Imanuel is (-as of Saturday-) 17 months old.   I’ve heard that 18 months is the magical potty-training month and so Israel and I have been doing as much prepping as we can to get Imanuel ready.  As of now, he’ll always notify us when he’s pooping by saying, “poo-poo” in a slightly strained voice and cheeks reddening.  The peeing situation is bit more challenging.  I’ve been letting him run around on the back deck in his birthday suit to get him more in touch with how he expels his waste.  The first few times he peed without a diaper on, he was quite shocked with what he saw (and what was actually happening).  It was kind of funny.  Anyhow, we’ve also been taking us with him to the bathroom and he’s well-aware of what the toilet (and tissue roll) are used for.  He loves sitting on his own potty seat and a few times he’s gone #2 on it- with a diaper, of course.  Today he actually sat on it bare-bottom while I gave him some toddler cookies (which he LOVES).  I know he had to go #2 because he told me, but on the potty he couldn’t perform.  I wasn’t surprised.  Anyway, at least he sat on there for a good 5 minutes or so.   I’m happy with his progress.  Any tips on making this a swift and productive journey, please let me know!
People think I’m crazy, but I’m still trying to see if we can get Imanuel potty trained before the next baby comes.  He will be about 21 months when that happens…and hopefully he doesn’t regress like the older siblings tend to do.
           

He is already trying to fit himself back into his old bouncer…

Something exciting that happened a few days ago was I finally saw my first buck.  All of the dozens of deer that I’ve seen up here have been females (and maybe males, but I never saw antlers to prove it).  Bucks tend to be super shy and cautious so they are really hard to spot.  The females are the ones you’ll see munching on vegetation on the side of the road while cars are zooming by.  So, when two deer were munching under our ripe apple tree and I saw that one had little antlers, I grabbed my camera to take pictures.  It was difficult because Bentley was barking like crazy, the baby was sleeping, it was getting dark outside, and I had to take the picture through a window and screen.  I had to take it quickly before Bentley either scared away the deer or woke up the baby.  The result was a blurry picture that I’m not too proud of.  But at least you can see the little antlers. 

The apples are tart and yummy.  Imanuel always wants to go outside to pick some apples to eat.  He even likes the ones that ar en’t ripe! 

One final thing that is worth mentioning is that we’ve adopted a new member to our household.  I believe it is a female (which is exciting to me).  She is our faithful bug-catcher that lives right outside the middle pane of our bay window.  Imanuel has named her, “Bitsy”.  I think you’ve guessed it.  She’s a huge, patterned spider that first found her home on our front porch, (then Israel destroyed her web because people kept almost walking into it) and then relocated to where she is now.  I’m going to have to do some more research to see what type of spider she is.  She’s a very good hunter (-caught and ate a moth a couple days ago).  Imanuel is particularly thrilled by “Bitsy” and consistently requests that we sing her song whenever he notices her.  (Her song being “The Itsy, Bitsy Spider”, naturally.) 

Imanuel checking up on Bitsy (close to the top of the window in dead center).  That’s where we can usually find her.

A close up of her on her web.  Picture is facing her belly.

The weather has cooled down – Thank God.  On the hot days, Imanuel’s favorite treat is ice.  I turn it into snow with our trusty snow shaver.  (Don’t tell him you’re supposed to put flavored/colored sugar syrup on top!)