Adventures in Potty Training

Adventures in Potty Training.

Let me preface that these pictures are from about 2 weeks ago when Matt's folks were here. When our adventure began.

For several weeks prior to their visit, Cami would wake up in the morning with a dry diaper. So I would sit with her in the bathroom and eventually she would potty on the potty. However throughout the rest of the day....she didn't show much intention or interest. I figured some success was better than no success and one day it would click. The Friday that Grandma and Papa were her she wanted to wear panties...call it showing off for her grandparents or it just clicking, but she went potty 3 times. 3 times again sunday and then 8 times on monday. I have quit keeping track at this point.

Two weeks later we are doing well, but not completely ready to say that she is potty trained. At home she wears big girl cotton panties and when we are at the gym or out and about its pull-ups. For the most part we have had very few accidents and she rarely goes potty in her pull-up. She has even mastered telling the workers at the gym when she needs to potty and pottying for them! She will even go in a public restroom as long as I have her potty seat that sits on top of the big potty (thank you Vanessa)!

Although she hasn't gone #2 on the potty, we are getting close to being fully potty trained! I would venture to say by the beginning of the summer Matt and I will be saving a great deal of money by NOT buying diapers! YEAH!

Here are a few pictures of this adventure. Did I mention I bribe with gummy bears?!?

Me sitting on the floor in our bathroom. I have spent more time in that bathroom sitting, singing, playing patty-cake and painting nails than I care to admit!
Did I mention that my 2 year old adores nail polish and having her nails painted. But be aware her fingers and toes MUST MATCH!
Getting to pick a candy after a successful trip to the bathroom!

Keep it up Cam!

Grandma & Papa's Visit

For those of you who do not know, Matt's parents live in Kansas. So our visits with them are unfortunately few and far between. This last absence was the longest since Cam has been around 4 months! Way to long! So needless to say, we were all really looking forward to their arrival.

Unfortunately, Cami came under the weather that morning (my birthday mind you). After a really rough night sleep she had a fever and threw up twice that day. As fortune would have it, she had her two year check-up that morning. Needless to say she wasn't in the best of spirits when grandma and papa arrived. That didn't stop her from cuddling right up to Papa when we stopped for dinner.

The first couple of nights were a little rough as sleep was concerned because Cam was just not herself. But as the week wore on she felt better and better.

We went to the park Tuesday morning and had the whole Park to ourselves. Papa and Daddy went golfing in the afternoon and Grandma Cami and I played bubbles (thank you Piper) around the house.

Wednesday we went out to eat at outback for my birthday dinner! See the princess pictures below. After outback, Matt and I went to a movie and Grandma and Papa took Cami back home.

Thursday: Papa, Grandma, Cami and I went out and about to Trader Joes and kohls and then to lunch. Thursday night Papa and Grandma kept Cami so that Matt and I would go to life group. Not to mention watching the Master's a good portion of the afternoon! :)

Friday: Papa and Daddy played golf again. Cami, Grandma and I went to the mall and let Cam play on the inside playground (cause it was pretty windy) and had a caramel apple. That was a big hit!

Saturday: we ran around town a little in the morning and went out to lunch. The afternoon was spent hunkered down avoiding the wind and enjoying the Masters

Sunday: Church and Costco. Our normal routine!

The trip was much too quick! Hopefully July rolls around fast! We miss you guys already!

Cami is just getting very interested in princesses. She insisted on wearing this dress out to outback for dinner. With stick on earrings and all!
Cami and Grandma playing the flutes (ie...old tupperware straws)
Princess dancing ...spinning
Cami's sad / worried face. sitting in her new wildcat chair

Giddy Up Papa
Puzzles with Papa. Althoguh I think Cami enjoyed taking them apart more than putting them together.
Baking Cookies....measuring ....adding and of course tasting
Baking Cookies with Grandma. I'm not sure if the batter got more nuts and raisins or Cami's mouth. But it was a good time. I promptly cleaned the kitchen after. Not accusing anyone of being a messy cook though!
Morning time with Papa. She definitely is a papa's girl.

Cami's 2nd Birthday

What a special day. I am still not sure how our baby is already two! Matt and I spent a lot of time over the last week reminesing about the day we brought this blessing into the word. Time flies when you are having fun!

Well, technically we have been celebrating Cami's birthday for a while now. She was able to open a few presents early....from my Aunt Arlene and Uncle Gordon and from my sister Crista.

The morning of her birthday, both Matt and I went upstairs to her room and sang to her and then we opened some presents before daddy went to work. (we are saving some presents for when Grandma and Papa get here on Monday). The rest is in the pictures. There was one thing that I didn't get very many pictures of, after lunch we went up to daddy's office and had a little celebration up there. Miss Barbara got Cami a cake and some presents. She is such a lucky and loved little girl!

buzz light year cupcake
make a wish
Blowing out the first candle of the day.
Opening presents

New snack bowl. Star shaped with toy story characters

Cami enjoying her breakfast cupcake! Notice the jewelry...part of the present from Aunt Karen and Uncle Mike, also the Jessie t-shirt she is wearing later in the day came from them.

After our cupcake for breakfast, we were able to skype with Nana and Pop and Cami was able to open her presents with them right there on the computer. That was so fun and I know that my parents enjoyed seeing her open the presents.

After our morning festivities we headed over to "the cow place" (chick-fil-a) for her birthday lunch. Cami and I went a little early so she could play in the play area a while before eating. Daddy met us there from work and the Altman girls joined us too! It was a perfect little celebration for our sweet 2 year old!
Cami's very good little friend Olivia and her mommy joined us at chick-fil-a for her birthday lunch. We had a great time.
Cami opening the present from the Altmans. It is this adorable ice cream set. Cami has been playing with it non-stop since we got it home! She Loves IT!

Kaitlyn and Olivia joined us for lunch. They are keeping track of the cow when he headed over to our table.

Look who is coming to our table...The COW!
The staff and Cow sang to Cami and brought her a free ice cream
After they sang happy birthday to Cami and brought her ice cream. She was a little nervous if you can't tell from the picture
After lunch and our interaction with the cow and ice cream, it was photo time. Friend Birthday picture. This was the best picture I could get .
Earlier in the week, I asked Cami what she wanted Mommy to fix for her special birthday dinner. Without a moment hesitation she replied "roni and cheese", so macaroni and cheese it was ...for all three of us. We were all toy story all day, so we each ate off of toy story paper plates!

After dinner, we hurried off to life group. I made cupcakes for Cami to share on her birthday. It worked out perfectly that life group landed on her birthday since we didn't have an official party.

Tower of Buzz cupcakes
A little shy when everyone started singing.
Her very own cupcake. She blew out the candle in own very non-chalant try....hence the surprised look on her daddies face!
Getting ready to blow out the candles for the 3rd time today!
The kids and mommies enjoying the birthday cupcakes. Vanessa and Olivia, Cami, Hailee and Piper.

I think Cami had a wonderful day. It was so special for Matt and I too. On days like this it is easy to see all the people that love our sweet family. Thank you all for the sweet calls, texts, and messages on facebook that we got throughout the day. Cami says thanks for all the presents!

Family Fun Day

After returning home on Monday night....that had officially been Matt's 10th (?) or so day working straight without a day off. So he took Tuesday off. All of us were EXHAUSTED, so we didn't do much of anything. Matt decided he would take Friday off and we would have a family day!

Oh Boy ....we had a family day. Got up, packed up a lunch and headed out to the zoo. It was a little cool first thing in the morning, but by the time we were walking around and ready for lunch we had all shed our jackets.

First stop....Polar bears
hanging out at the tigers. we don't often see the tigers so this was an extra special zoo day. not sure if you can tell in this picture, but Cami is mid RROOOAAAARRR
Another shot of the tigers
Checking out the seals. Actually a seal barked really loud right before this, it startled Cami and she literally jumped into Matt's arms.

Hanging with the monkeys. We arrived right after feeding time so they were very active. showing off by swinging from ropes, climbing ladders and as Cam would say being "silly monkeys"
our show off monkey friend
cheese. This is a picture from my iphone that I had to send to Grandma right away cause it was so darn cute!
Cami getting up close and personal with a cheetah.

Such a fun trip to the zoo. It's not often that Daddy gets to join us on our zoo adventures so that made it extra special. He was also amazed at how empty it was on a weekday morning, it felt like we had the whole place to ourselves.

After having a picnic lunch at the zoo, we made the drive home....at which time Cami promptly fell asleep. When we got home Mommy went to the gym and daddy relaxed while Cami napped.

After nap time and a little bit of yard work, we had our second adventure of our fun family day and headed to the movie theater. This is only the second time (since toddlerhood) that Cami has been to the movies...oddly enough we saw the same movie. We went on Christmas Day with Grandma and Papa Williams to see Tangled while we were in Kansas.

We opted for the dollar movie this time. Anyway it was so fun. Matt and I used to go to the movies a lot BC (before Cami) and we are so excited that she is getting to the age where she will sit through an entire movie and really enjoy it.

At the movies, we saw Tangled (again) . She sat in a booster and was great! Considering she isn't yet 2 years old, it is remarkable how well she will sit and pay attention during the movie.

We had such a special and fun filled family day. I'm not sure if the parents were more exhausted or the kiddo. Either way it was so fun and we made wonderful memories.

On a side note...Cami's 2nd birthday is in less than a week! Ahhhhhh....how is my baby already going to be 2?????

Welcome to 2011 Tournament Season

Last weekend was our first SCAGA tournament and the Spring Meeting for the PGA. A very busy work week for us at the Williams' household. Thursday morning we packed up the excursion and trailer and headed South for 5 days!

Here is a picture from the ride down. Passed Out. Love that we have such a great traveling kiddo! BTW....This was St. Patty's Day...decked out in green!

We were able to spend a bunch of time with our friends the Hanlon's. They have 3 adorable kiddos, 2 of which are girls and get along perfectly with our little girl! Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of the girls playing (don't know what I was thinking). You'll have to take my word for it, they had so much fun!

Thursday afternoon after we dropped Matt off at the golf course to work, Cam and I went back to the Hotel. We had 2 special visitors.... my Aunt Arlene and Uncle Gordon. They were driving through and wanted to stop and see us, and give Cami her early birthday present.

Friday we were able to meet up with my Graduate Studies Major Professor and his wife. Cami and I were able to go to my old department and see the changes made and see old faces. We then had lunch with the Del Campo's. They of course spoiled Cami with a bag full of toys! It was so nice to reconnect.

Saturday was a long day! First day of any event is alway extra long. One of the things I am typically responsible for (besides keeping Cami out of trouble) is registration. We arrived at the golf course about 6:40am, which if you know our daughter is well before her typical wake up time. Cami and I did registration, of course she was a charmer and shook players hands and told them 'see you later'. After registration we had a beautiful memorial for a member of the association who passed away unexpectedly earlier this year. It was difficult for us all, but a beautiful way to remember Barry.

This picture is from after we left the golf course Saturday morning and went down to the outlet mall to do a little shopping. One tuckered our SCAGA volunteer.

Sunday was the second day of the event. We were around in the afternoon to see the finish and help with take down and clean up. Earlier that day we were able to have brunch with my sister Karen and her Husband Mike. She is going to be working in Denver for the next 8 months, so it was nice to be able to catch up with her while we were in Las Cruces.

Being in a hotel is always interesting with a toddler. It's a little hard for her to settle down and go to sleep some nights, but most of the time she has been going on all cylinders all day with little nap and she just sacks out.
Monday, Cami and I packed up the excursion and checked out of the Hotel. Matt had an all day meeting at NMSU for the PGA section. We hit the road later that evening.

Pheww....One down and ???? to go :)

Another successful event

Check out more pictures from the event by visiting the SCAGA website and click follow us on Flickr on the sidebar

Its been a while

As you can see its been almost 3 weeks since I have blogged. Sorry. It has been busy around here. Where to begin....

Nana (Libby's mom) came to visit. Matt had a meeting down in El Paso and we all went along for the ride. actually my mom, cami and I spent the majority of the weekend packing boxes and moving furniture. My parents have decided that they love FL so much that they are making it their permanent residence. Their house in El Paso is on the market. Because of that, Matt and I benefitted from some of their furniture etc. She left on a Tuesday and then came back Friday. Her second trip was actually to work. She stayed at a hotel most of the time, but we were able to spend a little time with her after work.

Because of the influx of new things from my parents house we have spent a good portion of time reorganizing and cleaning. (the spring cleaning continues)!!!

This past weekend we went to a fun Cowgirl Themed birthday party for Cami's friend Piper. It was so fun!

Cami, Piper and Olivia swinging on the back porch
Somehow we got all the kids to sit still long enough to get a photo. Amazing!

Cami, Olivia, Abby (standing in the back), Piper, Caeden, George and Sam sitting on the grass.

Giddy-Up horsey
On your marks...get set....GO! Olivia and Abby racing
Birthday Girl playing bean bag toss into cowboy hats
tatoos
Lots of Games!

We had so much fun. Thanks to the Hauquitz family for including us in Piper's special day.

Now we are quickly approaching and preparing for tournament season begin. the first SCAGA tournament is in less than 2 weeks!

Not to mention a very special little girl will be 2 soon!

The rest of March is going to be a very busy month!