GOING very well

Ahhhh . . . how I love the beginning of nap time. It's 1:23pm, and as I write, both girls are snug in their beds, dreaming about the afternoon to come. The beginning of nap time is the BEST . . . it's the beginning of my 'off duty' time. The feeling is almost as good as when you turn off your light at night and snuggle into your own bed, knowing that you have a full night of sleep ahead of you (well, YOU may have some sleep . . . I am missing that feeling right now . . . but you get the picture). I know I have at least an hour or so to myself before Kate wakes up, and about 2 1/2 hours until I'm on potty patrol with Meg again.

Meg's potty usage is nothing short of fantastic. We are on day three, and yesterday we only had 1.5 accidents. I say '.5' for one of them because she realized that she had to go as soon as she started . . . stopped herself and told me she needed to go . . . then finished on the potty. I don't count that as a full-out mishap . . . I give Meg credit for recognizing the urge and holding it in.

Dude -- that is hard, when you think about it. You know what it feels like to have to go . . . then to go a bit and have to stop and hold it is a difficult thing to do. Meg is pretty great, I think.

Anyway, day three is going great. No accidents so far. We actually left the house! And Meg wore big girl panties! And we didn't have to change them! We made it to the doctor and to Target with NO accidents! It was awesome! (If you were potty training, you'd understand the use of all the exclamations . . . this is a feat worthy of many, many exclamation points.)

Just before nap, Meg declared "Poo Poo!" and actually WENT poo on the potty. It was wonderful. Who ever thought poop could be so glorious? It's almost like it shines, sitting there at the bottom of the little training potty. A little gem that Meg could not be more proud of.

I could not be more proud of her.

People keep saying, "I want pointers!" or "What are you doing?" Here is the drill -- every 20 minutes or so, we do a potty check.

"Do you need to potty?" I ask.
"No, I fine." Meg typically replies.

Sometimes she'll go sit on her potty for a minute -- but I think that is just to humor me. If it's been nearly an hour since our last success, then we sit for a little bit longer . . . and we usually have some action. I think that was the first hurdle -- associating the feeling with actually going to the potty. Many trips to the potty helped us over that one. Hurdle #2 -- relying on her to tell me that she's having that potty feeling. Today -- day 3, mind you -- she is really telling me she has to go. I keep asking . . . and she keeps refusing . . . but when she does have to go, she tells me and she goes.

That's what I'm doing. Two days of taking her a million times, and one day of letting her take me. It's working!

Other than poop, not much is going on here. As a matter of fact, after three days of this, I'm pretty bored with it all and am going a bit stir crazy. Jim worked on the playscape for more than 16 hours this weekend . . . which was most of both Saturday and Sunday . . . meaning I had nobody to talk to about anything (other than poop, of course) for nearly the entire weekend. And I was on 100% kid-duty. Yikes. I want so badly to get out of the house . . . but I know this will all be worth it in the end. One more day. Tomorrow, I have a sitter coming for Meg for a few hours in the AM so Kate and I can go to a mom-and-baby group. At least I have that to look forward to.

We are also looking forward to the arrival of Jim's mother and grandma tomorrow evening. They'll help me keep my sanity over the next few days, I'm sure. I don't think they totally believe me when I tell them we are having so much potty success. They'll see for themselves when they get her tomorrow.

Forgive me for all the Potty Talk. You probably don't really care . . . but if you've potty trained, you know how all encompassing it is. And if you haven't but WILL soon . . . you'll see what I mean. I'm sure I'll talk about it more as the week wears on.

Ahhhhh . . . I hear a baby waking up, so guess I am back 'on duty' for a while.

OH! Side note: Kate now weighs 8 lbs, 1 oz -- which is great. Exactly the right amount of weight gain since our visit last week. No more worries about my 'slow gainer' . . . she's doing great.