Update

Things are going really well. We got a $5 step stool and since then it has been much easier. Having to undress him from the waist down for a wee was really getting annoying (just dropping his drawers meant his penis pointed upwards and I got an unwelcome spraying) and success on the home front has translated into an overnight success at nursery.

When the experienced teachers left, suddenly my potty trained at home and previously at nursery son was having up to three accidents a day. They keep a time record of toilet breaks on the daily sheet, and when I noticed a pattern of accidents being 20 min after a toilet break I had it sussed that he wasn't weeing when being sat on the toilet. They protested that he was and it was "just Johnny" to have an accident 20 min later, but after agreeing to do standing up toilet breaks for him, he instantly stopped having accidents. (Well, there was one last week, half an hour after waking up for his nap, three hours after his pre-nap toilet break, which you can't really fault the little guy for!)

Poos are much quicker now, too. He asks to sit down when he needs to poo and just gets on with the job. This may be because I took all the toys and books out of the bathroom so we'll take one or two books or toys in with us, and that's it. He's definitely a home toilet kind of guy, and it took a lot of coaxing on day four(!) to get him to poo at my cousin's house. Since then he has gone at his Grandpa's (though we discovered the hard way with a less mild case ourselves that he had rotavirus at the time!) and his friend's house.

In the past week he has been taking his own trousers and undies off, as well as putting them on (two legs in one hole or backwards stylee) and finally succeeding in putting his shoes on. He hasn't dropped his drawers in connection with going to the loo except yesterday at his friend's house, when we turned around to find him naked from the waist down with a big puddle on the kitchen floor. It was quite bizarre and totally out of character. I hotfooted it over when I caught him later in the living room with his pants around his ankles. (Thank God as it's carpetted and that was when he made a poo!)

Time to wee like a man

I'm getting increasingly frustrated with the half hour toilet sessions, especially the ones that don't end with a poo. The puzzles are going out of vogue, and books are definitely in now that he's learning the (entire) alphabet and starting to recognise words. (By "words" I mean, "cow" and "moo" which he sometimes confuses.) When the reason for the half hour toilet breaks began to look more like "Mommy will read to me for half an hour" than "Oh boy I'm having a hard time making this poo" enough was enough. It also helps that he can now mostly distinguish between "I need to wee" and "I need to poo." Another motivator is that he's in jeans now instead of shorts, and so toilet breaks mean removing shoes, trousers, undies, etc. and it's getting to be quite a faff, especially on-the-go.

He has been weeing standing up outside from just about the get-go, and has been weeing sitting backwards on adult toilets when out and about, so the natural progression was to meld the two at gymnastics last week when they conveniently had a step stool in the bathroom. We now do these at home, too, when I'm just Frankly Not In The Mood to sit for half an hour on the cold metal bathtub which is uninsulated and exposed to the elements in the crawlspace under our house.

Teething regression

I cleaned up two puddles yesterday (one in the morning, the other in the evening) and Johnny came home from nursery with two bags of soggy clothes. I already cleaned up one puddle today, but that's probably because he had a massive wee in his nappy just before waking up, which leaked and wet the bed, so I didn't put him on the toilet when we woke up. I'm sure it's not helping that h is becoming very forthright with "NO!" but then toilet training isn't a race, is it?

Nevertheless, I'm blaming it all on the two molars about to erupt through his bottom jaw. He was positively charming at bedtime last night, but woke up three times before we went to bed (got drugs on the last one) and then nursed all night long, which he did the night before, too. This morning, after stripping him down to the buff, we lay snuggling and he took my finger and shoved it into his mouth so he could have a good chew on it. Thanks, Johnny, but Mommy already got the memo. Anyway, if he doesn't want to spend time sitting on the toilet while his teeth hurt, I suppose that's his prerogative, isn't it?

As evidence that it was all me...

... Johnny had accident-free days on Monday and today. In fact, this afternoon he went several hours without a wee. I got off from work early and we went to the zoo and his last potty trip was 3:40 pm and we didn't get home until 6:15pm. I'd asked him multiple times if he needed a wee (no) and dropped his drawers three times ("No Mommy") and fully expected a puddle in the car seat but he was perfectly dry. He didn't even pour his water all over himself in the car.

A bit of a regression this weekend...

... and I mean me, of course, not him. I've had to clean up a few puddles because I've asked if he needs to wee, and of course he's answered "no" because that's the only answer he gives to question. "Do you love mommy?" --No. "Would you like a cuddle?" --No. "Is there any reason Daddy shouldn't roast you on a spit and feed your bones to Inja?" --No. "Do you need to wee?" --No. I say I've regressed because in the past I wouldn't have taken no for an answer, or even asked a question, I would've said "Let's go make a wee." I suppose my excuse is I'm a little tired and I've been taking advantage of the fact that for the first time, he is amusing himself without burning the house down. I even got to unpack the dishwasher and clean the kitchen yesterday while Kurt had a lie-in!

I was taken a bit by surprise when he was in his nappy ready for his nap and playing with his toilet toys in the lounge and made a poo. Grunt grunt... "Are you making a poo?" --No.

First dry night!

Holy cow. DH was remarkably underwhelmed.

... make that weekend!

Wooo hoooooo!