Oh-Bla-Di

On July 23, 2010, Ava perpetrated her first con.

Scene of the crime: Red Robin

Facts of the case:  When approached by the manager of the restaurant to ask how her day was, Ava responded that it was her birthday.  Even when informed that that statement was a lie, the manager offered Ava ice cream if she finished her dinner.  Ava snarfed down a whole dinner of mac n’ cheese.  The manager made good on her promise and ice cream was delivered along with a whole group of singing waitresses.  Matt and I laughed in a fair amount of embarrassment, Ava loved the song, thanked the nice ladies and went to town on the ice cream.

Verdict: Can’t argue with free ice cream, right?

So, we celebrated Ava’s second birthday, again.

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.

We hosted a pool party/barbeque for the Fourth of July again this year.  Being the folks with the pool when it’s 105 degrees outside makes us the natural choice for putting this one on.

We had a great group of folks to celebrate with this year, including Kevin F. and his wife Cara who were visiting from Tucson.  The Belchers brought their new-ish puppy, Troy, with them and he and Libby had an interesting time getting to know each other.  The eventually settled down and got some sleep so that we could enjoy the parties!

The weekend ended up being rather gourmet, as we tried out a few barbeque recipes we had picked up during our stay in Texas.  We had grilled corn on the cob and Ava actually tried some!

Our resident firecracker was ready for the party early in the day.  Whoozy really loves to throw parties.  Can’t believe how big she’s gotten in the last year.  In case you need the comparison too, here’s last year’s photo.

As good as our meal was on the third of July, the menu for the Fourth was amazing.  Matt spent all afternoon cooking and smoking ribs and then we had, as sides, PW’s Mac & Cheese, baked beans with real bacon, pico de gallo, guacamole, & bacon-wrapped pineapple bites. For dessert, we had homemade vanilla ice cream, apple pie, & cupcakes.  We also had homemade strawberry ice cream that I made as an experiment and, oh boy, that was awesome.  Needless to say, no one walked away from the party hungry.

During the course of all the eating, we did find some time for some swimming…

…and, after a short break to eat dessert & wait for it to get dark….

…some fireworks.

People a couple of streets over were lighting some really big fireworks, so we got a pretty good show when all our sparklers ran out.  They didn’t know it, but our stranger neighbors had a very appreciative crowd sitting in our driveway.

Because of other major events coming up in our world soon, we’re at the end of our summer party season.  It was great to wrap it up with such a fun event!  Thanks to our friends for joining us….we’ll plan to do it again next year!

June was the traveling month for our family and, toward the end of the month, we ventured south to San Antonio for a visit with Matt’s family.  We arrived on a Monday and had the grandparents to ourselves until Friday, when both of Matt’s siblings were able to join us for one big family party.

The week was fairly chill, although we did get out and about a bit each day to explore San Antonio.  It was super hot and humid, so this pregnant mommy didn’t try anything too ambitious – I was really grateful to be able to use Ava’s naptimes as reasons to escape back to the air conditioning!

On Tuesday, we visited the San Antonio Botanical Gardens.  Apparently, they’ve gone through quite a bit of expansion over the years as Matt kept commenting on how he remembered things being so much smaller.

Ava had a great time exploring the flowers, trees and fountains.  She sure is a nature-lover at heart.  We’ll have to get that kid to a more plant-friendly climate soon.  My favorite part of the botanical gardens was the conservatory…it had an awesome bench set right over a giant air conditioning vent!  The rose gardens were also lovely, though, and new playhouse exhibits were set to open that weekend so we got a fun sneak peek of those too.

On Wednesday, we took the morning to go visit Mahgie & Poppie at Air Force Village.  We went to feed the fish at the pond and then joined them for lunch at the big house.  Four HUGE catfish really enjoyed the bread that Matt, Ava, & Mahgie threw to them!

The next big event was a Friday day trip to LBJ state park near Fredricksburg, TX.  We visited the living history farm where everything is done just as it would have been done in the early 19th century.  Ava got to see cows, chickens, roosters, and pigs and we all got to explore the house, barn & other outbuildings of the farm.  It was a gorgeous house…I told Matt we could have one just like it when we retire.  I *heart* old farm houses.

Our trip wasn’t all exciting outings.  We did spend some time just around the house too, and that was nice.  Matt helped his dad replace the fan in the dining room (oh boy, multiple Caspers men working on home improvement projects…look out!  At one point I asked Matt what it was like working with a mirror image of himself.) and we spent plenty of time watching movies on the new TV we discovered in the family room.

Did I mention that Texas was hot and steamy when we visited?  Well, it sure was.  The good part about that was that it made it totally ok for the adults to spend the whole afternoon sitting around the kiddie pool with our feet in and for Ava to spend hours running through the sprinklers.  You can never have too much water play on a hot day!

Sue & Steve celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary in the beginning of June and the weekend, once all the kids were home, was all about throwing them a super-secret surprise party to celebrate.  The three Caspers kids worked for a couple of months putting it together and I think it’s safe to say that their parents were not only surprised, but delighted, with the party.

All in all, we had a wonderful week in San Antonio and were glad to get to see all of the family in one trip!  Thanks to Grandma & Grandpa, Michael, Maureen & Whitney for all the fun & entertainment!

This post is weeks late, but its tardiness doesn’t reflect any lack of love of our Daddy around here.  Ava and I were excited to celebrate Matt with a relaxing day for Father’s Day (packing for a trip, doing laundry, and crazy doggie errands is relaxing, right?).  We got up and had some yummy coffee cake and coffee for breakfast and followed those treats up with some crafty gifts.

The first was just a little something to help our resident superhero remember that it’s ok to come home when he’s working so hard to make the world just as it should be.

And the second was to let him know that, no matter where he is, he is loved by all of us at home.

Lots of love to you, Matt, for Father’s Day and every day that you make our family complete.