This Mother's Day and Moms I Admire

Tomorrow is Mother's Day and I can't help but to reflect on how wonderful everything seems right now.

I adore being a mom and spending time with my little one. I love that I have wonderful children in my care that I get to "mother" through the week so that their moms can go to work or wherever it is they are going and feel safe and secure in the knowledge that their little ones are loved while they are away. I am thankful for my own mother who taught me how to nurture and to love.

There are so many other things in my life that are changing and/or have changed in the course of the last year. These things aren't really related to Mother's Day, but as I reflect on life I am thankful nonetheless.

After years of being a church gypsy, I have found a place where I can love and serve and grow in faith. In the past year I have seen friendships in my life change and evolve. Some of the change has been hard. Some has been very positive and uplifting.

I guess some of those changes in a way reflect on motherhood in that I feel I can be a better mother when I have support and friendship in my life.

There are so many supermoms in my life who inspire me to be better.

There's hippymama - She works outside the home, then lovingly makes dinner for the fam - often grilling a feast outside and sending her kiddos in the yard with nets to catch anything their minds can imagine. She knows when to step back and laugh or sing a song when a child has gone off the "deep end" and uses humor in a way that I only wish I could in the heat of the moment. She is sensitive to the needs of her children and won't let others push unrealistic expectations on them. She is a true giver to everyone she comes across and her presence is truly refreshing.

There's wondermama - She cooks, she cleans, she homeschools her kiddo and keeps track of a high energy toddler. She knows what it means to be the great wife that loves, supports, and respects her hubby, probably more than I ever will. She gives wings to her daughter's creativity and ideas by helping her write her own stories. She sees the value in letting her kiddos know that their creative ideas matter. She is a writer and works to sharpen her own creativity, thus striving for balance by allowing time for her own personal growth.

There's hipmama - She's willing to do anything, move anywhere, in efforts to create a better life for her family. She seeks out opportunities for her children to get them out and about. She is amazingly creative and uses her creativity along with her sense of humor to help her children succeed. She sees the value in turning garbage into "treasure" just to encourage a child to complete the task of picking up, something I could definitely work on. She is a writer and her words touch others. She is a gem of a friend and loyal to the core.

There's moonmama - Like the moon she doesn't seek to shine for herself, but reflects light to others. She gives her time, knowledge, and wisdom to other moms seeking answers for nurturing care and comfort for their children. She has a busy household of kiddos, but seeks to provide loving care that is respectful of each child. She supports and inspires moms to find the strength to mother in ways that might be different from how they were raised. Her support kept me going at a time when I was really discouraged as a new mom.

There's huggymama - She knows how to love, love, love and nurture. She would move a mountain if she could if it would help one of her kiddos (or grandkids). She has the world's biggest heart and her sensitivity and compassion towards others is insanely admirable. She is supportive without being invasive. She provides surprise coffee delivery at times when her daughter is feeling overstressed and overtired. She makes the best damn chicken dumplinoodles I've ever had. Happy Mother's Day mom!

Okay - so the names are cheesy. Give me a break. It was hard to come up with so many names. There are so many moms I admire in so many ways. So I hope no one is offended for not "making the list". These were some people that are in my life right now on an ongoing basis that I wanted to acknowledge.

I know that as a mom it's easy to be so self-critical. We see all of our faults. This Mother's Day I hope to give these specific mothers the gift of seeing themselves through someone else's eyes!

The Potty Situation

Well, we're ten days out and I figured I'd give an update. We breezed through the constant reward stage. Boo no longer receives potty candy for sitting on the potty or for having dry pants. He is consistent enough with using the potty that I felt it was time to get rid of that reward. We have continued potty prize for when there's an actual deposit in the potty. He looks forward to that. Some days bring more accidents than others, but he definitely knows what to do. I don't force him to potty. I remind him where pee and poo goes every now and then and that's about it. Sometimes he jumps up and announces he needs to use the potty and sometimes he waits too long and has an accident. Either way he's learning from the experience and I can see that he is progressing nicely.

I do think that it's been a bit stressful on him. He's been a bit clingier and restless than usual. This makes sense to me though. For years he was able to just let it go whenever. Now he has to constantly try to figure out what his body needs to do and when it needs to be done. So I'm trying to be as supportive as I can. Now that we're done with Kindermusik, we don't have many evening commitments. I'm trying to be very choosy about how we spend our time so that he gets plenty of down time and one on one time with mom and dad through this process. It's such a HUGE milestone though and I'm so very proud of him. Hurray Boo!

Giving All to God?

How does one give all things to God? There are those who would answer with a witty, christianese statement that simplifies the entire process. There are those who would quote a verse as though the verse in itself is the process. But if it were that easy, would Christ have prayed to God that his cup pass from him if that were at all possible? By cup, meaning his torture and eventual death on the cross.

What if the very depth of a person's soul and what they believe to be the greatest part of their existence is in jeapardy? Will a simplistic remark and/or bible verse set things right in a hurry? I think not.

The best answer I can come up with is that it's in the process, tears, begging, denial, anger, grief, and endangered hopes that we walk a path similar to the one of Christ, with a cross unique to our own life and situation. In the process, perhaps somehow we learn to stop begging for a different path and accept the cup which we are given and peacefully resign ourselves to whatever may come. I guess that's the best I can come up with for now.

Another Potty Post

I'm sure I'm beating a dead potty horse by continuing to post about this, but I'm just such a proud mama!

Last night hubby and I decided to do away with the practice runs that are a part of the PTLTD method. It just seemed a bit much. The idea behind it is to educate him on what he can do next time in order to prevent the accident, but I think no matter how positive I try to make it, it comes across as punitive. We've continued the pants checks for now (roughly every hour) and he gets to pick out a candy every time his pants are dry at a pants check. This has gone well and he has even volunteered a few pants checks when he knew he was dry! Starting tomorrow I'm going to decrease the amount of pants checks and eventually phase them out.

We've continued the potty prizes. Boo gets sooooo excited when he gets a potty prize and is very proud to tell daddy that he got his prize for peeing in the potty. He got 2 potty prizes the first day that we had potty prizes available, which was day #2 of potty training. He got 3 potty prizes yesterday and 2 so far today! We'll probably continue these for awhile until he's having very few accidents.

Every time he comes with me when I use the potty he is very proud to tell me that "[Boo] puts pee pee in the potty too!" He's very proud of his accomplishments and I'm so happy for him in that.

I think there are more updated versions of the potty plan that we used. I know there's some that have done a 3-day plan and there's other 2 and 1 day plans out there. The one book that I used is older and I think maybe that's part of the problem I have with it. When I reflect on it, it gave me a great plan, but only because I worked to soften it and modify it and incorporate some things from the "No Cry Potty Solution" into it. I wonder if it's because authoritarian parenting was more of a norm when the book was written, versus most parenting resources leaning more towards authoritative parenting in this day and age. The book definitely comes across as a bit harsh at times. My gut tells me that some of the newer 2 and 3 day methods are probably better written and gentler than the resource I used. However, I say that without having read any of them. I'm not knocking the plan completely, because it was definitely the foundation of what we worked on when we started training. I guess if I'm knocking anything, it's the authors recommended implementation of the plan. I wonder if I'm making sense or just rambling?

Anyways, hurray for potty training. It's actually more fun than I thought it would be!

Potty Day #2 - Update

Well, so I was wrong about the diaper thing. Boo woke up after sleeping in and insisted on his underwear instead of a diaper. So, hacking and feverish, he chose to continue the potty training. He was definitely a bit groggier and less energetic and I can tell he's not feeling well. Although, I have to wonder if the lower energy actually helped with the potty training! Less bouncing around meant more focus during the teaching.

I must say that thus far I'm impressed with the "Potty Train in Less Than a Day" method, which is mostly what I went by. I did incorporate some of "The No Cry Potty Solution" also. I do think that the implementation of PTLTD method could make a huge difference. I think it could be very harsh and insensitive if implemented in an impatient manner. I don't like the author's use of the word "reprimand" simply because that word has a negative connotation. If you ever read the book, you'll see where it's used. However, I think a person could easily take the ideas and methodology and soften the plan a bit, which is pretty much what I did. One thing that was not in PTLTD that I added was a potty prize box. I picked up stickers, $1 stuff at Target, party favor toys, etc...to make the potty prize box. I decided that potty prize would ONLY be for a deposit in the potty, not for an attempt. For an attempt, I still gave candy in the beginning. However, towards the end Boo forgot to ask for the candy after attempting and I didn't offer. I don't plan to offer anymore candy at this point, only praise for attempts. I do want to continue with the potty prize box for now because he's very proud of this.

We spent about 3 hours in the kitchen on potty training. Then his yawns and fussiness increased, so we settled in for a movie. He picked out "Up Down" or "Up" as it's known to most people. I reminded him often that "mommy likes dry underwear" and if he "has to pee pee, that needs to go to the potty." Towards the end of the movie I noticed a potty dance. I reminded him that "pee pee goes in the potty". He started heading towards the kitchen potty area. I followed and sat down on the floor as he started to potty and then subsequently got sprayed with urine. I feel bad because I kind of jumped a little and had to reassure him that what he was doing was wonderful and mommy was so proud. He was very proud to retrieve his potty prize after that and showed it to daddy when daddy got home shortly after that.

So now that he has the concept down and has successfully peed in the potty on several occasions, I'm supposed to remind him every once in awhile that "underwear stays dry" and we put "pee pee in the potty" and other such things. Also, I'll be conducting a dry pants check every hour. At this point I'll still give him candy for the dry pants in order to reinforce how important dry underwear is.

Then tomorrow, according to the book, I should just be doing dry pants checks prior to events that occur regularly, such as meals, snacks, before nap, etc...I will also be sending out constant reminders of where pee pee and poo poo go as well as reminders of the expectations of wearing underwear. There is a procedure to follow for accidents whereby a child practices using the potty 10 times in a row after an accident. We did this for the one accident that Boo had today. He was reluctant of course, but with some encouragement he completed all ten trials very quickly. The point is to do it quickly so that the child practices rushing to the bathroom. So it was easy to make it more fun because we got to run to the potty. So if he has an accident that is the procedure to follow for now. I will still be putting him in diapers for nap time and nighttime. This is a completely different skill that is more dependent on his physiological development and not something he has direct control over. So for now, I'm not going to worry about nap time or night time wetting.

So I feel like we've gotten a great start on our potty training journey. I'm looking forward to seeing how things go. Of course Boo will have accidents. Many people misunderstand the PTLTD method and think that the author is claiming that a child will be accident free after a day. That's ridiculous! Accidents are part of the process of learning. I would definitely recommend this approach, even just as a catalyst to start training or to mesh with other methods. There's just a lot of great ideas. There a few things that sound a bit harsh that I think a person must wade through and soften up a bit, but overall I think it's very great.

And on another note, I'm so proud of Boo for working so hard despite being sick. I'd love to get inside his head and figured out what motivated him all of a sudden to make the switch. It seems like a lot of work for just a few pieces of candy!

Potty Training Day #2

Well, we spent much of last night listening to Boo cough. He's now passed out on the couch and wakes up to have a coughing fit now and then. So, I am pretty sure that we'll be back in diapers today. I did find some cotton training pants and plastic covers last night. I bought quite a few of them so that my lackluster laundry habits wouldn't get in the way of plenty of dry underwear. I really am so proud of him. Despite being tired when we got home from grandma and papa's house last night, he wanted to sit on his potty. And we caught our second pee of the day then! Woo hoo! I got some other snacks to go along with the candy - chips, dried fruit, nuts, etc...I don't think he responds well to that much sugar during the day. Also, I bought a few cheapy toys in the $1 section at Target and in the party supply section for a potty prize box. When there's an actual deposit in the potty he'll get to pick something out of the prize box. So he got this little plastic car last night after peeing. He was so proud to show daddy the car he got for putting his peepee in the potty!

Boo Pooed and Peed on Potty Today!!!

Well, I wasn't planning on "officially" beginning the potty-training yet. I put the word official in quotes because I have been doing pre-potty training stuff with him ever since he was about 15-18 months old. I've always shown him the process, talked about it, let him sit on the potty seat, etc...He's been able to watch his older daycare friends, some of who are completely potty-trained and some who are working on it. But I've never actively instructed him in it. I personally wanted to wait until he was older as I felt he would get through the training process more quickly that way. I especially didn't want to train now since we're moving in a month. I guess I figured why train him now if we're just going to have a huge change in a month (moving into the new home) that could cause him to regress. BUT today he handed me his own plan. He told me this morning he wanted to potty and get potty candy (my daycare kiddo that's training gets potty candy when he uses the potty). I just happen to be in the middle of "The No Cry Potty Solution" by Elizabeth Pantley, so I stripped him down and sat on the floor while he sat on the potty. Then he told me he wanted a pull-up. I told him we don't have pull-ups, so he'd have to do diaper or underwear and I let him choose. Well, he decided he wanted underwear. So I had to run upstairs and climb over boxes in his room to get to his dresser and pull out his underwear stash (thankfully I already have an underwear supply for him). Since I'm doing daycare today I couldn't really just put him in underwear, so I used one of my cloth diaper covers over it to help contain the leaks. They don't keep all the leakage in as I later saw, but they reduce the mess. So he's spent the morning in just underwear and a cover with no other clothes. I pulled out my "Potty Train in Less Than a Day" book by Nathan Azrin. This is the method that I have planned on using for quite some time. However, I do not yet have my potty doll, so I find that we've now started a hybrid of "Potty Train in Less Than a Day" and some ideas in "The No Cry Potty Solution." I'm going to run out after work today and get Boo some more underwear and perhaps a few plastic covers if I can find some. He has pooped in the potty twice today and peed once. He was sad about putting diaper on for nap time, but I only have normal underwear, not cloth training pants, so diaper was our best choice for nap time. But I did promise him that he would go back into underwear as soon as he woke up. Now that he's initiated his own potty training, I won't go back to diapers (with the exception of nap time and nighttime) unless he really resists and insists on the diapers. So I guess we'll see where this goes!