Potty Time?

After her brief love affair with the potty last fall, Elise has shown very little interest all winter. When she first started talking about the potty and asking to go, the older kids in her class at school that were potty training. I guess when the older kids moved up into the next class, all the potty trainers left and she lost interest. We were never pushing it because we thought that she was still on the young side and it seemed like a bad idea to try to potty train in the winter when she was wearing four layers of clothing.

However, it appears that after her brief winter hiatus, Elise is interested in the potty again (without our prompting). It all started on Easter, over at my Aunt and Uncle’s house. They have one of those little kid sized potties and Ellie was completely obsessed with it (we only had one of those little donuts you put on the big toilet). She went in and sat on the little potty like every 15 minutes for the whole time we were there.

So, we decided to breakdown and buy a little potty, even though I think they are kind of gross, because she obviously likes it and it’s easier for her to do herself. And she is definitely in the stage where she wants to do everything herself. We also bought a DVD called Elmo’s Potty Time because it can’t hurt to slap the Elmo brand on something because she’ll inevitably be more interested in it if it involves Elmo. The DVD is pretty funny – it has all sorts of songs with clever lyrics like “Grown ups, oh yeah they do it/Someday maybe even you’ll do it/You’ll do it/You’ll use the potty” that are really catchy and somewhat embarrassing to be singing in the hallways at work.

Her very own potty has so far actually been more of a hazard than an exciting step toward diaper-free life, as she has been injuring herself on it quite a lot and never actually using it for it's proper purpose. A few weeks ago, she was trying to stand in her potty (don’t ask) and fell (obviously) with her little butt landing on the lid and getting scratched and bruised. Then last week, she fell off the potty (don’t ask) onto her Tickle Me Elmo doll (apparently it has hard mechanical pieces that can really hurt- who knew?) and bruised her butt yet again (people at daycare are seriously going to think we are beating our child). Yesterday, however, she asked to watch Elmo’s Potty Time and after we were done, she said that she wanted to use the potty. So, Marty took her in the bathroom and she sat on the potty… and she actually went! She was so proud of herself “Ellie pee pee in potty!” and we were super excited too because this is the first time she’s used the potty in months.
Ellie and her Aunt Kate (aka Aunt "Tate")
So it looks like we may be putting potty training into full swing here in the next couple of weeks. I was planning to being this over the summer, but if she continues to be interested now, we might as well go ahead and go for it. I am not looking forward to what I have been told is a long and exhausting process, but we do have several things going for us:

1. Her hatred of wet/dirty diapers,

2. Her love of the potty,

3. Her hatred of diapers, period.

4. Her catchy Elmo Potty Time songs that practically brainwash you into needing to use the bathroom.

Wish us luck!