Two black eyes and the Fourth of July

First off...for some reason I can't put a title in right now...it's having a quirk so I'll title this post after it lets me :)

I have had a week of accident prone children. First, Ellie sprained her wrist (which thankfully after a few days got feeling better and she decided that she was even good enough to do this session of swim lessons) and then both Will and Ellie got black eyes. Will got his by jumping over the couch to get behind it when he needed to pick up some of his toys, and his face landed on the window sill and Ellie was standing on a card table in the basement playing castles or something and she fell off and landed face down on the concrete. I'm sure if people were really paying attention, they would think that we are the most abusive parents ever!!!

We had a fun Fourth of July. We first went to the local Cedar City parade, which always has lots of people throwing lots of candy, and Will and Ellie have got the collecting candy talent down. Catie even got into it, realizing that it was more fun to get up off of her chair and get candy. The girls loved the dancers and Ellie told me that she wants to be a parade dancer. I had already thought about starting her in dance lessons, but after she said that I knew it was something that I really needed to get seriously looking into.

The kids also had fun playing with the Snap Pops and I didn't buy any fireworks at all because we would have had to go to a designated location to set them off and because they are really expensive. We can see the fireworks that Enoch City sets off from our house and this year it was a decent show. Catie even stayed awake this year to watch. It was a fun, relaxing Fourth of July without huge crowds and limited arguing - which goes down in my book as perfect.

I'm trying to get Catie mostly potty trained before I have to start school, so I'm sacrificing my workouts for this goal. As it is there have been a few days when we have had tons to do and I've just put a diaper on her so that I didn't have to take the time to switch out the soiled underwear, but I have less than 40 days before I go back to school so I need to buckle down and really focus on this for a little while. If she doesn't get it by the time I start school, I'll have to come up with a plan B - but if it isn't consistent there's no way that she will get it this school year, which wouldn't be the end of the world, but I am really looking forward to having kids out of diapers after 6+ years of constant diaper changing.

The highlight of my week was receiving a phone call from my dear friend Tiana. I haven't really heard from her for a while - I had a baby, she got married (which voids out the first year) and now is pregnant (again, a pretty awesome excuse) but I had the chance to talk to her for over an hour yesterday and it just made my day. There are a few people who I consider to be a really great friend and she is one of them and I love her tremendously.