It's another GIRL!

We went in for our u/s today and we are officially having another girl!  This is secretly what Bryce and I both wanted and even Abby wanted to have a little sister so we are over the moon excited.  :)  This little girl moves around a lot more in my belly and is a finger/thumb sucker already.  Now comes the hard part...agreeing on a name.  Abby is named Abby because that was literally, the ONLY name we could agree on.  Like last time, we're going to keep it a secret until she is born. 

Abby continues to be so sweet with her baby sister.  She is constantly giving her kisses (kissing my belly) and talking about helping me take care of her.  She is actually looking forward to sharing her old clothes, shoes and toys.  She really wants to feed her a bottle.  That seems to be on the top of her list of things she wants to do to help me. 

My little helper.  I love it!

Abby and her favorite chair.  I just loved this grown-up type pose she busted out after getting this new book.

I just love seeing kids eat corn.  Don't know why.

Daddy spotting Abby while she does bench presses.

Our silly big girl

Bryce is the king of making up silly songs for any application in life.  This includes when Abby gets her diaper changed.  It's not Shakespeare but Abby loves the song and sings it on her own now and we get a huge kick out of it!    

Diaper change, diaper change

Xiao Xiao gets a diaper change

Dup, dup, dup, dup, diaper change!

Abby's favorite Halloween candy is by far, any sort of lollipop.  There's just something about them that make her smile.  :)

Abby loves to ride horesy on her daddy! 

Just look at the excitement!

And lastly, baby in a basket reading books.

Baby Baker #2 - Week 19 (and 2 days)

Is it awful that I have not taken a single picture of my belly bump and even lose track of how many weeks I am??  This pregnancy has been almost identical to my last one as far as my symptoms go but as far as recording information?  It's nonexistent.  I feel slightly guilty but I was just so tired and busy chasing Abby around and still leave myself some "me time" that nothing got done.  With Abby, I kept a pregnancy journal and took weekly pictures.  I told Bryce we need to at least take one this Saturday to mark the halfway point - week 20.  Then one more before I get induced (because I have a feeling it will be just like with Abby and I'll be so swollen, I'm gonna want this baby OUTTA me ASAP). 

We find out on Monday if it's a boy or girl.  If you ask me, we're having another girl.  I just have a feeling and I'm also carrying the exact same way (low).  That could mean nothing but that's my gut feeling.  So stay tuned!  :) 

Abby is still being so sweet with the baby.  She rubs my belly and tickles the baby (my belly) and gives my belly kisses in the morning.  :)  She's got a serious sassy streak but she's a sweetie pie cuddle bug at heart.    

Trick or Treat!

Abby had so much fun trick or treating this year!  Last year she was only 1.5 years old so I'm not sure if she really grasped the whole concept.  We met up with a group of friends and Abby was the youngest and the slowest at trick or treating.  The other big kids were running from house to house while Abby took her sweet time and insisted on sitting in the wagon between houses.  We had to skip a few houses just to keep up!  Her little jack-o-lantern basket was filled to the brim by the end of the evening so all in all, I'd say it was a success.  Can't wait for next year!

This was our first house.  Abby is waiting patiently for her turn.

She was super shy but this nice man was waiting patiently.

And we're waiting...

Just like her Daddy, she couldn't decide what candy to pick.

The nice man finally sits down because Abby still hasn't picked her candy yet and what does our sweet baby do?  She decides to sit down too!  LOL!  What a great way to start the evening.  :)

Group shot of all the kids.  Abby was busy staring at Griffin, the Frankenstein.  Of course my camera battery decided to die so that's all for this year!

Getting in the Halloween Spirit

About 2 weeks ago I cut out fun Halloween shapes for Abby to glue together as an at home art project.  She LOVES projects and I used to do this growing up so it was fun to share this with Abby.  Then we carved pumpkins last night since Abby is old enough to understand it all now.  Enjoy the pictures!  We can't wait to trick-or-treat tonight! 

Dot, dot, not a lot!

She learned that at Gymboree - I like it!

She really liked the jack-o-lanterns - can you tell?

We also made ghosts and one scary black cat.  Forgot to make bats this year.

And my favorite - a wicked witch!

Last Thursday Abby had a Halloween Parade at school and got to give her costume a test run.  Success!

Abby's latest favorite pj du jour: her glow-in-the-dark skeleton pajama!

Here we go!  Abby's first time to "help" Daddy carve a pumpkin!  She essentially thought it was "gwoss" and "messy" but she enjoyed the whole experience of it all.  Especially when we lit them and turned out the lights. 

My two favorite Bakers!

She needed Daddy's encouragement to get elbow deep in the pumpkin.  She kept asking me to wipe her hands each time she touched the pumpkin.  :P

From the looks of it, she didn't really care to ever do that again.  :)

One down, one more to go.

One scary and one goofy pumpkin - done!

This picture is awful (time for a new camera) but it looks much better all lit up!

Having Fun at Home

I'm sort of going out of order but in the last few months, Abby's imagination has blossomed and she just talks all day long!  I love listening to her sweet, sweet voice and trying to make sense of all the toddler jibber jabber she speaks.  She's quite the little helper too and always wants to do things by herself as well.  We spend a large part of the day (and night) singing all the songs she knows: I'm a little tea pot, itsy bitsy spider, belle notte, once upon a dream, part of your world, heigh-ho, baby mine, when you wish upon a star, happy birthday, etc. The list goes on and on.  Her memory is outstanding.  She must get it from my dad who only passed it on to Kirk and NOT me and Ruby.  :P  She still remembers things from our trip to Taiwan back in April! 

Anyhow, I've been trying to think of fun activities we can do at home with her and the rest of the time, we are playing along with whatever she has imagined.  Here are a few pictures from the last few weeks (yes, I'm a little behind).

She is copying me wiping dust around the house with a Swiffer sheet.  Reminds of the picture of me around the same age copying my mom wipe the floor.  I was still in diapers too and that's pretty much the last time I did that!  :P

Abby watching Daddy make homemade pretzels for an Oktoberfest party 2 weekends ago.  :)

The flash went off in this picture but Abby was playing in the dark with Daddy's head light looking for animals!  She crawled all around the house looking for animals and kept telling us she found reindeer under our bed and under the couch!  They were brown reindeer too!

Here she is directing us to the reindeer.  :)

Abby LOVES to watch her Daddy shave his head and facial hair every Sunday.  It's their father-daughter moment but I had to get a picture because it reminds me of when I was little.  I LOVED to watch my dad (and my Lao Yie) shave in the mornings.  My dad would put a little shaving cream on my chin just for fun.  :)

This picture was taken last week and it's a big deal because it's the first time she drew a picture that was coherent and not just scribble!  This is a self portrait.  Hooray for Abby!

Super Fun Play Date Last Wednesday!

I have to admit, I had been postponing Abby's playdate with her Gymboree friends for over a month because I was just too tired.  It's sad, but true and it's because of the pregnancy.  I still haven't gotten all my energy back yet.  Only a few more weeks, I hope.  But last Wednesday, we finally got together and Abby had a BLAST!  We first met up at Monkey Bizness and Abby, Ryder, Ryko and Rycon ran, bounced, jumped, slid and played for over an hour!  They had sooo much fun and the grown ups got to catch up too.  :)  Then we all went to lunch at this bar and grill place that had a sand box in the patio and Abby thought that was more fun than the bouncey house!  All the kids had sooo much fun with each other - it was so sweet to watch them play and interact.  These are the boys from Abby's School Skills Gymboree class and they spent all summer with each other.  Abby calls them "her boys" and tells me she misses her boys all the time.  Ryder gives great bear hugs and Ryko gave Abby a kiss when we left!  It was so sweet since Ryko is a shy boy.  :)  All the boys took 3 hour naps after our playdate except our little one.  She was up and at it until 9:15 PM.  Crazy child.  Here's a picture of all the kids at the restaurant.  It's a miracle they all stood together for so long!

I'm getting frustrated because I can't rotate this picture but here is the gang:

Ryder, Abby, Rycon and Ryko!

She actually let me put her hair up in pigtails because she wanted to show the boys.  :)