Daddy Daughter Day

Abby has been to my office - heck she has been to my office more times than most people who don't work here have since she visited once a week in July and August.  She saw my office when I could not get to files from our recent move, and she came back and "helped" me with files when I could.  Abby knows where I work, though she is only two and can have no concept of what I do.

A few weeks back we think that Abby might have gotten the wrong idea about where I go when I leave the house every day.  You see, the three of us typically go fun places on weekends, but we also go to a lot of places over and over again.  We find a place we like and it becomes habit.  We did our best to get every dollar out of our pool membership, so Abby expected swimming a couple of times each week.

One Saturday Anny was not feeling very well and so I decided to grab Abby and get out of the house because it was an incredible afternoon, and the College Park AirFair 100 was going on - celebrating 100 years of aviation in College Park at the airport right around the corner!  Anny dropped us off so that I didn't have to deal with parking.  I took Abby, some cash, a bottle of water and a diaper in my pocket, and off we went!

There were all sorts of things to see - old planes and new ones, gilders and helicopters, an old car and lots and lots of people.  We walked around and saw some of the planes first, but it was blazing hot and there was no shade, so we made a dash for a covered tent.  They have just reconstructed a new Wright Flyer that will travel from city to city, so it was kind of neat to see that.

Because we got there after Abby's nap, we missed all of the really fancy stuff - the sky walkers and the maneuver displays and such.  I was a little bummed about missing the parachute jumpers, but I am not sure that Abby would have really understood how cool it was anyway, so I got over it.  I knew that Abby would get excited to see helicopters up close, and boy was I right!  We even got to go inside a Chinook that was parked for the day, which she then tried to imitate!





We also got to see a few of the choppers take off, which was jaw dropping for her - we stood right under the Montgomery County Police helicopter as it flew away. 

We also got to listen to live music and I introduced Abby to her very first ice cream cone!


The bottom line is that I took Abby somewhere by myself (and have done that a lot since then) and we had an incredible time - but Anny and I agree that we believe it has changed Abby's concept of what Daddy does every day.  It seems that she genuinely believes that I got to the airfield every day and watch helicopters and eat ice cream!

She Had the Strangest Dream...

It is my assumption that Abby had a bizarre dream last night.  That's the only explaination that I can come up with.  Here's my story...

Last night Anny went up to church for her month Women's Group gathering where they talk about boys and stuff.  (Not really, but that is what I say!)  That meant that Abby and I got to spend some quality time together playing and reading books and such. 

At bath time something happened, though I don't know what, that made her mood change from "this is fun" to "get me the hell out of this water or you'll pay!"  Nothing happened in the water, and I could not get her to tell me what hurt.  I'm guessing that she's just crazy. 

After getting her into her PJ's, through tears, we sat down for our daily dose of Signing Time on the DVR.  She cuddled really close for the first half, and I pried her off during the latter half to get some other things taken care of.  Part of getting her to sit on her own was to give her the famous Purple Hat.  It seems to be in every other picture on our Flickr Site because she wears it all the time.



I had to take the hat away before bed time, of course. That went over okay and with very little notice, really.

Then came 2:30 this morning. With everyone sound asleep, we were awoken to hear "PURPLE" being yelled from Abby's Room. Then "HAT!"  That was followed by "PURPLE HAT?!"  Anny got up and assured her that the purple hat was okay and that it was time for sleep, not hats. 

I am assuming that she was having some sort of dream about her beloved purple hat, but can't ask her what was going on because she has no clue it even happened!

When she got up at 5:15 and we went out for our breakfast time, she very quickly found her purple hat and they were united once again. 

Weird.

Apache!

Abby is always learning, and this morning she needed to release some energy. Is there any better way to do that than dancing? No. To that end, I taught her the Apache, to the song Apache by The Sugar Hill Gang.

I apologize for the shaky shot, but I was still prompting on when to do what.

Here's Abby:

Abby's Apache! from Anny and Rob on Vimeo.

Here's the "original" from The Fresh Prince of Bel Air:

Happy Halloween!

(Click on any photo to see a larger version)

At Abby's school yesterday they had a costume parade, and played with bubbles:


Here she is leading the charge for more fun!



I made a flower to go with the costume at dinner.  It did not last long once she figured out people were giving her food!


We only visited five or six houses, all of folks that we wanted to say "hi" to anyway.  In spite of that, she got a bag FULL of food!  Here she is checking out her haul!


Upon closer investigation, she dumped the bag and picked out a Reece's Peanut Butter Cup (my favorite, too).  We did NOT let her eat it right before bed time, I promise.  (And for the record, I didn't eat it either!)



Here is my favorite shot from the night. I like it for several reasons, but mostly because she was just so blissfully happy to dig into a big container of sugar. I'm sure she would have, if we let her.












Now the big question is whether or not to let her have some candy. She's had a few pieces of candy over her short life (Thanks Amy!) but typically chocolate winds her up. We'll probably have some with breakfast and keep it at that!

Happy Halloween!
(Or, at this point, All Saints Day!)

Me and My Shadow

Last week Abby noticed something on the wall.  I assumed that she found a dirty spot from a spill or a dog toy or something.  Instead, it was her own shadow!

She "followed" the shadow along the wall, and got a little concerned when she walked toward the hallway and it disappeared.  It was adorable!  I tried to get video of it, but as usual she stopped doing it when I was prepared for it!

Instead of posting such a cute video, here is a cute picture of both Abby and her shadow. 

Some Attention on Dad Labs!

Umm.... My daughter is going to be very unhappy with me one day. At least it is MY name mentioned, and not hers...

(Warning - very Poopy conversation. Both gross and funny. Do not watch while dining!)



Watch more hillarious parenting over at DadLabs.com!

MAMAMAMAMAMAMA

She's actually saying "Mama" at Anny these days. Dadada has been around for a while, and sometimes she even refers to me in the same manner, but often it's just babble. That's cool!

Anny is especially happy at the current "mamama" use. For several weeks the only time that "mamama" was uttered was in a crying fit. It sounded much like:

crywahcrymamamamacrywahcrymama

It would seem that Anny took this to mean that Abby associated "mama" with crying, and only crying. Not just minor I-fell-and-bumped-my-bottom crying, but the outright my-teeth-are-coming-in cry or I'm-so-tired-that-I-can-not-sleep cry or the popular the-dog-bit-my-toes crying. (that has not happened, for the record, but sometimes it would seem that the biting was taking place!)

I guess I can see how that would be distressing if I was the parent being cried about. I have to admit that the first couple of times I heard it I laughed out loud. It's funny, right? Seems that it is not as funny as I thought it was.

Now she has moved away from the scream "mamama" and is using it as regular babble and aimed at Anny too, so all is peaceful.

Trip to the Zoo!

We took a trip to the National Zoo on Saturday! We were supposed to meet up with other parents from our church, but it just did not work out right. Luckily our church intern, Erin, rode the metro with us, so we had that connection early on. We had misty rain in the morning, but after lunch the sun broke through and it became a wonderful day.

Abby was excited as soon as we walked in to Amazonia, the zoo's indoor rainforest. When you walk in you are greeted immediately with a pond of rays and other fish. We let her stand and look at them while we waited for others to join us, and she just stared in amazement. Then we moved over to the massive tanks, with all sorts of large fish and turtles. Upstairs you can see into the tanks from a different perspective, which is cool. They also have animals like monkeys and birds that roam free. It was early in the day and we did not see any monkeys and only a few birds.

She was okay with that, since she reall just wanted to see more of the fish. Here she is looking down on the ray-pond:

She fell asleep shortly thereafter. No, seriously. We had a nice time seeing the elephants, hippos, apes, big cats and other various animals. (some pictures of animals are HERE, but I didn't want to overcrowd Abby's site with animal pics) We even had lunch without the gabbing and cuteness of Abby. When she is tired and in her ErgoBaby she can sleep like a champ. I really should post about the greatness that is the ErgoBaby. Soon, my friends.

So, when she finally woke up we were all the way back up to the top of the zoo. If you've never been to the National Zoo you don't know of the slope. It's tedious. We managed, mostly by stopping to stare at animals just a little longer than we probably would have.

She was awake to see the Sloth Bear. She was amazed to see it go back and forth, right in front of her! She was standing, hands and face on the glass, for the longest time. Very cute.

I tried to get her to look at the bear through the blue binoculars (?). She liked playing with them, but did not understand to look through them.

There is a cute bronze statue of a Giant Panda. We sat Abby there for some picture time and she loved it! There's one where it looks like she's trying to escape, and another that looks like she's being tickled. I called this one "One Thinker, One Stinker."

From May 2008

It was a great day, and I wish that I had not messed things up as far as coordination. We'll be going to the Baltimore Zoo sometime, and hopefully back to DC this summer.

Scared of the "New Guy" in the House

Today Anny and I cut my hair while Abby was napping. She went to sleep and daddy had a thick head of hair, woke up to buzzed-down daddy.

When she woked up from her nap, I went to pick her up. She was wailing, not just the normal wimpery cry. I got her to the chair to comfort her a bit, and she wailed even louder. I thought maybe she was wet, but that was not it. She had just eaten before her nap, so hunger was not the issue. Anny came to see if she could be helpful, and Abby got quiet immediately.

She was scared of me. She saw me as a stranger in the house, not to be trusted. Not a good feeling for either of us, I can promise you that. I'm used to hearing her cry, she is a baby after all. That scream of terror, though. Wow.

We calmed her down and within a few minutes she was okay with hbeing around me again. Phew!

For your fun, here is a picture from earlier today. She is playing with a duck that sings about wanting to be the Easter Bunny. It's silly and cute in person. You'll have to settle for a picture!

From March 2008