Creativity and imagination!

Some days I do wonder where her ideas come from, other days I know exactly where those thoughts originated.

Miss Ava is now officially 2, though her temperament has been showing her "2 year old" side for months now. Ironically it seemed as though she hit her second birthday and her behavior miraculously improved drastically.

She so creative. We've really been working with her to potty train. She doesn't really seem to care much so I don't push the issue too much. She's decided her baby dolls need to potty in the toilet as well so we stand in the bathroom while she undresses each one and sets them on her little toilet and then does a "happy dance" to encourage them to potty. It is quite possibly the funniest thing I've watched her doing. She then asks me for an m&m to give her baby for trying. She pretends said baby is eating the candy then quickly pops it in her own mouth. I do appreciate the tactics!

Today she decided she needed to wear diapers all day, which is fine with me, potty training is up to her. She then went and got 2 of her baby dolls and 2 BG3.0s ( http://www.bumgenius.com/ ).

She undressed the baby dolls and put the diaps on them and gave them a "potty" talk. It was great. She then decided one of them "booped" which is how she says poop. She got the wipes, and started cleaning up her baby, the entire time saying "pewww." She then went to the toilet, grabbed the diaper sprayer (which I absolutely LOVE from http://www.cottonbabies.com/ ) and washed the diaper and then put it in the diaper pail. I'd say she has the idea of where it all belongs!

I've started getting creative with what I give her so she can use as much imagination as she likes to go about her days. She has access a large variety of art supplies and can come of with some great pictures, sculptures, and towers. When I make dinner she loves to be a part of it, she wants to stir the pot, I haven't gotten the nerve to let her stir on the hot stove. She plays in the pot and pans cupboard and has spoons and turners. She loves the hot mits and at least once has to put them on and say "hot hot, careful" as she carries the pot across the kitchen. I really could watch her all day while she explores her world.

I hope you've enjoyed reading, hopefully I'll get better at remembering to share what is going on in the wide world of Ava!

Crazy weekend!

Well, Blogger is fighting me and I can't add pictures. So, I'll tell you about our crazy, busy, fun weekend and try for some pics later.

We started our weekend early. We took the 2 1/2 hour drive to the smokey, fire infested Boulder to have lunch with Ava's grandparents (aka: Addam's parents) and Ava played in the park for hours and had a blast. We then hopped back in the car for another hour and headed to our friends' wedding. It was beautiful and a wonderful location. The ceremony was outside in this pretty rock amphitheater facing the river with aspen trees rustling in the wind, really it was gorgeous. We ate, we dance, Ava danced until her little legs wouldn't move anymore. We then hopped back in the car for a 3 hour drive to my parents' house. I told, CRAZY weekend!

Saturday we did some shopping for Ava's birthday party, then had a great time at my nephew Nikolai's 4th birthday party. He had a great time and all the kids were worn out.

Sunday we went to Denver and I did some wedding dress shopping with a great friend of mine and then we headed back up the mountain.

Somewhere in the middle of all that we decided it was officially time for Ava to get rid of her addiction to her paci. So far so good!!

I just can't seem to keep up with this...

Ava will be 2 years old in just a few short weeks. I have no idea where the time has gone. I think I may have accidentally blinked.

Life has been crazy and we are finally getting settled into the beautiful Colorado mountains. Here's our view! No, this photo isn't edited.

I would love to promise that I'll actually get some posts on here on a more regular basis, but I can't make that promise. I'll see if I can't try a bit harder though!

Ava is above and beyond with development. She is blowing through milestones like crazy, in all areas except speech. She just doesn't want to talk. She babbles and does communicate with us, but she doesn't say much. I'm not worried...yet!

Here are a few pictures so you can see just how big she's gotten!

p.s. Mejialar I know you read my blogs. Hunt me down so we can catch up! Try facebook.

HOLY MOLY!! I just realized isn't been over a year since I posted anything on here! So incredibly sorry for that. I'll work on getting pictures up and some updates.

Life has changed so much since January 2009 (when I last posted)!

Ava is now 20 months old and it sounds funny to say her age in months but I'm not willing to say "almost 2" quite yet. She's all over the place and doing wonderfully. The words are really starting to explode out of her, even though there are still many times I look at her with a very confused expression having no idea what all the jumble was that just came flowing out of her gorgeous self.

Since last January, Addam got laid off from RK and we packed up and moved to Sterling under my parents' wings to try to recover. A few months later some great family friends of ours offered to let us stay in an empty house they had for free in exchange for some labor on the house. We moved in July and enjoyed the country for awhile, knowing that it wasn't for us, but would work for the time being. Addam got a great job in March 2010 working at the wind energy park and we thanked God for that opportunity. Only a few weeks after accepting and starting a position at the wind park, Addam got a call from a company he had applied with months before. They were very interested in him. He went through a few interviews and the company loved him. After only 6 weeks with the wind park he turned in his 2 weeks notice and we packed up to move once again heading back to the mountains.

Today, we are now finally getting settled into our cute little rented condo in Avon, CO and loving it here. It was very hard for us to leave my family, having been so close to them for over a year. We loved having the ability to take Ava to Gamma and Papa's house so Addam and I could have "us" time. Even though it was hard to leave, we knew this was where God wanted us. Addam now works for MTech, a mechanical contractor, in Avon. He loves his new job and we live 3/10 of a mile from his office. He walks to work in the mornings, drives home for lunch with us, and Ava and I walk to join him on his walk home in the evenings.

So, as I said, life has changed drastically in the last year and a half, but we love where it has taken us. I promise to get a few pictures posted soon.

~Amber

Ava is now over 14 lbs and 25 inches. She is wonderful! She is teething which has proven to be more emotionally draining on me watching her be in pain and not being able to take that pain away from her. She also currently has a sinus infection so she's quite stuffed up. Well, it sounds like she is waking up, so I'm off.

I'm such a slacker

Sorry I'm just not as good at getting pictures and updates posted as I was when I was on bedrest and didn't have this pretty little girl to chase around.

So here are a few pictures from the last few months.

And here's a link to a video of her jumping and enjoying life!:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R38HCaQraJw

a few Christmas pics

Here are a couple Christmas pics. Sorry no time for much more.