Potty Training Days 1 &2

I've been wanting to get Maggie potty trained for quite a while but I just didn't feel she was quite ready...and I know from talking to my sister and many friends, that if they're not ready, don't push. So we just decided to wait and see what happened.

When she started MDO, I was so excited to hear that they would be working on potty training, since some of the kids in her class were already potty trained. I was really liking the idea of someone else doing the dirty work for me :) However, she didn't attend MDO for all of November & December, so that didn't work...

We had already had the little potty chair out and for quite a while now, I've had her sit on the potty every night, as she waited for her bath to be ready. She eventually learned to go. Then once she started school, we would go to the potty after every diaper change (since I'm assuming that's how they did it at school). Every time she would sit on the potty, she would go.

Since I'm home on medical leave and I basically am just resting throughout the day and not going anywhere, I figured this might be a good time to give it a try.

So, yesterday, we decided to just try it and see what happens. I've heard a lot of different suggestions from different people, what worked and what didn't for them. My sister had given me a bunch of pullups that she never used, so I decided to put one on Maggie yesterday afternoon, after she woke up from her nap. She was pretty excited to see a different kind of diaper but was a bit confused when I put it on her (since she had to step into it). I told her we were going to start going pee pee on the potty today and she said "ok momma". I got the timer out and set it for 20 minutes. So, every 20 minutes, when the timer went off, I would say, Maggie, let's go potty. She would stop whatever she was doing and run to the potty. And everytime she got on the potty, she would go. And we repeated this all day until it was time for bed.

We started all over again this morning but this time, I put a pair of panties on her. She was sooo excited. It was so funny. She didn't know what to do. She pulled her pants up and kept touching her rear, like she was missing something - ha! It's called padding :) Anyway, I decided to for-go the pull-up since it seems too much like a diaper. I figured if she had the panties on and had an accident, she would feel it more. We went all day long, every 20 minutes, to the potty. Around 6pm tonight, she started telling us that she needed to go potty...and sure enough, every time, she went. But then she started saying she had to go potty about every 7 minutes. Oh good grief. Seriously?! I mean, who can pee so much? BUT, I can't tell her no...that would defeat the purpose. So, we visited the potty MANY MANY times today.

She had one accident today and the interesting thing was, that she had it in the kitchen, got the wipeys out, cleaned it up and then said, "Momma, gotta go potty." I took her to the bathroom and of course, she was already wet. She sat on the potty with her head hung low. I said, "uh oh, your panties are wet. It's ok. It was just an accident." She looked up slowly and said - "an accident, momma? oh good. just an accident momma." Now, isn't it interesting how she seemed to think that she had done something wrong. Poor thing.

Overall, I realize it's only the end of day 2, but I am feeling really good about her progress. I honestly wasn't expecting such great results, so quickly. I can only hope that we continue on this path and have as good a day tomorrow.

Does any of you have any suggestions for potty training? What worked and what didn't work for you? How long did it take? I'm curious.....