I see London I see France...someone's wearing underpants

Yes, it's true suddenly and with no pressure or prompting from me, Nicole has decided to make her attempt at potty training. She started with wanting to wear big girl underpants a few weeks ago. A couple of puddles and rug cleanings later and she finally figured out she should pee in the toilet accompanied by the trusty Elmo themed seat. She has a whole routine. She gets her step stool in the bathroom, takes it into the hallway, puts on the light and brings the step stool back to the bathroom and puts in her Elmo seat into the big seat. She then proceeds to get naked. I don't know why this is a necessary step. Aimee needed to do this too, so perhaps it's part of the toddler mindset that naked = peeing in the toilet. Whatever the need, I am not questioning it since it seems to be working.

Our reward of course is M&Ms. I tried a sticker chart with Aimee and she was not impressed so of course I went all out with M&Ms and it worked like a charm. Now Nicole must have had some memory of this or perhaps it was her sisters questions of rewards for deposits in the toilet met with the yummy little treat of chocolate. Whatever the reason, M&Ms are the chosen reward for successful potty trips and my itty bitty Nicole has probably eaten her weight in them the past few days. Because just one M&M is not enough of a reward, we need at least 2 for peeps and 3 for poops. Again, not questioning just going with it.

So we have spent the past two days pretty much home bound. More because the weather has been so gross and humid but it did definately help with the successful potty usage. So much so that when the girls were next door visiting my parents, Nicole even christened their toilets with her little bum. My mother was so impressed she promised to take Nicole shopping tomorrow to pick out her favorite character decorated big girl underpants.

We are still in diapers/pull ups overnight, though this is more my issue because she would wear just her underpants but we have yet to get up in the AM with a dry diaper so I know we are not ready for that step. But in just three days we have made leaps and bounds into the potty training terrain. I will again pull the no help from me card in that I did in no way initiate this potty training but I sure as hell encouraged it when the interest was there. So here's to almost being out of diapers. Another $10 a week I can put in the bank instead of investing in Pampers, Huggies or Luvs. Though I am sure I will find another way of spending it instead of depositing it in the bank.