10 on 10

My friend Jo introduced me to a cool blog idea today. On the 10th of every month, takes 10 pictures in consecutive hours and post them. I decided to give it a try. Here goes!

My morning wouldn't be complete without a cup of coffee.


Finishing a wash of cloth diapers. Weeee!


Enjoying my view.


My friend Nikki and I treated ourselves to some yummy lunch.


I get easily distracted. Look at my clean house!


The dreaded monthly meeting!!


Thinking about dinner.


My favorite time of day.


Aftermath.


All clean!!

I love my church

Jason and I have been going to North Coast Church. When they announced that they were opening up a preschool at their new campus, it was an easy decision to send Avery there.
Yesterday I was waiting to make a left hand turn to go pick up Avery when I saw one of their facilities trucks stopped on the side of the driveway and two men in the front of the seat. I made my turn and passed them to see the passenger guy with his arm around the driver guy, both of their heads down in prayer. It made me smile so big. Who does that?? Stops what they are doing and prays for the other person? I love it.

Funny noises

Lately when Avery has been eating, she's making these silly noises to try and get us to laugh. She does a scrunchy face, then inhales/exhales rapidly. She finally didn't clam up when I broke out the video!

Happy 1st Birthday!

I know I'm delayed on this post, but I'm delayed on many posts. Better late than never!! A few weeks ago we celebrated Avery's first birthday! I decided to go with a cupcake theme since it seemed terribly cute, and she was a cupcake for Halloween. I got a few supplies online and tried to make as many decorations as I could. The big day came and she woke up with a fever. Ut oh. The night before was rough too. She was raspy, coughing and kind of wheezing. When she woke up with the fever, we called the doctor (at 2am) to see what they recommended. They advised that we get an appointment first thing in the morning. Our plan was to get her down for a good nap and then have her party start at 10:30. They wanted her at the doctor at 9:40. So much for a nap! She had the beginnings of an upper respiratory infection but otherwise was ok. No nap for her. Soon people came pouring over to celebrate her day. We made hamburgers, hotdogs and had lots of snacks. I made her a giant cupcake for her very own "smash cake" and then regular cupcakes for the rest. After they were in the sun about 10 minutes we had to relocate them inside because they were melting. Oops! She wanted to touch her candle after Mama blew it out. She opened her presents like a champ, got a ton of cute things, then promptly crashed for about an hour reboot.
It's been an amazing year. Parenthood has challenged me in ways I never thought to be challenged. She makes it so easy to love and protect her. We always comment how amazed we are at her learning, her sweet nature and just how darned cute she is!! I'm so smitten with her!! And heres a few pictures why ;).

What we've been up to.

It's been a while since I posted last and as you can imagine, a lot has happened. Avery will be 10 months in 2 days and is constantly amazing us. She is a full fledged crawler, pulling herself to standing and cruzing furniture. She started using a walker but isn't a huge fan of it at this point. The past few weeks have been uber fun, waiting to get her first tooth. It finally broke though and she's no longer sporting her gummy smile.
Pretty much since January we've been battling sickness. Once we start to feel better, one of the three of us gets sick again and starts the whole cycle over again. We had about a week reprieve and then I got sick again, got Jason sick and Avery is sporting a cough...again. It's been so frustrating, but hopefully we'll be on the mend soon.
Another adventure we're starting is cloth diapering. At first Jason was totally opposed to it, but once we broke down the cost effectiveness of it with the fact that we could use it with our second kid and never have to buy a diaper again...we were sold. We've slowly been building up our stash and are full time cloth diapering now. Luckily her daycare has been supportive of it as well and have had no complaints.
In mid February I got notice that they needed space in the office to hire some new people and I was just about the only one qualified. It took a while for them to finally ship me out the door, but I've been home for a week and a half now. I LOVE it! I get to spend the mornings with Avery, pick her up earlier than I used to and we had more time to spend during the day. Before it seemed that I would pick her up and we had an hour to play, do dinner and her bedtime routine. Twice last week I took her to the park before we went home and LOVED being able to spend that time with her. I know that we are totally blessed by this opportunity. Not only will it add to time spent with Avery, but it'll add cash to our wallets. I previously would be 1 tank of gas every 4 days. My last tank of gas lasted me 10 days!! Granted I got about 50 less mpg than I usually do, but it was worth it. I'm able to do things around the house more which is nice. I'm still getting my feet wet when it comes to the working from home but it's something I'm looking forward to getting used to :)
It's starting to get warmer down here in San Diego. We're all looking forward spending time at the beach and in the pool. Avery got some pool time last year and loved it. Here's some pics from the past few months :)

Crawling

I wanted to post a cute picture of her crawling around in her room.

8 months

It seems like such a short time since I wrote last. The past 2 months have flown by! We welcomed in the new year by celebrating Jason's birthday and visiting friends in Laguna Beach for a spectacular meal. We also had a visitor to Avery...her first cold. That nasty bugger came on New Years Day and we're still trying to fight it off. Meanwhile both Jason and I have been sick 2x's since New Years and Avery has been through 3 rounds of antibiotics. She had a diagnosis of "para-pertussis" which is a grade lower than pertussis/whooping cough. With the recent epidemic of WC going around, I was a worried mama. Then she got an ear infection, and pink eye. Poor thing can't catch a break. She's still battling this nasty cough. Doctor said that while she is wheezing, to keep her out of daycare. This week, with my own illness and Avery's illness I worked a total of 2 days. It was nice having the time off and spending it with her, but I'd much rather do it while all of us feel well.

The past 2 months have also brought a plethora of milestones. She started sitting up on her 6 month birthday. She celebrated her first Christmas. She learned how to army crawl. She learned how to crawl! And she learned how to pull herself to standing! While this makes for a much busier mommy, I am so proud of how quickly she is learning and practicing her new skills. She's mastered solid foods. Dinnertime is not as much of a battle as it used to be. She's starting to take on puffs, mum mums and yogurt melts. Anything else solid she thinks she's going to choke on. Hasn't mastered the sippy cup and still NO teeth to speak of! Mommy was a late bloomer too, but her gums are swelling up. I'm thinking by the next blog we'll have some teefers. Hopefully it'll build a dam for all this drool!! The girl is drenched all the time!!

She still loves going to daycare and playing with her friends. The ladies at daycare are very sweet and love her to death. They sent us a video of Avery talking to herself in a mirror. For the next week Jason and I watched it every night before we went to bed.

Things to look forward to:
- Trip to Vegas to see Vovo and Otto (Jason's grandma)
- Visit her new friend Liam in LA.
- 9 month appointment and shots.
- Her first Easter.
- Attempts at cloth diapering!