Progress.

Well it's been nearly 2 weeks since we started our potty training journey. It's been hard, it's been easy, it's been a struggle & it's been a breeze.

Sound contradictory? Well it is. But it's also the truth. Throughout these last 2 weeks, Ben has had momentary set backs where he'd forget what he was doing and pee where he was standing. He'd run and hide when he had to poo. However, the last two days.... it's like a light switched on in his brain. We only got him to poo on the potty a few times (either we'd miss it and he'd go in his diaper before I got him up for the day or he'd have an accident) but yesterday.... yesterday man, Nick & I could not have been more proud. Ben ran himself to the potty and went poo with out any prompting. Twice. And again today (twice).

So let me back up a bit.

I decided to buy a potty insert for the regular toilet. He can't quite get up and down from it without assistance (those legs need to grow just about an inch or so more and he can probably do that part all by himself), but he seems to much prefer the seat to the potty chair. We still have the potty chair out in the living room and he will use it, but for the most part he goes in the toilet. I wish I had started out with the potty insert instead of the potty chair, but live and learn. What works for Ben might not work for every one else. And as I got interrupted mid post by a kid that poo'd in the potty chair - if you are at ALL sensitive to smells, it's so much easier (and less stinky) to flush the toilet than it is to clean out the chair. Gosh that's foul. UGH.

Anyway, since we got the insert (I think I got that on Monday), he's only had a few pee accidents (and we discovered those have primarily been when Nick is watching him. Mm hmm. Cast your judgement. Okay, don't. Nick's been a fantastic help and I'm glad to take all I can get) and NO poo accidents.

I'm still doing diapers on him when we go out. First, it's been way too freaking hot to try to play outside with no diaper on (except today. I took him to the park today but 10 minutes after we got there, 2 bus loads of kids pulled up so we headed out) and second, he still seems to go about every 20 minutes. Some times it's longer, some times it's short, but it seems he averages 20 minutes between potty trips. So I figure we'll keep him mostly diaper free at home for the next month or so or until he consistently uses the potty with no accidents (or very few) and seems to lengthen the time between trips. Once that happens, we'll start venturing out with no diaper on.

I'm not entirely sure how we'll handle our upcoming trip to Chicago. I figure we'll do a diaper for the plane ride but if he tells me he has to pee, we might try the potty on the plane (ew). We're going to bring the potty insert (it's fairly flat) and I'll have him go diaper free while we're in the hotel, but I'm guessing he'll use a diaper more often than not. We'll find out!

So these last few days things have started to sort of click with him. He runs down the hall saying "pee pee" when he has to go. He races to the bathroom when he has to poo (two days in a row - yay!). His accidents are getting less and less. I wasn't sure he was ready for it even last week - some one asked me how it was going and I'm like "ugh" but if you were to ask me now, I'd say "it's going great!"

Maybe he'll be fully potty trained by the time he turns 2. Wouldn't that be cool?