Potty Training

We've had a lot of success with Lacey and the potty. We haven't used diapers while we are home for the past week. I still put her in a diaper for naps, bedtime, and errands though. I'm not sure how to transition out of that.

Here's what we did.

I got some candy (smarties for us), and put them in their own container. I printed off a clip art picture of a potty and taped it on. In our house, this is known as "potty candy."

I grabbed a bunch of things from Target's dollar section, and put those in a visable, see through, rubbermaind container. These are "special toys." They are for when we go poo poo on the potty.

I took Lacey to Target to pick out panties (I hate that word, but that's the word we use, so bear with me). Lacey has a new found appreciation for Dora the Explorer, so imagine her delight when she found Dora panties! I didn't have any plans to start potty training right then. In fact I was debating if I should wait until November, after we move. Either way my plans rapidly changed.

We literally got home from Target and she asked to put on her new Dora panties. I didn't really want to open them yet, because I wanted them to be a special surprise for when training really started. However, she persisted and I obliged. I told her that she needed to keep them dry. I started giving her juice and set the timer on the microwave at 15 to 20 minute intervals. I constantly asked her if she had to go pee pee. When her juice ran out, I re-filled it. When the timer was up, I set her on her potty to see if she had to go. She initially wet her panties, but apparently once was almost enough for that girl. She's had 1 accident since then (and it wasn't even on my watch).

By day 2 she was telling me when she had to pee. To be honest, since it is a lot of work, I wanted to get lazy and just put a diaper on. But I didn't.

So now, here we are a week later. She has received 3 special toys in the last 2 days! She has been dressed and ready for bed and then had me take off her diaper to go pee! Those are the kind of progress reports I need. I am starting to trust her potty skills more and more. She asks for panties the moment she wakes up in the morning. I don't really have to ask her if she needs to go pee, she just tells me. She's terrible at pulling down her underwear though, so we are working on that.

Now, I just need to figure out how to take her out in public without a diaper and trust her while she naps and in the carseat. Really I need to get to Babies R Us and buy some water proof items.



Here are some other things that helped:

1) ONCE UPON A POTTY- the DVD. My sister in law recommended this dvd to me and it has helped so much. That is really when Lacey "got it." We sing the potty song from the movie all the time.

2) Explaining to Miles that he is too little for the potty. He is too little for panties. He is too little for potty candy, etc.

3) Talking about other people who use the potty...Daddy uses a potty, mommy uses a potty, Elias uses the potty, etc.