Potty Time: Boon Potty Bench Review

I'm not rushing the potty training by any means. It would be nice to have him potty trained by the time the new baby comes, but even experts who claim to "potty train in a day" say the kid needs to be at least 2.5 before you can really go for it. He will be 2.5 when the new baby comes. I have friends who started at 18 months, but did have real success until after 2. So while I do think you can reduce or (eliminate in the case of EC) your diapers if you start earlier, they can't (in most cases) be responsible for their potty needs until they are older and I, personally, would much rather devote my energies to other things.

That said, I've found the slow, no-pressure, repeat exposure approach has worked great for other issues like getting Ian to drink soy milk and transitioning him to his crib. So far, we've been talking about the potty. We point out when we go to the potty and when Roxxy goes to the potty. We bought the Elmo Potty Time book with sounds. After a few months of that, we bought a potty, the Boon Potty Bench. It looks nice, doesn't require batteries, transforms easily between potty and bench and got good reviews on one of my favorite review sites, Z Recommends.

Ian loves to sit on the potty. He will go off and on the potty for 20 minutes. He hasn't peed on the potty, yet, but he is having fun with it and that is the first step. I think he just likes being naked, but whatever it takes! I don't ask him if he wants to sit on the potty. He tells me when he wants to try. Usually, when I am changing his diaper he says,"I pee da potty."

So he'll try, then get bored and run off to do something else and I will say,"Good try. Time to put your diaper on."

He will say,"More potty!" and try again.

I think my next step will be to give him lots of liquid and then ask him if he wants to try to pee on the potty. I am going to wait on that for awhile, but that is they next step. We did have one incident where he peed on the floor in between trying to pee on the potty. It scared him, which leads me to believe he isn't quite ready. He didn't realize what was happening. He has quite the far-reaching spray, though. Covered half the dining room!

Review of the Boon Potty Bench so far:

Seems comfortable for him to sit on. Has two side areas for potty supplies which Ian uses as toy storage, but also serves to keep him on the potty longer. He can open the bench to use the potty and close it to use it as a bench/stool. The pee shield is flexible unlike, most other pee shields so it folds down easily. It isn't really high enough to serve as a pee shield on its own, we have to tell him to put his penis under it, but it doesn't get in the way as I've read that some of the hard plastic ones do.

Sitting on the Potty (not cooperative during this photo shoot, he wanted to sit on the floor by the potty when the camera came out):

Showing Off His Potty:

Essential Potty Storage Compartments for Critical Potty Supplies: