Ode to the Potty

I'm kind of proud of myself.  I had been putting off potty training Hadley for a while because we have had so much going on where I didn't have a good chunk of time to just go through the motions with her.  I had tried previous attempts in the same way I trained Hayden and nothing had been working.

Finally, I googled potty charts one day and came across these cute charts that I think are real winners and everyone should give them a go.  I came up with the game plan that I would introduce the potty in steps following the chart and get her to at least get to know the potty.  Then, Friday morning I dove into it totally and it was rough.  She is very strong willed and it was hard to get her to want to follow through quite a few times.  I had her do straight undies with her normal clothes on and put a pile of clothes and undies near by to get ready to go through a lot.

The chart went up and stickers were prepped.  The first day, we had 3 different accidents and then 3 successful trips to the bathroom.  I found that it was hard to figure out when to bring her because she showed no signs and then would have an accident.  I finally estimated and came a little off so I reduced the time and found more success.  I had a 30-40 minutes window each time.  I also gave her more fluids to give her a jump start and a drink or two on the potty when she was turning up nothing.  

On Saturday, we had greater success with 3 good potty breaks and just 2 accidents.  On Sunday, we took it slower because I wouldn't be able to help her at church so she wore a diaper for church and through nap time and then I put a pull-up on her for the rest of the day because we had family coming for dinner.  Surprised, she went right to the potty on her own with a dry pull-up, did everything by herself and went potty.  I was so proud of her.  We did our happy celebration of high fives, rocks, stickers and some m&ms for the win after she was done.  She went 3 trips again and did great.  Then, this morning, she went right to the potty and did her thing by herself again so I do have to say, I do see the light at the end of the tunnel when it comes to potty training and I know I am not in the clear, but we are on our way to having just one kid in diapers now.  Wahoo!!!

Sidenote:  Hadley didn't like being on the regular potty with even a smaller seat on top so we have stuck to just her little potty in the bathroom to start.  Hayden was easy and used the normal potty, but Hadley had to do it this way.