Happy Anniversary

J.P. and I celebrated our 2nd anniversary on March 14th. It's strange to think that it's been two years already since we were vacationing in the Dominican especially since so much has happened during those two years! Ava gave us the most wonderful anniversary present and slept for 14 hours straight through the night...a record high for her!! We went out for dinner at our favorite restaurant, The Cellar, and my mom came over to babysit for the evening. It was a great time! I've included a few of my favorite wedding pictures as well as some shots we took before heading out for our "date"!

Playdate with Brea

Our friends Lori and BJ welcomed their beautiful baby girl Brea into the world last December. We took Ava over to meet her during the holidays, but they haven't seen each other since so Lori and I decided it was time for the girls to have a playdate! Before they arrived at our house, I took up Ava's bouncy chair for Brea to use and the second Ava saw it she crawled right over to it and tried to get in! I kept reminding her that the chair was for "little" babies, but she didn't seem to get it! Ava was very excited to play with Brea and was a little confused why she wasn't very interested in the toys and books she kept bringing over to her. The age difference is quite noticable right now, but in a couple years I'm sure it'll be hard to tell who's older. We had a great visit, unfortunately we weren't able to get any pictures since the girls kept us quite busy...oh well, there's always next time!

Cruising

Ava is in the beginning stages of walking...."cruising". She's been using just about anything that's in her path so she can pull herself up to a standing position: the couch, her toy box, the t.v. stand, our legs, etc!!! This past week she's really taken off with the walking part and we'll often see her moving around the house. My mom got her a walker toy for Christmas and she's finally beginning to get the idea of holding on and walking at the same time. For the longest time she would just hold onto the handle and push forward while standing still until she would fall to her knees!

Ava at the Gate

Ava has recently discovered the stairs in our entrance-way. She used to just crawl through the hallway and not pay any attention to them, but now she'll go right up to the gate and pull herself into a standing position. This morning she played there for quite a while, as she had a little friend to keep her occupied! Maddux has quickly caught on to the fact that if he stands on one side of the gate he's free from any tail pulling that might come from his eager and unpredictable little sister!! I'm not sure what Ava thinks of this new "game", but she seemed to enjoy reaching up for him as he watched down from the safe spot.

Nine Month Check-up

I can't believe it, but today was Ava's nine month check-up at the doctor's. I know I'm always saying this, but the time is seriously flying by!!! She did extremely well considering that we had to wait TWO HOURS in the waiting room before going in to see the doctor. Her appointment was for 4:30 and we didn't get called in until 6:30. Trust me, she was pretty sick of snacking on the cheerios that I'd packed in her bag and there's only so much you can do to entertain a baby in a pretty boring waiting room! She got a great report from the doctor and she now weighs 19 lbs, 8 oz and is 26 3/4 inches long. No photos to capture this event, but just picture a very restless, hungry, cranky little girl!!!! The poor thing!!

On The Grow

We met up with our friends Kari and Alexa at "On The Grow" today. It's an indoor playground centre for families and it SOOOOOO much fun!! There are three huge areas for kids to play that are designed to fit the needs of different age groups (babies, toddlers, and preschoolers). The baby area has exersaucers, bouncy chairs, and toys. The toddler area has balls, ride on toys, and slides. The preschooler area has a huge jungle gym, climbing wall, and slides. Ava loves crawling around and exploring everything! Today she decided that she wanted to see what the bigger kids were up to and she tried climbing up onto the jungle gym. After lots of playing, the girls had a nice snack of fruit, yogurt, and cheerios followed by a quick diaper change and then it was back to some more playing! It was a great afternoon and I'm glad that we were able to finally get out after being stuck in the house for so long while Ava recovered from her first cold!

Chocolate Pudding

Today was a yucky day weather-wise with lots of freezing rain and slippery roads so Ava and I were stuck inside the house all day. For something new and exciting, I decided to let her have some fun and explore with some chocolate pudding. I knew going into it that it'd be pretty messy so I stripped her down to her diaper, put a bib on, and got her settled into her highchair. When I'd done this sort of thing with spaghetti and Jell-o she didn't even try to put it in her mouth so I thought that we'd be okay without having her eat any of it. I don't know what I was thinking....I mean, we're talking about someone who won't even give her child fruit juice because of the sugar content, but I thought I'd expose her to chocolate fudge pudding???!!!! I'm not sure if it was the smell or what, but within a minute or so her fingers were in her mouth and then there was no stopping her! As you'll see from the video she definitely liked the taste. The tray was quickly taken away with a little protesting, but she was still able to smile for the camera!
****By the way...you can click on the pictures to make them bigger!!