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It is Saturday morning, and I’m making banana bread listening to an Apple iTunes Genius composed playlist that I seeded with Led Zepplin’s Going to California. Listening to this poorly composed playlist (Pandora would have created a better mix), it dawned on me that the invention of home recording devices like tape recorders which allowed the invention of the mix tape, must have been ground breaking. Listening to my playlist pulling Allman Brothers, Led Zepplin, Bob Dylan, Ryan Adams, and others, I can’t even imagine a time when people had two choices – to listen to the radio (a playlist composed by advertisers and producers) or single artist records – much less a time long before, when they were lucky to have a hand cranked record player. How much more rich life must be since the dawn of accessible music devices and the home concocted playlist.

This book looks right up our alley.

I read a study not long ago that kids eat more if they think they are eating monster slime or bat venom. We don’t go that far, but we do explain in simple terms the benefits of the meal in front of us, and woah – look at those kids eat! Pictured is Will snarfing down his chili after I told him that he didn’t have to eat it, but all the protein in those beans in there would make him strong and fast. Last night he had 3 servings of stir fry because it contained carrots (so he could see in the dark), squash (to make his hair golden), tofu (to make him strong) and broccoli (to make him live longer). Will has requested that I give him a wok for college so that he can make stir fry when he gets older. These explanations aren’t far from the truth, but I’m amazed at the results.

We’re in the middle of potty training. I’ve mentioned trying to potty train on my site before, and thanks to the wisdom I gained potty training my first, I realize that physiological readiness (a.k.a. ability to hold it) is just as important as enthusiasm and coordination to get to the bathroom, get undressed and go. Sylvie has had the coordination for a long while, now, and the enthusiasm for well over a year, but it is only recently that she has stopped peeing constantly (the physiological part). The problem is that since we’d been stifling the enthusiasm, waiting for the other parts to catch up, the motivation had started to wane. M&Ms enter stage right.

We don’t often ply our children with junk food, and I poo-poo using bribery to encourage children to do something they clearly aren’t ready for, but, well, we were all ready to ditch the diapers, and it ultimately came down to M&Ms, a simple motivational system.

Sunday, I stocked the house with 2lbs of M&Ms and a new potty training book – How to Potty Train Your Monster. (Between you and me, the book is mildly obnoxious, but Sylvie loves it and it does reinforce that accidents happen and she shouldn’t make a mess with the toilet paper – both excellent points.)
I was nervous about the chocolate route. It didn’t seem sustainable. How long do we use chocolate? Would we send her off to college with chocolate rewards for using the potty?

Evening 1, the chocolate was a hit. Dry underwear until bedtime. Mention chocolate and Sylvie makes a b-line for the potty.

Day 1, I just had to mention, “Hey, you want some chocolate?” Off to the toilet she’d run, thrilled when something came out. 5 accidents, 14 successful evacuations.

Day 2 was a school day, and so we gave Sylvie the day off.

Day 3, today, started off with an accident followed immediately by proper use of the potty, but generally, the power of M&Ms had worn off. She made it until bedtime with 3 accidents and 9 successful evacuations. Tonight Sylvie insisted on wearing underwear to bed, and turned down chocolate for her last bathroom trips. Looks like self-motivation and pride are taking over.

This was an interesting exercise in motivation, and it turns out to be proving that simple reward paradigms where there is a well understood pattern of rewards for behavior get boring quickly, even to a 2 year old. The M&Ms seemed to be a good catalyst to rewaken the more powerful personal enthusiasm and pride. It looks as though I might be eating all that chocolate myself.

Another motivational technique we use in the house is the marble jar. I feel much better about this reward system because it doesn’t rot anyone’s teeth. Although it is not much more complicated than the M&Ms, it is just enough more so that it has kept Will engaged for ~6 mos. The kids get marbles for doing good deeds and when they’ve earned enough (50), they get to redeem those marbles for a toy from Target. Will loves this, and the randomness with which we reward him with a marble – there are a few gimmes like cleaning up someone else’s mess, but most rewarding is left to the discretion of the parent on duty – has made Will an incredibly enthusiastic helper. The kid is raking in the rewards. Happy helper, above, pictured with his latest treasure.

Found this when I was looking for something else, today, but thought it was worthy of passing along. Great advice on writing a resume that won’t get tossed in the garbage.

We went camping, again, this past weekend. But, this time we started off the weekend canoeing down the Russian River, through the wine country. What a blast! Like every other place I’ve floated down a river, there are a number of outfitters who have set up shop on the banks who will rent all the equipment required for your float.

Our trip was coordinated through Russian River Adventures, the owner of which designed and sells SOAR inflatable canoes. His boats were in great condition, and his route was a scenic and well marked 8 mile point to point with a rope swing. With lunch, rope swinging and some splashing about in the water, it was a 4 hour float for the families.

The remainder of the weekend was spent “camping” at the Wine Country KOA. Yes, a KOA. You know, a camping theme park where they substitute Ks in place of Cs. Other than the small size of the sites, it was a dream vacation for the kiddos. This place has a stocked pond, pool, hot tub, mini golf course, several playgrounds, picnicking benches scattered about, and clean bathrooms. Every night was movie night, tho our kids were all passed out in the tent shortly after the sun went down.

Perhaps the biggest attraction was the motorcycle in the gameroom:

Hot tubbers:

Sylvie and Toby playing house. The log was their baby.

Will doesn’t like to pose:

Will: “We do what Lynne says because she is the boss at school.”
Dad: “Lynne is the boss at school? Who is the boss at home?”
Will: “Mom.”
Dad: “Why is Mom the boss at home?”
Will: “I don’t know. Bosses are born that way.”

Saturday it looked like a motorcycle rally was starting out from Pescadero at the same time we were, as there were a number of cop cars and couple of cops on motorcycles as well as hundreds of bikers. Doug and I found it pretty amazing to be in the middle of the hundreds of bikers, and thought Will would be as excited as well. When we asked, Will said, “I’m going to talk about this at share and no one will believe me that I saw a motorcycle cop!”

Post graduation, we headed out to Butano, near the town of Pescadero in the hills of Santa Cruz to camp with the neighbors. Wow.

I’m afraid to post good pictures of the place for fear that it will cease to be as incredible as it is today. This is a Disney forest with mossy branches, tall redwoods hollowed by fire, an infestation of bunnies and ponds full of newts. The campsites are large and mostly filled with tent campers. Unlike other California camping, these sites are close to incredible hikes that feel remote.

The kids had a blast, as did the adults watching them run about on their adventures in a huge happy pack. Despite much log crawling, only one kid fell in the fetid swamp. Though there was about an hour of half-naked marshmallow fueled fire dancing about the pit (kids, only), I’m the only one with burns. (I underestimated the heat of the tin cups on the fire pit.) The only tears were shed by over-tired 2-year-olds too tired to continue playing, but also too tired to fall asleep peacefully.

We snuck out for a 4 hour visit to Maker Faire in San Mateo on Saturday. We didn’t get to build a rocket, but we did catch the firing of the Tesla Coils and the 102 bottle Mentos and Diet Coke show. Awesome. Will came home the proud owner of a used Diet Coke.

Sylvie:

Will pushing some Art around:

The staring contest:

Today, we ended the adventure with a hike to the Ano Nuevo Elephant Seal rookery. But somehow, with 3 sets of adults, we walked off without appropriate photography equipment. Those seals are giant. En masse, they look a lot like a giant slug convention.

Hope your weekend was wonderful.

Friday, Will graduated from preschool. No pomp and circumstance. No dreadful valedictorian speech. They had tasseled mortar boards (centerpieces turned kiddie headgear) heavily guarded by the teachers up until the second they got to put them on, so there were no secret mortar board messages like “eat my shorts class of 2010” or “Swine Flu! I graduated!”. The teachers were dressed to the nines. One even wore heels. The kids filed into their seats in front of a standing room. There were tears. Will blew us kisses as he walked by. The kids sang “This little heart of mine, I’m going to let it shine…” And then there were the requisite pictures with besties. Ice cream sundaes for all. And the “cool” kids got to go home early with their parents for a celebratory lunch at a restaurant. The coolest kid, Will Diego, headed straight out of town for a raucous weekend of camping with the neighbors. Will told us, “I’m going camping with the girl I’m going to marry – Genevieve.” Well, okay.