The Potty: Is He Ready?

It's a rite of passage, progressing onto using the potty.  The hard part is determining the ideal time to take the leap into the abyss.  Me?  I'm in no hurry.  To clarify, I am potty trained just fine, it's Sam's potty training which I am not in a hurry to start.  From everything I've read or heard, if you rush them, it only makes it worse, but you should be on the lookout for signs of readiness.  The most important and obvious sign is an actual interest in the potty.  Sam hasn't been quite there yet.  He loves his "Elmo on the Potty" video, but then again he'd be thrilled to watch Lawrence Welk, as long as it's on "TB."  

When we were at the mall the other day, I had to use the potty myself, so I took him into the family bathroom with me.  There was a big  potty (to which adults without small children refer to as "the toilet") and a little mini-potty for pint-sized potty users.  Pretty neat!  As I got ready to use the potty, I suggested to Sam that he sit on the potty with his pants still on, just because "it will be so much fun to sit on the potty."  (You can a blame a girl for trying, can you?) He responded, "Sam don't want to sit on the potty."  OK, OK, so I went about my business.  

Since Sam's potty was close to the ground, he quickly figured out that he could reach the flusher.  And they became fast friends enjoying a flushing bonanza.  FLUSH!  I couldn't help laughing out loud.  FLUSH!  Cute, you gotta admit.  FLUSH!  No longer so cute.  FLUSH!  Cut that out!  And so on...  This thing packed some serious power, so the water had gained momentum and was churning like there had been a violent underwater explosion.  

Much to his chagrin, I subdued the Mad Flusher as soon as I was able, before he either flooded the floor or flat-out broke the contraption, or both.  As we washed our hands, I tried to avoid making eye contact with the other better behaved patrons.  I was leery of receiving one of those looks that said, "Can't you control your kid?"  Then, of course, I would want to respond with a look that said in no uncertain terms, "If you think it's so easy, why don't you give it a go and see what song you are singing after a couple of hours of pinging around the mall with 

him?!" 

As we left the scene, I noted for the record, "I still don't think he's ready yet."