Baby Love

Abby has had a love for baby dolls since she was a baby herself....all naturally, without any sort of encouragement from me. Her teachers at school have told me that she will line up all the babies in the room and play independently for long periods of time. They also told me that once she was caught "nursing" a baby doll, holding her shirt up and even switching sides a few minutes into the feeding. At home, she has become so creative in the ways she cares for, teaches and plays with her baby dolls. She always amazes me with her focus and creativity when it comes to her dolls.

Daddy had a larger than normal audience while working in the yard...

Loading up to "run errands"...

Just got home from HEB..."

Music class (we go to a music class where all the kids sit in a very large gathering drum while the mommies sing and turn it around in circles, so Abby was recreating the scene with her own babies)...

Suzy's gotta wash her hands...

Pretty creative bunk beds...

Going for a stroll with Katie's baby...

Happy Birthday Baby Dolls! (Please, please turn a blind eye to the messes in my living room! Some days the piles just get out of hand!)

Taking naps and reading stories... I love the way she talks to her babies with such tenderness, "what happened, sweet girl?"

Seeing her newest baby, opening a birthday present from Aunt Sue. She realized within a few seconds that the baby looks just like Bsby Doll, only she is a brunette rather than a blonde. Right after I turned the video off, she leaned over and said, "Hello, sweet girl..."



And, just in case you are wondering, Abby does know all of their names...

Big Accomplishments!

Katie still does not manage to appear in the blog as much as her big sis. Yet, she has accomplished so much in just a few short months. Yesterday morning, Katie was fussing when she was supposed to be napping... which is not too typical for her. Anyway, I ignored, and the fussing escalated to screaming. So, I gave in and went to check it out. As I opened the door, I said, "what's the deal?", only to have my question clearly answered with the sight of my "baby" standing in her crib. Apparently, she couldn't figure out how to get back down... I am giving her the benefit of the doubt that she was intending to take her nap after a brief test run in standing independently.

Daddy's proud of her musical abilities showing up at such an early age..

I think she surprised herself when she successfully made a sound with this recorder for the first time this afternoon.

She clearly understands the word "no" and, just like her sister, one of her early favorite words is "hi". She says "hi" anytime she sees a phone and anytime someone walks in or out of a room. Yesterday, we had a brutal 2+ hour wait in a doctor office, and she said "hi" to every single patient walking in and out. She definitely cheered the place up. She also says "Abba" sometimes for "Abby". My favorite is her roaring like a bear. If you ask her what the bear says, she roars. Even if you don't ask, she roars a lot. I think it is a defense mechanism of younger siblings... :-)

What a Weekend!

I know all of you have stories of those crazy, out-of-the-ordinary things that always tend to happen the moment your husband steps out the door for an out-of-town trip. This past weekend was kinda like that for us Gray girls, although I can't claim to have been left stranded, as I have parents who can still be found close by my side when I need them. Jake went out of town, and the sewer line between the kitchen and laundry room decided to stop up and spew kitchen gunk all over the place...so the roto-rooter guys came and made loud vibrating noises in the pipes under the girls' bedrooms till 11pm... then, Abby wakes up Sunday morning screaming that her back hurt & she needed to throw-up... the Ask-A-Nurse Methodist line advised me to take her to the ER... On our drive to the ER, she tucked her purple "throw-up" bucket under her chin and fell asleep. At one point, she startled awake and immediately said, "Mom, I really forgot to say 'bandera'." (We play a Spanish game when driving, where we say the Spanish word for things we see... well, a flag was the first thing she happened to see when she woke up.)

It all turned out to be nothing (thankfully), but Abby got a real-life learning experience about wheelchairs, hospitals, gowns and X-rays! She clutched her purple "bucket" and "Shaggy" (the brown bear her Uncle Scott gave her) all the way from home through the ER doors and until they wrenched it from her to take X-Rays. Although she protested it initially, she became attached to the green hospital gown, asking me all day Sunday after we got home, "Mommy, where is my gown?" She loved the wheelchair ride, and today she pointed out every single handicap sign we saw because they have wheelchairs on them. And she loved the X-Ray, astonished at the view of her own bones. This morning when we were memorizing "love the Lord your God with all you heart, all your soul and all your _____" she said "all your BONES!"

Not too happy upon arrival...

That bucket's not going anywhere, if she has anything to say about it!

She's warming up (after the Zofran)...

Off to get the X-Ray...

She's baaaack... enthusiastically announcing to the entire ER that she is "all better!" When we got home, she said, "Now that I am all better, we can go to church." I told her we had missed church, so then she said "OK, so now we can go to Fiesta Texas!"

Purple Nails are All the Rage

Purple nails, courtesy of AnKim. Mimi and Mommy say "thank you very much!" :-)

Abbyisms

1. One morning, out of the blue she said, "last week, I went behind that chair (in the living room) and ate a coffee bean"

2. She tells me a lot, "Mommy, I am frustrated about you!"

3. When Daddy leaves for work, she asks 15 times in a row, "Daddy, why are going to work" "Daddy, why are you getting in your car" "Daddy, will you eat dinner with me tonight?"

4. Mimi explained that smiling is good because it makes other people happy.... and suggested Abby try it, one day when she had quite a 'tude. In response, she actually said, "I don't want Katie to be happy. I want her to stay frustrated."

5. I walked by Abby's room around 11pm and was shocked to hear her yell out, "Mommy!" When I went in, she explained very coherently that she needed help putting Baby's jammies back on. When I told her that it was sleeping time, not play time, she protested, saying that she was NOT playing, but that she was simply taking good care of her Baby because Baby had leaked out of her diaper and needed a clean one.

6. Now that she is three, she goies to "Training in the Pews" at church. She calls it "Training & Confused." She may be on to something... reformed Presbyterian doctrine can be somewhat confusing. Ha ha!

7. When our church moved to its new location, Abby declared that she did not like the brown church.

8. She loves to ask the same question over and over. Sometimes, I humor her; other times, I simply say, what do you think? One morning, for the 5th time, she asked me where her Daddy went. The look on my face must have clued her in that the game was over on my end, because, before I responded, she quickly said, "Oh, I think you told me."

Catching Up & Looking Back

Whoa! I am so far behind on blogging. Tonight I cleaned out my camera and, as I looked at old photos, I was amazed at how much has changed in just a matter of months. Where does time go? I ask myself how I can possibly find a way to live each day in the knowledge that my little girls will be little for only so long and that each minute of these early years has such an impact on who they become? Anyway, here's a glimpse of life only two or three months ago. Every trip to the car was a battle with Abby wanting to bring everything she owns... then leaving it in a heap on the floor of my car to accumulate until Jake would get frustrated enough to shovel it all out into a box stuffed in the garage. I remember telling Abby that she could not bring everything with her to run errands because it would make my car junky and then she would tell strangers in the grocery store checkout that her Mommy's car is junky. It's funny to see her carrying all of her blankies and backup blankies, because these days she is set on only one of the six... which she can identify by SMELL! She will hold them all up to her nose, smelling each and rejecting each until she gets to the ONE... despite my best-laid plans to have lots of backups, we now have only one that can satisfy. When she is in a generous mood, she tells me, "Mommy, you can smell my blankie if you want to." Smelling her blankie is her comfort... quirky, but cute!

Tea Party

I am way too tired to do justice to all of the great material I have accumulated in the last few months. However, at the end of a wonderful day celebrating God's gift of Abigail Elizabeth Gray, I wanted to share a few photos from her very blessed day full of friends & family. Thank you to all of you who love her so well. You make such a difference in her life & we love you so much.