It's official, we are a diaper free family! I'm still not willing to say it was "easy", but it sort of was this time. Everyone told me not to rush boys...... "if they aren't ready, they aren't ready", I was told. But I was still really, really wanting to stop the flow of waste to the dump, the grossness factor, and the expense of diapers. H really didn't show ANY interest this past summer, whereas Cally was interested right when she was a few months past two. She, was a whole complicated story in terms of being fully diaper free. She was great with the pee by 2.5 years and was diaper free at 2 and three quarters.
For the past few months, we've offered Hazen jelly beans, gummy bears, lollipops, stickers, etc. to get him to use the potty. We were getting nothing. No interest in the potty and no interest in the aforementioned rewards.
A week and a half ago, I had this moment of weakness where I mentioned to Hazen that Santa just might give "big boys" (aka boys who use the potty) more presents. The words came out of my mouth and I was horrified. He asked a few questions about Santa and his elves and how they knew what he was or was not doing. I made up something and then let it go.
Later that day, we were at a kids consignment shop, looking for pants, and Hazen was hiding behind a rack of clothes, informing me that he was "pooping". We had dropped Cally and John at the grocery store to get some stuff and killing time, so I walked him to the bathroom to change him. When I looked at his diaper, I realized it was clean. I immediately sat him on the potty and he didn't fight me (as he usually had). He was all proud, even let out a little fart, and then someone started knocking on the door. I gave him a minute or so, but nothing was happening, so I decided to let that person go and then return to the toilet to try again (there was only one bathroom in the place).
Unfortunately, the woman waiting to use the toilet was in a wheel chair with an oxygen tank and she offered to let another little boy go before her. I sat H on my lap and told him to be patient, we'd return to the toilet. As we waited, we got a text from John saying that they were done at the grocery store........ After 10 minutes, we finally got back into the bathroom. I sat him on the toilet, told him how proud I'd be if he pooped in the potty and then heard someone else knock on the door?!?!?!? We waited a minute or two, nothing happened, so I aborted the mission and we headed to pick up John and Cal.
We needed to stop at Bed Bath and Beyond, so I decided to try one more time. Still nothing. On the way home, we all spelled a poop and lamented about how sad we were to have missed the opportunity. When we got home, I got distracted by unloading groceries and he asked me to change him. I reluctantly went up stairs to change another dirty diaper and found it was still empty. I sat him on the potty and told him to just try to do it in the potty and then offered a whole lot of high fructose sugar options. Low and behold, it worked! He pooped in the potty! Then he peed and pooped in the potty the rest of the weekend and the next day at Tammy's, like he'd always been doing it.
On the following Tuesday, known as "Mission Day with Dad", he had three accidents by noon. John said he "asked" Hazen if he had to go to the bathroom plenty of times, but didn't bring him to the potty. Since then, he's had no accidents. We are so amazed at how easy it ended up being, and proud of H.
While it is exciting to be out with the diapers and changing table and all that, it is a little bitter sweet. It means we really don't have babies in the house anymore. But fortunately, our good friends, Cath and Ty, just welcomed a new bundle of joy to our world.
Mazzy Pearce Merritt was born on November 2nd and she's just what we all need. A beautiful newborn baby that we can hold and rock and love, but not lose sleep over.
In other news, we've been sledding and skiing! And that makes all of the Abbott's happy!
But the snow didn't stick around, so we got back on those horses at Medora's and both kids are feeling so much more comfortable on this gentle giant:
Milestones are just that. Place markers, of sorts. They are timestamps that we remember for the rest of our life. It's not that I want to rush my kids and have them grow up more quickly. In fact, there are many moments where I just want to freeze the gingers in time. However, for me, potty training is one of the most sought after milestone to reach. Knowing just how hard it can be, I am so happy to have this is behind us. And we couldn't have reached this milestone without the best "cheer leader" of all. Big Sister Cal!
