Who ever said potty training is easy?

I love all of the articles and books out there that simplify potty training down into three easy steps. They didn't have our children in mind when they wrote it. All of our children have taken their own sweet time getting through this hurdle in life. Noah, is no exception. He has been potty trained for a month or two now which is great. We just can't quite get the poop thing down. If you ask him, he says, "Oh sure, I go poop on the toilet." The real answer is that if you get him near the toilet to sit down, he begins to cry and throw a fit. Truth be told, he would like to sneak out of the house and hide in behind the play area with a newspaper and do his business. Completely satisfied, he walks in from outside, pleased with his accomplishment. He will tell you all the right answers, "Next time I will go poop on the toilet." None of us believe him, but he says it with such conviction that there is a part of you that gets caught up in the moment. At this point in the blog, I am sure that you all have thoughts on what we could try. For the record, we have offered chocolate, candy, money and even a pony. Nothing ever works.

Now that we only have him in underwear, he always wants to change into his pull-up so he can go outside and do his business. Today, he started coming up to us saying that his bottom was hurting ie. "I need to go poop." From expert advise from out doctor, we ask him what he is going to do about it. He won't ever tell us. We went through this all day long while we were playing at the beach. Finally, when we got home, it really got ramped up and he was uncomfortable. He was in the bathroom with Reba and she all the sudden calls me in to a horror I will never forget. Noah had not made it to the beloved toilet, but let loose on the new tile that Reba had put in herself. I didn't quite know what to do, which is odd since this is our third child. All I could think about is the new tile. Kidding. Anyway, instead of having a nice dinner as a family, Reba and I were cleaning up the "accident" while Jacob and Jonah sat nicely at the table eating. There is nothing like weekend family time spent together running back and forth between the bathroom and the washing machine. It's all good though. The only good thing that came out of this experience is that he did actually sit on the toilet and produced. It used to be that fixing a leaky sink or painting that extra room in your home gave us a strong sense of accomplishment. Now, poopin on the toilet is all we have left. The energy we started with at the beginning of the day was drained from us around noon, but you perservere.

On a positive note, we did go to point no point, a sandy beach in Hansville, WA, and we have a great time. The kids played for hours without fighting. The weather was great and we had a great lunch. On the way home, the kids had to fight off sleep. Now that the kids are in bed, we are fighting off sleep. Have a great day. Until next time.

Quote of the day: "Dad, I wish I had ten arms so that I could eat, play with legos and watch television all at the same time." Jacob Mark LeRoy (age 6 and 11/12ths)

Robb