Spooky!!

We went for our yearly family pumpkin patch trip today. It's a little local pumpkin patch that donates the proceeds to Habitat for Humanity. We've gone to the same place since Alex's first October! Unfortunately, since we waited so long the pumpkins were a little soft so we took a few pictures then headed to the grocery store for a pumpkin!

Alex watched Josh work on our pumpkin while I made dinner.

Alex was even sweet enough to let Cooper lick the pumpkin scoop!

Josh and the pumpkin!

The pumpkin (and one of my mums I got for $5 at Lowes!!!)

Meet Spooky! Alex loves the word Spooky so she named our pumpkin Spooky Pumpkin!

Adorable

Saturday we went to Josh's company cook off. Josh volunteered to be in the pie throwing booth. He had pies thrown at him for 20 minutes. We missed most of it because Alex decided she had to go to the bathroom. When he was done, I snapped my favorite picture of Josh and Alex. I love that in the middle of all the chaos, all she wanted to go was kiss her Daddy!

I love seeing their sweet little lips puckered up to kiss!

Potty Training Recap

Well, I think it's safe to say Alex is potty trained...at least at home. Our first challenges will be this week when we go to gymnastic, dance and just continue our week like normal.

We had ZERO accidents yesterday. So far today, I've let her tell me when she had to go and stopped asking her. We are still accident free!!

I didn't really try a particular method. I've read some about the 3 day method and some other potty training tips/ideas. I kinda went my own route to see what worked best for us. We've had a potty for a while. We started out with the Fisher Price frog potty like a year ago. Alex HATED it! She would cry every time she sat on it. I ended up picking out a different one. We picked this one that can be used as a potty on the floor and it fits on our toilet with the bottom turning into a little step.

After cleaning a poo out of the potty I decided to put it on the toilet so I wouldn't have to clean it out anymore. The little step from the potty isn't quite tall enough so I ordered her a stool from Restoration Hardware Baby and Child. It will be here this week and it should make her reaching the toilet and washing her hands MUCH easier!

We stocked up on undies. For the first 2 days, I tried to keep her in the Gerber training pants. Not the plastic ones, but all cotton ones that are a little thicker than regular thin undies. I really liked these because when she would have an accident, she knew, but since they were thicker, it didn't leave as big of a mess where ever she was. I pretty much put her in undies as soon as she woke up every morning and we went about our day at home. I had to totally cut out TV the first day and a half because she would get so engrossed in the TV she would usually have an accident. After that, I went back to letting her watch a show or 2 through out the day, but it was always after she had used the bathroom. The first 2 days, I asked her every 30 minutes or so if she had to use the bathroom. She would tell me she had to go about 50% of time, the other times she would go when I suggested it. Today she told me every single time. We watched Toy Story earlier today and I was so proud she actually told me twice she had to go to the bathroom so we could pause the movie for her.

Our only issue we have now, is Alex is all about the M&M's. She will use the bathroom, get her M&M then 5 minutes later tell me she has to go again. She will push the smallest bit out for another M&M. She did this at least 3 times today. She also thinks if she sit on the toilet and toots, she'll get an M&M!

We will continue with the stickers and M&M's for a while longer and the "Potty Prizes" until they are all gone! Once we are done with the "potty prize" box I made we are passing it to our friend Kate who will start potty training over the holidays! I am sooo unbelievably proud of my little girl! This week we are going to Gymboree so she can pick out cute undies!!!

Potty Training: Day 3

Alex woke up completely dry this morning! She slept in a diaper, and will continue to do so until we feel she is consistantly waking up dry.

We finally had a poop! I know gross, but it had been over 2 days! This means she also got a "potty prize" or a poo poo prize as Alex calls it. I've decided cleaning poo out of the little "potty catcher" in her potty is so disgusting. I finally ordered her stool from Restoration Baby & Child so she can use the big toilet with her potty seat on it.

We ventured out for the first time today. We went to Josh's company cook off. Alex used the bathroom right before we left. We had 3 or 4 false alarms while we were there, but she finally waited until we got home to use the bathroom again!

Josh and I are just so amazed with how great she is doing with potty training. It took the first day from the time she woke up until 3pm to really get it. Had it not been for her wanting to go alone (and me letting her) twice yesterday, she would not have had any accidents and we didn't have any accidents today!!!

Potty Training: Day 2

As soon as Alex woke up, the diaper came off and undies went on!

She held out for a while and finally at 8:30, she told me to stay on the couch so she could go potty. She came back a minute later to let me know she was done! Woo hoo!

The day pretty much went the same way. She was all about going potty all by herself. We had 2 accidents. They both happened right in front of the potty. She wanted to go alone and couldn't get her undies down on her own. After the 2 accidents, I decided I'd take her into the bathroom and make sure she got her undies down. Then I'd sit in her room or the doorway until she finished! After we started doing this, she didn't have any more accidents all day long!

I'm almost scared to say it, but I think she has it down. Tomorrow will be our first challenge. We are leaving the house!

Alex still has not pooped! I thought she would do it at some point when she was supposed to be napping since she had a diaper on, but she didn't. I wonder how long this kid can hold out!?!?

Potty Training: Day 1

I made sure I got up with time to shower before Alex got up. I knew I would be sticking to her side like glue and with her naps being hit or miss lately, it was best not to chance it.

As soon as she got up, we went straight to the potty, took her diaper off and let her sit for a bit. Nothing. Then she got to pick out a pair of panties.

We had our fair share of accidents, but we also made it to the bathroom with time to spare several times!

Our morning started off with a few accidents and a few little dribbles in the potty, but nothing big. Alex got stickers and M&M's for the little drips so she would understand she was doing a good job!

Josh came home for lunch and we all sat down to eat. Alex wanted to sit at the coffee table so we let her. She told me at least 5 times she had to go potty so we'd run to the potty, sit and nothing. Every time we'd run to the bathroom she would yell at Cooper to stay away from her food. I really think she was too worried about her food to use the bathroom. The last time, she handed Josh her plate on the way to the bathroom. We sat there for a few minutes, I started reading her a book and she peed! A full pee!!! We were so excited we all started jumping around! Alex got her sticker and Josh let her pick out 2 M&M's!

During her nap time, she wore a diaper. She didn't actually sleep, but she stayed in her room long enough for me to wash and dry all of her undies from the morning.

After her "rest" time we had a few more tiny dribbles. At one point, she looked at me and told me to stay on the couch. She started running towards the bathroom. I told her to make sure she pulled down her panties before she sat down and she told me again to stay on the couch. I gave her a minute then peeked to see what she was doing. She was actually sitting on her potty, undies down! I ran back to the couch and reminded her to tell me when she was all done. She came back into the living room and grabbed my hand, she took me to the bathroom and showed me the potty! Another potty success!!!

We had one more accident after that, but 2 more successful (accident/drip free) experiences before her bath time!

We noticed, she likes going in by herself and pulling her undies down by herself. She gets so excited when she uses the bathroom! We didn't have a poo all day. I have a feeling she needs to because she keeps sitting and trying to push. I'm sure it's just the fear of the unknown right now. She is down for the night in a diaper. As we were telling her good night, she asked to wear panties when she wakes up.

I am crossing my fingers we keep going on this roll tomorrow!

Potty Training Here We Come

We are starting potty training tomorrow. We do not have any activities planned Thursday or Friday and the next 3-4 weekends we'll be home. I've been putting it off because I knew we had several 3-plus hour road trips and frankly, I didn't want to deal with potty training on the road.

We've had a potty for a while, but in addition to that, I am stocked up on juice, stickers, a little sticker chart I made, Potty Prizes, M&M incentives, and 13 pairs of undies. I picked up some small little things for Alex. I haven't exactly decided when she'll get a prize (after a poo poo in the potty, at the end of each day as an incentive, or after x amount of times actually using the potty), I'm planning on kind of seeing how it goes and then I'll determine what will be the best use for them.

My plan is for her to still use diapers at night time, mostly because I just got a box of 124 diapers last week, but also because she wakes up wet most mornings. We'll work on night time potty training a little down the road.