Potty Training: Phase I

We made a major purchase yesterday. An Elmo potty seat on clearance at Target caught my eye, and I thought we'd give it a whirl and see if it might just jump-start the whole potty training process.

My motherly intuition must have been spot-on (for once) because I was right--Zoey was THRILLED with the seat, which is really a smaller version of a toilet seat that sits right on top of the real toilet.

Zoey wanted to hop right on and break in her new seat, and made a valiant effort at going potty. She kept mentioning poo-poo, but after several minutes, we decided that she must be finished trying, and she hopped down. Tragically, after turning my back for two minutes to get a wash cloth out of the hall closet, I returned to Zoey's report of "Icky, Mommy", and found a turd resting on the bathroom rug, dangerously close to my sister Abby's travel bag. No good. As we flushed the turd and moved Abby's bag to her room, we had an upbeat discussion about how important it is to go poo-poo IN the potty.

Zoey opted for her big-girl panties instead of a diaper, and I'm thinking this might be the way to go while we're at home hanging out--she likes her underwear, and she knows immediately when she's wet and will come to find me for a change of clothing. This has significantly upped the amount of dirty laundry produced in the past 24 hours, as well as ANOTHER surprise turd that escaped on the kitchen floor as we stripped her down post-accident, but I think it might eventually clue her in as to what it feels like to NEED to go potty.

While I am somewhat embarrassed to admit the amount of wayward turds we've had to deal with in such a short period of time, I am happy to report that I have an ample supply of Clorox products on hand, AND ZOEY WENT POTTY TWICE AND POO-POO ONCE IN THE BIG-GIRL POTTY. (Are you marveling at the fact that my child has had three bowel movements in one 24-hour period? Bear in mind that these are only the ones worth mentioning, as Zoey has recently fallen back in love with blueberries. Nice visual, eh?) Anyway, much fanfare and M&M-passing-out ensued, and high-fives were shared by all.

If my sister leaves here still wanting to have children of her own someday, it will be a small miracle. There's nothing like a turd in your bathroom bag to make you rethink your reproductive timeline.