing for Justin to go there, because he is really interested in stuffed animals and pretend play right now.  It amazes me how he can be so destructive one minute, and then take care of his animals so nicely.  Anyway, for the party each kid got to pick from two bears and pick a shirt.  He chose a vanilla-colored bear and a blue shirt to go with it and named him Teddy Bear.  He is just learning now that animals can have both a general and specific name (like dog and Lucky), so I think he was confused when I asked him what he wanted his teddy bear's name to be.  He just looked at me like I was crazy and said Teddy Bear (didn't you know that Mommy?).  Then he kept asking for blue pants to put on him, and I was trying to explain that I don't think we get pants with him sweetie.  I can't believe how expensive all that stuff is – you could really spend a lot if you're not careful in there!

Challenge update:  Last week I went on a bathroom cleaning mission.  This was on Thursday and was perfect timing because I had that day off.  What's funny is that I have sometimes wished we had a bigger house and more bathrooms but after doing that I was really happy we only had one.  Then I made a list of what would need to be done in each room on a regular basis, so I can start getting some sort of cleaning routine going.  Another thing was I started a gratitude journal, which is writing down five things each day I was grateful for or made me smile.  I had done this before and was really happy to start it again.  Some days it is easy to think of five things, and other days I have to get creative, but it does make me see the positive in things even on a bad day.  Here is one from each day last week:

Gratitude Journal
Wednesday - The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes this morning was Justin.
Thursday - It was nice being able to do grocery shopping on a weekday.
Friday - Justin took a two-hour nap.
Saturday - I was able to watch two whole movies all the way through.
Sunday - Got Justin's new fall clothes washed and put away.

Thanks for reading!
Donna and Justin

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