potty training update

Kaylee: we've essentially given up. We'll try again in a few months. Essentially we're lazy and she's not motivated and we don't want to fight it. It was so easy with Ethan that if waiting a few months is what it takes for Kaylee, that's fine. She uses the potty to pee several times a day, but we keep her in a diaper because she doesn't always tell us she needs to go. And she always poops in her diaper now. So we'd just rather have the protection! Next time we try she'll already be comfortable with the whole potty system (undies down, sit, pee, wipe, undies up, flush, hand wash etc), so I guess that's something. Plus, since she does use the potty several times a day, we are going through fewer diapers, which is certainly nice.

Ethan: Ethan gets a diaper for night-time and other than that he's good! we ask him to go potty before we leave the house or right when we get wherever we're going, and other than that he pretty much tells us when he has to go. Sometimes we ask if he has to go and he says no and we trust him and it works out fine. Sometimes he tells us he has to go and we tell him he has to hold it (like if we're in the car) and he has never once had an accident when we've asked him to hold it. It's kind of awesome. I've cut our monthly diaper order in half, as well as all the diaper accessories. I like our diaper genie, but their room definitely smells better now that there's only one kid's worth of diapers in there! We had a little regression for a bit, and I told Ethan that if he kept his undies dry all day long he could have a cookie at night. We went to the grocery store and he got to pick out his cookie dough (he chose chocolate brownie w/ orange halloween chips, which was of course the right choice). When he earns his cookie at night, he either declines the cookie or shares with Kaylee! (crazy kid!) we thought Ethan getting a cookie and kaylee not getting one might be a motivator for kaylee but Ethan just shares with her! At this point sharing seems like the more important life lesson, so we just laugh and ask if we can have a "little tiny piece" too (sometimes ethan only share a few crumbs with kaylee, but he always offers and she's always satisfied with a "little tiny")

This is certainly not how we predicted potty training would go but... we'll take it!

Below is a very special video featuring our favorite potty phrase. It's really Ethan's phrase, although at the end there's one clip of Kaylee repeating it too, but it's an ethan original. If you aren't currently a parent of young children you may want to skip this video. There's no poop (or privates) shown in it, but it is a video of the kids sitting on their various potties... working hard. It's not a video for everyone, but I find it hilarious, so if you choose to watch it, I hope you do too. :)