The Saga Continues

I don't know how long Sophia has been pottytraining now, but it feels like a long freakin' time. Largely my fault, I know, for doing the first-child-trying-too-early thing. But she seemed ready, talked about going potty, saw all her friends (slightly older) doing it, and got super excited about having a new frog potty to go in, so I figured "What the heck" and jumped in.

And then put it on hold.

And then started up again.

Hold.

Back on the potty train.

Repeat.

Yeah, I have not been super consistent. So this has gone on for months, with one thing or another disrupting the potty training. Jude's feeding issues, Sophia's reluctance, the holidays (yep, it's been that long!), my laziness . . .

BUT!

We are in the home stretch!

I have finally figured out the perfect motivation for my lil' stubborn thing, and we're cranking now! The sticker chart doesn't work, she does not think that is cool at all. M&Ms are the way to go. We were doing 2 for #1 and 4 for #2 (she needed some serious motivation for #2, was not excited to do that on the potty), and that was fine when she was only going sporadically. But that quantity of M&Ms when she really got going and was on the potty every two minutes?

Oy.

She was turning into Crazy Girl after consuming what amounted to huge handfuls of M&Ms all day. On her craziest day she was so wound up by naptime that she bounced her Pack'n'Play from the side of the room by the wall into the center of the room, and then I found her under the mattress . . . though she didn't actually sleep at all. Naptime was followed up by Insane-o Afternoon, with Sophia running in circles around our downstairs for an hour while laughing maniacally. Yes, we have substantially cut back on M&M intake. We're down to to 1 at a time, no matter what comes out.

I did add more motivation to the equation before we cut back on the candy. I took a trip to Walmart a couple weeks ago, and for $8 I filled a basket with all kinds of non-candy goodies. At the end of each day with no accidents, the Snuggler gets to pick out a prize. I tried to mostly go the useful route so we wouldn't have a bunch of crap cluttering up the house . . . headbands, stickers for coloring time, a new spring plate, a couple necklaces, and her favorite . . . bath time soap paint.

And of course, the grand prize is coming up. As soon as Sophia is doing all her business on the potty (except for diaper at nap and bedtime) she is going shopping with me for a new baby doll. This has turned out to be the key. Sophia has been planning seriously for her new doll for the past month, and brings it up many times a day. This Saturday is Dolly Day as there have been no accidents in undies for the past week and only two the week before.

Sophia has actually met several other potty milestones in the past week. We were on our way home from a friend's house and Sophia announced she needed to go potty. We were ten minutes out so I asked her if she could hold it. No. So I pulled over and Sophia got to have her first side of the road potty experience. No pants got peed on . . . success!

The other milestone was the Walmart bathroom experience. I have been keeping Sophia in underwear for short jaunts, so when she said she had to go we flew thru checkout and ran for the bathroom. Not sure how you are supposed to do the "No Cart" thing with multiple small children so we were headed right in when another shopper blocked me. ???? "You can't go in there with your cart!" "My two year old needs to go potty, should I send her in there alone or leave my 8-month old out here in the cart?! I'm going in with the cart!" Fortunately she moved so I didn't have to karate-chop her out of the way to get Sophia onto the potty. (Not that I know how to karate-chop anyone, but when the kid says they have to go and you make a run for it the adrenaline really kicks in!)

Now, some of you may be wondering . . . WHY?! Why have I been pushing this, waiting a little longer would be perfectly fine and then I wouldn't have to work at it so hard, and what am I going to do to wean her off all her motivators?!

Anyone who has changed a two year old's poopy diaper knows exactly why IT IS TIME. I am so tired of changing super nasty poopy diapers, and with having Jude on solids I had two at a time . . . no thanks! As for the M&Ms and prizes and doll . . . all Dr. Dobson sanctioned, 'nuff said! And I really don't think weaning her off the fun stuff will be all that hard; she has actually forgotten about her treats and her end of the day prize before and not cared. We are really playing up the doll grand prize, and the fact that now she is a big girl and wears underwear . . . and it seems that she has made that switch in her head. Now I hear "I wear undies" instead of "I want to wear a diaper!"

Now D-Day is in two days, and Sophia is still deciding on a name for the new addition to the family. In the top of the running are "Allie," "Hard Boiled Egg," and "Blerga." I'm sure she'll know just the right name when she sees that new dolly, but my vote is for Allie. Blerga just doesn't have quite the right ring to it, and what's the nickname potential for Hard Boiled Egg?

Potty on!

Naptime changes

The last few weeks have been a whirlwind of craziness, mostly due to Sophia and her antics. Many of you know about Sophia's naptime activities . . . namely getting out of bed repeatedly and/or getting naked and peeing (or more!) in bed. For the past number of months I had solved those problems by having her sleep in the Pack'n'Play in backward zip-up pajamas.

No more.

Sophia has finely honed ninja skills and can silently climb in and out of the PNP anytime she chooses. Which seems to be all the time. She has also figured out how to slither her way out of zipped-up-snapped-up-backward pajamas.

Boo.

I don't know about you, but naptime is sacred time to me, time to relax and recover or just finally get something done. Not time to chase my toddler back to bed fifteen times. And of course it's hard to be stern when she looks so stinkin' funny with the neck of her pajamas around her waist (Thank God she didn't fall down the stairs!), or is just plain old naked.

Add to that the fact that I am finally being consistent with pottytraining (but boy is that a whole 'nother post!), and we have had a busy couple weeks. Lots of laundry from naked naptime peeing, and I was spending the morning trying to tire the Snuggler out so she would sleep instead of climbing.

Fortunately, it seems Sophia has FINALLY begun to really understand that her actions have consequences, and she doesn't like the ones I have instituted for getting naked and climbing out of bed. In fact, I have actually folded up the PNP for good and she is back to sleeping full time in her big girl bed! I never realized before how great it would be to have a toddler that finally got cause and effect, but it is going to make my life a lot easier.

So naptime and bedtime in the Libby house have now become much more "normal." No more backward pajamas and no more PNP. Just a warning of "Remember your consequences if you climb out of bed or get naked!" before bedtime and we're usually good to go. Of course, I did find her cuddled up naked in her big girl bed Saturday morning (yes, wet bed!), but one out of 14 (7 naps and 7 nights since being back in her bed) ain't bad!