Butterfly House and other random things

Kaylee has been pointing out butterflys in about every book we have so we thought it would be great to take her back to the butterfly house!! She loved it, but there were not that many butterflys this time.

Other news: I have started to potty train Kaylee, sort of. We are not going at it full strength but a few times a day she will sit on the potty. We started it this week and so far she has gone atleast once per day. She has been happyto sit. Not quite sure she understands what she is doing yet, so I am not pushing it. We have a small party everytime she goes and this morning we had a great big party!!!! Kaylee went poop in the potty today!!!!

We have started to demo our kitchen!!! So far, we have most of the upper cabinets down, the back splash off, and I scraped the popcorn ceiling off. We are taking it slow because we have some guests coming in four weeks. We know that we will not have it all done by then and so I did not want the kitchen to be out of commission for them. We have our cabinets being delivered next thursday and the appliances later. i am hoping by the time the company comes we will have the upper cabinets done and have our floor and backsplash bought.

I am having an allergic reaction to something this morning. It is on my face - red rash and itchy. I have not done anything special this morning so not sure where it is coming from but hoping it goes away soon.

Brian and I got the new Wii Super Mario Bros game about 2 months ago and just beat teh entire game last night. Including the hidden levels and World 9. Also collected all of the star coins from every level. In the past two months, playing this game is all we did on our free nights. I have to admit, I am glad it is done and we can get on to something else now!!

That is all that has been happening in our household. I am trying to catch Kaylee in a few video clips. She is saying some funny things lately, but will NOT perform for me.

Eating Habits and Hallway monitors

I know I have heard people talk about their children and not being able to get their kids to eat. Well, Kaylee is no different, except at breakfast. Breakfast is the one meal that as long as pancakes or french toast are being served, she will out eat me. This morning she ate 3 blueberry pancakes, and one cinnamon french toast stick. Then, she continued to eat a pile of blueberries. Unfortunately, for lunch she at two pickles. She would not eat her chicken, cheese, or strawberries. I do let her eat a few snacks throughout the day. Normally, they are whole grain cheerios, fruit, or something. Does anyone know a good vegetable that an 18month old can eat easily on the go? She does have a lot of teeth, but veggies are so hard and I am still afraid of her choking on them. I guess, I could just steam them up a little to soften them up.

On another note, did you have a hallway monitor when you were in school? I remember our hallway monitors were not only there to slow you down in the hallways, but were making sure you didn't drop trash or things like that. Lately, I have noticed some things about Kaylee that make me think she would be a great hallway monitor someday.
1. She has learned recently to turn on and off lights. If we leave a room, she insists on turning off the lights before we get too far.
2. I am not sure how she has learned this one, but before we leave a room, she picks up all of her toys (usually) and then we can go onto another activity. I am not complaining at this one at all:)
3. She has learned to say "thank you" and if she does something she will repeat thank you over and over until we say it to her. Ex. She is helping me unload the dishwasher, she hands me a silverware. If I do not say "thank you" for EVERY silverware that she hands me she will turn around and keep saying "thank you" to me until I say it to her. Then she will get me the next piece from the dishwasher.
4. Kaylee knows we pray before meals and at bedtime. As we are getting her into her high chair she immediately says "Amen."
5. She has started to have to have her babies where ever we go now, including going into stores or places. I am not sure if I will put an end to this one or let her have one in the store. What do you guys do on this one?
6. If she sees a piece of garbage on the floor, she immeditely picks it up and puts it in the garbage can.

Kaylee's walk!!!

My name is Kaylee Katerberg and I need your help. You see, everytime I get into my parents car, they always have the Christian radio station on. It is great music and I LOVE hearing about Jesus's love.

But there is one problem: the signal to this radio station is not heard everywhere we go, including in our own city or our house!!! The radio station is trying to buy a new signal so that we can listen to the music in our house and all over St. Louis and even some surrounding cities, but they need our help.

Here is where you come in. On Feb. 6th we(my parents will be there too) are participating in a Key to this city walk with JoyFM. I am not sure how far we will walk, but it is going to be a lot of fun. My mom will have the stroller with us if we need, but she just bought me some new running shoes, so I can walk far:)

I need to raise pledges (not sure what that is, but my mom can explain it). If I raise $150 I will get a T-shirt, but if I raise $500, we will get free Casting Crowns tickets. Unfortunately for me, my mom said that I am too young to go to that concert so I have a treat for you.

If we raise the $500 and get the two free tickets, then I will randomly pick someone from our sponsorship to get to go to the concert.

How cool will it be to be able to listen to such great, wholesome music all over St. Louis. I know I would love it and am hoping you can help me!! Please leave my mom a message if you would like to sponsor me. You can send us a check if you are out of town. Checks made payable to JOYFM. I need to raise this money fast though, as the walk is in a few weeks. I would love for someone to win free Casting Crowns tickets too!!!

Love,
Kaylee

One more 18 month post

Just needed to document Kaylee's growth from her doctor appointment yesterday.
Height: 32 3/4 inches tall (80 percentile)
Weight: 26.4 pounds ( 75 percentile)

She also has another ear infection, bummer. Also, a lot of fluid in her head apparently.

She is doing really well, but just coughing a lot right now.

18 Month Photoshoot

With a not-so-cooperative 18 Month Old:)

What better prop than a tripod? I could have thought of something better, but it was making her happy so we went with it. It is appropriate for this family I guess:)

Wardrobe change really killed the mood. Kaylee was not happy with us at all at this point. It got pretty tough, but she did great.

Peek-a-boo usually works.

Summersaults are good too.

I have to fix the color on a few of these, but I am happy with how they turned out.

18 Months Old

Look out world!!! Kaylee is 18 months old today!!

I actually can not believe it has been 18 months already. I was going to compile a list of all the words she is saying now, but I can't keep up with her and how many she is saying:) She pretty much repeats everything Brian and I are saying, we have to be careful as she is a very good listener. Brian even taught her how to play hide n seek the other day. One of us hid and she found us. She did very well and was laughing the whole time.

I am not sure if I am looking forward to potty training her, as I know it will be work. I also know that I am going to start putting her on the potty sometimes throughout the day just so she gets used to it. Ready or not Kaylee, you will get out of those diapers that you hate so much anyways:)

I can't wait for it to get warm and we can adventure out again. There are so many things to show you. For now though, we will just have to build forts:

Practice pouring things from one cup to another:

And watch the weather outside (and for daddy to come home from work)

Happy 18 month birthday!! We love you!!!

Playing in the Snow - if we can call it that:)

We had a little bit of snow on the ground last week. By "little bit", I mean that not even all of the ground was covered and if you stepped in the snow then it spread and it was gone. I thought it would be a great time to take Kaylee outside for some pictures. She was less than pleased with me. I think we were outside for a total of 5 minutes. Here are a few of the shots.