Potty Power...

I just realized that I have yet to blog about Cy's recent accomplishment, potty training! Admittedly, I was dreading potty training due to some unpleasant experiences of friends, but I knew that Cy was ready, so we gave it a go. I could not have asked for a smoother or easier potty training endeavor! Cy did amazingly well, only having 3 accidents the first day of potty training, 1 the following day, and he's been virtually accident-free in the weeks to follow. WOOHOO!
DISCLAIMER: There will be a lot of talk of pee and poop in the rest of this post!

Here was my strategy:
We talked up getting to use the big boy potty & wearing big boy underwear for several days prior to "Potty Day". Cy and I watched a couple different videos about potty training including "Potty Power" (which was his favorite) and an Elmo video. The morning of Potty Day, he had a good breakfast, then we put on his big boy underwear & I showed him the prizes (small pieces of candy, stickers, small toys, etc) that he would get to choose from when he pottied in the big boy potty. Then I started filling him full of liquids and off we went. I set a timer for 10 minute intervals, so we spent the bulk of that first day in the bathroom. Luckily, he pooped in the potty right off the bat (which I know can be a challenge for some people), so I was ecstatic! I collected several books for bathroom reading, coloring books, stickers, whatever I could think of the keep in occupied and sitting on the potty, and kept offering/pushing the beverages. Cy had a couple of accidents early on immediately after he had success on the potty & was picking out his prize...I guess he wasn't quite finished, but by the afternoon, he was doing great! His reaction after every successful pee was (& still is), "Yay, I did it!!!" And after each poop, "Look at that big poop!" Of course, each potty use was followed my an abundance of praise, and each accident, lots of encouragement. Cy still wears a pull up at night, when we're running errands, at church, etc, but he is not a fan of pottying in his pull-up, so most mornings he wakes up dry (he even calls for me in during the night when he needs to go), and we visit many bathrooms throughout our time running errands. We are so very proud of our big boy and thankful that his potty training experience was an easy one!