My Big Girl

Now that Hannah and Mallorie are back in school, Ava has been so much better about being on a decent schedule. She loves to help me get them to bed and then turn the lights down low and snuggle up to me and go to sleep herself. While they are out for summer, all bets are off. She refused to go to bed at a decent hour, but now, especially since we are up so early, she's happy to go to bed at night. For the last two days, she's also taken two naps every day. Usually one about an hour after we drop off the girls at school and then again around 1:30. I love naps. I think our bodies are still on West Coast time. Our heads have it right, but we are still just tired at all the wrong times. Even Rusty says he feels out of whack and he's usually pretty good about changing time zones. I guess three hours difference is just catching up with us.

Lately Ava's been so pooped, she just falls asleep where ever she's sitting at that moment. Here are some examples:

(and yes, that is infact a Christmas blanket she's laying on. It's Mallorie's favorite and she has to have it out all the time.)

I'm not sure how she fell asleep on that hard floor, but she seemed comfortable.

And the other night she fell asleep while eating. She had food all over her and I didn't have the heart to take a picture of her. I felt awful, but then again, I totally should've taken a pic.

She's been potty training this week. Wednesday was so good infact, that she only had two accidents. I took her to Target yesterday and let her pick out her first big-girl undies and she thinks she is somethin' in them! We didn't make it more than 30 seconds in them before she wet them, but it's just part of it. I'm so impressed with her. She won't say the word when she needs to go, but she tells me in her own ways.

We've been working very hard at her verbal skills. For a while she was saying several things. Then suddenly she stopped. All she would say was DaDa. Now, I've been making her try saying words before she gets what she wants. Even if she says it wrong I still give it to her. I just want her to try. But, she is saying mama, juice, mimi, yes, no, shoes, baby-(but she says it with d's). She says Mallorie's name in her own way. She barks at every animal we see, but will not say dog. These things don't exactly bother me because I know that she hasn't had to say anything for so long because we just do everything for her. I also know that once she starts, I'll never get her to stop.

She sings all the time. I get tickled because I'll hear her in another room playing with a toy and humming. Or when she's walking around the house she sings this hmmm-hmmm song all the time. It makes my heart just soar! We LOVE music in this house and are always excited when the kids show interest in any instrument, but I especially love it when they sing. Your voice is your ultimate instrument and I love to sing all the time. Lately I've been singing as if I was on Broadway making up silly verses about the girls and trying to make them laugh in the mornings while getting their lunches made. They end up doing the same thing and then it just gets loud and goofy. Ava isn't shy at all and holds her own while we're "singing".

Since Ava will be 18 months old on Saturday, I wanted to give a little update to the blog about her. I don't have a doctor here yet so I don't know what I will do about her checkup, but as soon as I gets stats I will be posting them as well. She's still pretty petite. She's just moving into an 18months size, but lately I have noticed she's been eating a bit more, so we may start seeing some extra growth in the next few months.

Anyway, I truly didn't realize it was the end of the week until yesterday when Hannah lovingly informed me (see, I'm sleep deprived). I hope you have a wonderful weekend. We will be enjoying having Rusty home for the weekend and probably trying out a new church. I'm nervous about this, but I really want to find the right church for our family. It'll be good.

~Blessings~