Fun day at the park

We had a great day at the park today with friends. I met up with my close friends Cindy, Patrice, and Darcy and all their kids at our neighborhood park. Abby was able to see Max, Paul, Colby, Aidan, Evelyn, and Cassidy (baby Cassidy as she likes to refer to her). The weather was a little chilly, but at least it didn't rain on us, and we had a chance to catch up for a bit. We also ran into a few neighborhood moms and their kids too. It was a great chance to catch up for a bit with people that I don't get to see that often, and Abby had a great time. She told me she didn't want to go home as we were getting ready to leave. Here are some cute shots of the girls together...

Abby's 2 year check

Here are Abby's stats at her 2 year check:

weight = 25 lbs. 12 ounces (45th percentile)
height = 34 3/4 inches (75th percentile)
head = 19 1/4 (85th percentile)

What can I say...the kid has a big head.  That's because she's so smart.  :o)

New family member

Look what we found the other day in our backyard.  A momma dove sitting in her nest protecting her eggs. We were wondering why there seemed to be a dove sitting on our garage roof all the time. Turns out that is the daddy keeping watch of the nest. The mommy bird is there all the time.

Like father, like daughter...

What's that up in the sky?  If there is an airplane noise, Abby always looks up.  She will usually say, "that's Daddy's airplane" if he's gone at the time. Her babysitter even told me that she makes comments whenever an airplane will fly overhead.  I happened to get this shot of her and it reminded me of Johnny and seeing him do the same thing on the Wigglesworth home videos. 

Handy Manny birthday party

Abby was supposed to go to a Handy Manny birthday party with Aunt Shelly a couple weekends ago, but then she got the hands, foot, and mouth sickness so we kept her at home to be on the safe side. Shelly brought over her goody bag yesterday and Abby loved it.

On a different note...Check out the size of Abby's hands and fingers...everyone thinks they are quite big for her age.  Since John and I have little hands and short fingers, we're thinking Abby may have gotten her hands from Great Grandma Lulu, since John tells me she was a concert pianist. I'm hoping she also inherited the talent part too. Abby's great grandpa on my side (my mom's father) was also very musical and my mom tells me he used to sing in a chorus group called The Chanters for the Shriners. He also knew how to play all kinds of instruments such as the piano, clarinet, saxophone, and trumpet. My mom played the clarinet, my dad played the accordian, Johnny plays the guitar and Abby's cousins Johnathan and Thomas played the drums and the piano.  It seems I am the only one that doesn't know how to play a musical instrument.  Let's hope Abby gets some of her musical genes from her great grandparents.

Abby hammering, or as she puts it "working", on her bed...

 

Spring Pics

We just took some pictures last weekend with our neighbor Allyssa, who is a beginning photographer. She took pics of me when I was pregnant with Abby and has taken some really cute photos of Abby during her first year. So it was about time to take some new pics. This is what she wore for our photo shoot. We'll be sending out new pics soon to all the family members.

Little Balls :o)

Abby is into playing with Playdoh. She insists that we make it into "little balls". She seems to like things that are small. If we make the ball too big she will let us know. She also loves the color pink at the moment. Here's a shot of her little pink balls...

Boots

I mentioned Abby's boot obsession in a prior post. Check out the size 9 (she's currently wearing size 7) pink cowboy boots from Alexa. Notice they are on the wrong feet, but she could care less.  This girl LOVES boots!

Pretending to be asleep with her rainboots on.

Our little talker

Last weekend I came home from getting my hair done, walked into the door, and Abby pointed to me and said, "You pretty!" I wish I had it video taped.  It was one of those moments I will never forget. The other day she pointed to a wedding photo and was asking me about it.  I told her that was when mommy and daddy got married. Her response..."Abby got married, Scoutie got married"...and so on. Her speech is just incredible for her age.  It's been kind of cool to experience her language acquisition, since I studied this stuff for years and years.  I remember going into preschools down in San Diego to give basic speech therapy to 4 year olds.  Some of the 4 year olds didn't even have 2 word sentences and you couldn't understand a word they were saying, so to see Abby doing so well with her speech is amazing.

Swing

We love hand-me-downs in this house. This is a little swing we aquired from my parent's neighbors who have grandchildren that are older than Abby.

Fashion Shoot

Here are some very cute pictures I took on Saturday morning while Abby and I were playing around in the backyard.

My little model

She is obsessed with wearing boots lately. You'll see more pics to come of her in her pink cowboy boots.

Reading

Abby loves being outside lately. Here she is one early evening reading on the back steps.

Little Goofball

Abby can be super silly at times. And she has the BEST giggle. I promise to work on figuring out how to post videos soon, so you can hear it for yourself. Here she is being silly in her chair.

Abby Turns 2

We had a small birthday party for Abby with Sacramento family members and a few friends in the neighborhood. It was what I call a 4 themed birthday party. We had owl invitations, Minnie Mouse plates, cups and napkins, Elmo party hats, and a Thomas the Train cake. All of Abby's favorites. She had a great time with her friends, and even ate some of the cake this year. Last year she wouldn't even touch the icing. Here are some pics from her fun day...

The picture below shows the look on her face while we were singing her happy birthday. She didn't really know what to make of it...

More fun pictures of singing happy birthday and blowing out the candles...

My favorite pic of them all...(Nancy's too)

Eating cake...

Trying on her new apron...

Abby and Max playing with the new kitchen (gift from mommy and daddy)...

More Funny Stories

Abby has been saying so many funny things lately that we wanted to write them down, because I'm sure we'll forget half of them as time goes on. Here are a few that happened recently:

• I was trying to swat a mosquito when Abby asked me what I was doing. I told her and she responded with, "don't worry, I get him".
• Our neighbor walked by this morning and she saw him out the window and started saying "hi Jesse". I had no idea she knew his name. 
• They must play games at daycare because she will constantly tell me, "let's play a game".
• She is going through a phase where she doesn't want to poop. I explained to her that everyone has to poop and then I list off names like mommy and daddy. So...you can see where this one is going.  Her new thing is to tell me who can poop. "Mommy poops, Daddy poops, Gabey poops, Piper poops, baby Cassidy poops"...and this goes on and on. Just today we were talking about it and I told her that it's just part of life. So later when I changed her she says, "part of life". It had me cracking up. You can't say ANYTHING that you don't want repeated.

Pickadillos

Since Abby is approaching 2 years old very quickly, I wanted to write about the things she can say or do now. Some are funny, some drive us nuts. Here is a quick low down on Abby's little pickadillos:

1. LOVES, and I mean LOVES the cartoon Caillou. I hope to someday force her to watch this show when she's grown, just like she makes us watch it. She also likes Dinosaur Train which is much more bearable for the adults, and I've learned a lot about dinosaurs. She often times pretends to be a dinosaur and says, "rah" and sings the T-Rex song from the cartoon.
2. She gives us eskimo kisses, which Grandma taught her to do.
3. She is still the most affectionate kid I know.
4. She sings the happy birthday song and rock-a-bye baby. She can also tell you who in the neighborhood has recently had a birthday (Piper, Max, Sarah).
5. She is often asking us "what's that sound" whenever she doesn't recognize a noise.
6. Bossiness and tantrums (we could do without this one!).
7. Her recent new thing to say is "I love (and you fill in the blank). She loves everything. I love butter, I love wine, I love Playdo.
8. Along those same lines, she does the sweetest thing at night. I like to hold her and rock with her in the glider before bedtime (especially on days that I haven't seen her all day). I will say I love Abby, and she will say I love mommy and this goes back and forth for many repetitions. It melts my heart.
9. She will get very sad if she thinks mommy or daddy are hurt. For example, if I stub my toe or something, she will come over to me and say "ahhh" and give me a hug.
10. Can dress herself on her own and put on her own shoes, often times on the wrong foot.
11. Common phrases out of Abby's mouth..."Abby do it", and "Stop it" or "Sit down Scout".
12. Whenever you ask her if she wants to do something or go see someone or anything like that, she will respond with "Yeah, me too". We think she picked up on the "me too" phrase at daycare.
13. Talks about her friends, Piper and Max who live down the street, all the time.
14. Whenever the phone rings she says "Daddy?" Sometimes she says "Grandma". And we will often catch her pretending to talk to someone on her fake cell phone. And I mean full conversations will go on. Very cute!
15. "Where'd Daddy go, Mommy?" is one I hear a lot. This one is very frustrating at times, because it usually occurs when Johnny is on a trip. I tell her he's flying his airplane and this usually ends in crying or a tantrum. The girl loves her daddy, what can I say. It sucks for mommy though. But when I go to leave for work and she is home with daddy, she will usually be upset and tell me to "stay with Abby".
16. She prefers to wear nightgowns to bed, instead of footy pajamas or a top with pants. She loves both the nightgowns that she got from Alexa. I have now gone online searching to buy nightgowns, because having only 2 means I'm either doing laundry every other day or she's wearing them dirty 2 nights in a row.
17. Reads books to herself and loves for us to read to her.
18. When she wakes up, we ask her who she dreamt about last night. She will list off every name she knows.
19. LOVES to terrorize Scout. Scout doesn't seem to like it much, but she does put up with it.
20. She says, "Don't fly airplane" when John is getting ready to leave for work.
21. When we're stopped at a red light, she yells "Go!". We've been trying to explain to her that we have to share the road and take turns with the other cars.
22. She will grab her purse and walk to the door and tell us she is "going to work".
23. She giggles at the simplest things, especially her buddy Max.
24. Loves to rough house with Daddy. This little girl is going to be tough.
25. Papa gives her horsie rides and she also rides on a play rocking horse that my parents bought back when I was a kid. They taught her to say "yeehaw", but it comes out as "neehaw". It's pretty funny.
26. Talks all the time and has us laughing every day!

This age is challenging but so much fun!

Funny Stories

I've been meaning to write about the funny little things that Abby says or does so I can document them in some way. So anyway here's one... as we speak she is trying to take all the Boogie Wipes out of the package. I told her one was enough and she asked me why. I said, "Because they cost money and we don't want to waste them." She responded with, "Abby get money". Awesome...I told her if she could get working on this one asap that would be great.

Daddy's Girl

This one says it all...shirt reads... Perfect (Just like my dad)