It’s hard to believe that Capone is 3.  Time has flown by, yet Rakicy and I have both commented lately that we can’t really remember what life was like without him.

2-3 has seen some huge changes.  He potty trained himself at 25 months and hasn’t used a diaper since.  We recently got rid of the potty seat, and at home he can go to the bathroom by himself without direct supervision if needed. He loves to help and one of his “jobs” is to help set the table for dinner.  

He is way more verbal.  He tells jokes and has mastered sarcasm and is brutally honest.  He understands and converses about a whole range of subjects and tells us stories about his day, his books, what he and his best friend N are going to do the next time they play.  He’s memorized many of this books and can fool most strangers into thinking he knows how to read.  He knows  his ABCs and can recognize about half of his letters and count to about 15.   In the last month he’s become obsessed with clocks and time and is constantly asking us to help him read the numbers on clocks.

We went to the doctor on Friday for his 3 year check up.  He’s just shy of 40 inches tall and 39.5 lbs (probably a little less as he was wearing heavy jeans).  Not that we were surprised but that means he is still one of the very tallest kids in his age group.   He was very excited that he didn’t have to get any shots at this visit.  He was so proud of himself for peeing in a cup on demand and was oddly enthralled with the nurse doing a finger stick.

He is still very dependent on his afternoon nap and has a 7:00 pm bedtime.   Lack of sleep and/or too much sugar quickly send things downhill in our house, so we are pretty strict on bedtime and diet.   He’s very excited about his new sibling coming this summer, although he’s very sensitive to how other people talk about this change (that’s a whole new blog post).

We celebrated his birthday last weekend because we were supposed to be in Oklahoma for a friend’s wedding this weekend, but at the last minute my doctor said I couldn’t go.  I’ll put the birthday party in a separate post (hopefully soon).

So what does Capone love to do at 3?  Here are a few of his answers to his favorite things…

1. What is your favorite color? Yellow and Green

2. What is your favorite toy? my recycling truck

3. What is your favorite fruit? grapes

4. What is your favorite thing to watch on tv?  The 1st Lightening McQueen movie when the disk isn’t broken

5. What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch? Cheese and olives

I asked him a bunch more questions and I’ll publish those shortly under a password protected post.  You may see a few more password protected posts in the future, as we try to balance our public blog and also respect our children’s safety and privacy.  If you’d like access to those posts, simply email me at info [at] dontpatthebelly [dot] com and I’ll get you access.

So I posted the other day that the baby was expected to be smaller than Capone.  I thought the ultrasound tech said 2 lbs 13 oz at the last sonogram.  That would be a normal sized baby.  In reality, the baby measured 3 lbs 13oz.  That is going to be a big baby.  Bigger than Capone (he was 3 lbs 6 oz at the same age).  Assuming the baby gains .5 lbs per week…we’re looking at more of a 9.5 lbs baby.   This doesn’t mean, however, that our vbac goal is off the table.  My doctor is not so much worried that the baby will be too big for a vbac, but is more concerned that the size of the baby may cause some of the heart issues I experienced with Capone’s delivery.  We are going to revisit it again at 36 weeks.

Now we’re just hoping to hold out until June 25th.  I would rather skip OSF and stick with Bromenn.

We are having a very small birthday party for Capone this year, and despite the fact that I said it would be very low key, I’ve been collecting ideas on Pintrest for fire truck themed birthday parties for the last few months.  I learned how to make a fire truck or firefighter helmet cake and pinned gorgeous ideas for birthday goodies.  Now that the party is a week away, I asked Capone what food we should have.  According to Capone, this is what you have at a fire truck birthday.

• bowl of pickles (the whole kind that are little, aka mini dill pickles)
• bowl of brown olives (kalamata)
• Turkey Sandwiches with Hot Mustard (Dijon) on Buns
• Chex Mix (cheerios, corn chex, pretzels, and raisins–no seasoning)
• yogurt with fruit
• chocolate cake

Easiest birthday party ever.  No themed food.  No up until midnight making food shaped like fire trucks or fire hydrants.  I’m glad I asked.

This afternoon while Capone napped, Rakicy and I cleaned out the former office which is about to become Capone’s new room.  Among the boxes of files and other junk we have moved though 2 states and multiple addresses, was the paper work from our marriage prep classes.   It brought back some complicated memories and generated an even more interesting conversation of how we got to where we are today.

Rakicy and I were both raised Catholic.  His family is all Catholic; mine is a mix.  We met in college and both attended the same university Catholic center.  It seemed a no-brainer that we would be married Catholic and raise our kids Catholic, but in the last several years that has not exactly been what happened.

I don’t post much about religion, but our family life and our religious views have become gradually more interconnected.  We were not happy with things happening in the Catholic church and it was becoming harder and harder for us reconcile those issues with our own family values and ideals.  Several weeks ago, we finally decided that it was time for us to move on.  Baby #2 would not be baptized in the Catholic church and our family would no longer attend our former church.  I mentioned this on Facebook.  A few people who were having similar experiences commented in support, several thought I was joking, and many more pretended that it hadn’t happened.

One of the clues that we wouldn’t stay Catholic long term is actually hinted at in our marriage prep paperwork.  The priest who worked with us, flagged “an area for further discussion” regarding our ideas regarding marriage roles.  I distinctly remember that night.  I almost didn’t go back to the next session.   Rakicy and I had both indicated on the marriage prep questionnaire that we viewed husband and wife roles as a 50/50 partnership.  At the time, I was in grad school and teaching.  Rakicy was working.  Cooking, cleaning, bill paying, etc were all divided up equally, not by traditional gender roles.  The priest gave me a lecture about this.  Rakicy was working (I was just teaching) and cooking and cleaning were really more of a wife’s responsibility.   I did go back to the courses, but simply with the idea in mind to sit there long enough to get the priest to sign the piece of paper because the church in Arkansas we’d already booked wouldn’t marry us without that magic piece of paper.  As much as the feminist in me hated to pretend to submit, I was more infuriated with the idea that this priest could actually cancel the wedding that we had already planned if I didn’t play his game.

Fast forward several years, we both became increasingly frustrated with the Catholic church but with Capone on the way and Catholic relatives on both sides, it seemed easier to stick with tradition than to cause a major rift.  We didn’t know where we wanted to go and didn’t really  have good answers for leaving, so we stayed.  Capone was baptized and we went to church periodically and with relatives, but we became increasingly uncomfortable with it.

As Capone got older, we talked about religion at home.  He knows some prayers, but our church experiences became more and more like this.  We’d go to mass.  We’d get angry at the priest/Church for some insulting, sexist, and or oppressive statement and go away.  We’d cool off and go back and then it would happen again.

A few weeks ago when the bishop of our diocese made some incredibly offensive and inappropriate comments, it sealed the deal.  We could no longer stay. So tonight, we began the first of our church-hopping adventures.  We started with an Episcopalian church because it is closest to the traditions we were both raised with, but with the inclusion and dialog we both value.  It was a little smaller than we were used to, but the environment was so much better that it confirmed we wouldn’t be going back to our former Catholic church.  We have a few more churches to visit before we know where we’ll end up.  Baby #2 will be baptized somewhere, but it won’t be in a Catholic church.

We started this blog to chronicle our adventures in parenthood and while I don’t intend to use it bash the Catholic church or detail our religious ideas, this has been a major turning point.  We talked about it with Capone as much as you can explain something this complex to a nearly 3 year old.   He was excited about visiting the new church tonight and gave the priest a high five and told him “next we’re going to Panda Express to eat” on our way out.  This was surprising since the anxiety over leaving the Catholic church had reached the point that most Sundays that we went to mass included a complete melt down of “I don’t like church.”

So I guess the moral of this story is parenthood has led us away from the Catholic church for good (unless some major things change).  And now we will return to our normal posts about new baby prep, recipes, and cloth diapers.

Not too long after Capone finally fell asleep this afternoon, the carbon monoxide alarms started going off.  Our digital alarm said 0, but every other alarm (they are hard wired) was going off.

So, I threw open doors and windows, woke up Capone, and called 911 from the front porch.  Minutes later a fire truck arrived and after 30 minutes or so of taking readings, checking gas appliances, etc, came back with the verdict that our alarms had malfunctioned because of age.  While smoke alarms need to be replaced every 10 years, carbon monoxide alarms have to be replaced every 5-7 years–even the hard wired kind.

So, while Capone thought giving up naptime to get a personal visit from three fire fighters was the best thing ever…at nearly 30 weeks pregnant, I thought I might go into labor and Rakicy who got the very descriptive voicemail “you need to come home right now, the fire department is on their way” is lucky he didn’t have a bike wreck on his way home.  So go update your carbon monoxide alarms, right now.  Our house will be 10 years old this summer, but the fire department discovered that most of our alarms were 11-12 years old.  Smoke alarms need to be replaced every 10 years; Carbon monoxide alarms generally sooner (5-7 years).  Hardwired or battery operated, you need to know how old the alarms are.  Our issued a false alarm, but they could have just as easily not alarmed when there really was an emergency.

Consider this a public service announcement.  We are just glad that a) there was not really a carbon monoxide emergency and b) that this happened at 1 pm instead of 1 am.

Capone wants to know when his buddies from Firestation #3 are coming back to visit, but we are off to Menards to replace carbon monoxide detectors tonight so we don’t get another home visit.  Next time we’ll just visit our fire fighter buddies at Safety Town.

We’re not telling the vital details that we do know, and that seems to bug some people.  So here a place to vent guess baby #2′s details.  The first 4 questions are required, the last 3 are optional.

Here are some random facts to get you started…

• Capone was 8 lbs 2 oz at birth, 21 inches, and born at 38 weeks and 2 days
• My due date is July 4th
• The new mother/baby unit at our hospital opens June 20th
• Nana’s birthday is June 30th
• At a 29 week sonogram, Capone was estimated to weigh 3.5 lbs (9.5 lbs at birth)
• At a 29 week sonogram, Baby #2 was estimated to weigh 3 lbs (8.5-9 lbs at birth)
• Ask other questions/factoids in the comments and I may or may not answer them.

Once we have some guess, I’ll provide a link to the summary of answers, so don’t put anything you don’t want published.

See the responses here.

We’re not big on lots of candy in our house, so over the last month, I started collecting non-sugary ideas for Capone’s Easter Basket.  I saw tutorial on Pintrest for Fizzy Sidewalk Paint, and decided that it would be the perfect addition to the Easter Basket.  As it turns out, I could have put nothing but chapstick and fizzy sidewalk paint in Capone’s basket because most everything else has sat untouched. 

It was super easy to make and now we’re waiting on today’s thunderstorm to wash away our sidewalk full of fizzy art, so we can start all over again next week.

Here’s what you need:

• Baking Soda (1/2-3/4 cup per color—the more you add, the more it fizzes)
• Cornstarch (1/2 cup per color)
• Warm Water
• Washable Temepra paint (or food coloring—see below)
• Vinegar in a spray bottle
• Empty containers with lids (I used mason jars and salsa jars)
• Paintbrushes, sponges, or other painting utensils

 Mix all of the dry ingredients together in the bottom of each jar.  Add temepra paint and warm water and stir/shake until desired consistency.  I made ours a little thinner, so it would last longer.  Thicker paint would give you brighter denser colors.

The Easter Bunny brought pink and blue sidewalk paint and one spray bottle of “magic fuzz.”  Most of our patio was covered in art by 8:30 Easter morning.   Capone quickly became in charge of the vinegar bottle and called himself the “magic fuzz man.”

Spray on the vinegar and watch the paint fizz

You can make the sidewalk paint by itself, skipping the baking soda, but the fizzing quality added a lot of fun to this activity.  We’ve played with the paint several days after daycare and have since added green, brown, and purple to our paint collection.  You could also use food coloring in place of paint, but I wanted to ensure that if it got on Capone’s clothes, it would easily wash out and I always have more paint on hand than I do food coloring.

The first several times, he doused the paint in vinegar.

This was better than any amount of candy I could have put in his Easter basket and it got us outside all day playing together.

You can spray the "magic fizz" before or after the paint dries. You will get a better reaction on dry paint. After the fizz is gone, it dries just like sidewalk chalk

After an incredibly busy March, we had one of the most relaxing Easters I can remember in the last several years.  In the month of March, we had back to back company with a case of walking pneumonia in between.  So our goal this Easter was to keep it laid back.

Saturday, we took Capone to the company park to scope out possible birthday locations.  It turns out that we’re not going to actually have his birthday party at this park, but he still had a great time.

That evening we sprinkled Bunny Food (stale cereal) in our backyard so that the Easter Bunny would know we wanted him to come visit.

It must of have worked because the Easter Bunny came that night and brought lots of cool stuff.  He filled Capone’s Easter Eggs with almonds and raisins.

And brought bubbles, a couple of book about the upcoming arrival of Capone’s new baby, chapstick, fun bandaids, fizzy sidewalk paint, and a small chocolate bunny that Capone is still saving.

We made breakfast casserole in a bundt pan, turned it upside down, filled it with chopped spinach and plastic eggs and had Easter Basket Casserole for breakfast.

Since we didn’t have a house full of company.  I threw orange chicken in the crockpot and we played with the sidewalk paint and bubbles all day.

The sidewalk paint was a huge hit!

Capone ruled that he was the only one allowed to spray the “magic fuzz.”

I’ll be honest, 90% of my Pintrest pins may not get done in the next 3 months (or ever), but today I saw something on Pintrest that made me stop and do it right then.  It was a user uploaded photo about putting emergency contact information on a car seat.  The pinner’s explanation talked about most children in carseats being too young to disclose important information (name, address, parents, etc) to anyone much less a strange police officer/fire fighter.

So I went to the computer and threw together vital information that someone might need to know in the event that we ever had a wreck and Rakicy or I (or any other driver with my child in the car) was unable to communicate with rescue workers.  You can buy these nifty stickers online, but I simply printed them on regular paper, covered them with clear packing tape and taped ONE STICKER TO EACH SIDE OF EVERY CARSEAT WE OWN.

No fancy graphics or fonts.  Version 2 will be on brightly colored paper to stand out a little more, but this was a something that I thought was important enough to not wait until I had time to run to the store for craft supplies. Here’s my template below.  Steal it, write it on a post-it note, use it however you’d like.  This is one Pintrest idea that is worth doing right now.