"I went poopy in the potty and Margaret is standing up...can you believe it?!?"

I would consider Andrew to have been potty trained for "#1" by age 2.5. I recall this not because I was documenting things in a timely manner, but because he was precisely 2.5 when Margaret was born and I remember being barely confident that when he visited me in the hospital, he would be able to tell me if needed to go to potty. Since he had previously gone "#2" right after breakfast, I thought that piece of training was going to be a piece of cake. If it was predictable each day, surely that would make this easy! But, no. He promptly "reprogrammed" himself to wait for when he had a diaper on...either nap time or first thing in the morning. I knew we were in trouble when he would go in his naptime diaper not 5 minutes after having it put on:(

In typical first parent fashion, we diligently worked to encourage going poopy on the potty. We tried pulling the diaper for nap. He went in his underpants...and didn't call for us to let us know. We tried pulling the underpants. He went in his bed and laid there with it until after naptime. Lovely! Then we gave up, thinking "Fine! If you want poop in your pants, then knock yourself out! We'll worry about this if it's still an issue before Kindergarten.". That is the kind of mellowing that you will do once #2 is in the house. Thank you, Margaret!

By 3+, I was over diapers (the size 5 ones, anyway). So we hit it hard again that summer. One glorious July afternoon, Daddy and Andrew called Mommy at work to say, ‘I went poopy on the potty and Margaret is standing up! Can you believe it?’ All the waiting was worth every minute of this priceless, unsolicited quote:)

"I went poopy on the potty and Margaret is standing, can you believe it?!?"

I would consider that Andrew was potty trained by 2.5. I am confident of this not because I was timely in documenting it, but because he was precisely 2.5 when Margaret was born and I recall being thrilled that we had passed that milestone prior to bringing home an infant. That said, I'll admit that it had been a LONG, hot summer reading Elmo Goes Potty in the powder room and that we had only mastered"#1". I thought #2 was going to be a piece of cake since he always went after breakfast. But as soon as we dropped the daily diapers, he waited for his nap or nighttime diapers. Enter Margaret into the mix, and we were suddenly not first time parents anymore and could care less if the kids was going poopy in his diapers. As long as he didn't need a diaper for Kindergarten, why did we care???

But shortly after 3 when he started going within 5 minutes of having it on, I declared that this was ridiculous. So we pulled the diaper at nap. And he went poopy in his big boy underpants. He did not call for me, so he sat there in it for his whole nap! So I pulled the underpants. He went in his bed. Again, he did not tell me, so he laid there with it for his whole nap! (Can you envision my head banging up against the wall!). Then one afternoon at the beginning of naptime, Andrew called me at work and enthusiastically shared that, "I went poopy on the potty and Margaret is standing up! Can you believe it?!?!?" No, sweet Andrew, I cannot. And I'm not sure which one makes me more proud:)

"I am bound, I am bound, I am bound for the Promised Land"

In June 2011, Michael and I took a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with our beloved Wellshire Presbyterian Church in Denver. It took us 6 months and some tactful urging by Margaret Bell herself to realize that we could indeed leave the kids for 10 days, travel half-way across the world into the unrest of the Middle East, and live to tell about it. Oh, and then there was the cost....the PTO cost for Michael and the financial cost of the trip. But you can't take vacation days and money with you when you go, so we bit the bullet.

All grandparents and half of their aunts, uncles, and cousins chipped in to make our absence possible. Not knowing what Andrew would understand or comprehend about it, we didn't explain the trip to him until a couple of days before. But what was priceless was his song of choice during breakfast for the few weeks prior to our trip. Before even telling him, he started singing a church favorite each morning: "I am bound, I am bound, I am bound for the Promised Land". Over, and over, and over again he reminded us of what was to come----for us, anyway!

The trip was the experience of a lifetime, no doubt.  Only after going did we realize why John has made the effort to go nine times.  What a blessing that is!  Below is a link to the Shutterfly Album I created.  It is an extremely brief version of the journaling I did while we were there, but a good review of our trip.

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0AZMmzhk1at2TCWg