I guess it’s only fitting that my mURPHY’S lAW mONDAYS have been posted on Tuesdays lately. I mean, that’s like the crux of Murphy’s Law, right? Anyways, this past week was dedicated to potty training my little princess. It was hell on wheels. I seriously contemplated checking myself into a mental institution on Day 2 [...]
Jan 112012
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I woke up this morning thinking that it was awfully light outside for 7:30.
See, I don’t use a traditional alarm clock. My alarm clocks are named Grady, Styles, & Madilyn. Styles uses an alarm clock and he gets me up at 7:30 if I’m not already awake thanks to Grady. I sniffed Grady’s neck for a few minutes and then climbed out of bed to check the time.
8:20.
CRAP.
My neighbors take Styles to school and he is supposed to be at their house at 8:20.
I went to wake him up to get him moving, knowing full well that I would have to load all 3 kids into the car to take Styles to school.
I went outside to check the temp so that I could dress my children appropriately, while Styles made himself breakfast. He doesn’t like eggs, and Madilyn called dibs on the rest of the milk so he couldn’t have any cereal. Tyson Mini Chicken Sandwiches for breakfast? HECK! WHY NOT? He popped them into the microwave, peeled himself a banana, and even took pictures of the stuff so that I could tell you all about it. Easy peasy. This might not be such a bad morning after all.
Whoops, I thought too fast. While I was making Grady’s egg, Madilyn and Grady somehow demolished the entire house. Tupperware all over the kitchen floor, the playroom mess had vomited itself into the living room. Clothes all over Madilyn’s room.
HOW DO THEY DO THIS CRAP SO QUICKLY?
Babies eat breakfast. Madilyn wants my egg. Fine. Eat my egg, I’ll grab something else later.
OK, babies are dressed, Styles is done with his Tyson Mini Chicken Nuggets and could only eat 1/2 of his banana. Whatever. Go brush your teeth.
I really need to get myself dressed. This white tank top sans bra is not appropriate to take Styles in to school. I look at myself in the mirror and realize that my naturally curly hair is naturally lookin’ like Buckwheat’s fro right now so I run some lotion through it as I hear screams from the other side of the house: “GRADY NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! MOOOOOOOOOM! GRADY GOT WHAT HE WANTED!”
I immediately knew what that meant so I ran through the house and by our front window wearing all of nothing but my white tank top and a pair of aqua panties. Cute.
When I get to the bathroom, I see Grady happily splashing in a puddle of Madilyn’s pee. He had taken the little bowl out of her potty chair, full of urine, drank some, and dumped the rest on the floor. That I just mopped yesterday.
I stand there, speechless, which my kids know means I’m pissed.
Pun not intended.
I contemplate getting the camera to take a picture of Grady frolicking in pee then think better of it and run the bath. I put Grady in the bath with the water running and stopper unplugged so that warm water is just flowing into the bathtub without pooling. I undress him as he’s laughing and salvage his dry diaper before using his clothing to wipe the puddle of pee up off of the floor.
As I’m running around the house, half naked, trying to get this mess cleaned up, I realize that it is almost 10. Styles is an hour late for school.
I mop the floor again while Grady splashes in the bathtub, having a wonderful time. I wonder how he can possibly stand the taste of pee in his mouth.
As I’m finally soaping Grady up, Madilyn strolls in with a cereal bar wrapper full of crumbs and proceeds to dump it all over the floor. I scream her name and she leaves the bathroom, only to return a few seconds later with her mop so that she can clean the crumbs up off of the wet floor. She begins pushing the crumbs all over the bathroom and I tell her to leave.
Once Grady is dry and redressed, I proceed to clean the crumbs up and shuffle the children out the door so that I can get Styles to school.
Can you see the mischief in his eyes? I should have known better....
School is 1.5 miles away and about .75 mile into our journey, it begins to rain. Hard.
Less than 3 months ago, this sort of morning would have resulted in a serious migraine. It would have crept up out of the anger in my chest, into my neck, and settled itself nicely into my left eye, temple, and neck. I would have driven my aching head to Chik-Fil-A and ordered a large Cookies & Cream milkshake then driven home without once taking my mouth off of the straw, and laid on the sofa all day, crying in pain.
I would have failed to change diapers, realized at 2pm that lunch had yet to be administered, and then sulked around staring into the fridge when dinner time rolled around.
There was no migraine today. There wasn’t even a headache today. Instead, there was a good 10 minute period where I went outside to breathe the fresh, cool, rainy air. I felt rejuvenated and willing to tackle the house and the children who constantly conspire to keep the place looking like a nursery school at 3pm.
I got lunch on the table at a reasonable hour, I put Madilyn to bed for her nap early, and I was able to change the sheets on my bed and fold some laundry.
Without Paleo, I would have been a worthless wreck today. Thankfully, I was able to take care of my children AND my house in the wake of a less-than-enviable start to my day.
Want to know where I get the Tyson Mini Chicken Sandwiches? Follow this link closely.
Disclosure: This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias. #CBias All crazy assertions that I have no more migraines, and all other opinions are my very own and were not influenced in any way.
Months and months ago I shared that we were finally in the market to put Madilyn into a big girl bed because I found her dangling over the side of her crib one day. Well, it took me until a week ago to finally make the leap.
I just KNEW that Madilyn was going to be like those kids on Supernanny where Jo has to take them back to bed 758 times before they stay, sobbing in their beds.
Since Madilyn was 5 months old we have had the same night time routine. We watch Sprout’s Good Night Show for 15 minutes, brush our teeth, sing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”, and then recite the last half of “Good Night Moon”. We then kiss goodnight and she lays in bed.
We ended up deciding on a twin bed for longevity’s sake. Kyle’s mom and dad got Madilyn’s new bed and we went to pick it up a few days later.
Well, when Kyle opened Madilyn’s “big girl bed” and finished putting it together, she was SO excited. She jumped right in and didn’t want to get out, despite the fact that it wasn’t even nap time.
(Yes, we need a box spring). This is Madilyn laying in her bed for the first time EVER.
“Yeah,” I thought, “THAT’S gonna last. PSH!”
Naturally, Kyle was closing that night so I was going to have to do bed time all alone. Madilyn and I did our standard night time routine and I put her in bed. As she snuggled into her covers, she told me that she had to pee.
“Great, now it begins” I thought. Being that she had potty trained the week prior, I obliged by taking her to the toilet. Nothing happened. Just as I thought. I took her back to bed and told her that it was bed time. I recited “Good Night Moon” again and tucked her in. A couple of minutes later, just after I had cuddled into my big chair, she sauntered out asking for water.
Being that she had potty trained the week prior, I told her no, no water and took her back to bed and told her that it was bed time. I recited ”Good Night Moon” yet again and tucked her in. Again. I left the room as she was trying to ask me for more water but her requests fell on deaf ears.
A few minutes later, she came back out and told me that she had to poop. Being that she had potty trained the week prior, I obliged. I sat her down on the potty, touched her shoulders, looked her in the eye, and told her that she had 5 minutes to prove that she had to go poop or else she was going to go back to bed.
5 minutes passed without so much as a fart so I pulled her up, redressed her, and took her back to bed. This time, I told her that if she came out of her room again, I was going to put her in the crib (which was still in her bedroom). She shook her head from side to side violently and then told me that she wanted to sleep in her big girl bed.
I went back out into the living room, looking forward to spending some time alone.
5 minutes later, Madilyn was still in her bedroom.
10 minutes later, Madilyn was still in her room. In her bed!
30 minutes later, Madilyn was STILL in her room!
The skies opened up and God shown his face upon my living room as heavenly angels sang a song of Wonderment and Awe.
And it has honestly been that easy ever since.
What was NOT so easy, was picking out her bedding. We looked at Beyond-Bedding.com and found some extremely cute sets at very reasonable prices. There were some lovely, mature bed sets for girls, some funky ones, some more super girly ones, I just couldn’t decide.
One of my favorites was this zebra print bedding. This SCREAMS Madilyn to me but she has black polka dots on one of her walls and I thought the polka dots and stripes would clash. What do you think?
OK so THEN there’s this make your own toddler bedding that is to die for. SO many options, SO many customizations, SO much fun. There are 4 steps to designing your own bedding and Beyond Bedding makes it incredibly easy to do. There are thousands upon thousands of things that you can do with your child’s room with this stuff.
I couldn’t decide so I sent several links to Kyle to look at and he inadvertently chose the one that really was my favorite all along.
Isn’t it the CUTEST?! I just loved the ladybugs, the black gingham, and the red fabric with white polka dots. I also thought that it would look great with the polka dots that were already on her wall.
We placed the order and then I immediately called my mom who ordered the hamper and wall decals to go with it.
When it arrived, Madilyn was SO SO SO excited to have a new “blankek” to snuggle with. I was extremely impressed with the quality. For $99 I wasn’t sure how soft it would feel but it’s like a soft cloud! The fabric is wonderfully soft. The whole set came with a comforter, sham, dust ruffle, and valance – truly a steal.
SO now that it’s all assembled and Madilyn is in absolute AMOR with her new bedroom, I am happy and beaming with pride not only at our huge milestone, but the beautiful room that is hers.
When Grady finally goes into his own bedroom, we’ll be doing the make your own baby bedding for sure. There is so much to choose from.
If you are in the market for high quality, beautiful, inexpensive bedding for your baby, toddler, child, or teen, I HIGHLY recommend Beyond-Bedding.com!
Disclaimer: I was provided a bedding set for review from Beyond-Bedding.com, however; my opinions were not influenced in any way by compensation. All thoughts, opinions, and precious babies in ladybug bedding are my very own.
I’ve always thought that potty training should NOT be a long, drawn out process.
I’m pretty sure I’ve told people that it shouldn’t be a difficult thing. What I meant by that was not that potty training should be easy, but that it shouldn’t take fooooreeevvvvvverrrrrr. It should be a cut wet and dry thing.
I made the huge mistake of trying to potty train Styles at 18 months. It just didn’t work. After a day, I realized that and gave up but continued to introduce him to the toilet. You know, the one that poses as a throne and sings a Stately Tune as the child urinates or defecates into the potty. Yeah that one. It’s a freaking toy. And that’s all it became. Another toy to play with, another game to play.
It wasn’t until the hurricanes of 2004 after Styles had just turned 3 that I finally got sick and tired of changing diapers. Disgusting diapers nonetheless. When Jeanne hit, I told Styles that we had no more diapers where we were going, only undies. He wasn’t excited about it but he didn’t have one single accident. He was potty trained in like 12 hours. And that was long before I heard of 3 Day Potty Training.
I also think that Pull-Ups are a huge money making scam, as evidenced by the fact that they cost double what diapers cost and you get 1/2 the amount. Not to mention Huggies’ new pull-on-diaper.
DUH PEOPLE! HULLOOOOO??? Are you seeing what I’m seeing? A Pull-Up on a BABY! Hmmmmmmm.
It absorbs your kid’s pee. It’s a DIAPER.
Pull-Ups = Diapers. Your kid knows it. I know it. Stop wasting your money.
Looks like a duck, walks like a duck, it’s a freaking duck, OK?
Anyways, potty training is not a game of horseshoes. There is no, “He/She/It is almost potty trained.” “He/She/It is almost there!” They either are or they aren’t. No almost. Your child has been almost potty trained for 6 months. Mine went from not even remotely “ready” to holy crap – DONE. Potty. Trained.
I didn’t think that Madilyn was “ready” but a good friend of mine introduced me to the 3 Day Potty Training System. I devoured the book in a matter of minutes and thought, “Um…that’s IT? That’s seriously IT? Where is the rest of the eBook?” I thought for sure I was missing some pages.
When I realized that all of the information I could possibly need to successfully potty train my kids was nestled within those pages like the finest buried treasure, I resigned myself to the fact that in exactly 5 days, I wouldn’t be leaving my house for 3 days straight. I was going to get this biznezz DONE. Screw the fact that we were in a car accident and I would have to deal with getting a rental (twice), and handle all of the resulting phone calls with both insurance companies. I was going to do this now or never.
Now won.
I’m not giving away the treasures. Not here at least. But what I AM doing, is sponsoring a giveaway of this awesome system because I believe so strongly in it, and I want other parents to try it too. If you want it to work for you, DON’T stray from the book. DON’T leave your house (like I did) because it will result in craziness that you can read about here, or worse. While you can’t force your children to drink, invest in a Sam’s Club Size box of Popsicles. What kid doesn’t love Popsicles? Plus, they’re extremely hydrating.
So I’m giving away a copy of the eBook that comes with the website’s live online help. You get lifetime support from people who have been there, done that.
And if you need any extra help from someone, you are more than welcome to come to my Facebook page and ask, or just comment here. I’ll do whatever I can to support you.
I’m not going to lie – this was not even remotely easy. On Day 2, I considered checking myself into a mental institution to get a break. My extremely strong-willed child would hold her bladder until I sat down to feed the baby and then she’d pee on the floor the second he would latch. Can you feel my face burning?
Luckily, the book provides the following help:
The ebook teaches you:
- How to work with the child that has ZERO interest or motivation;
- How to work with stubborn children;
- How to address your child’s fear of using the toilet;
- How to get your child to actually go IN the toilet (pee and poop) when they are ON the toilet;
- How to avoid the one mistake that will sabotoge your efforts to potty train in 3 days (if you have already started potty training);
- How to overcome and prevent constipation;
- How travel with your newly potty trained child;
- How to use public restrooms with your newly potty trained child;
- How to correctly address night time accidents;
- How to correctly address regression or relapses;
- How to include your daycare provider in your potty training efforts;
- How to get your child to tell you they have to go before they actually go;
- How to work with an older child;
- How to potty train twins and triplets;
- How to potty train children with autism or who are speech-delayed
Now that you have seen that list, do you want to give me yet ANOTHER reason why you don’t think your kid is ready? Yeah, didn’t think so.
Check 3 Day Potty Training out here.
Bye-Bye Poop!We cloth diaper so when Madilyn poops, we dump it into the toilet and flush it. As children begin to potty train, some are afraid of losing their poop so I have taught Madilyn to say “good bye” to her poop as we flush it so that [hopefully] she’s not afraid of losing it [...] |
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