Usually the comments actually relate to the pictures, but looking back at the pictures I have to post, there's just a whole lot of sweet smiles and family lovin'. And in thinking about what I wanted to say, it's more about what Addie's been doing lately than anything, so the comments may not match the pictures, it's kind of in whatever-mode today. Hope it's still enjoyable :)
Addie's vocabulary and sentence forming capabilities have just skyrocketed in the past few months, which means we're having a lot of back and forth conversations and....questions. The first time Addie said "Why, mommy?" I was so thrilled--Steve and I always vowed to answer our kids' questions the best we could and not do the "just because" copout answer, but we didn't realize that the onslaught of "whys" would start so early, and be so frequent! We stuck to our guns, and still love the questions, but after the 8th "why, mommy?" or "why, daddy" in a row...it can get a bit grating (Steve's final answer is always "Quantum Physics," to which he is always asked, "Why?"). Oh, and she's asking all sorts of other questions, too. "This means?" "Name?" (when we read a book, she has to know the name of every single person on the page, which means we make up a LOT of names...thankfully, she doesn't get upset if the next time we read the book, the people have totally different names).
You know that Addie loves to listen to and tell stories from the previous post, but Addie has also been singing a lot more lately. She knows all the words to Happy Birthday (she threw me two birthday parties today complete with a pretend cake and song) and she even wrote a song herself! The lyrics are always the same: "Addie has fun friendssssss....Santa comes every niiiiight....YOU" The first part is sung in a high pitched voice and "YOU" is in her normal voice. It cracks her up every time.
Speaking of birthdays, one of Addie's favorite games nowadays is "present". Since her birthday, then hannukah, then christmas all came back to back, Addie had quite a present-filled winter. Luckily, she loves to give as much as receive. Every day, Addie will fill a random box with small toys and say "For YOU" and give it to one of us. We then have to "unwrap" it, pretend ribbon and all, and say "THANK you" and then we make her a gift. Sometimes, she just wraps Hiccup around a small toy. Sometimes she pretends to sleep and makes us put her "present" under a pretend christmas tree. Sometimes...Addie is the present herself :)
Addie is also really into role play these days. For example, she loves playing with her doctor's kit, so she'll say "You're Doctor Mommy, I'm patient" and then lies down for a checkup. The best part is that she keeps up with the characters long after the checkup is over and we've moved on to another toy, so I could be doctor mommy for another 20 minutes. Another example--the other day it rained cats and dogs in the morning and in the afternoon it was warm, but still muddy, so what else to do but get the rain boots on and play "puddle leaf" (a game Addie invented and named--you essentially throw leaves into a puddle over and over). She loves Caillou, a cartoon character who has a little sister, Rosie. That day she said "I'm Caillou, you're Rosie" and for the rest of our time outside (an hour) I was Rosie. "Look Rosie, more puddles!" and "Come, Rosie!"
So if the internet and this blog still exists in 10 years we may get a very angry pre-teen Addie mad at us for this one (sorry, hun!) but I couldn't resist. Are we potty-training Addie? Not officially, and we're honestly in no real rush to force it or do a 3-day boot camp thing quite yet, so we're letting her take the lead, we ask occasionally, we always encourage if she asks, but it's not often. We have a little seat that fits over the big bowl and she's peed on it a handful of times and pooped once (yay!) and she looooves to read books on it. I love this picture!
In other "big girl" news, as of this weekend Addie is now officially out of the crib and in a big girl bed! Forgot to take pictures of the bed, but will soon. She's doing surprisingly well--she doesn't get out of it at all at night or during nap, she waits for us to get her. She has still woken up 1-3 times each night (or very close to the morning wakeup time) needing us to help her find Hiccup or re-arrange the blankets, so all is not perfect, but we're taking it one step at a time.
Addie loves hearing the story of how Steve and I met and got married. She points to my rings all the time and says "Two rings?" and I say "Yep, Daddy gave me a ring when he promised to marry me, and then another one on our wedding day." She went into her jewelry box one day, gave Steve a ring, put one on her finger and said "We married!"
We think Addie is going to be a fantastic big sister. She often asks me to lift my shirt so she can tickle the baby, say hi, and give my belly hugs and kisses. We read her big sister books and refer often to our friends who already have two children. The first night she slept in her big girl bed she asked us where the crib was going, so we told her that the baby would be using it. She immediately started transferring things to from her room to the baby's room exclaiming "baby needs trashcan!" She even went as far to say "Baby needs Hiccup" and deposited her constant sleep companion, Hiccup, in the baby's room before bedtime" When it was bedtime, we told her to get Hiccup (she hasn't spent a single night without him since she was 4 months old) and she was adamant "NO! Baby needs Hiccup!" until we convinced her that he was still inside and wouldn't be able to use it for a few months anyway. We were surprised and touched at her generosity. So is she truly ready for the big change? Only time will tell, but we think so. Sure it'll be hard for her to not be the center of attention like she has been for the past 26 months, but with her warm, sweet heart....we're thinking it'll be all right.
You can see in this picture how some of them were supposed to look like, but...
...Addie was in more of an abstract mood and wanted to break out of the snowflake motif :)
