White Christmas in Allen

We had a great Christmas here in Allen with Rustin's family. We went to the Christmas Eve service at our church (Allen Bible) and then came back to our house.

Avery has learned her finger is the perfect shape to fit up her nose...

We had a lot of fun playing games with Rustin's parents and Casey. If you ever have a chance, you should play Catch Phrase with Rustin. A few of his memorable guesses were "Daniel" Seacrest, and then when I gave the hint "actor on Ghostbusters" he said Tom Selleck and Burt Reynolds. We also had a pretty intense game of Pit.

Then it snowed on Christmas Day!!! I know that may not sound that cool to someone from up North or something, but I have experienced very few White Christmases here in Texas. Plus, if it does "snow" it's usually freezing rain that just turns to ice/slush. But on Christmas Eve, I think the temp was about 60 - I didn't even wear a coat to the service that night. Then all of a sudden on Christmas, it just started snowing! 

Avery liked checking it out - 

Then Rustin put some in a bowl for her to play with. She kept saying "ice!"

Then we decided to take her outside in the snow. It was a little tricky because like I said before, she's not walking, so I wasn't sure how this was going to go. Plus, I don't really have snow clothes. I mean I didn't think about investing in that for my 15 month old who lives in Texas. 

So it started out with me holding her - 

Then she was fussing so I thought she wanted down, so I sat her in the snow to see if she'd play with it. Well then she really started crying. Could be because snow was getting in her boots, or her booty was cold because she could feel the snow through her fleece pants. 

So we decided to take her inside and then she *really* started crying! We didn't know if she wanted to go back out? So it's still up in the air whether or not she likes snow. 

Wichita Falls Christmas

We started off our Christmas with a friend get together at Sherrie and Annette's new apt. There were guys there too, they just didn't want to be in the picture! We ate a lot of great food!

Then Avery and I went to Wichita Falls the week before Christmas to celebrate there since we would be with Rustin's family on Christmas Day this year.

We went the the Fantasy of Lights two nights in a row because we knew Avery would love it, and she did! It was so fun to take her somewhere that I grew up going. We have a picture of my mom holding me in front of this train when I was little so we tried to recreate it.

Then we took a few other pictures. I'm not an excellent photographer so a few are a little blurry, but you get the idea :)

Looks like a creepy ghost Santa in the background -

I look forward to taking Avery there each Christmas!

She also had a lot of fun just hanging out at the house with Grandpa and Lyle.

Then we decided to take Avery to see Santa. We didn't take her last year because it was just so stressful with my Grandad passing away, and she was extremely fussy all the time. I'm so glad I took her in WF. I saw the line at NorthPark in Dallas and it looked like it would have taken 2 hours! We walked right up and were behind just one person at good ol' Sikes Senter. They even let you take your own picture (which was really cool because even though I wanted to remember the moment, I knew she was going to scream and didn't really want to drop $25 for a picture of it).

This is the before when she was still happy -

And then we saw Santa -

I think the whole mall heard her screaming!

She also took her first "real" steps while we were there. She has been cruising for a while and will take a couple of wobbly steps, but she took 3-4 in WF. She has done all of her milestones on cool days - sat up on St. Patrick's Day, crawled on my 30th birthday, and walked on the day the world was supposed to end (Dec. 21).

I really think the reason she's not really walking yet is because she's a scaredy cat like her mom. When I take her to the park, the other little kids love the swing, but she acts like I'm making her sky dive when I put her in it. She has a look of terror on her face and immediately wants out. I think once she gets the courage up, she'll be running everywhere! (no rush though)

Ballapalooza

Avery went to her friend, Dane's, first birthday last weekend. They had this kiddie pool filled with balls, so I put her in to see what she'd do. Well she loved it. I tried taking her in to sing Happy Birthday to Dane and she fussed the whole time, so I finally put her back in.

A few little girls got in there with her and kept touching her head. They must have loved to feel the fuzziness like I do!

Then it was the end of the party and there was only a few people left and it was getting cold, so we tried to get her out. She shook her head and fussed every time we tried. Looks like she might need to get something like this for Christmas...

Thanksgiving

Like I said in my last post, I am WAY behind on my blogging, so I'm going to be catching up while my Etsy shop is on vacation (post on that later as well). So this is your fair warning you may be getting lots of updates :)

This year we celebrated Thanksgiving in Wichita Falls. As always, we had a lot of fun. As you can tell from this picture, Avery was ecstatic about Thanksgiving!

We went to my grandma's house to eat, and had to get another four generations picture. 

And Colby and Rustin were having a blast... 

Hanging out with Daddy - 

My cousin, Lindsay, had a baby boy named Aiden. Avery loves him (of course, he's a baby) and kept saying "baby!" excitedly whenever she saw him. 

Uncle Colby loves Avery.

Hayden is my cousin, Keyton's, stepson. He was super cute and Avery loved talking to him.

Avery wouldn't let anyone hold her except for Karly - 

And then she came home after the long day and relaxed by eating ice with "bampa." 

Avery 15 Months

Without the monthly pictures, I have not been good about updating my blog! Luckily she still has her check ups that remind me - even though they are less frequent.

Here are her stats -
Weight - 21 lbs, 30th percentile
Length - 31 inches, 66th percentile

Still looks like she'll be tall. It was also very sad - she had to get 4 shots :( I've been keeping up with the immunization schedule except for the MMR. I am not one of those moms who doesn't want their kids to get vaccinated, but it seemed like the most "controversial" vaccine is the MMR and my pediatrician said I will still be within the AAP guidelines if I wait on it. When the time does come for that one I plan to get it by itself.

She is still not walking on her own, but pulls up and walks behind her walker. The dr. said it's just a matter of her getting the confidence.

He says she is doing well on speech. I couldn't remember all her words then, but I'll try to remember most of them now. She can say - mama, dada, nana, willie, boo (baloo), grandpa (bampa), ice, hi, bye, hello, woof and her new favorite - baby.

She is obsessed with "babies." When she sees the computer or phone she says "baby," which means she wants to look at pictures of herself. Some mornings she just sits on my lap and we scroll through my phone photos and videos of her. She also loves other kids and calls all of them babies, even if they're elementary-school aged.

Speaking of videos, I uploaded a couple new ones to her channel - http://www.youtube.com/samrandrews

Her favorite pastime is going to the grocery store. She loves sitting up in the cart and saying "hi" to everyone we pass. She also likes me to hand her stuff so she can throw it in the basket behind her.

Here are a couple of pictures from lately -

And here are a few of her and her other BFF, Baloo or Boo. He is such a sweet dog. She crawls all over him and he doesn't do anything.

She has started grabbing chunks of his hair and smiling when I tell her "no." She also is still dropping food and before she does it, she says "uh oh" then chunks it. If I tell her no, she thinks it's hilarious and a game, so I've been forced to order a time out chair.

I have been dreading the whole discipline aspect of parenting but it looks like it's here. She definitely knows what she is doing. I didn't want to have her do time out in her crib or pack n play. I wanted both of those places to still be "happy" for her. That is why I ordered a separate chair (which is just a booster that I can strap her into) so she won't associate anything else with getting in trouble. I guess we'll see how it goes...

New Words/Wichita Falls

So Avery has been jabbering for a while now, but it seems like just lately she's been saying all kinds of new things!

She had mama, dada and Willie (although she said it like "whee") down. But lately she has added ice, cracker, Nana, bye, hello and good. She'll pretty much imitate anything we say. Also if you ask her what sound a doggie makes, she puckers her lips and goes "woo woo."

The cutest though is she says our dog's name Baloo like "Boo." And when she sees him, she says "Hi Boo!" several times.

We went to Wichita Falls a few weeks ago, and she had a lot of fun! She was so excited to see her BFF, Willie.

She also loves Lyle and apparently decided his lips were chapped because she politely placed the vaseline on him. I don't have a picture of it, but she also put my mom's travel lotion in between Willie's paws.

She is a mess when eating. She has reverted back to throwing things, but also found a new thing to do at Nana and Grandpa's - put piles of food on the big table.

She also talks on the "phone" now. She puts it way behind her back - hasn't quite gotten down the whole ear thing yet. She says "hello" when she gets it. The other day when we were driving around, I heard her jabbering a ton in the backseat, so I looked in the mirror and she had one of her phones and I guess was talking on it. Whoever it was, she had a lot to say!

I also feel so lucky - I happened to be in town when Sarah was having a dinner to celebrate her soon-to-be second baby. Kathryn was even in town too! I have been friends with these sweet ladies since sophomore year of high school. 

So... I judge myself for this pic. Avery loves eating ice. As I said before, she can say it, so she lets me know when she wants some. So sometimes I put some in her bowl and put it on the floor. Well Willie decided he wanted some of her ice so they sat on the floor sharing ice. 

Another thing I may be judged for...She wants everything she sees, so as long as it's safe, I give it to her. My mom had her in there while I was getting ready. She wanted to wear my headband and also hold my makeup. 

She stopped wearing bows a few months ago - seriously cried and ripped them off when I tried to put them on her. But now she's decided she likes things on her head. She kept wanting me to put my band on her. 

She also LOVES wearing her winter hat. I put it on her while walking from the car to the store, but she never wants to take it off once we get inside. 

She got to see Uncle Colby several times while she was there! Her favorite thing is when he sings. She crawls really fast so she can look at him. 

This is one of my favorite pictures. Avery has all three of her most-loved things - paci, blankie and Willie.

I feel like I should add a disclaimer here about the paci. I know I posted a while back that I was weaning her off of it and only giving it to her at night. Ha. That is not happening right now. A few days after I tried that is when she went insane and decided to fuss all the time and wake up like a newborn. I was willing to do anything to make her happy - including the paci. So she has it whenever right now. I'm torn if I should try to wean it to only night now, or just let her have it now and go cold turkey when she's older. I guess we'll see...