Potty training in the freezing cold, help!

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Just started potty training nearly 3 year old DD and it's going great inside the house. She's really ready and quite excited about it all, and we'd really like to crack it now if we can as at some point in next three or four months she's due a big operation and hospital stay. We don't want to try to train too near to that date, and also think it would be a mistake to miss this window of readiness.

The only problem is outside because quite understandably she's very reluctant to sit on a potty with a bare bum in the freezing cold. But the other option is just being stuck in the house constantly with a preschooler and newborn and it's not really doing any of us any good!

Is there some magic solution to this I haven't thought of?!

Personally, I never took a potty out with me when potty training. When going out I would get DC to go for a tactical wee last thing before leaving the house then off we would go. We started off fairly short trips - park, local shops, nature trail, etc - and within a week or two they could reliably hold it in if need be, which is a big part of potty training anyway.

That's true, I hadn't really thought of it that way. That makes me feel better!

I always trained mine during the warm weather. They'd just have a tee shirt and underpants on and the potty was always out. I spent a week in the house and that's all it took, but they were over three years old.

I agree, I very rarely take a potty out and about. After a few days of training you can see a pattern emerging of how long they can go between weeing, and how long after a drink they need to go and you can time short outings in between. They get the hang of holding on for a short time pretty quickly.
Just try to get them to go before you leave.

I think the warm weather would be so much better but feel like leaving it to the summer would be too long - and also that we may as well use the opportunity of lockdown since as soon as we can do anything like zoos, farm parks etc (can only dream of indoor play dates and play centres) we'll be there like a shot (if she isn't in hospital/recovering at home at that time)

I wouldn't take a potty out personally.

Plan trips as much as possible.

Lockdown is ideal. You can have tactical wees. So have a wee and then zoom out for a walk etc

Take spare leggings and knickers and a bag to out wet things in, just in case. I used to take an emergency pull-up too which was the last chance saloon if the dry clothes ran out. Some accidents are going to be inevitable, she'll learn her "hold onto it" limits by crossing them a few times. I trained youngest DC during the last lockdown and being at home by default definitely makes it easier.

I don’t consider them trained/ready to be trained until they can go a couple of hours between wees and can tell me with enough notice to get to a toilet, including eg home from the park. And they can wee on command (not just when they think they need to) so they can go before we go out. In the context of lockdown, where I’m not going further than for a half hour walk or an hour to a local park it wouldn’t occur to me to take a potty. We stayed home for a week or so while they learnt and after that they just went before we left, I took them to toilet every couple of hours on a day trip and I don’t think either child ever had a public accident. Potty only came if we were going to eg a remote beach. But mine were 3.5 before I trained them.

I do think you have to expect to be confined to your house and garden for a few days at the very beginning though. It’s really tedious, but I don’t think I could handle the volume of accidents and number of toilet trips at that stage anywhere other than at home.

Thank you. All really helpful, and should have been obvious, I suppose

Just that everyone I've known who've potty trained already took potties out and about so I just sort of thought it was the done thing

Next time will just pop out straight after a wee. I think she can go on command, but have to convince her to do it (which like getting her to put her coat on etc, is not always easy)

I never took a potty out - well, I did take a travel potty initially but it was never used by either dd - they did not want to sit on it in public. if we were outside we'd either be local or near a public toilet. I would just stay local and take a change of clothes.

I took a potty for a short time. Mine seemed to get it quite quickly.