10 Easy Steps On How To Potty Train Your Two Year Old Son:

Nah, I'm just kidding. But hey, guess what?

I only have to buy diapers for my baby girl these days!! Our Toddler Man, Hud the Stud, has said goodbye to the diaper days and moved onto bigger and better things. 

I assure you, it did not come easily. 

And it didn't happen overnight.

And it sucked. Hard.

And to be totally honest, we're still working on it. 

Who knew getting a kid to use a toilet would be so tough?! No one told me that when I signed up for this whole parenting gig. 

We tried a few different versions of a few different methods, started and failed, took a break, tried again, took a longer break and then came back to it at the beginning of December. And honestly, it all spawned from a good kick in the rear and some encouragement while talking with my good friend who'd had success training her twin girls that are about the same age as Hudson. I literally got off the phone with her that afternoon, stripped Hud's diaper off, packed away the rest of them and said, "that's it, wee man! We're doing this!" Surprisingly, we actually had some pretty good progress before our trip and I was hopeful that we'd be able to keep it up but the break from usual routine and being away from home caused our potty-train to sort of derail (har har).. I'm pretty sure he spent the better part of those 3 weeks in a Pull-Up but I digress. 

We picked right back up when we came home and I am glad to say, a few weeks later, that we have finally succeeded. 

Granted, there's still the occasional accident, and random rebel from potty time and I feel like that's to be expected this early on in the game with him still technically on the "young" side for potty training. But who knows, maybe I'm just tooting our horn a little too early.. Quite frankly, I don't care. 

I have no secrets to share, nor fool proof methods to divulge.. But I will say, oh my word, the headache, the endless mess, the frustration- it has been worth it. And I am so glad to be moving forward. I'm sure there are plenty of great excuses in favor of the waiting game, but I haven't changed the kids diaper in about 2 months and it feels GREAT. 

I have, however, cleaned crap off my floor, the toilet, his hands, my hands, the bathtub, his legs, etc and done more "bathtub laundry" to clean peed on nundies and pants than I can express. So. There's that. 

Step one: just do it.

Step two: don't give up.

Step three: no really, don't give up.

Step four: I see that look in your eye, you wanna give up, and really, you could... No one would think less of you.. But don't.

Step five: oh hey, look at that. There's a little light at the end of the tunnel, keep going.

Step six: hardcore regression.

Step seven: okay, it's past the point of frustrating and quite possibly the most infuriating thing you've ever dealt with... But it's gonna be alright, keep pressing forward. 

Step eight: make him help clean the crap off his clothes. See how much he likes THAT.

Step nine: he hates it.

Step ten: sweet victory.  Sort of.

{... Yeah, he's gonna hate me for this one day... But that's what parents are for right? Embarrassing you and documenting milestone moments?? You're welcome, kid ;) }

Valentine's Date

We have some pretty amazing friends out here, let me tell you.

We feel so blessed. 

For Christmas we were gifted with some tickets to the opera for Valentine's Day along with a promise of free babysitters for the night from our beloved Kennedy's. I just can't even express our joy for having such fantastic people here to be living life with. They take every opportunity to bless us and I can only hope that we are reciprocating even half  of the love they've poured out on us while we have been here.

They have played such an important roll in our stay here, truly filling some of the "family" void  in our lives since we all are lacking in that department in NYC. We take every chance to explore the East Coast together, and hang out to talk, share, joke.. It's so fulfilling. Truly. We typically all get together on Saturday nights for brinner and games.. It's become a bit of a tradition and I love it! We are so thankful for their friendship/familyship!

Anyways, they gifted us this fantastic evening, and we had a blast. Dinner at a fancy pants restaurant, and the opera... Hudson even managed to sustain his first bit of a head injury while we were gone and Alee handled it like a pro! Sent us pics, gave us a play by play and we were able to decide that he was a-okay, no stitches needed, and we could continue on with our evening. We came home before the opera ended, though.. It was a 4 hour production and neither of us were too confident in our abilities to stay awake throughout the rest of the show. Haha, we headed home and spent a few hours hanging with Tyson and Alee and watching the Winter Olympics together. We love our friends.