Progress, not perfection

Last night, I spied on my son through the crack of our bedroom door. I heard the creaking sound of his door opening, kind of a kid-escape alarm, and got out of bed to see what he was up to.

He walked into the kids' bathroom, went to the toilet and proceeded to actually use it. When he was done, he walked back to his room, stopping for about 10 seconds or so to shuffle and stare at his feet and then went back to bed. I was astounded and a little surprised - astounded that he would leave his bed to use the bathroom and surprised because he'd had accidents during the day.

Like I've said, it's two steps forward, one step back around here these days. From naked to training pants to underwear, from little potty to big potty, we are starting to see clear progress and very little backsliding as each day passes. The neat thing about being so present for this entire process is that I can tailor it to his needs and his needs only. There's no place we need to be, there's no deadline like entering preschool that we need to meet, there's no limit on how long we can stay in one phase of potty training. It's not a race, it's a skill he's learning and everyone learns in their own time.

I am getting a new window into his personality. He's a kid who is motivated by the idea of doing something, anything on his own, and we're leveraging that trait for training purposes. We made the big potty accessible and his clothes easy to get on and off; he does the rest and usually with little fanfare. This afternoon, he actually pooped in the potty unbeknownst to us until we found the unflushed evidence. He didn't even ask for a gummy worm (the current poop reward), although if I'm around he'll tell me that he pooped a gummy worm. I have to resist the urge to stay with him while he's in the bathroom lest he feel managed and handled. He can be trusted to use the potty, but his fascination with the toilet paper, the plunger and the flusher are hazardous. Maybe I can get him interested in the toilet bowl scrub brush? I actually had my bare hands in the toilet pulling out wads of toilet paper last week. Ugh.

He has been having accidents in his cloth training pants. ("I got wet mommy," he tells me.) He also sometimes asks to have a diaper back on, but we tell him no, he accepts and eventually does his business in the potty. I'm not taking these as setbacks or a sign that we're moving too fast, though. He's capable and ready for this and we just have to stay positive and encouraging. I had been reluctant to put him in underpants because of the laundry factor. Now that he's going on his own so often, we're just going to have a wet-undies week until he learns that wet equals uncomfortable. It's a good thing that a friend passed on about a dozen pair of undies that will actually fit him. (Thanks Jen!) Either way, I'm expecting to do a lot more laundry this week.

The tree fort in our yard

Over the past two weekends, Jim has been working on a backyard playground for the kids. We didn't want one of those build-it-yourself playsets - not unique enough, too expensive and it takes up a large footprint in the yard. So instead Jim built a swing set and a slide with a ladder and platform around three towering trees close to the house. I can sit on the screened in porch (also a Jimmy project) and watch Big Brother play. Big Brother loves the "lide" that daddy "builded" and waves and says "dank you" when he goes down the slide. He's having an absolute blast! He goes up the ladder and even up the slide with ease and rolls balls and cars up and down the slide. There's something for everyone - a swing for Girlface (that we already had), a swing for Big Brother, a second swing for a friend, and even a hookup for the hammock swing (where mommy can sit while she pushes the baby!). It was built with about $300 worth of supplies and about 12 hours of labor. Here are some photos.

The tree fort in our yard

Fiona's first time out

After pulling Girlface away from the dog food for the fifth time this morning, I finally wised up and put her in the high chair and threw some Cheerios down.

Big Brother told me, "Baby Ona in time out."

He's been deputized to help keep her away from the dog food. When she does get into the dog food, he goes behind her and puts it back in. (He's such a good kid!) His job is also to help keep inappropriate toys away from her. It gives him a reason to take a toy from her and consequently, at least in my mind, he doesn't often take other toys from her.

I haven't written much about Girlface lately. Big Brother has been the star around here with his potty training adventures. I fear that she'll just fade into the background sometimes. She's quiet (most of the time), determined, very deliberate in her movement (even when she was inside me) and often entertains herself during the day. She and Big Brother even play together sometimes. She's not sleeping through the night but is amazing us every day with her physical prowess. Girlface began crawling a week before she turned six months, is now cruising along the furniture and attempting to climb the stairs. Girlface also likes to feed herself, so we've gone from purees to finger food. The only way I can get her to eat a good meal is to let her feed herself for a few minutes and then, when she's frustrated at her own slow pace, I pop the food in. After about five mouthfuls, she's wrestling me for the spoon.

At her six month doctor's visit, she was crawling all over the floor and pulling up on anything she could. The doctor said he could count on one hand the number of babies her age that he'd seen do that. The nurses were tickled with how she touched her head to the floor while sitting down. It's a weird, shy tick that she displays sometimes. She weighed in at 16 lbs 11 oz, a weight that Big Brother didn't reach until he was nine months old.

It's been surprisingly easy to keep choking hazards and other dangers out of her reach. I really thought Big Brother's toys would be more hazardous, but she plays well with his cars and blocks and helps herself to whatever is on the toy shelf. With the second child, it all feels more laid back and we're better able to think through on our own what activities, foods and schedules are appropriate for her. We managed to keep the first one alive. This one should be a piece of cake.

Now if she'd only sleep through the night ...

Two steps forward, one step back

Over the weekend, we ramped up the potty training. Big Brother has been naked for the better part of a week, using his little potty more and more each day, mostly unprompted. The transition from being naked to wearing underpants or training pants has been more difficult. So far, he's peed on Thomas twice, pooped on Spiderman and sometimes begs for a diaper when he has to poop.

I'm trying hard to not remind him every 10 minutes or so to use the potty. It's tough. A few incidents have illustrated, though, that keeping my mouth shut pays off. We've had surprisingly few accidents, though. When we ignore him, he goes potty without prompting. Jim says Big Brother is probably like him: he just does things without talking about it.

Saturday morning, I was alone with the kids and needed to get Girlface down for a nap. I debated whether a naked Big Brother should be left unsupervised. I decided to chance it. While upstairs, I heard him squawking, "Diaper back on, diaper back on." That usually means he has to pee or poop but doesn't want to sit on his potty. I didn't jump up to help him as I had an infant physically attached to me. A few minutes later I heard, "I did it. Poopy in the potty."

I thought, "Hooray, two steps forward."

The next morning, he begged for a diaper, Jim obliged since we were busy cleaning house and voila, he pooped in his diaper. One step back.

Big Brother is learning how to pull underwear up and down on his own. Two steps forward! The only accidents he's had are when he's wearing them. One step back.

We've tried not to use subversive tactics or force the issue with him. We don't want to put artificial deadlines on him, but we do want our expectations to be clear and firm. However, the last package of diapers is slowly dwindling and I've told him that pretty soon there will be no more diapers. Today I started telling him that diapers are just for nap and nighttime. He told me today, "Sleepy. Go to bed." He had just woken up from his nap an hour earlier.

And as for rewards, he's mostly forgotten about the cars that he received last week for using the potty. I did make the mistake this morning of responding to his whining request for gummy worms by saying, "If you poop in the potty, you can have a gummy worm."

He whined. Then he ran to his potty, sat and angrily chanted "Gummy worm" while he trying to push. Clearly, he doesn't grasp the concept of delayed gratification yet.

Naked week

Disclaimer: The squeamish among you may want skip this one!
I've been told the best way to initiate potty training is to let your child run around naked, or, as it's called around here, "run around with penis." And that's just what Big Brother has been doing - inside and outside. In fact, Jim thinks we should just stick him outside naked with a bucket.

It's still early in the training and we aren't expecting much from him. We're just establishing a habit of using the potty and letting him get a feel for his body's functions. After a few naked hours, he's been asking for a diaper. Using the potty is a big change for him and I sense that he probably wants to hold on to the diapers just because it's familiar. He's not yet interested in underpants, even ones with Thomas, Spiderman or cars on them.

On Monday afternoon, I didn't replace his diaper after nap time. I explained to him that he should go to his little potty if he feels pee pee coming out. I expected some puddles. What I didn't expect was for him to take an unprompted seat on his potty and begin tinkling while Jim and I were engaged in conversation, essentially ignoring him. Jim promised him and delivered a new Matchbox car.

This morning, he was once again trotting around naked when I spotted the beginnings of poop. I picked it up (with a napkin, people) and showed it to him. I explained that he needed to go sit on his potty to put more poop in it. Thirty seconds later, we had poop. He was absolutely delighted. And I was delighted that it had not become a battle to get him to sit on the potty.

"I did it. I put poop in the potty," he squealed. "I did a car," he added thoughtfully.

Great, I thought. How long are we going to be obligated to reward every poop and pee with a Matchbox car? And do we have enough room in our house for them all? Until now, Big Brother has seemed unmoved by rewards. Unfortunately, he seems amenable to the idea for potty training. I guess that I'd rather give a reward than deny a reward in this instance.

We called Daddy and Big Brother had an actual, very clear conversation with him on the phone. Jim promised to bring him home a new Matchbox car.

An hour later, he came to me and said, "Poop." I cringed, expecting it to be on the floor. It wasn't. He had made another unprompted offering to the potty gods. At least this time he didn't mention cars.

Phonics by Ronald McDonald

This morning as I rolled through the McDonald's drive thru for my near-daily $1.00 large Diet Coke fix, my son looked up and said, "Letters, mommy."

Feeling rather proud that my son is recognizing letters in public, I prodded, "Which letters do you see, Big Brother?"

He grinned and declared, "Cheeseburger letters."