Oh-Bla-Di

I’ve been wanting to get a snapshot of Ava written before she’s too much past two and a half for it to count. Life’s been busy lately and, with traveling and Doozy on the way, the months are slipping by. But, I find myself treasuring little moments with my favorite girl lately (oh, nostalgia) and wanted to capture some of them here before they slide from my mind completely.

Here they are, in no particular sense or order…

*Ava is a talker. She talks non-stop all day long. She talks to dolls, toys, people, Libby, trees, flowers, everything under the sun. When she wakes up in the morning, she has a lot to say…eleven hours of not talking catches up with her and she overflows with words.

*We’re raising a fish! Our girl can swim! She’s down to wearing just the inflatable water wings now and can float on her back all by herself. She knows all the gear she has to wear to go in the pool and helps us run down the checklist each time. Earplugs, swim shoes, sunscreen & floaties are must-have items for pool time.

*She still loves Clifford Dog and Sesame Street. We’ve put Ariel on hiatus for a while since we were getting a little burnt out on the mermaid. Ava walks around singing like Ariel does when Ursula takes her voice, though.  Side note: When Ursula laughs her evil laugh as she’s swindling Ariel, Ava always says “That’s not funny, right?”  So perceptive, that one.

*Whoozy is a huge fan of classical music and requests “violin music” whenever we’re in the car. Since the situation has gotten a little out of control, we’ve instituted a take turns policy for the van. Ava chooses the music in the mornings, and I get to choose in the afternoons.

*Puzzles have recently become really awesome parts of Ava’s day. She got this one when we visited an awesome toy store in San Antonio and has totally mastered it. She does and redoes the thing for long stretches of time and her face reflects a huge sense of pride and accomplishment each time she finishes it. *Note to self: buy more puzzles!

*Ava is a very empathetic little person. She likes to check on people (“You ok over there?’) and especially likes to check on your mood. Whenever I speak to her sternly, the first thing she says is “Mommy, you happy?” Cute the first time…but she continues to ask until your answer is yes. Guess it’s her way of making sure we don’t stay upset with her forever.

*Likes to walk around with a floatie on one hand and shout, “Votes for women!” a la Mrs. Banks from Mary Poppins.

*Knows all of her letters and at least one word that starts with each.

*Has been pretending she’s a dog lately. She puts on her “leash” (it’s imaginary) and walks around on all fours. She even begs for treats! But, she’s the most polite dog ever because she says, “treat, please.”

*Ava has a go-to excuse for avoiding requests.  Of course, it doesn’t make any sense.  For example, “Ava, will you turn off the light to kitchen so we can go?”  “No, I can’t, my legs are too strong.”  Don’t know how a person’s legs get too strong to flip a light switch, but the excuse applies to any number of other situations as well.

*Today was the last day of Pirate week of school.  Ava’s been reporting back every day on the fun pirate things they’ve been doing in class.  For the party today, they were supposed to dress up.  Here’s our growing-up girl doing her best “Yo Ho Ho” in her pirate costume for the day.

*Ava has made her official prediction regarding Doozy.  According to our resident fortune-teller, Doozy is definitely a girl and when she’s born, we’re going to write her a book and tell her “Thank You.”  When asked if it would be ok if Doozy is a boy, she says, “No problem, Doozy isn’t a boy, Doozy is a girl.”

Can’t believe how fast our baby girl is growing up.  We’re looking forward to spending these last few weeks with our little family of three.  Love you, Whoozy.

Since this blog is not only our way to share the news of our family with our far-flung family & friends, but also my digital scrapbook of the little things in life, it’s time for another little update on what we’ve been doing, stuff Ava’s up to, and how things are going around here.  Since I missed Tuesday, when I could call this post Ten on Tuesday, here’s some “Words for Wednesday”…also in neatly numbered/bulleted lists.  

1.  Ava’s speaking in whole sentences.  Sometimes they’re simple…”Mommy, I want fishies, please.”  Sometimes, they’re not so simple…”Mommy, you’re driving the car to school, go that way, and I’m eating my Kix and drink my milk in my chair.”  Either way, it’s fun to hear her share what she thinks about things, what she did at school that day, what she wants to do.

2.  Ava talks a LOT.  However, context is still really important for understanding her.  Since there’s at least one night a week when Matt or I check in with her on the phone, having an interpreter is really helpful to knowing what she’s talking about.  Her vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds, but her enunciation, while good, can still leave even the most attuned ear highly doubtful of the content of the conversation.  Knowing what she’s pointing to, or the activity in which she was engaged when you called, can help all sorts of lightbulbs go on.

3. Dresses.  Our girl is turning into a real dress lover.  Her absolute favorite piece of clothing is her “flower clothes,” a cute striped dress with a sunflower on the front.  She wears it every Monday (because that’s the first day it’s clean again) and every morning she asks, “Flower clothes still dirty?”  Thank goodness she’s still willing to wear pants with them!  She’s such a monkey on the playground at school that dresses aren’t really practical except as really long shirts.

4.  One last Ava note (probably she’ll be involved in other notes…don’t worry)…she can ride her tricycle!  We’re still working on the looking up so you can steer thing, but she can definitely pedal.  Matt’s got a blog post started of her accomplishments from when I was gone.  Maybe you can encourage him to finish it?  

5.  Speaking of Matt, I put the poor guy to work this weekend.  A little backstory…. the weather here in Vegas has been beautiful.  Sunny, 70 degrees, light breezes.  Perfect springtime weather.  Trouble with that is that spring weather makes me want to move, as in, why is it spring and I’m not looking for a new house online and planning our move dates and thinking of how to pack the cars?  I actually called Matt last Thursday to tell him to expect to do something because I just couldn’t fathom spending two more years in our house without do something drastic.  So, that night I rearranged the furniture in our front room and Saturday we built a headboard for our bed and hung curtains (from our Ohio house, stuck in the bottom of a trunk waiting for the next time they were useful) in our bedroom.  Our room looks totally different now and we’ve changed just enough to tide me over for another six months or so.  I’m thinking our artwork will change next.  We’ll have baby pictures to hang soon!

6.  With spring in the air, we’ve been thinking about getting back in the pool this summer.  We spent all day Sunday in the backyard putting a solar cover on the pool, cleaning up toys and patio furniture and getting the yard ready to be another room in our house in the coming months.  It looks ready for a party and I’m excited to get out to grill, swim and enjoy!

7. Speaking of ready to party, 45 days until graduation.

8.  59 days until Matt turns 30.

9. I want to go to Florida and visit the Bond girls.  I want to visit the beach, too, but mostly I’d like to see my friends.  Miss you girls.

10.  I know there’s more that I wanted to write down about Ava, but I can’t remember now what it was.  Silly pregnant lady brain.  I think I only have three brain cells left and I used them all up getting to #9.

ETA: I remembered what the other thing was!  Ava can name all of her fingers…as in, index, middle, ring, pinkie and THUMB!  Thanks go to Matt for teaching her this very important early life lesson.

Have a great rest of your week!  Hopefully, we’ll get a post up with some pictures sometime this weekend too.