Day: February 7, 2006

potty training x 3 attempt #1 ended at 11.34am today.

will try again in three months.

it just wasn’t worth the frustration. i would rather spend five days training and older child who is ready than five weeks training one that isn’t.

there we go.

puddles and piles

in celebration of both my father and my father in law’s birthdays, today was day one of the triumverate’s introduction to toilet training.

last night i brought out the elmo knickers i had purchased while in the us. sela and lulu (and jasper) were very impressed to see elmo and i solemnly explained that tomorrow we would be wearing our knickers and bobs and they weren’t to get them messy. basically it was the same speech i gave young sebastian at 18 months.

except, oh right, with sebastian it worked.

i don’t remember the baby whisperer’s guide to toilet training too well, but i do remember that toilet training sebastian was easy. he was 18 months, pooping every night at 6.43, and so we started putting him on the toilet one night and gave him a sweetie when he did his poo. i can remember calling our relatives (it was easter) and we were so excited and told them we had the best news EVER and they said, "oh! you’re pregnant again!" and we replied, "No, we’re too broke for that, but even better, sebastian did a poopers in the toilet!"

today, same thing. i had the timer out, and although i was not around during the beginning of the morning (up late working on deadline), i know that the timer was set and every 15 minutes the kids were on the toilet.

except nothing was going in the toilet (or potty) except for the occasional foot.

by 10.30 we had already gone through six pairs of knickers and two bobs. one poo, five wees, and that’s not even counting the stuff on the floor.

why did we start toilet training? magnificent thinks they are ready and he tends to have a good eye for these things. but i have promised myself that by tomorrow if it doesn’t seem that they have caught on, i will stop. i think the book said that you have to give it two days at least. i just don’t want to drive myself crazy. i would rather spend five days training kids who are ready, then five weeks training kids who aren’t.

jasper is full of false advertising. he will walk up to you, and say in his best gravelly urgent voice,

wee wee.

if you don’t immediately respond, he will repeat weeweeweeweeweeweeweeweeweeweeweeweewee until you hustle him into the bathroom.

once there, the thrilled ginger boy he helps kick off his pants and plaintively requests, "book"

this is going so well, you think, but instead jasper stops his toilet training ways and uses the opportunity to fiddle with himself. he could sit on the toilet for hours and if i gave him his meals there, he would.

sela, is very earnest about using the toilet, she will tell me that "poopah in the toyet". but except for a few renegade wees, she is not following through on her lingo. but she is very happy to sit on the toilet and sing and read and basically do everything except bodily functions.

however, after emerging dry after her nap (during which they all wore nappies), i led carys to the toilet and by sheer coincidence, she did wees. oh i praised and praised and even better, took out the little packet of m&m’s i had in the bathroom. jasper and sela saw me hand their little sister one, and they took up the chorus

ooohhh, sweeties!

sare sweeties!

sweeties!

i tried to explain that sweeties were only handed out to those who made deposits in the porcelain, but the crew was less than compassionate.

by the end of the day the girls were wearing sebastian’s bobs, and no pants. they looked ridiculous, and very very cute. little butt cheeks hanging out of the bobs, that look of surprise when they feel the wees running down their leg.

ohh ohh, wee wee!

wee-wee will give it one more day. if by tomorrow it doesn’t look like they are making a connection, wee-wee will stop the training for a couple of months.