These Days...

 Several things to catch up on whats going on these days in with the Askew crew:

Penny you are almost 3 months! These days you are smiling and cooing and we are all in love with your sweet dimples and blue eyes. You have slept thru the night 3 nights in a row from around 10:30 to 6 or so, which I am trying not to get my hopes up about but has been pretty wonderful. I was joking when I came up with your first Christmas wish for the church program and said that you wished you would sleep thru the night but our wishes might just be coming true. I am trying to soak up all these last baby days because I know they go so fast and I want to cherish the beautiful parts of the perfect weight of you rested in my arms, the slow, heavy blinks just before you drift off to sleep, the simplest things that make you smile - a familiar face, twinkly lights and the wonder that is ceiling fans. We have special time together on Tuesdays and Thursdays when the big kids are at school and these days I love getting to share that time just me and you, sometimes we run errands, we attend ladies bible class or do chores at home. My spirit has always been one that craves a certain amount of quiet space to think, process and center and I am finding these days of quiet are so recharging to me and I enjoy having my little side kick along too. 

*A Daicia Pic - love her eyes captured here. and
I am a little smitten by this hand me down winter hat I've been loving on her.

Oh Rhett, how fun life is with you these days at two and halfish. You bring so much laughter to all of us. Your favorite foods are milk, avocados, pizza and pretzels. These days you are loving the books The Giving Tree, Mama Llama Red Pajama and Goodnight Gorilla. Last night when were reading The Giving Tree you asked me how do you get in the book? You wanted to climb in and put the trunk back on the tree that the boy took away. Your imagination truly has no limits, you keep expanding your Christmas list to include crazy things like "a Giant orange Dragon, a plane to fly you over your house to Benny's house ( while we are wishing for things I wouldn't mind a direct flight either to Benny's house) a live bird and a hang glider to fly me in the sky". You often tell me of crazy things you see out the car window, "look mom a hippo!". Your favorite show is Jake and the Neverland Pirates and you are on quite a pirate kick, you often have a foam sword in hand and like to yell out "yo ho ho". You are a little bit dragon obsessed lately too,  you "draw" pictures that you tell me are dragons, you use a raspy, growly voice at times that you say is a dragon voice. You love lately to wear your hair spikey for special days and call it your dinosaur hair. You still take a good long afternoon nap and I still have you in your crib, despite all your climbing everywhere else you haven't even really tried to get out of it yet so I think we will roll with it as long as we can. You kind of have a propensity with all your exploring of getting stuck places, you got your head stuck in a chair at the zoo this fall, you got your nose and head stuck between a pew and the wall at church the other day and more than once you lodged your foot places you needed me to help you get undone. I often call Ava, Avie-baby or Ava-boo, lately when you are calling her from another room you yell Avie-baby or Ava-boo in the same cadence as I often do and it makes me smile every time. I also love everyday when we pick up Ava you say to her in that thick and deepish voice that is so you "How was your day Ava, did you you miss us?" I love the way you love your sisters and you call them "My Penny" and "My Ava".

After the ice storm we had a lot of tree clean up to do, Grandpa brought you this chain saw to help out on clean up day.
You were all business. 

Ava these days you are thriving at Kindergarten being 5 and halfish. I loved going to a few school events of yours this past week and seeing you in this setting that has kind of been a mystery to me. You have two really close friends that you have bonded with but I also noticed your whole class seems to belong to each other, I wish all your schooling would be like kindergarten in that way, where you love each other and look after each other in the way I noticed you all do right now. You are starting to read, while I have mixed feelings about the academic pace of Kindergarten these days, you are so very proud of your reading. You love art and are often working on "projects" around the house. You have made a few books that you put in Rhett's book basket and you like to read them to him. You and your dad just finished your first real novel that you have been reading together at night, Poppy and now you are on to The Mouse and the Motorcycle.You are a great big sister, you are a natural nurturer and you've mastered how to rock Penny's car seat or bouncer just the way she likes it and can gently wiggle her paci in at the same time to soothe her if I am trying to cook dinner or attend to something else. You learned about deep breathing at school and you like to coach Rhett through using his "belly breaths" when he is having a melt down. He will listen to you and often this can calm him quickly. (It's kind of funny I tried the other day to see if you wanted to try it when you were really worked up but no such luck for the same success) You and Rhett play often together these days, most of the time you have great fun together playing school, putting on shows, playing in your "hideout" but you can also have some pretty epic fights too. You are still petite and sweet. At the doctor the other day, 2 year old Rhett weighed in at only 3 less pounds than you. I asked your teacher some questions at the fall parent teacher conference about your assertiveness abilities as you are naturally inclined similar to me towards keeping the peace and introversion and she complimented  you saying"that girl can hold her own!" and I really loved that. Your Friday behavior folder pretty much has all positive marks except for some weeks you got marked for "Talking at inappropriate times" and I have to say it makes me smile that my girl that is often quiet feels so comfortable she gets marked for this and that my rule follower can can also break out of that mold too as we all need too at times. You want to loose your teeth and are so excited to be 6 these days but I am happy for you to not move on too quick. 

One of our best moments these days, we were playing in the leaves at grandma's when dad returned from deer camp.

These days I've been navigating the world of 3 little and there's moments its beautiful and wonderful and truly a dream come true and moments I've been overwhelmed, frustrated and not always the mom I wanted to be. You 3 continue to be some of my greatest teachers during these season of life. Motherhood brings out many of my best parts and so many of my weakest parts, I am trying to embrace more the value of repair and the power of grace, you all teach me about forgiveness too for I find no one is quicker than littles to forgive and move on in the way you do.

23 Months

This week we hit the 23 month mark! Here's the monthly highlight list. 

• Singing! It so sweet when she breaks out in songs like her abc's, or twinkle twinkle little star, she can now sing all of those songs and today for the first time she sang a along in church when they sang Jesus loves me. I've tried to get video of her singing solos but she always stops when the camera comes out. Her other favorite song lately is if you're happy and you know it, she loves to do the stomping your feet part and frequently asks me to sing "happy feet".
• We have frequented the play ground in our neighborhood several times now and almost daily she will ask "go to park?" She just started being brave enough to go down slides on her own and she loves it!
• She knows several shapes, is counting to 5ish in order, and can sing her ABCs.
• Baby dolls are still her favorite, especially putting them down for naps. I can already see that one of her spiritual gifts is being a nurturer. It is natural to her like breathing. When babies or other kids are crying,  she says to me "they sad" and often tries to think of someway she can offer comfort. In the church nursery the attendants tell me she is making sure other babies have their toys and goes around giving pats on the back. 
• She loves to ask me "what doing mama?" Here's a frequent conversation we have these days: "What doing mama?" "I'm driving" "What doing mama?" I'm driving" to break this cycle I say "What are you doing" "I readin' book". pause for a moment. "Mama are you drivin'?".
• She loves the zoo and as soon as you enter often she starts saying "elephant" - by far her favorite animal (which is what I came up for her birthday theme this year). Our elephants are at the very back of the zoo so its a trek back there but hard to say no to that enthusiasm. 
• She loves to brush her teeth, sometimes asks in the middle of the day. I'm not sure how long she would keep going. I always have to stop the brushing after a while, often to her disappointment. 
• She's started testing limits more, When I have to put her in time out she immediately starts saying "listen and mind", this is the language I use when I put her in time out and get her out to try link that not listening and minding means time out. I think it's interesting when I give the 1 timeout warning she usually always still has to go to timeout but when I get her out of timeout and have her repeat whatever I told her to do, she always does it right way? So I feel like she's making some connections with it but its still a work in progress. Luckily she usually does listen and mind and this makes both our lives easier. 

This girl will be 2 next month! Seems like her birth wasn't that long ago. I am loving this stage too, she's so fun, funny, curious, affectionate and active!

21 months!!

Ava turned 21 months this week, here's her highlights:

•  Her vocabularly is exploding. She says lots of two word sentences now "I hungry", "Rory Sleepy", "What doing?". Her new word this week is "sorry". If she drops something, bumps into something, she laughs a little and says "oh sorry". She loves Elephants, loves to say the word and point them out.
• At bed time often she tells me "get in bed" when we are rocking to let me know she's ready to go to bed.
• Still can't decide on the naps, yesterday and today since she slept 12 hours each night, we are trying doing just one nap time in the afternoon. So far seems to be going well.
• She likes going to bible class and will repeat "bible class" several times when I tell her we are going there.
• She's 19.5 lbs. Still a very picky eater. Favorites are still gold fish, bannas, peanut butter, blueberry waffles, blueberry pop tarts, blueberry yogurt (see a theme going...), and she did add bacon this month!
• She's started watching Sesame Street a tiny bit, I recorded a few of them. The only problem is Elmo is the only one she wants to see, so if he's not on that segment she repeats over and over "Watch Elmo"? She will only watch for 5 minutes or so at a time before she's off to play.
• She's of course becomming more social, AM took some pics of the girl's this week as you see below. It so fun that they are interacting with each other more and more.

(We are taking the girls to Chicago in April! as my work is sending me to a training there. AM will watch the girls while I'm in training during some of the days and then we will play in the evenings together, We might be crazy for taking toddlers to the big city but I think it will be a great memory and I wasn't ready to be away from Ava for that long so glad that this option worked out!)

20 months!

Before I catch up on our Christmas festivities we enjoyed this year, Ava turned 20 months just before Christmas, so its time first to document whats going on this month with our girl!

• She's loves to give hugs and kisses, now she'll say hug randomly and come running with arms wide open, saying "momma hug". (My heart literally aches when she does this, it melts me every time). 
• She and her best bud Izzy love to give each other kisses, its just so innocent and sweet, love how much these girl's love each other. 
• She loves to point at things and ask you "what's this?". She can ask this question 20 times in a row and loves to go around a room and quiz you every item in it. 
• She's started singing. She randomly on her own will start singing "twinkle, twinkle little star" but gets lost after the first verse. Her version sounds a little like, "binkle binkle whittle star"
• She loves to play chase around the house, she laughs and laughs when you get her, and loves to chase us in return. 
• She's started saying the word "potty" a lot. I'm not sure if she's really ready but she keeps showing more and more signs she is, so might should get a potty for her soon. She randomly will sit on Rory's food or water bowl and declare its a potty. She is fully clothed when she does this so far Rory's area is safe, not sure where she got this idea about Rory's bowls?
• Just before the move this fall I was going to cut back on the paci but didn't really stick with it with all the adjustments, now that we are done with Christmas travel's decided we are back to cutting the paci down to the bed and the car. 
• She doesn't care a thing about the TV or any shows. She knows who Elmo is from her bath time books and will point him out sometimes when she sees him.
• I made a canvas for her room with a bird on it (I'll post more on this pinterest inspired project soon), she loves to come into her room and say "hi bird". 

Here's some pics from this weekend with two Christmas gifts, her doll stroller and her new boots!

Our Church had service night for the holidays at nursing home this month, they had this snow globe inside that Ava apparently thought needed a little squeeze. 

II remember this time last year, its was just before Ava would start to get teeth, start crawling, really eating table food and I remember that I was afraid I would so miss my tiny baby. I have to say, I love each stage, I really do. This stage is so much fun, most ways I think its easier, some days I'd say its harder but everyday I love her and love sharing this precious early years with her, I hope I stay present and soak up every bit of it! Love this girl so much!

19 months

Ava turned 19 months yesterday. This month I feel like her development has exploded, every time I turn around she's doing something new and often hilarious. Here's the run down of milestones this month...

• One of her new favs is opening and closing doors, the handles on the interior doors of the new house are all pull down levers so she can open and close them now. luckily the outdoor ones are still turn nob and she can't do those just yet, but it doesn't stop her from trying when daddy is outside and she wants to get to him.

• She weighs 18 lbs now, her favorite foods include peanut butter toast for breakfast, yogurt and spaghetti.

• My favorite new thing she does is tell us its time to "pray". She bows her head and puts her hands together and then will whisper some things that I can't understand and then say "amen". 
• We've started sporting a pony tail these days with her hair getting long enough to keep it for a little while.
• She still takes two naps a day, one around 9:30 and one around 2:30, she had a bit of an adjustment with the new house but is back to going down easy and sleeping her normal hours again. 
• She throw some fits mostly when she's tired but mostly those are just here and there and usually mostly easily managed.

S

• She still loves to take care of her babies, here she is at target giving her baby a paci while we shop. I keep this pint size baby in her diaper bag so we are never anywhere without one. 

• She still does a "crazy face" on command, she opens her eyes wide and smiles huge while gritting her teeth together.
• She can do her first chore with some assistance, I give her fill up Rory's food scoop and she takes it and puts it in her food bowl. She's figured out how to open up Rory's food bin and I have found her several times in the pantry feeding Rory by hand. They are both pretty sneaking about this, so it can take me minute to figure out what's going on.
• She says all sorts of phrases that run all the words together "where'd-it-go" "got-it" "you-okay?" & "Rory Hush".

18 months!

Ava turns 18 months this week! Here's the highlights for this stage...

• She continues to add words each week, some recently are "church" and she tells Rory to "hush", she calls me mostly "mom" now, sometimes still "mamma". So cute when I'm in the other room, she'll call out "mom, mom, mom" as comes and finds me. 
• rocking and shhhhing her babies to sleep is still her favorite pass time, She likes to use Rory's dog bed for her baby bed.
• She might just turn into a banana, she eats 2-3 whole bananas a day. She's showed an interest in strawberries and grilled sweet potatoes are her other current fav. She also loves to put cherrios or teddy grahams in her yogurt when she eats it these days. (see picture at the bottom of this post).
• She now wakes up from naps usually saying "up" instead of crying to let us know she's awake. 
• We shared a first together, we fed giraffe's at our zoo last week. (see top pic).
• She can tell you a wide array of animal noises, although the lion is her favorite, her little growl is pretty cute. 
• She had her first ear infection this month which got her first antibiotic, I paid extra to flavor it strawberry at the drug store, she seemed to like it pretty well, she would often sign more after she got some. 
• Her hair is getting long, trying to hold off cutting it and hoping her bangs will catch up. 
• I catch glimpses of a little girl at times when she's playing on her knees with pig tails in her hair. (see middle pic). 

17 months!

Due to change of seasons colds around here this post is late. But better late than never, right?. Ava is now 17 months old! Here's some of her highlights this month...

• Everyday it seems like she is saying a new word! She is starting to put some words together. "Hi Rory" "Bye Baby".
• She finally graduated from her infant carrier to a toddler/convertible car seat. 
• She still takes two naps and enjoys her paci, probably should start limiting its use to bed and car but I don't really care too much just yet. Maybe next month.
• She loves to play outside, its hard to say now when she says outside and then starts signing please to say no. Luckily the weather's been great!
• She still wears 12 month clothes mostly.
• She went on her first fair trip as you saw in the previous post.
• Her hair is long enough for pig tails which we've worn quite a bit.

This box has been a big hit around here this month.

Also this month I won my first ever blog giveaway, why both bloggers that teamed up for this giveaway are good friends of mine I can assure you it was a randomize drawing, thanks Life to her years and Urban Owl Knittery for our lovely owl hat, we love it! Here's Ava when we just got it out of the mail!

 

16 Months!

Ava turned 16 months this weekend! here's the new developments this month:

• She seems to be adding words every day. Notable new words include, Rory, help, please, all done, Ava and her new favorite is "babies".
• She still uses her signs a lot and is starting to put the words with her signs.
• She got 3 new molars this month. She didn't complain too much and then I just noticed them one day, all the way through and everything! 
• She still takes two naps a day! 
• She has a new dance that cracks us up, we call it 'drivin the bus'. 
• She figured out somehow that when you spin in circles it makes you dizzy, so she does that randomly throughout the day with this funny smile on her face. 
• The Nursery staff at church told me she's the little mama of the group, she brings the younger kids toys, and gives them sweet pats and kisses. 
• She's such a cuddler, she will randomly come and give us hugs and kisses throughout the day. I love that! 
• She's discovered blue berry whole grain waffles which de-throned yogurt for favorite breakfast food. She gets real excited to watch it pop up in the toaster.

Strawberries and Nutella snack/finger painting:

14 Months!

Ava turns 14 months this week! We enjoy her in so many new ways, I just re-read her 13 month post and realize she's changed so much just since that post...

• Her words include da da, bye, hi, uh oh, back (she tells Rory back), she can say mama if prompted and will "ruff" like a dog. She's regularly signing when she's hungry and wants to "eat" and still signs "all done" and "more".
• She is up to 5 teeth, 3 on top two on bottom but I think there are a few more on their way in this week.
• She got a new little chair that someone gave us and she loves to sit in it. She climbs in and out of it to rock and feed her baby, read books or just hang out.

• She's doing more independent play, you will find her often in her room "reading" books from her book basket.

• She is energetic and showing more toddlerness with her up and down emotions, she gets frustrated when she knows what she wants to accomplish but its not quite working out for her. Sometimes I try to guess at what she is wanting to help her but usually she prefers to work it out on her own.

• She's all about hugs lately, here she's giving Rory a hug, she also chased down her first boy for a hug this week. Luckily he reciprocated but he got done hugging before she was ready to be done, so he pryed himself loose and then the chase was on again. (This little guy was from church, I guess if she's chasing down boys I prefer it to be church boys :0)

• She can climb! She gets up on boxes, baskets, chairs to reach things she's wants.
• This month marked a big milestone. We use to rock her all the way to sleep and then at about 5 months old graduated to her putting herself to sleep with us in the room and this month we took the last step of her putting herself to sleep without us in the room. I honestly think she goes to sleep much faster this way at night and at nap times.
• Still on two naps a day, a morning and after lunch one.
• She starting to not hate milk and will drink some in her sippy cup during the day.

13 months!

Well her birthday sign is still up as I can't bring myself take it down but she is 13 months old today! Here's run down of the last month developments:

• Just this week she's started walking as much as crawling.
• She has a new word "hi" to go with still popular "uh oh".
• This month her new thing is to wake up at 5:45! we had a lucky day today where she finally slep till 7 for the first time in very long time.
• She still takes two naps a day most days.
• She HATES milk, she has no interest in most drinks besides water. We are still nursing in the morning and evening. Reading up on other ways to get her Calicum and vitamin A & D since the milk thing is going no where fast.
• Favorite Foods are Yogurt, Bananas & Gold Fish. Her appetite has picked up big time this month.
• She got a book that does the little piggies song for her toes for her birthday. She brings us the book now and will start grabbing her toes. She is also very interested in everyone else's toes too these days, she loves to try to tickle them and look at you to see what you do.
• Her favorite songs are this little light of mine & fuzzy caterpillar (she can make the little catepillar with her fingers and can do the little light with her finger for that song, she laughs & laughs when you hid it under bushel part).
• She loves to share with her friends. A few Wednesdays ago in our mommy and me bible class she crawled over to another little baby, cocked her head to the side and kept saying "hi". She loves to share her toys with others, When Izzy is with us on Mondays, I have to watch she doesn't share her toys too intensely as she will wave them enthusastically close to Izzy's face, but its still so sweet to see her interacting with others this way.
• She has some top teeth now to go with her bottom teeth.

11 months!

Ava turned 11 months old today! She seems to have new tricks every time I turn around! Some of her developments over the past month include:

• She said her first kind of word! She will drop something and say "Uh Oh". She just all the studden at Hobby Lobby dropped something over the side of the cart and said "uh oh" clear as day. She's repeated it many times since!

• She went on her first trip to the zoo! We went during spring break, so it was packed, she watch the other kids as much as the animals. She LOVED the sea lions swimming, here she is glued to the glass watching them. We have a zoo pass so we will be there lots this summer!

• She has mastered one sign consistently, using sign language to tell us "more".
• She's still so tiny. The onsie she is wearing in the picture below is still one she can fit in that is a 3-6 month size! Only certain brands can she wear that small still.
• Despite her tininess her appetite has picked up and I see a glimpse of toddler coming out as she prefers to feed herself rather than have me feed her. She loves finger foods she can feed herself.
• More glimpeses of toddlerhood: we've started working on the meanings of the word "no touch", a work still in progress.

• One of my new favorites, She does a monkey crawl when she gets to the tile floor but doesn't use it on carpet, cracks us up. Here's the monkey crawl in action:

They tell me this her last month of babyhood and officially at 12 months she enters the next phase, toddlerhood. I see her so in-the-middle this month, some toddlerness starting to bud and still so much of my baby there too. My aim this next month is to be even more purposely present, soaking up these last days of official babyhood.

10 Months

10 months! in two words: fun and tiring. I am finding each stage of new development some things are easier and always new challenges. but overall 10 months is a lot of fun. I can really tell this month that she is understanding so much of her world around her. Here's a few highlights at 10 months:

• Whoever thought Growling could be so cute. I am not sure how we discovered this but Ava mimics us when we growl and she does it with the sweetest half smile too.
• She loves to point now, she has figured out pointing gets our attention and she loves to "point" things out. (We've already had a few embarrassing social encounters when she points at people we don't know, like an older ladies Cane at church and other things she thinks we didn't notice but she wants to make sure we do).
• She loves to explore everything, opening cabinets, drawers, and anything she is probably not suppose to be in.
• She is starting to show some preference in food, blueberry yogurt is still her fav but she's started figuring out some vegetables aren't as yummy as the fruits and nothing is as yummy as yogurt.
• She can cruise around the room and crawl at a high rate of speed, she is starting to let go and try to stand on her own but so far falls down almost right away.
• She has conversations with herself and has really started to "play", talking to her doll and hugging on her stuffed animals, I love just sitting back and watching her at "play" it so captivating to watch. I wonder what her little mind is processing as she is playing.
• We conquered our first cold and cough, it lasted only a week and I am thankful she's been so healthy for the most part this year.

Still those precious big brown eyes!

Love's her daddy & her daddy is quite smitten with her too, they went this month for there first daddy/daughter day to the park, where I hear a fun time was had by all.


Her favorite cabinet to get into is Rory's cabinet, Rory doesn't mind because once and a while she gets something out of it:

9 months!

Ava turns 9 months old this week! So much has happened in the past month for her developmentally, the list of new things she can do seems to be growing each day. She has started crawling, pulling up on anything and everything, beginning to feed herself some finger foods, clapping her hands, giving us a high five and I am sure I could just going. She loves to cuddle and will put her little head down on our shoulders when she's sleepy. It's so exciting to see all the new changes. With the sleep lady's help we have a much better sleeping schedule for all of us. She still wakes up some nights but is doing ten times better than a month ago. We had two nights this week where she slept 11 hours straight through which made for some lovely sleeping for all of us. (The other nights she woke up from 3-5am) She gets very excited when Ryan comes home and I love to see the huge smile on her face when he walks through the door.

I can't believe this time last year I didn't even know her name yet! I love knowing her more every day. I can get caught up in missing her tiny newbornness or wishing ahead for the when she can talk to me and tell me whats going on in her mind but then I would miss what is now and I want to savor this moment because what is now is pretty great.

8 months old

Today our sweet girl is 8 months old! She's come so far in so many area's... just when I thought the smile and then the laugh could melt my heart like nothing else she does, then came along "the reach" and none of those have anything on that, when she extends those sweet little arms up in our direction, ah there is nothing like it! While she make advances in many areas, her sleep has regressed to newborn phase over this month, things have been better the last few nights with only a 2-3 wakings but after the holidays we will be implementing some of the sleep lady techniques (I'm reading her book that a friend loaned me, she seems to be in the middle area, not for straight crying it out but also steps it up from responding to every waking with rocking and holding, all about knowing your baby and her cues to help you make an appropriate plan for improved sleeping.) to help all of us get back on a better sleep schedule as at this point, I've ruled any medical issues, including teeth, think its more related to the separation anxiety that comes along with this developmental phase that maybe carrying over into night. Well thats my latest theory anyways. She says "ma ma ma" alot and "Da Da Da" while its not purposeful yet, I love hear her try to talk to us. I've started modeling some baby sign language for her so that we will have some of the basics down when she's ready to communicate that way. Can't believe this time last year she was in my tummy and I tried to imagine what the next Christmas would be like with an 8 month old. Its of course better than anything I pictured.