Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Potty, Popsicles and Cabin Fever!


image courtesy of marinwater.com


well, since i have potty-trained 3 kids (so far) i am going to share my tips in the order that i used them. i am sure that you are all aware that kids are all different, and i have used different techniques with everyone of our kids, so don't give up hope if you are struggling. eventually undies will be the only covering! with ciela, (for some reason she was afraid of the toilet for months before even starting, so i had to consider that) it took 1 week, and here's my method:

* first, plan on staying home for most of this week!

* i placed a freestanding mini toilet in the tv room, played cartoons and movies continually, and left ciela naked on the bottom

*every time she started to "go" i would put her on the potty, and explain what was happening, then after 2 days, she started trying to get herself there

*when she made it (mostly) she was rewarded with a liquid based treat (popsicles, juice boxes) to encourage a plethora of urine production

*by day 5 she was a pro, and i moved the potty to the bathroom. she had a few accidents, but by the end of the week, she was trained!

in case you are wondering, ciela just naturally went #2 in the potty without any troubles, but it took another 6 months to train her at night. i just waited until she would wake herself up, i was a bit lazy in the nighttime department!

3 comments:

Tara said...

I'm so grateful for such great tips. I have no idea where to start!

amy said...

this has been my method as well. it worked better with afton, but ella did alright, just took a little longer.

The Davies Family said...

Great idea! We also did that with our daughter..the whole potty in the livingroom watching lots of movie thing..but I really like the liquid reward..hmm I'll have to use that next time.