Abigail’s 1st Birthday

We celebrated the weekend before May 1st. It was an insanely busy weekend with Claire’s dance rehearsals and recital, but it was the PERFECT weekend weather wise, and such a sweet time with family and close friends. 

Her theme was “April showers bring May flowers”. The table, her high chair and the cupcakes were decorated with grass and flowers with raindrop streamers having behind the table in the window. We just did a few finger foods, drinks and cupcakes for her 4:00 party. 

I ended up having to wake her up from her afternoon nap around 3:30. She got dressed and played with claire and Kent while waiting for friends to get to the house. Once everyone was here we sang “happy birthday”. She could not WAIT to get her hands on that cupcake. She was reaching so hard trying to get it, and once she did, she devoured it! We opened presents shortly after. She got such wonderful and thoughtful gifts! A xylophone, ball pit, outdoor kitchen, ice cream cart, placemat with plates and snacks, book, pool supplies, shoes and clothes, a water table, ball toy and a lunchbox. After she opened gifts, we all went outside to play and it was the best evening! 

Her actual birthday wasn’t super exciting, but I hope she still felt loved and cherished. Claire sang happy birthday to her during breakfast and at supper. Mrs. Cristy came to watch the girls while I had bible study, and then we spent the day together just playing at the house. It was a cloudy and kind of drizzly day, so we stayed in. She roamed from room to room just jabbering and looking for things to get into. She let me know when she wanted to be held, and wrestled and cuddled with me in her room. She fell asleep while I was nursing her at bedtime and I just sat and rocked her for a while and reflected on this year and what a blessing she has been. 

Abigail Jean, you are my sweet sunshine girl. Everything about you is pleasant and cheerful. You love to observe, but recently you’ve decided that you want to get in on the action. You love to be chased and wrestled, and when we do those things you kind of collapse to the floor and roll to your tummy waiting to be tickled (much like Brody does). You think it’s funny when we tell you “no no”. Probably because you haven’t heard it very much, but it’s definitely becoming more used in our every day vocabulary - you like to sneak around and touch or pull on things that you don’t need to (trash, toilet paper, open potties, cords and plug ins...) You LOVE Claire. Love her. And she loves you. You’re starting to play with each other and really enjoy it. I know as you grow you will have more and more fun with her. You love to be put down to crawl around and explore. Your first reaction when someone tries to take you from me is to burry into my neck and I love it, but your getting better about staying with other people. You still love that paci and and know how to look for it if I ask where it is. If you have your paci and blankie together, you instantly lay down. You will lay still and snuggle with me sometimes and it’s so precious. You randomly kiss me over and over and it’s my favorite. I’m so very proud of you. I’m proud that you’re brave and excited to explore and try new things. I’m proud of your sweet disposition and the twinkle in your eye when you see something you like. I’m proud of how strong and smart you are. I’m proud of how well you sleep and eat. I’m proud to be your mama, and I’m extremely grateful for this first year with you! 

Abigail Month 12

Abigail Month 12

• still only says “mama” when she wants something.
• Loves to pull books off the bookshelf 
• Her hair started laying down 
• She likes to get into downward dog position 
• Babbles, laughs, crawls, claps and dances all the time. 
• She LOVES her blankie. It might be her favorite thing, and her blankie.
• Her favorite game is still handing things back and forth and saying “thank you”.
• She’s getting so brave with walking.
• Jabbering even more.
• When we tell her “no no” she just smiles really big and keeps doing things. 
• She loves to lay her head down on things. 
• She’s started to snuggle really big with me when new people talk to her and sometimes just because. 
• She will crawl normally when she wants to go really fast. 
• She’s wanting to climb.
• She finally had a good Sunday at church and small group drop off. 
• Trying to get pictures of her was a nightmare. I think she ate about a gallons worth of dirt 🙈
• I love watching her get around different places. 
• She has her own sweet little way of communicating. 
• Still loving that paci and blankie. She will go to her room just to find them. 
• Started weaning her from the 3:00 feeding around 4/10. It’s been really hard compared to dropping the 11:00. It makes her evenings really long. 
• She’s started mimicking the /s/ sound. 
• She does this open handed, extended arm shrug in the direction of where she wants to go. 
• So good at walking with her walker 
• getting SO mischievous! 
• She purposefully doesn’t kiss Andrew. 
• When you remove her from a situation and she doesn’t like it, she flails her body. 
• We celebrated her birthday the weekend before we actually birthday with an “April showers bring May flowers” party. 
• Says “nana” when she wants a snack
• Working on standing independently more often. 
• Walking more with things like a doll stroller or just holding on with one hand. 

• wears 9-12m clothes
• Size 4 diaper
• Size 2 shoe
• Nurses in the morning and at bedtime, eats 3 full meals, snacks a few times and 1 cup of whole milk a day.
• 20.3lbs (50%) and 29.72in (75%)

Abigail Month 11

Abigail Month 11

• Top front left side tooth (??) came on 3/1.
• Pulled herself all the way up to standing on the slide and in the tub, so we lowered her mattress on 3/4. 
• Her top font right tooth broke through on 3/4. 
• Raises her hands when she wants us to call the hogs. 
• She’s a BIG LAUGHER and DANCER 
• She has to be pulling/patting/playing with something while she eats. My shirt, face, hair, blanket, etc
• She knows she can let go and just fall back to get down from standing up. She likes to do it in the bath tub. 
• She’s pulling herself up more frequently. In turn, She had a day full of some major falls, including her first bloody injury - I think her bottom tooth broke the skin around the newest top tooth when she fell. 
• She started grinding her teeth. 
• She loves to play in the laundry room or the sunroom and she can get herself to those places pretty quickly. 
• So so playful. She likes to climb on top of claire to play. She’s even faster at pulling herself up to play with different toys. 
• She doesn’t feel well again (5/19). She’s super fussy.
• She stood up on her own from a bent over position several times and balanced for a few seconds. 
• Started rolling around and sitting up in her crib. Slept on her belly for the first time on 3/24
• She bites horribly when she nursed. 
• Went to the zoo and rode a carousel for the first time. She loved both. 
• She can walk with a walking toy.
• She pretty much eats everything and she eats really well. I would say her favorites are avocado and while apples. She attacks them. 
• Cries every time we drop her off st church nursery. 
• I think she could coast the entire perimeter of the house if she wanted to.
• She loves to wrestle.
• She can mimic us singing “whoa-oh-oh” from the greatest showman. 
• She celebrated her very first Easter. 
• She’s FEARLESS

Claire Winter 17-18

Claire: Winter ‘17-‘18

• she learned to do a flip/roll on her own
• She’s so good at using manners except when she accidentally hurts someone. She refuses to say sorry. 
• She’s picking up on so many funny phrases and expressions. My current favorite is the “soft smile” and her wink. 
• At bedtime she loves to ask “what’s your favorite part today?”
• “Too-ie” - toy 
• She’s really loving dress up and movies right now. 
• “Gleed-up” = giddy up
• I just love her lisp. Especially when she’s in the middle of playing and she says “what is this?!” 
• She’s going through another rough patch going to bed. Her most recent excuse was that she needed to go to the hospital to hear her heartbeat in her finger. 
• Claire is amazing directionally. She can tell us which way we should go to get places, and recognizes buildings that we’ve only been to a handful of times. 
• She’s into running and hiding when she’s doing things she shouldn’t (like sneaking and eating candy, watching the phone without asking, putting on makeup...) or when she gets in trouble. 
• We went swimming in a hotel pool with the McClain girls and Claire did an amazing job swimming under water. 
• Favorite phrase: “what is this?” “Why you say no to me? That’s not very nice!”
• Bed time routine is so long, and usually I try and rush through it, but when I just enjoy it, it’s the MOST FUN time and the time when she’s most willing to learn new things!
• She loves to sit on the potty and watch her iPad. She will tell us “I need 5 more poopoos then I get up.”
• Every night we have to line up all of her princess barbies on her princess pillow. 
• She decided to dry herself off and brush her own teeth and hair after bath one night. 
• Favorite foods are still Mexican foods: taco soup, quesadilla, and blee-toes (burritos). 
• When she gets sad and cries she’s started saying “that really hurt my heart”.
• When playing with Abigail, she’s said “here you go sweetheart” “that’s right darling”. 
• Learned to wink 
• Anytime I made her turn something off or skip something, she says “hey, that was my favorite”
• “Oh, we almost-agot...” /almost forgot/, “this is imposstible!”
• When she wants to do something we’ve done before she says “like we did last week” and if she wants to do something new she will say “can we do that sometimes?”
• Got pretty sick mid-February. A virus in the chest (basically bronchiolitis). Ran a low fever for several days, was acting almost delirious, horrible cough. Used the inhaler and got amoxicillin to prevent an infection. 
• The ATTITUDE!!!! 
• Her big thing is assigning family members different characters of her favorite movies. 
• “Hey what’d I just say?!” “You never can be (or) you never can do this again” “that’s all my fault”, “remember when we do that last week” - even if it was just earlier than morning...
• Recognizes letters A, C, M, D, K and J and numbers 1-5. 

Abigail Month 10

• 18.4 lbs (50%)
• 28.15 in (50%)
• Meeting her sweet milestones 
• Nursing 7, 3, and 7:00. 3 table meals and snacks. 
• Naps at 9 and 1, sleeps 7:30-6:30/7. 
• 6 teeth
• 6-12/9m clothes
• Size 4 diaper 

• coasted while standing by the ottoman on 2/5
• 40 weeks and 2 days old on 2/6 (how long I carried her in the womb) 
• She’s finally mastered finding her paci and putting it in her mouth. 
• Gives lots of kisses
• Loves loves loves when I read books or sing songs, and loves to watch Claire perform. 
• She is so PLEASANT! It’s the perfect word for her. 
• She loves to splash in water. 
• Basically crawled on Valentine’s Day. She starts in the sitting position, has one leg in the crawl position and the other leg up with her foot on the ground. She did multiple “scoots” to get to a bag of candy. 
• Got Claire’s virus. Bad cough and runny nose. And an ear infection. 
• Felt a top left tooth through the skin on 2/15. The front right side tooth broke skin on 2/16.
• She dances 
• Got herself from her belly to the sit up position on 2/22. 
• Has started letting go of things to stand on her own (2/26). 
• Is starting to crawl to come and find us, definitely gets herself to whatever toy she wants. 
• She can’t keep herself from dancing when she hears a song.
• Says “hi” and I think she says “bye bye” by saying “dada” and waving. Still only says “Mama” when she’s whining and has started saying “nana” and talking in a squeaky voice

Top Products for Abigail

Products that we got for Abigail that we didn’t have with Claire and I WISH we had! 

1. K’tan wrap: I carried her around in this almost every day until she was 4 months old. So easy and helpful! (Also the beachfront baby wrap because she was tiny all summer.) 
2. Angel care bath: easy to clean and she fit well in it. She didn’t slide as badly as she was in the summer deluxe bath. 
3. Mam pacifiers: I think they fit well on her face (if that makes any sense) and the rubber rings to go around them for paci clips.
4. NetePur laundry bar by H2O at home: got out all the blow out poop stains. 
5. Spare bouncy seat/rocker: I got a very cheap used one from Rhea Lana’s. I kept it in our sunroom so that I could easily carry it outside to lay her in it while I played with Claire.
6. Baby bling hand-bands: they’re just simple and soft and go with everything 
7. Fisher price sit-me-up chair: she preferred this waaaaaaay more than the Bumbo seat, and it seems like a safer option. 
8. Boon silicon pulp feeder: a great soft feeder to put different foods/textures in for her to chew on. Extremely easy to clean! 
9. Aden and Anias sleeping bag: it’s a super thick material for extra padding and warmth.
10. Zutano booties: soft, warm and they stay on better than socks! 
11. Moms on Call (book/app): whipped us into shape for better sleep! 

Christmas 2017

• We went to the lighting on the square! It was a warm evening but a lot of fun!
• We went to get their picture made with Santa and they did so well! Abigail liked looking at him. Claire went straight to his lap, said “I’m claire. That’s Abigail. I want a purple bike.” We got a great picture!
• Claire is OBSESSED with our nesting dolls from Prague. She calls them “messing dolls”. 
• “Campus” = Christmas 
• We bought a new Christmas tree and put lights on the house for the very first time! 
• We have a shepherd named Will and an Elf named Pete. Most mornings, she wakes up and asks “where my guys at?” 
• We are doing a simple daily advent and claire likes finding out about our daily activity. 
• She still loves the Little People nativity and Abigail likes playing with them too. 
• We watched Claire’s Christmas program at KDO and she was so good! The cutest performance ever! 
• We had an early Christmas with Lolly and Papa. They made a yummy breakfast and then we opened gifts. Claire got a mickey and Minnie Little People House, a stuffed unicorn, some Mickey look and find books, and princess sheets for her bed (so so cute)! Abigail got a little people Cinderella carriage, new sleep sack, a rolling toy, a crinkle toy and a new soft blanket. 
• Claire went to spend time with Meme and Poppi. They drove around to see lights and went and watched The Star. Abigail and I wrapped presents. 
• We are doing the Usborne sticker book of the nativity. One page a day for the week before Christmas. 
• Part of the girls Christmas from Meme and poppi was tickets to go to ththe winter wonderland ball. It was the best night of Claire’s life. She had zero reservations about meeting the princess or dancing in s big group of strangers. 
• Claire loves the Polar Express. We watch it a lot and act it out. She’s enjoyed the Grinch, Frosty, the Santa Clause and Olaf’s Frozen Adventure. We’ve also watched the Mickey Christmas stories again this year. 
• Mary = Married, and we lost Joseph. It’s really troubling Claire. 2 days before Christmas she asked for a soft Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus. 
• We enjoyed doing a daily advent activity. 
• We made reindeer food with stuff we had in the house: oatmeal, blue sprinkles, marshmallows, crushed candy cane and shredded carrots. 
• We made cookies for Santa and she’s so excited for him to come down the chimney and open presents. I’m very proud to say that she does also understand that it’s Jesus’ birthday most importantly.
• Poor Abigail has had a sad cold for the whole week leading up to Christmas, and Andrew got one the weekend of Christmas. 
• We went to see the Stewart Family lights and Claire really loved them again this year. I think Abigail really loved them too.
• We went to Christmas Eve church service. 
• She loves wishing others a merry Christmas.
• Christmas Day: Abigail was up, per usual, all hours of the night and then ready to start her day pretty early. Claire got up at 8, and Andrew went to get her and bring her in like he’s done the last 3 years. Even though she was SO excited about her presents, she was terrified to open them. She perked up when she saw their stockings on the ground, and then got excited to see Will and Pete with their presents. Will was sitting by baby Jesus and they were ready to do the last nativity page of her usborne sticker book. She LOVED baby Jesus. Kept up with him all day! She still wasn’t ready to open her presents, so she helped daddy and hen Abigail. And THEN she was ready. She was so sweet and expressive, and wasn’t ready for it to be over. Abigail just hung out with her toys and the paper, watching her sister. Claire’s gift were a pink bike, a helmet, an Ariel princess, a watch, and a big girl swing. Her stocking had lip gloss, a light up tooth brush, bubble tape and fruit snacks (she openly said several times that the gum was her favorite). Abigail got a zoom and crawl monster, a remote, new pacifiers, some stacking cups, and a Christmas book. Her stocking had a reusable placemat, a new bow, and some puffs. We had a yummy French toast breakfast while Abigail took a great nap. Claire loved playing with every new thing. We watched Elf. Claire did her sticker book and our advent activity was to sing happy birthday to baby Jesus. The rest of the day was pretty normal, we just got to have daddy home with us. We had a delicious super of chicken Alfredo pasta, salad and rolls. Unfortunately, I let my exhaustion get the best of me and didn’t enjoy this Christmas like I should have. Thankful for God’s grace and baby girls that love their mama even when she’s grumpy. 
• We had Christmas in Russellville. The girls loved their cousins and Aunts and Uncles. I got to sleep in every morning which is better than any gift! Claire wanted so badly to sleep with Lauren and Annie, but she was brought to our room at 2am. She did sleep really well in the bed with us for the first time ever! Abigail did decent until the last night. We got to go to an indoor pool and splash pad twice and both girls loved it! Andrew and I got to go see the Greatest Showman and it might be my new favorite movie! We were all spoiled with great gifts! 

Claire was pretty sad to be finished with Christmas. We still play “Santa” and she wishes us a merry Christmas at bedtime and it’s 1/4. We took everything down on New Year’s Day. I’m excited to see what happens in 2018!