Weekend in Visalia

My brother is getting married on June 14th so there are only 30 days until the wedding. You can check out their wedding website. A few weekends back, Caty and I drove down to Visalia (which is where Erin grew up) for the Bridal Shower and Bachelorette Party. We drove down on Friday and it was our test run for our drive to San Diego for the wedding. Visalia is about 4 hours drive, plus more if you are driving with a 3 year old, where the drive to San Diego is about an 8 hour drive. However I'm assuming that it's going to take 9 1/2 - 10 hours to get there with Caty. She does well for about 2 hours, then she starts getting antsy and with her being potty trained, we'll have to make a few bathroom stops. Anyways.... we had a blast over the weekend. On Friday we helped get things ready for the shower. Flower pots were given out to all those that came. Caty, being the big helper that she is, helped fill 40 pots with soil and then she planted the flowers. Erin's shower was so much fun. Although I had met most of her bridesmaids, there were a few that I hadn't, so it was good to meet them. 2 of the 11 were missing, YES I said 11. Caitlyn is one of 3 flower girls. We had a great time during the shower but afterwards is when the fun REALLY started. Her parents had rented a limo for the night to chauffeur us ladies around. I had a wonderful time spending the evening with Erin and her friends. It was fun to get to know some of my brother and Erin's friends. We went to a few different bars and I have to admit I had my share to drink. Since I'm not a big drinker, my couple gave me a nice hangover the next day. What happened to my days or should I say nights in Chico. Pretty sad! When Amy (Erin's sis) called their house to let their parents know we were headed home, I got the word that my dear daughter and wonderful mom were waiting up for us! Did I forget to mention that this was at 12:30 AM!!! Caitlyn had slept for a few hours, but I guess that she just needed to see me before heading to bed again. We headed home on Sunday and finally rolled into town late in the afternoon. What a fun weekend we had. Enjoy the pictures!

I'm back!!

So I took a little hiatus from the blogging world for a couple weeks, but I am back.

As for things that are going on with us:

Caitlyn will now go to the bathroom by herself. I still have to take her pants off for her, but at least I don't have to follow her into the bathroom each and every time. So picture this, at playgroup recently (it was at our house otherwise I wouldn't have done this) we were all outside and she said that she had to go potty. She was wearing a dress so I took her panties off and she went to used the potty. All of a sudden she appeared at the door with her dress pulled up to her chest giving everyone a show! All the moms started laughing and she came over and said "what?" More laughter!

Scott is almost out of school for the summer, only 4 weeks left. He is so ready to be done for awhile! We are looking forward to having him home.

As for me, not much is new. Just living everyday to the fullest and loving every minute of it!

Modifications around our house...

Several months back Caitlyn noticed that her "average height" friends could turn on the light switchs all by themselves. She tried moving one of her stools over but still couldn't reach. I did some research online trying to find one that would reach far enough down - there was nothing out there. So I posted a question to my LPA friends on MySpace and had a mother message me back. Here is what she sent me:

"If you're particularly handy, you can even cobble one up yourself using a wooden dowel and some electrical shrink tubing, both of which you can find at your nearest hardware store. You can also use one of those plastic rods that control the slats of any standard mini-blind unit. All you have to do is find shrink tubing that's just big enough to fit over both your rod and the light switch. Fit the two pieces together and then apply heat with a hair dryer until the tubing is tight and the rod secure. Easy as pie. A complete home improvement project, done and finished in under two minutes--doesn't get better than that."

Here is the link to the website she found it on:
http://www.shakhammer.com/2007/04/light_switch_ex.html


Our newest piece of furniture is a step stool for the bathroom so Caty can get up to the sink and wash her hands and brush her teeth all by herself. Well about 75% by herself - we still keep an eye on her as she likes to also use the cabinet door to boost herself up to reach the faucet. We found this step stool (it's actually called the Pup Step Plus) at Bed Bath and Beyond. It's made her a little more independent.












My dad, being the handyman that he is built Caty a step stool for getting onto the couch. She's had this particular one since she was maybe 1 and half. She just literally flies up the stool to the couch. She calls it "Papa's stool"

Caitlyn is 100%...........

POTTY TRAINED!!! She's in her 3rd night without wearing a diaper. What a relief it is to have her out of them. Our only problem is now, how to teach her to pull her panties down. As a little person having arms that just don't reach is causing some issues. Any of your other parents of little people have any suggestions?

For the longest time we had her potty on the ground, which my dad built a step stool for her to get onto the potty. It just wasn't tall enough for her to be able to sit herself down and scoot back. So we were always helping her. We finally moved the top of the potty to the actual toilet, because she would literally pee 15 times a day. We were tired of the whole emptying out process. We'll since she's become potty trained we moved her potty seat back to the floor and tried the step stool out again - still couldn't do it. So we just used one of her plastic ones and there was success. She is now able to get up there, do her business and be done. We have 2 issues to overcome though - 1)pulling the panties down by herself - I think she's going to be wearing A LOT of dresses now that the weather is warm so we only have one layer to work on getting down - and 2) she won't go in by herself and go. So we've got a few things to work on and hopefully soon enough she'll be going completely on her own. But I can't complain - it's wonderful to tell people that "my 3 year old is potty trained."

(these pictures were taken in Dec 2006 - when we first started
"trying out" the potty)

Rascal Flatts put on an AMAZING show last night

(The California Marine Corp)

The concert was incredible last night. The seats ended up being GREAT, 10 rows up from the floor!!! The radio station 101.9 The WOLF really came through for their listeners with such great seats. We even sat next to one of the DJ's - Susan Brown. Taylor Swift took the stage as the opening act and I really enjoyed her. And to think she's only 18 years old. She's pretty talented - she's written all of her songs herself. I really liked her performance. She got the signature foot stomping from the fans of Sacramento and it seems to really touch her. She really got the crowd going with her songs - "Teardrops On My Guitar" "Tim McGraw" "Pictures To Burn" "Our Song" and a few more.



But now onto the main guys - RASCAL FLATTS!! They put on an incredibly entertaining show. It was a sold out arena and so loud in there. They played so many great songs but skipped a few that I would like to have heard. I love their song Skin, however they didn't play it, bummer! I think my two favorite songs that they played were "My Wish" (which I video taped, but the quality wasn't very good) and "Bless The Broken Road." Gary, Jay and Joe Don played for about 2 hours and it was pure enjoyment! Because we were so close I got some AWESOME pictures and even a video. I had a wonderful time (THANK YOU Christine for bringing me and I thank your husband Ken for being in Paris). Enjoy the pics!