13 months -- December 26th

Miss Adalynn is now 13 months old. She has achieved several milestones this month.

• Being a late walker, she is finally now a walker. She walks most places now. This happened while we were at home for Christmas. Addie is very independent but also knows she will get what she wants. She wasn't to motivated to walk.
• She is cautious in most situations but warms up quickly.
  
• She is eating whatever she wants. Now that she can feed herself she isn't too excited about things on a spoon.
• She is starting to grow some hair. It is thickening and some of it is long. Some days it is blonde and sometimes it looks dark? It is straight for now no indication of curl.
• She loves babies and kisses them.
• She can crawl into her chair and sit down.
  
• She is working on coloring but mainly just takes all the crayons and puts them into her mouth.

Words I can say or try to say

• Mama
• Dada
• Bella
• Bawks like a chicken ( we have this down )
• Quack
• Duck
• Book
• Ball
• Dog
• Ga "Grammy"
• "gone-gone"
• Mamba "Maebrie"
• Bye
• something that sounds like "juice"
  
• there are these two syllable words that she attempts but they all sound the same Justin, Thank-you and Santa
• this is what we can understand-- she talks all the time and is starting to utter these long sentences with a lot of /d/ sounds in them
  

She is understanding so much. She knows where her belly is, and her head and sometimes nose. She prefers to identify our parts instead of her own. She knows what her socks are. I am surprised everyday by what she knows. Today Jeremy came in the house and said "where is your mama?" and she pointed to me and said "Ma-ma"

We are kinda sleeping through the night. However, we have been congested and are cutting two molars and then we traveled so we haven't been doing to fabulously lately.

We are up to 6 teeth. She is wearing 12 and some 18 month clothes. Starting to wear some size 4 shoes. She weighs around 22 lbs. Eyes are definitely brown. She has my waxy ears and when she is thinking really hard she locks her jaw just like Jeremy. We still catch her crossing her ankles like her daddy and great grandmother and occassionally we catch her moving her tongue around which my mom claims that I do also. She is the best helper ever. Any project that we doing she is more than willing to help from wrapping presents to loading the dishwasher. Her favorite toys are still her books! I hope that continues throughout her life. She seems to be a very smart little girl.

Christmas Morning

We got home around 10ish on Christmas Eve and is was like 21 degrees and super cold. Addie woke up coming into the house and was ready to play with my mom and brother. We stayed up for a while and she went to sleep around 11. Then Santa had to locate and assemble the kitchen. We had wrapped all the presents. Somehow we forgot to make Santa's cookies.

Christmas morning she awoke around 8, so we all sprang forth for our first Christmas at home. First we did Santa presents which was pretty much the only thing under the tree. Santa brought the kitchen, Bee Bop Band, a Cabbage Patch kid, puzzles, books, a push toy, computer, vacuum cleaner, lawnmower, Clippo table, Happy Feet, and a bag full of clothes. That's all I can remember. Then we did our exchange with Grammy and Randy.

Uncle Randy bought Addie a shopping cart with food. Grammy bought Addie a Princess cd player/jewelry box, bath toys, a fuzzy purse and a bunch of clothes and some more books.

We had a wonderful Christmas and are learning to play and operate all of our new toys. We have cleaned out Addie's closet and put some toys in there.

For her birthday we invested the money she got into Savings Bonds. However, with her Christmas money we invested in a toy box chest. If we forgot anyone we are sorry. We appreciate each and every one of you and hope that you had a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Lunch with Ma and Pa and Dinner at the Burris' house

We had celebrated Christmas with Jeremy's parents on Christmas Eve. Somehow I got pinned into the family room before I could get my camera. I will have to get the picture from Jeremy's dad because he took a lot. I think that most of you know and have heard of Jeremy's parents love for Christmas. If not imagine a living room with Don, Becky, Justin, Jeremy, Addie and myself and each of us surrounded on all sides by presents and not being able to walk! Addie got a lot of presents but the highlights were a rocking horse and Power Wheels Fire Truck. Her favorite is probably the Little People Farm with animals.

That evening we celebrated Christmas with a dinner at Jeremy's Aunt Patsy's house in Spiro, Oklahoma. We were able to see all of Jeremy's extended family. Then we were able to leave from there to head home to Centerton to meet Santa. The highlight of the trip was when we were a mile from Patsy's house in road work and the car headed for us didn't follow the cones and almost hit us head on. Luckily we saw it coming and pulled off the road and stopped our car. It could have been really bad! Stupid Oklahoma Drivers!!!

Breakfast with Grandmother the 24th

We had breakfast with Jeremy's Grandmother and Jeremy's cousins and their children. Grandmother has a breakfast on Christmas and then one on Christmas Eve as well for those of us who have Santa on Christmas morning. This is Darcy, Britlyn, Adalynn, Alyssa, and Breck with Grandmother. They belong to Todd and Robert. They both are tall have dark hair and Todd has glasses so Addie was really confused by more people who look like Daddy. Grandmother got Addie a baby doll, a holiday bear and some books and trinkets. Thanks Grandmother!!!

Memaw and Papaw Holt Christmas 23rd

This is Addie with Ma, Memaw and Papaw. Family tree again just to help everyone out. This is Jeremy's mom and her mom and dad. They live in Greenwood. Ma's brother Jim went to California this year for Christmas so it was just us. Memaw and Papaw were going to Memphis to help take care of Jim's animals so they hosted our Christmas early. This helped us out so that we could have our Christmas at home as well.



This is Addie sitting in a highchair. Whose highchair you may ask? Well Memaw told Papaw to get up in the attic and get down Becky's highchair. And well there it was. 52 years old, I believe. It was metal and pink and Addie enjoyed the noises that it made. It was very cute and Memaw and Papaw got a kick out of it.






This is Addie sitting in Memaw's rocking chair from when she was a little girl! Apparently Memaw keeps everything!

We enjoyed a wonderful meal and Addie enjoyed all of Memaw's music boxes and piano playing. They bought Addie a baby doll that she really loved and gave lots of kisses!

Visiting Granny Morrison- Tuesday the 23rd

Mom, Randy, Jeremy, Addie and I went to visit Granny on Tuesday. Granny is my dad's mom for those of you who may not know. She is 94? somewhere around there. She bought Addie some pull toys (a puppy and a phone) Addie was super excited. She also got a puzzle from Aunt Linda and some matching card puzzle things from Cousin Tammy. Aunt Pam mailed her some money and Cousin Brittany sent her a learning dog with Grammy.

We got to see Granny and Uncle Ronnie but that was all. The Morrison Family Christmas was on Christmas Day and we had planned to have Christmas at our house with Addie. We missed you guys but we loved the presents! Thank you so much for thinking of us!

Henson Christmas!

This is Addie sitting in my mom's lap waiting to greet the first person to arrive for the Henson family Christmas. Henson was my mom's maiden name and I think most of you know that she has four sisters. I am super close to all of them and my cousins. My mom hosted everyone at her house for our gift exchange-- we draw names. Addie and Jonah drew each other I think that was set up but anyways.



Jeremy and Addie opening her present from Jonah. It was a baby called Dress up Daisy. She has clothes that snap on. She is super cute and is in Addie's shopping cart.












Cousin Jordan helping Jonah open his train from Addie. It had balls which Addie wanted. She was a little aggressive with Jonah and I hope that Jordan and Susan haven't banned Jonah from playing with us.

We enjoyed getting to see all the cousins, aunts and uncles. We had a few new dating and fiancee faces and we enjoyed them as well. We missed Aunt JoAnne, Uncle David and Cousin Nolan. They live in Memphis!

Taking Off my Socks!

I wanted a picture of Addie with our tree and all of the presents before we packed them up and took them home. However, she thinks that taking off her socks is so funny. She laughs and says, No-no-no, while pulling them off.

Teacher Party December 18th

My principal, Mrs. Sharp asked if I would have everyone over for a Christmas Party. So I say sure why not? ( I don't know why that underlined)
We had dinner prepared by Mrs. Ana. She is from Mexico and made this wonderful soup, pork skewers and salsa. Donna and Zane, two of my best school buddies, decided that they would stay for some Rock Band.
Well this is Donna's Rock Band playing experience. She is holding Addie who fell asleep on her.

This is Colton, Zane's son, he enjoyed playing the guitar while Zane sang along with Jeremy on the guitar.

Friend Christmas Party December 13th.

Every year we invite our friends over for a Christmas dinner and white elephant gift exchange. Jamie and I decided that this would be a good time for the girls to exchange gifts. Addie and Maebrie exchanged School Buses made by Parents. It is a super cute toy!








Maebrie drinking Addie's juice. I think that this is a super cute picture of her!!!













Addie after she drank Maebrie's juice. I love this bow and somehow it got lost in the shuffle of Christmas. I think at Ma and Pa Yates' house. I had it in my hand and then Jeremy started throwing things in the car and I never found it again. So Ma if you see this bow save it for us!

Visiting Santa

Jamie and I had planned to take the girls to visit Santa at some point this weekend. So off we go to the Northwest Arkansas Mall in Fayetteville. As we were standing in line, I said, "hey whose baby is going to cry?" Jamie replies, "YOURS!"

So as we are awaiting our turn, apparently the camera broke. Santa walks through the line and both girls seem okay with him. Then they allow some people to cut in line I guess they had brought their own camera. We didn't know that that was an option. But I guess you don't have to buy pictures, you can take your own. I happened to have my camera in the diaper bag so up we go.

Jamie and I decided we would take a picture of just Addie, then throw in Maebrie and take a picture of both girls and then take Addie out and take a picture of just Maebrie. You can see below how that went for us.

OHH how you have changed us

My Sweet Girl,

I love you so much and am so proud of the baby girl that you are turning into. You are truly the most amazing and funniest person that I know. I can't believe that I lived 28 years of my life without you. Everyday you amaze me with your learning and your unconditional love for me.

I am most astonished by the way you have changed my life and your Daddy's life. I have never seen his eyes sparkle so much with love. He has done many things that he said he would never do all because his heart is full of love for you. I am thankful that God gave us you. I am proud of the mommy that I have became because of you. There is not a second that goes by that I am not thinking of you during the day.

I find it so rewarding to see you as a wonderful mix between me and your Daddy both in looks and personality. I look forward to the next year and all the wonderful years to come.

I Love You,
Mommy

More Birthday

This is Addie's pink chair that we bought her for her birthday. She was diving out of it in this picture. She is playing with her new baby from Auntie Vicki that we have named ChaCha
This is Addie eating her birthday cake. She really enjoyed it and we had to take it away from her.

Birthday Party

This is Addie's birthday cake! My friend Alix's sister, Autumn, made the cake. She is so awesome and available if you would need a cake. It was perfect and tasted good too. I received a lot of compliments on how good it tasted! We ate it all during Thanksgiving!

Here is Mommy, Addie and Daddy before the party started. We had such a great time and had a lot of people come and show their love for our little angel.

My First Birthday Present

Addie with her Uncle Will and Aunt Tracie. (Sorry guys this isn't the best picture of you two!)
Addie opening her present from Will and Tracie. They were unable to come to the party so they brought her present over the night before. She was super excited about the tissue paper. They bought her books and wooden blocks. She loved the books and we are working on learning to play with the blocks. Mainly, she throws them and gets them all out!

Updates and Apologizing

We would like to start this blog by apologizing for not posting in a while. We are usually better than this however, everyone in our family has had the stomach flu. Instead of all at once, we have each had it a different week and it has lasted 5 days. BEWARE--severe diarrhea followed with an occasional throw up and then an achy body and head ache.

So we are going to do a power post and tell you a bunch.

This is Addie pushing her push toy around the living room. She is able to push it easily and she can walk all around the table and couches but she has no concept at all that she can walk. I have to admit that this is one milestone I haven't really worked with her on. I enjoy her being a baby! I figure she'll learn to walk when she's ready. However, everyone is giving me a hard time about her not walking by her first birthday so I guess we will start practicing harder.

After shopping on Saturday, Addie was very tired and hungry. I was pretty sure that if we got her out of the carseat (she was asleep) and fed her she would continue to sleep in her bed. We fed her and laid her down. Then we proceeded to unload the car. We heard lots of squeals and playing. When we opened the door this is what we saw. Addie had turned on her mobile, was pointing at us and saying "Uhhh," there was also a very distinct smell of POOP!

Mommy and Addie love after work!

Daddy and Addie hanging Christmas Lights.

Playing in a basket. Addie, Jeremy and I
hung a floating shelf on Addie's wall and she enjoyed helping.


Eating Chocolate Chip Cookies.
Jeremy fed Addie a chocolate chip cookie the other night and she loved it.
But then she was wound up and didn't want to sleep.

When you're sick laundry doesn't get done. This is Addie scoping out her highchair which she enjoys pulling up on and playing with the straps. She has some goofy looking pajamas because we are behind laundry.

Oh my goodness!

I know that all mother's say it but I have the smartest kid ever. This was one of those weekends where I was like "WOW you are amazing"

Addie has learned to play patty cake, blow kisses and say "gone-gone". These have been works in progress but it just all came together today. She can also identify an Elmo from anywhere in a store. This is what she did today that was truly amazing.

1. We woke up. I had on a Lion King shirt. She kept touching the Lion. I said "Addie the lion goes grrrr" She growls back AMAZING then I say good job and she claps for herself AMAZING

2. She eats and when she is done she says "Gone-gone" AMAZING

3. We are at Target scoping out the new ELMO which she will be getting in a few weeks for her birthday. His display mode blows kisses. With no prompting at all, she starts blowing him kisses back AMAZING

4. She also points now, we are in Sam's Club checking out and there is a single Elmo doll out of place sitting by their manager's stand, she points at him and makes her "uhh" noise. AMAZING She is starting to generalize her knowledge of Elmo across settings! (This is for my school friends)

I can't believe how much and how fast she is changing! We have to be super excited about all our speech and language milestones. First of all because that's what Mommy does and second of all because she's not really into walking so much.

Fun Weekend!

My Uncle Brandon gave me this fun Sonic cup full of ice and limes to play with.
Me and my Uncle Randy playing on the couch. He is a working college kid so we don't see a whole lot of him. We were so excited that he came to visit and can't wait to see him more over the holidays.
This is my Uncle Brandon. He came to see us on Friday, Saturday and Sunday! What a treat!

I don't want to go to school!!!

This is Friday morning. Addie has on her jacket, and hat and she is fussing! I believe she is saying Please stay home with me Mommy!!! She was trying to rip her hat off her head.

I can eat M&M's

We let Addie eat some M&M mini's that she got for Halloween. This is her messy face after eating them. She loved them! Remember Santa, we want M&M's in our stocking!

Addie shoveling M&M's in her mouth out of my hand!

The Village People

For Halloween this year, Jeremy and the gang decided to dress as the Village People for Matt's Birthday/Halloween Party. If you are offended I am sorry but this is the funniest picture ever! If you know any of these guys you can appreciate the humor.
Construction- Brandon Cassidey
Sailor- Will Downey
Cop- Jeremy
Cowboy-Eric Bailey
Indian- Justin Yates

Trick or Treat

For Addie's first Halloween, she was a "Queen Bee." She had 2 other costumes in the works but this is the one that we chose. We visited Alix, Matt, Jamie, Maebrie and animals, Will and Tracie and Eric and Tasha (kinda, she fell asleep)

This is Maebrie, Roma and Addie all dressed as bees.

This is Addie holding onto the tree in front of our house. We think it might be nice to take her picture every year in front of the tree so we can see it all grow!

She was really excited to be outside and be in the grass!

Because it's my blog I can say this!

To all my family and friends,

Most of you know that I will be voting a Democratic ticket in the next week. This is how I believe not about how you believe. You can scream at me all you want, it will not change my opinion just like I will not change yours.

I say this because I continue to get all of these awful emails from you. I want to remind everyone that this is what our country is about having different opinions and voting. I am not enraged at all by your opinions but have found most of you are full of anger and hate for opposing opinions. I feel privileged to know and be loved by passionate people but do not let this election affect your physical health. Honestly, I feel some of you are going to stroke out if McCain doesn' win.

Love you all
and Happy Voting!

11 months old today!

Today was Addie's 11 month birthday! We have ordered birthday invitations and decorations. I spoke with Autumn about the cake. I can't believe that my little angel is going to be 11 months old! To think that last year she wasn't even here? I can't imagine a day without her. This is a picture of her in her highchair making her funny face. She makes it most often while eating! I realized that when I laugh and smile at her I squint my eyes so she has started closing her and laughing at us! She had mom, Jeremy and I in tears last Friday night while we were out eating!

This is what she is doing now:

• says, "mama" "dada" "Bella" "Anna" "no-no"
  
• she makes an "uck" sound which is look, book duck and sometimes quack. She has intial phoneme deletion (for my speech friends)
• imitates most sounds, like growling
  
• picks up her train and says, "bubububu"
• eats everything that I can make bite size, she has no concepts of biting things of yet
• drinks whole milk, and juice
• pulls up
  
• stands up anywhere that there is about a 3 inch elevation to push up
• plays on her knees
  
• squats
• screams hysterically when she is told "no"
• has a great concept of print and turns her books around when handed to her upside down
• covers her own head to play peek-a-boo
• claps with her cast kinda sad
  
• loves to crawl away fast when she thinks you are chasing her
• four teeth, two on top and two on bottom
• she has some hair?? maybe it is getting thicker but not longer?
  

This weekend we weren't really able to celebrate her 11 month birthday because she was super sick. She had a fever around 100 Friday and Saturday even with Tylenol. There was a lot of snot, tears, and drool. It seems as though she is trying to get more teeth. However, she is very congested and has a virus. There was also some yacking! Jeremy and I did pretty well with the yacking. I am hoping we are on the downhill slide of the sickness. Fever is gone!

New Creations by Mommy

I made this onesies with Kloee's name on it just like the Mouseketeers (sp?) used to wear, a red tutu with sequences and a Mouse Head band. She is going to be Minnie Mouse for Halloween.

I also made this Hog canvas for an auction for a great friend of mine. The hog is silver which is why it kinda looks funny!

Happy Birthday Uncle Nub!!!

Last Sunday afternoon, we went to Fort Smith for lunch to celebrate Uncle Nub's birthday! We ate at the Varsity Sports Grill. I had a cheese quesadilla! Yum yum!

We also visited the Toys' R Us and I got some things for my birthday and Christmas.

Playing in the Grass!!

Last weekend, it was nice enough to play outside. Here is Dad and I outside in the front yard (no dog poop) !!

Ummm I may have broken my arm!!!

For those of you who don't know, Addie has injured her arm. I picked her up from Anna's house on Friday afternoon and she had been awake about 45 minutes. Anna told me that she hadn't been using her arm since she woke up. She was giving to it when crawling. So I called the pediatrician and they said to take her to the ER. A long story short, no fracture according to the X-Rays but her alignment was off. They tried rotating it back into place but ended up splinting it after she refused to use it.
Today we went to the orthopedic doctor. Together we decided to cast her to be cautious. We had X-rays again. Alignment good and no fractures. However, he said her bones are not developed enough to see a fracture really. I told him I was concerned about the posturing of her thumb while resting and the fact that she isn't weight baring while crawling. He said casting it isn't going to hurt anything. So I said agreed. In my heart, I knew that it wasn't healed and I didn't want her to re-injure it. It is very embarrassing taking an infant to the ER and not know what they did! So we had a cast put on. We had a very positive experience even though the whole process was very long. Addie did an excellent job. So now she has a bright pink cast on for everyone to see!

Second: Maebrie's First Birthday!!!

After we spent about an hour at Allea's birthday party, we had our second party of the day. It was Maebrie's First Birthday!!! After Maebrie tore up her cake, I wanted a picture of the 4 of us. Addie reached in for a bite of cake and Maebrie wiped cake all over Addie's face!

First: Allea's Birthday Party

This weekend Addie celebrated her first friend birthday party. Allea turned 3! Allea goes to Anna's house with Addie and is a good friend of mine Annessa's daughter. Annessa went to UCA with me and is an occupational therapist, whom I have also worked with. In the above picture is Allea, Cameron (Anna's daughter and Allea's cousin) and Teagan (Andrea's daughter and Allea's cousin) with Addie.
This is Addie with Teagan. Teagan was born the weekend that Addie started at Anna's and it 6 weeks younger than Addie. Annessa and Teagan's mom, Andrea are sisters. I know that this is confusing but I talk about these people all the time so I thought you guys might want to see them.