Lately

October was completely absorbed by the Cobb and Atlanta Heart Walks. I survived my rookie season and I even think they are going to keep me around! To those who supported me with encouragement and or donations, I can't thank you enough!  A more formal thank you is on the way, so don't give up on me if you haven't seen it yet! Tucker's Tickers raised over $5,000 this year, making us one of the top community teams at the Atlanta Heart Walk. 

For those who didn't hear from me from late September until now, you know why!  With a busy job, a toddler, and a husband in school, we put the fun in dysFUNctional!

To make matters worse, Mom and Dad took a long planned and well deserved trip to Europe in October, so we were stretched thinner than normal.  I know we are so lucky to have them close, but I didn't realize how much we rely on them for help when we have long days.  We are so happy to have them back and we are always looking for an excuse to go visit.  Audrey loves to hug Pop and tries to say Niecie ("Ne Ne").  We looked at their picture every day while they were gone because Niecie didn't want Audrey to forget what she looked like.  Audrey would give kisses to the picture.  Now she has a habit of kissing picture frames.

Audrey got to see a good bit of her other grandparents in October.  Graham's dad and step mom kept Audrey while we went to my friend Kristi's wedding in St. Simons.  I'm not sure who had the better time, the new parents with an off weekend, the grandparents, or Audrey!  She came home with lots of new toys that had been her Aunt Madison's.  Graham and I have joined a tennis team, and Audrey and Grandma (Graham's mom) have been spending Wednesday nights together.  We are blessed to have family so close.  Even Aunt Whitney and Aunt Darbie took a turn after the Heart Walk.

Halloween came and went uneventfully.  Audrey was a little bumblebee, but she thought she was Dora...her hero. 


We took her to one house, our neighbors.  We are such old fuddy duds that we turned off the lights at 8:00, just after bedtime.  We are lucky we didn't get any tricks!

Audrey went from walking straight into running.  She loves going up and down the stairs, especially if you are chasing her.  Her most popular words are Dora and Baby.  She also says most anything that starts with a "B".  Ba=bath, Buh=book, Boh=bow, Bee=Bee, Beeeeeeeeeeee=bread.  Speaking of bread, the kid loves some bread...not the fancy stuff, just slices of wheat bread.  I'm not sure how many times in the last month she's eaten a piece of bread for a meal.  I made her toast one morning and she was angry.  How dare I mess up her wheat bread.  Grilled cheese was also a no-go.  She peeled the bread off the cheese.

Grandma made a similar mistake with raisins.  Audrey loves her raisins.  On Halloween, Grandma bought her a HUGE goodie bag filled with raisins and {yum} yogurt covered raisins for Trunk or Treat.  Audrey was again annoyed that someone messed with her raisins.  How dare we dip them in delicious yogurt and try to serve them to her?  She chews off the yogurt, spits it out and then eats the raisins.  Clearly not my child.  I chew off the yogurt and throw away the raisin!

While trunk-or-treating, most children were gathering as much candy as they could, stopping at some cars several times.  Not my child...she saw a car whose owner had unintentionally left a box of wheat thins in plain view.  Audrey pitched a fit until everyone figured out she wanted a cak cak.  They thought it was cute, but after tantrum 2 and 3 I politely asked them to remove their wheat thins from her sight!

Audrey added a couple new words to her vocab this weekend and I think it's adorable. She says "UH OH." It's so cute.  It's cute when any kid discovers how to use that.  She also started saying Ahp hee (happy).  Ahp hee Ahp hee Ahp hee.  It's usually my cue to sing "If you are happy and you know it."

The biggest Audrey news is that we took away the pacifier.  She was only using it at night (not at daycare or for naps).  I thought we had a 21 month appointment, so I was scared to tell the pediatrician that I didn't take her advice to literally pull the plug after our last visit.  The first 3 nights were perfect, she was a little confused, but went right to bed.  I thought we had the easiest baby and we were just that good at parenting.  Nights 4-14 were pretty rough.  Screaming hysterical fits after starting bedtime.  I think Graham and I both were ready to give it back at different times.  Last night was the first night in 2 weeks where she went to bed without crying.  I'm really proud of her!

We go see Santa tomorrow (somehow I doubt she'll fall asleep again).  I had to make sure to get us caught up from October before we moved into November and Santa!