Back and forth

Hey ya'll. So it's time for me to start blogging again. Why? Well, mostly because it's something I can do to keep my hands and mind busy at the same time, while also enjoying myself. I am sooooooo ridiculously tired of being fat. I mean, like, it's crippling. I know it's in my head to a certain degree, but come on folks, the scale don't lie. My weight has alllllways been a struggle (not necessarily a struggle with obesity, just a struggle with NEVER being thin enough. Battle of the bulge, so to speak) and I want there to be a time in my life (before I die) where I am not consumed by whether or not people can tell just how big my fat roll is. You hear me?

I've gone back and forth about whether or not to blog on a separate weight loss blog, but I don't think I'll do that. Considering the fact that my problems with weight are pretty all consuming right now, it's a big part of my life. So as I blog, I'll blog about my successes and failures with my weight loss journey, and I'll begin blogging about our lives, too. Cuz I definitely have not done that. And Diesel is already 13 months! Time sure flies these days. I feel like I blinked and the last year went away.

So lets see. Lemme give some kid updates. I'll start with Mckenzi.

Mckenzi Mae:
-Turned 3 last month
- Potty trained herself in May, and fully night potty trained herself the day we moved into our new place (right when she turned 3). And when I say potty trained herself, it's zero exaggeration. I started trying to train her a little before she was two, and would try here and there every couple of months. She knew what the toilet was. She knew what to do. She just was totally disinterested. Then one day she said she had to pee, she went to the bathroom, did her thing (while I watched from the doorway without her knowing) and we never looked back! It was the easiest transition ever. Every time she peed, it was a major party. Every time she pooped, we celebrated as though she won an emmy. Truth be told, she still likes us to party in her honor, and we do appease her now and again. When she suddenly stopped peeing in her night time pull up, I was simply astonished. I figured it would be a while til we could night train her, because she takes around 6 ounces of milk every night before bed. Everyone says to stop doing fluids a couple of hours before bed when you're night time training, and my husband just wasn't on board with taking the milk-comfort routine away from her yet. Mckenzi has always been difficult to sleep train, so when we found a schedule that she jived with, we were hesitant to consider any sort of change. So when she stopped wetting her pull up at night while still having her bed time milk, we were (needless to say) stoked beyond reason. The girl is a champ.
-The girl is super theatrical in alllll things. LOVES to dance, LOVES to sing, enjoys choreography, attentions, talking, jibbering nothing at all (thinking she's being super intelligent), etc etc.
-Huge personality. The girl is so friendly and fearless that it not only scares me sometimes, but it's also totally embarassing on ocassion. For instance, at disneyland yesterday while in line for Pirates, Mckenzi began to share our life story with the old couple behind us. By the time we got on the boats, they knew all of our names, that grandma is her bestfriend, daddy is a police man, all the rides we rode so far that day, that twix (our dog) poops all over our rear driveway, that she hurt her butt when she fell off the chair the day before, and so on and so forth. Joy, right? We will be working on boundaries and appropriate conversation starters, obviously. I am glad she's not super shy and afraid of everyone, but I do need to start educating her about strangers and the like.
- Speaks spanish. It surprised us. Dora has taught the girl to count to ten in enspanol!
- Counts to around 20ish, and not because of us. I don't care what people say. TV is awesomely educational. She has known how to count like this for at least a year, if not more. Same with her abc's.
-The girl can sing. She carries a tune and has such a sweet little voice. Sing her a song a couple of times, and she knows it by heart start to finish. She can be found roaming disneyland, singing twinkle twinkle little start at the top of her lungs. She makes sure she sings it loud enough so that everyone she walks by looks at her and makes eye contact. The girl lives for that, I swear. She won't be held back, either. Tell her to sing a little quieter, and she shouts like a maniac.
-Her current pop song requests are "Call Me Maybe" by Carly Rae Jepson and "Marry You" by Bruno Mars. She knows the songs word for word, and one of her favorite things to do is bump it with her head phones on to these songs on repeat while we ride in the car. I dont' know whether to shake my head or laugh out loud as my 3 year old belts out these lyrics. Bad mom? Who knows. My kid is having a blast.
- She is a talking maniac. NON STOP. You will certainly become quickly annoyed with the lack of silence around Mckenzi (if you're not already used to it). It's difficult for new people that aren't used to being around us. I forget sometimes that she's considered a talker because it's just part of my life. I love my little talker though. Not to say I don't appreciate some silence for a couple hours once a week!
-Disneyland is currently all the rage for Mckenzi. Nothing is too fast, too high, or too scary. She's crazy and a total fanatic like her dad. Now he has a riding buddy! He can't wait til she's a couple of inches taller (neither can she, frankly. she's dieing to ride splash mountain) so that she can ride everything with him. Gotta be 40 inches for most of the big stuff, except for Indiana which is 46 inches i think.

That's enough about her. Now for D-man.

Diesel Scott
-When reprimanding Diesel, I rarely use his middle name. It's the "normal" thing to do, I can just never think of it, and when I finally do remember what the heck the kid's middle name it, it doesn't feel right using it because it's my dad's name. It's weird. Boo. I've tried calling him by his first and last name, but it just doesn't work! I need a good discipline name for him, lol!
-He doesn't talk nearly as much as Mckenzi did (and does). He's our little observer. He watches.
-He's not reserved and he's not shy, he doesn't let Mckenzi (or others) boss him around and he doesn't slip behind the scenes. He's a powerful yet quiet presence, and I love to watch his little personality develop.
-He knows what he wants, and he's not afraid to let himself be heard. Don't let his usually quiet demeanor fool you! Kid can squak with the best of um!
-He's very strong willed. If he wants to do something, he'll do his best to get exactly what he wants, but he does it as quietly as possible. Mckenzi is the opposite; she is loud and proud and lets you know that her plan is to be defiant and that's just how it's gonna be, kicking and screaming and all. Diesel will avoid eye contact and go straight for the prize, as you tell him 'no', and that's that. He'll get it one way or another, and then when he is reprimanded afterwards, has the most heartbreaking, sincere little sad face/cry you'll ever see or hear in your life. Kid knows exactly what he's doing! Love him.
-He is all boy. He loves balls. Will sit still with his jaw dropped, mouth open, eyes wide as he watches his uncle play around with a basketball. Then once he has watched for long enough, he'll simply point and beg to play too. He's got very big hands, and does well both throwing and catching and playing with balls easily enough that he rarely gets frustrated. It's so cute. He'll definitely be an athlete. Nothing else captures his interest quite like his Uncle Jared and basketballs. Though, he does love his sister's chapsticks. It's her current obsession, and because she's so obsessed, obviously he is too.
- He doesn't say many words. Dadda, Momma, and that's about it. We think he might be trying to articulate other words like "uh oh" etc, but it's too inconsistent to tell. He blabbers on and on and it's the cutest little language, he just hasn't shown interest in actually speaking much.
- He does use sign language as a way to communicate, and it's so cute. Usually it's just to express that he wants "more".
-He's so happy and fun and excited, and he's such a joy that it's ridiculous. He has opened our eyes to why people have so many kids. If all kids are like Diesel, we would have 6 too! Mckenzi is like having 4 kids, I'm not even joking.
-He's a sleep champ (not unlike his mother ;P). He takes a 2-4 hour nap every day, and then goes to bed at 6:30/7 and wakes up between 7/9am. Champ, right? And he just puts himself to sleep, and that's how he wants it. I did not have to sleep train him, it's just always how he's preferred to do it. Lay him in his bed with his bottle and his silky, and that's that. He doesn't cry, he just rolls to the side, closes his eyes, and sleeps. I'm totally fist shaking at all you ladies that swear up and down that Mckenzi is a bad sleeper because of me. You can suck it. It's how she came. She doesn't like sleep. Or at least she hadn't realized until recently that sleep and rest is nice, and now she understands and embraces that sleep feels good and she needs it. I never changed enforcing her schedule/routine etc, she merely began to realize that sleep is good, and that she's not really missing out on life while she sleeps. The girl has such a ridiculous zest for life that sleep was always such a disappointment for her. Anyway, Diesel is not the same. I've trained him and taught him just exactly the same as I did with Mckenzi. He did not want to co-sleep; Mckenzi thrived on co-sleeping. I nursed them both almost exactly the same amount of time (Diesel a year, kenzi 13 months). I'm the same mom to both of them, and their personalities are just so different, that their habits are different. And that's all there is to it!
-Diesel is a dancing kind like his sister. He drops it like it's hot, fist pumps, and head bobs like it's nobodies bizniz. I have the best video of it, too. No one introduced him to dancing like we did Mckenzi. He started on his own, and hasn't stopped since. If he hears music, his fist is in the air and he's booty shaking for miles. LOVE IT.

OK, that's enough of an update for now. In other news, Neal is officially hired with his new department. We still don't know when he'll start with them, but that's ok. At least we know we're in. We seriously can't wait for the transfer. We are happy with the change, and don't think that it can come soon enough. Also, I'm 60 pounds overweight and considered obese by 2 pounds. Hooray. Check back for updates there, cuz it's all down hill from here. I worked my ass off for 2 months straight and lost major inches, barely any pounds, and then took a month off and I think I undid everything I worked so hard for, hahaha. Oh, life. Life, life, life. But I'm ok. I'm not done with my journey. I'm bound and determined to lose the weight, because I made a deal with myself that I wouldn't have another baby until it's a reasonable and healthy thing to do. Right now, I am not healthy enough. Gimme 6 months, we'll talk then.