Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. I wanted to take a moment to give you an update on my almost 29 months old (going on 6 years old) daughter. Miss Addison has always been super independent for her age but she reached a new level a few days ago. After announcing that she needed to go to the potty, I began to follow her to the bathroom. My little girl turned around, looked at me, and with authority said, "NO MOMMY, BY MYSELF. "I'll BE RIGHT BACK. YOU STAY RIGHT HERE, O.K! She even had her hand out motioning me to stop! Stunned, I responded "O.K." Making sure I stayed a couple of steps behind, I continued to follow her. When she discovered my failure to follow her orders, she repeated them in a firm and clear voice, "NO MOMMY, GO BACK! I WANT TO DO IT BY MYSELF!!!" After a few moments, I tip-toed to the bathroom door and hopefully whispered, Do you need any help honey? She initially responded, NO! However, after about two minutes she called out, "Mommy, I need help washing my hands." So over the last 72 hours, Addison has reduced my role in assisting with her pottying ritual to that of the hand washing helper. If her step stool had been in that particular bathroom, she wouldn't have needed me at all. Of course Aaron and I are thrilled that she has done so well in the potty training area, but I must admit that we are a little sad that she is growing up so fast and is already telling us to get lost. This parenting thing never ceases to amaze me!

Of course you want a few pictures, so I try not to disappoint. Why lose my HUGE blog reader base?:-) The first picture is one of my favorites taken around Thanksgiving. The second one is her school picture. The last two pictures were attempts to get a cute Christmas card picture. That didn't work out so I'm now shooting for New Years cards! I improved my posting frequency a little bit in 2008, so I'll try to do even better in 2009. Laura (one of my dedicated and patient readers), please teach me how to blog more often!

Halloween 2008

OUR LITTLE LADYBUG!

I'm not that into Halloween. I dressed up as a child and went trick-or-teating, but I never understood why so many adults go nuts over Halloween. One very grown up neighbor told me it was his favorite holiday. Well OK! I must admit that last year I was slack in participating in the neighborhood Halloween hoopla. All the neigborhood kids were dressed in adorable costumes, and all I had for Addison was some cute pumpkin pajamas. One sweet neighbor gently scolded me for "robbing Addison of her 1st halloween. This year, I decided that I needed to at least get Addison a cute costume so she could participate in her school and neighborhood Halloween activities. I'm so glad I did because Addison (and her mom and dad) had a blast at several Fall/Halloween parties and she looked so stinkin' cute dressed up as a ladybug. Once during the festivities I made the mistake of calling her a bumblebee. I couldn't believe how she quickly corrected me with attitude, "Mommy, I'm a ladybug!" So there you go. Addison has fully been introduced to Halloween. Her parents have been reintroduced to costume hunting and having an excuse to have tons of candy in the house. I guess it's true that having a child allows one to relive some of the fun times experienced during childhood.

Here's Miss Addison. Just don't call her a bumblebee.

 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

I've Been Tagged!

Wow! I’ve been tagged by Laura (who’s doubtful that I still blog) Gracie’s mom - Send me your Blog address so I can answer your tag questions.

1. What time did you get up this morning? 6:30

2. Diamonds or pearls? Diamonds

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? Sex and the City: The Movie

4. What is your favorite TV show? Grey’s Anatomy

5. What do you usually have for breakfast? Coffee and toast or English Muffin

6. What is your middle name? Once married, I changed it from Anne to my maiden name.

7. What food do you dislike? A three-way tie between Beets, Liver, and Chitterlings

8. What is your favorite CD at the moment? Gee, I’m having a middle- age- moment. It’s really good but I can’t think of the singer’s name or name of the CD! She’s one of those Alicia Key’s/Nora Jones type singers. I think she was raised in England and performed on Oprah last season. Cherita, (one of my four blog readers) please let me know who I’m talking about!!!

9. What kind of car do you drive? A mid sized SUV that prefers premium fuel.I’m looking forward to trading it in for a car with a less sophisticated palate for gas.

10. Favorite sandwich? Chick-fil-A

11. What characteristic do you despise? Condescending and/or arrogant remarks

12. Favorite of clothing? A-line dresses and skirts (I totally agree with Laura…so comfy and forgiving)

13. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? I would love to visit Ethiopia again as well as other African countries. Traveling throughout the UK and seeing more of Europe would be great.

14. Favorite brand of clothing? Banana Republic is my reality but I crave clothing by Tory Burch and Theory.

15. Where would you retire to? Maybe Charleston or a Caribbean island. But hanging around the ATL with the freedom to travel anywhere at anytime ain’t a bad deal either.

16. What was your most recent memorable birthday? Two years ago because I got my travel call to head to Ethiopia!

17. Favorite sport to watch? Not a big sports fan, but I will watch post regular season baseball if the Braves or Yankies are playing.

18. When is your birthday? January

19. Are you a morning person or a night person? I’m an AFTERNOON person!

20. What is your shoe size? 9

21. Pets? Nope, but thanks to Addison’s fascination with animals, we visit the dogs and cats in the neighborhood quite frequently.

22. Any new and exciting news you’d like to share with us? We’re adopting from Ethiopia again!

23. What did you want to be when you were little? Can’t remember what I wanted to be in grade school, but I've known since high school that I would be a psychologist. Weird, I know.

24. How are you today? Delighted. We’re just one document (CIS clearance) shy of a completed dossier!

25. What is your favorite candy(lollie/chocolate)? Lindt Milk and Dark Chocolates.

26. What is your favorite flower? Bright Pink Tulips

27. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? Two dates: November
4th (VOTE VOTE VOTE) and November 10th (TINA TURNER concert)

28. What is your full name? I'm too sick of writing it. After working on that dossier requiring me to write my FULL name over and over, I'm thinking I need a name change!

29. What are you listening to right now? My brain telling me to return back to work instead or working on this list!

30. What was the last thing you ate? An Egg McMuffin.

31. Do you wish on stars? Are you kidding??? But I do like the old R&B classic, I’m Wishing on a Star” by Rose Royce. (Cherita, I couldn’t think of the group that performed this, but instead of relying on you, I goggled it!)

32. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? Fuschia

33. How is the weather right now? Rainy and cool.

34. The first person you spoke to on the phone today? My office assistant.

35. Favorite soft drink? Coke…not diet, the sugary stuff

36. Favorite restaurant? Most Thai and Ethiopian restaurants

37. Real hair colour? Dark Brown

38. What was your favorite toy as a child? Light Bright (until I stepped on one of those pegs), Easy Bake Oven

39. Summer or winter? Niether! FALL, FALL, FALL

40. Hugs or kisses? Hugs Rule!

41. Chocolate or Vanilla? Can I have a little of both? If not, Vanilla.

42. Coffee or tea? Coffee in the morning, Green Tea at night

43. When was the last time you cried? Before I answer, let me tell you that I am a cry baby. I cry a lot but it’s usually when I’m overcome with joy. (I’ve been hanging around Laura too much). I cry during great campaign speeches or rallies. It doesn’t even have to be the actual candidate making the speech. It could be the candidate’s wife, husband, former baby sitter, or milkman. Heck, it could be Joe the Plummer---well maybe that’s taking it a little too far! It doesn’t matter. If I think the message is sincere and I can relate…I cry. But back to the question: The last time I cried was a few nights ago when Addison was suffering with a bad cold and I couldn’t do enough to make her feel better. The next day I cried (just a few tears of joy) when I looked in the rear view mirror and saw her happily munching on her crackers and dancing in her car seat while singing some cute new song she had learned at school.

44. What is under your bed? One of Aaron’s neat boxes of things.

45. What did you do last night? Organized adoption documents and surfed the internet for that gas friendly car.

46. What are you afraid of? I’m very afraid of Addison or Aaron being injured in some way. I admit that I probably say “Be Careful” more than the average mom or wife.

47. Salty or sweet? It’s perfect when you have a little bit of both.

48. How many keys on your key ring? Six

49. How many years at your current job? Let's just say I've been here long enough for my God daughter to get her driving permit.

50. Favorite day of the week? Friday

51. How many places have you lived in? One state, 12 residences

I tagg anyone who has a blog and would love to play this game.

Here's a little Fall cuteness:

Look Who's Two!

Yep, Miss Addison is now two. Although I've been warned about the difficulties of raising a two year old, I think I'll refer to the next twelve months as the
"Trying Twos". If you've read this post before, you may notice that I've changed my tone from "Terrific Twos" to "Trying Twos". Although I've previously pondered why our society embraces the negative title, "Terrible Twos", the reality is that raising a two year old really can be trying. Although I might as well view Miss Addison's mixture of sweet and spunky behaviors as normal developmental behaviors, these behaviors require serious patience, nurturing, guidance, more patience, and love. Did I mention the need for patience?!! So in honor of Addison's presence on earth for twenty-four months, here are 24 things (in no particular order) about her that add much joy and energy to our lives and make us proud to be her parents. And yes, I've included some of Addison's characteristics that require a lot of the Big P...Patience!

1. Addison greets us most mornings with a big smile and jumps of joy. I must admit there have been a few times lately when she woke up on the wrong side of the crib!
2. The empathy she shows for others when she senses they are upset or uncomfortable
3. Her willingness to share even when she clearly doesn't want to
4. Her relatively strong verbal communication skills
5. Hearing her say "Thank You" without prompting or proudly saying, "Excuse me!" after a cough (even if the cough was fake :-).
6. Her great independence (which makes us proud and crazy at the same time - especially in the morning when we're trying to leave the house)
7. Addison's amazing memory of people, places, routines, and details
8. Her love of animals, both stuffed and real
9. Her efforts to assist me when doing her hair. You should see those little fingers move while trying to work those rubber bands!
10. Her attempts to style my hair followed with a, "There you go!"
11. Addison's love of books and music
12. Her show of love and affection for her mommy, daddy, and extended family members
13. Her intelligence
14. Her expressive eyes and overall outer beauty
15. Her generosity with hugs and kisses
16. Her excitement when it's time to bless the food and making sure everyone says "Amen".
17. Her appreciation of variety of foods: chicken nuggets, pizza, avocado (she actually asked her daycare provider for avocado), yogurt, cheese, plums, mangoes, apple juice, cheerios, ice cream, and her latest crave...quesadillas.
18. Her playfulness and sense of humor
19. Her attempts to write numbers and the alphabets
20.Her expressed opinions about her clothing and shoes ("It's too tight", "It's too big", "It's just right!"
21. Her indecisiveness about her desires: I want it/ I don't want it, I wanna/I don't wanna, I need to potty/I don't wanna potty, I had fun/I don't wanna have fun...Talk about the need for big time patience! What's a parent to do?!!
22. The fact that her temper tantrums are typically over within a minute or less
23. Her sense of confidence and ability to hang with older toddlers and children, and perhaps most of all,
24. Addison's great balance between gentleness and strength
Needless to say, this list could have been a lot longer!

In an effort to please the three people that still follow this blog, I've posted a few recent pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

Up Close and (too) Personal

A few weeks ago, we met up with some friends to visit The Yellow River Game Ranch.This interesting place has a mile-long trail where you come quite close to people friendly birds and animals. We encountered white-tailed deer, bunnies, buffalo, sheep, goats, and even black bears (which were kept in large cages). For reasons I won't go into, I felt sorry for those bears. Anyway, I was a little caught off guard by the overly friendly deer and other animals. I think Addison was over it after a few minutes of feeding the deer. Funny, Addison is always running after and chanting, "Come back!" to the birds, squirrels and dogs in our neighborhood, but this level of closeness between man and animal seemed a little too much for her! Here are a few pictures from that day:

 

Hi Bambi!


 

Gee, what big eyes you have!

 

Dad, I think he wants more.

 

Hurry Dad! He's getting a little too cozy.

 

That's right, go to Ceci. She has lots of carrots!

Addison's First Job

We have decided that Addison will be our subdivision's first official dog walker. She loves trying to walk dogs but most are too large and strong for her to control. Well, Addison has recently met several yorkies in our neighborhood that have enabled her to hone her dog-walking skills. She can really handle yorkies because they're so small and light. A young couple was with their yorkie "Polo" in our neighborhood park and Addison insisted on walking him. It's gotten to the point that if anyone with a dog stops and talks with us, Addison will reach for the dog's leash as if it's her job to walk it. Polo’s owners took these pictures with their cell phone and sent them to us. We just happen to live in a subdivision where dogs are plentiful and very pampered. In fact, the dogs in our neighborhood have their own doggie park! So forget the lemon-aide stand, Miss Addison has found her toddler - age calling. We're pretty impressed with her finesse and think she’s just the cutest little dog walker we’ve ever seen :-)

 

 

 

A Day at the Zoo

Gee, I haven't posted in months. I started out the year with such determination to post at least monthly. What can I say? Trying to keep a blog going while parenting has been a challenge for me. I'm surprise that anyone still checks in from time to time to see if I've posted anything. Well I thought I could at least post some pics from Addison's recent trip to Zoo Atlanta. As you will see in the 1st photo, Addison was less than thrilled to be there. Just look at her expression in the 1st photo when she realized that she wouldn't be allowed to run freely through the zoo for the next couple of hours. Or maybe she was thinking, "Mommy thinks I look adorable in this get-up but I think I look ridiculous!" Although the pictures don't show it, Addison soon realized that spending the day at the zoo was actually fun. Now if I can just get her to smile for the camera:-) Enjoy the pictures!