Works-For-Me-Wednesday: Portable Potty

When you are potty training, the location (and cleanliness status) of the nearest bathroom is constantly on your mind. And after a few day trips in which there was either no potty or one so gross I was afraid of it, I decided to find an alternative.

When I was growing up (with 6 younger siblings), Mom kept a potty chair in the back of our van. It was well-used. I wasn’t all about carrying a potty chair around with me, but I found a great substitute.

It’s the Portable Potty. It works as a seat on a toilet or as its own little potty.

We’ve already taken it to a state park, where it was used three times. Just those three times have been worth every penny. You do have to be careful though, because Caedmon ended up pinching his fingers once. The “legs” it stands on snap into place, but don’t lock. So when we were parked on a hill and he sat down a little sideways, it collapsed. But we remedied that quickly and went on about our business.

I cannot tell you how awesome it was to just tie up that sack and toss it in the trash. No fuss over cleaning the potty out or worrying if water was available. And we were able to use it in the back of our SUV without any trouble.

You can buy refill liners if you wish. The reviews I read said that a grocery sack (with no holes!) along with a few folded-up paper towels in the bottom was an excellent substitute for the company’s liners. (They have an absorbent pad in the bottom, and the potty comes with three liners.)

I made my own refill liners as suggested in some of the reviews. I found several grocery sacks without holes, folded up 2 paper towels and stuck them into the bottom of each bag. Then, I folded them individually and stuck them into an old wipes container. And after using the refill liners that came with the potty, I think these will work just fine. If you wanted to go a little more high-tech, you could use a thin absorbent pad instead of the paper towels. They would stick to the bottom of the sack like the store-bought refill liners, but they would also cost more, though probably not as much as the refill liners.

The potty also comes with a heavy weight plastic carrying bag, which makes it easy to slide under the seat or store in the back of the car.

Action shots? Not this time.

And I will say that in a pinch, I might just end up using this thing myself. There won’t be any action shots of that, either.

It works for me. Head on over to Kristen’s for more Works-For-Me-Wednesday!