Dodd Wedding Weekend

June Update

June Update

Addison has 7 teeth now. Loves to stack things up and carry them around. She’s our little organizer. Can climb up on to the couch and loves to get up on her tippy toes to reach as much as she can. Her hair easily goes into two piggie tails and even goes up into one high pony tail. She can snap and clap and loves to dance whenver she hears music. She just started to imitate Mommy and Daddy when they do things. She loves to snuggle and will give you a big hug and kiss if you ask Please Hug or Kiss. She loves to eat and will eat anything other than broccoli and potato salad. She loves ice cream just like her Mommy. Loves to play outside, although she didn’t like the pool too much…she doesn’t like to be splashed in the face.

Her words include (but aren’t limited to)

Da, Ma, No, Yes, Ball, Peek (peekaboo), Uhoh, Baby, Beep Beep, Please, Duck, Quack, Moo, Baa, Piggie, WeeWeeWee, Woof, Dog, OooEeEe (Monkey Noise), Bye, Hi, Up, Night night, Book, Shoes

We are looking forward to a summer full of fun memories made together as a family of three.

Addison's Twelve Month Video

Addison's Eleven Month Video

Addy's 10 Month Video

I forgot to post this last month, so here is Addy's 10 month video

Addison's Eleven Month Update (Feb 25)

Can hardly believe that our baby is already 11 months old! Though at times it was a hard month, it was still filled with many fun times and memories. Addison loves to talk and now when you ask her she will tell you what a doggie says: woof....woof. She also has become a much better eater this past month and wants to try everything that Mommy and Daddy are eating. Addison is able to stand without support for much longer now and we are looking forward to her first steps which will probably be soon. She loves to climb up the stairs. Constantly. Up the stairs! Not necessarily sure what she wants to do when she gets up to the top, but just loves the thrill of climbing stairs. She loves climbing all over mom and dad as well and often uses us as leverage to climb up onto the couch. We got the biggest snow storm of the winter this month, at least 18 inches over night. We took Addy out to play in it and although she did better than last time, she is still not a big fan of the snow. She is learning how to roll a ball back and forth. One really fun thing she has learned is how to blow raspberries on any exposed skin of mom and dad that she can find. She thinks it is hilarious to "tickle" us and make us laugh!

Addy had her first over night trip and it was actually 5 nights! We went to a counseling conference in Indiana, and Addison stayed at Grandma and Papa Schneider's house for the week. She did really good but really missed her momma and daddy. She loved playing with family and especially loved Buddy. Just before her trip to the grandparents, she had her first ER visit. Addy had a fever for 3 days of 102-103 and it would not go down with tylenol and she started to vomit. This was all the night before we were to leave for our trip and we could not take her to the doctor's office. So we brought her into Mommy's work to make sure she was okay. She was fighting a virus, they took good care of her there and we were confident to leave her at grandma and grandpa's the next day. She ended up having a fever for a total of six days with a very bad cough and congestion. It was so hard to be away from our little girl while she was sick. And at the same time, Addy was teething! It took another two weeks but just before her 11 month birthday one of her top front teeth came through! Now we are just waiting for the second top front one to come in.

Looking forward to Addison's first birthday in just one month!!

Addison's Ten Month Update (Jan 25)

Addison has grown much in the past month. She is quite the crawler and loves to explore everywhere and everything in our home. She climbs into cupboards underneath coffee tables and even crawls behind the couch. The day she crawled behind the couch, she came out the other side and was covered in dust! Silly girl! She is such a happy baby, always laughing and smiling and singing to herself. Always talking too, can't wait til we understand what she is saying! She is really good at standing up and often lets go and stands on her own for a couple seconds before sitting back down again. She doesn't like walking holding our hands too much anymore though, she would rather be crawling. So we are working on this!

Addy celebrated her first new years since the last update, and she had lots of guests for that night. Papa and Grandma S, Uncle Kevin, Aunt Angela, Lizzie and Gideon all came for the party. We had lots of fun.

We are working on eating better with our foods. Addy is not always the best eater of baby food. But she loves eating big people food and loves to try new things that we are eating. Hopefully soon she will be a better eater. Her favorite finger food to eat is cheese! She loves getting little chunks of cheese to eat. One last fun thing that Addison loves to do this month is tickle mommy's tummy. She will lift up Mommy's shirt and blow rasberrys on her tummy just like we do to her tummy. She thinks it is SO funny! We are loving each moment of raising our little girl!

Top 10 of 2010

Our Top 10 Memories of 2010

1. The birth of Addison Joy on March 25, 2010

2. Kate passing her NCLEX test and receiving her RN
3. Andrew's new position at the mission, which is a much better fit for him and he is able to teach and counsel men
4. Kate's new job at Spectrum Health Butterworth Hospital as a Registered Nurse in Emergency Department

5. Moving forward with EBM and pursuing becoming missionaries at Bethesda and finishing the application process

6. 4 amazing years of marriage on July 2, can't believe how fast 4 years have flown by

7. September Dodd Family Visit in Cresaptown MD

8. Many family visits and memories made and 2 new nephews Reece and Gideon

9. New home in January 2010, much bigger place for us to rent and raise Addison in

10. Watching Addison grow and change so much in just 9 months of life!


What an amazing year it has been for our family! Looking forward to what God has planned in 2011 for the Dodd Family!!

Christmas 2010

We had a wonderful few days of Christmas celebration this year. Andrew's parents came down to visit for a day at our house. Addison had her first experience opening Christmas presents with them and she loved it! She would have been content with just getting wrapping paper for her gifts! She loved being able to rip and crinkle the paper without it getting taken away from her! She tried to eat every piece she got her hands on.

We celebrated our Christmas on Christmas Eve. Addy's two special gifts were a piggy bank we had painted for her and a puppy that plays music and lights up. She had a great time helping everyone open their wrapping paper and then proceeding to eat the paper. Andrew surprised Kate with 4 oil paintings of an African Sunset, it is absolutely gorgeous! And Kate gave Andrew a calendar for his desk at work. We had a big breakfast that G had sent us in the mail, it was so yummy- bacon, panacakes, ham. Yumm! We love reading to Addy each day and it was fun to read her the Christmas Story. We are looking forward to making that an important part of our Christmas celebration and remembering the reason why we celebrate Christmas. Later on, we had a Christmas dinner with steak and cheesy potato casserole and Christmas cookies. It was so wonderful to celebrate our first Christmas together as a little family :)

We celebrated Christmas Day at Kate's parents. Both of Kate's grandmas were there for the day as was Kyle, Kevin, Angela, Lizzie, and Gideon. It was great to spend the day with family. Many many laughs and smiles and memories made. Addison once again loved opening the presents and was excited to open everyone's present for them. She was quite nervous and could not take her eyes off of Buddy, Grandpa and Grandma's labrador retriever. She did not understand what the big black furry thing was. She loved watching her big cousin Lizzie play and it was so fun to see Gideon and Addison together since they are just 3 months apart in age.

Christmas this year was by far our best one ever, we loved watching Addison's face light up as she opened her gifts and watching her take in the many special things of the season.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!
Love,
Andrew, Kate, and Addison Joy

Addison's Nine Month Update (Dec. 25)

We realized the other day that we had not written a 9 month update for Addison and figured we had better write it before she turns ten months old! From November 25-December25, Addy had so much fun enjoying the holiday season. We got a real Christmas tree and she LOVED touching and playing under it. Addison really became quite the crawler throughout the month. At first she just army crawled everywhere but by the end of the month she was crawling on her hands and knees. She really likes to crawl over us or under our legs. She also is now a little explorer and crawls through tables and under chairs and pulls on everything and puts everything she can find in her mouth, we think she has been plotting for the past 8 months what she will get in to and now that she can move she is doing everything she had planned out. She also started to pull herself up and Addy loves to stand. She has a table that makes noise and lights up and she can often be found standing at her table and dancing to her music. She is still a baby who loves music and shakes her knees, feet, bottom, and head whenever she hears music.

Addy has been working hard this month on eating baby food more often and having less milk and she hates it! We've been introducing food with more chunks in it and having her eat more foods than the ones she loves and it has been quite the struggle and there has definitely been days when both Addy and Mommy ended the meal in tears. But hopefully she will get better with persistance and patience.

Addy had her 9 month doctor visit and she weighs 18 lbs 14 oz (50th%), 28 1/2 inches tall (75th %) and her head was still in the 25th %. The doctor was very pleased with Addison's growth and development and said that Addy is doing great with her motor skills and will be walking before we know it.

Addy had her first snowfall in December. She did not enjoy getting dressed up in her snowsuit and not being able to move much. She was really not too impressed with the wet white cold stuff, hopefully she will enjoy it more next winter!

We are loving every moment that we are blessed with with our little baby girl!!