The Third Summer

The first summer was an extension of my maternity leave, an ongoing cycle of eating, playing, and sleeping that now leaves me remembering that time primarily as a joyous hibernation.  I started this blog that summer to help me take it all in.

Last summer we had one-year-old walkers.  With official toddlers on our hands, we played outside more, became brave enough to vacation, and worked to transition out of breastfeeding and down to one nap. 

When they return to their child care center in late August, Michael and Sophie will likely go into a transitional (gulp) preschool classroom. Seriously, that made me take a deep breath.  As they continue to grow from toddlers to little kids, there are a couple changes that we will embark upon in the remaining eight weeks or so of this third summer: potty training and ditching the pacifiers. 

I know it's getting way past time to have tossed the paci's already (they're two--26 months old), but since the kids only use them for sleeping, it just hasn't seemed worth the trouble of upsetting bedtimes just to meet some expectation of what is "normal."  Still, I do have the goal of getting rid of those suckers (pun sort of intended) before late August.

As far as the potty issue, we have two matching potty seats that the kids have sat on a few times without diapers but that are mostly stacked, unstacked, and stood on when Micheal and Sophie come to the bathroom with me.  We also have a toilet seat with a little one on the inside on the real toilet.  Michael has sat happily on there as well, but Sophie is not a fan.  Throw in the collapsable step stools (love those) that we currently use for brusha-brusha time, and we're...almost prepared.  We need some training pants, eventually big-boy and big-girl undies that I plan to have Michael and Sophie pick out, and maybe a chart and stickers.  But even once we have all the stuff, are we all reeeeeally ready?

Based on this article from the Mayo Clinic, Michael and Sophie are pretty much there.  However, I have yet to have seen a dry diaper in the morning, and there have been a few poopy ones recently.  I feel like I should wait for that before I give this a real go.

I'm also not certain of my method.  Will we just go to training pants and set a timer for every thirty minutes?  I've heard one mom say calling the timer the "potty fairy" worked pretty well since then it's not just mommy saying it's time to put down the toys and sit on the potty...again.  Maybe we should do that 3-day naked weekend potty training thing?

I don't know.  I do want to start this summer since I'm home with the kids, and playing outside makes accidents less of a thing, but obviously I still have some homework to do.

If you have any advice, as always, feel free to share!