Catching up with Allie's life up to her 2nd birthday

Given that we are so behind on blogging again, we have several random photos of Allie from the last few months. She recently turned two-years-old, and we will have a post with pictures from her birthday, but we are trying to keep the blog in somewhat chronological order.

Allie still loves reading - both reading to herself and being read to. We thought this was really cute how she just took a seat in the hall and started reading.

Allie absolutely loves her Daddy. Especially since Mommy has been pregnant, Daddy is the one who gets down on the ground and plays with her more. People ask if she is a Daddy's girl. We answer that it depends. Sometimes the answer would definitely be yes, but at other times, Allie definitely wants her Mommy. Below are a few videos of Allie having fun playing with Daddy.

In this first one, Allie kept saying, "two, three, two," instead of "one, two, three." Daddy didn't catch on to that until Mommy clued him in. It is pretty cute watching Allie trying to get Allie to do, "one, two, three," which was followed by him tossing her on the couch.

Allie really enjoys wearing backpacks. I guess she is trying to be like Daddy.

One of Daddy's classmates is a girl named Gargeyi from India. Gargeyi is in love with Allie. We took Allie to visit Gargeyi in her office one day. Here's a picture of Allie at Gargeyi's desk.

We've had several questions regarding whether Allie is excited for her baby sister. Although she says, "baby" and "baby sister" when touching Mommy's belly, we're sure she really doesn't understand. We're hoping that Allie will adjust well to being a big sister. Sometimes we think she will do well, and at other times, we're just not sure.

We have set the bassinet up in our room. It has a button on it that plays classical music. Allie loves to push the button and listen to the music. Sometimes she will cuddle up with her blanky on Mommy and Daddy's bed. She has sat on the ground and rocked one of her teddy bears to the music, too. These are some sweeter moments.

Then there are moments like the video below that make us not so sure.

Allie has enjoyed playing with the baby toys that are out. We got this exersaucer from someone at church. At first, it just sat in our living room for a few days. Allie loved to sit in it and play with its toys as seen below. Hopefully she will share alright. We're optimistic because we have seen Allie be really sweet with real babies, giving them toys and saying, "here baby."

Only time will tell how well Allie will do with her baby sister. We know that her world is going to be rocked, and we just hope that there will be more sweet moments than not.

This is just a random picture of Allie. She is looking like such a big girl!

Allie continues to grow in independence. She is beginning to demand making fashion choices. It started with shoes; she would insist on either the "purple" or "pink" shoes. The other day, she took it even further. She had been wearing a pair of capris but then insisted on wearing a pair of shorts over them. We were going to go to Walmart, so we told her she needed to put shoes on. She insisted on her red shoes. And to top it off, she wanted to wear a hat. Here's a picture of the final outfit. She was happy.

Allie really enjoys singing, too. She is beginning to learn more words to different songs. She loves, "Jesus wants me for a SunBeep." She will jump as she says, "SunBeep;" I guess that is what they do in nursery. She will also sing some of the words to "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star," "I am a Child of God," and "Rock-a-bye Baby." She actually loves to rock her toys in her arms as she sings, "Rock-Baby, in tree-top."

I think we say this in every post about her, but Allie truly is such a joy in our lives. We feel so blessed to be her parents.