Developmental update at 4 years old

I still can't wrap my head around the fact that Tristan is 4 years old. When it comes to small children, every year that goes by is astronomical! Tristan is so different and so much bigger now. As adults we may age but we are pretty much no different than we were a year ago. For kids, it really is astronomical. Throwing kids huge birthday parties may seem excessive but it's such a huge milestone that I really love doing it. Tristan's construction party was his biggest party yet! It will be hard to top that one. Parents tell me that kids grow out of the parties as well and they don't get excited about them much as they get older. Right now all the kids are so young and excited and that makes me even more excited to throw a birthday party! One day, we can all look back on all these special occasions with fond memories. The experiences are priceless :)

Speech

Showing his white teeth after a dentist cleanup.

Tristan is a little person who you can have clear conversations with. His pronunciation of letters is improving all the time. Anyone can understand him most of the time. He used to have problems saying the sound of "f" but now it's fine.

He is developing his own personality but a lot of Jean-Louis and I are in him as well. He copies us and often says "aw, man!" "that is so cool!" and "what the hell?" It's not the best thing but we don't swear (or at least I never) so you will never hear him say anything worst than "hell."

He can seriously listen to you and understand what you tell him, if you have his full attention. I had a conversation with him about how bad it is to eat things that are burned such as burned toast. I told him it tastes awful and it can also lead to cancer and cancer could lead to death. The first time I told him that it just stuck with him. He knows that I yell every time his dad eats burned toast and so when Tristan sees this, Tristan tells his dad not to eat it because he will die.

When I explain something to Tristan, he repeats what he learns to his dad. He explained to Jean-Louis how some of the African's have no money and no food to eat and that is why they have no meat on their bodies. We do not want to waste food here because we are lucky to be eating so well. That was the lesson there :)

Tristan sucks at keeping secrets. I have told him plenty to test him and so far he has only kept one or two. He blabs to his dad all the time!

Tristan's signature.

He can write his name and copy his phone number. He remembers his phone number from memory as well. He can read numbers well but he gets a few letters mixed up. He also gets French and English pronunciation of letters mixed up some times.

Tristan likes to talk. Some times there is no shutting him up. He's your typical little 4 year old! Blah, blah, blah. But it's so entertaining and he has such a sweet and innocent voice :)

Eating

Dining with him has been great lately. He is eating a bit more now but I think he is still under eating for his age. He eats everything we give him. If he doesn't like it much, he still eats it because he knows he has too. For instance, he doesn't really like bittermelon so we don't give him much but he will still eat what we give him. I love bittermelon :)

Being goofy with a funny looking carrot.

He just left his highchair this week! I know we took forever doing this but it was only because he was making such a huge mess. We don't feed him at all and he had to prove to us that he could sit at the table on a regular chair and not make a mess. This week, we had plenty of water spills on the table and on the floor :( One time it was milk too. He still wears a bib to protect his clothes. We may lose the bib soon, depending on how it goes. Then again, even Jean-Louis still wears something on his body to protect his clothes. Ahem.

Sleep

Tristan sleeps from 9 or 9:30PM to 7:30 or 8AM. That is about the same as usual. He went from not napping at daycare to going back to naps. When he is home with me, he doesn't nap at all. We put him down earlier around 8:30PM or so.

Physical Development

Tristan is 37 pounds. We are looking forward to when he is 40 pounds so we can put him in a booster seat in the car. That should make things a lot easier.

Tristan is around 40 inches (or 102 cm) tall. He is finally tall enough to reach the bathroom sink to wash his hands if he tippy toes. We still have to carry him for the kitchen sink. He is also tall enough to turn on any light switch in the house. I believe at 40 inches tall, he is now tall enough to go on Disneyland rides! Assuming he is brave enough to go on them.

Tristan is wearing anything from 3 to 5 year old clothes. The 5 year old clothes need folding in the sleeves and pants but they don't look overly huge. For clothes that are 3 years old, we just let him wear them as undershirts under bigger shirts. It's cold right now so the smaller shirts are coming in handy! Since he is short, 3 year old pants are just the right length.

Potty Training

Tristan still pees in his pull up at night. At one point he went almost 2 weeks dry at night. We thought that was the end of pull ups but we were wrong. He just went 4 nights dry and then peed again. Since he is our only child, we haven't felt the urgency to push him much. Now that he is 4, we are having more conversations with him about this because he can understand more. Hopefully he will decide to stop all pull ups soon.

During the day, we can trust him to go potty by himself. He pees and washes his hands by himself. When he has to poo, we normally go assist him.

Behavior

Tristan is a fun and imaginative child. He likes to pretend play and he tells crazy stories or sings funny tunes all the time. We sort of do that ourselves so he definitely gets some of it from us.

When he does something bad and we yell at him, he gets mad and tells us that he will hide under the table and never come out again. We need to control our yelling some times but he is going through a time where it is some times really hard to get him to listen and do what we tell him to do. He likes to stall things he doesn't want to do right away such as go to bed.

Tristan is a very fortunate child. We shower him with nice toys and great food all the time and I'm not sure if he is spoiled or not but some times he forgets how lucky he is. When we go to the store, he some times asks us to buy him things. I tell him that I don't like it when he asks for things and that really nice and good boys don't ask. Good boys just get things some times. I tell him it's okay to tell us what he likes and show us but don't ask us to buy it. Now when we are at the store, he grabs toys and brings it to me and says "this is really cool." See? He's learning!

Lately, we have found that he has been over opinionated and stubborn a lot. For instance, when he doesn't want to put on his coat himself and wants us to, we could be standing there arguing for 10 minutes. Sometimes we are able to convince him to do it but other times, he will throw a tantrum. Yes, a tantrum! We haven't seen these sorts of tantrums since the terrible twos. Luckily, these don't occur as often and don't last as long as the terrible two tantrums. It's still pretty awful though :(

Tantrums aside, I think Tristan is at the age where he can be a lot of fun to be with. He is mature enough to have conversations with and smart enough to rely on for help some times. He corrects us many times when we talk to him and we don't even realize we made a mistake. He likes to be useful so he helps where he can with things around the house. For instance, he helps set the dining table and this past weekend he helped put up decorations on the Christmas tree. He did break an ornament along the way though. It was the first one we ever broke:( Oh well. It could have been worst.

Tristan is very affectionate. We shower him with kisses and hugs and tell him we love him all the time and he does the same to us. His grandparents in France noticed how affectionate he was when we were in France this past Spring as well. I hear that kids grow out of this affectionate phase so I want to enjoy it as long as I can :)

3 years developmental update

Wow, I still can't believe Tristan is 3 years old now! Bye bye under 3 freebies. We all knew the time would come. But really, time goes by quickly and kids grow so fast! I'm so happy to be able to spend so much time with him while he is still young. I feel like we have celebrated every milestone and everything we do together will leave behind great memories for the future. With another birthday behind us, here is the latest in growth and development for Tristan.

GROWTH

He really is getting so big! Physically he is a bit bigger than he was a year ago. He isn't growing at the rate he used to when he was a baby so we're able to let him wear his clothes for longer periods. He still wears some of his 24 month clothes even. Most of them are pants though. Last year's 3 year old winter clothes will get worn again, which I'm thankful for. Tristan has nice clothes and some of them are really expensive French clothes so if he can wear them for more than one season, then I'm happy! Some of the pants we let him wear last year no longer need to be folded at the bottom. He wore the same Halloween costume as last year! It was slightly big last year and this year it may have been a bit snug. Jean-Louis weighed Tristan a week or so ago and he's 32 pounds. When compared to the other kids at daycare, Tristan appears to be a bit on the small side.

FOOD & EATING

Tristan may be a bit small for his age (or maybe he's average) but I know he eats well and I'm not worried at all. Jean-Louis and I are both petite so I don't expect Tristan to be very big or tall one day. For the past week, Tristan has been eating well. He some times nibbles at lunch but then when dinner comes along, he eats all the food we give him. He'll have a bowl of vegetable and chicken soup, then yogurt, then fruit and maybe a cookie. Overall though, we still don't enjoy mealtimes very much. Whether or not Tristan eats all his food or not, we still have to nag at him or coach him along quite a bit. Sometimes we even have to soup feed him a bit to hurry him along. Jean-Louis really really hates doing that! Lately, it has been pretty good though and Tristan has been eating by myself.

Things are pretty much back to normal now. When we came back from vacation, Tristan became a bit more difficult at the dining table. Thank goodness we are back to our routine. We're allowing Tristan to eat more things now, including junk food like processed candies. He had his first lollipop just a few days ago. At first he really liked it but then after about 10 licks, he didn't want anymore. He has also tried pop, black licorice, M&M candies, and chips. When he does eat junk food, it's more like a sampling. The idea is just for him to try it and let him know that he can't have too much because it's not healthy. I think it's important for him to try all sorts of foods so that he at least knows what they are and will be able to follow when people talk about them. We also don't want to deprive him to the point where he would engorge in tons of junk when he's at a party because he can't have any at home. I heard that is a problem with some kids. Of course we are very strict with him as well or else he would be a very picky eater and not listen at the dining table.

POTTY TRAINING

Tristan is going strong with his potty training. He is fully trained when he is awake and 50% of the time when he is asleep. It could be more because he has been increasingly waking up with dry pull-ups now. I can't remember the last time we had a potty accident. When we were in Hawaii, Tristan didn't have any accidents, even when we were on the tour bus all day. We were very lucky because it turned out that we had totally forgotten to bring along a change of underwear and clothes for him if he had an accident. So lucky! I don't bother asking Tristan if he has to pee anymore. He tells us and some times he will even hold it a long time, while I finish something up in the kitchen. We used to run up the stairs every time he told us but now we just calmly walk up. It's so nice to be potty trained :)

SLEEP

Tristan sleeps a bit less now since he has pretty much given up his naps. He stopped napping at home for a few weeks now. Sometimes when we are out, he may fall asleep and then we just let him. If he can sleep, I'm all for the naps :) We just don't bother putting him down anymore. He seems totally energetic and happy about it too. His bedtime hasn't changed. He sleeps around 9PM and wakes up around 7:30AM.

Tristan still sleeps in his crib. He slept in a twin and double bed when we were on vacation and only fell off it once. We thought we would have to transfer him over to a bigger bed or extend his crib when we got back. It turned out he liked sleeping in his crib. It's not a big deal to us since we would prefer to keep him in the crib as long as possible. He doesn't jump out and this way he is contained. I used to hear my friend talk about how her kids would run to her room at 6AM and wake her up. I'm trying to delay this from happening to me as long as possible. I know I'm lucky Tristan listens a lot. He wakes up in the morning and he calls out from his crib "Mommy? Are you awake? I'm not tired anymore." I would look at the clock and respond "Not yet Tristan. Go back to sleep. Mommy needs 20 more minutes." That usually does it :)

SPEECH

Tristan is piecing together new sentences like you wouldn't believe it. He'll hear something once and then try to use it in a new sentence. I'm not sure how and when this all happened but we're noticing it right now. He is also speaking with better tense. He'll say things in the present and past and is figuring out which one to use and when. He asks "why" to everything. I think the "why" stage started when we went to Whistler back in May. He's funny to have conversations with because he has answers for most things even though they don't make sense. Let's say he has a reply to most things :)

Jean-Louis says that Tristan has no theory of mind. What he means is that he doesn't know that there are some things he will know that we won't know. For instance when we pick him up at daycare and ask him what he did at daycare, he says I don't know. Then he turns to me and asks me "do you know mommy?" The same thing happens when I ask him about the kids at daycare. This makes it extra hard to learn about who he plays with and who his friends are. It wasn't easy knowing who to invite to his birthday party.

Tristan speaks English but has a full understanding of French. He says a few things in French and only French. He can say a few things and understand even more things in Chinese. One thing I'm proud of is that Tristan doesn't swear or say things like "damnit." I don't swear and Jean-Louis is controlling himself from saying things like "damnit" and "Jesus Christ." So far it's working because whenever Tristan is in shock, he says "oh my goodness." However, he does know dirty words and he'll say it to be naughty. For instance he says "caca" here and there to be funny. "Caca" is poo in French. Luckily, not many people know what he is saying and probably thinks he is just making funny noises.

BEHAVIOR

Some times we lose our patience at Tristan and then we yell and become aggressive. Tristan is learning from us and some times he protests and misbehaves for attention. A couple of times, he tried to hit or kick us when he was really mad. Every time, we pulled him aside, lectured him and got him to apologize. He's pretty good at saying sorry and he understands why we are sad when he is behaving badly. He is also polite and says thank-you and excuse me.

Tristan is rough when he plays so we're teaching him to be more gentle when pretending to play things like "kung-fu." We pretend fight him but he fights us for real and some times we really get hurt! I am definitely going to enroll him in some kind of martial arts class. He's going to kick butt!

He's goofy. He likes to make funny and weird faces all the time. I think he gets that from me. At his birthday party this past weekend, he had a hard time standing still with a straight face when everyone was singing happy birthday to him. He keep making faces and sticking his tongue out. I notice but Jean-Louis didn't. Some times he just does that.

Tantrums? What tantrums? Yeah, he still tantrums from time to time. They don't bother us much anymore since they hardly happen and when they do, they last maybe a few minutes at most. We're so glad the terrible-twos are behind us. From what I hear, threes are awesome :) It's already pretty awesome I think. Tristan really is a great little kid.

First day in the 3-5 room

While many parents are excited and stressed about the first day of school today, I was excited about Tristan's first day in a new room at his daycare. He has graduated from the Toddler room and is now in the 3-5 room. It's the big boy room! Kids ages 3 to 5 attend this room. Apparently, some of the kids in the room even attend kindergarten as well. Maybe this has changed now that kindergarten is a full day.

Tristan will be 3 years old in less than 3 months. Because he is ready now and there are spots available in the 3-5 room, he is starting this program this month. September is a big transition month for daycare because many of the kids in the 3-5 room are starting Kindergarten or Grade 1 and will leave the daycare. That allows all the rooms to shift upwards and free up space for new kids to join the daycare. Tristan and another little girl from his toddler room moved into the 3-5 room today.

When I dropped Tristan off this morning, he was excited. He gave his lunchbox to one of the staff members, grabbed a book and sat on the couch by himself looking at it. He just made himself at home. Just like that :) I noticed the other little girl from his toddler room was not coping so well. I am not sure she was quite ready to come into this room but if she didn't now, there may not be space for her for months. I think she has only begun potty training and typically, you need to be fully potty trained to come into the 3-5 room. She looks much smaller than Tristan. When her dad dropped her off and left, she cried. She has been to the daycare for a long time too but the new room was overwhelming to her I guess. Poor girl:(

One of Tristan's best friends is in the 3-5 room. We have talked about the 3-5 room change for a long time now and he loves that "he is a big boy now!" In this room, Tristan will learn more independence. There are no more individual daily report sheets. He may not be reminded to drink water and will have to learn to ask for water more when he is thirsty. In fact, when I picked him up today, the second thing he said to me was "can I have some water please?" It makes me wonder how long he has been thirsty for. It was so hot today too.

In the toddler room, there was one staff member for every 4 children. Here in the 3-5 room, there is one staff member for every 8 children. In kindergarten, there may be one teacher for every 22 children. The program in the 3-5 room will prepare Tristan for kindergarten and I am thankful for that. It's a huge transition, especially if a child has not been to daycare before. Tristan is doing great so far and I'm not worried about him at all. They say that some kids have a hard time transitioning from being one of the biggest kids in their room to being one of the smallest kids in the new room. A lot of Tristan's friends are already in the 3-5 room and he also knows the staff there. Even if he hasn't been in that room a lot, he is familiar with the people and has been in that same building since he was 13 months old. This gives him a huge advantage in adjusting to the new room. It's so hard to leave your child at daycare for the first time. Some of the parents are going through that right now in the 3-5 room. I feel for them and thank goodness we won't have to go through that pain again.

Tristan is potty trained! (knock on wood)

It has been at least three weeks since Tristan had a wet underwear. He went for nine days at one point earlier and then in the middle of a tantrum, he peed in his underwear. I have a feeling that it wasn't an accident though, if you know what I mean ;) Since then I believe we haven't seen any accidents and daycare hasn't reported any either.

It's been long enough that we're calling it a pass. He is officially potty trained! This of course doesn't count the wet pullups he wakes up in. Somehow he just isn't holding his pee while he sleeps. Maybe I should give him underwear to wear anyway and train him in bed? I hear that some kids will even wet their beds when they are four years old :(

Being potty trained makes it so much easier to go out with him. Being a little boy who can pee standing or sitting makes it THAT much easier! :) We some times will tell him to try and pee before we go out if we know that he hadn't gone for awhile. However, most of the time he just tells us and the odd time, he will just head to the bathroom alone. It's great because we don't have to keep track of his bathroom routine anymore!

On a related note, Tristan has been eating so well lately and is pretty much pooing at the same time every day! Hooray for balanced meals and being regular :) The bad news is that we're now nagging him to hurry up because he takes forever to eat. It's funny because there really is always something bugging us :)

Tristan is 31 months old (or 2 years 7 months)

It's been awhile since I have done a post on Tristan's developmental updates. Today is no special day, except that it is the 20th of the month. Here is a brief update on how he is doing.

Potty Training

Tristan is well on his way to becoming diaper free. He wears underwear all the time except when he naps or sleeps at night. He has only had 2 dry diapers so far after waking up in the morning but when he does pee in his diaper it only happens once since the diaper is only a bit wet. He's working on it :) This weekend we went over to Victoria and even when we had a diaper or pull up on him, he did not pee in them once. No accidents and he even did number 2 at a restaurant. This is not to say he doesn't have any accidents. There are at least a couple of accidents a week still. Some times we just don't make it to the bathroom in time.

Eating

Tristan is eating everything. He isn't as picky at the moment and will eat anything you give him. If he is picky, we bribe him with an upcoming course (e.g. cheese stick) and that usually does the trick. He has also been eating more sweets such as muffins, cookies, scones, and granola. These are all homemade but he also likes to eat store bought arrowroot animal cookies. I would say that he eats sweets maybe twice a week. He's at that age where we just want him to try everything and discover the world. If it's something that isn't great for him like a brownie, we'll just give him a bite or two. Jean-Louis almost let him try pop but then I said no. That stuff is pure crap and besides, Tristan hasn't even drank juice yet. Okay, so maybe he can't try everything quite yet! :)

Sleep

He sleeps from 9:15PM to 7AM. He naps for 1-2 hours. We can't really complain here. He's quite consistent and sleeps through the night. Some times if he wakes up a bit earlier, we just go tell him to go back to sleep and cover him up and he does.

Tristan is still in his crib and will be for awhile. There is a piece of wood we can move so that he can get in and out easily. We plan to remove that piece in October, after our vacation. Right now, he can jump in and out of his crib but he is usually good about staying inside until we get to his room.

Speech

He can sing but he is shy around others. Some of his favorites are Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Eensy-Weensy Spider, Happy Birthday, and Wheels on the Bus. His pronunciation is getting much better now. He can have simple conversations with my Mom on the phone and she actually understands him. He is still mixing his French and English. He is a little us in many ways. He says "oh my goodness" a lot and I've heard him say "what the heck" and "what the dickens." He tries to explain everything with "because... I'm a big boy" or something else. He loves to say because. You ask him why or how come and he'll say "because" and then try to finish it off with something. We find that he is constantly rehearsing his speech with us. We have to let him too but it's very interesting to watch him.

In the last week or so, he has been saying "love you" to us. Yup, it has taken him this long! Not sure if he totally understands it but we'll take it :)

Growth & Exercise

Tristan weighs 30 pounds. He can jump down from the third step on the stairs. He likes to run because Mom and Dad runs. He walks home one way from daycare and he increasingly wants to walk more. He loves biking on his Strider and requests to do it every day. He is at that age where we can take him out more and he can have fun. Overall, he is just easier to care for and more fun to be with. I think that is a recipe for traveling more, don't you? ;)

Behavior

Tantrums are on the decline. At the moment. Of course this could change but we're enjoying every moment of peace:)

When he coughs, he knows to do it into his elbow. He is an expert at blowing his nose. Bye bye aspirator! He started blowing his nose a few months ago. A couple of weeks ago, he started to spit out toothpaste after we brush his teeth.

First dry overnight diaper

We just reached yet another milestone in Tristan's potty training. He's has been doing very well in underwear pretty much all the time except that he still sleeps in a diaper. We let him wear underwear when we go out and we have so far managed to find public washrooms for him whenever he needed it. I have to say little boys are lucky they can pee while standing up! He even peed while standing on a log off a trail when we went hiking in Whistler. He sits and pees too but lately his preference is to stand, since daddy pees that way too :)

Tristan is advancing in potty training because he can hold his pee for long periods. I remember one day when he only peed twice from the morning he woke up to the time it was 4PM. I must have peed like 5 times by then. Since then I have tried to get him to drink more but it wasn't like he wasn't drinking at all. This week he actually wet his bed many times. He wears a diaper to sleep and he pees so much that it leaks. It really annoys me since I have to do laundry all the time. We decided to cut him from any drinking after 8PM. We encourage him to pee before bed but it doesn't always happen. We have been starting to tell him not to pee in his diaper and if he doesn't for awhile, we can put an underwear on him. He seems to like the idea but we just figured he is not ready yet.

Yesterday, I forgot to change Tristan out of his underwear for his afternoon nap. When he woke up, the bed was soaked. He didn't even know until I pointed it out. When he realized what had happened, he cried. He was devastated. This morning when he woke up, he walked straight to the potty, sat down, and pee on his own while I was in his bedroom fetching his day clothes. When I came to the bathroom he was said "look, I peed!" I took the diaper he threw on the floor and noticed it was as light as empty. I was totally shocked! Then Tristan said "I hold it. No pee it there. I hold it." Hooray! Then we both did the happy dance :)

I'm beginning to think that Tristan felt all along that it was okay to pee in his diaper during nap and sleep times. We allowed it since we didn't think he was ready. It seems that he is ready to give up the diaper and that we just had to tell him no. "No it's never good to pee in your diaper. You only have it on for emergencies. Try not to pee in it." I think he understands. And now he is trying.

Potty reward stickers: 1 per successful pee or poo

Tristan's ready for underwear!

No, he's not fully potty trained yet but I would say he is 75% there. The past few days he has been making remarkable progress. We tried underwear on him a few weeks ago but he was wetting his pants several times a day. Now, he maybe wets it once. We use diapers when we are out or when he naps and he still stays dry. He'll still be wearing diapers when he sleeps at night for some time but I can see us giving up the daytime diaper pretty soon.

We're obviously really excited! He is not only staying dry most of the day and peeing in the potty 5-6 times a day, he is now also starting to tell us when he has to go. He poos in the potty too but he has been doing that for at least 6 months already. I guess that was also another reason why we didn't push the potty training so hard since he was already pooing in the potty and changing pee diapers weren't so bad.

When we started Tristan on underwear and he was peeing through his pants, Jean-Louis would get really mad. I was less mad because I knew he had to pee and get soaking wet a few times before he would learn. The good thing is that he really hates it when he is soaking wet. Jean-Louis kept telling me he wasn't ready but after a couple weeks of soaking pants, we are finally seeing progress. When I say a couple of weeks, I really mean a couple of days for over a couple of weeks since he only wears underwear at home with me Thursday, Friday, and a few times on the weekend.

I use stickers to reward Tristan on every successful pee. Jean-Louis didn't like that idea initially but I kept telling him that it's okay and it works. Now not only is he sold on the idea of giving stickers to Tristan but he is giving Tristan more than what he deserves, at least more than what I would give him. For instance, Tristan only gets one sticker for a pee. When Tristan came home with a dry diaper after a trip outside and then peed in the potty, Jean-Louis was so impressed that he gave Tristan two stickers! To think he was against the whole idea of potty rewards in the first place! :)

Tristan only wears underwear at home starting Thursday. On Monday, he goes back to daycare and is in his diaper. We can put up with pee on the carpet here but we can't assume daycare can. Today, when I dropped Tristan off at daycare, I spoke to one of the staff members about his potty progress. They told me that they can try underwear on him at daycare too if I wanted to. Yes, please! If we can transition him into underwear during his daycare days too, he will make even more progress. Being in underwear there will also force the staff to be more attentive to his potty needs. Right now, their focus is still on the older kids who are closer to turning 3 years. In just over a month, Tristan will be 2 1/2 (30 months). It's funny to think we have been putting him on the potty on and off since he was around 15 months old. I should have thought of using underwear sooner:( Although, underwear for very small bums are hard to find.

Toddler underwear! Nah, he's not ready.

That's right. We bought Tristan his first underwear. Actually, we bought him like ten underwear. It's all very exciting even though Tristan is not ready for them yet :) That's okay because he will be soon!

Tristan is actually doing quite well. He's trained for #2 (a.k.a poo), if you don't count the unusual accident he had a few days ago. His diaper stays dry more and more each week. He pees in the morning many times when we put him on the potty and some times after he wakes up from his nap. He some times tells us he has to pee and when we put him on the potty, he does pee. However, he still pees a lot in his diaper.

Last week when Tristan was home with me, I let him wear underwear. I knew he would pee in them so I put on tight pajama pants on him. This way when he did get wet, it would mostly be contained, even if I had to change everything from the waist down. Not even 20 minutes into the underwear test, he peed his pants. Yup! The second underwear test that day stayed dry for almost 2 hours.

You may be wondering why bother with underwear since he is clearly not ready yet. The way I see it is that he needs to feel uncomfortable to want to pee in the potty. If he gets soaking wet, he will clearly not ignore it and continue playing. Some pull-ups allow him to feel a bit wet but we found that it hasn't been helping. He would pee and pee into it and then it would leak. Also, the pull-ups just seem like fancy diapers. To us and probably to him too. Underwears are totally different. In other words, Tristan feels like he can still pee in the pull-ups because they can absorb pee like diapers. He is learning now that he cannot pee in underwears at all!

This week I'm doing the same thing. Thursday more or less ended the same way as last week but today went exceptionally well. We only went through one pull-up this morning and he has remained dry since. The trick is to put him on the potty every one to two hours. When we went out, I put a diaper on him. We came home two hours later to a dry diaper. When he had his nap, I changed him out of his underwear and put the same dry diaper on him. He woke up with a dry diaper. As a result of putting him on the toilet every one to two hours, he peed in the toilet four times today and pooped once. I can certainly see how this method can work really well!

Sounds easy, right? Not so much. Even when he didn't want to go potty, we had to insist. To avoid tantrums, we bribed him with a reward sticker if he pees first. We don't have to bribe him all the time but today, we handed out two stickers to him. It's okay, we have a thousand stickers and he will likely be potty trained before we use them all :) We really don't like to bribe but we hate tantrums more. Also, in the past we learned that tantruming over the potty can give pottying a very bad experience for him :(

If we can keep this method up, I think he could be trained fairly quickly. My friend did this exact same thing and her boy was fully trained after two months. Her boy was 25 months old when she trained him. Tristan is now 28 months old. Tristan is far along enough in pottying training that I think he could be trained in less than a month if we could be consistent. Sadly, I can only do this with him a few days a week since daycare has their own pottying routine. Hopefully our method will register with him enough that his diaper will remain dry most of the day at daycare. That would have to mean that he holds his bladder for longer periods at daycare or he speaks up about having to pee.

First public pee for Tristan

Yesterday, it was a beautiful sunny day so we drove to North Vancouver. We continued driving on Marine Drive all the way to Horseshoe Bay in West Vancouver. We admired the luxury mansions along the way and we played in the nearby park. There was a diving group there so we watched them in the water.

After wards, we drove to Delany's Coffee House and gave Tristan his lunch. Before leaving, I went into the bathroom to change Tristan's diaper. His diaper was actually pretty dry or completely dried. He then said he wanted to pee. I layered the toilet seat with toilet paper and placed him on top. I couldn't hear anything but when he got off, I saw that he peed. Woohoo! First public pee at 27 months!



It wasn't the first time we place him on a public toilet. They're difficult because we have to hold him and then there is the dirty factor. Yeah, I'm paranoid about this sort of thing. Tristan couldn't care less but man, I was so excited about his first public pee :) Tristan is increasing doing better and better with his potty training. He wears both diapers and pull-ups now. He is holding his pee more and more since we often find that his diaper is dry. We noticed the same thing from his daycare report.

We don't have many diapers in stock at home but we have tons of wipes. We find that we barely use wipes anymore since his diapers are not that dirty. Tristan has not pooed in his diaper for a very long time now. I think he is pretty much potty trained for #2 :) He is making great progress for #1 too. It might just be time for me to start buying him some underwear :)

Potty training is slow but working

In our household, there isn't much pressure for potty training. We're taking it easy and it's slow but it seems to be progressing. I hear that most babies are potty trained by the time they turn 3 years old. Girls, in general, will be trained earlier since they tend to not like to feel uncomfortable.

We started training Tristan early. We introduced the potty to him when he was 1 year old, maybe even before. We really began to train him after we got back from France when he was 18 months old. He showed signs of readiness early. Before he was even 1 years old, he would point at his diaper when he pooed. Later on, he would sign to us and then when he could speak, he would tell us after he pooed. Then as time went on about the time when he turned two, he would tell us before he had to poo. Then he would tell us before he had to pee. Overall, it was a hit and miss for us. He did it some times but not all the time.

When Tristan turned two, we sort of put more pressure on him to potty but then we noticed it was backfiring so we had to relax. I mean he stopped making progress for awhile and was scared of the potty. I know! Another problem was that daycare was not training him the same way. We find that they are more focused on getting the older kids on the potty since they are the next ones to graduate from the toddler room. The younger kids sit on the potty when it is convenient to do so.

Tristan is now 25 months old. At home, he poos in the potty 85% of the time and pees once or twice a day. During his three days in daycare, he may get lucky and poo in the potty once and he may pee once there as well. One day last week while he was home with me, he pooed in the potty once and peed there three times. I consider that a good potty day :)

He is definitely making progress but he's still far from being potty trained. We were way too optimistic starting out but now we're just going to go with the flow. I think he will be ready when he is ready. Maybe we'll upgrade him to pull-ups or some kind of training pants in a month. I think it would help for him to feel more uncomfortable so that he will tell us more often before a pee occurs. We're not quite prepared to have him go bottomless though because we're fully carpeted here :(

Our potty strategy is pretty simple. We put him on the potty before every diaper change, some times more. We go sit on the potty for a good length of time after meals. While we are on the potty, we read, sing, and talk. If there is a successful pee or poo, we give him a high-five and cheer. Praise is his only reward and some times bragging rights to me or Jean-Louis :) Next, we diaper him. If there was a successful potty, we then let him flush. Then, we have him wash his hands.

Tristan may very well be all trained by now if I were doing things differently. I know of a friend who trained her 27 month old toddler boy in just two months. She placed him on the potty every hour for two months. Wow! That is a lot of commitment. I could do that for awhile but not that long and the daycare routine would just mess it all up. Unfortunately her strategy does not work with our routine :( But honestly, I'm not too sad about it all. Tristan poos in the potty most of the time and diapering seems so easy now compared to when he was on solids and pooing in his diaper 3-4 times a day :)

Getting ready for daycare

I have been meaning to write a post about the two hours I spend with Tristan every morning before daycare. Yes, it takes us that long to do our morning routine before we can leave the house for daycare. If I had a full time job outside of the home, I would be doom! Luckily, I don't and we pretty much get to take our time in the morning :)

I don't like disturbing Tristan from his night sleep so I let him wake up on his own. I think we have only ever woken him twice in the morning. For emergencies though, I do set an alarm for us because it would be crazy to arrive at daycare in time for lunch.

Here is our morning routine:

• 7AM - Wake up
• 7-7:20 - Potty time for both of us, wipe face, change diaper, change Tristan into day clothes
• 7:20-7:30 - Change myself into day clothes, wash & lotion my face, all while Tristan plays
• 7:30-7:45 - Put away dry dishes & prepare Tristan's milk
• 7:45-8:05 - Prepare breakfast for Tristan & hot drink for me, all while Tristan drinks his milk
• 8:05-8:50 - Eat breakfast, clean up, bag daycare lunch
• 8:50-9:15 - Brush teeth, potty, apply sunblock
• 9:20 - Walk to daycare
• 9:30 - Arrive at daycare

Potty training in full swing

Tristan was probably ready to be potty trained back when he was just 15 months old. Many times, he would point to his diaper after he pooed. When he turned one, we brought the potty out so that he would get used to seeing it in the bathroom. At around 15 months, we started to put him on the potty every now and then to sit so that he would get used to it. Some times we would put him on it with his pants on. When I would pee, I would put him on to sit across from me. We weren't very serious about training him then but we wanted him to feel comfortable about going to the potty. We knew we were going to France and we didn't want to have to potty train him there so we decided to just delay everything.

It's been two weeks since we have been back from vacation. The first week back was just about getting readjusted. The second week, he peed in the potty for the first time. Today, he pooed twice in the potty. Each time, he told us beforehand and we would sit for around 5 to 10 minutes before he would do it. We read to him each time and we would talk or sign to him. Some times we sang to him. We did this so that he would remain seated. Lately, we also tried to teach him how to push. He now makes the pushing noise when we sign potty :)

At 19 months and starting the toddler room at daycare, this is good timing for all of us. In the toddler room, they put all the kids on the potty whether they are ready or not. For those who are not, they will get used to sitting on the potty. We weren't sure if the staff in the infant room would have put him on the potty and sit with him, if we had trained Tristan earlier. There definitely needs to be consistency in the routine if we want to teach him.

Some babies are ready to be potty trained earlier than others. Tristan looked like he would be ready early and right now we are off to a great start! He actually seems anxious to be potty trained :) I hear it isn't that easy so I'm interested to see what happens this week. I'm actually really glad that Tristan spends two weekdays with me at home. If daycare doesn't take care of his potty needs, I can try to make up for some of that while he is at home with me.

Thursday and Friday at home with Tristan

This month Tristan started part time daycare. He had been full time up until now. Because of our trip to France, today was actually my first day at home with him. He woke up at the unusual time of 5:45AM and needless to say, my day felt really long. He did nap for a good 1 hour 20 minutes straight though. I used that time to eat lunch, clean up our lunch mess, and finish my last blog post about our trip to France. It was awesome :)

When the weather improved, I took Tristan outside. He needed a change in scenery. We both did. We walked to a nearby park after picking up my niece and we played for awhile in the playground. Then we were back home. The outing killed a couple of hours but it still felt really long.

I think overall it went pretty well. We spent some time going down the stairs for training. Tristan can go down unassisted if you talk to him and remind him to use the wall and basically coach him along the way. He can't be trusted though because a couple of times he just dove head first down. So bad. Tristan also sat on the potty more today and we sang a song together using sign language. I figure if I can't get work done with him here, I mind as well focus my energy on teaching him and spending quality time with him while he is still somewhat of a baby.

The day just felt long and a lot of work because it has been awhile since I have done this. He hasn't been sick at home since the end of March I think. Also, I fed him super messy food today and cleanup was no fun. I will definitely have to go out more because we will definitely drive each other nuts if we stay home all day. With it being summer and all, I no longer have any excuses. Time to get my butt out and get some exercise too!

Just the beginning of toddlerhood

Tristan is your typical active toddler. The only time you can expect to see him fairly still is when he is drinking milk or when he sleeps. When he first started daycare in January, I remembered one of the staff there saying that when the babies start to push the highchair around the room, that is a sign that they are ready to leave the Infant room and go into the Toddler room. I thought that was strange because Tristan was already pushing the highchair at home way before he started daycare.

He has been in the infant room for four months now and I am actually quite anxious for him to leave soon. I think after about 2 months, when he was 15 months old, he must have been pretty bored. The infant room is very small and if the kids don't go outside, I can see how it could be very boring for them to be there all day. I think the main entertainment is the staff and other babies. The toddler room is so much more exciting and once they go into that program, the staff puts them on the potty right away. That is something I'm looking forward to :)

Tristan loves to imitate what people do. Big people and small people. Tristan likes to do what we do and copy us, which is nothing new. Apparently, he does this at daycare too. One of the boys at daycare and Tristan imitate each other. One of them would throw their hands in the air and the other would too. Then they would both laugh. Something like that. Also, one of the girls likes to hug and kiss Tristan. When I first saw her do it, I was a bit uncomfortable. Tristan just stood still the first time but then started to push her away and run away when she tried it again, the second time and the third time. The little girl had a runny nose and she was trying to kiss him on the mouth. I actually took kleenex out of my pocket to wipe his mouth afterwards. Then, when I went to pick him up that same day, I saw the little girl do it again and this time Tristan did it back. Oh my goodness! Tristan is making out with the little blond girl from daycare! At just 17 months? Anyway, when they tried to hug and kiss each other, they ending up knocking each other over. I went to catch them but the little girl hit herself on my knee a bit and cried. Yup. That was a quick end to that make-out session. I wonder how often this goes on at daycare. Or maybe I don't want to know. What kind of surprises me is that the staff don't intervene at all. Should we be encouraging this sort of behavior towards strangers? I don't know.

Our once sweet baby is showing signs of throwing tantrums such as stomping his feet and crying when we don't let him have something. Sometimes he rolls on the floor and has a fit too. We ignore him for the most part. I think we're getting a preview of what people call the "terrible twos." It doesn't happen a lot but we would prefer not to see it at all :)

For the past week or so, he has been picky with his food. I hear this is a toddler phase as well. He wasn't sick or anything else so we can only conclude that he was just picky. We fed him how we had always fed him but some times he would refuse to even try the food. This is all stuff that he has eaten and loved before like broccoli, carrots, peas, noodles, and even some fruit. Actually, there was a day where he basically only wanted to eat cereal, fruit, and milk. What did we do? Well, we just kept trying and if he wouldn't eat, we would just skip that course and move onto fruit. We didn't give him any more fruit than we would normally give him because we didn't want him full on just fruit. We figured once he was hungry, he would want to eat. We packed him the same food again to daycare and he refused to eat it there too. It's the first time he has ever refused to eat his main dish at daycare. They were somewhat shocked too. Anyhow, this went on for 2 days and then he decided to eat again. And then he decided not to. It seemed like almost every other day he would eat a bit more of the main dish. That was Friday.

On the weekend, Tristan ate everything we offered him. Not a lot but he ate some of everything, which was good enough for us. I think new food and alternating between two main dishes helped. Things were even better today. Tonight, I made French veal stew with green olives, mushrooms, onions and served it with rice. It has been awhile since I made that. Tristan ate so much we thought he was starving. His daycare report said that he ate most of his food too. He must have really liked the dish and he is probably still hungry too from not eating too much last week. I don't know if we have our old Tristan back yet but we'll give it a week before introducing plain steamed vegetables to him again. If this week goes well, maybe we'll steam a little something green next week or at the end of this week.

Back to normal, back to daycare

Today is the start of the first full week of daycare for Tristan. At least I hope it will be. We stopped giving him antibiotics for his pink eye on Saturday. That pretty much means we are back to normal and life goes on for all of us. Right? Sometimes, we can't help but think there is something else disturbing him because he is quite a bit of trouble these days. He seems easily agitated and is becoming picky at the dinner table again. Are his molars coming out? I don't feel anything at the back of his gums at the moment. He has a small tooth coming out in the front but it can't be that. Maybe this is all normal because he is getting used to daycare where he has all the freedom in the world and then he comes home and we have all these boundaries. He is venturing into places at home where he is not suppose to and he knows it too. Sometimes when we yell at him and say no, he slowly drops himself to the ground and rolls over like he is going to sleep. What is up with that? Maybe he saw someone at daycare do it and is now imitating that person. So bizarre!

The past week with Tristan at home made me appreciate having daycare even more. Sure he gets sick more and he is allowed to get away with throwing food at daycare etc. but overall, daycare is a blessing for us, especially for me. Tristan is such a monkey and I am getting tired of running after him and saying no. The problem is our place is just not baby proof enough. There are so many things that are dangerous like the stairs, fireplace, sharp objects in the kitchen drawers, and dirty places we don't like him to touch or step on like the hallway, window sill etc. There are just too many restrictions and it sometimes feels like a high-paced full time job just keeping him away from all of these things. We get frustrated and so does he.

Besides running after my little monkey last week, we did get to enjoy some quality time together. We read together, sang, danced, played with his toys, and went for walks. We also got the chance to practice more sign language and learn a few new ones as well. We got to enjoy lots of potty time too. Tristan is really getting used to seeing it and wanting to sit on it, even if it's just for a minute. The goal right now is not to actually train him but to get him familiar with being on the potty and thinking it's fun to sit on one. When I pee, I have him sit on it right across from me. He usually doesn't stay sitting though. He would rather stand by me or throw things in the bathtub. Go figure! The other good thing is that he is now often telling us his diaper is dirty after he poos. A few times he even told us before he went and maybe when he was peeing but we're not totally sure about the pee part. It's a good sign and we are definitely headed towards the right direction :)