I just support my daughter (who is 2 1/2) on the full-sized toilet seat. She was hesitant the first time, but we talked about using the 'big girl' potty and she does it without hesitation now. Nothing to carry along, no mess!!

We keep a one of those little plastic ones in our trunk. Use it before going into a grocery store, etc. Works like a charm. Been doing it for my underwear wearing boy since he was 22 months. Freaked out in big public restrooms.

He likes to sit in the hatchback and watch the world go by.

My daughter just turned three and announced at her birthday party of all places that she wants the, "The Big Girl Pants." So after months of me bribing and cajoling and m&ming she did make up her own mind like everyone promised. She refused to go in public restrooms as well until one day I pulled this:http://www.amazon.com/Ginsey-Dora-Folding-Travel-Potty/dp/B00076SKZY/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=baby-products&qid=1278018835&sr=8-8 out of my purse. It is a Dora the Explorahhh folding top for the big potty. It really does fit in my medium sized purse. She loves it. In the car I use our small baby bjorn and line it with a grocery bag with a few paper towels in the bottom.

Our bathrooms at the public parks are closed more than 1/2 of the year (due to the possibility of freezing pipes apparently. We live in Wyoming) and so I needed something that would work well al fresco.

At the time, my son also refused to sit on most big potties and I had to support him. Not a problem for a quick pee, but kind of a PITA for a long poop.

I found that the Potette Plus (not the regular Potette mentioned above) worked for both. It's a small portable potty and the legs fold out to make a potty seat. It's pretty compact and fit in my kid size back pack at I used as a diaper bag. Now I bring it in the car only if we'll be at the park for a while or we'll be doing a lot of driving on roads where there are no bathrooms (Wyoming again!). Amazon carries it for $16.

www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001AG1P16?ie=UTF8&tag=frthca-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B001AG1P16

Four kids potty-trained and I have never felt that we needed a travel potty. Is this a new thing? I totally understand a child being a bit wary of a big public restroom at first, but as long as I was right there hangin' on it was never a big deal for us. Plus, playing with those automatic hand dryers afterward was almost always enough incentive for my little ones to do their business. Admittedly, I'm a big meanie and fall squarely in the "suck it up" camp when it comes to this sort of thing. Learn to use the big bad restroom, kids, because there's no way I'm carrying around a plastic toilet so that you can poop in the back of the car!

I was going to ask if these were actually for real!? There is no way I am carrying a potty to the grocery store so my child can pull his pants down in the parking lot and poop! You have GOT to be kidding me!? Talk about freaked out... what if they go through a phase where they can only poop in public or the back of the car!? I get the one to fit over a regular seat and even that's disgusting but the others...?

My oldest is a boy, so luckily, in case of emergency we usually find an empty field.

My second, on the other hand, is a girl...maybe we'll look into these when the time comes. Then again, my mom made all 3 of us girls pee in fields if desperate, which was definitely an incentive to not GET desperate.

My sister-in-law still talks of a harrowing experience on a long car trip where her mom made her pee in a ziploc. She was famous for having to go about 10 seconds after the family had stopped to go to the bathroom...I think peeing in a ziploc cured this habit.

I have three young girls. We keep the Potette Potty in our vehicle at all times. If we can find a public restroom, we use that. There are many times, however, when we can't find one fast enough. Road trips, parks with closed restrooms or filthy gas stations that I'm not about to bring my children into. I don't carry it into stores or anything, but there have been many times when this saved me. It folds almost flat and has disposable bags and liners so there's no mess or anything to clean. We love it!

We have the Potette Plus too. It stays in the trunk of the car. It doesn't get used often, but when it does... I REALLY appreciate having it.

Great comments everyone. As is the case with most things, it depends on the child I think, where you live, and also the age of the child. My daughter started potty training at 18 months so it would've been a little intimidating for her to get on a big toilet in a public restroom and she didn't really have the ability to hold it very long yet.

We go diaper free pretty early and that helps motivate the parent, if not the child. In the early stages, we bring a bjorn potty seat with us/and or the little bjorn potty for the car. The kids eventually get comfortable with using the big potties (but are scared to death of the hand dryers) but it helps in the early stages.

Our daughter was taught to use an adult toilet at her infant Montessori school -- they did the toilet training there, everyone together, and everyone got comfortable with the "equipment" they needed to use, so it was never a problem.

With our son, we brought along a little Bjorn potty, as we travel a lot, and there wasn't always a convenient rest stop when he was little. This phase didn't last long, he was soon able to hold it for 50 or 80 km... I was sure happy, as we felt pretty conspicuous (and a tad ridiculous) zooming down the autobahn with a plastic potty in the back window...

We got a small potty for the car that we use for potty emergencies and it has been a life saver, especially on long car trips when there are 30 miles or so between rest stops.

Potette Plus, all the way!

I just bought one of those folding seats to make the big seat smaller for my daughter and half the time she didn't want to use it. Then again for the longest time she only wanted to potty in bathrooms with lots of choices not at home and especially not on the baby potty.

I saw a child on one of those portable potties in the trunk of a car outside of Target this past week and I was not sure what to think.

Use the Potette and love it. It's great for long drives or for a child who takes an extra-long time on the potty. We also carry it in our hiking backpack when we take long hikes. My son has been using since he was 16 months old.

At the beginning of potty training we carried a Bjorn little potty in the truck for emergencies only. If she said she could hold it then we used public restrooms.

With summer here we have been doing a lot of walking and she has had to pee in the grass three times and is thrilled by it LOL. The joy of being three.

Potette here too! Great for parks with no bathrooms and long drives on the interstate with no rest stops. When bathrooms are available we always choose those (and my daughter was obsessed with checking out every public restroom at first) but these are great for emergencies when a bathroom isn't available.