19 months...

We have had 19 months of total bliss!  Our lives have been so blessed over the past several years and Addison truly completes our world!  She is growing up so fast, I just want to bottle up every age so I don't forget all these little stages in her life!  We soak up every minute with her, in which there never seems to be a dull moment!

Addie is a busy little girl.  She continues to love reading books.  We read several books a day and Addie loves to read to us as well.  She has her favorites and she has learned the words to them.  If you stop reading she can tell you what comes next in the book!  She received 26 new books for Easter, so we have been doing lots of reading this past week.  She gets excited when we have new books.  We check out a few books at story hour each week too!  So we stay pretty busy!

Addison has officially learned ALL of our immediate family names!!  She had down all of my family and most of Dan's.  She was having a hard time saying Aunt Emily's name, but now calls her 'Me'.  She is great with names and it doesn't take her long to learn them!

We continue to work on colors and shapes.  Addie is getting better with her colors, but mixes them up pretty easily at times.  I am really wanting to devote more time to sit down and work on these things with her every day.  Usually I will just ask her these things as we play, which she responds well to.

Addie talks through her actions all day.  She says "run" when she is running, "jump" when she is jumping, and so on.  She knows SO many words now.  She is constantly pointing at things and telling us what they are and asking us for things she needs.  It is truly amazing how much kids can pick up on!  She surprises us with a new word all the time! She is also beginning to put together three word sentences.  She is always saying, " c'mon mom play!"  I don't get too much done anymore because I can't say no to her!  So, to get a little done around the house I get Addie to help me.  She loves doing the dishes, or should I say she LOVES playing in the water!

When we play, it is usually with her babies.  She loves her babies and takes one when we go places.  She typically will give one to me and she plays with one.  It is wonderful to watch her take care of the baby, saying and doing some of the things I say and do with her.  She melts my heart!  She often puts her baby in clothes baskets.  I think it is supposed to be baby's bed, but Addie climbs right in with them!

We are so excited that it is beginning to slowly warm up here.  Addie loves going outside, especially going out with Daddy.  She loves riding the tractor and skid loader (which I need to get a picture of) and playing on her slide.  We have yet to get her swing set out, but plan on doing it soon!  She also loves going out to see the cows and MOO at them.  Don't you just love Dan's bibs in this picture?!!  I like to call him Farmer Dan when he wears them!

Addie catches onto things very quickly these days.  We have to watch what we do and say very closely, because she will quickly follow!  She likes to do things that I do, especially wearing my clothes (already!).  She will get my shoes and put them on , she also tries to put on my pants if she gets a pair!  Here she is wearing my slippers around the house.

 

Tonight Dan had a hunt that he went to with his friend, Matt.  Matt is at our house a couple times a week, and Addie thinks he is just the coolest!  It is so funny!  She will even ask for him sometimes!  Since Dan was gone, Addie and I thought we would have a fun girl's night!  We did a little dancing and then set up her tent.  The tent that she got for her birthday and would have NOTHING to do with!  I thought we would try it again.  Wouldn't you know...

She LOVED it!!

 I think I may have gotten her a little too wound up before bed, but she was having a blast!

Here are some more pictures form our week...

She figured out that if she blows through her straw while drinking milk, it creates bubbles.  She LOVES bubbles!  I let her do this for a little bit before the milk was spilled all over the floor.  I had to laugh to myself, because there once was a time when I WOULD have cried over spilled milk! (I worked hard for that liquid gold!)

She loves taking her baths in bubbles now!  I tried it when she was around 15 months old and she didn't want to get in the bath for a few days, it scared her so much!  We are making progress!

We have a big morning planned tomorrow as well!  We are headed to Fredericksburg for a book/reading event for small children.  I am not sure what it all entails, but my friend, Lacey, invited us to come.  We are excited to check it out!

18-month Pictures!!!

 I finally had time to get our pictures up!!  They turned out wonderful, as usual, and we were lucky to get a beautiful day to take them!  Addie did as well as an 18-month old could and was a trooper while traveling to all our different locations!

Hope you enjoyed them!  Hard to think that next time we get pictures, we will have a TWO year old on our hands.  Scary stuff!  Have a fabulous day!!

Pictures done by Nichole Priebe!

Easter 2011

It is amazing to think that we are celebrating our second Easter with Addison!  Honestly, it feels as if she has always been part of our lives.  Hard to imagine what life was like before her!  Easter was a blast this year with Addie at the age she is.  She had so much fun with all of it!

Easter morning we awoke to the wonderful smell of egg casserole baking in the oven.  It was hard to resist eating it, but it was for the church breakfast.  I really should have planned ahead and made two!  We couldn't make it to breakfast because Dan had to get chores done before church.

The night before, I had Addie put on her Easter dress.  She loved wearing it around the house and one of the first things she did Easter morning was get her dress and attempt putting it on herself!  Too cute!  The only problem was she was attempting to put her legs through the arm holes...

After Addie was dressed and Daddy was in from chores, it was time for Addie to hunt her Easter basket!  There were 5 eggs with little clues in them for her.  Each egg would lead her to the next clue and eventually her Easter basket.  I was amazed how much Addie got into this!  She was searching for eggs around the house the rest of the day!  

Addie with another clue..

After she found her Easter basket!!  The Easter bunny brought her LOTS of books!!  She loves to read and I think she has already made us read all of these books to her!!  She also got some sidewalk chalk and songs to sing and dance to!  

We put the cd in while Dan and I were finishing up getting ready for church and I caught her in her room dancing!!

Quick family picture after church...

We love our Addie!!

After church we were having lunch at our house.  This was not originally planned, but we had so many people sick in our family that we were the "healthy" household, and actually I am still on the mend!  I love having things at our house because we don't struggle with nap time and Addie is much more pleasant if she has her nap!  I had lots of food to bake when we arrived home, so Max and Addie were more than happy to help.

Working on cream cheese bars.  Max was so amazed that egg white turned to fluff when beaten!  So cute to see him excited by such a simple thing...

After lunch we colored Easter eggs with the family.  I planned to do this with Addie before Easter, but since I wasn't feeling well, we ran out of time!  It actually worked out great doing it with the entire family.  Everyone had fun doing it!  This picture was taken right away, because Addie fingers were very colored, and still are today!

 

After coloring eggs we went out to hunt them!!  Addie loves hunting eggs!  Notice her Easter tattoo on her hand that she got from the WOT Easter egg hunt and her little green fingers!

Aunt Vicky helping Addie get an egg out of the tree...

Playing with the ball when we were done hunting eggs!

I had to share this picture from today.  NEVER leave an 18-month old unattended (even for a min) with an Easter basket!!  In some of the Easter eggs we hunted yesterday were the mini Rees's Eggs (mom's fav).  As I was in the other room for seriously a few minutes, she managed to get one out of an egg, unwrap it, and eat the WHOLE thing!! I walked it and she tried to pretend that nothing happened, but it was written ALL OVER HER FACE...

I walked in and said, "Oh, my goodness, Addie!!"  She replied with, "yumm, yummmm!!"  The candy is now hidden!  I should really hide it from myself too, because Dan and I are going to be the ones eating it!!

Hope everyone had a wonderful Easter.  We feel so blessed with all the God has provided for our family.  It was a great weekend to reflect on all of these blessings and His love for us.

Getting caught up...

Okay, I am SERIOUSLY behind on blogging!  We have had so much going on these past few weeks, and to top it all off, I have been sick AGAIN!  I had strep throat for the second time this year.  Luckily Addie has not been sick and she has been helping Daddy take care of me!!

So let us rewind to last weekend...

We had my cousin's birthday party.  He is now 12, which is SO hard to believe.  Seems like yesterday I was babysitting them as babies!  Addie had a blast with all the kids, but did not go too far from mommy, daddy, or grandma!

  

Grandma and Addie!  My mom HATES pictures taken of her and I am sure something will be said after posting this, but I love this shot! 

Birthday boy, Lucas and Addie making "the face"!!

More of the family! 

On Monday we began work on our kitchen, which was planned to take two days.  Well, as diy projects usually end up...it took more like 3 days.  Which isn't too bad, but it is really hard when you have an 18-month old and no real kitchen!
Here is a "before" picture...

 hard at work...

 Here are the "after" pictures!!  I love the color of the new counter tops and my deep sink!  Actually makes dishes kind of fun!

So far we have done the counter tops, along with a new sink/faucet.  We still have lighting, hardware for the cabinets, and a stove vent to install.  Hoping this will get done sometime in the near future!  

Fast-forward to this weekend, Easter weekend!  On Friday night Addison and I went to church.  Dan could not make it because he was not done milking.  Addie was HORRIBLE!!  We have been having some difficulty in church lately, but this was to the extreme.  Guess it was a REALLY bad idea to go to church so close to bedtime and I don't think I will be doing it again! 

Saturday was the big WOT Easter egg hunt.  I had to help out, so didn't get to see Addie hunt eggs, but Grandma got some pictures for me!  I was told she was a little grumpy during the hunt, but who would blame her?  It was freezing out there!!  Mom said she kept taking her gloves off and throwing them on the ground! 

I think I have caught up!!  I will post Easter pictures later today!!  We also got Addison's 18 month pictures back from Nichole, so I will work on getting those up as well!!