Poop Goes in the Potty - Take 1

*Disclaimer* If you aren't potty training or aren't planning to, this is probably way more information than you care to read. There's your fair warning.


Potty training.
Once your kid turns 18 months, it seems like the buzz starts. People start asking if you've started potty training, if you're thinking about it, what method you'll use, etc.

Boys potty train later. It's just a fact. Part of that is muscle control. They actually aren't able to control the necessary muscles as soon as girls are. Still, everyone encourages you to asks when you think you'll start.

So for a few weeks I've been thinking Sam may be ready to start. He'll be three at the end of October. I've been mentioning it to him, we bought this, and we've laid out the bribes, M&Ms, a big bag, whatever type he wants.

My original plan had been to reserve a weekend, send Grey off, put Sam in underwear and see how he did...hoping he would pick up on it after a couple days and we'd be diaper free. Due to travel, Grey's birthday party, and random other events, we haven't really had a weekend we could do that and we won't have a weekend like that for another 3 weeks or so.

Sunday, Bob decided he was just gonna go for it. He says he noticed Sam pulling on his diaper so during breakfast, Bob asked if Sam wanted to go poop on the potty.

Success! And so we made a pit stop at the gas station on the way in to church to get M&Ms.
(Dark chocolate peanut for those who are wondering).

Of course, since we were headed to church and since he's in the nursery while we're in church, we had to put things on hold. But over the next few days, he had various other successes. His diaper wasn't dry for too long but he was having dry periods. Tuesday was kind of a bummer. He didn't want to try at all. In fact, I was starting to get a bit discouraged thinking we just needed to nix this plan and do the weekend thing.

Wednesday, we got back on track a little and he had a bit of a breakthrough. It became pretty obvious that he knew how to control the flow of urine. I kind of already knew this because he'd look at me (with a diaper on) and say, "I just tee-teed." Wednesday though, he was using the control to go in the potty. Yea! It was just the encouragement I needed. Weird right?

Big thanks to Bob for suggesting we mix up the rewards a little to include fruit snacks and pickles.

Thursday we had a few successes, nothing mind blowing.

Friday, Sam hopped up on the big potty and tee-teed. Then we ran to Publix and I wasn't giving it a whole lot of thought. In fact, I'd been trying to decide if we should just lay off until we have a few days where we can really focus on it.

So I'm finishing up my grocery shopping when he tells me he needs to tee-tee in the potty. I rush to the bathroom, squeeze me and my big belly, and the double shopping cart into the family restroom. About 10 minutes (no exaggeration) later, and after much of Grey's screaming, we had success! Wahoo!

Trading diapers for underwear and trading our vacation for potty training.
Take 2 will be up tomorrow.

We Were the Ones Hogging the Family Restroom at Publix This Morning

Day 6 of Very Relaxed, Quasi Potty-Training
(not at all the way I expected to start this little endeavor)

Sam woke up with a soaking wet and poopy diaper.
He tee-teed in the big potty later in the morning - got some M&Ms.

We went to Publix to do a little grocery shopping.

Sam told me about halfway through that he needed to tee-tee in the potty so we raced to the bathroom.

I kept telling him to hold it, finagled the cart in the family restroom (which was hilarious with my belly), sat in there for probably a good 10 minutes - during which I would say, "ok buddy, if you're going to do it, you need to go on" or "it's ok if you don't have tee-tee, let's just go finish shopping".

He asked me to turn on the water.
I did.
He asked if he could get this little race car that holds Cheerios if he tee-teed.
I said yes.
Grey screamed a lot....A.LOT.

Sam tee-teed in the potty and got the car.

I was pretty impressed :).

Winner

Some of you were amazingly close and some not so much. In fact, I'm wondering if I need to learn a little more about couponing from y'all! Rebekah? Them giving me $.10? That would've been impressive!

With a guess of $32.94, only $1.58 off, Angela is the winner. Wahoo! Ang, email me with your address and I'll stick the Starbucks card in the mail :).

In case you're curious, here's the breakdown:

Not on sale - black

On sale - blue

On sale and coupon - red
- 1 baguette $1.79

- 1 bag of Doritos $1.99

- 1 box of Lucky Charms $.97

- 1 box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch $.97

- 2 pouches of Uncle Ben's Ready Rice $.97 each

- 2 pouches of Fisher's trail mix $.50 each

- 2 boxes of Betty Crocker Supreme Brownie Mix $.90 each

- 2 blocks of Kraft cheese $1.17 each

- 1 box of Uncrustables (are these gross? never tried them before) $1

- 6 cans of Progresso soup $.42 each

- 6 cans of Green Giant corn $.48 each

- 1 can of Pam $1

- 1 carton of Egg Beaters $.67

- 1 gallon of Publix organic milk $4.99

- 1 pkg. of strawberries $1.67

- 1 pkg. of organic carrots $1.50

- 8 bags of Green Giant Steamers $.32 each

I'm off a couple cents somewhere, but you get the idea.

So, who all is couponing? I'd love to hear about one of your best runs.

A Giveaway Using the Money I'm Saving from Couponing

I started couponing about 2 months ago. It has become a game, a challenge, like everyone says it has to...if you want to stick with it.

This isn't going to be a long explanation of how to coupon. If you're interested in that, I recommend this site. It's awesome and, really, it's all I use. (Check the tutorials at the top right of the page). One thing you'll see here is how beneficial it is to stockpile - buying things are their rock bottom price.

This is a game for you guys!

Below you'll see a picture of the items I bought recently at Publix and a list of everything in the picture just to be fair (in case you can't see everything).


- 1 baguette
- 1 bag of Doritos
- 1 box of Lucky Charms
- 1 box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch
- 2 pouches of Uncle Ben's Ready Rice
- 2 pouches of Fisher's trail mix
- 2 boxes of Betty Crocker Supreme Brownie Mix
- 2 blocks of Kraft cheese
- 1 box of Uncrustables (are these gross? never tried them before)
- 6 cans of Progresso soup
- 6 cans of Green Giant corn
- 1 can of Pam
- 1 carton of Egg Beaters
- 1 gallon of Publix organic milk
- 1 pkg. of strawberries
- 1 pkg. of carrots
- 8 bags of Green Giant Steamers
Total before coupons and tax = $91.37

The challenge is to guess what I paid out of pocket, before tax for all this stuff. I'll send the winner a shiny, new $5 gift card to Starbucks. (Whoever guesses closest, over or under, wins!)

When I announce the winner, I'll tell you how much I spent and how much I saved. So fun, right?!

You've got until next Monday, March 8 at noon CST to guess. (I'm looking for dollars and cents here). I'll post the winner sometime that afternoon.

Hobby Lobby, Take a Lesson from Chick-fil-a and Publix

CFA and Publix are two establishments who've got customer service down. They've identified their main customer base and they cater to it. I would argue that the customer base for each of these stores is the same...moms with young kids.

Chick-fil-a's got the playground, the sticky placemats, the option to trade in your toy for ice cream.
And we've already gone over what Publix has (double shopping carts with steering wheels, free cookies and balloons, free diapers in the bathrooms, etc.).

Hobby Lobby has got a lot going for it. It's a Christian company and I feel good about spending my money there. In fact, there have been numerous times I've called it my favorite store. However, after today, I don't know that I can say that anymore.

Relive it with me...
After I finagled Grey's carseat into the much-too-small cart, which didn't leave room for me to put Sam in the top, so he had to walk, I headed in to wait, in a pretty long line, to return some paper. Imagine this, an almost two, crazy little boy in Hobby Lobby. He is NOT allowed to not be in a cart in there for good reason BUT, I didn't have much choice because I forgot the double stroller. Strike one for me.

Anyway, I'm trying to exchange some paper I bought a while ago to get some for Grey's birth announcements and Sam's birthday party invitations.
I've got my receipt. Great, right? Nope. Strike number two for me.
The cashier informs me that my receipt is over 60 days old so she can't do anything for me. She won't even do an even exchange, which is what I wanted.

By this time, I've had to pick up Sam who was running around the registers, and he has begun to squirm out of my arms to touch the credit card swiper...oh, and he's whining :).

I let the lady know this store has allowed me to do this very same thing many times before. She just stares at me.
So, I ask her if I didn't have the receipt, would I be able to get store credit...and pick up my receipt to stick back in my bag. She informs me that she has to follow store policy and that if I come back through her line, she won't be able to do anything.

Ugh!

I understand an employee needing and wanting to follow store policy. She was doing the right thing. What I don't understand is why the store policy allows someone to walk in without a receipt and get store credit for any item but they have a time limit on when you can EXCHANGE something if you come in with a receipt for it. How does that make any sense?

I know one reason all these stores are cracking down on returns, ahem Target, is because they're losing money on shoplifting. But hello, if I can get something out of Hobby Lobby, then walk back in and "return" it for store credit YOU ARE LOSING MONEY. If I buy something and a couple months later, come in to exchange it with my receipt, you are not losing money. You are breaking even and keeping one of your most frequent customers happy.

Strike number three for me was not thinking to ask to talk to a manager. Surely they would've had a different response. Don't you think?