Transitions

It goes so fast. You don't really believe it when people tell you that, but it is true. My Pumpkin is smiling and "talking" with me and reaching up to touch my face. He is showing his personality and getting to be a big guy before my very eyes.

My little girl is growing up. She knows all kinds of things that I don't remember her being exposed to. She tells me to "sit down" when I am in the car and turning around to help Peanut with his binky (I only do this when Honey is driving - promise). She sets up tea parties in her little dollhouse. She sings the right words to songs, remembers and tells the stories in books, and generally wants to do everything she sees other kids or adults doing.

Sometimes transitions that I think are going to be difficult end up being really fast and easy. Peanut has always been really easygoing for the most part, but I don't know that I expected some major events to go so smoothly! She made the transition from a crib to a twin bed in a single day. We put the mattress in her room to start organizing the space for the baby and she decided then and there that she was sleeping in the big bed. She got rid of her nap binky in one day and her nighttime binky in two. No crying or fussing. I just said I couldn't find it and would look for it while she slept. Then it was forgotten.

The most stunning transition has been the "click" of really getting potty training. If you do not have kids, you might not grasp the full excitement here, and you would probably be shocked at how frequently family conversations revolve around pee and poop. I'm so sorry, but this is my life. You may choose to move on to another post. Yesterday, I was in the laundry room and Peanut was in the playroom cooking up a storm in her kitchen. I was gone for a minute or so, and I heard a splash. I thought, "Oh no, she put something in the toilet". Then I thought, "that sounded like a bucket of water into the toilet - oh gosh...". I ran to the bathroom and found that she had stopped playing, gone to her potty, pulled her shorts and undies down, peed, dumped the pee successfully into the toilet (!!!) and wiped and pulled her pants up. She was flushing when I arrived, and she calmly told me "I pee". We have been doing some form of potty learning for a long time - I think we had a potty in our bathroom by 15 months or so with zero expectations. But she likes to do what everyone else does, and by 18 months I was no longer changing poopy diapers. Getting the peeing down pat was the harder part for her, and until we just gave her the choice to wear diapers or underpants, I think she was confused. Once she had underpants on, and understood that you can pee in a diaper but not in underpants, it was a few short weeks and voila! Of course we expect some accidents, and there have been a few, but she is really quite reliable.

What's next for my little ones?