We officially have a walker!!

Ava took her first (3) steps last Thursday and we have been doing lots of practicing since then. Over the weekend, she would walk 5 or 6 steps between Nick and I but now she will walk most of the way across her room if she sees something she wants (her blankie, the kitty, Mommy, Daddy, etc). She is still a little wobbly but she gets so excited that she claps and giggles when she gets to her destination because she is so proud of herself- its adorable! She is also starting to "talk" according to daycare and my mom..Apparently she says "hi" when the phone rings and told the daycare lady "no" last week. She also says "dada" and will go find him if I ask her "where is Daddy?". I'm excited for all the new things she is doing and looking forward to her being able to walk and talk more- maybe by her birthday!

Here is a quick clip of her new skills- she was more worried about the camera than walking though..

Costume party!

Yesterday we went to Ava's 1st Halloween costume party! Our friends Dean and Jamie have 2 kids- Raegan turned 4 a couple weeks ago and Logan just turned 1 (he and Ava are exactly a month apart!) Yesterday was their birthday party. Ava had a great time and was exhausted by the time we got home. Here are some pictures of Ava in her costume:

Ava & Logan (the birthday boy)
Trying to get the leaves that were falling
Cute as a bug!
Mommy can I fly?
Happy Halloween!

1st Steps!!!!

Dori (the daycare lady) just text messaged me this morning to tell me that Ava took 3 steps in a row!!!!!! She was sitting on the living room rug and Dori was sitting on the couch with another child. Ava stood up and took 3 steps towards Dori and reached out to grab Dori's legs but she did 3 steps all by herself! Of course, Mommy is very excited! I think those were her first "official" real steps! I hope she gives a repeat performance for me tonight :-) Maybe its her adorable shoes that I got on clearance the other night that have inspired her to walk around and show them off...Here are her "magic walking shoes"

other new pics

Proof of teeth

So it looks a little cruel in these pictures but she's had teeth for over a month and never lets me take a picture..as soon as she sees the camera, she stops smiling and reaches for it..so with a little assistance from Daddy, we managed to get a few pics..

The weekend

Well the painting never ends..we are still working on painting the outside of the house. I got up early Saturday and was painting by 7:30am. My mom came over to hang out with Ava until about 9am and then my step-mom came over and played with her ALL day until 5pm. Nick was working so my friend Amanda came over and later my dad and brother came over to help. We made great progress but we still have a long way to go!! I will post before and after pictures as soon as we are done! I am taking tomorrow off of work to try to make some more progress on it..In the midst of all the painting, I realized Ava felt a little warm..when I came in at 5:30pm Saturday night, she had a 102.4 fever. I took her to the doc yesterday and he thinks its a sinus infection. She has pretty much slept all weekend and just lays on the floor and mopes when she is awake..hopefully my baby feels better soon! She was still running a fever this morning so hopefully with some sleep and some Motrin, she will make it through the day at daycare..

Yay Mommy (not about Ava for once)

I got promoted today!! YIPPEE!!!! I have been working on getting this promotion for over a year and after much hard work, it finally happened. Luckily my job duties won't really change at all, I will just get paid more (and who doesn't love that?) Make me feel like all my hard work over the last 3 years is worth it. Unfortunately, because of budget cuts, I won't get the full monetary increase until March but I will get 1/2 of it now and 1/2 then. Either way, I'm pumped! I think we will be going out to celebrate tonight :) Oh and bring on a new house and another baby..oh wait, its not that good of a promotion but its a start in the right direction!

She stands! and other stuff..

Life is about to change...Ava will be walking soon (I think!). She's been pulling herself up to stand holding onto furniture since the 4th of July..in the last week or two, she has suddenly decided she is brave enough to stand in the middle of the room holding on to nothing! Even if I am sitting right there on the floor or there is furniture to hold on to, she lets go and just stands there. Right now its just for a minute or so and then she gets wobbly and squats down but I have a feeling we will have a walker on our hands before she turns 11 months :)

Ava's other new tricks include splashing in the dog's water bowl and the toilet bowl (YUCK-note to self: close the lid!). She has also learned how to blow bubbles in her bath, flush the toilet, take the toilet paper roll down and unravel it, open the kitchen cupboards and take stuff out (another note to self: must install cabinet locks pronto!) and climb the stairs (see picture below). She is a very busy girl and keeps us moving..Oh and her teeth are coming through more so you can see them when she giggles which is adorable! I will have to try to catch them on film..

She spent this Saturday with Grandma and Grandpa so Nick and I could go out and enjoy fall fest- she loved it there! She has lots of fun new toys and they let her have syrup on her pancakes so I'm sure she'd gladly stay with them anytime :) Nick has been working 12 hr days for the last 10 days thanks to Hurricane Ike so we will all be glad when life gets back to normal. We are in the middle of painting the outside of our house and garage..it is quite the project but I am too cheap to pay someone else to do it...We are all looking forward to finishing it because it will be our LAST project on our house and then we can relax for the winter (and Nick will have time to hunt instead of remodeling the bathroom like last winter)

the Zoo & ISU game

Ava and I and our friend Jamie and her two kids went the zoo a couple weekends ago- it was a perfect fall day and Ava loved every minute of it..especially the birds and the giraffes! Here are a couple pics from our day~




So yesterday was the pathetic ISU vs. Iowa game..For those of you who aren't from Iowa, it is the biggest football game of the year between the two state rivals. ISU is the "underdog" but have won 7 of the last 10 games so we were hopeful they would win again (because its Nick's alma mater)..no such luck..Iowa got some pretty lucky interceptions and managed to pull off 17-5 victory but we had fun anyway. We went to Gpa & Gma's house, ate some good food and played..Here are some pics of us in our new ISU gear~






One more thing..look at what kind of trouble Ava gets herself into while Mommy is blogging/Knotting/Facebooking..guess I'd better get off here and go chase after her!

Random Pictures

California pictures

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California & lots of teeth!

Well of course I'm a week behind in posting (what's new?) but I finally have a free minute to update everyone on our trip to California. Ava did wonderful on the way out there-she didn't mind the plane and was charming all of our neighbors on the plane by giggling at them. We got in late Tuesday night (August 26th) and Grandpa M. picked us up from the airport. We hung out at Gpa and Gma's house and had some delicious meatloaf (Ava at almost as much as me!!) and went to bed late. The next morning, Nick's cousins Theresa and Julia came over to meet Ava and they loved her :-) Gma Ginther and Aunt Katie flew in that morning so our party kept growing and growing. They hadn't seen Ava since she was 6 weeks old so I'm sure they were pretty excited and shocked to see her. Uncle Mike and Uncle Doug also joined us over the next couple days and Gpa Ginther and Aunt Megan came on Friday after the long journey from Sacramento. Ava had a ton of fun playing with her aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents! We did a lot of swimming in Great Gpa & Gma's pool and we are pretty sure Ava is part fish..she was kicking like a froggy and has even started to blow bubbles in the water- pretty good for a 9 month old if you ask me! Friday night of our trip we had a big family reunion with all of Nick's aunts, uncles and cousins. We cooked out, took a group photo and caught up with everyone. We saw all of Nick's aunts and uncles at our wedding 2 years ago but hadn't seen his cousins since Christmas 2001 so everyone had changed so much...We flew home Sunday night (August 30th)..Ava did great on our first flight but not so great on the way from Houston to Des Moines. I felt bad for the people around us since she cried for almost an hour straight but unfortunately, there isn't a whole lot you can do on a plane..Over the past week, we quickly figured out what her problem was..she has cut 7 teeth in less than 3 weeks!!! She didn't get any teeth until after she turned 9 months so apparently she thought she should play catch up to her friends and get them all at once. She has actually handled it all really well- we are very blessed to have such a good baby. She still sleeps through the night..her only teething symptoms are being extra sleepy, clingy and not hungry. I think she is finally feeling better because last night she ate almost half a highchair-tray full of food! She is on all table food now and pretty much eats whatever we are eating. She loves pasta, bread, fruit, veggies, scrambled eggs...the list goes on and on- she is definitely her father's daughter as she will eat anything!

No longer a toothless wonder!

So yesterday, Ava's daycare lady called to say she had taken a two hour nap in the morning and was working on almost a 3 hour afternoon nap and wanted to know if she should wake her up. I told her to go ahead but was dreading what 5 hours of sleep meant-She has been really clingy the last couple days and had bad diapers (sorry for too-much-info!) soI figured she was getting sick. When I went to pick her up from daycare, she was running a low fever but seemed happy overall. Well we went to Grandpa and Grandma Gardner's house for Grandma's birthday and I decided to do some investigating, hoping I would find a good reason for Ava not being herself..Sure enough I hit the jackpot! Ava finally has a tooth!!! Its the bottom left center one and its all the way through the gums but you can't see it when she smiles yet. I was pretty excited because I was beginning to wonder if she was ever going to get any teeth :-) Thankfully, she is still sleeping really well and not being cranky so once again, we have been blessed with an easy baby. Knock on wood- I hope she keeps it up! We leave for a wedding this weekend and then vacation on Tuesday so I hope she stays happy-who knows, maybe we will come back from vacation and she will have a few more teeth...

Ava's 9 month pictures

http://s98.photobucket.com/albums/l266/nici8379/Ava-9%20months/


We went yesterday to get Ava's 9 month pictures and although it was hard to keep her sitting still long enough, we got some good pics!

Ava's growthchart

Just wanted to get this on here for my own sake..its fun to watch her grow!


11/15/2007 0 days 7 lbs.9 oz. 20.5 inches
11/17/2007 2 days 7 lbs.0 oz. 20.5 inches
11/21/2007 6 days 7 lbs.6 oz. 20.5 inches
11/29/2007 2 weeks 7 lbs.15 oz. 21.5 inches
12/14/2007 4 weeks 9 lbs.6 oz. 22 inches
01/15/2008 2 months 11 lbs.9 oz. 23.75 inches
03/17/2008 4 months 13 lbs.13 oz. 25.5 inches
04/25/2008 5 months 15 lbs.6 oz. 26 inches
05/09/2008 6 months 15 lbs.13 oz. 26.5 inches
06/15/2008 7 months 17 lbs.0 oz. 27 inches
08/12/2008 9 months 17 lbs.8 oz. 28 inches

recent Ava pics

Ava wanted to help Daddy

open his presents

Diaper changes are

a challenge these

days so I just let her

go....

Mommy's 25th birthday (man I look tired..)

Ava loves to "play" with the kitty-doesn't she

look like a devil child?

Go ISU!!!

Jumping on the Bandwagon

Well everyone else in the world blogs these days so I thought I might as well blog too..this will replace our "babysites" webpage since this is free and that is not :-) Up until now, I have documented Ava's progress on www.babysites.com/sites/avag so feel free to check it out if you want.. I will try to update at least weekly but with a 9 month old that gets into everything, 2 pets, and a husband, things get a little chaotic in our household sometimes!

So what's new with us lately? Well Ava had her 9 month check-up yesterday. She is 17lbs, 8 oz (25th percentile) and 28 inches long (75th percentile-ie longer than 75% of girl babies her age). Doc wasn't concerned that she is so skinny-she figures its just because she is so busy that she burns it all off! Ava crawls like a little maniac these days and stands up at every piece of furniture she can find. She walks along the couch and coffee table and will walk from room to room if you hold her hands..won't be long and she will be really be running the show! She loves to chase Chip and Emma (the cat and dog) and to splash in the dog's water bowl (I realize that's gross but she's so speedy I don't always catch her before she gets to it). She is on mostly table food now- she loves spaghetti, kiwi, goldfish crackers, scrambled eggs..pretty much anything we give her she will eat as long as its not baby food-little Miss Independent only wants "big girl" food these days... She is still our toothless wonder but her doc thought she saw one close to breaking through on the bottom so we will see how long that takes..

As far as Nick and I, Nick got a new job a few months ago and was working evenings but he finally got switched to daytime hours so that has been great! We are finally able to spend more time as a family and doing stuff with our friends. We are still in the house we bought a couple years ago and are almost done with all of our remodeling projects..Nick did the bathroom this winter and we are going to paint the outside this fall and then we are DONE-yippee!!! Nothing else too exciting going on in our life..we are looking forward to our California vacation and we leave in 2 weeks- we are headed to southern Cali to see all of Nick's extended family who will get to meet Ava for the first time..