Adventures in Potty Training

Okay, so I thought I would give you an update on how Laney is doing with her potty training. So I decided to pull out the Pull Ups on Sunday. Now for those of you who know Laney, you know she loves anything Dora. So of course I bought the pretty pink Dora Pull Ups. I got them out and she was very excited to put on Dora. I explained to her that she is a big girl now and about using the potty. I decided to take the strategy the first few days to just take her potty every hour or so to get her acclimated. The first few hours went fabulous. She was dry everytime and was able to go tinkle each time as well. I would give her 3 M&M's after a success and 1 if she only tried. I thought to myself, "This is going to be easy". I should have never even processed those words.

At about the fourth trip, Laney was not so happy about going potty. The novelty of the M&M's had already worn off. I tried stickers, episodes of Dora and other things. Finally, I said to Laney, "You have to go potty in the big girl potty because otherwise Dora will get wet. If Dora gets wet or stinky, then that will make her very sad. We don't want to make Dora sad, do we?" She responded with "No, Dora Happy". Needless to say the rest of Sunday and all of Monday, Dora was dry. Who knew that was all it took. God bless you, Dora!!!! There were even a few times where she came to me and told me that she had to go. It is a still a work in progress. She is coming to me know and saying "pee-pee", but she has already done it. Therefore, we are continuing the routine trip to the bathroom every 1-2 hours.

We had some other firsts here at the Mohler house last week. Leah gave us her first smile, and boy was it sweet. She really responds to Laney's voice and will give her the most smiles out of all of us. I have yet to capture her sweet dimpled grin on camera yet, but I have been trying.

The other first was Laney got to play with Play-Doh. Yes, I know Cindy, you gave it to her for Christmas. I was just waiting for the right moment. I had to do some soul searching before we sat down and opened up the Play-Doh. When I was little, it was a red letter day when you were able to play with Play-Doh at my house. My mom was a bit of a neat freak. We would have to set up the old card table in the garage, and that old card table would have to have a table cloth. Seriously, I think we were able to play with it maybe once every few months. Okay, I will admit it. I inherited that "neat freak" gene from my mom. Andy sometimes calls me the "clutter nazi". I can't help it that I like things orderly and neat. So before I broke the seal on the Play-Doh, I set some ground rules for myself.
1. I will not hyperventilate if Laney mushes all the colors together.
2. I will not fret if some Play-Doh gets in the carpet.
3. I won't disrupt her playtime to swifter up the Play-Doh on the floor.
4. Finally, I will let her use the Play-Doh whenever she wants (within reason).

We had such a fabulous time. She played for over an hour with the Play-Doh and really wasn't that messy. I did have to chuckle, though. She got quite upset when the purple and green Play-Doh got mushed together. I guess the "neat freak" gene lives on. My mother would be so happy. ( :

Here are a few shots of the girls over the last couple of weeks. Like I said before, I am trying my hardest to get Leah to smile while the camera is on.