Yeah, I Emailed a Picture of Poop...

Something happened today that I thought would never happen- Alli pooped on the potty. I was so excited and proud of her that I almost cried. I even took a picture of her and her poop and emailed it to my husband at work. I feel kind of lame that things such as my kids toilet habits excite me, my how I have changed from pre-kid life.

The best part is that she did it all herself. I was upstairs putting laundry away and she yelled that she pooped. I ran downstairs because I figured she pooped on the floor (wouldn't be the first time) and to my surprise she was on the toilet. I had given up on pushing her to use the potty- I just put underwear on her everyday and dealt with whatever happened whether it be giving her jellybeans for peeing on the potty or whipping out the paper towels and cleaning pee off of the floor.

Now when it is Jilly's turn to be potty trained I am going to take the hands off approach and let her figure it out. It really just is not worth the power struggles, like the ones I had with my son and then the ones I had with Alli before I gave up and said whatever. If only I could go back in time and give myself this advice, it would have saved me many headaches.

More Potty Talk...

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I jumped back on the potty training bandwagon last week and it is going surprisingly well.

My daughter, whom I affectionately call Alli Poo Poo, is going to be three in June and up until recently I thought she would be wearing diapers when she graduates from high school (maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing as it would most likely keep boys far away from her). One day I said screw it, I'm going to stop being lazy and put some darn underwear on her- if she pees all over the floor then I'll just have to clean it up.

Well, she has been doing really well with only minimal floor peeing. We went to the zoo on Tuesday and she insisted on wearing underwear. I was very nervous about the situation but she did not have one accident; I do have to say though that waiting in line for the restroom with a four year old boy, a two year old girl and a baby is not exactly fun and getting everyone plus a stroller into a bathroom stall requires a certain finesse that I do not posses.

Pooping is not going so well, as in she just lets it rip in her underwear. The rule in this house is if the poop is super messy the underwear gets thrown away and if it's not then mommy will wash the underwear. Every time Alli poops the first thing she says to me is don't throw my underwear away to which I reply stop pooping in your underwear and you won't have to worry about them getting thrown away (yes this makes sense to us adults but to a two year old I may as well be speaking gibberish). I did make a new deal with her today because I'm sick of dealing with poopy underwear- I told her that if she tells me when she has to poop that I'll put a diaper on her to poop in. I figure maybe when she tells me she has to poop that I can try to convince her to go on the toilet with bribes of candy and toys and if not then at least she'll do it in a diaper that I don't have to clean.

The worst thing about potty training Alli is that I know I'll have to go through the whole shebang again with Jilly Billy. I'm hoping that since she's the third child she'll just teach herself but that's not how it really works, is it?

Potty Training- Epic Fail Edition

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My plan was to have my daughter fully potty trained by the time the baby arrived and well, I have failed. I thought that I would be more upset but instead I am just saying oh well.

She knows how to go pee on the potty but just decides that it is not worth it to interrupt her play time to do it. Bribing her with M&M's and chocolate doesn't work because she could really care less about those things (my kids are not easily bribed). I told her that if she poops on the potty she will get a toy out of the toy closet and a lollipop- she never gets to have lollipops so she really loves them but guess what? She does not want to poop on the potty.

I know that I could put her in underwear and let her pee and poop all over herself and my floors but I am not up to cleaning the floor and I refuse to clean poop out of underwear. I did enough poop cleaning with my son and at this point in my life no way, no how am I doing it anymore.

At least I know that my daughter is capable of using the toilet but at this point I have realized that there is no use in forcing potty training on a two year old who doesn't feel like doing it. My kids are stubborn little monsters and if I want to keep just a shred of my sanity I need to pick my battles. As long as my daughter decides using the potty is cool enough for her to do before she starts nursery school next September, I'll be happy.

And yeah, maybe I am lowering my expectations so that I can feel like I am not totally sucking or being lazy about potty training but so what? I'm the one changing the diapers and if I want to be somewhat delusional about it then good for me. Sometimes us moms have to be a bit delusional to make it through the day (or drink copious amounts of wine).

Happy Pee Pee to You...

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My daughter has been peeing on the potty all by herself which is wonderful. I was stressing out about the whole potty training thing because I wanted to make sure it was done before I had the baby but then I gave up because I was just too tired to deal with it.

Well, my little missy must have seen that soiling her diaper didn't bother me anymore and decided that since she wasn't annoying me she might as well start going on the toilet. She still poops in her pull up but I am just going to let her stop doing that on her own too. I refuse to put real underwear on her because cleaning toddler poop out of underwear is gross and I did enough of it with my son to last me a lifetime.

If anyone is looking for potty training advice I just want to say any advice anyone gives you is bogus. All kids are different and respond to different techniques. That annoying person who goes on about how her little princess potty trained herself at 12 months old is dumb- ignore her. That other annoying person who goes on about how their little prince pooped his pants until he was in Kindergarten but it was fine because she didn't want to pressure him is dumb- ignore her. Ignore your mom, your friends, your neighbors, the old lady in front of you in line at the drugstore when you are buying size 6 diapers, all of the parenting magazines and any other sources of potty training advice. Screw them all.

My son took major bribing (candy and toys) and many hours with his little butt planted on the toilet (while watching tv, playing with play dough, playing with very expensive toys we bribed him with) for him to be potty trained. My daughter took me not giving a crap, M&M's and sticking a birthday candle in a roll, lighting it, singing "happy pee pee to you, happy pee pee to you, happy pee pee dear Alli, happy pee pee to you" and letting her blow out the candle. The little baby who is growing in my belly right now- who the hell knows what it will take to potty train her? For all I know I'll be so frazzled that she'll run around the house like a wild dog defecating all over the floor.

So I guess my only advice is that I have none because no matter how many kids I have I'll still be completely clueless as to what I am doing (and every other parent is the same whether they want to admit it or not- so don't listen to anything they have to say either).

Target- It's Potty Time!

5 Boxes Kelloggs Cereal @ $2.75 each - Free box wyb 4 and $5/5 MC

2 Kraft Marshmallows @ $1.42 each - (2) free marshmallow peelies wyb 2 Rice Krispies

Dora Backpack $13.99 - $5.00 Target coupon wyb 5 Kelloggs/Keebler Products

2 GoGurt @ $2.69 each

Minnie Mouse Underwear $10.99

4 Reptile Toys @ .84 each (reg. $3.37 each)

Hunts Pudding .95

Less $1.78 Red Card Savings

Total: $34.13

Saved 46%

My daughter decided last night at bedtime that she was going to pee on the potty and did it again this morning so I bought her what she has been wanting more than anything in the world- a backpack. This came at the perfect time because Target has a coupon for $5 off a backpack when you buy 5 Kelloggs or Keebler products and the cereal is on sale this week for $2.75 and you get one box free when you buy four boxes. I was going to get the backpack anyways so I basically ended up getting five boxes of cereal and two bags of marshmallows for $1.00- pretty sweet deal! I didn't notice that the boxes had peelies on them for a free Cars car when buy three boxes of cereal so I am going to go back with my receipt and the peelie to get my free car! Yeah! (I also have to go back because the cashier didn't scan my $1/2 GoGurt coupon).

Total: $34.13

Totally Not Ready for This...

I want to preface this post with I am not the type of mom who thinks I am awesome when my children do something smart. Some days I am a great mom and other days I am just a lackluster mom- I figure it will all equal out by the time the kids are adults. When my kids reach a milestone it is all them- I may have helped a bit but they do all of the hard work.

So, my itty bitty baby girl Allison (she is 20 months old) has decided that she wants to be a big girl and go the the bathroom on the potty. She has been doing this off and on for a couple of months and I have been resistant to it. She may be ready but I don't feel ready to potty train her. I have horrible flashbacks to what a pain it was to potty train my son and though I know it will be easier with my daughter I don't feel like dealing with it right now.

Yesterday afternoon she peed on the potty three times and pooped once and her diaper stayed completely dry that whole time. She is too little for this!

Even though I don't feel like dealing with potty training her I am not going to hinder her efforts. Every time she tells me she has to go I take her to the potty and when she goes I tell her what a good girl she is and give her mini M&M's. Maybe I'll start to formally train her when my son is out of school so we will have more time to be home bound but she just may train herself before then.

My little baby girl is growing up way to fast!