A rainy day

always calls for a tent
and a tea party and Daddy's yummy pizza! We gave Alison some extra dough and told her she could play with it. Before I knew it she was eating it and saying, "Daddy's pizza YUMMY!"I heard a lot today, "Mommy, come in" and a lot of, "Milo, out!". Alison did not like Milo joining the tea party, but Milo thought we made a cave just for him. Alison also got really upset at Milo at dinner when he was in her chair. She started throwing a little fit saying, "Milo, my chair!". I've never met a child who argues with cats over chairs.

Little Miss Personality

This afternoon Alison was coloring and when she jumped off her chair for a moment Smoochie quickly stole her chair. She hollered, "Mom! Smoochie's coloring!" I felt like I had 2 toddlers fighting over the crayons. She jumped back in the chair and neither was going to give it up.

In the last 2 years of Alison's life, there have been distinct days where we have been able to say that she changed. I would say that today was one of them. Today was the first time that Alison somewhat had a conversation with me. Usually when I ask her a question she just repeats the last word I say. Last week she started nodding her head if the answer was yes and today she actually answered my question! We were leaving the Y and I asked her if she had fun. I got a nod. Then I asked her what she did. She said, "I play with kids." It was pretty amazing. I asked her what she played and she said something about Minnie Mouse and horses and then said,"I play babies". It was really refreshing to have a conversation with her!

Trip to Colorado

We just got home from an awesome trip to Colorado. We took too many picture to put them all on this post so I'm going to put them in the slide show on the right. Ben posted all of them here, and Kent took some amazing photos that you can see here.

The first video is some clips I put together from the trip and the second is from the hay ride. We left Virginia Tuesday morning at 4:45am, and as I predicted Alison was wide awake from that moment on. She did awesome the whole way there and I have to say the travel magnadoodle was the best thing I've ever purchased. We went to Ben's aunt and uncle's house in Denver when we first arrived and then followed them up to Estes Park. Ben's grandparents rented 2 houses and invited the whole family to come out. We were thankful for the invitation and the opportunity to see family. Ben actually met several of his cousins for the first time and to our benefit they are young and were able to play with Alison. Baby Schuler is only 6 months old and Alison fell completely in love with him. She always wanted to hold him and give him hugs and kisses. We spent the week hiking and hanging out with family.

Ben's aunt let us borrow a hiking pack that Alison could ride in. One morning we took Alison to a kid friendly hike that was pretty flat so she could actually walk. She only made it a short ways before a chipmunk ran straight towards her and scared her, and she quickly wanted back in the pack. A big group of us also went on a hay ride. Ben and I were excited to see that Alison enjoyed being around the horses. A year ago when we took her out to see my dad's horses she was petrified. We stopped halfway on the ride and roasted some marshmellows-Alison's first! One bite and she was done, but that just left more for me! I could have spent 3 more weeks hiking and being in the mountains. I certainly was not ready to come home, but I suppose no one is ever really ready to come home from vacation.

Happy 4th!

We didn't chance keeping Alison up late to see fireworks we were pretty sure she would be scared of, so we just stayed home and relaxed this 4th of July. We were able to see the Smithfield firework show from our driveway so Ben and I watched a little. I actually really enjoyed this 4th, much better than previous years. The only fireworks I heard or saw were from the town show, opposed to previous years when it sounded like we lived in a war zone the entire week before the 4th.Alison's personality is growing by the day and she is constantly making me laugh. This morning I was loading up some dishes in the dishwasher and she ran to grab her potty, brought it into the kitchen, plopped it down in front of the sink, got the sponge wet and started wiping down the counters. She's always saying, "help please" and I pray that her desire to help continues throughout her life.

We're heading to Colorado on Tuesday to vacation with most of Ben's family. I'm excited that we get to see so much family this month, but am somewhat dreading the travel. We leave for the airport Tuesday morning at 4:45 and knowing Alison, she won't sleep much once we wake her up. I have some surprise treats ready for the trip and am praying that they are super entertaining!

Poppy came to visit

Buttoning Poppy's shirt
Rick was able to spend some time with us, en route for business. We're thankful for any time we can get. I'm also thankful that Alison warms up quickly to family she hasn't seen for awhile. Poor Rick had a torn muscle in his back and was in a lot of pain, but it didn't stop him from playing with Alison and holding her every time she said, "up please".
We went to the Crab Shack for dinner last night and Alison discovered a love for ranch dressing. Poppy scored major points with Alison when he started feeding the birds and ducks. Ben and I got nervous when the birds starting swarming right in front of Alison and she started leaning further out the window. I guess that's what grandparents are for-to do the things parents wouldn't dare. We went to the beach to feed the ducks after dinner. Alison loved getting to see the birds up close and personal.
This morning we went to breakfast at the Bakery where Alison was well fed. Then we walked around downtown and toured the museum.
After we dropped Rick off at the airport we headed to the beach. Ben was finally able to use his body board and Alison actually played in the sand.
After a long morning of fun, Alison didn't even make it back to the car before crashing.

The best surprise ever!!!

Ben was supposed to get home from his 2 week trip in Florida right about now. I had this morning all planned out. I was going to unload the dishwasher, clean the sink, vacuum our bedroom, go to the Y, clean up and then he would be here! Last night I was laying in bed running over my morning schedule in my head when Ben called. He had told me that he was going to leave straight from school at 5:00, drive to South Carolina and spend the night and then finish the drive in the morning. He also told me that he'd call when he stopped (because I'm a worry wort and wanted to make sure he was safe), so I knew that's why he was calling late last night. I said, "So where'd you end up stopping?" and he said, "Why don't you come open the front door and find out?" I ran to the door to find him standing in the dark...man, he got me good! It truly was the best surprise ever.
We both went to get Alison this morning when she woke up. Ben was super anxious to see her and I couldn't wait to see the reaction on her face. Her reaction was quite opposite what I had envisioned. She was crying pretty hard and wasn't stopping when we came in her room. Instead of a smile she had tears rolling down her cheeks. Ben quickly found that her mouth was bleeding. Somehow she tore the muscle in between her front teeth. Our pediatrician warned us that this might happen because Alison's is much thicker than normal. In most cases it eventually has to be cut, but maybe whatever happened in her crib will prevent her from ever having that happen.
My plans for the morning weren't what I had planned, but they turned out to be far better. We found out that downtown Smithfield was having it's Olden Days weekend so we went to check it out. There were old cars lining the streets, people dressed up in costumes, horses pulling carriages and a Paula Deen look-a-like contest. Pair that up with the Farmer's Market and you have one fun morning.I also painted Alison's toes for the first time this morning. I thought Ben wouldn't want me to, but when Alison asked for her toes to be pretty too, he said it was okay. She sat more still than I thought she would and is so proud of her pretty toes.Last week Alison and I met Sarah, her little girl Maddie and baby Jon and the park. One good thing that has come from Alison picking up the Barney song is that she will now give hugs to her friends. The girls had a blast playing together and started calling eachother Madison. We thought it was pretty creative. Maybe life would be so much more simple if we all started combining names.