I never thought I'd be so thrilled when my daughter started telling us when she has pooped. But I am. It sounds like such a silly thing, but I was practically jumping for joy yesterday when Kevin told me that Alison told him she pooped and there was really something there when he changed her diaper. It gives me hope that she will, eventually, be successful in potty training and we might escape some of the interventions that other SB kids require to make them bowel continent. And since the same nerves control the bladder, I'm encouraged that she will be bladder continent without intervention as well. Of course, only time will tell.

In other news, Kevin's company picnic was a lot of fun. There were lots of kids there and they had fun stuff for them to do. There were some clowns there making balloon animals and painting kids faces. It was a long wait, but Alison got a cat face painted on her. She looked really cute! I was kicking myself for forgetting the camera, but we did take a picture when we got home There were two moonwalks set up. One looked sort of like a carousel and was geared more towards the little kids and one was a crouching dragon that you went in throught the open mouth, climbed up the "tongue" and slid down into it's "stomach." It was geared more towards the bigger kids, though Alison did get to go in it just before they took it down. Instead of going in through the mouth, they sent her in through the other end. It was like crawling through a wind tunnel! She had been in the other moonwalk, but some bigger kids got in, too, and a couple of them fell on her and one ended up kicking her in the face. :( She was upset by it, but was even more upset when we got her out because she really wasn't hurt and really didn't want to get out! Jumping is her new favorite thing to do, so a moonwalk was the greatest thing since sliced bread for her. At dinner, we tried to get as far away from the dj's speakers as we could, but it was still way too loud and Alison got freaked out a couple of times, until we put some earplugs in. Then she was fine and happily ate chicken, mashed potatoes corn and a roll.

After dinner were the awards and after the awards were all handed out, it was time for the fireworks. Alison did not like the fireworks on the 4th of July, but we were hoping that by using earplugs it would be better. It was not. The first three that were shot off were the really loud booming ones and Alison completely freaked out. We hadn't even had a chance to sit down yet. :( I put her in Kevin's car and he got in there with her, hoping she would be all right, but before long she was hiding on the floor of the front seat. During a lull in the explosions, I grabbed her and headed for my car (and her carseat), but didn't get there fast enough. I nearly dropped Alison as she wriggled around trying to get away from the noise while I was trying to unlock the car (no keyless here). We both jumped in the front seat and I turned on her favorite CD. That helped long enough for me to hop out of the car and run to the other side and get in the back seat, pull her between the seats and plop her in her car seat so I could strap her in and we could leave. Since we don't live that far away from the plant, you could still hear the fireworks quite well at our house. Alison was not happy about that. She wanted to go see our neighbors, who were sitting outside with some friends, until she heard the boom, boom, boom. Even inside she tried to hide. Finally it was all over and she was pretty much all right, though I think she had some bad dreams involving fireworks that night because she woke up screaming a couple times. :( I think we'll probably skip the fireworks next year.

On Sunday, Alison started in the 2 year old Sunday school class. We were also there because we're "teaching" on the second Sunday of the month. She had a lot of fun and loved all the new and different toys that they have in that room. We had a good class. There were two kids who cried a little bit at first, but it didn't take long for them to settle down and get interested in playing. Sunday night was our first UMYF meeting. We're counselors again this year. We have paid babysitters for programs like that (and I am the new babysitter scheduler), so I took Alison to the nursery while Kevin headed down to the meeting. Either she had so much fun at Sunday school that morning or she knew Lillian was going to be one of the babysitters, because as soon as I put her down she ran down to the end of the hall and couldn't get the door open fast enough. She was ready to play!

The rest of this week will be spent getting ready for our big trip next week. I think we're going to have a lot of fun, and I will definitely be ready for it.