Learning from a 2 year old

One of the beautiful things about being a parent is when you see your kid develop their own personality and start to explore the world for themselves. My son and I are not very alike. Physically, he takes after my wife very strongly and he has more of her personality as well. I am fine with that as I am not much to look at and my wife has many great qualities.

One key area where my son and I are different is how social we are. My son is an extremely sociable and affectionate kid. At day care he has become a bit of a 'serial kisser'. That is when I pick him up, he goes up to random kids and gives them a hug and a kiss. Obviously, there is a huge difference in life stage and life experience (he hasn't had 33 years worth of cynical life experience) but he is a genuinely affectionate person who will hug and kiss anyone. As a parent this has been a bit of a challenge for me because I am not comfortable with open displays of affection as I did not grow up in an openly affectionate family. However, I have come to the conclusion that I should encourage this in him because it appears to be his natural personality coming through. In fact, I have come to celebrate the fact that my son is so wonderfully open and caring. I am even at the stage where I now recognise that my lack of openness is a deficiency within me. Learning life lessons from a 2 year old......... who would have thought.

Toilet Training and Other Disasters

My son is now 2 and half and so my wife and I starting thinking that it was time that we started toilet training. He is becoming steadily more aware of the toilet and what people do in it. He was given a Bob the Builder Easter egg by his grandparents that contained a chocolate egg sitting on an egg cup. James then proceeded to call the egg cup 'Bob's potty'. It was about then when we decided to try toilet training.

Like most toddlers, James is obsessed with The Wiggles. In moments of parental weakness we use The Wiggles as a bribery tool and it usually works. We raised the topic of suing the potty with James and he was initially resistant until we told him that he could wear Wiggles undies. At that time we didn't know that there was such a thing as Wiggles undies but it was a pretty sure bet given that just about everything else is branded Wiggles. So we went off and bought Wiggles undies and so started the great toilet training experiment.

James was very keen to get the Wiggles undies on. So my wife had a good talk to him about the potty and telling Mum or Dad when he needed to go to potty. The Wiggles undies come in a pack of 6. We had gone through 5 in about an hour and a half. James was good at telling us that he needed to go to potty. Unfortunately, it was preceded by dribbling liquid running down his leg.

Undaunted, we have pressed on and are now trying to get him used to wearing undies. It is a definite work in progress but a bit of fun as well (if you don't mind cleaning up wet patches all over the carpet). Like most blokes, I did not consult any expert tips before embarking on the toilet training journey. I have no real advice apart from covering your floor in plastic if you have expensive flooring........