all about belle

Anabelle and books!!!

It was about a year back when Ray and I were at an H.O.A. meeting at the Windermere Library and saw a book called, "Fanny and Annabelle", by Holly Hobbie (who's books I love). It was the cutest book :) I sat there and read it to Anabelle and she thought it was so great that her name was included in the book. I was thinking on this today as I was looking into 'discovery' type books for her. She is so great about entertaining herself and sitting down with one of her books. Hopefully, she'll grow up to read ALLOT!

Belle is doing many things and I wanted to take a moment to tell you all about them:

*She is getting very interested in her on-going potty training. We've been watching the Potty Dance DVD from Pull-ups that I purchased in the mail and that is really helping her get ready for the big day (March 5th-Official potty training day). We will try :)

*She is using her tongue to gibber jabber...she is really trying to speak and has her own language. She knows what she is saying and that's all that counts :)

*She is now in size 2T/or 24 months clothing (they are big but it's the next size in clothing) and I like that fact that I don't have to buy a new wardrobe every 3 months now. The growing has tapered off- by her last c/u visit so is the size in clothes...she's still growing just not as fast ans newborns and infants. She's coming into her own person.

*We had to change her diaper size to Huggies size 5 (27lbs and over) she's not quite to 27 lbs but her peeing on the couch and leaving trails (once again) gave us a clue this past week that bigger diapers were a must. Now they fit perfectly and not in her little baby crack :)

*She tries to place her own clothes on herself and take them off; especially at bath time at night.

*She is recognizing her colors and shapes. She also has these cards I bought months back (and keep going over with her) on her animals and numbers. She is aware of the animals, not so much with the numbers...

*She tries brushes her hair

*She tries to brush her teeth 

*She walks up the stairs by herself (but with one of us behind her)

*She eats toddler and preschool snacks and food or bites of ours (NO MORE baby food or cereal)

*She tries to put shoes on (hers, ours, it doesn't matter- if she sees shoes, she puts them on

There may be more, she does so much that I have to write it down as she does them or else it comes and goes in my mind and there is no way to keep track after that...Every milestone she makes is AMAZING!!

On another note, even though it's months away, I have already been planning her 2nd birthday bash. I am getting ideas together with Ray. We are opting outa' the 'GRAND' birthday (like we did last year), but last year was a big deal as she turned 1!!...We had the idea of having her birthday after her official birth date, later in the evening (as it will be HOT), and having it in our home and courtyard. We are hoping to have a nice little set up back there before it gets too hot to redo our courtyard. It would be nice to have more pavers and then a nice patio too. I'm dreaming but I hope it works. We have some good ideas :) We planned on having a kiddy pool, sprinklers and a backyard BBQ with hot dogs and hamburgers...this also depends on when we are going to our next vacation to Pensacola...we will see. Never too late to be prepared and start thinking of ideas :)