All about Abby

Abby is 2 1/2 now (a few months ago). She is very girly! She loves to imitate me in just about all things. I gave her some old makeup and she keeps it in a little purse and loves to get it out and put it on (and on and on...). Then she comes and asks if she looks "cute" and "so pretty"! She also loves to wear "cute dresses", which works well right now with the potty training because we can leave her bottom bare and she does a good job going on her own. The funny thing is that she HATES to get her hair combed (even with spray conditioner) and so this girl that wants to be all cute and pretty usually has a rat's-nest for a hair-do!




Another funny thing is that even though she has all her teeth in, she still drools. We don't know why, I guess she just doesn't have control of her mouth yet! Many cute pictures have been sabotaged by drool (which is hard to photoshop out!).


And not only does she like to imitate me, but her brother as well. Here she is trying on his helmet (backwards though!) and she likes to try to do just about anything he does, and often finds out that she simply not big enough or old enough to do it just yet!
But as she loves to be like Jamie, she is also very good at blaming Jamie for all things. Her most used words are "Jamie did it". Jamie does antagonize her quite a bit but I think she does her fair share of sisterly things back to him. She has a very nurturing personality so that if somebody gets her or is sad, she will go and hug them and say "okay, okay", or "wrong?".

Favorite activities: going to school, playing dollies, cooking (helping mom and in her own little kitchen), playing in grandma's playhouse, coloring and painting

Favorite foods: berries and most fruits, yogurt, and pancakes (she's a big breakfast eater!)

How she talks: Abby has a big vocabulary but uses very little "connecting" words. "Abby Jamie play sand saw spider", is a typical Abby sentence. "You do it", "got owie", "wike it" (which means don't like it)

A few June happenings

the lake

We spent an afternoon at the lake and Megan, Anthony, Kate and Aiden hung out with us too. Jamie learned how to steer the kayak (with a canoe paddle) all by himself. Then he tied another boat to his and gave Kate a ride too! Aiden learned how to dive headfirst from the lawn into the sand (he was fine)!

preschool

The summer program at the kids preschool started in June and Abby finally got to join in! Her and Jamie were in the same class for the summer and so far they've both had so much fun. Abby is so excited to go to school and she usually does some sort of painting every time!

San Antonio

There is really only word that is needed to describe our little trip to San Antonio:

HOT!!!!!

But I'll try to give you a little more information. For starters, the drive from Houston was about 3.5 hours, and for over 50 miles, there were billboards advertising this place called Buc-ee's, how could we not stop? It really was just some oversized convenient store but it did have some good fudge and we stopped there for food both ways.

San Antonio, on the river walk, was very pretty, I gave most of my pictures a "vintage" tint because it just had that "olden" feel to it:
remember what I said about hot?
crossing one of the bridges:
The river boat tour was pretty neat and the kids seemed to enjoy it too:

staying hydrated:
we ate at a tex-mex place along the river:
the alamo:
Chad taking the audio tour of the Alamo. The kids and I went to a nearby theater and watched Up, rather than us all whining to Chad that we were too hot!

Houston

Tea parties

The kids totally (like totally!), loved doing little tea parties out on the patio. If you could only see the sweat glistening all over them (it didn't seem to phase Sydney much). They also really enjoyed playing on the playground in the backyard. Their favorite part of the trip though was of course, the pool, you can pictures of them in the pool at Carrie's blog: www.sydkad.com, go to June and click on 'Pool Fun'.

Downtown

One day we went downtown Houston to go to an Astros game. Before the game we went to a really cool park that had ponds for racing little sailboats and a whole area of fountains that kids (and adults) were playing in their swimsuits. There was a playground and a restuarant and even a farmer's market going on that day.

The Astros stadium was pretty cool, Chad and I figured it was the 8th major league park we've visited.



Jamie apparently thought it was too loud (I think they just scored a run)!

And there was a great place for the kids to play too:

Toodles!

Galveston Island

It was incredible to see the amount of destruction that remained, but it was also incredible to see how many businesses and homes had been repaired already and back to pretty much normal.

McDonalds was completely knocked down:

See the giant hole in the beachside hotel?

Sweet cheeks...

Cousins having fun dumping water in a hole:




Trying out a photoshop action called "Heartland":

Attack of the birds!
In the background you see the seawall that is approx. 12 ft. tall, the storm surge of the hurricane was well above that!

Having fun with Aunt Carrie:



Uncle Jason and Syd:

The girls found some dollies left on the beach:

and here they are drowning them (actually they said they were washing their hair!):


The kids were totally enamored by a baby sitting near us:



Jamie loved to swim in the ocean as the waves were really small and gentle. Both Chad and I walked him out aways into the water.

Unfortunately, there were a lot of jellyfish that day and Jamie ended up getting stung, the lifeguard gave us some vinegar and he felt better in no time at all.