Potty Training...the overview

Hannah is officially potty trained! We are very excited about this milestone. She expressed a strong interest right before her 2nd birthday, but we held off because of upcoming travel. She expressed an interest again in December (right before Christmas) and we jumped on the opportunity. Wes wasn't traveling, so I had back up.

We decided to try the three-day method of training. It worked well for Hannah. For those of you who don't know about the three-day method, it's basically a potty training boot camp. You put the toddler in underwear, sit them on the potty through out the day and/or any time they start to have an accident. Supposedly, by the third day the toddler understands that you go to the bathroom in the potty. Hannah had a few interruptions (travel and other obligations) during the "three days" so it took her more like a week to catch on.

Here's the run down (this is really more for my benefit down the road for #2):

Pre-training:

• We introduced the potty to Hannah early on. We have two little potties (one up stairs and one down) that were out about 6 months before Hannah expressed her first true interest in training. She was around 1.5
• Every time I went to the bathroom, I'd ask Hannah if she'd like to sit on her  potty (this could either be with or without her diaper on)
• We put her on the potty every night before bath time bare-bottomed.
• She had some successes on the potty before our full-on training. I'm sure these were flukes, but it was a great time for us to praise and reward her for going. We made a huge deal out of her successes. I'm talking full on dance parties, high fives, and plenty of hugs.
• We read "Princess of the Potty" over and over to her while sitting on the potty.

Boot camp:

• Hannah got a package of Disney Princess panties to wear and she thought they were so fun and special.
• We started off by putting Hannah on the potty every hour and letting her sit for about 15 min. Keeping her on the potty was tricky. Fortunately, she loves several apps and we'd only let her play with them while sitting on the potty. We also read, sang songs, strung beads on a rope, tried lacing cards, among other things. 
• Every time Hannah had a success, she got to pick a special treat. Most of the time it was candy, but she'd occasionally pick stickers.
• If we had to leave the house, Hannah was in a pull-up and we kept reminding her about the potty.  This was a bit of a fail...really a get out of jail free card if you will...

Today:

• She mastered #2 first, no problem. Then, she got #1. A month later, she's switched. She some times has trouble with #2 and has a good handle for #1. She doesn't have trouble telling me or Wes when she needs to go to the potty, but has a harder time telling others. This is especially true for #2. 
• She still (over a month later) goes to school in a pull-up because she hasn't been able to tell them when she needs to do #2, but always tells them when she needs to do #1. Until she gets a handle on both, she has to go to school in a pull-up.
• We keep a small travel potty in the back of our car and always put her on it before going into stores, play dates, music class, etc. She gets distracted easily in certain situations and this helps set her up for success.

In hind-sight:

• We made the mistake of letting her go completely bare-bottomed for her training. When we put underwear on her, she began to think it was like a diaper and would have an accident. It took several more days to break her of that. 
• It can be very frustrating to keep your patience. I was thankful Wes was around. He certainly stepped in when my patience expired and gave me time to cool down before jumping back in. It's very important to stay positive throughout the entire process. I need to remember this for our second baby one day.