First Baseball Game

Right now, both baseball and basketball are "baball"- so she kept saying "baball!"  She sat and watched the first 15 minutes or so, then ran around and played the rest of the time with a few checks every now and then on how the game was going.

Pamela Anderson must have heard Abby Jane was coming and decided to show up for the event.  It's funny how even normal events can have a funny "only in LA" twist!  

Doesn't every child have a picture like this?

Choosing to forgo morning nap + a morning swim= an unfinished lunch!

As you either know or have gathered, Abby Jane is not your average relaxed baby who falls asleep cute places for a photo op.  She went on to basically sleep through getting cleaned up from lunch, having a dirty diaper changed, and getting placed in her crib.  Praise the Lord she's obviously not ready to lose that morning nap!

Rocking Chair a.k.a Bottom

Tonight, Abby Jane was trying to stand on her truck, something she is yet to execute, but already knows it's a bad idea because she says "NOOOO!" while she tries.  Jake pointed out that it was good practice for surfing, but we told her to sit on her bottom anyways.  She kept standing up and trying to step up on the truck, so I asked, "Abby Jane, where is your bottom?"

She pointed to her rocking chair.

Of course.  Abby Jane is frequently standing in her rocking chair as well, and we always say, "Abby Jane, sit on your bottom!"  And she does.  Because evidently her rocking chair has an alias.  "Bottom."  Such simple reasoning, really.

On her own...

So I was talking to a friend last week who said her 9 month old was feeding herself.  I started feeling guilty that I've only let Abby Jane try once or twice...

So on Sunday we started letting her help, and she's gotten somewhat effective in feeding herself!  The only problem is she thinks it's fun to get applesauce on her upper lip and sniff it in. 

The library had a sing-a-long and petting zoo today- Abby Jane had a great time!

13 months

I'm a week late on this one, but here is my girl at 13 months...

We are having so much fun with her these days... she is always cracking us up with her continual monologue and undecipherable running commentary.  However, her vocabulary is expanding very quickly!

These days, Abby Jane:

-eats about a pound of grapes a day, it seems

-has added to her animal and noises repertoire that you put your arm in the air for the elephant trunk and smacks her lips for fish kisses, that fire trucks go "woo woo" 

-walks backwards and thinks it's so funny

-likes to sit on anything that looks like it's just the right height for her- a box, a curb, a step, the endcap of an aisle at the store- this is particularly enjoyable if there is a nice sippy cup to enjoy while sitting

-now the first thing she says every time we go into her room to get her is "uh-oh" because she's thrown all her animals and blankets onto the floor

-new words are "phone," a much better "shoe," balloon is now "boon," "Pooh," "moon,"  "beep beep" (for the microwave) "whoa!!" "Millie Moo" (one of her books), "bug," has gotten good at mimicking the sounds in names ("Katie" or "Beth") and can say "yes" and "no" with relative accuracy in the answers

-she understands SOOO much that we say and can bring what we request or point out what we ask most of the time

-her favorite toys are pretty much the same, but I've not mentioned that she has a "Numbers" book with lots of flaps and sliding and pop-out objects that is her one of her favorite books- to the extent that we hide it after we get too burned out... and she invariable still finds it and loves it!

-she plays all kinds of games with herself (put all the fridge farm magnets in back of truck, take them out and put on fridge, repeat)

-loves to smell flowers

This is from our first unsuccessful whale-watching outing (we are now 2-3 over the past 3 years), but it was still fun to play at the beach.  When the waves crashed so close, Abby Jane said "WHOA!" over and over!

Tough cookie

Bless her soul, she fell yesterday and busted her lip on the sidewalk!  It was so sad to see her little lip bleed.  This picture is kind of odd, but you can see the swollen part on her top right lip! 

She only cried for a minute or two, then was quite happy to stick a cold teething ring in her mouth (thus the red cheeks).  After that, she just ran around looking like she caught the wrong end of a left hook!

Wednesday Playgroup

Abby Jane and I have a bit of a cold, so we had to miss the "neighborhood" playgroup today.  But here are most of the usual suspects, though it is rare that we are all there!  I am missing Citlali and Madison, but here is everyone else...

Cailyn- 2

Jacob-2 (this was taken one day when he was playing at our house while Tiffany had some one-on-one time with new little Luke!)

Keira-3 (Abby Jane cheesing it up in the background- she loves the sidewalk chalk Keira got for her birthday from Jacob!)
Jaana- 8 months (Cailyn's little sister)
Sydney- 17 months (her mama has one on the way!)
Jack- 8 months
Only three of the total of nine of these little ones were in our original playgroup of eight (remember Snakes in a Playgroup?) when Abby Jane was born... everyone else finished law or business school or got new jobs.  It's neat to see the group transition in and out and multiply with new little ones!

Lodi

Last weekend, we drove the 7 hour (it would be more like 5ish without a little person) drive up to Lodi, CA, to see some precious family on my dad's side of the family who I have not seen in 10 years for some, and much longer for others.  Here is one great treat Abby Jane got on the way up and down in between naps, snacks, and running breaks... getting to watch DVD's!  She loved it since it's not something we do at home.

This is my Aunt Jeanne (my dad's aunt) and my mom, who met us up there.  Aunt Jeanne is the consummate grandmother, and it was medicine to the soul to stay in her home and spend the weekend with her! She is a precious, precious woman.
Aunt Jeanne hosted all the in-town family and the cousins who were flown in for a big dinner on Friday night- there was something like 30 people there, and it was SOO fun to see everyone and reconnect!  For the family who are reading this, the entire Lewis family was there- all of Dad's cousins, and all of their children and grandchildren.  The Fine family was also there, minus Melanie (who's in VA with her baby girl and husband).  Vanessa and Bryan drove up from Paso Robles (the town where we went wine tasting our first Jan. in CA), Dianna flew up from Long Beach, and Julie flew down from Seattle.

Here are the kiddos present for the big shindig, who were hanging in quite decently given that it was 8:15 when this photo was taken (hence the PJ's on Abby Jane and the Grant on the other end)... from L to R: Grant (13 months), Tyler (18 months), Emily (3), Madeline (5), Alexandra (3), and Abby Jane.

On Saturday morning, we joined my cousin Mark, his wife Michelle, and their little ones Tyler and Emily at the park to play and have a picnic on a beautiful day.

Saturday afternoon, Mark took a bunch of us cousins wine-tasting- Lodi is all wine country, a fact I somehow missed in all the childhood trips to California... though I'm not sure how, since there are vineyards everywhere you look!  My mom joined us for her first time to wine-taste.

Aunt Jeanne watched Abby Jane while we went out, and this is what we came home to.  How snuggled in does that kid look?  After I picked her up, she leaned back down for Aunt Jeanne!

We had dinner with the Fine family on Saturday, cousins of mine who we spent every Thanksgiving at either their former home in Cincinatti or them coming down to Atlanta from as early as I can remember through my high school years.  Here I am with three of the four Fine girls- there's only a 6 year age range between the five of us, so we got into all kinds of trouble and fun growing up!

We came away from our time up there SO glad that we went and thoroughly convinced that if we lived in the same town as all these sweet cousins, we would really love spending time together.  It was neat to see the grown-up versions of the kids you ran around with as a child and really enjoy being with them in this adult stage of our lives!

We didn't know...

Buying big girl shoes was going to be such a traumatic event!  She made her opinion on new shoes extremely clear at the store, then we got home and set her down, and this is what happened...

Tuesday has dawned a new day in the world of big girl shoes.  After some severe disagreement between mom and daughter as to whether or not she should put them on this morning before going to the library, Abby Jane has acclimated quite nicely.  She does stop every now and then and point down and say "shoe-shoes" as if to say, "I'm aware that these are new."  But at least she's walking much more normally today, though we're not back to our former half-running pace!

Afternoon walk today with "library mom" friends, Jenny and Sabrina (we missed you, Trisha!)

It felt like spring this weekend...

Saturday...

Sunday...

Pointing out a dandelion...
A Juice Plus box is the favorite toy of the day!