Tinkle tinkle little star...

The title of this blog will make sense once I tell you what Ava's new favorite thing to do is. She likes to pee. On the floor. She tinkles, and I really do think she likes it. She never used to do this, but lately, as soon as the diapers off and she's out of reach, she leaves a puddle. Luckily the past few times have been on the tile floor, but she has done it on the carpet a couple of times too. It's frustrating because I like to let her air out a bit between diaper changes since she's been getting diaper rash more frequently. Right now she has the worst diaper rash ever, I really feel bad, but I can't let her go even a couple of minutes without a diaper, otherwise I will be cleaning up a mess! She got a potty chair for her birthday, and even though I know it is probably too soon, I am thinking about taking it out of the box and sitting her on it, just to see what she does. This morning she peed on the floor in front of the TV, right before we had to leave for work, and she ended up stepping in it and falling in it before I could get the paper towels. Good times.
Yesterday afternoon we went up to visit with my parents for a bit. It is nice to hang out there, but they have stairs everywhere, and Ava is all over them. She loves just going up and down, for no reason at all. We have to try to barricade the staircase with chairs, and then we let her play on the 2 steps up to the hallway. Up and down, with me just picturing the fall on the face that is bound to happen. She is getting better though, she is usually very careful. She loves their grandfather clock. When it makes its noise she puts her face close to it, and watches the pendulum (I can't spell that word). She was very mellow the whole time we were there, until it was time to leave and she didn't want to leave the doggies. My parents have 2 large outside dogs, their tails are level with her face. She wanted to hang outside with them and as soon as I went to put her in the car seat she let me have it. She loves dogs. When we are out for a walk and our neighbor walks by with his dog, she starts crying when we pass them, because we are leaving it. I'm sorry Ava, but your momma has a strict no dogs policy, at least for the time being. We have a cat, and most of the time Ava couldn't care less.
In good news, I got a raise on Monday. Factor in the money I'm saving in not having to pay for daycare, and it is pretty good. I will get another raise if I ever get enough time to get my insurance license. This is not what I want to do as a career for the rest of my life, but for now, it is working. In all honesty, I do it because I am not ready to put my baby in daycare yet. I like the fact that I am in the same house as her, and I don't have to ask someone what she did all day, what she ate, how she got hurt, etc. I don't know how people do it. To celebrate my raise, I took Ava to Walmart and bought her a few things. She got a Dora chair, a Dora book, and a Barney movie. She loves all of those things, and seeing how happy it makes her makes me happier than anything I could've bought for myself. Here are some pictures. I take LOTS of pictures, and most of them are cute so it's hard to narrow them down to just a few.

St. Patrick's Day outift


DORA!

Look how happy!

Sometimes you feel like a blog...

and sometimes you can't think of anything to write about. We've been busy bees lately, but this week Brent has Spring Break off from school, so we get to be like a normal family for a whole week! Tonight we actually made dinner and ate...together! Kind of. Whenever we eat we usually feed Ava first and then we try to eat. She usually would rather eat sitting on our lap and off of our plates then eat in her high chair. I don't usually let her do that, so she usually just tinkers around while we wolf down some food.
In big news, Ava is pretty much off the binky! Friday night was the first night we tried it, and it was pretty much a disaster. The way we would normally do it was to put her to bed without the binky, but it would be in the crib and she would put it in her mouth as soon as we put her in there. Friday the binky went missing from the crib. She was okay at first, but she began to cry soon after we left the room. After about 10 minutes we went in there and she had worked herself up to where nothing would comfort her. We gave her the binky, I tried rocking her, I laid on the floor with her..she just cried. After 30 or so minutes, she finally calmed down, and with binky in mouth, fell asleep. Since then, she has not had the binky at night, and we all survived. No crying.
She is working on learning the parts of her body now. She knows hands, head, belly, toes, eyes & ears (sometimes), mouth, and knees. Sometimes she knows shoulders too. Her 2 front teeth popped out so quickly too. In the morning, when it's time to go to work, she walks to the door and looks at me like, "let's get out of here!" She even gets my shoes for me. She has started to try to wear my shoes. She loves being outside, and she loves playing ball. She knows birdies and she points to the sky. She loves doggies and she loves ducks. Today she had her first glass of real grapefruit juice and she didn't even make a face. Her favorit foods are noodles, especially macaroni and cheese, and bananas (not at the same time). Her absolute favorite things are books. She loves to be read to or just sit by herself and look at them. In the car she will look at a book the whole way to wherever we're going. Her favorite one, besides the big animal picture book (see previous post) is Barney Plays Nose to Toes. She acts out the pictures; when it says "March your feet up and down," she kicks her feet. When it says "Wave your arms all around," she waves them. At any time I can say those phrases, and whatever she's doing she will stop and march or wave. She makes the cutest sounds, and she is the sweetest girl. She gives so many kisses, and she has learned to not open her mouth when she gives them.

Playing at the Beach

Last weekend, we loaded up the family and the camera tripod and away we went to the beach. It is nice that we live about 15 minutes away. Our goal was to get a decent family photo. We got a few nice pictures, not that "perfect" one that we were hoping for, but it was fun all the same. This was the second time Ava had ever been to the beach. The first time was last March when she was about 3 months old. She loved having her feet in the sand, we could not contain her - hence, not very good pictures. It also doesn't help that we have a new camera that we don't quite know how to use properly. Here is a sampling, we took probably 50. Enjoy.

Kitchen

The Before's




The During's




The After's

Wonder Girl

I haven't posted much because I've been sick for the past week. I had another sinus infection, and tonight is the first night that I've felt decent. When I get sick my voice is the first thing to go, and the last thing to get back, and I hate it! Brent was sick for a couple of days and Ava had a runny nose, but I think that was because she is finally getting her top front teeth! I am so happy. She is 13 months old today and is just now getting them. And, she became an official walker on Valentine's Day. She took 4 consecutive steps on December 26th, and after that she would take more and more but she would still crawl most of the time. On Feb. 14th it was like something clicked and she was walking everywhere. When she fell, instead of crawling, she would get right back up and walk. She is getting better and better everyday now, and we are so proud of her. She had one bad walking accident so far (knock on wood) - she was walking in her room, tripped over her shoe, and hit her nose on the window sill. It bled just a little bit and she had a red mark for a couple of days, but she is okay.
She is loving her books - one in particular. She has this big, animal picture book and she will get it and come over to us and sit in our lap and point out all of the pictures for us. She can identify most of them too - doggie, cat, fish, horse, monkey, and a couple of others. She is learning the parts of her body too. She learned belly first, and now she knows head, toes, knees (sometimes) and unfortunately, boobies (sometimes). Ashley the babysitter taught her that one. Yesterday afternoon we were working at the YMCA, and the after-school elementary kids came into the babysitting room to wash their hands. While they were standing in line at the sink, Ava was staring at them, and then for no reason at all, she just lifts her shirt all the way up, and her belly and boobies were hanging out. Of course the little elementary kids thought this was hilarious, and I went over and pulled Ava's shirt down. That's my girl.
She understands so many words now. She looks up in the sky for birdies, she knows trees, and today she learned flower and how to smell them. Brent bought her a pink carnation for Valentine's Day, and today she was making me smell it, and I would take a big sniff and then go "ahhhhhh." She would then copy me. She points to things that she wants, and she knows where things go. She knows "books" and she walks to the bathroom when I say "bath." She loves to play with a ball, she tries to throw it to us.
Her bedtime routine changed too. She was getting to big to rock. Now we put pillows on the floor in her room, turn out the light and turn on this and we just look up at the pictures on the ceiling. Then when it goes off we lay in the dark listening to soft music, and after a few minutes we put her in the crib and she goes right to sleep without a sound. Usually either Brent or I do it alone, but tonight we put her to bed together, and it was really nice. Ava kept going back and forth, giving us kisses and hugs and cuddling with us both. She is the sweetest baby.
Speaking of bed, I'd better get there myself. Here's some random pictures from this month.

Ready for her close up:


Having fun on a walk:

Peek-a-Boo! I'm not wearing any pants!

Big blue eyes:


Valentine's Day dress


The everyday animal book:

Life is hard for a baby: