This week marks another milestone in our parenting adventure - our middle baby is officially in a two day preschool program.  She's in the exact same class, at the exact same school, with one of the same teachers Grace had when she started two years ago.

This is a huge milestone for many reasons... but mainly because it means Brooklyn is potty trained.

Potty training is the worst.  All parents know this.  But with Grace it was a breeze, relatively speaking.  Within a week she completely had it.  We knew then we were fortunate but had no idea just how true that was.  Then we embarked on potty training Brooke and we realized just how insanely good we had it.

As a disclaimer, in so many ways, Brooke is the polar opposite of her big sister.  She is feisty, ornery, loud, determined and strong willed in areas that her sister is not.  Her personality is out of this world but it also means that when it comes to parenting skills, ours were not at all prepared for our second child.

Enter potty training.  We waited until the second half of this summer, hoping that maybe it would just catch on with her big sister being potty trained for the last two years.  Unfortunately, no such luck for us.  Somehow, someway, we made it through.  Eventually Rob made the call and decided we were going to cold turkey (ironically enough, this is also how we broke her of her binky as a toddler) remove diapers and pull-ups from the equation and after a rocky few days it seemed to have clicked.  I hesitate to say she is potty trained, simply because it has been a long second half of the summer.  But if I am being really real, she is.


Last week was her preschool orientation and meet the teacher gathering.  I guess maybe I didn't know what to expect, but I was completely blown away by Brooke's reaction to the classroom.  She walked in and sat down and didn't even hesitate.  She responded to her teachers, said hello to her classmates, and listened when given directions.  And when it was time to go she announced that she wanted to stay there forever.

I fired off a text to Rob and said, "you'd never believe how Brooke is acting!"  Usually when someone says "hi" to Brooke that she doesn't know, she will hide behind my leg and refuse to say a peep to them.  She doesn't like being told what to do and rarely does she initiate the conversation with people.  But none of these characteristics were present at preschool.

She was confident.  She was bold.  She listened.  Her perfect little smile was readily available.  And she surprised me in so many ways.

Monday night she crashed hard knowing that in the morning she got to go to school.  Tuesday she was up and getting ready the moment I said "baby, it's time to get ready for school".  She hopped out of bed and went through all the motions.  We snapped some pictures and we were off.

After dropping Grace off at school, daddy met us at preschool to walk our girl in.  She didn't look back or hesitate in the least.  This girl is so ready to take on this year at preschool, and that makes me one proud mama.  But there is nothing better than seeing your 3 year olds face when they see you at the end of a two and a half hour separation.

She's ready to take on the world y'all, but she still needs me.  That makes the growing up a little bit easier to deal with.