I’m probably jinxing us as I write this…but it’s been one week since Peanut has woken up with a dry diaper, sorry, a dry PRINCESS diaper!
The idea of one child completely off diapers is really exciting!
Potty training Peanut was trying at first – stickers, chocolate and candy (even though the MD told us not to use candy as a reward), as one may recall…
It had to be just a matter of time, since Peanut has able to stay dry while napping more or less she started wearing undies.
All it took was one leaky princess diaper and a wet bed to spur Peanut into waking up at night and using the potty.
Bye-bye nighttime pull-ups!
Apparently, miracles just don’t happen at Xmas.
As Mads was getting dressed for Easter festivities, she asked, ASKED!, to wear her Cinderella undies!
After months and months of putting the undies out, her refusing and putting on pull-ups, finally, undies. Still, there were a few accidents, but, she wore her undies for most of the day. (After her 3rd accident, I caved and let her wear her pull-ups, not good, I know.)
She even wore them this morning. Maybe a little peer pressure at day care will help things along…
apres egg hunt
So 2 1/2 years have passed and still no progress. Mads’ pediatrician isn’t going to be happy. I figure we have until August before she lowers the boom on us.
We’ve been through almost everything: stickers on a potty chart (that only went so far), hugs and praise (yeah, right), and even rewards we weren’t supposed to offer, candy! We started with jelly beans, then moved on to M&Ms and finally hershey kisses. Surprisingly, the candy “thing” didn’t last long at all.
Things were going well, then all of a sudden, the potty had become the last place Mads wanted to do anything.
Recently, I got it into my head….hey! what about big girl underwear?! Mads is doing the princess thing now, so maybe princess undies would help motivate her? When she saw her “gift” she was so excited (and I was very hopeful)! The excitement about the big girl undies lasted only about 1…2…3 seconds.
So, now we’re back to where we started – suggesting times to use the potty and rushing her to the bathroom when she starts making her bm “face”.
Thanks to a dear friend of mine, whose daughter is 3 months younger than Mads and is “day” potty trained, I found the book, Potty Training in One Day.
I’m reading, reading, then, sadly realized that it might take us a bit longer and be a bit more difficult than I had hoped for – this girl has got some serious control issues. We were forewarned by one of the pediatricians in the group (the “old school” MD) that potty training is best something that is outsourced and that Mads will do her business in the potty when she’s ready – her way of letting us know that she’s in control of her world. This was filed, naturally, in the section, POTTY TRAINING RESISTANCE.
If princess undies (she won’t even wear them!), jelly beans and chocolates aren’t working, S & I have our work cut out for us.
A couple weeks ago, I took Mads to the pediatrician for her annual exam. Everything was going fine until I was asked, “So, how’s potty training coming along?” Um, it isn’t. I then explained that Mads was using the potty just fine at day care, wears pull-ups at day care, but once she gets home – nada. The MD told me that we needed to be a bit more proactive at home. Later that day, I found a Hello Kitty themed potty chart (she’s not into Hello Kitty, yet – but she loves Sagwa, so we just run with that) and dug out some stickers to use as rewards. Though it’s easier when we’re home all day to enforce this active potty-training, the weekdays are working out fine, too. So, she gets one sticker to put on her chart for #1 and two (!) stickers for #2. Lately, she’s only been able to do #1, which is fine – people are telling me that #2 will take longer to master. Until the other night. She started to make “the face” and I rushed her to the potty. Before you know it, she’s saying, “yucky!” and yup, #2 in the potty. I praise her, hug her and give her two stickers for her potty chart. Now, she’s no fool. She tells me, moments later, that she needs to go #1. So she sits on the pot and after a minute, she says, “good job!” and asks for a sticker – nothing in the potty. I try to explain to her that if there is either #1 or #2 in the potty, then she can have a sticker. I think she understands as she didn’t ask for a sticker after that.
Getting cultured…
We all got our dose of culture recently at the Dale Chihuly exhibit at the De Young museum. The exhibit itself was really awesome (sorry for lack of a more refined word) – even Mads seemed to enjoy most of it. It was my first time in the new museum (I know, shame on me!) and wow! Amazing! We also got a neat view of the living roof on new Academy of Sciences across the way from the tower. (The Academy re-opened last weekend, but I think we’re going to wait a bit – but looking forward to it!)
Getting sprinkled…
Finally the bay area has it’s own Sprinkles. By the looks of it, they may not open shop in SF, but as long as I’m working in Palo Alto, their Stanford location is fine by me. You can read my review here.
Getting cheeky…
So, I’ve got this coworker that just stunned (maybe not stunned, more like, confirmed his personality) me the other day. Background story: Valentine’s Day was coming up and we all got to talking and this guy was saying that he’s advised his son to give valentine’s to all the girls in his class so that he’ll have options. Okay, practical, I suppose. However recently, we discovered (loudly) that his ringtone is a Madonna tune and it wasn’t until then that I noticed his most interesting cufflinks.
Not sure if I had a point with this story, but I felt the need to mention it.
Getting fried…
This past weekend was the 6th annual Fry Party. I think the party was smaller this year, which was nice. Of course, the deep-fried cheese curds were exceptional, as were the fried pickles. Team Kellybean didn’t enter the competition this year – maybe I’ll get my stuff together for next year – no one fried my ideas this year. Anyways, we enjoyed everything from deep fried Wontacos and deep fried Banana Split sushi to Fried brie with jalapeno jelly and battered and deep fried chicken tenders sandwiched between two jelly doughnuts. Evil. Maybe next year, I’ll just bring the Tums.
Etc.
Celebrated my mom’s birthday at an old haunt – the Mr. and I had our first date here.
Mads’ Halloween costume arrived.
Quote for the day “From the LA Times: ‘I guess the only difference Between Sarah Palin and Dick Cheney is…lipstick.’”
Loving Santogold right now.
Using the potty / Potty Training
At home: refuses to use her pot; likes to put Nemo on her pot and declare, “Nemo pee pee.”; but from time to time, will sit on the pot for a few seconds, clothes on; wears diapers.
At day care: asks to use the potty; tells her caretakers when she needs to use the potty; wears training pants
Our pediatrician says that Mads doesn’t use the potty at home because, she wants us to know that she’s in charge. Well, yes, she has become little miss bossy: “Mommy color!”, “Mommy sleep!”, “Daddy sit!”, “Lucie move!”, “Daddy eat!” Oy!
Foreign Languages
At home: lucky if we can get a few words out of her in either Spanish or French (I would say she’s quite proficient in English for her age)
At day care: knows her numbers 1-10 and colors in espanol; can speak key phrases and words in espanol
Mads is getting better with her French, but we can only get certain spanish words out of her “dos” y “ocho” are favorites, if we’re lucky, “agua”
Thumb sucking
At home: when tired or when she needs to comfort herself
At day care: not anymore
Wha?
Though we’re in no rush, we decided to buy a training potty for Mads, just to get her used to the idea. Natch, we bought the one with all the bells & whistles – it sings, makes fun sounds, does everything short of dancing. She seemed to take to it, she’d sit on it, with or without a magazine and pretend flush when she was finished.
So, last Friday, when I pick her up from day care, her caretakers are telling me that I need to bring Pull-Ups on Monday. Huh?! Apparently, miss Mads has been requesting to use the potty after snacks and meals and has been successful using it! Of course, when she comes home, after meals, we go into the bathroom, I’m armed with books, puzzles and toys, and as we approach her potty, she looks up at me and says, “no”, and walks away. I try and coax her back in, short of offering chocolate or cookies, and again, “no”. I am supposing that it’s easier for her when she sees other kids doing it. And I thought this potty training this was going to be easy.
In other big-girl updates: we removed one of the crib side panels to make way for a big girl bed for Mads. Tonight is the first night so we’ll see how she does.
Al fresco
So last weekend, during the brief-est of heatwaves, we dined al fresco both for diner et dejuner. Saturday dinner we grilled some brats, with couscous and a tomato-cucumber salad, with fresh, homemade strawberry sorbet for dessert. For Sunday lunch, S grilled some marinated tri-tip from Mollie’s. Sides included cassava chips, my make-shift Meditteranean couscous salad: prepared organic couscous, chopped organic roma halved organic cherry tomatoes, chopped english cucumber, crumbled feta, chopped mint, olive oil and salt & pepper;
and a fruit salad: strawberries, pears, cara cara oranges, bananas, chopped mint. Both were delicious and refreshing on that sweltering day.
Seeing that Mads likes to splash around in the bathtub…and to our dismay, Lucie’s waterbowl, we naturally thought that she’d enjoy a wading pool. She splashed around alright, but do you think she took one step into the wading pool? Of course not. She threw her beach toys into the pool and made big splashes from kneeling over the edge of the pool and, yah, that was about it.
Coming up
I’ve got an occasion of sorts coming up and my goal was to find new dresses, but that didnt’ pan out too well. I suppose one can expect that from shopping online.