For her birthday cake I made a duck-shaped 3D cake with yellow feathers, an orange beak, and blue eyes.  Degen was very excited about it and has been asking for more "quack" (duck leftovers) all morning.  Yesterday while the cake was cooling and waiting for icing in the refrigerator he snuck into the kitchen while I wasn't looking and took two big handfuls out of the side of the cake.  I got pictures and I'm uploading them (and all our September photos) to our gallery on www.colinandbethany.com today so you can check them out.  It was definitely humorous–after I got over the shock.

I finished reading a book and started a couple more on potty training, or "toilet training," as some experts like to call it. I've also discussed it with my mother and done some internet research, including looking at reviews of training products on Amazon. It looks like kids won't be trained if they aren't ready, and if your efforts fail for a week or so you should give it a rest and come back in a few weeks or months. It also sounds like there are some preparatory steps that have to be taken to make the process easier on everyone. And it seems that daytime training and nighttime training are totally different beasts. My goal in all of this is to stay as relaxed as possible and to not worry about "getting it done" so that I don't freak Degen out. So, we're now working on the preliminary steps. Today I taught him to flush the toilet, hoping that if I teach him about the sound it won't scare him when he has to use it. I helped him try on his "big boy underwear" today for the second time and congratulated him for keeping them dry for about an hour before changing him into his diaper for his nap this afternoon. We practiced putting them on and taking them off, which is going to take more work before he masters the process. But he seemed to like the idea of wearing them, which is a good sign. I think I'm going to get a toilet adapter seat and a step stool instead of a little potty to start with and see how that goes, hoping to eliminate some of the cleanup and one extra step.

As far as birthdays go, the common wisdom seems to be to invite as many guests as your kid is old, in this case his age and the number of guests will be two. The accepted practice sounds like dong 1 to 1 1/2 hours for a party at this age, and to invite the parents to join you (if only for assistance with crowd control).

The order of the party goes as follows: opening activity (to introduce kids to each other and warm up as they arrive), craft or activity (maybe music or throwing things or something simple at this age), food, presents, goodbye activity. A theme seems to keep things simple, interesting, and cohesive. I'm thinking circus, dinosaur, farmer, firefighter, or superhero might be appropriate this time. I'd like to make a neat cake and have lots of fun stuff to send home with the kids. Place mats, "costumes" (a mask, cape, hat, etc), and whatever craft we make seem like a good start, plus some little treat. I'm thinking a Saturday morning before naptime would be a good time for the party.

Another tradition I'm thinking of starting is a "birthday book"–just a simple little scrapbook with an outline of the hand and/or foot, some vital statistics like height and weight, likes and dislikes, and maybe a photo for each birthday. And I'd like to make a video and take pictures at the party/on his birthday.