Reading while on the potty

I had to post about this little morsel of toddler-parentdom before it's forgotten.


Tonight as usual, to get Astrid ready for bed, she sat on her potty before her bath. I used to sit and wait (I still do if it's just pee pee), but #2 takes awhile, and I've taught her to let me know when she's done so I can get other things done while checking in on her. While she was going potty, I was putting a stack of books together for her bedtime reading. Astrid came in and saw the books on the table.


Me: "Are you done?"
Astrid: (Silence. Focused on the stack of books.)
Me: "Astrid, did you go potty?"
Astrid: "Books."
Me: "Did you go poo poo?"
Astrid: "Uh...no." (pause) "Book?"


I tried to explain to her that the books were for after her bath and that I would read them all to her. So she knew that she wasn't supposed to take a book, but she hadn't seen some of these books in awhile and I could see she wanted to. So like a little ferret, she snatched 2 books and ran with them to the bathroom. I had to laugh out loud. She was laughing too. I guess if you have a vice - that's not such a bad one to have.


I followed her to the bathroom and found her sitting on the potty with the books opened in front of her along with an old magazine, looking guilty. We've been away from the house this week, and haven't replaced the magazines in the bathroom.


Me: "Do you want me to get you a new magazine?"
Astrid: (big eyes of surprise) "Yeah!"


I brought her another magazine that she hasn't flipped through yet (The New Yorker) and was met with a heartfelt "Thank you!"


A couple of minutes later she came back and said, "All done. Astrid go poo poo."


While I was cleaning up Astrid was clapping and saying, "Good job."


This potty-training thing isn't so tough after all. I no longer have to change poopy diapers since Astrid always uses the potty for that. Except for the time we were at the mall, and she wasn't able to go #2 in the restroom and went in her diaper 10 minutes later, (which was partly my fault b/c I got tired of crouching down in the stall holding her and making sure she didn't touch anything), I can't remember the last time I changed a poopy diaper. She will sit on the potty on her own a few times everyday and do her business. Just like that it happened. It's really true what they say - when a kid is ready to be potty trained you'll know. But no one mentioned the part about having new reading materials available for potty time. I guess that's just Astrid. =)