10 Months Old

Sweet love, my favorite time of year is now. I am beyond delighted to see you experience this season for the first time from the cool temps to the plump orange pumpkins. I remember going to the pumpkin patch last year with eager anticipation of your arrival. And now you are here, all ten months of you.

It is really hitting me that in just less than two months you will be one. I have probably said it a dozen times, but you are hitting this mark way faster than I remember with your brother. Part of that is because my attention is divided between you two but you are also reaching new milestones so much faster. Two more teeth are coming in for a total of six. And you have stood on your own several times for a few seconds. Can I just say how fast you get around. Your knees never touch the ground when you crawl but you sure do boot scoot. It made me a little sad, but this past Sunday you were moved out of the baby class at church into the one year old class because as they said you can pretty much get into anything. I know, I have tried to sweep when you are on the floor.

One thing that is not changing as much is that you seemed to have slowed down in your growth. You are wearing 6-9 month clothes with a few 12 month items and at 10 months weigh 16.9 pounds. Maybe, just maybe your eyes will stay blue like your daddy's. Although in the below picture they look brown.

You and your brother are still two peas in a pod. It's fun being able to give you both a bath at the same time. And most of the time, he actually likes that you can play together. He thinks it's fun to help feed you too. As I'm typing this, Gavin leans over and asks if that's his baby sister in the picture. I think only you could pull him from It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown.

 

Now is that perfect time of year in Texas when we can comfortably enjoy the outdoors.  You squeal and wiggle your feet when we go outside. You just may be our little musician. We were listening to Gavin's choir cd in the car and I am almost certain you were shaking your rattle in time to the music. When I had to pause it, you stopped the rattle and started it back up with the music. No wonder you have always like to dance when someone sings a tune. 

 

We love you to the moon and back and more Missy Moo Who. ~ Mama

And Speaking Of...

I mentioned in the last post that Gavin was going to Awanas. It's basically a kid's program at our church that teaches kids memory verses and Bible stories. Gavin always comes home with a cute craft too. We've been working on his verses at home and it amazes me how many verses he still remembers about seven weeks in.

Here he is for the first Awanas' night. Lately, I can't get over how grown up he looks.

And here he is another night in his cute little Cubbie vest with his daddy.

We're really thankful for this sweet ministry at our church. I think Gavin gives his seal of approval too.

It's a Stretch

So the other day, I was searching through pictures of Gavin to create a poster for Awanas. It was supposed to show his growth from a baby to a boy to coincide with the story of Jesus as a boy. I came across his fourth birthday pictures. Yeah, remember that event I have mentioned several times before but have not backed up with pictures. Well, I figured it was now or never. And seeing how this was so long ago, I'll keep it brief.

It was actually Gavin's idea to have a Swedish Fish birthday. And how does one have such a party? It took some imagination and many hours on Pinterest to figure that out. One of the caveats had to be that the party should be fairly easy to throw together since we were moving the next week. The pool was the perfect activity except it rained the first half of the party, but some food and a craft project seemed to keep the kiddos entertained.

 

  

  

 

 

Two of my favorite parts of the party were the fruity shark attack and the school of Swedish fish we cut out of a flotation device for the pool.

  

  

But of course my absolute favorite part of the party was celebrating my sweet four year old with family and friends.

 

Zoo Day

This must be a record for me to actually blog about something we did the same day. It will probably be Gavin's fifth birthday before I get to blog about his fourth. Anyways, today we took a trip to the zoo along with other moms and kiddos from our Sunday School class. It was truly a beautiful day and surprisingly not crowded.

This was Ava's first trip and I think she looked pretty thrilled to be here. In fact, she did really well for not taking a morning nap. Let's just say all three of us crashed when we got home.

 

I'm fairly certain this same seal statue has been here since I was a little girl. 

Gavin and his friend Emily had so much fun. He thanked God today for having fun at the zoo and getting to play with Ava and Emily. So Sweet!

 

That's my favorite animal.

 

 And here I am with my other two favorite animals people.

The zoo has grown quite a bit since we were there last. The new addition is the African Forest and for a certain (overpriced) fee, you can feed the giraffes lettuce. When Gavin was one years old, we did this at a zoo in Florida where you pretty much had free reign, but at the Houston zoo it felt a little like the giraffes had an army of zoo bodyguards. I think Gav still enjoyed himself.

And this little one enjoyed herself so much she finally conked out on the ride back to the car.

9 Months Old

 

Well, Miss Ava Grace, I had all intentions of posting this almost two weeks ago when you actually turned nine months old, but a thing called life happened. And if I were to impart some kind of wisdom/insight to you at nine months, it would be that life does not always go as planned. People get sick, work has deadlines and the ten loads of laundry call your name. But not to be Debbie Downer on you because sometimes life calls you to chase your crawling kids around the living room or snuggle with your four year old for a few minutes of cartoon watching.

I still don't want to miss documenting the past month of your life because with each passing month, you get a little taller, a little funnier, and a whole lot cuter. If last month was a month of firsts, then this month was time for your personality to really shine Miss Ava Grace. We call you a "mess" with the sweetest of intentions. It just means that you are really, really funny to us. You scrunch your nose up when you smile and sometimes can hardly contain yourself when you "dance." You get those little legs to going up and down in what I call your squats.

 

You have been "helping" me in the kitchen. Mostly, I give you a bowl and some measuring spoons and that occupied for awhile until you found the fun game of looking at yourself in the reflection on the oven. That's not such a "hot" thing to do little missy. "No" is a word you have been hearing frequently this past month. You must like it because we have to say it to you often. Like your daddy says, you don't know the subtle meaning of "no" just yet but you are learning. 

You tend to give your brother one of two looks. Either your face lights up or you give him this "what are you doing?" kind of look. He simply adores you.Yesterday he kept saying, "Mama, take our picture."

You have become quite vocal although I don't know that you connect "Mama" and "Dada" to anything in particular. I looked down today and you had pulled yourself up by holding on to my pant leg with one hand. Crawling seems second nature to you but you do it without allowing your knees to touch the ground. It's so sweet to watch you sleep. The thumb is a certain must and if I'm holding you, you reach up and hold onto my hair. If you are in your bed you hold on to your rabbit's ear.

 

At your doctor's appointment, you weighed 16 pounds and 6 ounces (11%) and were 27.5 inches long (50%). I wasn't surprised that percentage-wise your weight had gone down since you are so active, but it was surprising that your height went from the 95% to 50%. The doctor said you could have been going through a growth spurt last time.

Finger foods make it to your mouth very quickly especially cheese. Meats were something we added to your diet this month and you are new friends with the sippy cup although all you do is chew on it.

Life just keeps getting a little busier and a lot lovelier with you around. We love you so dearly Ava Grace. ~ Mama