Floodwaters, Sippy-Cups, and Coffee mugs

      Damon is growing. He eats more snacks. He has more energy than ever! And he is now over 4 and a half years old. Too old to be so dependant on his beloved sippy-cups. While I agree there are convenient, if not appropriate, places for him to use his sippies (in the car or for water by his bed), for the most part he needs to start drinking from a regular cup. We began this process a few weeks ago. We started by replacing his milk sippy cup at lunch and dinner with a plastic tumbler. While he tried so hard to be careful and use two hands, there were sticky spills at every meal. But we kept practicing...and then there was the flood.
      For the first time in over 7 years, our basement flooded. Our basement has weathered it's fair share of storms, and we've been fortunate that this is the first time.   So in the aftermath of the"Great Flood of 2011" ," we are still in clean-up mode. We've been going through boxes of treasures, deciding what is worth keeping, and what is junk. The flood certainly decided for us on many items...things like my entire personal library of books were destroyed. My husband's libraries of CDs and sports VHS tapes were also total losses. So we've been in sort of a state of re-evaluating what is important and what is just stuff.   In all this digging through boxes, I came across my collection of coffee mugs.  I've been collecting them my entire life.  There are mugs from almost everywhere I've traveled.  Places like the Strausburg Railroad, Williamsburg, Disney World, and even one from The Bahamas.   As I was sorting through all of these mugs, and deciding which ones were especially memorable or unique, and which ones were just mugs, it suddenly occurred to me that this might be an option for Damon and his milk.

Enjoying a snack and drinking from his mug.

     In typical fashion, Damon chose a coffee mug from the Strausburg Railroad with a whimsical train on it.  He feels so grown up using his coffee mug.  He's since chosen 2 more mugs: one from Myrtle Beach and another that has his adorable 4 month old face all over it.    And we've thrown away 2 sippy cups.   So in the morning my son and I sit at our kitchen table drinking from our mugs...juice in his and coffee in mine.  He's growing up way to fast!