update on little miss stubborn

Unfortunately today I was unable to spend the day with Sass. I had a work commitment that I had to keep so she spent the night with my mom and the whole day. I told my mom my thoughts though and told her to just back off and see what she does. She did great. She did nap in a pull up but besides that no accidents all day.

We picked her up around 6 and took her to dinner where she drank an entire juice box. We were headed to Rita's after so I just told her that if she had an accident we couldn't stay and would have to go home. While sitting outside I noticed her doing the "potty dance" so I just gently reminded her if she need to go to tell me. She immediately said " i need to go potty" so off we ran and SUCCESS!! The Rita's man gave her a sticker for her success which made her day!

We played for a little bit after we got home when I noticed her acting a little funny. All of a sudden she goes " I have to poop!", so Super Dad rushed her to the potty. She had already had a little bit of an accident, but was able to finish in the potty! YAY SASS! Success number two!

After that we bathed and got ready for bed. I put a cloth diaper on her trying to back off and not make a big deal. While sitting down stairs all of a sudden we hear a little voice singing that she has to go potty so Super Dad ran upstairs and took her. Success number 3!!

In a matter of 3 hours she told us three times! I have to be gone again all day tomorrow, so we will see how it goes!

the epitome of stubborn

I know she's cute. And she says the darn most adorable things all the time, but good gracious this girl has a mind of her own!

We have officially finished our three days of intense potty training and honestly, I don't think we are one step closer. The girl knows what to do, she's not afraid of the potty and is more than verbal enough to tell me.

She just. doesn't. want. to.

No way, no how. We have done stickers, prizes, jelly beans. You name it, we have tried it, but she wants nothing to do with us asking her, suggesting, nothing. She has to want to do it or she won't. She knows the difference between wet and dry, clean and dirty. She knows how to sit on a big potty, a little potty. She can even take off her clothes and put them back on correctly.

She just. doesn't. want. to.

This has left me in a predicament. I know she is capable. I know she can do it. Do I put her back in diapers? Do I got the pull up route which she treats like diapers? Or do I keep bugging the daylights out of the poor child telling her a million times to "tell mommy when she has to go potty?" I truly am at a loss at what the right thing to do is.

Tonight I had an idea. She's 2. Surely I can out smart the kid, right? Here's my thought.... tell me what you think. She HATES being dirty. We constantly have to have a napkin when we eat, a wet wipe when we paint, so on and so forth, yet she has no problem tinkling in her pants and not telling me because she knows I will make her go potty. She won't tell me if she is wet or dirty even though she knows what that means.

She just. doesn't. want. to.

To me, this means it's reverse psychology time. My plan is to put her in panties and pants. I'm not going to ask her to tell me, or ask her if she has to go, or set a timer, none of it. I am going to totally ignore her in all regards to the potty and let her have an accident. And when she has an accident, I'm just not going to say anything about it. I figure pants will be more uncomfortable wet than if she was just in a dress, but I am totally going to put the ball in her court and let her come to me. I know her and I know she won't like feeling wet. I have never let her stay wet long enough for her to be uncomfortable because I am constantly checking to make sure she is dry and running her to the potty. I am going a totally unconventional route. She's an unconventional girl, what else is to be expected. I am giving her a logical consequence... you tinkle in your pants, you are wet until you tell me, then I will help you solve the problem.

It might not work but I don't know what else to do to get the girl back into the game and I really feel like we made too much progress to go back to diapers, so it's worth a shot. And if you don't like my plan, please don't call DFACS on me. I promise to bathe her and clean her all up after my experiment is over and I won't let her sit around in her dirty undies all day or anything, but I want to see what she will do if I just leave her alone!

potty training bootcamp update - day 2

UPDATE#3!!!
Napped with out a diaper and woke up dry!

UPDATE #2!!!

Guess who told me mid swim lessons that she had to go potty!! She was wet and freezing but she did it!

UPDATE!!!

Guess who woke up DRY this morning!! Woo to the Hoo!!

We are about to embark on day two of our potty training boot camp. I actually hear Sass stirring in her bed as I am typing. Yesterday went pretty well. We did have two BIG accidents, if you catch my drift, but other than that it was just a little sprinkle here or there. She has gotten much better about using her words and letting me know.

Several prizes were earned yesterday. It was such a pretty day I tried to encourage her to pick things we could play outside with like bubbles and chalk. She ended the day picking two little mermaids that came from the dollar store and are now carried everywhere because they are her "friends". We kept the potty outside with us yesterday and I kept her tush exposed so she could see herself start to have an accident and then run to the potty.

Last night I read the "3 Day Potty Training" manual that you can download. It was really easy to read and gave me some great ideas. It was written by a mother of 6, so I am going to attempt to follow her method from here on out. We aren't suppose to go anywhere for the first three days, but Sass does have a swim lesson this morning, so we are going to venture out for that and then rush back home to get back to business. The part of this method that I like the best is you give the control over to your child. Instead of asking them a million times if they have to go potty, you just keep reminding them to "tell mommy if you have to go potty". We did this all day yesterday, and boy not asking them is a hard habit to break, but she was doing really good about telling me more and more as the day went on.

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On another note...... a friend recently sent me this great blog called Faithful Provisions. I highly recommend adding them to your blog reader because she always has the scoop on great deals! Today's great deal that I am going to have to indulge in is a free pastry from Starbucks with the purchase of a coffee. Since I am with child, I have sadly had to give up frozen coffee drinks because they can't make them decaf. The idea of drinking hot coffee though mid July, in the deep south, at 8 months pregnant is so not appealing so, I have now become a fan of iced coffees. My current fave is a decaf, nonfat caramel macchiato. YUM! I will most definitely be stopping by this morning on the way to swimming to pick up my breakfast! You will need to either print off this coupon or show this to the barista on your handheld to get your free pastry! Have a good breakfast!

love this

Ha ha! I saw this on Facebook today and it made me laugh! So cute!

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Potty Training Bootcamp update:

The day is going pretty well. I have been flooding Sass so she will need to tinkle a lot which is working. I did let her go get something from her room this morning which resulted in our only big accident. Other than that she is getting better about stopping herself if she starts and finishing on the potty. For a while this morning it was so nice out, I let her play out back nekkie bottomed. This really seemed to help her see when she was starting to tinkle and then run to the potty. We are really working on using her words to tell me when she has to go potty, but still has a ways to go. Hopefully the afternoon will go well! She is napping now and I just made myself some peanut butter cookies as my reward... big mistake, they are so yummy I can't stop eating them! LOL! Wish me luck!

potty training bootcamp

Sass has been potty training for several months now and we have totally hit a plateau. She will have great days and then really not so great days. She is good as long as we take her ALL the time, but she rarely tells us. Even if she has an accident she only tells us about half the time.

Since Bubbie is away this week at the beach with the "grands" I have decided it's time to go hard core on the potty training. We have been pretty laid back about it and worked on it here and there, but we are going full force now.

First thing first, we needed potty prizes. We have been giving jelly beans for going potty but they obviously aren't working. This afternoon I hit up the good ol' Dollar Tree and started stocking up! Lucky for me, my girl loves her some princesses and Dollar Tree is full of fun princess goodies. We have wands and bubbles, sidewalk chalk, new coloring books, and even pink silly string, plus oh so much more! I really should have taken a picture to show you, maybe tomorrow. Oh, and how could I forget... STICKERS! Must have stickers. Lucky for me, I found a book of 414 Ariel stickers for a $1! YAY!

We started this afternoon. I put all our surprises in a big gift bag and made Sass her first "potty ticket". I wrote the numbers 1-3 on it and started flooding the girl with diluted juice. I explained to her if she went potty in the potty she got to put a stick on one of the numbers and when all the numbers were covered she could trade in her ticket for a surprise. She took to this immediately telling me she had to go potty and Viola! she did. Sticker number 1 was earned. We took our ticket and our stickers to my mom's house for dinner. Sass preceded to then pee on the floor the next 3 times.... uh oh... maybe this isn't going to work. But finally we had two more successes.

She then came home and picked out her first prize, a pink fairy wand that lights up and makes a very magical sound. We made a new ticket, but this time it has the numbers 1-5 on it. She went potty two more times and earned two more stickers... three more to go until she gets back into the prize bag! Yay Sass!

We plan to go no where tomorrow. I am going to oj and cranberry juice this girl as much as I can and hopefully we will get better and better at telling mama when we have to go potty. I trained Bubbie this way with potty tickets and prizes, so hopefully it will work with Sass too!

Pictures and updates to come tomorrow. I'm too tired tonight to work on them!


* image from The EC Store

bye bye pull ups! hello imse vimse trainers!

UPDATE #1

Well, not a great update, but I have a feeling it's more my fault than the trainers. Sass was so good about telling me this morning when she had to go potty that I didn't make her try while we were at the dr's office and we had a flood accident. Her pants did get wet, but not the floor thankfully. The interesting thing is that I don't know that it was fault of the trainers. Remember I mentioned that these run really big.... well, when I pulled the trainers off of her, the middle was wet on the inside, but not the outside. My hunch is she leaked out the sides because little bitty's theighs are big enough to fill up the leg holes. We are going to continue testing them out the rest of the afternoon, but for now she is testing out a new goodmama fitted for nap time.... hopefully we will have more success!

Kelly's Closet had free shipping over the weekend and the Imse Vimse trainers on sale (they still are on sale), so I bit the bullet and bought a handful. I have to say first off that I am super impressed with the service from Kelly's Closet. I believe I ordered them on Sunday and they were on my doorstep yesterday! WOW! Talk about instant gratification! I will absolutely be ordering from them again!

So, these super cute trainers came yesterday. What's the difference between these and say, Gerber training pants? Well, these organic cotton undies have a layer of PUL in between the cotton which is suppose to help prevent accidents from getting the child's clothes wet, yet still feel the wetness of the undies. While we love our Gerber trainers, if Sass has an accident in them, it's flood city, so I'm too afraid to take her out for long periods in them. Because of this fear (which has been justified by puddles in public... so sorry Target, we didn't mean it..... either time it happened....), I have resorted to using Pull Ups for things like church, going out shopping, and play dates at other peoples homes.

I hate using Pull Ups, not only for the environmental reasons, or the cost, but I might as well put a diaper on the girl, because she totally knows the difference and will use the Pull Up just like a diaper. She is much more aware of her accidents when she is in panties. You know you are in trouble when she says "mama, I did something". Never a good sign! Beware if you order, these trainers run large. I ordered Sass the 15-24 month size which ranges from 24-31 lbs, she's only 23 but these are the smallest I could find!

This brings us to today.... test day! The new cloth trainers were washed last night and dried and are ready to be put to the test. We have swim lessons this morning and then Sass gets to go to the OB with me. Perfect place to try out the trainers! I will post an update later!

cloth trainers vs. gerber training panties

I didn't cloth diaper Bubbie, so he was trained in Gerber training underware and pull ups. I started cloth diapering Sassie at 4 months. Now that we are potty training I have been using Gerber training pants with her too. They are just thicker underware. If she full fledge tinkles her legs get a little damp, but she is pretty good about as soon as she feels any wetness, stopping and telling me.

I have looked at cloth trainers on several of my favorite online diaper stores, but I just can't bring myself to bite the bullet and spend up to $14 or so on one pair of training pants when I can get three pair of the Gerber ones for about $6.

So fill me in! If you have used cloth trainers before what's the upside?? How are they different? I wish we had a local cloth diapering shop so I could go in and see some in person, but alas... we just aren't that green in the hot south!