When Griffin came home, Dave and I were well aware that we would be dealing with three kids in diapers for a while. It’s a scary thought, but in someways you’re already doing it so what’s a little bit more poop? Then Lilou came home, and there were four. In diapers. Let’s just say the people at the diaper genie company were very used to my requests for replacement parts.

Last fall, Manny had had enough. She told Dave and I at dinner that Lilou was getting potty trained. To be honest, we thought it was ambitious and had little chance for success. Lilou had just turned three, and Tess and Remy had not been in a mad rush for the underwear when we potty trained them. We were waiting for Lilou to show some interest that she had not shown. But Manny is tenacity incarnate. Lo and behold, even though it took a while and quite a number of steps back, Lilou was soon gallivanting around without diapers. We marveled at Manny’s ability to get her across the line and counted our blessings.

Just before Christmas, Manny told us she wanted to potty train Griffin, at 2 1/2. I’m not saying that quite right. She told us she was potty training Griffin. My first thought was, “NOW? Right before the holidays? Like we don’t have enough going on!” But Griffin listened.

So here we are, on the other side of four in diapers, with no one in diapers during the day. It happened so fast and so unexpectedly that Dave and I are still marveling at the freedom. We went to a birthday party this weekend, and as we were leaving Tess asked where the diaper bag was. I stopped dead in my tracks, then grinned at her. “We don’t need one anymore Tess! Everyone in this car is out of diapers.”

Somewhere in the middle of diaperland (Amazon, take all my money), all I could dream about was the day we were having – no diaper bag, just some pretty fabulous kids leaving the house to have fun, knowing how to ask for the bathroom if they needed it. But then we got used to it; that was just our status quo. And now it feels kind of surreal!

We’re not all the way done. We still have a couple of kids in nap and nighttime diapers. But swimming? Diaper free. Resto? Museum? Diaper free. And so, so weird. Have you ever had that dream where you’re naked somewhere and supposed to be dressed? I keep having those moments of panic, then smiling. We’d like to have one more kid, which does mean another round of diapers. But after four? One will be cute.