Spring fun

Nobody knows why, but Annabel was awake from 12:30 - 3:00am last night, so this isn't going to be long post. I'm tired, and feeling at all witty or entertaining! But I have been meaning to post some pictures from the past few days, so here you go -

Where did Annabel go?

Nate celebrated his birthday last weekend, and Annabel enjoyed singing "Happy Birthday" to him several times throughout the day and she loved the ice cream cupcakes that we got for him. We spent the day relaxing at home, just how Daddy wanted.

Since we now have a pretty large hole in the landscaping in our front yard, we headed to the nursery on Saturday. Annabel was a great helper!

Bed time stories by Annabel

So I was looking at the blog updates from all my friends today, and realized that I have become quite the slacker. I don't have any great pictures, and I think that is mostly because we've been working on the house and potty training lately. So not a lot of photo ops to speak of. Potty training is going pretty great - she's not 100% of the way there, but she's really close - just needs to get the hang of #2. And the house projects are wrapping up... our egress window is done (looks great!) and I've got most of Annabel's room painted, so that means soon her big girl room transformation will soon be complete. Then maybe we'll start enjoying the summer? Hope so!

Since I don't have any good pictures, I thought I would take a video tonight... and since her big girl bed is pretty much her favorite thing right now, decided to do it there. So this video is of Annabel reading me some stories in her bed. It's long, and not super interesting, but I know there are some loyal viewers who will appreciate it. She's loving reading to herself these days, and is starting to memorize her favorite books so she can read them even better. She's so fun!

Pics from Easter

I grow tired of posting pics here and on facebook, so I'm going to try something new. If you aren't on facebook, you can click on this link to see pictures from our Easter weekend.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2058454&id=1345907113&l=396674383d

Birthday balloons

A conversation with Annabel

This is most days for us..... makes me smile! :)

Today's your birthday!

Oh man, what a weekend! I still find it hard to believe that Annabel turned two years old today, but I suppose my serious exhaustion should be enough to convince me. Yesterday was Annabel's birthday party, and today we just celebrated at home with our little family of 3. The party was great.... My parents, brother and sister came, as well as Nate's mom, sister, brother-in-law and nieces. We were also joined by 3 of my friends and their kids and husbands. Annabel had a blast playing hard all afternoon and into the evening with her friends. She got lots of great presents, with her favorite being a Minnie Mouse doll that Brooklyn gave her. She has not put down since she got it.... Minnie has pottied, been fed blueberries, had coffee, and taken a few naps. As if pottying doesn't take long enough, now we have a mouse that has to come too??? :)

Today we played it pretty low key. I think Annabel was still worn out from yesterday (even after sleeping 13 hours), so she was pretty cranky this morning and we decided to hold off on any outings until after nap. Then she slept for 3 hours, so when she did finally wake up we didn't have a whole lot of day left. But we went out for some shopping anyway, and had a birthday dinner at On the Border. Annabel was excited because she got a salad, which is her new favorite thing. She didn't like it as much as an Arni's Junior, which is no surprise to me, but she still enjoyed the ranch dressing.... it cracks me up that she was chanting "salad, salad" at dinner! After that we came home, had cupcakes, opened presents and watched some Dora. All in all, I think Annabel had a pretty good day!

Here are some pictures from our weekend:

CHEESE! This was cupcake round #2, tonight. She actually only licked off the frosting. Oh well!

Brooklyn and Annabel trying out her birthday present from Nate & I - a little table and chair set.

My parent's got Annabel a Cinderella crown and fun dress up shoes. The shoes actually de-railed the whole present opening, because once she had them on all she wanted to do was walk around. Mommy had to finish opening her gifts. This girl LOVES her shoes. :)

Annabel enjoys her cupcake at the birthday party

Annabel's buddies - Mady, Brooklyn and Drew

The birthday princess

Yet another new pair of shoes.... These boots are made for walking!

I tried all weekend to get a cute picture with me and Annabel, and this was all I could get. It's so hard to get a cute picture, because she's so stubborn!

And tomorrow starts the third year..... pretty impossible to believe, but I am excited for all that it will bring!

Happy St. Patty's Day!

This was our minor effort to celebrate our partial Irish heritage on St. Patrick's Day - Last year I put green milk in Annabel's bottle, and I decided to try and make a tradition out of it. She could really care less this year, but I bet next year she will think it's kind of cool.....
We were able to enjoy the spring like weather today. Annabel particularly loves talking to the dogs in our back yard - behind the safety of our chain link fence, of course! She's so funny because she absolutely loves dogs, but only from a distance. She won't go near them on her own, and would be terrified if the dogs could actually get to her. Our neighbors have 5, and all are pretty big so they are particularly frightening. But with the fence, she can get close and have a conversation with them. Today one of them kept barking at her and she just stood there and said "What? What, puppy?" The dog never answered her. :)

Play time with Mommy

These pictures are from the playground at the Church behind our house. It's crazy to me to see how much better she can play on this stuff this year - she's so big! She has mastered the climbing wall, and loves to go down the tallest slide by herself. I am sure we'll be at the playground a lot this summer, because she loves it.

"Come on, Mom!"