The other day I was nursing Anya in her room (next to the bathroom). I heard what sounded like the handle to the stepstool. I thought she was turning on the lights which she does often. Then she goes around and turns them off. Awful entertaining to her. Me - not so much. Then I heard the toliet lid opening. Ally is not a troublesome girl in that she hasn't ever tried to play in the toliet of gotten into stuff she shouldn't (much), so I wasn't too worried. What I was, was hopeful. Maybe she would go to the bathroom by herself. Maybe we were pressuring her too much, and she just needs to be able to do it on her own. (I'm an optimist it seems - who knew?)
Didn't hear from her for a little while, so I burped Anya and checked on Ally. I found her kneeling on her stool with her diaper and pants around her ankles. There was a small pile of poop behind her on the bathmat, and she was "swimming" her fish (metal on the nose so she can catch them with the fishing pole in the tub) in the toliet. The kid has a short attention span. What I figure happened is that she sat down to poop. Nothing happened in the first 2 seconds, so she got down to play with something, and while she was squatting, out came the poop. No longer needing to sit on the pot herself, she thought she would give the fish a dip in the water.
I do give her an "E" for effort though. She knew she had to go and sat (for a little while). Praise for the notion. Soap for the hands and fish.