September 13, 2010: Pregnancy and Potty Purgatory

So we officially started potty training this weekend. Liam woke up Saturday morning and began his "potty party". He got to pick out his underwear (between Thomas the Train, Mickey Mouse, and Dinosaurs). Here he is putting on his first pair of big boy underwear!

....and then he gets to pick which potty he wants to use. We decorated his potty upstairs with dinosaurs...a huge T-Rex balloon, dinosaurs lined up along the tub to cheer him on, and dinosaur books to distract him on the potty. Downstairs we made a train bathroom...with Thomas the train balloon, a Thomas potty seat, and train books like the classic "Chug chug poo poo" :). Here are Liam's bathrooms decorated and his expression when he first saw them....(note T-Rex is in his hand...yes he is an integral part of potty-training).

I guess I think of it as potty purgatory because we really haven't been able to leave the house. Liam started on a 20 minute timer plan where he had to go sit on the potty every 20 minutes...let me just say you cannot get alot done in between. Not to mention with my pregnant bladder, we were pretty much in the bathroom all day...good thing our bathrooms are so entertaining now :) Anyway even though I thought we would go a little stir crazy from being inside all weekend that wasn't really possible...because Nick had 5 high school friends in town, his old soccer teammates. He was just going to meet them out Sat night but they ended up coming over for the day to watch football. Liam had fun meeting the boys and was really excited when they indulged him in a game of soccer in the backyard!I took a pic of the boys before they went out for the night. It's been a while since Nick has partied with a group of single guys at the club and even though he didn't make it home till 3am! he still rallied for potty training the next morning. We were 'pleasantly' awoken at 6:45 am the next day with Liam calling out over the monitor "need to go bathroooooom". As Nick describes it, he's never seen an 8-month pregnant woman run so fast :) I raced up the stairs, put Liam on the potty, and we were off for a very successful second day! The first day Liam went twice in the potty and had quite a few accidents. But the second day, Liam went 7 times in the potty and only had a couple of leaks. And he asked to sit on the potty without the timer going off too! When we weren't pottying, Liam and daddy watched a lot of football...wrestled on the couch (how CUTE is his bum in underwear?!)...played more soccer and went for wagon rides...not too bad for a weekend spent at home!And even though he will kill me someday...here is my little man in his big boy underwear...helping daddy in the garage no less. He pretty much spent the weekend dressed like this although we did put on a t-shirt for company :) Without the extra padding of his diaper he looks even more gangly...but still too cute in mommy's eyes.

Now today on day 3, I can say that we are pretty much potty-trained (at least going #1). He only had 1 real accident today...and TONS of success in the potty! We even stopped using the timer and he was staying dry for much longer periods today...including during his naptime! I have to say I tried not to have too many expectations because he's barely 25 months old...but he just continues to amaze us! His rewards when he goes in the potty are that he gets to pick a sticker and eat 2 m&ms. He is sooo funny about his reward and totally reminds me of my brother Alex. He carefully chooses a sticker and puts it on his shirt. Then we start "the m&m process". I have dumped them in a ziploc so he can pick out 2 colors. First he sticks his face in to smell them...I'm not kidding, it's so funny and I have no idea where he got this. Then he debates his choices, picking up m&ms to study them before either putting it back of eating it. Sometimes I just want him to pick and be done with it, but he really enjoys drawing out his reward to make it last...who am I to interrupt? :) Here is during his reward process...

When Nick got home tonight Liam's shirt was covered in stickers and he got to brag about all his success. I think he is def becoming more proud of his skill and even told me today when looking in the mirror that "I look really tall, mama". If that's not a two year old version of feeling proud, I don't know what is :)

Ziggy and I had our check-up this morning (Rachy and Pres were nice of enough to step in and continue the potty schedule). Ziggy is still on track, growing great, and (unlike my first pregnancy) helping me to gain a nice and steady, but not overwhelming, amount of weight :) So even though this weekend had it's rough moments, we all survived and are on our way to becoming a diaper-free house...for a very brief period at least :)