Hallelujah!

I have not wanted to post this for a couple days as I didn't want to jinx it, but Anna Caitlyn Riggs is now potty trained!!!! That's right folks - start the music, cue the confetti and proceed with the parade. This little girl (as precious and innocent as she may look in this picture) has been the most stubborn person I've ever known.

Preschool starts next week and I had almost succumb to the fact that she may not be able to go if she wasn't potty trained. We have tried EVERYTHING to get her to go. Finally, Monday morning she decided she was done with "baby diapers" and wanted "big girl panties". I took her comment with a grain of salt (and about 3 pitchers of margaritas since her behavior has made me start drinking heavily - kidding) as she had made this statement before, but after MANY minutes (adding up to several hours) sitting on the potty that day she finally did it! And she has been doing it ever since. Amazing. Just goes to show you that children will be potty trained when they are ready to be potty trained and there is not much you can do about it.

So we are all VERY happy at the Riggs household this week and Anna is extremely proud of herself. Yee haw!

Too funny not to post

While we were in Kentucky, my Dad and I took the girls to my parents' church so they could play in their children's room for a little while (it was really hot outside and the girls were just starting to feel better so I didn't want to chance them getting out, all hot and then sick again).

Anyway, Anna found these goggles (not sure where they were in the room). We didn't even know she found them until we turned around and saw her riding on the push tricycle as pictured here. Hysterical!

Enjoy!

What a week!

The girls and I spent last week in Kentucky with my parents. We had an exciting week planned, but a summer cold (or a bad allergy attack) took over the girls and we didn't get to do too much but recover. That was fine as Grandma and Grandpa (my parents) were able to spend a lot of time with girls reading and snuggling - always fun.

We were able to see Mom-Mom (Chris' grandmother) and Nana (Chris' Mom) rode up with us to help with the trip from Tennessee - thank goodness.

I have some great pics so I will post those now and give more details about the trip (not that there are too many to give) later.

Above is Grandpa (my Dad) and Ashlyn watering the flowers on the back deck.

Above is Grandma (my Mom) and Anna being silly.

Above is Anna (left) and Ashlyn (right) playing with Mom Mom (Chris' grandmother) and her teddy bear.

And these are of the girls (Anna Left/Ashlyn Right) at Dairy Queen on Sunday night. They made quite the scene. There is a jukebox in this DQ and right before we left the song "Cheeseburger in Paradise" by Jimmy Buffett came on. Well - it is not widely known - but my girls and I like to put on any Jimmy Buffett CD and dance around the house. This is one of our favorite things to do actually. So when the music started, the girls started dancing - hysterical. The good patrons of DQ that evening didn't realize they were getting a frozen treat and a show - ha!

You Scream, I Scream, We All Scream For Ice Cream

Yesterday marked the return of the Martha O'Bryan Ice Cream Crankin' in Franklin, TN. Basically, several Presbyterian churches get together along with a few sponsors - mainly Purity Dairy - and bring ALL kinds of homemade ice cream to a LARGE park-like area in Franklin. For your donation you get a small cup and a spoon. Then you go from table to table to get samples of all the ice cream - YUM! They also have bands playing and jugglers to entertain everyone as we gorge ourselves on ice cream. The flavors range from the very basics - vanilla/chocolate - to the extreme - cinnamon pepper & Barney in a blender. My favorite was the banana split flavor and the key lime pie flavor. They were GREAT! You actually get to vote on your favorite and the votes and the judges decide on a winner which will be a new Purity Dairy ice cream flavor.



Nana and Pappy met us there to enjoy the afternoon and I can tell you Chris and Pappy definitely got their money's worth. I think they sampled EVERY flavor there and there were at least 100 different ice cream stations around that place. Pictured above is our group (other than me) including our daughters who ate every colored popsicle there was. From left to right - Anna, Nana, Chris, Pappy, Ashlyn.

Snip, Snip

My little girls look so grown up!!!! Ashlyn is in the picture on the left and Anna is on the right.

Yesterday, we got the girls' hair cut for the very first time. I just haven't been able to bring myself to cut it over the past 3 1/2 years til now. But they are supposed to start pre-school in September and the long, long hair was getting hard for all of us to deal with. So it was time to bite the bullet.

We've been talking about it with the girls for a couple of weeks to get them ready and they seemed to be pretty excited about it other than Ashlyn thinking a haircut would turn her into a boy - funny. Plus, we planned on donating a large chunk of it to Heartstrings which is basically the Locks of Love associated with Vanderbilt Hospital here in Nashville. We showed the girls the pictures of the little girls that are sick and don't have any hair and they both seemed eager to help.

I thought for sure I would cry, but I was able to control myself. It was also a little hectic as the girls got their hair cut at the same time so I was bouncing back and forth between them to make sure they were doing okay. Anna was a little hesitant at first, but did great and Ashlyn was a little ham and kept flipping her new "do" back and forth in front of the mirror - kinda made it hard for the stylist to get a straight line going with her hair.

Here a couple pics of our new grown up angels. I just LOVE their cuts and am so proud of them! We (me, Grandma and Grandpa Cook) took them to Chuck E. Cheese afterward as a reward and they wore themselves out. And they wore us out as well.