Hannah speak

Some of our favorite Hannah words right now...

mazagine

detrucktion (meaning construction)

detach (meaning attached)

And the best of all - Boulderlrlrlrlr

Sometime over a year ago, when Hannah was learning to speak and couldn't say a lot of words that ended with "r", she would just say part of it and then add a bunch of lelrlelrler's at the end (you know, the flipped tongue thing?). Like "fridgerlrlrlrl". It was hilarious, and then of course gone. Then out of the blue she did it to the word Boulder the other day. We were driving that way and she asked where is Boulderlrlrlr. Made for some good laughs in the front seat!

We had a combo birthday party for Hannah and her 6-year-old cousin Elliot last weekend. The candle holders (see the little birdie things?) were on my mom's 3rd birthday cake!

3 Years Old!

Hannah's rockin' birthday eve - 3... 21... what's the difference, really? The important thing as that we've discovered that the Waterloo Pub in our little downtown Louisville really is the same Waterloo as the record store and pub in Austin. Apparently the Waterloo folks sold the TX businesses and moved out here. Yay for us! They even have their own smoker and make a decent barbeque sandwich! (Which is more than we can say for the local Dickey's chain - so disappointing...)

Ice skating at the downtown rink. After talking about it for days, she predictably freaked out as soon as she got on the ice. We finally bribed her with getting to open a present when we got home. Equally predictably, once she got out on the ice for a little bit, she loved it! It was a fabulous evening.



Low-key birthday. We're having a party with family in a few weeks, so for now a cupcake in jams will have to do. Please know that it was after lunch, not breakfast!

Drum roll please...

After 3 years, the first 2 with very little hair, we finally talked ourselves into a very minor bangs cut for Hannah's birthday.

With her beloved new baby and bear from grandparents.

Better than "cheese", I suppose!

Helping with the pre-drywall inspection on our house-in-progress. It since has drywall and exterior paint!

Playing with Daddy.

Christmas in Flagstaff

After a day and a half (plus 2 hours for an interstate-closing wreck) drive, Hannah and I arrived in Flagstaff to hang out with my parents. Andy flew to Phoenix the next day to check out the Ultimate stores there, so I drove down the next evening and we got to spend the night away - on our own! We've only done this three times since Hannah was born, and we're scheming to see how we can do it more often...

Some highlights of the trip were 8 inches of new snow in Flag to cross-country ski and snowshoe in, mild Phoenix weather to run in (with flowers - in December!), lots of fun Baba and Nammy time for Hannah, and the first-ever performance by the Doggett family trio at the UU Church of Flagstaff's Christmas Eve service!

1st order of business - cookie decorating

The great gingerbread house project while I was in Phoenix.

Singing her way through a favorite book.

New Christmas Eve duds, thanks to Nammy.

Hannah's comment on the photo - "Daddy doesn't have fancy clothes."

Look what Santa brought!

Muggin' with Baba.

Fun Christmas morning.

Nap in the warm sun. No, Hannah did not actually nap, but I can't believe she was still for the photo!

House-to-be

First, the obligatory fun photos of Hannah. Not terribly flattering of me, but Hannah's having fun.

We have passed the end of our rescission period on our to-be-built house, so work has started and we're on the way to being homeowners again! Here are some photos of the new foundation and the interior of another home in the neighborhood with the same floorplan. Kitchen cabinets and counter will be the same, but tile is different throughout. Should you care to see more, the builder is Markel homes and the floorplan is the Flatiron. They've made some minor changes in the plan, and ours is a 3-car garage, but you should be able to find the floorplan somewhere on that site if you search around enough.

Little singer

Bedtime was a little rough this evening, but eventually Hannah went down fine after a second try at story and song time and some extra hugs. Just a few minutes after we closed the door, she started singing to herself. Hannah was singing herself to sleep with "Frosty the snowman (with the correct interval eeked out, mind you) was a great big happy soul." I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, so I did a bit of each.

Words

We're thoroughly enjoying Hannah's words these days. She had been substituting a ya or wa sound for L for a long time, and we decided to see if we could get her to fix it. So we practiced a few times - mostly in the car - and heard lots of "la-wa", and "luh, luh, wuv." Then rather suddenly, it worked.

So now she says these really exaggerated L's in her words, and it's hilarious. "Ba-lue," "Llongmont," "Aunt Ca-laire." I'll try to capture some on video soon. We even have L's where Y's belong, which makes for "lellow" and the like. Add this to our recent favorites - "rasnaut" (restaurant) and "overgirls" (overalls) and you have frequent giggles from the parents. Very fun.

Halloween 2009

Along came a spider...