Tough Week In Toddlerhood

My oh my- I thought as kids got older things should get easier, but I'm still learning as I go! Up until the last two days, Nate hadn't napped. What changed was (a) I put a dark,thick blanket over his window to block out a ton of light and (b) it wasn't until almost 2:30pm/3pm that he fell asleep. It didn't even matter that he had been up since 6am, which used to mean he would be ready for a nap between 12:30-1:30pm. I have a friend whose daughter doesn't take her nap until mid afternoon now (about six months older than Nate) so maybe it's just a matter of he can go longer in the mornings without sleep-eight hours! Or maybe I'm just lucky. Or maybe...who knows?! I consider myself lucky if he takes a nap period nowadays. I thought as long as Nate slept through the night I wouldn't care if he didn't nap but...after consecutive days of no naps, I think it's almost just as bad as if they don't sleep at night! He doesn't do so well yet at playing independantly so I literally count on his naps to get any kind of "me" time. Maybe if he was able to do something by himself for a period of time it wouldn't matter so much to me. I love Nate to death, but I don't even get the bathroom to myself if he's awake.

On top of long days, Josh just found out that he's going to Michigan next week-7 days long! Almost 6 nights with Nate and I alone. Josh's trips have usually been shorter than that, I think it's been a year at least since he's had one that long. I guess that's another reason that I'm going a little more frantic than usual about Nate napping :) I'm so happy we have plans next week with different friends and other activities to keep us occupied-I really hope it's a fast week!

One more thing: we just may be using our last box of diapers for Nathan :( We've decided after this box (and I wanted Josh to be home!) that we would start potty training. I'm just about fully prepared-I bought big boy underwear,pull-ups and a doll that BOTH pees and poops. Yes, I said that right-we're using a "model doll" that once we feed it, will pee AND poop. Should be interesting. I got this idea from a friend who thought the doll helped out quite a bit-her son was potty trained in three days! That includes the #2 in the potty. The plan is to let Nate run around in underwear at home,let him/show him to feed the doll,take the doll to the potty to see it actually go potty. Then we have a "potty party" to celebrate the doll's success-and the doll gets a reward (in our case, tiny Reeses :) ). Nate will wear pull-ups when we go out and for sleeping. I'm hoping though to spend the first day or two mostly at home to try and get him used to the underwear idea and get him to realize what it feels like to be wet so that he'll hopefully let me know when he needs to go. My only worry is that he might be too young yet to communicate his needs. I hear a lot about how "back in the day, kids were potty trained by 18 mos" but today it seems like we're lucky if kids are potty trained by age 3-and even then a lot of kids still wear pull-ups at night at least.

Here's to a nice weekend and a smooth next week!