Hats, Hats, Hats

Allie has developed a new obsession with hats. Not just any hat. It has to be Nick's Cincinnati Reds fitted hat. She wears it all around the house and has decided that she just can not possibly eat unless she has that hat on her head. If only she loved her winter hat this much...

Contemplation

Allie has decided that the only thing she will eat at restaurants is shredded cheese. She is a total cheese-aholic. We get lots of funny looks from the waitresses when we order a cup of shredded cheese, but Allie loves it and makes for a cheap date. Here's a picture of her at brunch contemplating how she got that piece of cheese up her nose.

Peanut Butter = FAIL

In an effort to get Miss Picky to eat a wider variety of foods, I decided to give her peanut butter to dip her apples in. This is how that ended:

She was picking up globs of peanut butter with her hands and shoving it in her mouth, but at least she was eating it!

Lesson learned. When serving peanut butter to a toddler, make sure it is attached to something. They are not capable of dipping apples in it and eating them neatly.

Is There Such Thing As 4 Peas in a Pod?

Allie and the boys are definitely 4 peas in a pod. They love spending time together and I love watching them interact more and more as they get older. I think we've got a lot of fun, crazy years ahead of us with these 4!

Watching Elmo together after church.

Happy Valentine's Day!

We hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's Day with the ones you love!

She'll be very upset if you won't be her valentine!

Great-Aunt Mary Ellen's Sweater

I opened the mailbox the other day to be greeted by a package for Allie from my Aunt Mary Ellen. Inside the package was the most adorable little red sweater that she knitted just for Allie. I was in total awe of the quality and cuteness of the sweater. As soon as Allie woke up from her nap, I changed her clothes so she could wear the sweater right then. Thank you Aunt Mary Ellen! I absolutely love the sweater and Allie does too!

The Window Sill

On Thursdays, Allie and I take her cousin Carson to his physical therapy appointment. We play in the waiting room while Carson does his thing. Every week, Allie finds this small window sill near the door. She loves to sit there and eat snacks or play with her toys. It's her special little spot for some reason. Here's a picture of her enjoying her special spot.

Another Playdate

Allie and I attended another play date at Jumpin' Joeys recently to celebrate her friend Lillian getting her hip dysplasia spica cast off. It was a great time with many friends and a wonderful thing to celebrate! Allie had a blast. She loves running around, throwing the balls and climbing on all of the mats. I wish there was a similar place closer to our house so she could burn off some of her energy more often!

Jackpot!

In order to change Allie's sheets, I have to pull her bed out from the wall. After doing so, I finally solved the recent case of the missing binkies. Apparently Allie likes to hide her binkies between her crib and the wall. When I moved the crib, I found 8-10 binkies back there. Allie was in heaven with all of the binkies! She picked them up and carried them all around for the rest of the evening. What can I say, she's easily amused.

Happy 3rd Birthday Izzy!

We headed to Chuck E Cheese to celebrate our beautiful Goddaughter, Izzy's, 3rd Birthday! We had a great time but that place is total chaos. I don't know how my parents took us to Chuck E Cheese as often as they did without going insane. It was cute to see the kids hanging out together and enjoying themselves and Izzy seemed to have a great birthday so it was totally worth it! Happy 3rd Birthday Izzy! We love you!

I'm sure she'll actually be driving before I know it!

Playing another game.

NOT a fan of the swing ride.

Enjoying some food with the other party guests.

The beautiful birthday girl!

Blowing out her candles.

Allie enjoying some of the birthday cake.

Allie enjoyed the show...from a safe distance.

Driving the car with Chuck E Cheese!

Hanging out with the boys during one of the shows.

Dancing Queen

Allie LOVES to dance. She dances to commercials, in the car and even at stores that play music over the loudspeaker. The genre of the music doesn't seem to matter. She just dances away and then claps and yells, "YAY!" at the end of the song.

I took her to one of Loren's Show Choir competitions recently. The child was in heaven! There was music and dancing...what more could a girl ask for? She danced during the performance and even danced in the lobby when they re-played the performances on a television. We have no idea where she gets her rhythm being that Nick and I are both horrible dancers.

Cheese!

Allie's top teeth are growing in kind of crazy. Her front two teeth don't appear to be descending completely leaving her other top teeth much longer. It looks kind of funky but adorable at the same time. She's at that age where she does big cheesy grins too. She kind of tilts her head back, opens her mouth very wide and says, "Cheeeeeeeesssssssseeeee." She's such a ham.

Caught red-handed trying to hide Daddy's phone in her Dora car. She loves this car and rides it all over the house. Unfortunately, she also loves to hide things in it. Normally I don't mind but I've found several cups of milk in there that are disgusting! Now, it's the first place I look when I can't find something.

SNOW!

We finally got a decent snow fall back in January. Nick and I decided that we should take Allie out to experience it. We bundled her up and headed outside. Lets just say she was not.a.fan. She cried and cried at first. The fact that she fell over and couldn't get back up probably didn't help. She finally warmed up to the idea and seemed to enjoy herself a little bit. We were slightly un-prepared and didn't have a sled so we decided to improvise with the pink car instead. A few runs down the hill on the side of our house and she was a much happier camper. She even cracked a few smiles!

We were having a great time right up until I suggested we make snow angels. Mark that idea down as a big Mommy FAIL. She cried the whole time, ending our fun times in the snow. Oh well, maybe next year!