Monday, July 26, 2010

Spa Day with Erika

About 2 weeks ago, Erika and I went to Sernity Day Spa. A much needed break from reality. We headed out around 11 and got to spend some time together. Texting back and forth can only do so much for us talkers! lol. We spent our time waiting for our pedi's and manicure's chatting and catching up. It was so relaxing. By 2 oclock we were all fancy with new nail polish and waiting for our massages to begin. I couldn't wait. My back has been giving me a fit. Carrying around Ava, bending and twisting, and carrying that carseat (2 more months and we can move to front facing yay).

After our massages, we went to where my sister Jess works and got our eyebrows waxed then a very very late lunch.

I love having a day to just talk and complain about life while also sharing the greatness of it. Having a person that will listen to you vent and then laugh with you when you tell her a funny story is great. Many people are a little funny about their inlaws but Erika and I have a great relationship. We are best friends. And I am thankful for it. I wouldnt know what to do if we didnt like each other or were just tolerable of each other because we are married to brothers. We may not agree on everything but we talk it out and dont try to push our beliefs on each other.

These past 2 years especially have been stressful from marriage to moving to pregnancy. And to have someone to lean on when you can tell the hubby is tired of hearing about it is special to me.

Our spa day was great and I am glad I could spend it with my sister in law. To be out of the house without Ava on my hip was wonderful too, but I missed her soo much. Couldn't wait to get home and get a hug from her. Erika got hugs and kisses from her too and Erika got to see her walk.

I hope spa day comes again and we get another day out of the house and to relax and gossip and chat with each other.

Play Date!

This past Saturday we went over to our friend's house and the guys went to the basement while the moms stayed upstairs with the kids. Ava had a blast. She played so hard with Parker and Emma. At this age, they really are just learning to play with each other and usually just play by themselves, but they all behaved good and seemed to get along well. Parker and Emma play all the time together so I was wondering how Ava would do with them, especially since she is about a year and half younger.






They did well together. Ava loved Emma's kitchen set, it might end up being a Christmas present in our house, and kept busy transferring the dishes from one stop to another. She also loved giving me a plate or cup then taking it back and putting it somewhere new.








By 10pm she still wasnt asleep which is waaaay past her bedtime, so I had to ask Kenny if it would be okay to break up his time with the guys and head home. As soon as she got in her carseat her eyes began to close. She was in bed by 10:30 and was OUT!







Walking

Ava has been walking for about 2 weeks now. She is getting better and faster, thought I would share a little of it.

Sunday, July 11, 2010

A day at Aunt Jess's House

This past Wednesday, Ava went to Aunt Jess’s house for the day. Jessica had asked about 2 weeks ago if she could watch Ava on a Wednesday that she was off. I couldn’t tell her ‘no’, it’s her niece. So I scheduled it in and let Becky and Kenny know.

So last Wednesday I dropped her off a little after 7 and headed to work. Throughout the day I would text and check on her, always she was doing fine. Jessica sent me a few pictures, Emily and Ava played tea party for quite some time.



Ava ate a huge lunch, Jessica made homemade lasagna and Ava ate a lot of it. After lunch, she crashed while Emily sang her lullabies.

They played throughout the afternoon.

Ava had a ball. When I picked her up I thanked Emily for watching Ava for me. She told me that her mommy had helped. Which I thought was too cute. Emily took over as babysitter for Jessica apparently half way through that day.

I told Emily anytime she wanted to spend the day with Ava to just let me know.



Summer Fun!



Ava has never minded water. When she was a newborn, I just sponge bathed her but around 5 months old I began putting her in her baby tub. She loves it. She has so much fun in the water. So when it started getting hot my mom got a pool, Becky got a pool, so Kenny and I decided to get her a little pool. When we went to Gander Mountain the other day with a gift card Kenny got for Christmas we initially were looking for hunting gear I believe. Kenny couldn’t find anything he wanted and we came across this section of pool stuff. We saw the little inflatable pool and decided we would get it for Ava.







Well last night, we blew it up and even before it was completely finished, she was squealing and came over and crawled right into it. I had to run her out of it 3 times while I was blowing it up. When it was ready, I filled it with warm water and put on one of her swimmers.



She was in heaven. She played for about half hour. She was splashing water and throwing her toys out of the pool. She kept standing up and slipping back down on her butt. She’s too funny, NO FEAR. She puts her face in it, will let you dump water over her head. She has a ball.

Talk Talk Talk

9 Months and Counting

Ava is now 9 months and 2 weeks! Oh how time as flown by. She is the center of our hearts and the more she learns the more it amazes me.



Ava is now talking; saying ‘daddy’, ‘nanny’, ‘dada’, ‘ash’, ‘done’, ‘baba’ and a few things come out sometimes that sound like little phrases. Sometimes it will sound like ‘I got it’ or ‘I did it’ or ‘I done’. Her communications are getting stronger. She now tells us when she is done eating by putting her head down her to chest and basically refusing to finish. I don’t mind this at all, I would rather her tell me she is full than fill her until she explodes. She raises her hands in the air when she wants to be picked up and if she wants to sit on the couch with me, she’ll come over and stand and stare at me until I ask ‘Up?’, then she will get up on her tippy toes and try to come up with me. She absolutely lets us know when she’s not happy with her facial expressions. Her brows tell us a lot. They will go down and you will get the ‘I’m mad right now face’ but I have to say she is quick to get over it. She doesn’t stay upset long and soon will be playing with something else, something that she is allowed to play with. Her little fits usually stem from her playing with either our air purifier or the satellite box, about the only 2 things we say ‘NO’ to and the 2 things she insists to always try to play with. She is responding to what we are telling her more and more. She knows that when I ask her to lay down, that it is time to lay down on my chest or the bed and relax for either her nap or bed time.

She is 15 lbs and 9 oz and 27 inches long.
She is growing right along with what her doctor would like to see.






She is now eating table food. She has shared everything from a poptart to a steak dinner with me in the last few weeks. She loves to eat. On the weekends when we are home, she will eat at her normal times then also snack with me when I am eating. She LOVES her puffs. She sees them and gets all excited. When we are eating something I am not comfortable giving her, I will let her eat puffs instead. That way I get to eat and so does she. She is drinking milk and juice. She loves yogurt, since taking her off a night time before bed bottle I have substituted with yogurt.

She is only drinking 2 bottles a day and soon I hope to get that down to 1 then by September to zero. I took the bottle away from her at night about a week or more before Memorial Day, just to experiment and see how she reacted. She did very well. She didn’t even miss it. I feed her a jar of 3rd foods/or whatever we are eating/or both, then the yogurt about a ½ hour from her bedtime and she is good for the night. On the weekends when she’s with me, there are days that she doesn’t get a bottle at all; I will just give her milk throughout the day with her food. She has been handling those days pretty well.

She is picking things up and throwing them all over my house. She is learning to use her fingers more for small objects. She is free standing on her own now and even takes a few steps at times. She is getting more balanced; walking is not that far away. She moves very fast now that she has crawling down pat. She knows where her toys are and can spend an hour just moving them here and there and playing. She loves her windows. We have huge windows in our living room and she will play at the window sill forever. She takes her toys over and puts them on the ledge of the window sill and will move them all over, they will fall to the floor, she will pick them up, and they fall again. She LOVES to bang things against the windows. The more noise she can make the happier she is.



She usually takes a nap in the morning and one in the afternoon, for the most part. She has days where it is too busy for naps and crashes early that evening. She is usually in bed relaxing by 8 and a sleep by 830.

She is definitely both of our personalities. She can be sweet and gentle and then be rough and carrying on. She can have a quick temper but it disappears quickly. Right now she is a momma’s girl when she is tired or hungry and daddy’s girl when she wants to play.

She has so much fun with Kenny. He will pick her up by her feet and swing her upside down, she just smiles. She definitely aggravates like him, she knows when she is pushing buttons and will laugh at you while she is doing it. She likes to aggravate her daddy; she will keep going back to something he has told her ‘no’ on just because she can. She will go for it and just as he is getting up she will back away and smile at him. She can stare and smile at him all day I believe.

She is growing so fast and learning so much. This is such a fun age. We are just enjoying every moment we have with her and taking it all in.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

4th of July-Ava's First

Our 4th of July weekend wasn’t too eventful but it was nice. Saturday was normal, Kenny went to work and Ava and I cleaned the house, played, and finished laundry. It was so hot outside that we didn’t do much other than play inside. Ava played and took a great 3 hour nap.





Sunday, the 4th, Ava woke up talking. She cracked me up. She has always made noise, she has always been a mouthy kid, since birth but that morning she woke up saying words kind of. Kenny got home from work and laughed at her. She was yelling and making a lot of noise. When we went to speak, she would become louder. We hung out a home until about 4 then made our way into moms. She was having a cookout with a little swimming. Ava had a ball with Emily and the pool. She has no fear. She was floating in my arms and dunged her head in the water, making herself cough up water but loved it and tried to do it again. She loves the water. Emily had a cupcake and Ava wanted it so bad. She was reaching for it and trying to climb my mom’s kitchen table. And at one point she yelled out ‘Nanny’ and looking at my mom, telling her to get her a cupcake. That made my mom’s day. She had been saying ‘nan nan’ for a day or so but this was “Nanny” and it was loud. That evening, Ava decided that she would NOT go to sleep at her normal 8 o’clock bedtime, but 10 o’clock. She was so hyper and moving all over the place and of course talking. Since she was up, when the neighbors began letting off their fireworks, we went out to watch a little. So Ava got to see fireworks on her first 4th of July. It made me so happy. I figured she would sleep through it all.

Monday was great! I was off, Kenny was off and we were both home. Ava woke up talking and out came a few words. She is now saying ‘Nan Nan’, ‘Nanny’, ‘Dada’, ‘Yea’, ‘Hey’, ‘Hi’, sometimes it sounds like ‘dad’ and when she is upset ‘Mommy’. All within two days she has found so many words. Also the gibberish that goes along with that, the syllables that come out, we try to make it out what she is saying. And it’s nonstop. We LOVE it!!

We headed to Winchester, to get out of the house a bit and run a few errands. After eating lunch at Bob Evans, which Ava really behaved herself and ate a lot of their rolls and mashed potatoes, we headed to Kohls. Since we were in Ranson, we visited my dad for a little bit and then was on our way back home. It was a loooong day. After supper, we went to Central’s softball game for a bit. It was fun and I love watching Kenny play but it was HOT. So Ava and I didn’t say the whole time, she had much more fun in the bathtub.

After some playtime and more ‘dadas’ from Ava, we went to bed. I couldn’t have asked for a more fun and relaxing weekend with my baby girl and Kenny. She is growing so fast and doing so much now. Like I said, uneventful but it was wonderful for us.