Is peeing on the post office floor a federal offense?

When training anyone to learn a new task, whether it is an employee or your child, you have to be ready to reward for a job well done and offer more training and support when the job is not done correctly. So what do you do when potty training your son and he pees on the post office floor? You grab his hand and walk briskly out of the building to your car and drive away.

OK, so that was Tuesday, the first day of potty training. Today is the fifth day. My son went from about 10 accidents on Tuesday, to two on Wednesday, to no accidents on Thursday and one on Friday. Constant praise, his big boy chart and all of the great advice I received from readers helped me to potty train him quickly. He also seemed ready. We had tried last October and he was not ready so we waited.

My son has now earned his sea creature hat. This was the award he picked according to the terms of his big boy chart. However, this is not as easy to find as I thought. I am looking for a baseball cap or other style hat with sea creatures on it. If you, or someone you know sells a product like this, please email me the details. And if peeing on the post office floor is a federal offense please let me know!

Creating a Big Boy Chart

My youngest son, who will be four years old in August, has shown no interest in potty training or doing anything that a four year old should know how to do. He explains that he does not want to be a big boy, he wants to stay little. Usually I apply lessons learned at home to managing my employees, but in this case a program I developed for my employees is being used at home.

At Bisson Barcelona, we implemented the Star Reward Program. I created this program last year as a way for employees to reward their peers for going above and beyond. This program greatly increased team work. Each employee is issued star certificates, which can be awarded to their fellow co-workers when they feel that person has helped them in a positive way. Once an employee collects five star certificates, they can turn them in to me and pick a prize from the star jar. Prizes include scratch tickets, gas cards, Dunkin Donut gift cards, a coupon to sleep in one-hour late or leave one-hour early and a coupon to wear jeans on a non-jean day.

So I decided to try a similar technique with my son. Today, we created a big boy chart. Every time he does something that a big boy should do, he will earn a sticker for his chart. Once he earns 20 stickers, he can turn in his chart for a prize. Big boy activities we agreed upon include putting on his shoes, getting undressed, getting dressed, clearing his plate after he eats, and of course...using the potty. He earned his first two stickers today for putting on his shoes twice. He was very excited to earn the stickers, and he has decided that his prize will be a new baseball hat (with animals on it per his request).

I would love to hear suggestions from other moms on methods they have used to encourage their children to become big boys. Wish me luck!