pictures and stuff

Loves her new flip flops

the outfit for the flip flops

here's the outfit we need to make flip flops for

Great Grandma Loeb & Abbie

Uncle Stan & Abbie checking out the fairy house

this is the fairy house, see the green, that's the roof

here's the hammock Abbie fell in love with, nice shot for a kid

this is the fairy school

another pretty picture Abbie took

Happy Abbie

Friends she made at Solstice in the hammock she loved

Abbie thought her lunch was beautiful, and found she loves brie

Abbie thought Grandpa's dinner was beautiful, it was really yummy too

she was pooped after a party

got feet

here are Abbie's new flip flops. I love them. We are going to make some pink/green/yellow ones to go with an outfit Grandma got her. These are to go with her 4th of July outfit, yea, I know obvious right ;) anyway. I love them.

we are spending the week in STL after spending the weekend in Ohio. I'm doing another blog post in a sec with pictures.

by the way, do you have feet or know a girl who has feet who would love these flip flops? what would you pay for them? I'm just curious?

tuesdaycakes

Not sure if the lovemyabbie people all read the cup cake blog, but just incase you are interested. Todays cupcake was great.
http://www.tuesdaycakes.blogspot.com

what Abbie did this morning

I got this game for Abbie
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/images/B00000K3XI/sr=8-1/qid=1244152892/ref=dp_image_text_0?ie=UTF8&n=165793011&s=toys-and-games&qid=1244152892&sr=8-1

She loved it. I thought it would be something I'd have to help her with, but I got her started and backed off. She got through 21 of the cards without much help really and was disappointed when we had to put it away. I'm always amazed to watch her solve puzzles, she LOVES them and she's really good at them. Letters not always so much, but puzzles are like heaven for her. Sort of the opposite of me, so that's probably why I'm so impressed.

Anyway, looking for a good gift, this is perfect. Mighty Mind is what it's called and like I said she played until I made her stop. She also loves
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000NNLNW8/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=3201567235&ref=pd_sl_45g5lvvb93_e

what I did this afternoon

One of my aunts gave me a box full of fabric, most of it Mary Engelbreit. I love Mary Engelbriet, I have since the 80's, worked for her in high school and some days I wish my house looked like one of her lovely, lovely drawings.

So anyway, I've got some blocks now what to do with them. I'm thinking they should have red material, but was also thinking the soft green from that chair in the last shot would be nice. It needs more blocks I know if I want it to be a full quilt. I have almost the same shade of yellow on the walls in the computer room, well on 2 of them anyway. It would be pretty as a wall hanging in there also, or slightly bigger draped on the futon, who knows. any suggestions? anyone?

thank you

A year ago today we were in Washington DC. Wonderful vacation, wonderful wedding, wonderful time. However the most memorable part of my trip was the visit to Arlington Cemetery. This is the most memorable image for me.

The crisp uniforms, the polished shoe, the spotless rifle, the closeness of the soldiers, the solid of the stone, the path walked over and over and over and over, it just all took my breath away, but more why they were there, who they were, what they were honoring, the whole thing.

To all those who have served, are serving or will serve, thank you.

sewing

Did your mom or grandma or anyone you love ever sew you something? A blanket, halloween costume, outfit, head band ANYTHING? Get a sewing machine, buy one, borrow one, steal one and sew something yourself. Figure it out, stick with it, take the time. You'll find as you are cutting and stitching and ripping seams and resewing and trimming threads just exactly how much they cared for you. You will know even more how much they cared if you wait until you have EXACTLY the amount of time left you need to finish the project and then subtract 10%. Oh, and make sure that just as you are starting to sew that you realize there was one thing you had to have that you completely forgot and the store is 20 min away and closes in 15 RUN!!!

I made Abbie a dress last night, not the first probably not the last, but ever time I sew her something I am reminded of all the care and love that went into every stitch of anything that was ever made for me.

Thanks mom.

Pictures to come...

heard in the car

as I'm loading up and getting out of the garage etc...

Abbie: hmmmmmm.......
me: silence.
Abbie: mommy, I said hmmmmmmmmmmm...............
me: oh, ok.
Abbie: mommy, I said hmmm, that means I'm thinking of something. when I say hmmmm, you say whatcha thinking about Abbie.
Abbie: hmmmmmmmmmm...............
me: Abbie, whatcha thinking about?
Abbie: I can't tell you mommy, it's a secret just for me.

all I can say is WOW.

dentist=disaster

At least it did today. Abbie's first dentist visit. She was excited, we didn't make a big deal about it, didn't talk too much about it. We just said they would take some pictures with a special machine, that they would clean her teeth and that might tickle and then the dentist would touch them with a pointy thing and she wouldn't feel it at all. MAJOR MELT DOWN. I have no idea why, there were no shots involved at all. The dentist barely could look in there and finally said she looks good, I'm sure her teeth are fine, is this the form you need signed. You'd think she had a root canal. Her face was all red and blotchy, the little paper bib was SOAKED from tears. So we let the dentist sign the paper and left. No sticker, not treat from the box nada. And in the car she said ok, they can tickle my teeth now mommy. HA!

Abbie & Maddie

We've had my mom's dog the last couple of weeks. Dog sitting has been interesting. I think my allergies are ready for the dog to go home, but my daughter is not. She loves having Maddie for so many different reasons. She has someone to boss around, she has someone to play outside with her, she has someone to snuggle on the floor with, she has someone to eat what she drops, she calls Maddie her sister so she's not an only child and I think it makes her feel like a grown up. I really think I'm allergic to dogs. Who knew, I grew up with a dog assuming the allergies were from crud in the air not the fluffy guy in the kitchen.

Anyway, the dog is headed home this weekend. Abbie said she will miss her but it's ok she's going home because she was stinking up her room last night. See.

easter goodness

Here we go

woa there's another one

look how many I found

I got them all except one

This is the one we didn't get. Grandma let Maddie keep it, it's not like we were getting it back and would we have wanted it?



Sorry there's no before pictures of her basket, but she made out good. Someone left the door to the dining room open at mom's and Abbie being the early bird that she is found it before we even realized she was up. Much squealing and giggling.

Her funny Easter story. I signed up to bring hard boiled eggs to school for their party and kept talking about them getting to die eggs. After a day or so Abbie says "mommy, what means dieing eggs?" Apparently she thought they were going to KILL them. so I explained and she was much happier.

Oh, the dress, I made that. T-shirt and not quite a yard of material.

what it is :)

What it was...

an old hawaiian shirt rick put in the goodwill pile.

what it is...

a dress for Abbie

It's not perfect, but for something I made in a couple hours with no pattern it's a good start right?

Abbie Hugs

So, no matter what else is going on an Abbie hug makes it all better. Things are crazy lately, no job for me, Rick's job is rocky because it's the same industry I came from (he's feeling secure, but still), every time we turn on the tv there's another story about the recession & job loss, car issues, house issues, kid issues. and then... there's Abbie, sassy as always she can ALWAYS make me laugh (much to her chagrin) and when it's really bad I say "can I have a hug" and she always says "sure mommy" She never says hang on while I finish this row, or let me finish loading the dish washer or any of that stuff, just "sure mommy" and she never asks what's wrong or if every thing's ok. Just squeezes with all her might.

Every day I wonder what I did that God thought to give her to me, but every day I'm so thankful she's mine.

I had a couple friends over last night, we had to run an errand (ok we had to go find chocolate vodka, I'm so embarrassed that I was in a liquor store with her, such a south city hoosier I am) anyway, in the car we were all laughing and goofing around and she piped up something. I'm not sure what she said, but I saw her face in my mirror and she was just pretending she knew what we were talking about and wanted to throw something in the conversation. I CRACKED UP. She's so funny and grown up sometimes and other times she's just that 4 year old little girl. At some point I said what ever to someone and she doesn't believe it's a good word, so she scolded me in the car with my friends. It was so funny listening to her be me, she sounded JUST like me. Sometimes it's nice to hear myself coming out of my mouth, know she's listening and learning from me, other times I just want to roll over and die realizing she's listening to EVERYTHING.


****if you aren't from St. Louis, you may not know hoosier except as in Indiana Hoosier, well where I come from it's not a good thing, but I'm from south city and there's a little hoosier in all of us, at least we had shoes on the baby in the liquor store :)

clothes

Most mornings Abbie picks her own outfits. Sometimes she is TOTALLY coordinated and cute, others looks like the light was off when she picked. However, she always looks beautiful, at least her mamma thinks so. Here's today's outfit.

Here's one with the shoes.

Abbie stuff

I haven't been posting much about Abbie. She's still wonderful, but some how she's turned into a 17 year old in a 3 year olds body. Not sure how to deal with that, but we are doing our best. I figure she'll be a lawyer with the way she negotiates things, like bed time, dinner, what clothes to wear and how flip flops are perfectly acceptable in single digit weather. It's keeping us on our toes that's for DANG sure. And her responses to us, BLOW ME AWAY. She was playing music this weekend at the market, and it was chilly, the guys playing had coats, some had hats and scarves, I asked her if she wanted her coat, at least the hood on her head and the rest just hanging. I got the EYE ROLL of all time, I don't think even I can roll my eyes like that without whiplash. So she played in just her dress, see...

That's charile with the coat, scarf, hat AND gloves. Even Grandpa has a coat and hat on. Abbie would have bare feet if I'd let her. Least she had fun right? Last year she played once, osh kosh over alls and bare feet. Some lady kept saying "look that baby got no shoes" I wanted to yell out "she does, honest there are $50 shoes from stride rite in the stroller right here next to her see if you can get her to wear them"

have a great afternoon.

Abbie says

I don't buy pop tarts, don't really like them, didn't grow up eating them. My daughter, however, thinks they are gold. She saw someone eating them Friday night and I caved and bought a box on the way home.
Saturday I gave her one, told her if she had it in the morning she couldn't have one until the next day, ok mom she says that's fine. On with the pop tart eating

ten minutes later
Abbie- ok, I'm ready for another pop tart
me- remember I said if you have one now no more until tomorrow
Abbie- ugh!
10 more minutes
Abbie- can I have another pop tart
me- remember what I said about pop tarts
Abbie- ugh, I was hoping you would forget by now.

Another funny.
Abbie asked me to make her some jewelry, I said ok let's get out the beads. We picked beads, we picked the clasp, we got the string. What should we make I say, a bracelet for my foot waist she says. She either didn't know the word ankle or just didn't think of ankle. I think foot waist sounds better anyway.

52 cupcakes

or at least that's the goal. Everyone and their cousin has a cupcake blog. I don't know that I'll start a blog, but I'm going to try to do a new flavor every week. This week, I started with ginger bread cup cakes with a lemon filling. Filling done and cooling on the counter, cupcakes baking in the oven. The batter tastes remarkably like the molasses cookies Rick loves. I just wanted to add, I finshed, filled and tasted the cupcakes. I had no idea how yummy lemon & gingerbread could be! Wow!

Baking, any cooking really, relaxes me, I have something to show for it when I'm done. We've been making bread, bagels, pasta, soup from scratch, that's all boring regular eat every day stuff. The cupcakes will be "special" no plain vanilla or boring chocolate, well unless there's a fancy topping or filling.

While making cupcakes today I realized perhaps the measuring stuff I have needs new friends. We have 2 sets of measuring cups, one was Rick's grandma's. They are the old metal ones with the size stamped into the bottom. The other set of cups, pink for the cure, kitchen aid I think. I also have a measuring cup from Crate & Barrel. I think of my aunt every time I use it, she gave us a gift card when we got married and that was one of the things we brought home. I also have a measuring cup from pampered chef. The kind that you can measure peanut butter with and push it right out. I only have one set of measuring spoons, it matches the pink for the cure cups. My bowls need friends too I think. Maybe none of it needs friends, maybe I need to be organized, but in 51 flavors I bet I'll know.

What's your favorite cupcake recipe/flavor? What's your favorite kitchen tool?

books, books, books

I remember when I was little falling asleep with a book in my hand. In the car I would read in the dark catching as many words as I could between street lights and when we ran out of street lights I'd be so let down. I remember my first book light, I could read all the way to where ever. I LOVED READING. I still do. I can remember feeling the wind blow through my hair as I stood on a prairie, if only in a book. I remember solving the mystery before the end. Choose your own adventures, I always tried to go back and find that same path, never could. Even now I read as much and when I can. Last week I read an entire book in a day. I'm a quick reader. The book last week, it helped that Abbie loves the library and books as much as I do.
Bed time is 8:00, we do our best to stick to that, but most nights if you check on her close to 10:00 she's still reading. I know she can't read, but she's reading a tall stack of books. She'll just about clear off her shelf if you let her. If she's read a story more than once she remembers it and will tell it to her animals. Kids books, board books, toddler books, we read her Alice in Wonderland, and now we are working on Gullivers Travels. When we were reading Alice she decided her name should be Alice, I'm hoping she doesn't as us to call her Gulliver though.
I hope it opens as many memories for her as it does me. I hope she can find the same sense of escape in a book as I do. I don't have enough breath to read her enough stories to make her tired of listening, I just don't think there are that many. Her new favorite is storynory.com I'm not sure if I should feel guilty about it or not. Our ipod is full of someone else taking Abbie to all these magical places, stories without pictures but I know she's making the pictures in her head. Sometimes she'll even tell me one of the stories. After she's in bed and tucked in, we've read her our stories she asks for the ipod. Sometimes I go in and we listen together and for one brief moment our day we are both in some magical other world together. I hope she's never too old to listen with me.

today we made bagels

Abbie loves to cook. She likes measuring and cutting and mixing and mashing the dough as she says. Today we made bagels, cranberry walnut whole wheat bagels. YUM. Those are my favorite kind at panera, well they are white there, but you know. We also made Valentines for her friends. Simple ones that you could tell Abbie made pretty much on her own, she even wrote her name on the backs of all 18 of them.

The hardest part of this whole mess (me being out of work) is that I FINALLY have the chance to spend some time with Abbie and take care of my family & house and myself and is causing quite the conflict in my head. One day I'm feeling guilty that I'm not earning real money, the next I'm thrilled to be able to move slowly and do the morning at Abbie's pace. Head to story time, bake with her, read with her, color with her, have dinner ready when Rick gets home, laundry done and all the rest of the things that go along with staying home. Today Abbie brought me her piggy bank full of coins and said here mommy you can use this instead of a new job. Every night when I head to bed and pull back the covers she's hidden a different animal to keep me company when I sleep. I'm so fortunate to have this time to spend with her and I'm doing my best to remind myself of that.

snow day and stuff

so mostly pictures. I took Abbie to the park one day lats week. I think she had fun.

and I made this today while she's napping. A tote for my knitting needles/crochet hooks. It folds over and rolls up. I'd seen something similar in a store for 30 or 40 bucks and it wouldn't hold so many needles!