life with BIG GIRL abby.....

Thursday, September 22, 2011

This Summer

We did manage to find some silver linings to our often cloudy spring/summer....

We discovered that Abby loves to pick fresh strawberries:

Picking

Maybe more eating than picking...

Eating....

Eating...

I think you get the idea....

Let's go Mom!

More eating...

We did bring home a few without bites in them!

We also spent a lot of time at Marbles Kids Museum:

Making pizza

Putting away the groceries

Bathing the puppies

And having a picnic...We have learned that life is too short. Sometimes you've got to start with the cheesey poofs!

Yum!

Eating a PB&J next

Playing in the water

We also started a plot in the community garden. We planted our plants and then because of so much travelling, we had to give it back. But our plot helped the garden to donate more than 2 tons of food to the Wake County food bank. So I guess it wasn't for nothing!

My big girl helper

Watering the plants

Getting good and dirty

We spent some quality time as a family:

Hanging with daddy

And celebrated Isaiah's birthday

the birthday boy in the shade

Opening presents after the Easter egg hunt

Hanging with Mommy

We also managed to take a quick trip to ATL to surprise Sister for her birthday!

Greg and his girls

Sweet Sisters

Abby and Jess Jess

Love this

We also had some interesting slumber parties...

Can the stroller sleep with me mom?

(I left her in my room while I ran to get her PJs and came back to this!)

We went to the park and fed the ducks:

Cute girl

Throw the bread Abby - don't eat it!

Abby and Daddy

Ducks

We played with Olivia a lot:

Play-doh time!

Puzzles!

Working together

And finally we found random black marks on our noses...

still have no idea where this came from...

So yes, we had a rough spring and summer. But as you can see, life does go on...

And we will move forward and continue to smile....

Monday, September 19, 2011

Moving forward....

Dear Abby,

This spring and summer have really been awful. For awhile I didn't even know if I would come back to this blog. I guess I just wasn't in a good place to be happy and joyful and I didn't want to fake it.

Years from now I hope this blog becomes like your baby book. Where you look up things you did and see yourself as you grow. So in order to give you a full picture, I've included the not so happy things. Life is sometimes about loss. And between July 22, 2010 and July 11, 2011 I feel like I have lost a lot.

Granddaddy went to heaven in July of 2010 and Grandmama followed him in May this year. She was ready to go and although I miss her very much, it almost seemed right for her to leave us to join him. In a way, life is supposed to be about growing old, living life and then letting go to go to heaven. It's sad of course, but we prepare for it.

But when someone leaves at 32, it's hard to wrap your head around it. And that's what has happened to my Beavis. Your Auntie Brandice left this world on July 11, 2011. Her cancer came back in December and it almost feels like the fight was lost before we even got started. She's gone and I'm heartbroken. You're going to grow up and there will be times where you ask me why something happened. And you're going to want me to help you make sense of something. And I guess I'm writing this to say that life happens. And it's not fair. And there are good people that get the short end of the stick and there are horrible people that seem to be continuously rewarded. There's no sense to it. There's no sense to Brandice leaving.

And that's why this summer has been so hard...Everyone goes back to living and yet I feel like everything should stop. How can that lady be grocery shopping so carelessly when Brandice's favorite song is clearly playing in the background? How could everyone go through the day on 9/9 and not realize it's supposed to be Beavis' 33rd birthday? Why doesn't anyone at work ask me how I'm doing anymore? The world continues to move forward. And I feel left behind....

So that's why I haven't posted. There have been wonderful things happening in your life that I am so very proud of. You are growing and becoming such a precious little girl. Your smile brightens my heart even on the darkest days.

I miss Beavis...I imagine that I will spend the rest of my life telling you the funny stories of me and Beavis and her spirit will live on.

Just be patient with me as I try to figure out how to keep moving forward...

I love you,
Mommy

Thursday, April 28, 2011

First "Real" Haircut

Abby had her first "real" haircut. This actually happened on February 20th but it's taken awhile for me to post!

I call this her first real haircut but if you count the times that Mommy has butchered her hair, it's really haircut #3. I think I've probably lopped off about 2" total so you can imagine how pretty her hair would have been if I just left it alone! Luckily, I am letting the professionals do the cutting from now on!

What is going on?!