Abby Calendar

A little while ago we started a weekly calendar for Abby.  She has always been curious about what will happen next and what the plan is.  So, I found a simple white board Monday through Sunday calendar and have been drawing pictures for the things we have planned.  She loves her pre-literate calendar.  She knows when it is a work day (for dad) and when she has play dates or story time.  It's been great to organize our activities.  It's also been fun to see what kind of pictures Greg and I will come up with.  This week I tried drawing a picture of my parent's house and Abby thought it looked like the temple.  Abby is pretty good at coming up with ideas of things to put on her calendar too.  For instance she thought her Sunday looked a little empty and insisted that I draw a couch and the TV with Areil (The Little Mermaid) because that is what she wanted to do with her Sunday afternoon.  She also wants to see herself in the pictures.  If I draw a bathtub she wants Abby in there too with toys.  The same goes with the grocery cart, she wants there to be an Abby in the cart with "bananas and all the other thingses".  I'm glad she is enjoying her calendar as much as I hoped she would.

Also, she came up with these herself.  She cracks us up.

She said she was swimming and the chair was her swimsuit

Greg thinks she looks like a mad scientist.

Finishing February

It seemed as though our February was pretty uneventful.  That is until last week.

Greg's mom and sister arrived on Thursday night.  On Friday (while Greg was at work) us girls went to a chocolate dipping class.  Just recently a cute cake and candy supply store opened up close by.  My Mom sent me to a truffle making class they had there and with those skills I made over 350 truffles for my sisters wedding.  I had a very positive experience doing that class so I signed us up for the chocolate dipping class.  We had so much fun.  We dipped all kinds of things:  classics like pretzels and strawberries but also some things I hadn't thought of like potato chips, Nutterbutters, Oreos, and dried fruit.  Abby had so much fun, I think she dipped more then anyone else.

Abby's sneaking a dip

I love her face in this one

The rest of the weekend we filled with some shopping, eating, and tons of grandma time.  Abby wouldn't let grandma out of her sight.  We also had dinner at our favorite Indian place, Abby loves curry!

We all headed to the airport early Monday morning.  Greg's family was going home and we had to fly to Salt Lake City then rent a car and drive to Rexburg, ID for my sister's wedding.

My sister was set up on a blind date just before this last Thanksgiving.  The date went so well that they got married.  My sister looked beautiful.  And it was nice to reconnect with some extended family that I haven't seen in a long time.  I don't think she was planning on the blizzard that showed up on Monday afternoon.  It made for a very cold wedding.  Abby's favorite part of the wedding was the time she got to spend splashing with Greg at the hotel's pool.  We didn't couldn't stay long because Greg had to get back to work.  We were home on Tuesday night.

Abby's latest thing has been asking us to tell her stories.  She will ask for specific stories many times a day.  "Dad, can you tell me the story of Becky's wedding?  Don't forget the pool part."  "Mom, can you tell me the story of getting pizza."  Everything is a story in her book.  The only hard part is that she sometimes has high expectations and can get really frustrated if we don't tell a story the "right" way.

I don't think Abby completely got over the cold she had a few weeks ago, or maybe this is a new cold.  Either way she has been sleeping later in the morning (one morning she even slept till after 8am!) and she's quite sensitive during the day.  Last night both Greg and I took turns laying down with her because her bellybutton hurt.  She seemed to be in quite a bit of pain but it eventually calmed down and was able to get some sleep.

Sad colds, warm weather

Well, I guess its been a little bit since we have posted.

The week before last was a rough week in the Allen house.  All of us were sick with something like a cold and Abby was hit worst of all.  For most of a week she had no energy to do anything more than lie on the couch and a cough and runny nose that lasted nearly three weeks.  It has been pretty sad but thankfully she seems to be completely over it and back to her (over) active self.

Debbie has been doing a couple of cool classes lately.  First, she did a cake decorating class.  She has made some yummy and fun-looking cakes that Greg has taken to work.  Here is a fish one that she made.  Greg took it to work but Abby insisted he bring home a piece with the eye and a bubble.

Debbie also took a truffle making class and made a couple hundred of them for her sister's wedding this month.  Of course we saved some for ourselves.


We have had an unseasonably warm week that is reportedly going to be continuing to the first half of next week.  It really feels like winter has broken and we are into spring and we have spent time working on the garden, going to the park, and washing cars.  It is going to be a very harsh reality check when/if winter returns.  It has been a super mild winter (other than the snowstorm) and we're glad for that.

Also, notice that pose with the arm raised and sort of curled?  Abby does that any time we are going to take a picture.  I thought I didn't know where it came from but as I write, I'm thinking it might come from ballerinas, her current obsession.

We found a horse statue recently installed at the little Country Village near our house.  So Abby of course had to try it out.

She also spent plenty of quality time on the merry-go-round but she spends literally less than 30 seconds on each horse before needing to ride a different horse.  Sigh.

Hopefully the warm weather and fun times continue!

Snowed In

As Greg mentioned last weekend it started snowing enough to cancel church.  As it turns out it continued snowing up till this last Thursday.  It doesn't snow here very often and usually if it does it only sticks around for a day or so before getting washed away by the rain.  So when we get a real snow storm the area doesn't really have the resources to take care of it.  As a result things almost shut down.  Everyone just huddles up in there houses until the snow goes away.  We were no different.  Greg went into work for half a day on Monday and then worked from home through Thursday.  Abby and I stayed at home and watched movies, played with friends down the street, went for cold, snowy walks, and tried to not get cabin fever.  When we measured on Thursday we had about 8 inches of accumulated snow.

We decided to make a smoothie for dinner one night but before we really got started Abby wanted to make a pretend smoothie.  The video is only a sample of her pretending skills.



 Abby's friend came up to the house one afternoon with a sled and Abby had her first real experience sledding. She enjoyed it.  Abby never wanted to wear gloves or her hat and it was a constant battle.  Maybe as a result, she ended up a bit sick on Friday.  But she's feeling better after a day of movie watching.

Snowy Weekend!

Winter has certainly arrived here in the Northwest!  It snowed last night and all this morning and has left us with a couple of inches!

As soon as we found out church was cancelled, Abby insisted we go out right away so we spent a while making a snowman (ended up being a snow girl that never got really finished), shoveling off the driveway (worthless since it snowed so much more after we finished), and Abby throwing snowballs.

After our snow adventure, we camped out inside for a while and then had some friends nearby over for lunch and went over to Greg's cousins for dinner.  It was a pretty relaxing day and a nice change of pace.  We're not really sure what the next week will bring though as there is a lot more snow in the forecast.

Prior to today's excitement, there hasn't been a whole lot to report.  Abby is bossy as ever but also a lot of fun.  She lately has been singing a lot of songs for us, some that she has heard at church or preschool but also a lot that she just has made up.

Some of the songs/stories she has made up lately include:
"Once there was a little tiny baby snowman"
"Masticated! masticated masticated masticated..."
And, as always, her Ariel song that just has her singing "aaaaahhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaa"

Merry Christmas and Happy New Years!

We hope you are all enjoying your start to 2012!

It's been a few weeks since we posted, we have been busy with the holidays and spending lots of time with friends and family.

This year, most of Debbie's family came up here to Washington to spend time together and celebrate Christmas.  Abby's cousin is just a little bit younger than her and Abby loved spending time with her. She still asks about her. We spent lots of time hanging out and went to Warhorse together as a family on the day after Christmas. (Where Greg, not for the first time, placed hopes on 'fresh' pretzels being good in the theater and was intensely disappointed)

In addition to Christmas, we had a pretty fun, short week with Greg having last Monday as well as Friday off of work.  On Friday, we made use of Greg's parents gift of a family pass and went to the Seattle Aquarium.  It is a lot bigger than it looks from the exterior and Abby had a lot of fun seeing octopus, fish, and seals.  We didn't quite get all the way through before Abby was done but thanks to this year long pass we can go again and again to see the things we missed!

Alright, here are some pictures of some of the fun we have been having!

Here is Abby doing something on the floor (playing 'babies' probably) with her cousin.

Abby loves exploring and trying new things.  She found mommy's swimming goggles somewhere and of course had to try them on.

Here is Abby 'trying on' a new Christmas dress (sorry about the sideways pic, I can't get it to rotate)

Enjoying a Christmas present

 -

Spelunking for the last gifts

Sporting matching aprons

Opening presents with Debbie's family (Abby went ballistic when she saw the Santa outfit)

Poking starfish and creeping herself out with a model octopus

Greg gets Monday off work so another shorter week.  What an awesome time of year!

Pre-Christmas Christmas

Last weekend we took a quick trip to Utah.  We had a super fun time with gramma Kelli and papa Micheal.  Abby spent lots of time...

playing "house"

having cold park time

painting

tormenting loving the kitten Aunt Gen was kitty-sitting

opening presents at Great-papa's house

loving time with papa

It was a fast trip and even though Abby had a harder time sleeping there then she has in the past we are still glad we went.