Potty Progress?

I think potty training is a special circle of hell for parents. It feels like we've been working on potty training with S FOREVER.

In reality, we started working on potty training S last June. Yes, A YEAR AGO. She expressed interest in the potty at that time, so like the eager-beaver parents we are, we got S moved up a class at day school two months early to a class where they worked on potty training. She was not quite two at the time.

She took to it pretty well for a few weeks, at one point going pee pee on the potty three times in a single day. Based on that, I thought FOR SURE she would be fully potty trained by the time we went to Jamaica in September.

If you are a mother with older children reading this, I know what you are thinking: "HAHAHAHAHA! Like that was going to happen! Silly, first-time Mommy!"

Unfortunately, in July, my husband had to have emergency abdominal surgery and ended up being in the hospital for three days and then recovering and unable to lift, carry, or care for S for about six weeks after. Confused by her unexpected stay with the Grandparentals while J was in the hospital and then her Daddy's sudden inability to do anything with/for her, S completely regressed. No potty for her. Accident after accident in her panties at school. My dreams of diaper freedom by Jamaica ended. J and I tried to stay with it and get her back on track for awhile, then completely backed off potty training for months in defeat.

In November, J thought we should kick start it again with a potty weekend, where we cover the house in plastic, put out the potties, put S in panties, and let her realize that it feels like, well, crap, to pee or poop in your panties and you should run to the potty instead. A friend had told me about this and said you had to do it for three days straight, then you never put them in a diaper again. Riiiight.

Now, my husband does not have the patience or attention span to do anything for three days straight unless it's play World of Warcraft or rebuild a computer, so I did not hold out high hopes for us making it through a three-day weekend only focused on going potty.

J lasted until about 2 p.m. on the first day and then he was ready for it to be over. LOL. S, upon feeling any sensation of poop or pee would run off the plastic we laid down to cover our carpet, stop on our kitchen tile, and cry and go in her panties there, no matter how much we tried to get her on the potty. So epic fail all the way around.

At this point, I was willing to back off potty training until the summer before Kindergarten. I figured by then she might get the hang of it. However, in February, her teachers started pressuring us to send panties to school and they would work on it with her there. No way, I said, remembering last summer's parade of poop-filled laundry when S regressed during potty training. I told them, of course, I wanted them to keep working on getting her on the potty to go, but they could just keep her in pullups because she would never TELL US she needed to go and making a mess in her panties did not seem to deter her. All it did was make my life a stinky poopy hell trying to get stains out of the laundry each night!

So S would faithfully sit on the potty at school as directed by her teachers, but she wouldn't go. At all. At home, we brought out the Sesame Street potty poster that came with her Elmo potty and put it on the wall, all ready for stickers. For weeks it hung, stickerless.

Then, sometime in late March, the tide turned, thanks to my mother, the Nana. S stayed with the Grandparentals overnight on a weekend and the Nana got her to go pee pee on the potty by saying if she went pee pee, she would get to call Mommy and tell her. Amazingly, this worked. Turns out S likes to get to call someone and have them praise her for her potty-going accomplishments! I got several phone calls that day from S saying, "I went pee pee on the potty, Mommy!"

I need positive affirmation of my potty progress people-hand me the phone!

But back at school and at home, S's potty standoff continued. She would only go for Nana. A few weeks later, I took S to school-a rare occurrence as J usually takes her-and I told her if she went on the potty for me, we would call Nana and tell her. AND IT WORKED. After that, she started going potty for J as well as Nana and me. She likes to call someone and tell them afterwards...Nana, me, or Daddy depending on who gets her to go. She also started getting to put stickers on her poster, which she likes a lot.

A few weeks ago, I relented and started sending panties to school. She has had some poopy accidents, but it has not been a few times a day every day like last summer. The last few weeks she has come home from school in panties without having an accident in my car. Last Thursday, she got a big sticker, because she wore panties all day without an accident!
The next day, although I have been totally chickensh*t to take her out of the house in just panties, I took her shopping sans pullup or diaper. She went pee pee on the potty for me after we'd been out for over an hour and had eaten lunch. Sadly, 20 minutes after that success, she pooped in her pants. However, I had brought an extra outfit and plastic bag and wipes, so I cleaned her up and changed her and she was good to go. It was not as scary as I thought it would be.

She's definitely making progress. She completely understands to hold the pee until she's on the potty when wearing her panties, but she does not grasp the idea of doing the same with her poop. She DOES NOT want to go poop on the potty! The last time I tried to get her to do so, by the time I got her to the potty and pulled her pants down, she had already pooped, and half of it got all over her pants and the potty seat and the other half fell on my foot. That's right. ON MY FOOT. Not. Glam.

So, we're still working on it. She turns three in August. I think she will be completely in panties by then, but still having poop accidents. My new goal is for her to be peeing and pooping in the potty by the time we go to Walt Disney World in November, but we'll see. This time around, I'm not so naive as to think it will be that easy! (I also have a mom friend with a four-year-old son who REFUSES to poop in the potty. Still. She is beside herself.)

Potty training...not glamorous and not for the faint of heart. Just like the rest of motherhood. :)

What worked for you when you were potty training your kids? Especially to get them to poop on the potty? This will end someday, right? Talk to me!

One Year Blogiversary! More "Getting to Know You" Random Facts

One year ago today, I launched Glam-O-Mommy. I didn't have a real plan for my blog...I'm just a woman who writes for a corporation for a living who wanted to write about myself, my life, my daughter, and things that interest me. But mostly my feelings about and experiences with motherhood.

Glam-O-Mommy and S

Lately, I've been a bit remiss in keeping up with my blog. In December, I was sick or my daughter was sick and my husband had surprise shoulder surgery and the holidays were crazy and I just had no energy left over to give to it. In January, I got assigned to a huge, insane-making project at work and began having less of a work/life balance and more of a working-on-my-Friday-off-and-often-Sunday-nights-just-to-keep-up life and again, I've had no energy left over for the blog.

To top it off, I feel like I'm in a bit of a personal rut. I work, I spend time with my daughter and husband, I do tons of laundry, I try unsuccessfully to keep our house straight and orderly, I sleep. Wash, rinse, repeat.

BORED YET? Me too. Doesn't exactly inspire much in the way of insightful writing either. I mean, don't get me wrong...I have a really good life, with many moments of fun and love and beauty and I'm very grateful for all that I have, and yet I just feel like I want a little surprise, a little unpredictability now and then...just something. (Like my last post, about my adventures in San Antonio Snowland-that was unpredictable and surprising and thus, good blog fodder!)

Anyway, for my blogiversary, I thought I would share more "Getting to Know You, Getting to Know All About You"/Random Facts About Me, for your reading pleasure. In no particular order, here we go:

1. I have three playlists in heavy rotation on my iPod currently: all the songs I buy from Glee, Legally Blonde: The Musical (OMIGOD, you guys have to see it if you haven't-SO GOOD!), and "Children," which consists of the Backyardigans, Yo Gabba Gabba, Sesame Street, Sharon, Lois, and Bram, Laurie Berkner, songs from Mary Poppins, and Three Little Birds by Bob Marley. ("Children" is for my daughter S, obvs.)

2. Last weekend, I got my first mani-pedi in two months (SO not glam). My nails have really been suffering from my lack of time lately right along with my blog (see also: interior of my car). Anyhoo, it was a rainy day, I was reading this lovely book, The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister, and just relaxing. It was pretty much perfect. J and S were at home napping, so I didn't miss out on anything with them either!

3. I used to be addicted to chocolate. Like, I had to eat a little something chocolate EVERY DAY or I could not make it through that day. When I was pregnant, I often indulged in Baskin Robbins Chocolate Fudge Ice Cream Milkshakes, because a) HELLO, PREGNANT, b) MUST HAVE CHOCOLATE, and c) HOT FROM 1,000 DEGREE HEAT IN SAN ANTONIO SUMMER AND DID I MENTION I WAS PREGNANT?! I say "used to be," because the weirdest thing happened about a year ago. I just stopped craving chocolate. I didn't need to have it every day, or even every week. I've sometimes gone weeks without having any! I have no idea how, after 36 years, my body just stopped craving it, but it did. I still eat chocolate occasionally, but I no longer seek it out and go crazy when I do have it.

4. Weirder still, I've begun craving two things alternately in the place of chocolate. For awhile, it was candy, such as Spree or Sweet Tarts or Sour Patch Kids. Then, I switched and began craving chips and salsa. All the time. Like, planning our meals out around which restaurant has the best chips and salsa!

5. In November, we're taking a big family vacation (the three of us, plus the grandparentals!) to Walt Disney World. We're going to spend five days visiting the parks and then a few days and Thanksgiving with my 74-year-old widowed aunt, my mom's sister. I'm super excited, not just because it will be S and J's first visit to WDW, but because it will be my fourth visit and first in 17 years! The grandparentals are coming along to take care of S when she gets tired, but I want to keep going!

6. Next month, my husband and I will have lived in our house for six years. THIS IS THE LONGEST I HAVE EVER LIVED ANYWHERE. Growing up an Air Force brat, I was used to moving every three years. While I love our house, I now seriously have the desire to move, partially because since S's arrival I feel like we need more room, partially because we think we might want to live in a different area when S starts elementary school in two years, but mostly because I have the itch to move and have a new place to decorate and an opportunity to clean out stuff that has been accumulating in our house for six years! And yes, I realize I could just clean out that stuff on my own without moving, but come on! Like I'm going to do that! Silly.

7. I am a picky eater. I do not eat fruits or most vegetables. I am a steak-loving carnivore. I KNOW. Very unhealthy and weird. Now, for the record, I enjoy the flavor of most fruits, but I do not enjoy chewing the texture of fruits. So I drink LOTS of fruit juice instead of eating fruit straight up (I also take vitamins and drink health shakes). Of vegetables, I eat peas and green beans. And that's pretty much it. Again, it's a texture thing. I have been this way as long as I can remember. As a kid, I also did not like pizza or any seafood, but started liking more of these foods in high school. My poor parents, who eat most anything, did not know what to do with me growing up. I special-ordered everywhere we went! And my food things are so crazy, such as I won't eat a tomato (always take it off my burger order) but I love ketchup and salsa.

8. Bananas freak me out. Obviously, I don't eat them (see #7 above). I think my reaction to them is severe because I had a potassium deficiency when I was five and the remedy the doctor prescribed was I had to eat bananas. A LOT OF THEM. My mother had to basically force me to eat them since I didn't like them and it was traumatic for me! Ironically, bananas are my daughter's very favorite food (I should mention my daughter is not a picky eater at all, thank goodness, and my husband and I go out of our way to feed her all kinds of fruits and veggies-bananas, apples, oranges, corn, peas, sweet potatoes, and watermelon are her faves. I want her to be a better eater than me!) When I peel a banana for S and give it to her, I work very hard to look normal and then when I turn to walk away I usually shudder a little and have to wash my hands! LOL

9. I was a Girl Scout for only one year. My mother and my best friend's mother were the co-leaders for our Brownie troop. When both our moms decided not to be troop leaders the next year, my friend and I quit too! I don't think I was really cut out for Girl Scouts, as I'm what you call "Naturally Indoorsy."

10. I've informed my husband recently that we are going to Paris in Spring 2013. I will be turning 40 then (EEK!) and S will start Kindergarten that fall, so it will be our last time to do a big trip during a school year and avoid crowds. And I love Paris and I will be turning 40 (OMIGOD!), so we have to go! We're doing Disney this year and our big trip next year will be Canada, since we go there every other year to visit my husband's family, and I haven't been to Paris since 2002 (our honeymoon in 2004 does not count, as we flew in to Paris and took a train from the airport directly to Lyon-hubby didn't even plan for us to spend a day in Paris because I'd already been there twice!). Really, I want to go spend a few days in Paris and then take a train and visit some other areas of France. Mostly, I want to take S to another continent...I was lucky to live in England when I was her age and think it's great for her to get exposure to other cultures while she's young.

First night of our honeymoon, Lyon, France 2004-we look so young and happy!

So that's enough randomness for now. If you have read my blog randomly or regularly this year, I thank you and hope you'll comment from time to time. If you have commented on anything on my blog, I've really enjoyed our interactions!

So to help me celebrate my blogiversary, please tell me about yourself! What's in heavy rotation on your iPod? What's the best book you've read lately? Any weird food habits? Planning any dream vacations? I really want to know!!

What I Wish for 2011

I'm not a huge fan of New Year's resolutions (I have two standard ones: lose a little weight, exercise a little more--that's pretty much it.)

Rather, I'd like to think ahead to what I wish for 2011.

First, I wish for good health for all my family and friends, especially my husband, who went from never having surgery to having two in one year. The first one, back in July, was more scary and potentially life-threatening, but both have been tough on him and on all of us as he tries to get back to normal. Please let him have a healthy year this coming year!

Second, I wish for more time...time for fun with my daughter, time for myself to unwind and be pampered a little, time for reconnecting as a couple with my husband, time savored with my parents, and time spent catching up with good friends.

Third, world peace. That would be pretty awesome. :)

Fourth, a few fun adventures with my family. This last year, we visited family in Florida, Canada, Alabama, and spent a week on Survivor--I mean, in Jamaica--on vacation. In February, I'm taking my daughter to Arizona to visit my two best friends from college. One is single and the other is married with four children under the age of five (guess which one we're staying with LOL), so the weekend will definitely be an adventure! We don't have anything else planned at the moment, but I'm excited to think about where 2011 can take us.

That's really it...2010 has not been a horrible year. After all, it's the year my daughter learned to spell her name, count to 15, talk in more complete sentences, give hugs and kisses, answer the phone, use a computer, and swim like a fish! It's the first year she could wear her hair in pigtails and appreciate a pretty outfit as she did tonight, saying "That's cute!"

My daughter proclaimed this outfit "Cute"! Future Glam-O-Mommy, I hope!

This is my daughter with one of her potential future husbands--my friend's son.
She's looking a little less glam after spilling juice down her shirt at dinner this evening
at our "Early New Year's Eve Party" aka "New Year's Eve With Small Children
That Ends by 10!"

Happy New Year everyone!

We Need a Little Christmas, Right This Very Minute

It's been a rough two weeks around my house.

I had a raging case of strep throat for three days last week, just as my husband was visiting an orthopedic specialist and finding out he was going to have to have surgery on the shoulder he slammed into the boards playing hockey a few weeks ago. As in, surgery RIGHT NOW. So just as I was getting over strep, I was suddenly caring for my now-completely helpless husband (because of course it's his right shoulder and he's right-handed--he's not even allowed to tie his shoes right now!) and my toddler who has also been a little under the weather with a sinus infection.

I had to cancel a Christmas playdate I was supposed to host for my friends and their children. I also had to miss taking my daughter to see the Nutcracker for the first time. Boo!

Already behind at work due to my own illness, I'm now getting farther behind because I have to shuttle my husband everywhere (appointments, twice-weekly physical therapy) and I have no one to share the school dropoff/pickup load. I had planned on taking all of next week off, but now plan to work at least three days to try and catch up. Boo!

So we NEED a little Christmas, right this very minute! I feel pretty unprepared for Christmas and certainly would've done more if illness hadn't felled me last week; however, I find myself really looking forward to the next two days despite my exhaustion. On Christmas Eve, we read the Christmas story, open gifts, and eat a little buffet dinner with my parents at their house, then on Christmas morning, we open Santa gifts at our house and then host Christmas dinner for my parents.

I need just a few things for it to feel like Christmas: (1) To hear "Thistlehair, the Christmas Bear" by Alabama, (2) To drink lime sherbet punch, which we have on Christmas Eve every year, and (3) To hang out with my husband, daughter, and parents. So I am sure by tomorrow night, I will feel the Christmas spirit very strongly!

What do you need for it to feel like Christmas?

I really only have one Christmas wish this year: for everyone in my family to have good health and happiness in the year to come. Especially my husband, who went from never having surgery to having two in the span of five months.

Merry, merry Christmas to all of you and your families!