The Power of Peer Pressure

Even as a toddler, I guess there's nothing more influential than what "everyone else is doing."

I was about to give up on Ella's potty training. I called her preschool late last week to find out the first day of classes, because that's my drop dead date. Either she's potty trained, or she can't go. We've already agreed, it happens when she's ready and if she's not potty trained, we'll just wait and start preschool when she's 4.

Our little lady hear me talking on the phone about school and asked if she was going. I explained that yes, we hope she's going to school with Sophie in the fall, after her third birthday. But I used the advice from some of our friends and mentioned that "the teacher told me that all of the girls and boys at school are done with diapers. They all go pee-pee and poopy in the potty." That was apparently the motivation she needed. She stripped right there in the kitchen floor and ditched the diaper. "I wear big girl panties, I go school with Sophie."

That was 7 days ago, and we've gotten up every morning since and put on big girl panties. We did have a couple of accidents, one in the urgent care, and the other in our kitchen floor. We do still wear a diaper for nap time and for bedtime at night. But otherwise, she's been "taking care of business."

I'm amazed and how she's suddenly embraced this. I do have to remind her and prompt her to go on a regular basis. But she's starting to grab herself when she needs to go, so I catch that and remind her what that feeling means. I think we'll get there and I"m so proud of her!

While Daddy is probably not happy about her showing off her "booty" in these photos, I think they're pretty cute. We rewarded her first full day with dry panties by buying some new Little Mermaid panties. As you can see, they're a big hit!