A few cute Christmas pics...

We took these at Neannie and Pop's over Thanksgiving.  I love them!  

Abby Kate's Costa Rica Pics

Listening to the monkeys talk to her!

That black blob in the tree is a monkey!









Just to tone the mass quantities on my blog of pics, thought I would share the fun ones of Abby Kate on the trip.  She LOVED swimming.  She would hop back and forth from the pool to the hot tub all day long.  The pool was super chilly so it was great to have the hot tub to warm up!  And the day we went to the beach, she LOVED it!  I was shocked because she can be super sensitive to texture and I wasn't sure how she would react to all the wet sand.  But she loved it! I think she would have played for hours on end.  I am SO glad....we can gang up against Daddy in the future and lobby for beach vacations!  

Birthday Girl!

I cannot believe our baby is 3!  This has been, by far, the most noticeably different birthday yet.  It is amazing how children grow and develop.  For the most part, the first few years bring about subtle differences.  Of course, you see the obvious growth: crawling, babbling, walking, but little of their true personality.  I have found as Abby Kate's vocabulary and ability to communicate has grown, the more I feel I KNOW her.  

This year has revealed this little girl, with no traces of baby.  She loves to chat, sing, and laugh.  She loves to be chased and tickled.  She loves being scared (her favorite is when I hide and as she "finds" me, I jump out and say "ROAR!" and she screams at the top of her lungs and says, "AGAIN!").  She is passionate and loves exclaiming about everything.  

For a while, I had begun to think she was going to be shy.  She did fine around those she knew but clung to us when she was around other children in public.  Just recently, she has stepped out of that and even walked up to a child in a store the other day and patted her chest and said, "HI!" I about fell over.  She loves attention and spends most of her day saying, "MOM! Watch!" She loves to dance and still loves her bed.  She gets in it many times a day and the transition from crib to big bed was much simpler than I thought it would be.  She just loves being there.  She loves wearing jammies and puts up a fight when I try to dress her.  She knows the alphabet by sight and can count to 20.  She loves to sing and "read stories."  She has recently gotten into coloring and writing.  She still has a short attention span.  She hops from one thing to the next super fast, which we are working on.  She still is a finicky eater.  She hates the texture of things.  She will not eat fruit (except apples) and only likes sweet potatoes as a veggie.  We are working on this too.  She loves turkey and chicken and cottage cheese and yogurt and any kind of pasta, especially pesto.    She still loves bread!  She drinks a ton of milk and was introduced to chocolate milk this year, which is a treat.  She is still sleeping wonderfully (which will possibly end soon due to us taking her "abby" (pacifer)...I know, WAY late).  But I am waiting for the Farmer's Almanac weaning day, which is the 17th of this month.  She is potty trained but still working in diapers at nights and for her nap.  

She has been SOOO excited about her birthday this year.  We started by celebrating at Neannie and Pop's with the fam.  She LOVED it.  Aunt Krista got her a cake and topped it with Sleeping Beauty figurines and after each nap and waking up each morning, she asked, "Can I have cake?!"  So much for the early distaste for sweets!  She just loved eating the icing.  

We then had a little party for her here at home.  She loved everyone being here and had super fun playing with her friend's Everett and Addi...and of course, Kourtney!  She got tons of fun presents and has loved playing with each thing!  We realized this year after inviting family and a few local friends, hosting this at our house was not going to work in the future.  It was a smidge crowded but my cup overflowed with having so many of our family and sweet friends in one place!

Abby Kate, we are so deeply thankful for you.  We delight in you.  Every day is a precious gift as we hear you begin to softly chatter into the monitor.  Daddy and I often race to see who can get to your room first.  We love hearing your cheerful, "Good morning!" and to see you hop out of bed or better yet, to want us to snuggle.  You truly are the most precious earthly blessing we have known.  We are humbled that God would entrust you to us and pray daily that He would parent you through us.  We want more than anything else in the world to point you to Him and to see you come into a personal relationship with Jesus.  You are truly so special.  Your personality, your health, your gifts, your beauty....all things we cannot wait to watch God work together for His good.  We praise God for you each and every day and will try to NEVER take you for granted.  You are more than enough.  God lavished His sweet blessings upon our life the day you were born.  He expanded our hearts and taught us more about true love than we had known.  Our knowledge and depth of insight into His love grew exponentially when we met you and understood what He gave up when He sent His Son, Jesus, to this earth to die in our place. We adore you precious girl, and are deeply thankful God has given us a front row seat to watch your life.    

Princess

Our precious one has been quite princess obsessed lately. Bobby and I were laughing after taking her to roam Toys R Us on Sunday at her attraction for all things royal. We wanted to get some ideas for her birthday (which she is talking about 199 times a day) and Christmas. If you haven't been lately, they have lots of fun stuff set up in anticipation of Christmas and you can spend hours in there letting them play and roam for free (if you can say NO over and over!). She found this crown and earrings set for $4 and suckered Daddy into buying it for her. Neannie bought her the Cinderella costume and Sweecie bought her another pink princess dress so we are hardly ever in normal clothing these days.
All of this has really made me giggle remembering. My brother, Hal, always LOVED to dress up. He would watch a movie and literally, within minutes of the credits would have ran to his room and created a costume depicting the character we just watched in the movie. The funniest part was he was vigilant about the details. Even down to Superman's curl. He wanted to look JUST like them.
Abby Kate has inherited his same love of details and costumes. When she puts the Cinderella dress on, she wants Cinderella hair, down the the random ribbon I had laying around that I attempted to make look like Cinderella's. And she wants the crown, and earrings and wand. She sits and looks at her self in the mirror for ridiculous amounts of time admiring her beauty. She loves to hear us tell her how beautiful she is!
On the way home that day, B and I mused at God's design. Our little girl, who has never watched a princess movie, knows the attraction of royalty. She doesn't know the princess is the daughter of a king. One who is historically doted upon and loved by all her countrymen. She doesn't know that men would give their lives to fight for her hand. She doesn't know that she was an heir to the throne. She just knows they are beautiful and special. She sees their picture on boxes and commercials and wants to emulate them.
Just a word little one, remember as you grow up, you ARE a princess. Chosen and dearly loved by the King of Kings. It is in HIM that you find your worth, your truest beauty. It is in HIM that your identity will be found. Rest in that...always. Your Daddy and I pray that for you with all of our hearts!

Happy Trick or Treating from Abby Cadabby!

Our next door neighbors were dog sitting and dressed up the dog!  Abby Kate LOVED it!

Our friend's Bryn and Josh came by with their precious little pumpkin, Cardyn!  Abby Kate LOVED holding her!

Sweecie and Poppy got to come!  Mom will kill me for putting these on here.  She had been working super hard planting pansies for me!  She had gotten REALLY hot!  Weird October was so warm!  Uncle Hal was working but Aunt Ashley came to play and she worked hard handing out candy with Momma!




We had a great night last night!  SO much fun!  Abby Kate is at the perfect age to enjoy seeing so many people dressed up.  We basically spend the evening on the porch, handing out candy and her oohing and aahhing over each princess that came up our sidewalk.  The funniest part was seeing scary kids come walking up and she would exclaim "OH MY WORD!  Momma, what IS THAT?!"  And we would all die laughing.  She was not scared, just fascinated.  She was not too crazy about trick or treating.  She showed her sharing skills and really wanted to give candy rather than receive.  Funny.  What a fun night with our princess in training!

Pumpkin Patch!

I have NO IDEA what is going on with my camera cards lately but all the pics I took from my camera are saying they are corrupted due to the card.  Thank goodness my sweet sister in law had her camera too!  We had SUCH a fun weekend spending time with Neannie, Kourtney and Krista.  The pumpkin patch was so fun and we basically took in all the fun they had to offer.  We rode on a hayride, played in the houses, climbed the hay bales, and AK's favorite, slid on the slide numerous times.  She has asked me 10 times since yesterday if we were going back to the pumpkin patch.  I will have to take her one more time this week!  Thanks, family, for such a fun weekend!

Homecoming!

We had SUCH a wonderful weekend.  OSU homecoming is one of my favorite events of the year.  This year, almost all our family got together and had SUCH a sweet time together.  We also got to visit with dear friends not seen often enough.  Friday night was walkarounds.  OSU has one of the largest homecomings in the nation (I actually think it is the largest).  Walkarounds is where the close the main roads through campus and all the sororities and fraternities pair up and create these massive house decorations in front of the houses.  You would not believe the size of these things.  So needless to say, Abby Kate was in wonderland.  Not to mention there were tons of booths and a carnival and PIZZA!  One of my favorite memories of the night was AK and B going on a slide at the carnival.  B went with her so he could slide down with her.  She got to the top and a guy working held on to her while B finished climbing up.  She pulled away from the guy and hurled herself down the slide (see pic 6 and 7).  We all DIED laughing!  

We tailgated on Saturday in a lovely spot.  We had perfect views of Pistol Pete and the band.  Abby Kate got to run and play to her hearts content!  She had plenty of doting adults to play with which put her in heaven.  She also tried to make friends with each child that passed.  She loves to talk to other people and then turn to me and say, "MOM! I am talking to them!"  I assure her "I see that!" which really cracks me up.  We really did have such a wonderful time.  I will post more pics on my personal blog.