How to teach a human being to control their bodily functions.

So we've been having fun this week. Keeping our New Year's Resolutions and all that. We had a spurt of the home improvement bug, and so we've been having a little fun moving around pictures and clocks and such and confusing ourselves. Now we spin in circles looking at the wall and feeling bewildered.

But beyond that, we're entering a fun new world this week. We decided for reasons unknown to the human race to try a little potty training and see if Kimberly took to it. We've potty trained one child, so pretty much we're experts. And by experts, I mean people who have no idea what they're doing and live by the motto "fake it til you make it". Let me tell you a little bit about potty training. It is a process wherein small children take control of their parents' lives and get spoiled while giving nothing in return. They can't figure out when to relieve their bladders, but they know exactly what avenues to take to score ipad time, suckers, stickers, movies, and other goodies. Potty training is the fruitless search for El Dorado that entices parents time and time again but takes it's sweet time materializing. Potty training is the toddler Lucy grabbing the football from the parent Charlie Brown. Potty training is awesome fun for the whole family.

Let me tell you something else I am learning about potty training this time around. You should never have multiple children when you are potty training. If you have older siblings, they may suddenly develop the need to use the potty twenty times more than normal in a bid for attention. They may also yell "YOU NEED TO USE THE POTTY!"to the potty training target at odd intervals and try to drag them into the bathroom by the hair. They will also require a treat, movies and ipad time every single time their younger sibling has any of these privileges. Now: you should never have a younger sibling around when potty training either. Especially mobile ones. They tend to try to splash in the toilet, unroll the toilet paper, dig through the garbage, steal ipads, and beg for suckers. I have come to the conclusion that the best way to handle this conundrum is to have one child, raise them to age 18, kick them out of the house, and then have another. Repeat.

So. We're having a good time here. Probably we'll be potty training for the next year, because that's how we roll. But never fear. It will give us a lot of quality family time, and a lifetime supply of suckers. Score.

Onward and Upward, to 2013

Hey all. Did you have a Merry Christmas? We did. It was exhausting. Good thing it only happens once a year. But we survived and enjoyed it and now it's time to get down to the serious business of January, which is,  I think I have mentioned before, the coolest month ever. Like a month long hangover of nothingness and cold. Not that I've had a hangover before, but I imagine if I did it would feel like January. Maybe I'll make a chain to count down to February.

However, January it is, and January it will be all month. So we'll just have to suck it up and get down to business. That's right. You may have thought that on my new once-a-month blogging schedule, I would forget to grace you with my traditional New Year's Resolutions Spectacular! But never fear. I have not forgotten, and I am here to resolve and reform and sally forth and improve and retrospect! But since it's no fun to follow through with my own goals, we're going to make family goals. Because I'm pretty sure my children have no pressing plans to resolve and reform and improve, and I find this disturbing. So, here are my suggested goals/edicts for my progeny, partner, and yes, for myself, because I guess I could use some edicts too. Let's do me first so we can get to the fun stuff.

Cami. Resolved:
1. To exercise once in a while. I would put down some hard numbers, but that might foster accountability or something and we can't have that.
2. To play with my kids with reckless abandon at least once a day. Drat it all, I quantified a goal. But I figure resolving to forget about everything else I've resolved to do once a day is somewhere within my range of ambition. Also, I sort of like my kids. They're good-looking and deviously adorable.
3. To look at Jessie once a day and say to myself, "Self, that is one good-looking and hilarious man you chose to marry there. Good call. Carry on."

Spencer. Resolved:
1. To learn to walk. He's close but he lacks motivation. We think either juice or being told he's not as ambitious as his sisters will spur him to action. Or he might sit there and chew on his stuffed bear. Whatever.
2. To learn to call Jessie Daddy instead of Mommy. Although I sort of like the mix-up.
3. To tunnel a secret cave into the floor in which to escape sudden assaults by sisters of the female variety who may want to sit on his face.

Kimberly. Resolved:
1. To learn how to sleep past 6 am. This will solve global warming and usher in World Peace.
2. To enter rehab to kick her juice addiction once and for all. Apple juice can drastically lower your inhibitions, causing you to remove your pants and sing "Santa Baby's coming to town" in public.
3. To learn to potty train with minimal stress and tears. From Mom or Kimber. Because potty training is around #3 on the New York Times Top Ten Ways to Have a Good Time.

Madeline. Resolved:
1. To enroll in acting lessons. We thought this might be a good outlet for her passion and flair for the dramatic. The master plan is to let these forces out in a safe environment instead of, say, at the dinner table or at bedtime.
2. To attend kindergarten and ride a bus. This has pretty much been her New Year's Resolution since April 2008.
3. To have 10 additional brothers and sisters, all at one time, who will reside in the basement in 10 cribs and be cared for exclusively by Madeline, except in the event she wants to take them for a walk, in which case I must accompany her because she is not allowed to take walks by herself. And if they cry, she plans to shut the door to the basement and hang out in the peace and quiet because she is very nurturing.

Jessie. Resolved:
1. To beat Cami at foosball, because we all know she schools him. Every. Time.
2. To buy a pink tie and wear it not infrequently, proving to the world that burly manly men wear pink and work it.
3. To appear on Celebrity Jeopardy and win a trip to Jamaica that he can donate to poor needy college students who support Van Noy for Heisman.

Now I know our New Year's Resolutions are lofty and ambitious, but we are beautiful, humble, refined individuals so I like our chances. We're excited for the new year and the chance to be awesome. You may think that we'll probably forget about these goals and end up watching West Wing every night while eating M&Ms and ice cream, but if you thought that, you would only probably be right. I hope you all made a bunch of awesome goals and practiced writing 2013 instead of 2012 so you don't look dumb next time you go to the bank. Mazeltov.

Warners in living color! Behold!

Hello world! Life has been busy of late. Holidays are the best. And the busiest. We took a nice long vacation to Las Vegas for Thanksgiving, and that was fun. I should probably blog about it. Maybe I will soon. It was a lot of fun and we did a lot of fun things, including eating, sleeping, playing, swimming, not sleeping, walking, and stuff. But that's for another time. First, for another overdue post I've been promising you: pictures! I have  an amazingly talented cousin who does photography, and she took some for us at a park in Draper. I love them. We haven't really ever taken professional family pictures, so this was fun for us, and I don't know why it took us so long. Only six years and three kids. Oh well. I will now share the wealth with you. Those who have seen these pictures on facebook may feel free to twiddle their thumbs and whistle. I was afraid it wold be really cold, but it was actually pretty nice. Madeline got a splinter and got grumpy, and Spencer fell on his face several times during the day in an attempt to look beat up and bloodied, but other than that, all went well and we now have pictures for posterity. You are welcome, posterity. Please enjoy my artful arrangement of the photos. I spent many minutes making them beautiful and geometric and perfect, insofar as my computer allowed me, and then many more minutes putting them wherever because I can't figure out how to make blogger bend to my will. Sigh. But seriously. Check out these exquisite looking people.

Welp. That's us. I sure love this family. They're pretty good-looking and fun to hang out with. Many thanks to Emilee for making us look good. And perhaps there shall be future tales of vacation and stuff we've been doing. Maybe. If my kids quit waking up in the middle of the night. That's all folks.

Now she's almost 3!

 It's been crazy here for the last month. I kind of feel like that's just going to be how it is for the next twenty years. So we do what we can. But we can and must take a break to honor our most recent little milestone achiever:

Kimberly is 2! This has been a long time coming. Mostly because when Spencer was born, Jessie and I started telling people she was "almost 2" when they asked because it made them seem farther apart. But that was nine months ago. We are deceitful liars. This girl keeps us on our toes. And this picture pretty much sums up how life is around here. Awesome. So a little about Kimberly, because she is the star of the show. I would include more pictures, but they're all on Jessie's iphone. Lameness. So pretend there are more awesome images. (Speaking of which, family pictures coming soon, thanks to my extremely awesome cousin!) Anyway. Kimberly. In a bullet list. Because I love me a good bulleted list.

• Kimberly continues to be a medical marvel. I don't know her exact stats, because we haven't been in for an appointment yet, but she's still tall and skinny. And prone to getting sick. We just finished a bout of stomach flu last week. On the bright side, the doctors think they are brilliant geniuses who know why. On the not so bright side, they think it's because she's "sensitive" (not allergic) to, you know, everything, including most dairy and grains, and they want us to cut all these things out of her diet for three months. That's a post for another time. But if anyone out there is a whiz at gluten free cooking, I will hire you to feed Kimber for three months. Remember, we pay in chocolate chip cookies. Which are not gluten or dairy free.
• Kimberly loves to sit and do. This includes mostly books and puzzles. The girl is insanely good at puzzles. She sits and does them all day. As long as they're the kind with a border so she can get started by herself, she can do 24 piece puzzles on her own. She's probably a prodigy. If world peace can be solved with jigsaw puzzles, she's a shoo-in for a Nobel Prize. It's fun to watch her too, because she talks to you while she does them. It goes something like this: "Where does it go? Where does this go? Right there, right? Right? Turn it around! Turn it around! I got it! I'm so smart?"
• She has pretty mad verbal skills too. I don't like to brag, but she's probably going to get tapped to narrate documentaries or something. She repeats everything anyone says, and she and Madeline have awesome conversations/arguments/philosophical debates. Like most kids, it's kind of hard to understand her unless you hang with her all day, but she talks in mostly complete sentences and has a great vocabulary. My favorites: "Help me?", "I'm so funny!", "It's okay Spenceroo, no no Spenceroo!", and "Madeline! Are you coming?"
• She loves baby dolls. A lot. First thing she does in nursery is locate one, and then she's usually okay to stay. She also loves yogurt. (Which she is "sensitive" to, of course.) She wants it everyday for lunch and starts asking about 10:30. She likes to have stories read to her and she loves the "Pie Pad" and gets rather testy if you take it away. "Hey! I playing that! Give it back to me!"
• She throws killer tantrums. She has this sort of Jekyll/Hyde complex. When she's feeling compliant, she is by far the sweetest, most helpful, most obedient of our children. When she's feeling like testing your patience, it's kicking and screaming on the ground, earsplitting levels of noise, and endless supplies of stubborness. More often than not you'll find her watching television with us a half hour after the other kids fell asleep because we gave up and surrendered to save the other children from the screaming. Major diva in the making.
• She loves BYU. She recognizes the logo and will start cheering for them if she sees a football. Like I said, prodigy. Also, picture:

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So, you know, that's a little bit about Kimberly. There's probably more, but I could spend all day talking about her and I should probably browse facebook I mean fold laundry now. But we sure love our Kimber. She entertains Madeline, takes care of Spencer, charms her father, does the dishes, and generally runs the household in her own subtle, devious way. She's pretty cute too. We're glad we can finally say she's two and not be lying, and glad we've got her to keep the family in line. Love you Kimberly! (See, being second isn't so bad.)

The Warner girls, explored.

Do not adjust your television sets. I know, we're back online and it's been less than a week since our last conversation. But I felt inspired. Or bored. Or something. First things first, I know you're dying to know- Kimberly is now the proud possessor of ear tubes! And what good looking ear tubes they are. I think. I can't really even see them. She bounced back so fast that Jessie was skeptical that they did anything to her except knock her out. But my insurance claims they did something that cost a lot of money, so I have faith.

Speaking of the munchkins, they are the subject of my inspiration today. Spencer's sudden transformation into a man of substance has often led me to ponder which of the sisters imparted their dastardly or angelic tendencies to him. And yes, I know he got all his DNA from Jessie and I. But we are great believers in nurture around here, having heard too many of my phrases parroted from Madeline, and Madeline's turn of phrase in Kimberly's mouth. It has also led me to ponder in great, deep, philosophical sessions, what an amazement it is that two children could be so alike and yet so different. Spencer, alas, will have to wait to be the subject of my deep thoughts until he has shown more personality than smiling, crying, and stubbornness. But I thought you all must be as deeply interested as I am in my daughters, so let's play compare and contrast! Mostly contrast. But here's a brief rundown of the ways they are similar:

• Looks, obviously. They've gotten more different as they got older, but still similar enough that strangers have no trouble telling they're related, and every time we put Kimberly in an old outfit of Madeline's, it's deja vu all over again. And their baby pictures frequently get confused even by their dear father, who is not as obsessed with when we got certain clothing as I am.
• They definitely have similar mannerisms and habits. The way they talk, the way they play. There's that nurture thing.
• They both have an intense passion for pink and baby dolls and books. Many shared interests. Time will tell if that's just Madeline being bossy.

There's other similarities, but they're not as fun to talk about as their differences. Sometimes I get so thrown by Kimberly because I'm used to dealing with Madeline and forget she's her own person until she reminds me. 

• First, the biggest difference: their temperament.  Madeline is drama queen extraordinaire  Exceedingly and irrevocably happy until she's in the pit of despair. No in between. Every difference of opinion is a fight with her. Every timeout an ordeal. Not so with Kimberly. She's definitely been known to throw tantrums, but she's also often remarkably unruffled. She doesn't care about punishments or thinks they're funny. Where Madeline rages and reacts, she'll often observe or go off and do her own thing. A lot more patience, or apathy, depending on what spin you want to put on it.
• Madeline is a total extrovert. She must play with friends or perish. She talks to random people at church or out shopping, and if no one else is around, she requires me as an audience. The worst thing in the world for her is being alone. Kimberly is shy. She takes a while to warm up to people and doesn't like strangers. She's good at playing by herself and would rather sit with me than run and play.
• Madeline is robustly healthy. I think she's had two sick visits to the doctor her whole life. But when she is sick, you know it. She's a terrible patient. (See drama queen above.) Kimberly has been in to the doctor more times than I can remember for ear infections. She's had tubes and stitches and hand foot and mouth and throws up ten times more often than Madeline. But it's hard to tell when she's sick, unless she's puking all over your shoes or something. She might be a little crankier, or a little more tired, but mostly she just keeps going and playing and doesn't complain much. Nice and easy to take care of, but hard to tell if she needs medicine.
• Madeline has trouble concentrating on one thing. She bounces from thing to thing and never wants to pause or stop, and gets bored fast. Kimberly can spend half an hour reading one book or doing a puzzle. She gets absorbed. This is fun at places like the aquarium, when Madeline is racing from tank to tank and Kimberly wants to spend half an hour looking at one fish. One exception to this rule: they both would spend all day on the ipad if I let them. Dang technology.

So, that's their little world in a nutshell. It's fun realizing all my parental tricks and strategies, which have been pretty much trashed on Madeline anyway, won't work on Kimber, so we're back to square one. And now that Spencer is all into free agency and controlling his own destiny and junk like that, I'm pretty convinced he's going to do his own thing too, and so this parenting gig will always be an experiment. Good thing are test subjects are pretty cute. 

Back street's back, alright!

Wow. You know it's been too long when Jessie realizes you haven't blogged in a while. I have officially become one of those bloggers. How to catch up? Unfortunately, you'll never get back those months of potential wittiness and endless entertainment, and I understand you lament the loss of my riveting world. But maybe it's time for a quick recap of important life events I happen to remember and anything else I think you need to know. Followed by repentance and a renewal of my efforts to be an awesome blogger. Which will probably end up a lot like my attempts to be a responsible library patron who returns books on time and doesn't incur fines. Welp. What we've been up to:

• Ear infections. A lot of ear infections. This is at the top of my mind because Kimberly has officially exceeded maximum ear infection danger zone red, which is the arbitrary point at which we get sick of watching our kid scream and suffer, and instead opt to traumatize her in hopes of a better tomorrow. So she's getting ear tubes next week. My mother paranoia knows no bounds. So I'm spending the weekend letting her do whatever she wants and driving Jessie nuts with over planning for the big day. Awesome. She's also getting her adnoids pruned. Hopefully this will put an end to our days of antibiotics and all night parties.
• Crawling. All of us. Spencer has joined the ranks of the mobile. And we're all so impressed we get in on the action whenever we can. The girls enjoy stealing his binky and putting it across the room to test his mad skills. 
• Oh. Our ward split. So Jessie has been doing that. Whatever that is. 
• We enjoyed conference. Madeline enjoys drawing many pictures of the temple, which curiously resembles a normal house with giant multicolored persons on top with funny horns. Kimberly enjoys drawing small lines and circles and insisting each small mark is the prophet, temple, scriptures, or Jesus. Spencer enjoys eating paper.
• Madeline started preschool. Goodness, I almost forgot, because it's been a while since she started. She loves it excessively. She goes next door, so I kick her out of the house and watch her run away in my pajamas. I'm in my pajamas, she's not in my pajamas. In case you were confused. She loves her backpack. She loves her friends. She loves her letters and her millions of art projects. She loves snacks and playtime and singing and basically everything ever. I love going shopping and running errands with one less kid. Win/win all around.
• Jessie and I ran away to Park City and abandoned our children. We went down the Alpine Slide, did some shopping, watched some football, saw our first ever 3D movie (at the dollar theater! Live it up!) and slept in. The perfect weekend. The kids painted their nails and ate treats and went to the park and didn't even miss us. Well, Spencer missed us a little. That's why he's my favorite. (NOTE TO FUTURE ADULT CHILDREN READING: THIS IS A JOKE. I LOVE YOU ALL EQUALLY. YOU ARE ALL MY FAVORITE. ANY THERAPY YOU MAY REQUIRE IS NOT MY FAULT.)
• We're all psyched up because my little brother is coming home from his mission. We made a paper chain, because we are super chain makers and any excuse to cut paper is golden. Madeline is all ready to fly to Chile and pick him up. She is even learning to talk in a Spanish accent. Also, you can bet after conference Madeline is all ready for her mission at nineteen. As long as they send her to Argentina or Chile. And let her bring her baby doll.

Well, that's it. Probably more, but I don't want to exert my brain and remember. Just assume we've been completing many covert missions for the CIA and working hard on our new fashion reality show. We love you all, our many and devoted fans. Thanks for hanging around. We shall reward you with Warner for President bumper stickers for your vehicles. 

In which delusional sick people review major international competition.

Hey sports fans. Like always, just wanted to let you know we're alive. Barely, but you know. This poor blog is dying, I think. I should let it edie a peaceful death, but instead I will resurrect the poor thing every month or two and drag out its pitiful existence. So. Summer. It's a doozy. We've been busy, I think. I couldn't tell you for sure because my brain is a little fuzzy. We're all a little germy just now. Naturally, Spencer and Madeline are only moderately goopy and hacking, while Kimberly is taking the brunt of it. She's on her second round of antibiotics this month and fourth ear infection of the summer. Poor kid. Oh, and she likes to wake up all night because she's in pain. I've never understood how a sick mom is supposed to sleep off a bug when the kids are sick too. One of those mysteries of the universe.

But hey. The good news is, we've been having fun too, in between infections. We went to Logan a few times to attend a baby blessing and a sealing. Very special and awesome. And we canceled life for two weeks to watch the Olympics, because we are hard core. I should have been blogging my opinions on the Olympics every night, because I am the supreme expert on sporting events and you were all dying for my last word on the subject. Sorry to be sick and stuff. I can make it up to you right now, in Cami's awesome Olympic recap. In short:

Michael Phelps is amazing and ridiculous. Lochte I could do without. Seems like a poser to me. (is that still a word? Did I use it correctly?) Gymnastics rules drive me nuts. I don't understand their tiebreakers and randomness and nation quotas and stuff. Gabby Douglas is also on my cool list, and the world can shut up about her hair, because it looks better than mine does and I'm not doing flips and stuff. Usain Bolt is on my bad list. Ridiculously talented and fast and a legend, and yet incredibly, I think his opinion of himself is still overinflated. That's ego. Missy Franklin: Good. Old Bulgarian guy on still rings: awesome. Mikayla Maroney memes: overdone. Water polo: hard core. Chinese diving: absolutely a failure, because let's face it, seven golds in eight events is not enough. Pregnant shooters: way cool.  Opening Ceremony: failure which could have been redeemed if the Queen had actually jumped from a plane, but alas. I don't watch team sports like basketball and soccer, because there are cooler things going on. Like archery and speed walking.

So, hope at gives you your fix. If we can quit growing bacteria in Kimberly's ears, we might get around to writing novels again, or running for president or something. In the meantime we have to get ready for fall and preschool and other Big things. Because that's all we do. Big important things.