The Abbott Family Web Site

Ultrasound photo from 9/23/2008

Josie’s going to be a big sister! Our biggest news of the year is that we are going to have a baby! The newest addition to our family should arrive by May 14, 2009. We are thrilled! Josie is in love with babies and said she’d like to have one live with us. I think she’ll be a great big sister. Everything is going well so far, although the morning sickness is quite a bit worse this time around. I’m 13 weeks along, though, so hopefully the nausea and exhaustion will go away soon. At our first appointment in September, we got to see the baby on the ultrasound and hear and see the heartbeat. It was a healthy 151. We went in for our next check-up on 10/30 and everything looked good. We heard the heartbeat again and it sounded very good. Nice and strong with a good rhythm to it. We’ll have to go back and listen to the tape to figure out the rate. We’ll be checking in again with the doctor just before Thanksgiving. I’m sure you can all imagine how excited we are to be adding to our family. What a blessing this is!

Is it any wonder that with two Disney-loving parents, Josie learned early on who Mickey and Minnie are? She lovingly calls them (both) Mimi. She absolutely loves her Mimis. I bet you can imagine how excited she was to see them in their home of Disneyland last week. We took her for a 6 day trip to visit “The Mouse” and we had a wonderfully relaxed time. We took the Nanny along as well (that would be my mom, Grammy) which made nap time a great time for Steve and I to get out on our own.

Josie loved all of the rides she went on. We took her on almost all of the available kids rides, but I think the carousel was her favorite, by far.

Unfortunately, “It’s a Small World” was closed and “Storybookland” was closed our last couple days there so we didn’t make it on those. We also missed “Casey, Jr.” But I’m pretty sure we made it on all of the other Fantasyland rides, as well as the Bug’s Life area of California Adventure. It was so much fun to watch her toddling down Main Street in her Tinkerbell costume or Minnie Mouse dress. Apparently other people thought she was pretty cute too. The crowds weren’t too bad until they started picking up on Thursday, which was to be expected. Although Christmas remains my favorite time to visit, it was fun to see the park decorated for Halloween. One of the highlights for me was on the last day I was able to meet up with my old friend Theresa who is now a manager at the Emporium on Main Street. We both were part-time cast members at the Disney Store in Portland before I headed to one in Spokane during graduate school. She had moved to the new one in Vancouver when I transferred to that one as well, so we worked together off and on for almost 5 years. I’m so amazed and happy for her living the Disney dream. She worked her way from part-time to full-time to assistant manager to manager of the Disney Store and then made it down to Disneyland. Does it get any better than that?

Another highlight for us was we got to visit the stone that Steve bought for me for Christmas in 2006. We paid for a 50th anniversary stone in the plaza between Disneyland and California Adventure. It may seem silly, but that was really thrilling for me.

We went to three character breakfasts while we were there. We started at Minnie’s in the park. I have to say, after going to several breakfasts at WDW last December and also experiencing Goofy’s Kitchen last time we were in Disneyland, the way they handled the food at Minnie’s was a great disappointment. There was no clear start to the lines for food. The lines were ridiculously long. And the best part, because of the placement of the entrance and the placement of the food, the long long lines for food blocked the entrance so people trying to be seated had to weave through the people in line and the people in line didn’t want to move for fear of losing the spot they’d been standing in for 10 minutes. The nice part was the characters (from memory there were at least 8 ) all came to your table. Unfortunately, we were put in the middle of a section so Josie would watch them come all around her but it took them forever to actually visit with her. We actually had to chase Pooh down because he came to all the tables around us but never came to our table and she was so disappointed.

The next day we tried Storyteller’s Cafe at the Grand Californian Hotel. The food was handled much better there. The lines were not bad unless you wanted an omelet. There was a decent variety. Other than that, it was a great disappointment. We thought we were at a good table this time for the characters to come by but they seemed to go all around us again and tease Josie. The biggest disappointment was that we only had two characters (Dale and Terk) actually come to the table on their rounds. Kenai (Brother Bear) came to all the tables around us and Josie was so excited but he didn’t come to our table. We had been there an hour and seen two characters so we mentioned it to our waitress who talked to the person in charge of the characters. She told us Kenai would be by, so we waited. He did finally make it and Josie was thrilled. We saw Koda (also from Brother Bear) from a distance as well as Chip but neither came to our section of tables, although they were close. For the price of a character breakfast, when you are paying for the experience of seeing characters without having to wait in the lines at the park (because believe me, my breakfast was not worth even half the price we paid), this was extremely disappointing. I doubt we’ll waste our money there again.

Our last attempt at a character breakfast was at Goofy’s Kitchen. This is by far is the best one. There is a huge variety of food and no lines to get to it. They had both breakfast and lunch fare. Off the top of my head, I remember at least 6 characters. We were seated on a main thoroughfare. In a little over an hour, all of the characters made it to our table except Jasmine who we ran into on our way out. This is probably the only one I would try again.

On the topic of food, I was so excited to eat at Blue Bayou again that we had 3 reservations, including one on our last day for lunch, which also happened to be my birthday. Our first visit was our first day in the park. We had lunch there and it was not what I remembered. The prices, like everything these days, had gone up a bit. That was not completely unexpected. Unfortunately they had gotten rid of a lot of the variety on their menu. If you don’t like blackened and spicy or seafood, then you don’t have much to choose from. Steve and I shared the beef ribs and it was delicious. Unfortunately, I wasn’t in the mood for much foodwise, but I’ll explain that in a later post. This one’s already getting long enough. I did get free birthday mousse, which was great. We decided to cancel our other reservations, including the one on my birthday. I’ll probably always insist we eat one meal there when we go, I just won’t have such high expectations. Even the mint julep (one of my absolute favorites) was quite watered down.

I know it sounds like there was a lot that didn’t go right on this trip. But we are good Disneyphiles and we didn’t let it get to us. As Steve kept saying, if you can’t have a good time at Disneyland, then you’re doing something wrong. We had a blast and loved watching Josie really take in the experience this time. She was a little young to get it when we went to WDW in Dec. It really is true that the most fun you can have at the parks is watching your children enjoy it.

We stayed at the Grand Californian Hotel and actually managed to get adjoining rooms. That might be the best thing I can say about our stay this time. Unlike our previous trip to stay at GCH (which we thought was wonderful except for our Downtown Disney view room – VERY LOUD), we were not nearly as impressed this time. It kind of left us wondering why we used up so many of our DVC (Disney Vacation Club) points to stay there instead of the Disneyland Hotel. The rooms really are quite nice at GCH, but we were so greatly disappointed in the housekeeping service that I’m not sure if we’ll stay there again. There were jawbreakers on the floor of the bathroom that Josie kept finding, leftover from a previous guest. I found one also, which was against the wall but out in the open, not even hiding under the vanity. I’m not exactly sure how they could have missed them. Needless to say, that was a huge safety hazard when having an 18-month old toddling around the room. Another safety problem we noted was the fact that out of six times housekeeping knocked on either of our doors, they only announced who they were one time. In a hotel as nice as this, I would expect that when they knock they are letting you know they are in fact hotel staff before you open the door. We did inquire about this at the concierge desk and were informed that all hotel staff should be identifying themselves verbally when they knock so you know who is there.

We love the fact that they offer turn down service but can not understand how a hotel that is catering to families would want to come in your room at 8:30 or 9:00 at night to do it. I guess we are abnormal parents but we actually kept Josie to her afternoon nap schedule and her regular bedtime. After the first night where we realized they were not going to turn us down before Josie was going to bed at 7:00, we decided to call housekeeping every day and request early turn down, being specific as to the fact it needed to be done by 6:30 so our daughter could go to bed at 7:00. When they say it’s no problem, you actually expect it to be done. I’m trying to remember but I think in our 5 nights, it might have happened twice.

Then there’s the regular maid service every day. The first two days they cleaned our room while we were out in the morning so by the time we brought Josie back for nap around 1:00, the rooms were nicely made-up. After that, we would get back from our morning out and find the rooms were still a mess. Wouldn’t you figure they have the same schedule of cleaning every day? So on Wednesday, the rooms were not cleaned when we got back. Steve noticed they were cleaning every other room as they came down the hall, skipping half of them. Ummm, ok that’s an interesting way to do things. We put the Do Not Disturb sign on both of our doors and put Josie down for her nap. We figured they could come back after she got up when we headed back out. With Josie napping in our room, my mom and I were resting in her room while Steve did some shopping. About an hour into nap time there was a knock on the door. It took me a couple seconds to wake up and decide it might be Steve coming back and he might not have a key to my mom’s room so as I started to get up there was another knock. No problem, Steve will wait for me to get there. Next thing I know, as I’m on my way to the door, the door is opened and there is a housekeeper walking in. Needless to say I was fuming as she wanted to clean the room and the Do Not Disturb was clearly on the door. They should NEVER let themselves into someones room like that. I basically kicked her out, telling her that the baby was taking a nap and they could not clean now. Of course, Josie wasn’t sleeping for long as the noise of it all woke her up. Needless to say, we had a conversation with the concierge about all the problems up to that point and she said she would talk to her supervisor and to the housekeeping department. While we had no more unexpected intrusions during our stay, I’d like to say they there were no more problems either. Unfortunately, Josie had an accident in her crib and we had to call for a change of sheets. First, they sent up a mattress pad only. Then, when we called again, they sent up a mattress pad and a twin size sheet. How exactly do you put a twin size sheet onto a crib? Finally, we called again and told them we needed an actual crib sheet and that the baby was getting ready to go to bed so it needed to be pronto. This all started around 3:00. It was now 6:30 and we still didn’t have a sheet for her bed. Finally, after 7:00, they brought up another mattress pad and twin size sheet. If we hadn’t taken an actual crib sheet off the crib to begin with I might wonder if they don’t have them. But they obviously do. Steve was able to fit one of the twin sheets on the crib well enough that we could put her to bed. Then he marched down to the front desk with the other sheets to have a talk with them. They looked up our reservations and saw all the problems we had had. To their benefit, they did give us a credit on our room to try to make up for the hassle. But honestly, I would rather have had decent service and paid full price so I feel like going back there some day. I’m just not sure if we want to waste our DVC points on staying there again or not. Steve suggested that the next time we go we should use our DVC points to stay on the concierge level of the Disneyland Hotel. My family stayed there in 1996 and I have to say that sounds like a great idea to me.

It’s so hard to believe that Josie is now 18 months old. I can’t believe how quickly the time has gone. We took her for her check-up on Monday. She is now a “whopping” 19 pounds 13 ounces (3rd percentile) and 30 inches (10th percentile). As the doctor said, we guess she’s just going to be a petite girl. I’m betting, looking at her father, that she will end up taller than me. It’ll just take some time for that to happen. And it looks like we shouldn’t have that pesky childhood obesity problem either. She eats and eats and eats but she is still so slim. I remember having that same problem when I was little. Of course, that all changed as I got older. I won’t mind one bit if my daughter has the slim gene.

Josie has also decided that she is now capable of walking. Within the last week, she seems to have figured out that it’s ok to walk around. She does more walking than crawling. It seems like she was waiting until she had the confidence and balance to not fall very much. She is also finally moving off of baby food. We’ve been trying to move her to table food for a long time but she seemed to be sensitive to the textures. She has now been eating more grown up foods (Gerber Graduates, spaghettios, etc.) for 2 weeks. She is also more willing to try things we are eating. She really enjoyed the curly fries when we had lunch at Arby’s this weekend. She still says no a lot when we offer her new things to try but at least we’re making progress.

She now has over 90 words. She uses 2-word phrases and I’ve heard at least one 3-word phrase. The doctor was quite impressed by her language skills. We would expect an 18-month old to have probably around 15 words and to start 2-word phrases around age 2. I’m quite a proud “speech mommy”!

Here is a picture of Josie cheering on her favorite team (UW Huskies, of course!). This was on our way to a game about a week and a half ago. She’s actually wearing the same cheerleader outfit that my mom made for her last year. We just let the arm holes out a bit and it fits again for this year.

And here is a picture for Josie’s Aunt Deb and family. They gave Josie this outfit and she’s now getting to the point where she can wear it. It’s a 12 month size and you’d figure that by the time she was 18 months old she’d be able to wear it, right?

I’m not sure where Josie gets her stubborn streak. I’ve told Steve that it must be from him because I’m sure it’s not me. *wink wink* He laughs and gives me this look. Between the Fornia blood in me and the German blood from my mom’s side, I’m sure it can’t be me. Whoever she gets it from, Josie has been demonstrating lately that she is stubborn and has a will all her own. We are still working on encouraging her to walk on her own. She’s more comfortable taking a few steps between people and will even take a few steps away from furniture over to me. But she really doesn’t want to go off walking on her own. She did surprise us the other night by standing up next to her box of books and then taking 5 or 6 steps towards the kitchen. She was holding a small bag that she plays with and I think she didn’t even realize what she was doing. So we’re getting closer but it’s definitely a slow process. On the other side of the coin, her language is great. I counted recently and she has around 50 words that she uses and there are days where she picks up 2-3 new ones. I love that she talks to me now. She also loves to tell us what a doggy says (“oof oof”), what a duck says (“ack ack”), and what a bird says (“peep peep”). We’ve been working on cat and cow but she hasn’t quite gotten those down yet.

I weighed Josie before her bath last week and she was up to 19.5 pounds. We’ll be taking her for her 18 month checkup next month so we’ll get a more accurate weight then. Hopefully she’ll be past the 20 pound mark. Although she’s not as willing to try “big girl food” as I’d like, we are making progress on moving away from baby food. She eats a lot though and let’s us know when she’s full. She is currently into “sticks”, or as she calls them “ti”. They are similar to small cheetos puffs that come in a couple different flavors. She is always asking for them. And she will inhale anything chocolate. Definitely my daughter! She must have eaten about half of the molten lava cake that we had at the Chart House.

We went to the Clark County Fair last week and had a great time. It’s a good size fair with quite a bit of vendors and 4-H activities to look at. I think Josie’s favorite was looking at the 4-H dogs. She loved woofing to all the dogs. We also had a chance to see the cross-stitch and knitting that Grammy entered into the competition. She won third place for her cross-stitch (all Disney themed) and won a first place blue ribbon for the sweater she knitted. Josie really liked the sweater.

As usual, Josie insisted on saying hi to pretty much everyone she saw. And she was very excited when they would say hi back. I think we’re pretty lucky that she is as social and friendly as she is. We also played a couple of scratch-it lottery tickets at the lotto booth and I won $20!! That was the first time I’ve won any lottery.

Josie is very excited, although she doesn’t know it yet, to be going for an extended sleepover to Grammy and Pappaw’s house soon. Steve and I will be going on an anniversary trip to Reno and Josie will get to stay with my parents for almost a week. She has had a couple of sleepovers with them where she spent the night but it’s always been just one night. I’m not sure who I’m worried more about, her or them… She is such an active little girl now that it can be quite exhausting to spend all day with her. Of course, if you have books to read and you don’t mind reading them over and over and over then you can usually entertain her for a while. She’s quite the little bookworm. We have to keep introducing new books to her library because we get so tired of them since we’re reading them all the time. But it’s worth it to us because we are thrilled that she loves to read as much as she does.

Josie’s latest fascination seems to be with balloons (“bu”). I’m not sure how she spots them but it doesn’t matter how far away they are or how hidden, she can find them. She points out every balloon in every store we go to. I had been trying to find a decent looking one for a couple of days to buy for her but the ones in the stores seemed to be partially deflated and we couldn’t find anyone to blow up a new one. However, yesterday we found a good looking stash of them at Fred Meyer and Josie got to take home her very own purple star “Happy Birthday” balloon. She’s been so excited to play with it.

I think that’s all that’s new for now. If I can think of anything else I’ll be sure to post. Hope everyone is having a fantastic summer!

About two weeks ago we lost a dear old friend. You can see him standing guard outside of our house, as he’d done for the previous 30 years or more.

I’m talking about our stately and beautiful gumball tree. I was so excited when I moved in to have a gumball tree. I remember them from when I was little. Unfortunately, it kept growing and growing. Steve would spend hours and hours every week raking the leaves during the fall. It looked like it had even more leaves than ever this year. And then in the spring/summer the gumballs started dropping and they sure hurt to step on in your bare feet. During a couple of our snow/ice/wind storms we’ve lost large limbs off the tree and have been lucky that they landed in the yard and not on the house or cars. So we started talking about having it removed. I felt terrible about it because it was such a gorgeous tree and if there wasn’t anything wrong with it, except being so much work, then was it right to cut it down? But we finally agreed and had it removed. It was a very sad morning, with many tears shed by me. We came to find as the tree was cut up that in fact it did have some issues. Something, we think perhaps a beetle, had been boring into the bark. And many of the large limbs seemed to be rotting from the inside. It would only have been a matter of time before they fell. I didn’t feel quite as bad about cutting it down after these findings. Here is the finished product:

Our house looks a bit bigger and there is definitely more light coming into the living room. I think a lot of the plants and grass in the front yard are grateful to have more sun now. And Steve has agreed to help me plant a few smaller trees and fix up the flower bed in the front. We are thinking some flowering cherry or dogwoods would be nice. We will probably also put an arch there so I can finally have my honeysuckle that I’ve wanted as well as a place to move the clematis if/when we add on to the back of the house and I have to find a new home for it. We will also hopefully put in a new lightpost since the one there is broken after some vandals decided to smash it last Halloween. In the long run, it was the right decision to have the tree removed. It was just a very hard decision to make.