More big-girl time (and one of the little girls gets kicked out of class)

TubaDad is away on another business trip and Catherine is visiting. Hooray!! I couldn't be happier. We go together like peas and carrots (Isn't that how Forrest Gump put it? I'm too lazy to Google the exact quote.) Catherine is always game for anything (plus she likes all the same trashy reality tv shows that I do—bonus!). The girls could not wait for her to arrive on Monday. Here they had just asked for about the 800th time if the plane had landed yet.



They decided to make her a candy bag while they were waiting (predictably, they got a little sidetracked and ended up only making bags for themselves, but hey it's the thought that counts, right?).



We picked Catherine up at the airport, then immediately took her out for an incredibly posh dinner (Chuck E Cheese, cough cough). And she smiled the whole time—see, she's game I tell you, game.



Then, on Tuesday, the girls had their first day of preschool in the big-girl class. And I even took a picture. It's kind of blurry, but at least I didn't forget the camera this time. Catherine took one of the three of us too, which was such a treat.


While the girls spent a couple of hours at preschool, I took Catherine out for a bday pedicure and twisted her arm to buy blingy flip flops (first flip flops she's EVER owned, which made my jaw drop through the floor, I won't even pretend otherwise). We also managed to speed-shop through Nordstrom's and get some takeout steak with kalamata olive aioli sauce. Mmmmmm.


Here's a close-up of my monkey toes, just because I am grinning about the sweet little flower that was painted on. How cute is that?


During naptime, my dad held down the fort and we went and played Bingo with my mom and her friends. Oh man, that was some stress. Not even kidding. Those folks are serious about their bingo. About halfway through I was really wishing they served alcohol.


Have we told you the story of the infamous kittycat boots? Oh man, it just kills me. The last time Catherine visited, she took the kittycat boots home (because I thought they were too small for the girls). I was going to donate the matching froggy boots, but just hadn't gotten around to it yet. Well Ree grabbed them out of the garage one day and lo and behold they still fit and the girls have been wearing them all spring. Oops. Catherine has been wracked with guilt every single time she sees those froggy boots on the blog. (The day Ree phoned her and said "Cafrin, why you take Ro's kittycat boots" might not have helped, hee!) So she brought them back this trip. And Ro danced a jig when she saw them. Won't wear anything else. The end of the little video, where Ree nails Catherine about something else and you can hear us both gasp is pretty funny.


Today, Wednesday, the girls are pretty fiesty. Whooeeee, I don't even know how many timeouts they were in this morning. Maybe Catherine was counting. Anyhow, later in the morning we took them to gymnastics for their regular classes (they're in two separate classes because they can be disruptive when they're together). Ree was being pretty stubborn and wasn't listening (tough to deal with, believe me I know), and she got kicked out. Permanently. Really. The coach, who is brand-new (this is her third week), brought Ree over to me and said she couldn't be in her class anymore. I'm guessing this won't be the last class that one or both of our little darlings get kicked out of, but it certainly was the first one. And now it's documented on the blog. Kind of a historic moment, huh?

We had lunch, played at the park for a little, brought the girls home and gave them a bath, and it's naptime now. As soon as I hit publish, I'll be napping too. Want to bet whether Catherine takes one too? It has been an action-packed few days and doesn't show any signs of slowing down. More stories later.

~~~ Update ~~~
A little champagne and some chocolate and icecream, and we are ready to tackle whatever the day brings tomorrow! Catherine laughed at me because I simply could not wait for the champagne to cool so I threw an icecube in the flute and polished it off. Hey, you do what you gotta do when faced with a tough day.