Who is this man, and why am I sitting on his lap?

Abby, Grant, and I are enjoying the beautiful snow at my parents house in Park City, UT. My mom graciously volunteered to watch Abby the yesterday while Grant and I went skiing. Having been two years since hitting the slopes we had a grand ol' time, although we are both feeling our time that we spent on the slopes today. Tomorrow we head up to Wyoming to be with Sue which we are very much looking forward to!

Now to share what Abby has been doing....

This of course being Abby's first Christmas we wanted to get her picture with Santa. Little did we know how scary this experience could be.

For the first attempt of pictures I tried pictures with the Santa that came to my school:
As you can see here she was not a fan. She could not understand why I would set her on this strange man's lap and then walk away across the room while waving and smiling at her.

So we turned to plan B:


Don't I look happy? It's been a while since I've done this.


Our next attempt was at the mall where we had Abby dressed for the event. For the first shot she got to sit with her good friend Kyler, who didn't mind the big guy.



But as soon as Kyler left she shared with Santa that she would really rather not be on his lap.


Next year we hope that the Santa experience will be a bit more pleasurable.

To end this post I wanted to share two clips of our big girl.

In this first clip you get to see how mobile see is becoming. Abby also shows off her two bottom teeth that came in last month.

Then after seeing an advertisement for the new remake of the Karate Kid I was motivated to try out some of my karate moves for Abby:

Diaper Rash Blues

We have been fighting a diaper rash for the last week and a half. We ended up at the doctors to get some medicated cream which is finally clearing things up thankfully, unfortunately that is not before several other attempts at trying to clear things up.

Grant and I discussed several things that we could try since the layering on the Desitin was not doing the trick. Well we thought taking our time to change diapers would help air out. After telling this to my father he laughed as he replied saying that would do nothing. For things to really to dry out she needed to be hanging out sans diaper for hours. So we went to taking a nap without a diaper. After a fairly large diaper deposit before a nap I thought it would be a good time. We layered the crib with waterproof pads and laid her down. She drifted off to the dream world or so we thought until 15 minutes later there was an urgent crying escaping from her room. We quickly went to check on her to discover she was indeed not done depositing and had finished her business then proceeded to spread the mess around the crib. I'm sure mental images are enough, there will be no posting of pictures of this terrible mess. A bath and thorough crib cleaning followed.

Did we learn out lesson with this....NO.

The diaper rash continued. So after returning home from school Abby had fallen asleep I was again thought this to be a good time to dediaper our baby. After successfully getting her into the crib without waking Sweet Abby D, I took off her pants and diaper without waking her! 5 minutes later I peeked my head into the room to check on my sleeping girl, I was greeted by a smiling baby standing holding onto the edge of her crib...... happily peeing all over the place.

My lesson learned from this adventure, if you would like to call it that, is solving diaper rashes for Abby is best to do with keeping her diaper on!

Here are some photos to showing Abby enjoying the Christmas season!

These first few pictures of our family at Silver Dollar City in Branson, MO. They decorate their park with over 4 million Christmas lights for the holidays!

Grant's mom came down for Thanksgiving, and helped Abby decorate the Christmas tree!

Lastly, here is Abby doing her best reindeer impersonation!

Abby & her Granddad

Well, it is obvious that we have let our blog posts slip for quite a while, and that means that we have some catching up to do. However, most of the updates on Abby and all of her new milestones (crawling, new teeth, pulling herself up to a standing position, generally keeping mom and dad on their toes) will have to wait until the next post. We promise that it won't be a month and a half between posts this time too!

As a general rule, our blog is about Abby and her adventures through life. This post won't be an exception to that rule, but it may depart from the "normal" post a little bit. As most of you know, my Dad was diagnosed with a very aggressive type of brain cancer in April of this year (Glioblastoma Multiforme for you medical types out there). He underwent whole brain radiation and oral chemotherapy treatments during this spring and early summer, and had a few treatments of another drug called Avastin early this fall. Unfortunately these treatments weren't able to extend his life as much as we had hoped, and he passed away on October 26th. It still doesn't seem real in a lot of ways to know that he is gone. I am very thankful for the time that we got to spend together as a family during the 6-months that passed from the time that he was diagnosed until he passed away, and very very thankful that he got to meet Abby before he died.

Having grandkids was probably the biggest thing that my Dad was looking forward to for quite a while. He had been dropping subtle, and not-so-subtle hints to Peggy and I for quite some time to let us know that he was highly in favor of us starting a family. When we told our parents last year that we were pregnant, I think that my Dad was probably the most excited prospective grandparent out of both sets of our parents. My parents were actually down in Arkansas when we told them that we were having a baby, and when my Dad found out, he instantly had a huge smile on his face, and all he could say at first was "Really!?!" He was just so excited that he couldn't believe that this time had actually come!

When Abby finally arrived, my Dad was very excited to meet her, but unfortunately he had a very minor medical procedure (unrelated to his ultimate brain cancer diagnosis) scheduled which kept him from coming down right away. My parents planned to come down to Arkansas to meet their granddaughter a few weeks after he had his procedure performed. As he was recovering from that procedure, he started to have some weird memory problems which were our first signs that something wasn't right. These memory problems ended up postponing their travel plans to Arkansas for a few weeks while doctors tried to figure out what was going on. By the end of April it was apparent that there was something serious going on, so Peggy, Abby, and I all drove out to be with my parents in Wyoming and give them a chance to meet Abby (she was 1-month old at the time). I wish that Dad had gotten the chance to meet Abby before he was diagnosed with cancer, but that doesn't mean that they didn't have some good times together. We were sure to take lots of pictures and videos of Abby and her Granddad when they were together, and I thought it would be nice to share some of those with everyone as a bit of a tribute to one of the proudest Granddads around.

This is a picture of Abby and her Granddad about 5 minutes after they first met back in April. Abby is a bit tired from the long car ride, but Granddad is pretty happy to be holding his granddaughter!

Here is another one from our April trip to Wyoming. Abby had found a pretty comfortable spot in her Granddad's arms.

This is a video of Granddad finishing reading a Sesame Street story to Abby. She had been quite fussy during the first part of the story, and you will find out why she was fussy in the middle part of the video. At the end you will get a glimpse of how special Abby was to her Granddad.

In June we all flew out to visit the Grandparents again (this was Abby's first airplane trip), and here is a picture of Abby's Granddad riding in a fire truck and waving to Abby during the Flaming Gorge Days parade. Granddad served on the GRFD for more than 25 years, but had been retired for the past 8 years or so.

Here is Abby handing her Granddad a card for Father's Day. Actually, if I remember right, I don't think that she wanted to let go of the card, but she did eventually give it to him!

This last picture is from September when we all flew back out to be with Abby's Granddad on his 61st birthday. This is a picture that we will all treasure for years to come, both Abby and Granddad having a great time together.

It's been a while....

Well since returning to work busy is a word to describe the Logan household. To catch you up with the happenings today will be a picture post. Enjoy. A sign that it has been to long with posting I forgot the way in which pictures publish on here. So the next picture is the most recent and with the last being taken back in August. You have a choice now you can scroll down and just go back in time or quickly jump down not looking at anything to closely and then scroll up enjoying things as they should have been. The choice is yours.

Abby favorite thing to watch now. She will stop whatever she is doing to watch Allie when she comes into the room. Allie's whole take on Abby is to quickly give her a kiss and then get out of the way before Abby can grab a hold of her.

A bath time fan. Rubber ducky your the one for Abby!

To show you just how Allie tries to throw herself in the middle of things to get attention.

This picture just misses Abby up on her hands and knees. Currently Abby gets up on her hand and knees and just wobbles back a forth then will plop on her stomach and wiggle/roll her way to the object she wants. She is getting very close to the crawling stage. Just last night she sat up on her own twice. Where did my little baby go?

Abby is getting strong enough to sit up without holding herself with her arms. She is very excited to be able to reach her toys now.

We got a new couch, here Abby is very much enjoying herself as I go a bit crazy with snapping picture of her.
The serious pose.
Although she has a big head (97% tile) it doesn't quite fit into Dad's hat just yet. As it was on her head she would pull it down over her face and get a bit startled. It is a scary thing when your world disappears.
A Logan family picture. Howard was always keeping a watchful eye on Abby.

In September we flew out for Howard's Birthday the weekend of the 26th. In this picture Abby sees her first Bison in Evanston, WY. She was not a fan of the Wyoming wind.

To Update you on Howard, he started a new treatment with the drug Avastin. Since starting this treatment we have seen an improvement with his mobility. We are hopeful that the drug will continue to help him.

Abby has one question for you...."Are you ready for some FOOTBALL?"
Dad and Abby ready for the first game home game of the year that we enjoyed from the comforts of our own home.
It this picture you will witness Abby's battle wound. Unfortunately Abby lost this battle.

While Abby was asleep in her crib at daycare a little boy wanted to share his toy with Abby. He unfortunately tried to give it to her a little to rough leaving a little raspberry on Abby's check.

You can tell how upset Abby is about the whole incident.

Our cute little roller. At this point she was rolling all over the place. She is one silly girl any time a camera comes out she freezes and just stares at the camera.

Abby means business about her two teams. She is a football fan in the making. She is bit scared about the HOG game this weekend though.

We've had a lot of people tell us Abby looks like a doll they once had. I think she looks very dollish in this picture...notice Allie chillin' in the background.

I love to eat! Meal times are my favorite. If I had my choice I would have bananas with every meal. They are delicious!

Dad and I hanging out!

The girls. Allie always making sure to be right by my side!

Feeding Time

Abby reached another milestone this weekend, we started her on solid foods! Well, we started her on rice cereal, which we mixed with lots of milk (1 part cereal for 4 parts milk), so the whole meal was pretty liquidy. We're not really sure how much of it she actually ate either, as you can see in the video, quite a bit of it ended up on her face and on the bib she was wearing. But still, she had her first solid food! She has been watching us eat dinner pretty closely lately, and she has definitely been interested in food, so she took to eating with a spoon pretty well. She did get a few good swallows down, so overall the whole experience was a success!

Before you watch the video of the first feeding, here is a video that almost shows her first experience of drinking out of a cup. Grant was having some orange juice with breakfast yesterday morning, and noticed that Abby seemed really interested in his glass. He put it in front of her and she grabbed for it and brought it straight to her mouth. She definitely acts like she is going to be a natural with drinking out of a cup.

Here is Abby's very first experience with solid food! She ends up wearing quite a bit of the food, but that is how you know that your dinner is good when you're only 5-months old!

Summer Photo Extravaganza!

Since the summer is sadly coming to an end I'm doing a picture post to catch up on what we have been up to.

Grant and Ricky after racing the go-carts on Grant's Birthday on July 21st.

The happy family just before diving into Grant's Birthday cake from Ricks...Yum!

After returning home after some errands. Abby's way of telling me, "Mom I'm worn out and need to rest a bit."

Sue and Howard came out for about two weeks at the end of July. While Grant and his dad went for a Saturday breakfast together, Sue, Abby, and I enjoyed getting some fresh produce at the Farmer's Market and then visiting the Botanical Gardens of the Ozarks to see the beautiful flowers.

Abby enjoying her toes as she posses on the quilt Jackie Rockhold made for her.

Nana and Abby enjoying the Arts Festival in Park City, UT the first week in August. This was my first time flying solo with Abby, without the help of Dad. Although I was pretty stressed about it, everything went very smoothly. Little did I know the adventure was yet to come!

Abby's first ride on a chair lift at Deer Valley where we heading for a short hike while my brothers and dad mountain biked. It was fun to get to be with the entire family. We were all out in Park City for my parents annual Jimmy Buffett Party.

Abby and I up on top of the mountain...it was quite the view.

Back home after our travels out west Abby is enjoying her first time in her high chair. Going off what we have read we are starting to put her in it when we eat to get her ready for eating solids. Notice the position of the dogs. Although we have not introduced foods to Abby yet the dogs seem to know what will soon become a good food source for them!

Irene, Leah, Abby, and I enjoying the last concert in the park of the summer. I am so sad to see these end. They have made for good times!

Abby meeting her Great Grandfather Bowden for the first time. Abby has become quite the traveler. After this trip Abby has been in 10 states: Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Arizona, Tennessee, North Carolina, Michigan.

Abby's first time in a big pool. She was not quite sure about floating on her back.

She loved this little boat we found.

Four generations.
I had set Abby down with her doll while I went to wash my hands when I came back Abby was holding the doll's hand, too cute! She has become fascinated with faces. She gets a kick out of watching the other kids play at daycare.

Yes, with the mention of daycare the summer has ended and it is time to head back to school. I find myself torn about this. I am very excited to get back in the classroom and get a new year under way and yet I am heart broken about having to be away from Abby. Teacher inservice started Wednesday so Abby has had a few days to get to know our wonderful daycare provider, Jennifer, and to met the other kids. It has not been easy but I know it will be better with time.