Happy Birthday Weekend To Me!

We have had a very busy birthday weekend, which started with me having to take my Xterra to the shop all day Thursday to get a sensor repaired so my truck would pass emissions. Luckily, Grandpa Pete works for Goodyear and helped me save $225 from what the Nissan dealership was going to charge me. They are such a ripoff! Grandma Mary picked Audrey and I up from the Goodyear shop and we spent a nice day shopping while my car was being worked on.

On Friday night, the whole Farbotko clan came up and Mary made Chinese food for dinner. Audrey and Ian had a great time chasing each other around the house. She really wanted Ian to sit in her chair with her, so I stuck him in there and got this cute shot:

Saturday evening, the Hoffman side of the family came up. Mom made a big pan of lasagna and the kids ran around like maniacs. Jack wanted to watch a Baby Einstein video, so Andy stuck it on while we were finishing dinner and got a rare shot of all four kids sitting still!

Tina brought over some baby pool toys that Jan wanted to get rid of. Audrey found the yellow float suit and wore it on her head while quacking like a duck. What is wrong with her?? :)

The funny kid quote of the night came from Tyler, who called Jack a girl. When Jason told him that Jack wasn't a girl, he said "But he's so pretty to look at." Too cute!

We have The Wiggles concert tonight, so I'm sure I'll have some great pictures to post soon. Audrey and Jack were singing Wiggles songs together last night, so I can't wait to see what the two of them do at the concert!

To Potty Train or Not To Potty Train?

Although I think she's still a little too young for it, Audrey is starting to show us signs of understanding using the potty. She will tell me if her diaper is really full and she gets embarrassed if she has a poopy diaper. If you ask her if she has poopies, she'll say "No!" and then go run and hide in a corner! A couple of weeks ago, she sat on the twins training toilet and said "I go potty! I go pee pee!"

Yesterday, she was playing with her Little People dollhouse and I asked her what the Mommy was doing. She grabbed the Mommy, stuck her on the little toilet and said "Mommy go potty!" She might have done that because she always sees me going potty now since her little sister seems to be sitting directly on my bladder!

While I was changing her for bed last night, she said "No diaper" and ran off naked. Andy told her not to go potty on the floor, and she said "Potty!" and ran to the bathroom. Andy sat her on the toilet and she just sat there and giggled. Every time he took her off, she would want back on to "go potty." She never actually did anything, but she's getting the concept!

My big dilemma now is whether to wait until I am on maternity leave to potty train. I figured it would be easier for me since I'll be home every day, but I don't want that to be too much for Audrey to deal with (new baby plus potty). I would absolutely love it if she was out of diapers by the end of February so I don't have two in diapers at one time though. Decisions, decisions...

Here is a photo of Hazel (in Audrey's chair of course - she's actually napping there right now) that I snapped this weekend:

Audrey gave her all of her plastic animals and kept saying "Say thank you. Say thank you, Hazel." Being the ingrate that she is, Hazel never did thank Audrey for piling all of her animals on her! ;)

Take A Baf?

Audrey continues to amaze us with her ever-expanding vocabulary. She is also becoming the master of stall techniques at bed time. There's the ever popular "Take a baf?", plus "Brush teeth?", "More juice?", "More diaper?", and "See Roscoe and Hazel?"

If we come home from somewhere and it's dark out, she'll ask to go see the moon when I get her out of the car. We'll walk out to the driveway, find the moon, and she'll say "Bye bye moon. See you tomorrow!"

She also picks up on songs quickly and can sing at least a dozen songs, getting most of the tunes and words right. Along with songs like Twinkle Twinkle, Old McDonald, and Where is Thumbkin, she also knows Jingle Bells, various Wiggles songs and the theme songs to the Mickey Mouse Club and Little Einsteins.

There is a new older lady in her room at daycare that is always gushing over Audrey when we pick her up. Today she told me that Audrey is the sweetest little girl that she's ever met. I guess Audrey saves the Drama Queen personality for home!

Enough bragging about Audrey... the pregnancy is going well. I had the yucky one hour glucose test on Tuesday and spent the evening barfing up a storm. I'm not sure if it was from the glucose test that morning or the Wendy's that I had for lunch. It could have been either one! I don't know when I get the results back but hopefully I passed so I don't have to take another test. I plan on taking it easy this weekend b/c I had a little bit of spotting this morning. The nurse said that it was probably from lifting something (Audrey perhaps?) or overexerting myself.

Here are some pictures of Audrey, Ryan and Batman playing on the tire swing. Ryan was spinning everyone around and singing a little song about spinning. Audrey thought he was pretty funny, and Mommy thought Jack was pretty funny in his Batman jammies! He always has some kind of costume on when I see him!

Happy Halloween!

I got off work early today and, being the procrastinator that I am, I had to carve the pumpkin really quickly before dinner. Audrey helped by playing in the bowl of pumpkin innards and occasionally scooping some of them back into the pumpkin.

Audrey wasn't very into trick-or-treating. We went to two houses, and on our way to go visit our neighbors Ed and Judy, they came driving up in their golf cart with their granddaughters. We hopped on the back and hit one more house with them, then, as the little girls were at our house, Audrey ran in the door and wouldn't come back out. We made it to three whole houses! All of our photos were taken at our house, so we don't have any shots of Audrey in action.

We only had the doorbell ring about 10 times. There seems to be less and less kids each year. I guess all of the neighborhood kids are growing up. After eating some of her loot and wrestling with Mommy and Daddy, Audrey just finally went to bed (it's 9:30). I have a cake in the oven for a neighborhood fall festival tomorrow, then we're off to some friends house to watch the Georgia vs. Florida game. Go Dawgs!

Here are the rest of the ladybug pictures:

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NKOTB!!

Although no one but probably Amanda will enjoy or read this blog entry, I had such a great time at the New Kids On The Block concert that I wanted to record it on my blog. Someday, Audrey and Baby 2 can read all about what a nut their Mommy was!

The concert was awesome!! We were sitting on the side of the auditorium, about half way down and at the front row next to the floor seating. We had noticed something across from us that kind of looked like part of the sound board, but Amanda had heard that there might be a second stage in the audience. Sure enough, about half way through, the lights went down while the guys changed clothes. I looked over and said "I think I see a piano over there!" An usher then walks up to me and asks me if I have a camera (which I am now kicking myself for not bringing). I told him no and he said that the New Kids are going to perform on that stage and then walk down the aisle right in front of our seats!

They did three songs on the small, rotating stage, including one of my favorites, Tonight. Afterwards, they walk down the aisle back to the stage. I had my phone out to snap pictures, then I thought "Screw it - I want to try to touch all of them!" Danny and Jon came down first. They only had one body guard each b/c they really aren't the popular ones. Really, they didn't do much at all, especially poor Jon who was mostly backup vocals. I got both of their hands. Then, the three popular ones (Jordan, Donnie and my favorite, Joey) came down surrounded by body guards. I got Jordan and Donnie by the shirt and grabbed Joey's arm!

It was so much fun to go out and act stupid for the evening. My ears were ringing when we left and my back and legs are sore today from standing so long. Hopefully Baby Girl won't have any hearing loss when she comes out! For a bunch of 40 year olds, they put on a great show.

Here are some of the photos from the phone. You can see how close they were to us!

The first one is Jon, Jordan and Danny, next is Joey and Donnie, third is Donnie and Jon, and then I got Jordan, Danny and Joey!

Birthday Party Weekend

Audrey was a party girl this weekend! On Saturday afternoon, she went to her buddy Emma's party. Emma's Mommy borrowed Aunt Tina's bouncy house and Audrey recognized it as soon as it started inflating. She spent a good deal of time jumping around like a maniac.


Her friend Jackson, who used to live across the street, showed up a little late to the party. As soon as Audrey saw him, she ran over, grabbed a party favor bag, and brought it to him. She's such a good hostess!

The only time she acted up at the party was when she saw the birthday cake. She made a bee line for it with her arms out and didn't quite understand why she had to wait to get a piece. The girl likes her cake!



I didn't have my camera, so here are a couple of pictures that I borrowed from Emma's blog. Here is the birthday girl with all of her loot:

Here is Audrey trying to steal food from Mommy's plate. Seriously, does she not know that I'm pregnant?? She's lucky that she's so cute, so I'll share my food with her.


On Sunday morning, we picked up Grandma Carol and went shopping with the intentions of buying a winter coat. We ended up with about four bags of clothes for Audrey and found a winter coat at the very last stop!

After we dropped Grandma Carol off, we headed over to the Farbotko side to celebrate Aunt Stephanie's birthday. Grandma Mary had four more outfits for Audrey - is she spoiled or what? I wish people bought me bags and bags of clothes!

Audrey had a little more patience while waiting for a piece of Aunt Steph's cake. After cake, Audrey and Ian were on sugar highs and were chasing each other through the house. At one point, Audrey wanted her shirt off. After her top came off, she put her hands over her chest and danced and laughed... I think we have a little stripper in the making. ;)

Prison Break!

Audrey escaped from her room for the first time early this morning. I heard a little "Mommy?" over the monitor, then I didn't hear anything else so I went back to sleep. A few minutes later, I feel this soft touch on my back, which I assumed was a cat jumping on the bed, so I didn't turn over to look. Then, I hear a little runny nose sniffle, so I turned around and there is Audrey standing by the bed. It was a little startling! I must not have shut her door all the way last night b/c her door handle is kind of stiff. I guess it's time to put the door knob covers on just in case!

Luckily for me, she came into our room 2 minutes before my alarm went off, so I didn't loose any sleep. Poor Andy is off work today, so he had the pleasure of getting up at 6:30ish instead of sleeping in a little bit.

Here is a picture of Audrey at Kroger that I took with my phone. Only the cool kids wear Daddy's sunglasses while grocery shopping!