Abigail Grace

This girl is growing and changing so quickly, it’s unreal.

Her memory is really sharp, and she’ll randomly recall something that happened weeks or months ago in detail. She’ll also randomly burst into song (granted, she’s still just saying the words to songs instead of truly singing them, but still) and has started “singing” along to songs in the car.

Her day is one long narrative with songs interwoven—whether she has an audience or not.

Also along with her memory, she has the majority of her books memorized, and we’ll often catch her with a book open in her lap reading it out loud. Of course, she can’t read, but she’s got whole books in her head. Related: she does know her alphabet (capital letters) and is learning the phonics. She got an upper/lower case alphabet puzzle for Christmas, so hopefully we’ll start honing in on the “little” letters soon.

We’re in a phase right now where reading is her activity of choice, and it’s always me or David telling her “ok, reading time is over!” Seriously…10-15+ long books a day. I love Dr. Seuss, but man, his books are long.

She’s starting to play with Madilyn a little bit and really likes making her laugh (and will often report, “Mommy, I made Madilyn laugh! Yay!”).

While she’s saying “please” and “thank you” and other polite words with little prompting, we’re in a difficult phase behaviorally with whining and flat out disobedience. “Abigail, come here, please.” “NO MA’AM!” (walks opposite direction). Or, “Time to take a bath, Abigail,” (in a whiny voice) “I don’t want to…wah, wah, wah…” Sigh.

Hilarious quote from Abigail: “Mommy, one day I will have a king, and then I will have milk in my nipples!” Ha!

Madilyn Joy

She is so close to walking, it’s ridiculous. She even took a few steps tonight nearly unassisted (I was holding the back of her shirt so she didn’t fall forward). Maybe by our next post, she’ll be toddling around. It all started on December 11 when she figured out how to walk with her push toy. Since then, she’s been cruising all over the place, and climbs our stairs multiple times a day. She stayed standing without holding on to anything right around Christmas. She won’t let us force her to walk, though. Unlike Abigail at this age, if Madilyn wants to sit down, she just sits. Abigail couldn’t figure out how to sit down until after a year old.

I’m pretty sure she’s calling both me and David “Da-da!”, and that might even be her word for milk. “Bbbbaaaaaa” and “Dadadadada” are her most common “words,” that she uses at all volumes and all inflections. She’s especially vocal when pointing to any illuminated surface—whether it be a light, a tv, a computer, a reflection…crazy.

She’s pointing to everything and waving all the time, and she’s nodding a lot—although, we don’t know if she understands what that means. She mimicks much more than Abigail ever did. For example, at dinner the other night, Abigail put her hands above her head and said “Hurray!” Immediately, Madilyn put her hands up high and made a loud sound. She also plays a game with Abigail by tilting her head to the side and waiting for Abigail to copy before righting her head back up.

She’s figured out how to put things back into a container, so at least for now, cleaning up is fun for her—albeit, slow. She’s also enjoying turning pages in her board books if not actually reading them. I hope her attention span lengthens before too long so we can really get into reading!

We’re in a “I WANT MAMA!” phase right now, and I’m not sure how much of it is teething vs. separation anxiety vs. plain out “I WANT MAMA, AND THERE’S NO REAL REASON!” As a result, she’s super clingy to me and wants to be held way more than usual. And she’s very effectively communicating her dissatisfaction with whatever she’s unhappy with. Abigail took her toy? Disgusted yell. I put her down when she wanted to be held? All out banshee crying. Whew.

One perk is that at nap time and bedtime, she snuggles up on me. So nice!

Notable events

I’ve got to be honest, I’m really not up to writing about everything we did this month in detail, so here’s a fun list for my records. Between that and the videos/pictures below, I think you’ll get a good sense of what we’ve been up to!

Dinner with the Arnaudins, Christmas tree shopping at Boyd Mountain Farm, celebrating Dad’s birthday in Greenville, Bible study Christmas party and charades, Atlanta trip for a funeral for a dear friend’s infant son, making ornaments, craft night at Brittany’s, Abigail’s preschool party, play lodge wipe outs—Abigail busted her lip, and Madilyn bit through her tongue (ouch!), YMCA Christmas pageant, mall to see Santa Claus, Polar Express at Chick-Fil-A w/hot chocolate, Abigail in Greenville…David off work…we visited WCU campus, Christmas Eve in Columbia, Christmas day and dinner with neighbors, McGee Christmas in Spartanburg, loads of family time.

Slideshow, then videos, then individual pictures:

Hanging ornaments
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Madilyn walking with her push toy
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Abigail and me decorating ornaments
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Madilyn walking with Daddy at the YMCA
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Christmas dance party
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Abigail getting a mouthful of icing
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Christmas dance party 2
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Happy birthday, Jesus! (yes, our cake was partly eaten already…we shouldn’t have made it a day ahead of time!)
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Madilyn standing up
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To walk, or not to walk?
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Sister head bonk
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Abigail Grace

She talks pretty much only in complete sentences now, and the things she says can be so amusing at times. She’s trying to figure out time references (i.e. last night vs. tomorrow, etc), and will often just throw a reference out there hoping it works, “Mommy, we had pancakes for breakfast tomorrow night,” or “I didn’t go to time out lasterday.” The “lasterday” word cracked me up. Despite the confusion there, she does know what we do on each day of the week—just not the days of the week order. “I go to preschool Thursday and Tuesday.”

We’ve learned that Abigail will go along with pretty much any schedule of events so long as she’s warned, so most days, I’ll give her the rundown of our plans. Then she repeats it all back to me over and over. “First we go to Target. Then we go to the car wash. Then we go to the bank. I get a lollipop. Then we get home. I take off my shoes. I eat lunch. I go potty. I take a nap.” Or whatever. Kind of OCD, but kind of funny too.

She still loves to read and has started reciting books while we’re reading them. We checked out a couple of new books from the library, and Roly Poly Pangolin was an instant hit. There’s a video below of her reading it with me. She’s also started “singing” songs that we sing or that she’s learned in preschool; that’s been fun.

She has become pretty possessive over her toys if Madilyn gets near—”That’s MINE, Madilyn!!” and sharing is a constant battle, but what 2-year-old is a happy sharer all the time? Time out is the discipline method of choice and seems to work pretty well. Too bad she’s in time out several times every single day. Sigh.

Madilyn Joy

She pulled to standing in the crib on the same day I blogged last month about how she couldn’t do it. Oops. Guess she read my post. She’s figured out giving high fives and waves to people when she wants to. She is trying to figure out how to point and is starting to really understand certain words like her name, mommy, daddy, light, NO, come here, eat, water, etc). And just like her sister at this age, Madilyn loves ceiling fans and the pull chains under them.

She babbles most of the day and will sometimes just open and close her mouth without making any sounds at all—like a fish face. Some part of every day is spent drumming her index finger over her lips while trying to babble. Pretty funny.

She’s finished with purees and is 100% on table food. That’s been a nice change and happened earlier than it did for Abigail—mainly because we thought Abigail had to be on purees until later. Oops. Glad to be finished with the blender for a bit.

Not sure how time is flying so fast, but in two months, I’ll likely be finished with nursing because……she’ll be ONE YEAR OLD. Holy cow! Has it really already been a year since I was 7 months pregnant with Madilyn? It doesn’t feel like that long ago.

We had her 9-month appointment, and she’s 22.5lbs (back on the growth chart at the 95th percentile), 28.5″ long, with an 18″ head. At Abigail’s 9-month appointment, she was 20.5lbs, 29″ long, with the same size head.

And for fun, here are a couple of comparisons of the girls at the same age. Abigail is on the left in both pictures, and Madilyn is on the right. In both shots, the girls are 8-9 months old.
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Can’t believe how much more hair Madilyn has at this age than Abigail.
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9-month check-up in the same office, just 18 months apart!
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Notable Events

Rock and Roll Half Marathon in Savannah—The first weekend in November, I went down to Savannah with five other gals to run a half marathon in the Rock and Roll series. I had so much fun, and didn’t do too shabby considering I’d just run another 13.1 mile race 4 weeks prior and I didn’t have a running partner during the race. It took me around two hours and 5 minutes to finish. I’ll take it! Unfortunately, Madilyn wouldn’t take any bottles of pumped milk for David, so I came back in a hurry.

Happy Birthday—David turned 28 on November 9, and we enjoyed a fun day of celebration. For breakfast, we had very hungry caterpillar parfaits (I layered graham cracker crumbs/granola with yogurt and each of the fruits the caterpillar ate in the Eric Carle book. Too cute!), and lunch and dinner were Mexican themed per David’s request (quesadillas and enchiladas, respectively). David only worked a half day, so once he was home and the girls were awake, we went out to the Arboretum to explore a bit. It was a beautiful day, and we had a blast. The following weekend, compliments of David’s parents, we went to the…

Clemson vs. Wake Forest game—it was our first time back in Death Valley since graduating in 2006. Thankfully, Clemson pulled out a win, but it was their last win of the season. Thanks for pulling through for that weekend, tigers! We met up with David’s brother, Kevin, and his girlfriend, Brittany before the game and after for a campus stroll and dinner. So nice! The girls got to stay with my parents for the day and night and had a wonderful time as well.

Wee Trade Holiday Sale—What can I say? I love a good kid’s consignment sale. I was able to find a beautiful Christmas dress for Abigail, some Christmas pjs for both girls, and a couple of Christmas gifts for Abigail. All on the cheap. Score!

Daddy/Abigail play date—We’re working on letting each Saturday morning be a special time for just David and Abigail, and one of the November Saturdays, David took Abigail to the Mountain Play Lodge. They had a blast, and Madilyn and I went back with them after naps to check it out. Abigail seemed to really enjoy the one-on-one time with David and just being the center of attention for a bit when all of us were there.

A Finished Knitting Project—finally!—I knitted David a scarf. Unfortunately, I haven’t taken a picture of it in its 6-ft+ glory, but I will soon. Here’s the pattern, and it turned out just like that, only I used a darker gray alpaca yarn. I learned a lot through this project—especially considering I probably knitted a 9-ft scarf taking into account all the times I had to undo rows of stitches. Haha! Looking forward to my next project, whatever it might be.

Cookie Playdate—Abigail had a ton of fun at Jana’s house making sugar cookies. She got to mix the dough, roll it out, cut out shapes, and decorate them (and eat them!) once they were baked. Jana gave out precious aprons to the group to boot. So cute!

Thanksgiving in Boone, NC—We trekked up to Boone, NC where David’s parents rented a cabin for Wednesday-Sunday of Thanksgiving week. What a blast! We had delicious food, played fun games, took lots of brisk, hilly walks, and enjoyed the company of family. It’s a bummer we all live so far away!

First major colds of the season—With our favorite time of year comes our least favorite activity: being sick. Bahumbug. Abigail got sick (most likely) from the church nursery on the Sunday before Thanksgiving. By Tuesday midday, she was coughing, and by Wednesday, the snotfest was in session. She is at the tail-end of her cold right now over a week later. While she was sick, David and I caught minor cases while Madilyn got a horrible cold. She’s only five days in and hopefully over the hump, but a couple of 101.6F fevers freaked us out. Poor baby!

Photos and Videos

Again, there’s a slideshow of photos first, then videos, then the individual photo files. Enjoy! See you next month.
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Abigail saying the blessing before dinner
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Madilyn cracking up when I slam a book shut
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Madilyn waving
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Trampoline fun
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Abigail feeding Madilyn
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Abigail memorizes books pretty quick. “Roly Poly very small does not like new things at all…” Cute book!
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Abigail singing her condensed version of the goodnight song I sing to her
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Over Thanksgiving, we went to a farm with family and fed some goats
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Learning to jump/fall into the pool
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