Da Poddy

Yesterday morning I awoke to the sound of Evie's bright little voice.

"Momma. Poddy. Momma. Momma. Poddy. Poddy. Momma. Poddy."

Now usually Evie sleeps in her bed. It's a little toddler bed, easy for her to get in and out of. She typically sleeps til around 7:30 a.m. and when she wakes up I go ahead and get up with her. Some mornings she wakes up earlier, before either of us should be awake, and I put Evie in her pack and play and we both sleep 30 more minutes. I think I will have to quit on her second birthday because I just feel like she's getting awfully old to put in a play pen. But who knows.

Anyways, usually when I put her in her play pen she just lays down and goes back to sleep. But some mornings she's persistent and yells and talks for a while so I end up getting back up and starting my day. Yesterday, was one of those mornings. I put her in her play pen and go back to bed. As soon as my head hits the pillow, she yells out, "Momma."

I open my eyes. I wait.

"Momma. Poddy."

*gasp*

This I think was the turning point in our potty training.

Last week, Evie was very hit and miss. Some days it seemed like she sort of "got" potty training. Others, I might as well have been asking her to develop complex theories in chemical physics and write graduate level dissertations on Thoreau. It was incredibly frustrating. And most of all, it was not at all what I was expecting.

When we started potty training, I knew it wouldn't be an overnight thing. But not until I started really asking friends for the nitty gritty details did I discover that this was something I'd be working on for probably the next year. At least.

YEAR?!? A whole freaking YEAR?!? My gosh...and no, it won't be a year of dragging a two-year-old to the potty every 10-30 minutes and singing the potty song and coaxing and encouraging and bribing and BEGGING her to go potty. But for probably a year we will be dealing with taking her to the potty when she needs to go, cleaning up accidents when she forgets to go, praising her for remembering to go. Lord help me, I might be potty training number 2 before the first one is able to sleep through the night without an accident. But everyone keeps telling me that girls are easier. I hope Elly is taking notes on everything Big Sister is doing...that would certainly make life easier.

The last two days however, have been more like what I envisioned of potty training. Instead of the frustrating waiting and coaxing while still ending up with a wet pull-up, we have success. I put Evie on the potty, she sits contentedly for a bit and then she pees. Then she jumps up screaming "Did-dit! Did-dit! Poddy! Poddy!" It's adorable. Then we flush it (She always says bye), rinse the potty cup, and go get her treat. When she wants a snickers, she points at the jar and tries her best to say it. It usually comes out "Snirss" and if she wants a gummy bear she points at their bag on top of the fridge and growls like a bear. Treat in hand, we replace her Pull-Ups and she returns to whatever she was doing. We have been practically accident free for two days.

WOOHOO!!

Today, she even peed in a public potty, I think. She says she did. And she may well have. I was too busy laughing with her at the hilarity of trying to keep her teensy butt from falling into a toilet. She thought it was a riot.

And I know that it's not all downhill from here. We may have days again where she doesn't want to potty. Ones where she has lots of accidents. But we'll keep going. I have seen the light at the end of the tunnel!