Potty Training

For the last 4 or so months Emma has been able to go on the potty and more and more lately she has been telling us that she has to go potty and does go when we take her. This happened a couple of weeks ago when we were out to eat but I did not have her travel seat with us and she refused to sit on the big potty. Ended up making a mess all over the floor. Needless to say I put the travel seat in her diaper bag when we got home that day.

Anyway I decided to go ahead and start potty training her so this weekend we spend our time inside working on that. I bought Emma some cloth training underwear because I have had so many people tell me not to use the pull ups.

Saturday I let her go bare butt around the house just so she would not think that the training pants were the same as a diaper and while she had some accidents over all she did really well telling us when she had to go. Thankfully she went 1 and 2 on the potty and all of the accidents were 1 so they were pretty easy to clean up. We really did not even need to use a timer to make sure she went every so often.

Sunday I started introducing her to the training underwear and she continued to do really well with them but still has several accidents. Emma definitely let us know when she had an accident because she did not like being wet.

This morning Emma woke up at 3am went potty and went back to sleep. This happened again at 4am and when she woke up at 5am Drew decided to just start the day, last night was Drew's night off). I took her to the babysitter in her training underwear and I'm very nervous on how she is doing. She has never actually gone on the potty at the babysitter before so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that she is doing okay.

Hopefully from now on we will only use diapers for nap time and bed time and eventually not even then. Anyway just figured I would share what we were doing this weekend.

Haircut & Big Helper

I have been thinking about giving Emma a haircut for a couple of weeks now because her hair has gotten so course in back and you could see that it was breaking quite a bit. Yesterday before she got her bath I decided to go ahead and cut her hair just a little bit to get rid of the split ends. She did really good and let me cut her hair. I think that it looks a lot better now and I'm sure the curls will grow back quick enough.


Some of Drew's friends from Jasper came up the end of last week to go to the Zoo, Children's Museum and the Fair. They came over for supper on Thursday night and Emma had a lot of fun playing with their daughter Sarah. There were a few fights over toys but over all they did really well together. Then on Friday Drew picked Emma up from the babysitter and they all went to the Children's Museum. Unfortunately I do not have any pictures of the girls together but Drew said they had a lot of fun at the Museum as well.

This was Drew's weekend off so it was nice to be able to spend some time as a family. I took full advantage of having Drew at home to help me watch after Emma and was not only able to get the house cleaned but was able to go through Emma's old cloths and get them packed up properly and we were able to get both cars washed. Also I was finally able to go though her pictures and print some off for her picture albums (I had not gotten any printed off since Emma turned 1). It was really cute because Emma loves helping us out so she wanted to help us wash the cars and do laundry. Believe it or not she actually does a good job helping with the laundry. Emma helps us load the washer and dryer and turns them on when it is time.

Emma actually put all of her wash in the washer by herself and then closed the door. Drew then picked her up and let her turn the washer on once he had added the detergent.



Helping Daddy eat Popcorn

Checkup and Birthday

Emma had her 18 month checkup this morning. Drew said she did really well. Currently she weighs 21lbs 12oz and is 33 1/2 in tall. This is a gain of 2 inches in hight and 2 lbs in weight since her 15 month checkup. She has not gotten any more teeth since her 15 months checkup so she still just has the 8 front teeth (4 top and 4 bottom). We can tell that her gums are swollen and we have sworn a couple of times that she was seriously teething but still nothing..


Drew's 26th birthay is today. When I asked him if he wanted me to make him something for his birthday he said that a black forest cake sounded really good so that is what he got for a birthday cake. If you do not know what a black forest cake is it is a cocholate cake with cherries.

Drew was going to take Emma out to eat this morning before going to her doctors appt but plans changed when Emma decided to wake up at 3:15 this morning. She was wide awake so instead of going out to eat Drew took Emma into work and showed her off too his coworkers. This is Drew's weekend to work so he did not have to work last night. On the way back home Emma fell asleep so he let her sleep until it was time to leave for her appt.

18 Month Professional Pictures

I took Emma to JC Penny on Friday to get her 18 month pictures taken. We had a few problems getting in because our appt was at 9:40 and the store did not actually open until 10:00. They did not tell me which door I had to go to and it was not an obvious choice. Anyway I think that we got some really cute pictures.






After getting Emma's pictures taken we headed to Jasper to visit some and go to the Jasper Strasenfest. Drew wanted to watch the Waterball Contests that was Friday night. For anyone who does not know what the waterball contest is it is a contest between the firefighters to see who can knock a ball to the oppoinents side using the fire hoses. I have to say that it was not nearly as exciting as in years past. Celestine did not even put in a team.

On Saturday Barbara and Aubrey came down so Emma and Aubrey got to spend some time playing together. They do not get to see each other much so it is always nice to see them playing together. I think they had a lot of fun. I wish that I had some pictures of them playing but I fogot my camara at home. Hopefully mom or Barbara can send me some they took.

Grandparents and Butterflies

Mom and Dad came up for a visit this weekend and brought up a toddler bed and sand box that mom had found at yard sales for Emma. While they were here we went to the White River Gardens which is located right next to the Zoo. Every year they have a butterfly exhibit along with all of their flowers.

Saturday dad helped me defrost our deep freeze and we enjoyed playing around the house. Dad had fun playing in the sandbox with Emma. Then on Sunday we had a wonderful time at the Gardens. It was such a nice weekend to be outside.



They had frogs spouting water into a pond and Emma was running between the frogs playing in the water. She was pretty wet by the time we were able to get her away from them.


This is a picture from the top floor of the Greenhouse that overlooks the outside garden. What you can see in the picture is not the entire outside garden but it gives you some idea.

One of the many Butterflies. They have the butterflies in the greenhouse and it is filled with all different plants so that they can sustain different butterflies from all over the world. It is really hard getting a good picture of them.


We had a really nice weekend. Next weekend we are going to be going to Jasper for the Strausenfest. I took off work this Friday and I'm going to get Emma's pictures taken in the morning and then we are going to be heading to Jasper. Hopefully Emma will behave for her pictures.

Make sure to check out the other post from today.

Our Little Helper

I made Zucchini bread last weekend and Emma wanted to see what I was doing so I figured why now let her help me make the bread. She did a really good job helping. Overall Emma really is a pretty good helper. She helps us set the table and clear the table most nights.


Adding Vanilla to the mixing bowl.

Adding Suger to the mixing bowl.