Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Christmas was a wonderful day! Addie definitely grasped the concept of family, presents and fun! We read The Christmas Story on Christmas Eve and hopefully by next year Addie will really grasp the true meaning of Christmas....well....I'll give her a couple more years. Of course the presents and gifts and food are easy to grasp....because they are right there in front of you! And they are all sooo much fun!

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Addie "reads" us books all the time now. I could sit and listen to her read to me all day long! Her little voice is just adorable.
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. Addie and Granddad are playing with a music box. Addie loved the little bear that went around and around on the ice skating rink!
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I think Addie could have played with this all day long!
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I Love this picture. I think Granddad is explaining to Addie that the stroller is for her baby doll....not for Addie! She doesn't seem very receptive at the moment....

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. There we go....Now Addie gets it! She pushed the stroller all around the house! She still sat in the stroller a good bit during the day though! She was not completely ready to let her baby doll have full reign of the stroller just yet....

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Addie helped everyone open their presents too! Luckily Uncle Rod did not mind!

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Addie and Cousin John playing with one of her new toys!
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.Although Addie was having a lot of fun....she is very serious when she is concentrating! Mom said that I was the same way when I was a child....always very serious. I was just taking everything in and I assume that is what Addie is doing also.

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Addie is a wonderful dancer! She is starting to hum along with you when you sing to her too! So cute! Addie got a video cam for Christmas. You plug it into the TV and she can see herself dancing. She kept pointing to the screen and saying "Addie". I don't know if she really grasped how it all happened but she liked to see herself on the big screen! Don't we all!

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Addie is Wii bowling in this picture!.

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After we got home on Sunday and took all the new toys up to Addie's room....this is what she played with the rest of the night......a shopping bag! There was a tear in the top of the bag and she thought it was the funniest thing that she could walk around with the bag on her head and still see out through the tear.

How old is Addie now? Watch and see!

Addie knows how old she is! How cool is that! This was too cute not to add to our Blog! It might take a while to load but it is cute if you can get it to work. Enjoy!

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She can even tell us how many fingers old she is while drinking from her sippy cup....she is so talented! Multi-tasker!

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And the Temper Tantrums begin......

Although the temper tantrums only last about 5 seconds....they are starting to happen. You know the hardest thing about it though......is for me to not laugh when Addie has a tantrum! They are so ridiculously funny that it is so hard not to laugh. They can spark over something as simple as she wanted a fork and was given a spoon! Oh well....It is all part of growing up. Distraction is my favorite word! It seems that when a tantrum begins....all you have to do is just show Addie a new book....or point to something new....or ask her a question "Addie what color is this?" and the tantrums completely stop and she is ready to move on. I really wonder what goes through that precious mind of hers sometimes. OK...so maybe the most loving thing for me to do was not to get out the camera and capture these outbursts on film....but I just couldn't help myself.

In this picture Tallulah is staring at Addie wondering what all the fuss is about....you can see Tallulah's black snout right next to Addie's face! Obviously Tallulah was not fazed by the upset!

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Look at the bottom lip...could it be poked out any further!

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Addie is very profoundly saying "NO" in this picture!

Decorating for Christmas!

Addie was a BIG helper this year in decorating the house for Christmas. She helped me decorate......and then un-decorate the Christmas trees!!

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We have a Tigger Christmas Tree Skirt that she just loves. She wasn't quite sure what to do with it though :)

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We have a little tree that is just Addie's size. She loves to rearrange the few ornaments that are left on the tree. She did not understand why she could not put the Christmas tree skirt around the little tree though!
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Addie hiding behind the Christmas Tree! She was very curious why we had a tree in the house.
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All of the lights that she put on were in the same spot! I had to do a little rearranging! We decided we would do a "lights only" tree this year! We will bring the ornaments out next year!
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She dragged the garland from the box......all the way across the floor....to the stairs! What a big helper!
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Turkey Hands and Feet Project!

Addie and I had fun making her hands and feet turkey! I guess I should say hands and foot turkey since there is only one foot there! The body of the turkey is one of her feet and the feathers are her hand prints. Addie did it all herself.....well....she might have had a little help!

Addie is excited to get started and paint!

Addie doing a little finger painting in between hand prints!

Very carefully painting her hands! We only used about a pint of paint! Oh well....that is what it is for right??!!

Red and Orange!

Orange and Yellow!

An Early Visit to see Santa!

Addie is really starting to recognize Santa! We made an early visit to see Santa this past week and she was intrigued.....not necessarily "smiley" but very interested in this man with a white beard! Santa was very sweet. While we were picking out which pictures we should purchase I heard Santa talking to Addie about all of the reindeer. I even heard Santa comment on how pretty Addie's shoes were that she was wearing! It was so cute!

At this point Addie was ready to go eat so she was not really cooperating with pictures!

Learning Time

I recently read somewhere that by the age of 17 months your child should be able to sort things by color, shape, and type. WHAT! SERIOUSLY??!! So of course I was very aware of the fact that Addie did NOT know her shapes and colors and freaked out! So..I decided to make a project for Addie to become more knowledgeable in this area! I went to Micheal's and purchased plain wooden circles, rectangles and squares. I had to make the triangles because I couldn't find any. Then I purchased some paint and we painted the primary colors of red, blue and yellow. I found an old St. Joseph's shirt that I used to wear during P.E. when I was in middle school. It makes a perfect smock for Addie!

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Of course we painted the newspaper too!

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Last night Addie said "yellow" and "red" so she is gettin' it!

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.Then we did hand prints and wrote the color above the hands. She loves to look at her hand prints! It is so funny. She waves to the piece of paper where her hands are stamped!

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Vesicoureteral Reflux

Well the first half of last Wednesday was not a fun day for me, Addie or David. Addie was diagnosed with Vesicoureteral Reflux when she was 6 months old.....aka...kidney reflux. When she was 6 months old she had to go to Children's Hospital to have a test called, Voiding Cystourethrogram (VCUG), to confirm it was kidney reflux. She has been on a daily antibiotic since she was 6 months to keep her from getting UTIs. Well a year later it was time to go back for the re-test to see if Addie still has kidney reflux. The test involves X-rays and Addie had to be catheterized. A radioactive liquid that can be seen on x rays is placed in the bladder through a catheter. Pictures are taken when the bladder is filled and when Addie goes to the bathroom. The test shows if the urine leaves the body normally or flows back up into the kidneys. Needless to say Addie was extremely confused and crying and upset. It was emotional, not because of the diagnosis, but because any parent hates to see their child upset. Of course Addie did not understand what was happening to her or why she needed to be held down or why she needed to be catheterized. Apparently kidney reflux is very common. After speaking with a few other moms they informed me that their daughters had to go through the same tests as well. The wonderful, fantastic, great, thrilling news is that she no longer has kidney reflux! Yeah! We will not have to go back to have this test done again...hopefully never! I am smiling in this picture because all of her tests are done. As you can see from Addie's expression she does not believe me that the tests are over. Poor thing.

After we left the hospital Addie felt fine so I wanted to go do something fun so we went to the Children's Museum. It was PERFECT! http://www.imagineit-cma.org/ Since we went in the middle of the week there was no one there and Addie had free rein of the place! I honestly think she forgot about the hospital visit when she came here! This place is wonderful!

There was the natural tunnel! It was as you were crawling through an underground tunnel. There were little caves with snakes and underground creatures you could see! Addie loved this. It had a slide at one end! We had to pull her away from this to go to the other activities!

This was moon sand! This stuff is wonderful. It does not stick to your hands! It never dries out and it molds like clay!

Then there was the pond area! They give you a rain coat to wear so your clothes don't get all wet. They have fishing poles and frogs and all sorts of pond creatures!

Future Mozart! Didn't Mozart write his first piece at the age of 5! Addie will give him a run for his money for sure!

The Bulldozer of course!