Ellie is Potty Trained!

At the end of April I did a post on how Ellie was very interested in the potty and how I was not interested at all in training her. Well that was Friday when I posted it, and the next day I decided to try underwear to see what happens. Well it was a disaster, I thought, since the whole day we had about 20 accidents and 2 accomplishments. I knew the next day she was definitely not ready since she was completely turned off the potty, she had no desire to sit on it. However, surprisingly on Monday she wanted to sit on the potty. I decided to go ahead and let her because I hated to teach her that the diaper is where you should go potty. So she sat on the potty, and then to my amazement she PEED! I was shocked, but was still thinking this was only a coincidence. However she kept asking and continued to pee on the potty and keep her diaper clean! Tuesday I decided to keep her in underwear around the house, but diapers while we were out or during naps/nighttime. This went well and we continued this until Saturday (May 1) when I decided to keep her in underwear all the time except nighttime. Sunday night she refused to wear a diaper, so I let her go without. We had one accident when she woke up the next morning. Monday night, the same thing but she had 2 accidents (in the middle of the night). I ended up putting her in a diaper. Tuesday night, she was convinced that a diaper would be okay to wear to bed.

So little Miss Ellie is potty trained except for at night! I'm waiting until her diaper is basically dry until I switch to completely diaper free. I'm completely shocked, but she totally was ready. She really did most of it on her own. She goes by herself most of the time, I rarely ask her if she needs to potty because she usually always tells me. She has been doing great being accident free most days. She still has problems pooping in the potty, she can never catch it in time. This is not so fun since we have to clean up the poo in the underwear, but hopefully soon she'll learn. It's not as bad as I thought it would be, and it's nice knowing I don't have to buy diapers for her anymore! So proud of our little Ellie!

So here are some tips to any of you who are thinking of potty training (these are some things I learned and were told from others, a great help):
-for training girls: a dress is a major plus because you usually don't have to change the dress, just the underwear!
-hand sanitizer is your best friend especially if your child doesn't reach the sink. Going to the bathroom about 20 times a day, you do not want to wash your hands every time, but yet you need to teach them that you should. So sanitizer comes in very handy because it's a major pain to try to wash her hands when you have to hold her up while washing.
-potty training 1-2-3 was a great approach! Instead of approaching it as let's go pee and poo on the potty, you approach it as let's stay dry and clean. This way they learn that being dry and clean is the goal, so diaper or no diaper in order to stay dry and clean I need to go on the potty! Definitely check out the video
-treats really encourages them to go, and even now we still try to give her lots of praise. I think this helps keep her going.

We only are having troubles with poo and at night. I think time will help, she is really young. She does great out and even on car rides. I'm very impressed by her! Yay for Ellie! She's a big girl now :)