Thursday, January 25, 2007

Miracles never cease

Two amazing things happened today:

My contractor actually showed up to finish all those annoying little odds and ends that accumulated over the past few months. He's been having (legitimate) health issues and kept cancelling on me, when he wasn't cancelling because he was busy working down south, or because the lintels still couldn't be repainted because the walls hadn't yet dried out enough (we had major water issues remember)... Anyway, he and his partner showed up today and completed my entire to-do list, including two extra things I asked for as a favor, with no question of any money changing hands, though I did insist on giving them a bag of dates from the box we'd received when we visited the kibbutz last week.

And thing number two I'll whisper quietly so as not to antagonize the potty training gods. Maya has been dry after school and all evening for the past two days! She's been completely trained all day at school for months now, but at home it's been a disaster, and that's an understatement. Yesterday morning as I threw up my hands in despair her teacher offered to draw a smiley face on her hand (which is a reward she really loves) the following morning if she stayed dry all evening. She did really well and couldn't wait to get her smiley this morning, and then stayed dry all afternoon and evening again today! She actually GOT UP IN THE MIDDLE OF A VIDEO not once but twice to go use the bathroom. I thought I was going to pass out I was so shocked. I've known for months that she can do it, because she goes of her own initiative all day long, but it certainly wasn't happening around our house. Fingers crossed that a few days (weeks, months, whatever) of positive reinforcement from her teachers will finally do the trick! (You're getting the irony here, right? The fact that her teacher has to reward her for behaving well at home...) Who cares, I'll take it wherever I can get it. I am SO ready to be done with the constant cleaning. Please please please please please let this be it. I wonder what kind of sacrifice would be best to offer to the potty training gods. I'd burn a diaper as an offering, but god only knows what kind of toxic crap I'd be releasing into the atmosphere...

1 comment:

Robin said...

That looks cute Karen, thanks for letting me know about it. The smiley thing seems to be working for now (desperately crossing fingers), so I'm really hoping that we'll finally be done with this long before I could have something shipped from the States. And just out of curiosity, how did you keep your son from just grabbing out all the chocolates? That's what Maya would do, in fact, she'd drag over a chair and climb halfway to the ceiling to get them if need be!