Social Butterfly

Last weekend we hosted our potluck group and Abri had an absolute ball! This was the first time I've seen her get SO EXCITED to play with other kids. It was really cute to watch her run around smiling and laughing. I'll let the photos speak for themselves.














pretty soon little Ryan will be running around with the other kids!




Ethan let me practice my sports photography on him as he showed me his football moves


pretty Maylin




As I mentioned earlier, Abri was really into Kathy. She rarely lets me hold her and read to her for that long.


Evan, aka Yang Yang, had to get in there too!




Emily and Evan entertained themselves with this fun game.




Ethan and Evan - so sweet.


I think this photo pretty well sums up the night for Abri!

Believe it or not, there are more photos so feel free to check out the set on Flickr. Potluckers, you should definitely take a peek because there are more good shots of the kiddos.

such a sweet little face

Coming up on 15 months

It's been a while since I've posted to the blog. We've definitely been busy but I can't really remember at the moment what we've been up to the past couple weeks. It's all a fog since the Hawkeyes went down so tragically to Northwestern and now to dreaded Ohio State. Chris and I were both saying how glad we are to be able to turn off the TV and focus on our adorable Abri. Otherwise there would be a lot of moping.

Abri turns 15 months tomorrow and is just as cute and lively as ever. She's acquired a few more words such as "bubbles" and "emmy" (her cousin), and she especially loves to say "bye bye". She also really likes to talk with her Cookie Monster voice which is super cute and really quite impressive.

She gives HUGE hugs and lots of kisses. It totally makes up for the fact that she's not a snugly baby anymore. She will often come over to me and give me a hug and just squeeze me and kiss me. It's an awesome feeling.

Abri also really loves palling around with other people besides me. If my sister or mom is around I'm barely noticed. Tonight we had our potluck group and she wanted to sit on my friend Kathy's lap, read books with Kathy, and as she was playing with other kids she would occasionally come over to Kathy. If you didn't know, you probably would have thought Kathy was her mother based on her behavior tonight. It's actually pretty cute to see her get excited about these new friends of hers.

I can't remember to what extent I've described her love of music and dancing on the blog. Pretty much anytime she hears music she dances. When I'm driving I often see her dancing up a storm in her car seat. She'll move her entire body from side to side, kick her legs, move her arms up and down and jut her head forward and backward. It's quite a spectacle. She'll sometimes fuss when I have a slow song playing and when I change to something upbeat she starts happily dancing.

Here are some more photos I took one day when we were just hanging around the house. I even used the timer to get in a few shots with the two of us, just to prove my existence.

Old Friends and New in Chicago

A couple of weekends ago my niece Emily, Abri and I headed into Chicago for the weekend. I had tried several times to get to Chicago over the last year but it never worked out so I was thrilled to finally be heading in to my old stomping grounds. We had a little extra motivation this time because Emily wanted to visit a friend of hers that she knows from her Colorado vacations... his name is Spencer and he's pretty cute. :) Chris decided to stay at home and enjoy some guy time with his friend, Rob.

First I have to mention the sweetest little scene that we got to witness on our way in on Friday. We stopped for a quick dinner at a Potbellies sandwich place and while we were eating this woman came in with flowers for her daughter who was working there and the great news that her daughter was accepted to the University of Iowa! It was so cute. A little later the dad showed up and we saw her big envelope that said something cool like "It's great to be a Hawkeye!" They were all so excited. Emily and I congratulated all of them and told them how great the UI is. So fun!

We got to stay with my friend Andrea in her amazing condo which has the most incredible view of the lake. It was so awesome to reconnect with her and meet her son Carlisle for the first time. He's only about six weeks younger than Abri and I have been dying to see him in person. He is SUPER CUTE! He's a little sweetheart who seemed much more innocent than Abri who at one point went up to him and shoved him over laughing all the while. We need to work on that... Anyway, I really enjoyed chatting it up after Abri went to sleep. It was delightful!

On Saturday we took Emily up to Glencoe where her friend lives. We drove by our old apartment in the city and my old office and shortly after Abri decided she had enough of the car seat and had a major meltdown. (Note to self, limit amount of time in car on next Chicago trip.) After dropping Emily off I had to stop at a shopping area for a while before we could head back into the city and of course Abri fell asleep right before we got back to Andrea's. I couldn't get her to nap of course and soon it was time to head back up to Glencoe.

This time however we got to see our friends Kara, Jon and their two adorable daughters Rebecca and Tessa. Unfortunately I forgot my camera so I didn't get any pictures of them. They're a great family and it was so fun to see them again. After we saw them we picked up Emily and headed back into the city stopping for dinner at Leona's, a restaurant we used to take Emily to when she was a little kid. They have a theater room and we used to let her run around in there. It was out of order this time but that's okay because Emily probably wouldn't have been interested and Abri is too young to watch movies. Still, it was fun to be there for old time's sake.

After getting Abri to bed on Saturday night Andrea asked about the Iowa (vs. Michigan State) game. I figured we'd be too busy to watch and thought I'd just catch the replay, but since she asked we discovered that she had the Big Ten network and she turned it on with 2 1/2 minutes to go - the best part! What an incredible ending. We were all jumping up and down, as quietly as possible. We talked to Chris a little later and he was watching in a bar, which went crazy after the final play. So crazy in fact, that a woman tried to high five him and smacked him really hard in the eye! He thought he might have a scratched cornea. It was really painful and his eye was watering and apparently some people thought he was crying because he was so happy about the win. Fortunately it was just a bruised something or another but he had a big red spot on his eye for a while. He told his accidental attacker that it was okay because the Hawks won.

Okay, back to the Chicago trip... On Sunday we had another major treat - we got to meet up with my other friend, Andrea, THE Andrea of Madison, who we had just visited about a week earlier. She brought her brother and her parents, who I had not seen in years. It was great and we got to eat at my favorite place, M. Henry's. Yum!

It was a great weekend but I am ready to stay close to home for a little while now. It was just too much car seat time for Abri. She was a trooper for the most part. Unfortunately I didn't take many photos other than at Andrea's apartment. I would love to have more time in Chicago with my camera. Someday... For now enjoy these shots of Andrea, Carlisle and of course the star of this blog.


I love this photo of Andrea and Carlisle


and this one






The view from Andrea's apartment! Emily took this with a zoom lens. I wish I would have taken a shot of her bank of windows so you could see the whole expanse of the park and the lake. It's amazing!

Grrr! Happy Halloween!

It was a fun Halloween for our little leopard. We started celebrating on Wednesday when we went to Chris' office for their annual trick or treating event. The kids go from office to office collecting candy and it's cool because you don't have to worry about the weather. There were so many cute kids and Abri had a ball running around in her costume and watching the other kids.

Then, following the scary but ultimately happy Iowa game, we went to a neighborhood party. The family that hosted it went all out with an elaborately decorated back yard with crafts for the kids and they even had a fire. Abri ran around and also hung out by the CD player and danced. Unfortunately I didn't bring my camera!

We left the party to go out for a quick dinner with my parents to celebrate the Hawkeye win and then came home to hand out candy. We took the candy out front and Abri ran around in our driveway and on the sidewalks following the other kids. She loved being outside and did not want to come in at all. Fortunately her Aunt TC came over to see her in her costume and then we were really excited when our friends Lisa, Aaron and Ryan came trick or treating. Ryan was unbelievably cute as you'll see in the photos below.

It was fun to dress Abri up last year, but this year was awesome because she loved her costume so much and she definitely was able to get into the holiday. She enjoyed grabbing candy even though she doesn't really know what it is and loved seeing other kids. What a fun Halloween! I hope all of you had a great Halloween as well. Oh, and GO HAWKEYES!


at daddy's office








it was SO CUTE to watch her toddle around from this angle!


she made friends with a little doggie (and then we saw this cute boy the next morning at story time)


here she is at dinner wearing Chris' sunglasses


running around in the driveway


crouching in the grass








more fun with the sunglasses, does she not look like she's posing for the paparazzi?


Ryan the puppy. Isn't he so adorable?!!


Aaron, Lisa and Ryan

My Busy (gulp!) Toddler

It's been a long time since I've written about Abri's latest antics. She is now more than 14 months old and time continues to fly by. Since she turned one it seems her development has progressed exponentially!

• Walking - She took her first steps about a week and a half after her first birthday and I would say that she finally became a full time walker within the last two weeks. She LOVES to walk! When I take her to the park or hiking she walks quite rapidly and protests if I pick her up. She's going to be running soon I think!
  

• Talking - For a very long time Abri's only words were "dada" and "mama" and everything else was "duhduh". I was starting to wonder if she would take a long time to expand her spoken vocabulary. Then she started saying "Yang Yang". In the past couple of weeks she has added "ball" (bah), "yellow" (yehyo), "moo", and I can't remember what else... let me think about this some more.
  

• Signing - I bought Abri several sign language books recommended by my friend Kathy and she has learned quite a few of the signs. The first one she learned was for light and it was cute because she was SO EXCITED to make the sign and then have us affirm what she was communicating. She also knows the following words: bath, toothbrush, moon, more, dog, ball, and there may be some more that I can't remember right now. She also made up her own sign for "all done" which is actually a little shrug with her hands up. She's also been doing this little thing where she hugs one arm with the other and sort of pats it which I think her niece Emily may have taught her, or perhaps Emily is the person she first did this with. It's the equivalent of blowing a kiss only a hug. That also happens to be the baby sign for "love" so I guess she just really wanted us to know that she loves us.

• Climbing - this is my least favorite development! This girl LOVES to climb. She can get from the floor to the top of our dining table in just a few seconds. There have been many instances where I'll turn away for a brief moment and turn around to find her on the table or if the chairs are pushed under the table she'll be wedged in there.
  

• Stairs - Stairs are her passion. She likes to walk up and down them fully upright and especially loves holding the handrail. She needs my help but I can only handle it for a few minutes, in part because it's tedious and also because it's rather precarious and I'm afraid she'll hurt herself even with my help.
  

• Imitating - She is imitating us more and more and of course it is so adorable. One of the best examples is our household mantra, "Let's Go Hawks!" We started chanting it during an Iowa game a few weeks ago and now she does it all the time. Of course she can't actually say the words so she just makes sounds in the that rhythm and hits her hands on her thighs. Yesterday she picked up a plastic cup with the Hawkeye logo/colors and she started chanting. We didn't even realize that she associated it with the actual Hawkeyes. Pretty awesome. Clearly she's excited that the Hawks are having such a great football season (knock on wood!). She also has this game with Chris where he picks her up and she kicks over a yoga mat. Chris yells "hiya!" and now Abri can say it too. Also tonight when I was sweeping we gave her her own little brush and dustpan and she "helped" me clean.

• Socializing - For months now Abri constantly waves at just about everyone when we are out in public. This is especially true in the grocery store and on stroller rides downtown. She gets so many smiles and attention from everyone and seems to thoroughly enjoy it. One day I figured there must have been 30 or 40 people that smiled when she saw her and I thought about how cool it is that she can spread a little sunshine to random strangers.
  

Gosh, there is so much more but I need to wrap this up. I'm just amazed at how much she understands and how her memory is increasing. She also has quite a sense of humor and loves to offer up goofy smiles and funny forced giggles. Oh, and she loves to hug and kiss anyone she knows as well as all of her stuffed animals and even random objects like a spoon or a chair. I love that she is so affectionate. Let's hope that behavior sticks around as long as possible.

Here are some photos that I took when we were at the park yesterday. She loved walking around and was especially intrigued by a couple of guys who were tossing the football back and forth. We've been trying to savor these last warm fall days.

Girl Time in Madison

On Wednesday Abri and I set off just the two of us to visit my friend Andrea for a couple of days in Madison, WI. We had the best time! Friday night we went out for dinner at a great Thai place and then after I got Abri to sleep Andrea and I sat in her cozy living room by the fire and drank red wine and ate chocolate. We talked and talked. It was luxurious. It was just what I needed. I couldn't get the smile off of my face!

On Thursday after our breakfast of blueberry pancakes courtesy of Chef P. we went to the Children's Museum, then across the street for a delicious lunch of pizza and salad before we headed back to her place for a nap. Then late that afternoon we went shopping so that we could get Andrea a couple of tops/sweaters for date outfits. We also found Abri a Halloween costume. It is SO CUTE! I can't wait to get her all decked out. Here's a clue: it involves spots and some face paint. Also, it is not a "girl" costume. After our shopping trip Andrea made delicious potato leek soup and then after Abri went to bed we continued with the wine drinking and chocolate eating. I was worried this was going to become habit forming but it hasn't happened since I returned home.

On Friday we had another awesome home cooked breakfast and then Andrea was kind enough to babysit Abri so that I could go to Trader Joe's. I loaded up on various items for myself, a friend and my sister and even borrowed Andrea's cooler so that we could get some frozen/refrigerated items. Abri did great with Andrea, she was not the least bit concerned when I said goodbye, she just kept climbing the stairs with a brief wave in my general direction. (Going up and down the stairs was her favorite activity at Andrea's.) We were sad to go, especially since Andrea is such a great host. I felt pretty spoiled with her cooking and helping wrangle Abri. Fortunately Abri slept for more than two hours on the way home.

It would have been nice to have stayed for the Iowa - Wisconsin game but we had to get back for Emily's confirmation on Saturday. The important thing is that the Hawks won! Sweet!

I feel like I have so many things I've wanted to blog about and just haven't had time. I'm hoping to do a post soon about all of the various things Abri has been doing like walking, climbing, talking, cackling, etc. She's moving so fast these days!

Here are some photos from the Children's Museum in Madison.


Wouldn't you know she spent a solid chunk of time at the Children's Museum going up and down this little staircase? That's pretty much what she likes to do at home.