Potty Training

We tried potty training a while back and it didn't work.  It was my fault I think.  I quit being super diligent too soon and put too much trust in him too soon.  Once we were off the horse, we could just never get back on so to speak.  We actually think we somehow accidentally conveyed to Monte that he wasn't allowed to go at all when he had underwear on or or somehow made him scared of going on the toilet, we're not sure.  Anyway decided to take a month off and then try again after the River Trip.  

Gotta love those little underwear hineys!

This time has honestly been quite a smooth transition from my perspective!  He got it right away and has done a great job!  We decided to use cheerios as a reward for #2 and seriously, would that we all experience that type of joy sometime in our lives as Monte does when he knows he gets cheerios!  He was starting to have #1 "accidents" sometimes if we didn't take him often enough, but I think it was because he just didn't want to stop playing to go.  We debated between punishment or reward and decided to use cheerios ANY time he went to see if that worked and if it didn't, then we would use some form of punishment for "accidents."  I should clarify here that these were intentional "accidents," he knew he needed to go and decided to go on the floor.  We weren't going to punish him for an actual accident.  But turns out positive reinforcement is a BIG motivator with Monte and it worked like a charm! 

 There's been lots of shortless days around here!  Less laundry right?!  His first town day was a success too.  He went to gymnastics, Academy, got a hair cut, ate at Texas Roadhouse and spent the evening at Annie and Grandad's without an accident! yay!  I also decided to just go cold turkey with naps and he's done great with those too!  The only time he's wet the bed at nap time was the other day in Penny's bed....Sorry Aunt Penny!!

We've been doing pull ups at night and he usually still wakes up wet but for the first time this morning he woke up early before Gunnar went to work saying "Tee tee" so Gunnar took him and then put him back to bed and he was still dry when he woke up for the day later so yay!  Maybe that will continue??

All in all, I am pretty glad to only be changing one set of diapers, toddler dirty diapers are just not fun, and Monte seems pretty proud of himself still these days too!  

Another little fun fact that I feel like I will want to remember later when I'm reading this is that every time I take Monte to the bathroom he says "No Dit in nere" (No Kit in there) and wants to make sure the door in closed to Kit can't come in while he's going.  I'm not sure why Monte feels so strongly about this but he really does have a hard time if Kit is in there too.  I think he knows that Kit is going to get into stuff and that bothers Monte. Anyway Kit is usually banned from the bathroom during potty time and gets SUPER excited when we come back out!