Eleanor is 1!! Yes, my baby girl turned one on July 29th and she had a little party, with special cake baked by Keekey, to mark the occasion. She wasn't too sure about the cake at first, but apparently it left a good impression because when we celebrated her birthday with Uncle PJ and Aunt Bethany the following Saturday she attacked her cupcake like some kind of rabid animal. Fraser was very concerned that we didn't have a big birthday party for Eleanor like his party in June, but I explained to him that Eleanor was really too little for a giant bash, which allowed me, I think, to save face since this sounds like a plausible explanation and sounded a lot better than "Because Mommy is just too friggin tired to plan and host another party right now." Sorry Eleanor, I'll make it up to you with some kind of Fairy Princess Pink Sparkly Pony Party when you are five.

Of course, amid the excitement of Eleanor's birthday (okay, also an excuse, somewhat less plausible) I completely forgot that Fraser and Hammie's checks for the first month of preschool were supposed to be postmarked by July 31st. So, on August 2nd when I had an "Ah-ha" moment (well, actually more of an "Oh-S***!" moment) I drove the checks and forms over to the mailing address and prayed they wouldn't be too strict. The preschool teacher called that afternoon to inquire whether Fraser and Hammie would be attending preschool this fall, and I answered "Oh yes! I sent the checks in." She said "Oh? When?" "Um, well, I dropped them off this morning..." Apparently this was okay since she didn't immediately inform me that Fraser and Hammie would be expelled from preschool. She did, however, inquire how everyone was doing this summer, which brings me to the real reason that I had blocked out the due date for the preschool check. You see Hammie needs to be potty trained, or at least well on his way, in order to start preschool exactly 34 days from today. So I said to his teacher, "We are really working on potty training with Hammie, and he has made a lot of progress in learning to pee in the potty, but he just won't poop in the potty!" So she basically said that was okay as long as he is trying and hopefully we'll make some more progress before school starts.

I am pretty embarrassed to admit that I managed to lie to Fraser's preschool teacher (who I really like!) not once, but twice in that conversation. To say that we are really working on potty training is a shameless exaggeration. I am working on potty training, but am regularly getting so frustrated that I give Hammie the option of putting a diaper back on so it doesn't become too stressful, for me. I am not concerned about it becoming too stressful for Hammie since he cares about as much about learning to use the potty as he does about learning to fly the space shuttle. Which brings me to the second lie. Hammie does in fact pee in the potty, but only because I set a timer for every 30 minutes and make him try to sit on the potty. He has never never ever never asked to sit on the potty himself so that he can pee. It was not a lie, however, to say that he refuses to poop in the potty. Even with sitting on the potty every half hour he still has never ever never never pooped in the potty. This is especially worrisome because, just playing the odds, if he had zero control he would have pooped in the potty at least once just by sheer chance, but no. I honestly think he is holding his poop until he is not on the potty and then going in his underwear, or when is outside without underwear, on the lawn. Not good. There are not a lot of glamorous parts of motherhood, but I think potty training must be the most unglamourous of all.

Anyway, Sesame Street is almost over, so it is time to try to get Hammie to sit on the potty, again. Please God, just let him poop in the potty once today so I don't feel like we may as well have just flushed that tuition check I dropped off down the toilet.