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We're out of chocolate.

The Scoop on Potty Training

Caitie is now potty trained; I still help out with the wiping to make sure she stays clean, but other than that, she can do it on her own. Caitie had a fear of toilets ever since the 'toilet incident', remember this post? This kept her from cooperating when it came to potty training. She eventually overcame that fear. We got her a potty chair last year, which she would sort of try out, but would continue using diapers, until recently. We got her another potty chair in July; it's pink and is more comfortable to sit on, and fits onto the big toilet seat. I also put up a potty chart at that time in the bathroom she uses most; the downstairs guest bathroom. The potty chart came in a potty book we bought her a while back. Using the reward system, and having the new potty chair seemed to work at first; she liked putting stickers on the chart, but it was still 'hit and miss'. Once July was over, I needed another potty chart to take the place of the one from the book; I decided to look online to see if anything was available. After seeing what some people came up with, I decided to make one on my own; the chart was for two-weeks time. I don't know if it was the personalized potty chart, or something else that convinced her to start using her potty chair consistently; doesn't matter, really, I'm just glad she's accomplished that milestone. When we went on our trip to Disneyland, I put Disney characters on her chart on the days we would be away from home. While we were away, she got used to having no potty chart to put a sticker on each day; she is now going potty without expecting a reward for doing so. I wasn't strict when it came to potty training, I didn't want to stress her out by forcing the issue; I'm glad I was patient and gave her time to adjust to it. Since she's started using the potty chair consistently, she's only had two mishaps; these happened within days of her starting to use the potty chair, ever since then, there have been no mishaps, and she stays dry at night. Here are the potty charts I made; I thought they came out kinda cute...

The reason I made them two-week charts is so the stickers that went with each chart would fit into the squares. I wouldn't have been able to make them as interesting if I had made monthly charts, which would have been four rows, I wouldn't have been able to add some of the cute graphics had I done so. These are the charts before stickers were placed on them.

Here is the first one I made; it has a frog theme.



Caitie likes bears, so went with pink and a bear/star theme for this chart.



Caitie loves the Cars movie, so went with that theme on this one. I put Disney characters on the days we went to Disneyland and the beach. She hasn't used a potty chart since then.

Cowgirl & Indian

Meet Hawklin, Caitie's new Indian friend. They're riding Caitie's horse Rocky to a rain dance party.



"You'll need to give me directions to your tribe, Hawklin, I forgot my GPS."

"Look up yonder... there's the smoke signal! We're almost there. I can't wait to get the rain dance started." (let's hope it works)

I don't know about y'all, but I sure would like to see some rain in these here parts.

Flu Update: Not sure if it was the flu or just a really bad cold, but if I remember correctly, there's no fever with a cold, and body aches and chills usually accompany the flu, and since we all had a fever, and Michael had body aches and chills, I'm thinking we had the flu. If we did have the flu, I have no idea what strain it was. I have no idea why I'm writing this update, I haven't a clue what I'm talkin' about, other than to say we're all doing much better now. I should have just left it at that... ummm, yeah, I definitely should have just left it at that.

The flu, flat foot, and pizza

We went to Peter Piper Pizza again this year for one of Caitie's birthday celebrations. Disneyland was a repeat, and then the pizza place; we did the same things last year. I don't like change; just call me blah. We went to the pizza place on Wednesday night. Caitie was getting over a cold, or what we now know is the flu, Michael came down with the flu a day or two after Caitie, and then I came down with the flu; it made for a tiring evening; we're still recovering. I tried to keep my distance and hold my head on my shoulders as it pounded away. But Caitie had a good time and got some nice gifts. It was an 'off night' for me. I think it was partly because the pizza place made a few changes, one of them being the lighting, it seemed darker than usual, and some of the games had been changed, and it wasn't crowded; it's usually pretty crowded, which gives it more of a festive atmosphere. These changes along with my head pounding made the night seem surreal; maybe a better way to describe it would be the feeling of my head surrounded by heavy fog. I was pretty much out of it the whole evening. We stayed until closing time; we were the last ones to leave. Even that didn't change this time; we were the last ones to leave last year as well. Things end up staying the same even when I'm not in control. Interesting... anyway... I did have to perform my parental duty at the end of the evening by telling Caitie no at least three times to her request in playing on the climbing contraption at closing time; I had to end up putting my foot down, of which her response was, "I'll go ask daddy then", and she then ran after him as he was heading out the door. If the pizza guy hadn't locked the door upon our exiting the premises, she most likely would have convinced her daddy to go back inside so she could climb one more time before leaving. I've had to put my foot down on many occasion with her lately; I think I'm developing flat foot from having to do it so often. ha Just as it was an 'off night', yesterday was an 'off day'; my flu symptoms worsened, as did Michael's, he hid under the covers in bed for most of the evening due to body aches and chills, Caitie still had a cough but felt well enough to play. Hopefully we'll be over this soon.

I took some pics at the pizza place, but since I wasn't feeling well, I didn't pay much attention to settings, composition, etc., so they're not of the best quality. I also took some pics of the cupcakes I made for the party; here are a few pics...

Caitie helped me make the cupcakes, mostly by licking the spoon, bowl, and beaters.



She also put the cupcake holders in the muffin tin; I then poured the batter in.



The party theme was the Cars movie.







Caitie played this game, and on her second try, hit the jackpot. A young boy and his sisters came over to ask if Caitie did it, he looked amazed. He said he'd been trying all night. Caitie was oblivious to what was goin' on, she just held on to the tickets as they poured out... all 250 of 'em. So cute. I felt like I was in Vegas; it was kind of exciting. Here she is hitting the big button; you can see the green light was on, that's the jackpot.



Here she is collecting her winnings.

The Cat Factory

Well, it's actually called The Bear Factory. We went there on Saturday afternoon; this was the same day we attended the City of Phoenix auction. We went home after the auction, rested a bit, then headed to the Arrowhead Mall. I told Caitie she could pick out an animal to make; this was part of her birthday present. She had one made there back in June, at the same time we had one made for Nannie. She had a zebra made then, this time she picked a cat. Here are some pics...

I took these first three pics with my Canon PowerShot camera. Here she's holding her soon-to-be-stuffed cat.



Having it stuffed. She pressed on a foot pedal to get the stuffing machine goin'. She picked a heart from the basket on the right to be put into him before he's sewn shut. The lady goes through a whole rigmarole where she tells Caitie to pat the heart with her hand, rub it on her cheek, tap it on her leg, etc. This is to add life to the animal. Each time the lady would tell Caitie to do these things, she would turn to me, of which I would then show her again what the lady said to do. I say just throw it into the stuffing and get on with it! I'm such a fun mom.



Once the animal is stuffed and sewn shut, you head over to the bathing/brushing area. The brushes and air that blows out of the blue/yellow thingies helps get rid of residual fur that occurrs when it's being sewn shut.



I took the following pics with my Canon 40D. Here she is with her new cat Gilbert. She got this name from a cat that's in a cartoon she watches. As you can see in the pics below, Gilbert has clothes on. The store has lots of clothes to choose from and has every accessory possible as well. Caitie chose a pink top and pink undies and put pink and white bows on its ears. I think we need to explain to Caitie the difference between boy and girl cats; I think its name should be Gilda, or something of the female persuasion. Wondering how the undies fit onto the cat? Why, there's a hole in them there undies for the tail to go through. They thought of everything.







Caitie had a cold and got in the nursing mood and started taking Gilbert's temperature. He's/she's(?) doing well... just in case you're wondering.

Hey, Bidder-Bidder-Bidder

Sounds like the ol' baseball chant, "hey, batter-batter-batter...", that's what it sounds like an auctioneer is sayin' half the time, but with a lot more bidder-bidder-bidder's. I can never understand what those guys are sayin'. We went to a City of Phoenix auction on Saturday. It started at 8am; we ended up staying until around 2pm. It was a hot day... let me rephrase that... it was a VERY HOT and HUMID day. I made the mistake of dressing Caitie in overalls; she was miserable most of the time, even crying and demanding to leave right before the outside auction was over. I figured her behavior was due to not getting enough sleep and being hot, but I found out later that she was coming down with a cold; poor thing.

There were gas pumps. I kept trying to figure out what we would do with them had we been crazy enough to bid on them. We didn't hang around each item being auctioned off, so I don't know who bid on them and what they went for. I would like to know where they're being relocated to. Wouldn't you? I mean, come on, this is interesting stuff. If you don't live where there's an HOA, or if you do and it's one like we have, you may see these beauties in a neighbor's front yard as decor. At least you wouldn't have to go far for gas. Always look on the bright side of things, I say.



One of the reasons we went to this particular auction was because of this big red beauty. Michael's like a little kid when it comes to fire engines. Caitie shares his enthusiasm; she would love to have one of these to play with. I asked Michael why he needs a fire truck... I finally figured out that it's a guy thing. There were four fire trucks in all up for auction, three '89s and one '81. The first three went for around $4,500 each, the latter one went for $3,600. If they had stayed under $3,000, you would have heard a siren outside your house, most likely. Michael planned to go to everyone's house to show it off. Maybe he would have offered to wash your house?

Here's the inside of one of the fire trucks. Caitie fits right in with her cool baseball hat and red shades. She wasn't too thrilled with how dirty it was inside.

This was the first fire truck up for auction. Look hard and you'll see a Channel 3 news guy with a camera in the crowd, he was aimed right at me, so I hid behind my camera and decided to take a pic of him filming me taking a pic of him, or somethin' like that.

This was the last item up for auction. This is a huge generator that could light up the city of Phoenix, or at least one of the streets in the city of Phoenix. The opening bid on most big items was $25,000, but always ended up going down to the $1,000 range before anyone would start bidding. We at first thought we might get a chance to bid on it when it stayed in the $2,000 range, but it soon shot up to $13,000, which was the final bid, and it wasn't from us. Michael said it would have been nice to use at our property up north. I wonder how loud it is when running? I didn't give that any thought until now. Some small generators are pretty loud, so I can only imagine how loud this one is.

A side view of it.

When we left the above auction, we headed over to another auction being held indoors. We didn't stay long though, there wasn't much we were interested in.

As you can see here, these auctions are populated by men folk; there's my hubby in the middle of the pack. We had a nice time at the auctions. I know it would have made us the most popular family on the block, but I'm not sad we didn't end up with a fire truck and gas pumps.

It's finally here

You're just silly

I call Caitie a silly goose quite often, and I sometimes comment on her cute butt cheek/bottom that shows when her undies ride up. She must have combined the two when she said this to me the other night: "Get your silly bottom over here", wanting me to come over to where she was. She also says "you're just silly" quite often, in a cute tone. I need to record her saying these things; it's so cute. I must admit, silly and adding jiggly does describe my bottom, not that you wanted that vision in your head. Don't you wish you could have the last 20 seconds of your life back? Anyhoo... Here are a few pics of Caitie in her cute pink undies...

Dancin' in her pink undies...

I call this pic "silly stripes". Why, you ask? You did ask, right? Well, it's in a 'silly' post and there are stripes. I'm not a complicated person, I'm very simple-minded, as I'm sure you've figured out by now.

"She's Four" Photo Shoot

I did a 'three year photo shoot' of Caitie last year, so I decided to do one this year as well, this one being her four year photo shoot. Unlike last time, I didn't have to bribe her with a lollipop. ha In case anyone is wondering, this is how I see Caitie at four years old: She's sassy, funny, imaginative, determined, inquisitive(and how!), sweet(at times), has her daddy wrapped around her little finger, gets cranky and upset with her mama due to the camera I have attached to my face most of the time, and my being the main disciplinarian(see daddy comment above), but I can take it. ha She reminds me of family members on both Michael's side and my side. She likes things clean(hi, mom!), she loves to talk(hi, nannie; hi, lynda!), she loves to build things(hi, jim; hi, david!), she can be sarcastic at times, and likes to be goofy(hi, dad!), boy does she have a temper(hi, randy!)... those are just a few that come to mind at the moment. She does, of course, take after me and Michael as well. She's smart and can be nice at times just like her daddy. She can be manipulative at times to get what she wants, and is a 'little nutty'(as we like to call it), these she takes after me. Lucky girl. Anyhoo... without further ado, here are some pics from the photo shoot...

I realized after I took these pics that it would have been better to have waited until her curls had 'relaxed' a bit before doing the photo shoot(i used smaller curlers this time so her hair would dry faster and i could take pics in decent lighting); her hair looked really pretty later in the evening. Ah well, you live and learn.

Mouse Trap

Except we're the ones being trapped... by Mickey Mouse(don't get this? me either. this is for lack of a better title). We went to Disneyland again this year for Caitie's 4th birthday. If you keep up with my blog, you know we went there last year for her birthday as well. I don't know if it will continue and become tradition, but it's been nice being able to do it over the last year. We went there in May as well, over Memorial Day Weekend. Maybe the title should read 'Mouse Addiction'. The only difference between this year and last year is that we flew last year, and we went to the Anne Geddes store last year and in May, but we drove this time and skipped the store. Another difference is that we stayed at the Grand Californian Resort last year and this year we stayed at the same hotel we stayed at in May, the Tropicana Inn. It's much more affordable and is within decent walking distance to Disneyland/California Adventure. We went to the beach on all three visits. Unlike last year's birthday posts, I'll only be doing one post for this trip, since both trips are so similar. Here are some pics from our trip this year; some will look similar to last year's and May's pics...

I made this iron-on and put it on a t-shirt for Caitie to wear to Disneyland on her birthday. This is what she's wearing in the first day's pics. I thought it turned out kinda cute.



Our hotel. We left home pretty late on Tuesday night and arrived at our hotel around 3am Wednesday morning, I believe it was. Michael got up early on Wednesday morning and headed to Disneyland for a bit while Caitie and I slept in. He came back after a couple of hours; we all then headed over to Disneyland.



Disneyland entrance.



One of Caitie's favorite rides at Disneyland, the carousel.

On one of her other favorite rides at Disneyland, Dumbo. I tried getting this pic without using the flash, but wasn't successful, so decided to use flash. I hardly ever use flash.

We went to the Rainforest Cafe for her birthday dinner. We went there last year as well. We love this place. They're singing Happy Birthday to Caitie.

Caitie is enjoying the attention.



She can't wait to make a wish and blow out the candle.

Here she goes...

We got her a few things at Disneyland for her birthday, one of them was a princess wand. She saw it in one of the gift shops and asked if she could have it. We surprised her with it at dinner, and with a few other gifts as well.

This is in the Rainforest Cafe gift shop. She's in stuffed animal heaven.

Posing with her new ape friend at the Rainforest Cafe.

The Rainforest Cafe is located at Downtown Disney. As you can see, there's hardly anyone around, this would only happen at a late hour, which it was when we left the restaurant.

We went to the California Adventure Park on Thursday. We don't like this park as much as Disneyland, but we had a good time.

I took a pic of this sign as we were leaving the park to head over to Disneyland for the rest of the day/evening. The California Adventure Park closes earlier than Disneyland. It's right across from Disneyland.

We were watching a parade at Disneyland.

Caitie got on her daddy's shoulders for the parades; she had a good view. It's nice having a tall daddy.

I always make sure and get a pic of Main Street at night when we head to the gift shops before leaving.

We went to IHOP for dinner Thursday night.

We went back to Disneyland on Friday. I like to get at least one pic of the Mark Twain Riverboat on every visit.

Ever since last year, on her birthday, Caitie has wanted to ride the monorail. We saw it pass by our hotel room when we stayed at the Grand Californian Resort last year, and every time it would pass by Caitie said she wanted to ride it. We finally rode it this year. She loved it; she didn't want to get off.

Another pic on the monorail.

Here is what the monorail looks like.



We would go to the hotel room in the afternoon for a bit each day to freshen up and relax. It was HOT and HUMID there, so I needed a lot of freshening up; a lot more than I was able to do, but you do what ya can. I got a pic of Caitie bein' silly while eating some Whopper candies; she was trying to look like a chipmunk.

I got a few pics of the Disneyland Fantasmic show, which is done on the 'river', this is where the pirate ship and Mark Twain Riverboat run, but during the show Caitie wanted me to hold her, so I didn't get any good pics of it, but did get a few pics of the fireworks they have after the show.

I told ya I like to get pics of the Riverboat; it's beautiful at night all lit up with the lights reflecting on the water. This was taken after the Fantasmic show was over, not too long before we left Disneyland.

We checked out of our hotel room on Saturday morning. We were running past the checkout time, and once we were in the SUV getting ready to head out, it wouldn't start. The battery needed a jump, so Michael went to the front office and they gave him someone to call. We no longer use AAA; boy did we miss it that morning. The guy showed up in record time though, so we didn't have to wait long for service.

Settling up before heading out and to the beach.

We finally made it to the beach. We always go to Huntington State Beach.



My little sailor girl playin' on the beach.

The little girl in this pic could pass for the Coppertone Baby, wouldn't you say? Dark tan. You can see just how fair-skinned Caitie is. I slathered sunscreen all over her.

The little girl threw the football on the sand... neither one of them knew what to do after that. ha

Caitie and her daddy playin' near the waves.

Leaving the beach and heading for home.

When leaving the beach Caitie fell and scraped her knee on the roadway in front of our SUV. She was pretty upset. We stopped at a drugstore to get the necessary stuff to doctor and bandage it, and to get her some chocolate to help her forget about the mishap.