Cousin Love!

Addy is LOVING being a big cousin! She calls Maximus "Maa" and believes he is her baby. She loves to hold him and kiss him, and really loves to "help" feed him. Although sometimes she does feel as though needs to show Max who is boss, by going onto whoever's lap is holding him and working her way into his position...other than that, she really hasn't acted jealous of him or threatened at all. It's pretty amazing because she does act like that a lot with other kids. She must know that Max is here to stay and someone really special!!!

The other day, while Landon and I were in Lubbock and Grammy and Grampy had both babies, Grammy was changing Addy next to Max. Next thing she knew, she looked up and Addy was holding Max's hand. She loves him so much...it's so sweet!
















Here are a few more pictures of the two of them together...

Our little Bumblebee(s)!

So, because of the first birthday fiasco (refer to an earlier post), I had absolutely NO expectations for the next major event, Halloween. Actually that's not entirely true. I expected that Addy would not be into it at all and be completely frightened of everyone in their costumes. I thought this for two reasons. One, she absolutely freaks when one of us puts a hat on, and Two, I put a Blue's Clues on the other day called "Costume Party." Steve (who actually freaks me out during every episode) was wearing an alien costume. Addy said "No, No, No!" and just started wailing! It took a long time to convince her that Steve was not going to wear that when we started a different episode. In addition to this, she does not like wearing anything on her head or anything that might feel weird. All that to say, I was not entirely optimistic about our Halloween festivities. However, I was pleasantly surprised! When it was time to put on her costume I said, "Do you want to put on your pretty dress?" She got so excited and said, "Yeah!" We decided to not make her wear the headband with antennas, so my mom took pipe cleaner and put them on berrets so she had no idea that anything was weird on her head. At this point, I was just impressed that she was wearing her costume!

Then came the next tricky part. We bought Grinch a bumblebee costume as well and had tried it on him a few nights before. Addy just shook her head and said "No" when we put it on him. So this time (since I was determined to walk downtown Troutdale with both of them dressed as bees) I said, "Look, Grinch has a dress on too!" It worked! She thought that was so funny, and didn't seem to mind at all. So here we have our two little bees looking so stinking cute, but we now have to pass the third test... Walking downtown and seeing other people in costumes...maybe even with hats! Once again, she passed with flying colors! She took her little pumpkin "trick-or-treat" container and walked around getting candy. We would say, "Addy do you want more candy?" and she would nod and say, "Yeah!" at the same time. Then she would walk up to the people and stare into the candy container. They would tell her to take one and she would just look at me. "Mommy do it?" "Yeah." And off we would go to the next one. She loved it! And so did we. Needless to say, she and Grinch got a lot of attention for their matching outfits. They were so cute!

After that, we were off to the church carnival that Grammy worked so hard to put on. We were feeling pretty confident at this point that she would have a good time. I think it was a smart idea to have her walk around and get used to costumes first. Addy had a great time there too! I hardly saw her all night! She was going around to the game booths with different people, and everytime I looked over a new person was feeding her candy! Mommy really had to let go...it was Halloween! We are so proud of our little bumblebee and the little girl that she has become. She is such a joy and such a goof. It was a great night!

Funny Girl!

I just had to post some pictures of Addy being her usual silly self. She is such a goof, always trying to make us laugh! She knows exactly what will get the biggest reaction and she goes for it...Lately her favorite thing to do is a "cheesy smile" and if any of you have seen it, I don't think the image will leave you anytime soon. Is it cute? Umm, I haven't decided yet but it definitely is hilarious! It's like so freaky looking that it's almost cute...you know, a face only a mother could love! She is such a joy, my mouth literally hurts by the end of the day because I have been laughing and smiling so much. Of course with this personality comes an extremely busy and opinionated little girl, but if any of you knew me as a child you know that I had it coming!!! She is completely exhausting at times, but always entertaining! Lately I feel as though she is just my best friend, by my side constantly and always having fun. I have loved every stage of her life for different reasons, but right now is so much fun because we are able to communicate so much and we can understand each other in ways that no one else would be able to (or in words that no one else would know!). I know it will just get more fun as she learns to talk more, but I love that she is still kind-of my baby at the same time. I have the best of both worlds...Can you tell I'm feeling pretty happy and in love? And don't even get me started on my husband...you want to be able to keep dinner down, right? =)

Addy (Sporty Spice) Lynn

So, Addy has now attended two major sporting events and loved both of them! The first of these was a Mariners game in Seattle. Daddy was extremely excited about the sporting event itself, I was excited about dressing Addy in a Mariners sweatshirt and eating garlic fries, and Addy was more excited about playing in the "Kids Zone" then anything else...so we all had our reasons for excitement! It was a great way to end the summer, being outside watching a baseball game.

The second awesome event was the Blazer Fan Night at the Rose Garden. This was a free event where fans could watch the Blazers scrimmage each other and hear them talk about the season. When we walked up to the Rose Garden there were about a million people (no exaggeration) pushing each other into the place. We weren't quite sure why people were going so crazy, but as we finally got inside we saw that the Blazers themselves were greeting the fans! Well, Landon about died right there on the spot and decided that the absolute coolest thing that could ever happen would be to have Addy's picture taken with one of them. We pushed our way over toward Jarryd Bayless and I got my camera ready. There were security people pushing the fans on through so that we didn't slow the crowd down, but I just knew that as soon as they saw my adorable Addy they would stop everyone and let us take a picture. Well, not so much, but I managed to yell to Jar (that's what I call him now), "How about a picture with the baby?" All this happened while Landon ran up to him and held Addy out and...snap! We got an awesome picture with our new best friend!

(I do have to point out that I thought I was supposed to take a picture of all three of them, Jar, Addy, and Landon, but Landon apparently thought I was just taking it of Jar and Addy. The picture of Landon looked a bit too similar to some of his taken around his 6th grade year so he forced me to cut him out...=( ).

Anyway, we had a great time the rest of the night watching our Blazers play. They were awesome and we are pretty sure that Addy is a huge fan now.

Oh, we also managed to snap a shot of Greg Oden, even though his bodyguard was trying his best to get us out of the way...you can't stop the Lynns and our Blaze Craze!!!!

Success!!!!

Well, it has been a while since my last blog. Our computer was in the shop for the last month or so, so I have a lot to catch up on! We successfully got family pictures taken!!! We decided to go to Picture People in Clackamas so that Addy could play in the kids area for a while before entering the battlefield... She was still not 100% excited about having a stranger point a camera at her, but she did so much better than last time and we actually came out of this with something to show for it! Our original plan was to have some individual pictures taken of her in addition to the family pics, but by the time we were done with those we thought is was better not to push it! Here are a few more pictures:

Rookie Mistake

Ok, so I'm a first-time mom. And my first child just had a first birthday. It was a big deal to me. I had what some might call, "expectations" for how this whole birthday thing would go. Addy has always been an extremely care-free friendly baby, and so in my mind she was going to do everything that I had imagined for her to do on her first birthday. I decided to begin her birthday by going to Kiddie Kandids and getting a family photo taken together...(I know, I know...why would you do that on a day when she is having a party and swimming lessons as well? I may have even heard that from a couple of people who I lovingly ignored). She did awesome for her 7 month pictures, so this would be a breeze. We got to Kiddie Kandids and waited our turn. We got everything set up to take the pictures and...

*Insert adorable family photo here*

Oh, wait...no it never got taken. Addy took one look at the lady (who admittingly may have been trying a bit too hard) and began to scream and claw me and would not look at the camera. We decided to let the family behind us go first and then try again. Still a no-go. The lady took one picture of Addy and Landon and tried to tell me it looked good. Um...yeah if you want your baby to look like she just got stung by a bee and was allergic to it. I'm talking swollen eyes, tears, redness, the whole bit. I told the lady we would make an appointment for the next week and try again (sure...).

So we left a bit disappointed, but still looking forward to the rest of the night. I knew that Addy just needed a good nap and then she would be back to her sweet, easy-going, do-anything-to-appease-mommy self. Maw-Maw and Granddaddy got into town shortly after that and Addy decided that she would much rather play with them then do any sleeping. (Granddaddy finally got her to sleep for about 30 minutes on his shoulder before the party). We decided against swimming lessons at this point, and let her be at home until the big event. We got to the party and Addy was great. She was happy to see everyone, and she would have been perfect all night except that I had expectations. There is that word again. I thought she was going to wear her "I'm One" hat and dig into her cake and make a great mess and laugh and...you get the picture. That is not what happened. She was not extremely happy with me for trying to force all of this, and I did get some pictures of those things but they look slightly different than I had imagined...

And then again the next day at her playgroup party we had nearly the same issue...

(Can you guess which one is Addy?)

But hey, it was mommy's fault. Poor baby, she tried her best and would have been fine if it weren't for mommy and her dang expectations. On top of all that we later realized two things A.) She was starting to get a cold and B.) She is now a toddler and has extreme opinions, stranger anxiety, separation anxiety, and so on. She did have a great time for the most part and after I learned my extremely valuable lesson, I had a great time too. She got lots of fun presents and had lots of special people there to help celebrate her life. I can't believe my baby girl is one! What a big girl! (oh and did I mention that when you ask her how old she is she puts up one finger?) She is so stinking smart!

Man, do I love that girl!!!!

Check out Addy's Montage of her first year

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