Barb, one of the moms who works at the Ottawa store, recently reviewed the flip training pants for us. Barb has tried many (many!) nighttime combinations with her child, if anyone's opinion on these trainers counts for something, it's Barb's! We stock a good selection of training pants as it is, but the training pants we have stocked up to this point were generally best suited to daytime use. When parents come into the store looking for an overnight option for potty trained kids, they need something that fits, and more importantly, something that will not leak.
The flip training pants are sold in a boxed set that includes a one-size cover (fits 20-50 lbs), five organic cotton inserts, and set of waist panels (see a video of how the inserts and cover work together here). The cover itself can be adjusted in the rise, the stretchy waist panels allow parents to adjust the width of the cover. Cotton Babies sells additional sets of stretchy waist panels in different colors, they are not sized differently, they are available purely as an aesthetic measure to create different color combinations. The flip training pants (cover and inserts) are manufactured in the United States.My daughter pees like crazy at night, so much so that she can pee right through a disposable training pant, leaving it a sodden stinky mess, with wet bedding far more often than I would like to deal with. At five years old, and weighing more than 40 lbs, we have had a hard time finding resusable nighttime training pant options that work. I’m quite happy to say the new flip training pants work overnight for her.
I prepped the training pants' inserts by boiling them in a large pot for approximately five minutes with a bit of laundry soap; constant stirring prevented the nylon hook and loop closures on the inserts from resting on the bottom of the pot (the nylon would melt against the hot surface of the pot), followed by a hot wash and machine dry. The inserts took a fairly long time to dry, but that seems to be par for the course for extra-absorbent materials. It’s probably not necessary to prep the inserts before daytime use, but I wanted to be sure the inserts would hold up overnight.
For overnight use, Cotton Babies recommends pairing up the training pants' organic cotton insert with one of their
biodegradable inserts. I used this combination on the first night we tried the flip trainers, I'm happy to report that we experienced no leaks! Since I would prefer a nighttime solution that does not involve a single-use product, the next night I paired the training pants' organic cotton insert with a 3-layer AMP hemp insert. This combination was bulkier, but it also worked really well, the hemp wasn’t even saturated. I have also tried pairing the flip organic cotton insert with a 2-layer AMP bamboo insert, that allowed for a much trimmer fit (shown at left), and still no leaks.
My daughter could easily pull the training pants up and down, which is important for children who are working on daytime toilet training. In terms of the weight range, since we needed to add extra absorbency, I'm not sure she will fit in the training pants as long as the manufacturer suggests. For children at the upper end of the recommended weight range, pairing the organic cotton insert with a disposable insert allows for a much trimmer fit, which would certainly allow the training pants to fit longer.
I’m not wild about the contrast design of having the stretchy waist panels a different colour than the main part of the cover, but I’m really happy to have something that works. I like the fact that I can separate the inserts from the cover for laundering. I would like to be able to purchase additional covers separately, with only one cover in the pack, I have to handwash the cover between uses. Only having one cover is better-suited for daytime potty training, it would be convenient to simply replace the cotton insert with each accident, rather than replacing the entire training pant, especially when you're out of the house.
Overall, I would recommend the flip training pants to parents who are potty training their kids, I will happily continue using it with my daughter.
The flip training pants are introductory priced at $29.95 until December 31st, 2011. Their regular MSRP is $42.95.
