Laura's Mommy Blog

Archive for the ‘Product Reviews’ Category

So now that Ava is in potty training, I am on the hunt for the best training diaper out there. When she is at home, I try to put her in regular big girl underwear, but when we leave the house I need to have her in something more secure in case she has accidents. After all, she just started, so there are a lot of accidents. Here is my comparison of the two major brands that are on the market.

Branding and Design:

Huggies Pull-Ups have Disney Princesses for girls and Cars for boys. I guess it all depends on what gets your child excited. Some kids may be hesitant to potty train and give up their diapers, but a picture of their favorite character on their new training pants may encourage him/her to wear them. EasyUps have either Dora or Diego. My daughter tends to lean more towards the Dora ones.

It is very hard to determine which is the front and back of the of the Pull-Up. Both sides look very similar, so I can never tell if I am putting it on correctly. I’m not sure if it makes a difference, but I’m always scared that it will leak if I put it on the wrong way (hasn’t happened yet though). The EasyUps have a very clear design to them to differentiate which is the front and back of the diaper.  It shows on the outside of the diaper where it catches the urine, which is much higher in the front than the back.

Fit:

Pull-Ups seem to be a bit harder in material and stiff. They are also a bit loose around the legs and are not as snug on the bum as I would like them to be. My daughter does not seem to be bothered by any of this though.

EasyUps have a very snug fit and are much more cushier. My daughter has a very small waist, so I always have a problem finding pants that won’t fall off of her. The Pull-Ups are a bit loose around her waist, but the EasyUps fit perfect.

Sizes:

Pull-Ups comes in sizes according to your child’s age, for example, 2T, 3T, and so forth. I seem to have a hard time finding her size (2T) in the stores. For some reason, they always have 4T-5T on the shelf, but not much of the smaller sizes.

EasyUps sizes their training pants the same way they do their diapers, so if you are already using Pampers diapers then it is easy to figure out what size to buy your child. My daughter is in size 4 diapers, so I just bought her size 4 EasyUps.

Freebies:

Both companies offer you freebies in the mail to help your little one with potty training. Huggies will send you a free DVD for your child to watch. All you have to do is go to their website and give them your info and they send it to you for free. Here is the link for the free DVD: http://www.pull-ups.com/na/potty_training_DVD.aspx I haven’t received it yet in the mail because it takes 4-6 weeks to receive it, so i cannot tell you whether it is effective or not, but it’s free, so why not give it a try?

Pampers will send you a potty training kit for free if you sign up on their website. The kit includes a free sample of an EasyUp diaper, a Dora/Diego trophy, Dora/Diego stickers, a potty training chart, and a Dora/Diego coloring page. My daughter likes the stickers and the coloring page, but I don’t think it helped in encouraging her to get on the potty. It’s just a bit of extra things to give your child to reward them  for sitting on the potty, but again, they’re free! Here is the link for your free potty training kit: http://www.pampers.com/en_CA/potty-kit-request

Pee Indicators:

Pull-Ups has a Cool Alert , which essentially gives your child a cold feeling when they wet their diaper. I thought this was a neat idea and maybe it would help my daughter want to use the potty instead of the diaper. But she doesn’t really seem to react to it. I really don’t know if she feels it or not, and if she does, she doens’t tell me.

EasyUps have a Feel n’ Learn feature. It’s supposed to make your child feel wet, so they can learn to use the potty instead. Again, my daughter does not react to this.  I think it really depends on the child and my daughter never really reacted to her diaper being wet, so I guess this is just transitioning into the training pants as well. I’ll tell you what she doesn’t like, and that’s when she wets her big girl underwear. There is nothing comfortable about standing in a puddle of pee!

Sides:

Pull-Ups have a very easy design for the sides of their training diapers. They are velcro and easy to open and re-close. This makes it easy to check your child’s diaper if you need to.

EasyUps do not have a open/re-close function to their training diaper. Once your child has wet their diaper, you can rip off the sides to remove it, but you then cannot re-use the diaper if you find it is dry.

Conclusion:

I’ve decided to stick with the Pampers EasyUps. My daughter gets really excited when I take one out because she sees Dora on it. I also like the fact that they fit so snug, I am not nervous about it leaking at all. They also seem to be a lot softer on my daughter’s bum. I don’t like the fact that they do not have the open/re-close sides, but I guess I could live without it. I just make sure I don’t rip the sides unless the diaper is wet. You can easily tell if they are wet or not by feeling them. The diaper will feel a bit heavy if your child has peed in it.

I would love to hear from other moms about what they are using. Let me know if there are any other types of training pants that you are using and how you like them.

Djeco Building Blocks

I’ve had these Djeco building blocks for about a year, and I have to say that they are a great toy for young kids. They come from France, so you probably will not find them in your typical department store or Wal-Mart. My mother picked these up in a specialty toy store in the city.

The blocks are made from a cardboard, but they are very sturdy. Ava just loves playing with them, and I love to watch her. I can see just how much she is learning when she plays with them. It helps with her motor skills and hand/eye coordination. Stacking up 10 blocks can be difficult for a little kid. Each side of the blocks have pictures and you can match them as you are stacking, which is another great exercise for your little one. Once the blocks are stacked, Ava loves to count them with me. The blocks also have cute picture of animals on them. My daughter loves to point to the pictures and name each animal.

There are so many great learning oppotunities with this toy. Something so simple, but yet very effective. It just goes to show that we don’t always need all the glitz and glam that technology offers us today. I do agree that there are some great electronic toys out there for kids, but sometimes it’s nice to take it back to the basics.

Baby Bjorn Potty

The potty that I bought to potty train Ava is the Baby Bjorn potty. It comes in red or blue, and I obviously chose the red for my little girl. So far, I think I made a good choice. I know there are a lot of pottys on the market with all sorts of gadgets, but I wanted to stay away from those. I just wanted something that was simple to sit on and clean afterwards. The white portion just lifts out and you can dump your child’s treasures easily into the toilet and then clean rinse it out.

Some pottys make noises when the kids use it, but how realistic is that? When they eventually switch over to a big toilet, are they going to wonder why that one doesn’t sing as well?

This potty is also the same model that they use in the potty DVD that we have, so I was very happy about that. The movie we have has a song in it called “Bye-bye pee-pee” and it shows real kids singing and dancing to the song. It also shows them sitting on pottys and they have the exact same model as us, so Ava can really relate to it.

All in all, I think this is a great potty to use for training. 5 stars!