Just like any other day

Today started out just like any other day. Our usual morning milk routine, for both girls…getting breakfast in everyone’s tummy…getting dressed, and so on. It wasn’t until 11:00 that things started getting weird.

For the third day in a row, Emma came to me asking to use the potty. Three days ago, I started thinking, “ok, well, if she asks to use the potty, I’ll let her so as not to discourage her from eventually wanting to use it.” Each morning, she has asked to use it, and has successfully gone twice.

Even though Emma is my first child, and usually parents are excited for them to master new skills, I have been the one procrastinating on Emma learning to use the potty. She has seen her friend Clara Anne use the potty at our house numerous times – and Clara Anne is quite the potty-er now! But since we’ve got about three weeks of travel planned in February, I had been pushing out of my mind visions of rushing Emma into the bathrooms on planes in favor of images of casually changing diapers whenever it happens to be convenient for me. I, mama Eggroll, had no interest in potty training. So what if Emma did? I did not.

But perhaps it was not meant to be. Just like the previous two days, today was the same story. So, after peepee #2 this morning, I sort of spontaneously decided we’d start potty training right then and there. We got out some paper and markers and made a little potty chart. We opened all the packages of big girl panties we had hoarded from the US. Out they came, Disney princesses, Care Bears, and of course, Dora. We created quite the snack spread on the table – raisins, Dark Chocolate M&M’s from the States (thanks again, Kim!!!) , crackers, milk, water.

And as the morning went on, we would talk about going potty. As she scampered around in big-girl panties, we’d remind her every few minutes to come use the potty. Each successful potty got a Dora sticker on her potty chart, three dark chocolate M&M’s, and a full round of the Dora “we did it” theme song. (we were very tired by the time evening finally rolled around!) Emma glowed under all the praise she received, and she got lots of chances to receive it! She was going potty almost every 5 minutes most of the morning!

That being said, we certainly had our share of accidents today – most notably, at lunch and dinner time when Emma, preoccupied by the assortment of delicacies in front of her, completely forgot that she was a human being capable of emptying her bladder. We had two significant puddles then.

But all in all, for an on-the-fly day of potty training that was neither planned nor wanted, the day ended like this: 8 accidents, 22 successes, including a bowel movement during what we thought was a late-night excuse! The pre-nap efforts found emma peeing every 5 minutes or so, but by bed-time, she had worked her way up to 20 minutes or half an hour.

We still have a long way to go – please don’t hear me saying she is totally potty trained - but she is largely the one initiating now and we made lots of unexpected progress today! Who knows what tomorrow will bring???

Special thanks to: Rachel (for making the mistakes for me to learn from!), Clara Anne (for being such a good example for us!), Dora (for being such great inspiration) MiMi and G (for extra panties and the Dora Potty Book!), Mantha (for giving up your normal amount of mommy-time), and Daddy (for giving me second chances at bed-time!)