Addy speaking in sentences still shocks me sometimes

We were driving home this Saturday with Lance and Jess after getting some lunch. We were teasing Addy about having to take a nap when we got home. (She would rather die than miss hanging out with her beloved Aunt Jess)

Nate: Are you sure you don't need to take a nap? You look pretty sleepy Addy

Addy: No, I sleep tonight

What?!?! Where did that come from?!?! She talks all the time but it's about 50/50 real words and her own special language, Ad-lish. When complete, perfectly phrased and pronounced sentences come out it's all I can do not to fall over :)

Catching Up

It must be time for my bi-monthly blog post!

It's been a very busy, very cold few months and I blame that for the fact that we haven't been taking many pictures. Who wants to see multiple pictures of us lounging around the house in warm clothes. The up-side of not using the heat to save energy is that we get to hang out in our PJ's a lot :)

Lucky we had a 3 day spell of wonderful warm weather last week and took immediate advantage by heading to the zoo. Not only is it a great little zoo but they have the coolest playground I've seen anywhere. There is a huge padded area for toddlers and despite the fact that some 8 year old hooligans kept knocking her over Addy had a great time in there.

Checking out the local fish exhibit. Turns out local fish are booooooring. Addy loved it though

She had a great moment with this turtle. It kept walking around and looking at her. Several times they were nose to nose through the glass

"Hi Turtur!"

The petting zoo was also a bit hit. She ran right up and started petting goats, almost throwing herself over the fence in the process

This kid has no fear of animals. These were big goats, with BIG horns and even after one knocked her down she was still in the thick of it, petting them all

Man, I have GOT to get a tan!!! To bad I passed my pasty pasty skin onto Addy. She'll have to learn to love it though. The poor kid gets slathered with sunscreen any time we leave the house.

Watching the monkeys.

You should see her monkey impersonation. Complete with sounds, chest beating and lots of jumping around

I can't get over how grown up she looks here. Where did my baby go?!?!

There are no animals here, just scummy pond water. She had to look at everything though!

Playing Zoo animal at home. She sat under the clothes basket and roared at us for about half an hour

Coming to give Mommy a kiss

She loves climbing into our cabinets. Most of them have kiddy locks on them but I left it off the Tupperware drawer so she could play in there. Now I need to teach her to re stack and put away all the Tupperware she pulls out :)

She'll pull the door closed and then jump out and scare us. If you're ever at our house and she does this make sure to dramatically scream, jump and fall on the floor in terror. She's going for the big reaction

This girl LOVES hats. As soon as we get home at night she finds one of about 8 and puts it on

Oh....My.....Goodness. The cuteness is to much to bear

All of our friends were over this night to play Catan (about 8 people in all) and she was sitting there "reading" to us all.

This is her FAVORITE outfit. Of course the required hat, her jack-o-lantern slippers that rattle and favorite polka dot pants.

We've also developed a new infatuation with sweeping. I'm not going to lie, I'm strongly supporting this hobby.

Is it bad that I want to get her little cleaning supplies for her birthday? Maybe a little duster? They even make a mini Elmo vacuum that actually works! I could use some help around the house :)

GODZILLA!!!!

She doesn't' really play with her blocks yet but loves to knock them down when I play with them. Normally I can't get more than 2 stacked before Godzilla runs in and sends them flying. I had Nate hold her hostage in her room so I could build a huge castle with every block. The glee on her face at having that big of a castle to destroy was awesome :)

And that's all she wrote! Now that it's starting to warm up and we can go do things again I'm hoping to be more consistent with the pictures and posts. My parents are coming up in a few weeks to visit as well so plenty of great photo ops then

The Great Harlingen Bean Wars

OK, the post title is kinda stupid, it references a really bad movie I once watched about an actual bean war. Whatever, it was all I could come up with.

In actual fact Mom bought several pounds of dried pinto beans (which elicited several remarks at the grocery store) for Addy to play with. It was an even bigger hit than the corn bins at Halloween. I certainly know a summer activity we'll be engaging in quite a bit!

Yeah, this has nothing to do with beans. It's just Addy eating her candy necklace. It also explains why she's so filthy in the subsequent bean pictures. Face and neck covered in sticky candy + dusty beans = an incredibly dirty child

Dirty and having a blast!

My Mom is probably going to lose her yard to pinto sprouts this summer. Not only did we get them all over the patio but Addy ran through the yard throwing beans around like Tinkerbell scattering fairy dust.

When burying your arms in a bucket of beans isn't enough? Just dunk your whole head in there!

Like I said, she adores her Uncle John. The two of them were inseparable all week. It was really cute and she's lucky to have such a cool Uncle

I was afraid she would try to eat a bunch of beans but for some reason she had no interest in that. Now sticking them up her nose and in her ears, totally different story

A Very Merry Christmas

As usual these pictures are going to be out of order. I hate Bloggers way of loading pics backwards. Especially since I write my posts at work and have to minimize the window so it doesn't look like I'm slacking off. Which of course I am :)

Every year we have a silly string war. One year we got John so badly he ended up having to shave his head because of all the silly string in the fro. This year was tame in comparison.

Opening presents on Christmas Eve

She got a play kitchen this year and TONS of accessories. The grocery cart was the real favorite though. We actually had trouble getting her to open anything else after that

Mimi and Grandpa

See what I mean about the grocery cart? Totally infatuated

Hiding in Mimi's napkin cabinet. She could almost close the door behind her and loved jumping out and startling people as they walked by.

Christmas Eve we headed out to the island for a little beach and Dirty Al's seafood. What is it about the beach that always makes people so tired?

Enjoying a lime at Dirty Al's. If we let her eat lime's as much as she begs for them she wouldn't have a bit of tooth enamel left

A really good family picture. We were going to have real ones taken too but the wind was 40 MPH that day and we had to cancel.

Seems like every time we go to the beach I get some variation of this picture.

Addy once again freaked out about the sand. This time though we didn't have time to let her get used to it. So some very accommodating grandparents and an uncle carted her around on the their shoulders the whole day. This is probably the only time her feet touched the ground.

Very accommodating

I can't really explain this one. I know Nate wasn't hungry. Mom cooked enough food for a small country. I'm still full!!

Making orange juice with Grandpa. One of many reasons I love the valley, fresh squeezed orange juice year round.

Addy fell head over heels for her Uncle John. Quite literally in this case

The first day we were there it was pretty cold (for valley standards). Again this picture has no explanation. I just love every one's reactions to Nate

Grandpa and Addy plugging up the hole in the fence so the neighbor dog couldn't come over to poop. It didn't work.

Addy comes from a long line of pyro's. I'm proud to say she was just as infatuated with the fire as both her parents and uncle. Hopefully she won't be as bad as John and I were as kids though. At 11 we burned down an entire clubhouse and at 14 John set himself on fire. Good memories :)

Okay I take it back. She may be as bad as John and I.

22 months and she's already set herself on fire :)

She LOVES hat's. If it's not Nate's beanie then she's sporting my Titans ball cap backwards or an old Togo army hat I have.

Nana (Nate's Mom) got Addy this table and chair set for Christmas. We've been having lots of tea parties. But if you don't slurp loudly and appreciatively you have to leave the table. She's very particular about tea drinking etiquette.