Happy New Year!

I'm coming up for air! :)  Happy new year, everyone!  We've been a busy family but happy as can be as well.  I would like to say first of all that I owe a lot of thank you notes for a lot of generous Christmas gifts for Miss Abby and I swear they're coming! :)  I went through a painful bout of carpel tunnel that kept me away from the keyboard and pen.  :)  But, let me say, we feel blessed each and every day for the generosity, love, and support of our friends and family.  We love you all so much.

We have some exciting stuff on the horizon!  We're planning a trip to Virginia Beach in March and will be visiting our nieces Lauren and Dianne.  On the drive back home, we're also going to visit our cousin Amber.  We're looking forward to spending some time with our family and we're excited to share miss Abby with them also. :)  We've been practicing saying Lauren, Dianne & Amber's names and Abby called Dianne "Gandhi" the first time she recited the name back to us. :)  She's even talking about Virginia now when Leif and I are in the midst of planning our trip.  We'll be on Virginia Beach for St Patty's day too so expect some cute green-laiden pictures of our beach bum girl. :)

Leif and I have also started actively looking at houses! :)  We have a wonderful realtor and have been enjoying the somewhat overwhelming process of buying a home.  We can't wait to make a little place for ourselves and I can't wait to paint a room- any room- any color that I please.  ;)

Last weekend we took Abby to see Sesame Street Live thanks to a wonderful Christmas gift from Auntie Mandy.  Abby just loved it- and stayed engaged for the entire hour and a half show.  Abby even shook Abby Cadabby's hand.  She danced and sang along with the characters and pointed out all of her favorites.  We had more fun than we ever thought possible at a sesame street show.  ;)

Abby's busy and lively and amazing as always.  Her vocabulary is constantly bursting with new words and phrases and she can even count to 10 in Spanish.  She loves to sing and dance and laugh.  She enjoys building towers with her blocks and driving her firetruck and car all over the living room.  She has such a zest for life and she makes our lives just burst with happiness.

Last weekend we bought her a training potty and let her play with it in the living room.  When Leif told Abby that she could play for another 5 minutes before it was time for bed, she replied: "No minutes.  I'm a potty."  We couldn't stop laughing and gushing and were completely in awe.  :)  We'll be starting the potty training process soon but are in no real hurry...  ;)  We have gotten brushing teeth down pat now though.  ;)

Sending love to everyone!!!!  :)