A year in review and a preview of 2010!!

This last year has been a great one!

• In January Philip and I left Ethan for seven days to go skiing for the first time. All in all, Philip and I enjoyed the trip (even with our outing to the hospital).
• February was a memorable month for us because we got to shout, "We're debt free!!" You can read about our journey here and here. You can listen to my call in to the Dave Ramsey show here.
• For Spring Break in March Ethan and I traveled down to Louisiana and later Ethan went on his first camping trip.
• April was challenging as we began the long road of potty training. We also celebrated Easter with my Nanny and our first Easter Egg hunts.
• May contained more potty training adventures, but mostly I remember the beginning of summer marked a beginning of the end to my responsibilities outside the home.
• Potty training continued through out June, and although I declared him potty trained, I have to say he wasn't independently trained until sometime in September.
• In July, Ethan turned two and Philip and I went on our second mission trip to Slidell and the 9th ward of New Orleans. We were both impressed by what God had to teach us there.
• Ripping up the deck to install a french drain really took over our August plans.
  
• But, in September we had a GREAT time touring London and Paris with my family. I hope to write actual blog-like posts on the shutterfly site soon.
• We experienced déjà vu in October when we found out we were pregnant with our second baby. Also, Ethan went trick-or-treating with his friend Blaise.
  
• In November the deck began to be rebuilt (Phase I and II were completed) and we celebrated Thanksgiving with family and friends.
  
• Our first high-risk appointment for this pregnancy was in December and because of my blog post about it, I have found a woman in Knoxville who went through the same exact experience that I will go through! I can't wait to meet her and pick her brain!! We also celebrated Christmas with my family and Ethan went on his first official hike. Whew, we had a busy month

Preview of 2010:

This year I have challenged myself to read the bible from cover to cover. In the past I've tried the "skip-around" plans where you read OT, Psalms, and NT all in the same day. These don't work for me because I can't follow what is going on in the OT vs. the NT. This past year Philip read the bible with a plan that just starts you in the beginning and goes straight through. He has liked it very much, so that is the plan I'm going to try this year. If you'd like to see the plan please check here and I will keep it ahead of our schedule by a month or so. I have the days listed so that anyone can start at any time. Let me know if you want to join our challenge (Philip is actually starting to read through again this year to give moral support.)

Here are some other highlights to look forward to:

• In May Philip and I will celebrate our 10th anniversary!
  
• Hopefully sometime in June we will welcome the second little Boudreaux to our family
• Ethan will turn 3 on July 2nd!!!

I'm looking forward to this year and I hope you are too!

The Boudreaux Potty Method

Disclaimer: I don't really know what I'm doing, but I'm willing to share what I did. Do what works best for your family and please don't supplant my judgment for yours!
First I'd like to say that I have a child who is eager to please (most of the time) and gets excited about three mini-m&ms. Also Lightening McQueen (aka "Kye") is like Kryptonite for this kid and he will do about anything to get a sticker with Cars on it.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, potty training occurs at different times in different cultures and this timing is more likely based on the culture and not the child! Ethan and I talked about potty training for two whole months before spending a whole day in underwear. At the very beginning he got three m&ms for just sitting on the potty (clothed or not) and that lasted about a week or so. Then if he sat on the potty that would be good, but he only got m&ms if he peed in the potty. A couple of times a week I would put him underwear for an afternoon so that he could feel what it was to be wet. When he went I would not fuss at him or make a big deal we would just talk about the wetness and that our goal was to keep Wall-e, "Kye", or Elmo dry!

Finally when the big day came to start training I put him in underwear and made him sit on the potty every 40 minutes. The key to this plan is to always have liquids available. I didn't really force him to drink, but I did offer plenty of salty foods. I also added a sticker chart in the bathroom and he got a sticker every 40 minutes when his underwear were dry and another one if he could "go" on the potty. Of course m&ms were still part of the system and I would be sure to bring a canister of them wherever we went. Rewarding for dry underwear was my friend Betsy's idea and I really think it has contributed to our success. Ethan even says now when he is in the bathroom, "Kye dry!"

If you read past posts you'll also see that we did use diapers at night and pull-ups only for nursery and VBS. These are only used when an accident would require major clean up (sheets, pillows, stuffed animals, softees, etc.) or would uneedly inconvience someone else. They do have little pictures on the front so I can tell if he stays dry and reward him as such.

To all you moms out there who are considering potty training, go for it! What's the worst that could happen? If you have any questions please feel free to post them. Betsy did post descriptions of the "phases" of potty training over on Tarnished Teapots and it is great!

I declare thee potty trained!

Okay, so we are still having occasional accidents, but we are in underwear all the time except for naps and night time (and even then we are dry 95% of the time)! I even picked him up today from VBS and he was totally dry! That is amazing since Megan and the other teachers have plenty to do besides ask Ethan if he has to potty. By tonight he had had a 100% accident free day which I am so happy about. Today was a busy day and he ended up crying through part of dinner because he was so tired.

Well, one last day of VBS and then I will try to post a summation of my Potty Training method here since so many of my mom friends have asked. Betsy did quite a good job over on Tarnished Teapots, so if you are desperate for help head on over there.

Potty Success!

Warning: This post contains more potty training information!

Yesterday we spent the morning at Walmart and then iHop. I was so proud of Ethan because he had no accidents for the whole morning. He even went on the big scary toilets at both Walmart and iHop. When we got home I was changing him for nap time (when he has been doing all his #2s) and I told him that if he went #2 on the potty he would get an easter egg. Well it worked! Until 7 o' clock last night he had an accident free day!

Talking to my friend Betsy made me realize that I do need to change my tactics a bit. Our goal should not be that Ethan is accident free, but that he is self-sufficient in this area. Along these lines, I'm doing things a little bit differently today. Instead of timing Ethan and making him go every 40 minutes I'm putting the ball in his court! I'll ask occasionally if he needs to go and he will still get rewards and such, but I'm going to wait for him to decide if he needs to go. I'll also encourage him to just go on his own or tell me if he needs to go. Next week we will be at VBS so he will need to be able to tell his teachers that he needs to go.

All in all today may be a day of more accidents but in the long run I'm sure it will be worth it.

Potty Training Day 1.5 and 2

Warning: Once again, this post contains details that maybe only I am interested in :)

We have really taken kind of a break this weekend because of other obligations that we already had. Saturday night at 6:30 we went to a friend's birthday party and although he went in a diaper, he had only had one accident up until then since he woke up Saturday morning. Today he went in a diaper to Nursery and then we were at a luncheon until three. After he woke up from his nap today he went back into underwear and has only had one accident (both of us were outside when he did it, and he did come looking for me after the fact). Even just now he told Philip he had to peepee and he had barely wet his underwear but then he went on the potty! Tomorrow is another busy day, but then things settle down for a while until we go to the zoo on Thursday.

The good news is that I will have to make him new potty charts tomorrow because we are running out of space! I'm also planning on keeping a tube of mini M&Ms in my purse for when we are out and about!

Potty Training Days 1 and 1.5

Warning: This post may contain details of my son's life that you have no interest in! Feel free not to continue if potty training is not your thing!

We are on day two of full blown potty training! So far I have to say I am satisfied with the results. Yesterday I had no plans, so I decided to start our PT week off early. In the morning I put Ethan in big boy pants and we talked about the potty etc. About 10-20 minutes after I had him in underwear he had his first accident and it didn't even phase him. He was just walking around wet. Betsy had suggested focusing on keeping underwear dry just as much, if not more than going to peepee in the potty. As I changed Ethan I talked to him about keeping Wall-E dry and I even hung up a piece of paper to reward him for having dry underwear. Taking my friend Heather's advice I started taking him every 30-45 minutes weather he wanted to go or not. I would ask every 20 minutes or so if he was dry and that would earn him a small star sticker on the chart.

That worked until lunch time (I'd heard that meal time is hard) when he had another accident. The good thing about this accident was he yelled, "PeePee!" as soon as it happened. That gave me hope that he was aware of the fact that he had wet himself. I put him in a g-diaper for naptime and then after nap I put him back in under wear. Everything was going great until I was on the phone with a friend. Ethan said, "m&ms?" "Not unless you peepee in the potty." I replied. "PeePee?" Well, before I could get off the phone he had gone. That one was totally my fault! It taught me a good lesson though, and phone callers be warned: I may hang up on you with no warning if we are on the phone in the next couple of days/weeks.

After that last accident he went back into underwear and stayed dry for the next couple of hours. He then went into a diaper because Philip and I were going on a date night and Ethan was off to church. This morning we began again and at noon he has had no accidents! He hasn't asked to go, but he has kept his under wear dry and I consider that an accomplishment. Here are our award charts:

In addition to stickers he also gets three M&M's for number 1 in the potty and an "Easter Egg" for number 2 in the potty. He has yet to earn an Easter Egg, but he asks about them, so I'm sure it will happen eventually. I'll keep you all posted as we continue down this new journey!

P in the Potty!

Well, we are yet again moving on to another step towards becoming a grown up boy! This all started when we had my pediatrician Dr.Brice in to talk to our MOPS group. He mentioned that a lot of the milestones that we take for granted (walk by 1, potty train by 2 or 3) are very culturally influenced. He mentioned that his last practice was located in a real rural town and that there babies were expected to walk by 8-10 months and potty train by 1.5! Then, two Sundays ago on my "run around town with out a kid" trip I picked up a potty ring at Target for about five dollars. I figured that we had talked about the potty for long enough, let's actually potty!

For the first couple of days whenever I was changing his diaper or clothes I would offer him two mini M&Ms if he would just sit on the potty. "Mnms?" Anything for those! So for a couple of days we just sat on the potty, talked about peepeeing, got our two "mnms" and grunted a little bit. Then I went to Duck Duck Goose on Wednesday and I got a Baby Bjorn Potty Chair for $5.00! When I got home Ethan was really excited to sit on his new potty and low and behold he actually went peepee. For this he recieved five whole mini M&Ms. Since then he has gone on the potty about once a day at least and I have transitioned so that M&Ms are only earned if something is produced. I don't consider this potty training yet, I like to think of this stage as more of a training for our training! Until the actual traingin begins I will continue asking and rewarding (I figure this part can't hurt) and when we are home in the mornings I will especially try to catch a number 2 in the potty (#2 in the potty = great)!

Here is what I have in mind for the actual training: PLAN A (I guess I'll call this one ambitious.) I will have a free week at the beginning of the summer and I think we can use that week to start our ambitious plan! Here are the keys to my plan: I have about a package and a half left of regular diapers to use up and then I plan to transition to g-diapers whenever he is not at preschool. These allow Ethan to feel wetter right when he goes and they have cloth exteriors so they seem like a logical tranistion tool. Then on May 30th Ethan will put on big boy underwear and I suppose we will hang out at the house for that week! My friend Allison just posted about her progress and I think I will steal her stickers idea for the actual training. I see some Cars stickers (or temporary tattoos for #2s) in my son's future! We could even get some bonuses for accident free days or half days!

I'll keep everyone posted on our progress....this could get really interesting!