Day 2: Not Bad

Julia woke me up at 8:08 AM with her thumbsucking. So I missed her morning pee because she got up before me. Nursed, gave her a chance to go, put her down for a nap.

Woke her up at 12 PM for lunch. Gave her the chance to pee and she went! Nursed for 15 min or so when she pulled away and was looking around. She also tightened her abs and kind of twiddled her legs so I gave her the chance to go and she made me a poo and more pee. Back to nursing. A short while later, she grunted "Unh!" while tightening her abs. I thought she was empty but I decided to go with it and give her another opportunity and she made some more poo. Guess she wasn't quite done the first time.

I decided to just say "Pssss" as our potty cue regardless of it being pee or poop. Every time I held her over the box I said it. Either way, it's still a potty event so it doesn't much change my response. When she was done doing her business, I praised her for being a clever girl. I also told her I liked her giving me cues even if I wasn't up on interpreting them all yet.

I let her try nursing some more but she didn't want any so I put her down with her gymini mat. Julia spent a while kicking around but then hollered so I had to go back over there to roll her back over.

She's been doing that a lot in her sleep lately -- rolling to her tummy and then getting "stuck" there. Then she wakes up and starts hollering because she can't roll back how she wants.

So far this is going a lot easier than I thought.

And boy, do I LOVE just dumping the box contents into the toilet, rinsing the box out and dumping THAT into the toilet and then just flushing.

I always feel environmentally guilty using disposables and I hate physically trashing them -- the odor! And this is mild smelling breastmilk poo. I can't imagine the other kind.

I never mind the physical aspect of washing her cloth diapers because I feel happy using them over disposables. It saves us money and it's kind to her butt. But I'm always thinking about reducing energy use with a baby in the house. That's why I bought a lot and wait to go through the lot before laundering so it works out to 1-2 times a week instead of every day or every other day.

But the box rinse is even easier on my mind and my hands than the cloth diapering. I can't wait for her little potty to come with the new car seat cover! I expect there to be misses but even part time EC will help me cut back on cloth.

Every step across the continuum leads to less waste and her independent potty-ing.

I'm getting more and more curious about reading Laurie Bourke's book. I think I'm doing pretty good trying to figure this all out on my own with little resources at hand.

1:39 PM

Missed a cue while writing this entry. I had her at my feet in her bouncy seat and she started to squrim and I thought she was bored so instead of giving her a chacne to go, I rocked her instead. Then later I found the diaper full of pee/poo when I moved her to the other room. As much as I dislike the Huggies odor, it does let me know if the diaper's been soiled right away!

6:29 PM

Paul came home at 6 PM and woke up from a nap. I explained how to EC her and he got her to make pee and a little poo upon waking. Missed the tail end of the poo bit... it came a few minutes later into the diaper but they both gave it a good try and we're all learning.

Paul and I both just need to get a better sense of how long to leave her over the box and let her "hover" longer to make sure it is all out.

11:00 PM

Peed and poo'd Julia after her evening nap just as my MIL called and asked what I was doing. I told her I was pooping the baby and she seemed amused. At least I know she won't bug me about early potty training.

I went to do gorceries and we closed EC efforts for today. I had to cook all this food and Paul was watching the baby and while he can deal with diapering, he's not really sure how to EC without my help.

I'm cooking 6 or 7 sets of meals. Half is to take to my SIl who jsut gave birth so they don't have to worry about cooking and the rest is ours.

So while I was waiting for things to bake in the oven I made a flannel prefold out of my old flannel nightgown. I have enough material for 3 more prefold experiments. I doubt they'd ever be more than burp clothes but I like the practice and the "free" fabric to play with.

I got a nursing dress today from Motherwear I want to try to copy and I want to sew cloth diaper stuff so any place I can practice my sewing is great!