Potty Trained!

Well, it's official.  Natalie is potty trained!  This has been a major work in progress.  We started potty training right around her second birthday.  (For those who are counting, yes, it has been a 9 month process!)  We started by introducing her to the potty, having her sit on it, play with it, etc.  Then we moved to pullups, where we majorly stalled for many months.  Pullups for her, were kind of a crutch.  If we mentioned going to the potty we got one of two reactions.  Either she would agree and go happily with you where she would do her pee pee in the potty without incident, or we would get a screaming fit.  Mostly it was the latter.  Grrr.  In November, we picked a weekend where we tried to do big girl underwear ONLY.  We had a 100% failure rate.  What was frustrating was that she knew the feeling, but she would ignore it until she was all wet.  We knew she didn't like the feeling of being wet in her big girl underwear, but it didn't seem to make a big enough impact for her to correct the behavior.

For whatever reason, last weekend, she decided she wanted to be a "big girl" and start doing more pee pee in the potty.  I don't know if she finally feels settled (new house, new baby brother in the last few months), or if she feels challenged that her BFF Gaby is in big girl underwear and using the potty.  Whatever the reason was, we jumped at the opportunity.  She had one accident Sunday afternoon (while watching Dora... I think she wasn't paying attention).  She went Monday and Tuesday at daycare without any accidents.  Wednesday, because Daddy had a 2 hour doctor's appointment, I picked the kids up from daycare and took them to Friendly's for dinner. I asked Natalie no fewer than 4 times if she had to go potty, but she said no each time.  As we were packing up to go home, I noticed she was walking funny -- a sure sign she had an accident.  I changed her pants in the parking lot (LOL!!!) and she hasn't had another accident SINCE!  I'm so proud of her!   We even went out Saturday for about 2.5 hours.  We went to Wellesley College to walk around the campus and then into Wellesley Square for lunch.  She waited until we go to the restaurant and went potty there.  She didn't have any accidents.  We are so happy!!!!  I can't believe my baby girl is becoming such a BIG GIRL!!!!!

Next up this weekend... sleeping in a big girl bed!