My Little Prince

A few weeks ago, we went to Evan's good friend Avery's birthday party. The theme was a princess party, and everyone was to dress up in their princess costumes. To help Evan understand what all this princess stuff was about, we rented Snow White from the library. He didn't like the movie. To get in the spirit, we let Evan dress up as a prince for the party... complete with sword and crown.



Avery was so welcoming and they had activities for Evan as well, but he was still the only boy with eight other princess girls. It was too funny to watch, because at one point, he was just sitting on the couch staring at 8 little girls twirling around like princesses. :) He did have a great time, and we are so thankful to have our friend Avery next door!

My 10 Month Old Baby

Ainsley is 10 months old today! What a fun age! Ainsley is waving all the time, loves to give big, open mouth kisses, and is giggling away! She is still my happy, sweet baby!



A few things about the last month:
~ Ainsley is finally eating.. a little :) She has discovered finger foods, and seems to like them much better than baby food. She's still nursing 5-6 times a day, and now enjoys cheerios, yogurt puffs, cheese, noodles, and of course, water from any straw cups! Interestingly, she will eat baby food from anyone except me :)
~ The past month has been pretty rough sleeping wise. I think it's mostly due to separation anxiety, but Miss A wants to make sure that I'm around. We have had lots of time in the middle of the night hanging out and early morning wake ups. I hope we are back on track now!
~ She is still a Momma's girl, although she's starting to warm up to Daddy too!
~ She is starting to really communicate and understand us. She's starting to say ma-ma, da-da, pat-pat, and up. She's signing milk occasionally, and definitely knows what it means.
~ Ainsley has been pulling up, cruising, and getting herself around everywhere. She's getting pretty good at her walker too, figuring out how to turn it around.

~ She is finally over her snotty nose - yeah!!

~ She plays so well by herself, especially if she has a stack of books. She will sit and look at books forever! Her favorite book is Pat the Bunny, along with any other touch and feel books.

Ainsley's hair up (for our church tailgate party)!

Loves to swing - either outside or in the basement

Dressed up from her 1st (of many) princess birthday party!

Park

A few weeks ago, the forecast was 50 for Saturday afternoon. Doug was busy moving a pool table, so I asked my parents to join the kids and I at the park. Although the temperature was 50 - it didn't feel that warm since the sun was missing! We had a great time anyway. It did make for some great pictures at the park of the kids and my parents. (Btw - I am so lucky to have them in our lives! They are so loving and giving and Evan and Ainsley adore them!)

A singing along

Ainsley loves to sing along with this toy... I caught a little on camera:

Evan making Ainsley laugh

Nothing better...

Making Pizza

Last week, Evan and I got to go on a field trip to Domino's for pizza making! (Thanks to Aunt Robin and Mya for watching Miss A!) Evan got to put his order in the computer, wash his hands, and then make a pizza. He rolled out the dough (not sure about that one), spread the sauce, and put on the cheese. He then made their own pizza box while the pizza cooked in the oven.

Evan got to eat his work at the end of the field trip - it looked pretty delious! What a fun day with E.

My Sweet Boy

So, I have found that parenting so far has gone in phases - all the phases (so far) have been fun - but some are more challenging than others. :) Everyone says that 4 is fun (after those "tough threes") - well, I have definitely found that to be true so far. It also seems true that when it gets tough with one (Ainsley has decided not to sleep at night), the other "steps up" for me.

Self portrait

Anyway, Evan has been in an awesome "phase" lately. I am just enjoying him so much and feel so blessed to be his mom. He just seems so grown up! I can ask him to get ready for school and he'll go potty, wash his hands, brush his teeth and put his clothes on all by himself. I just look at him and think, when did you become so big? He thinks about everything, and every night at bedtime, he's asking Doug or I a ton of questions about his day. He loves school and has re-learned to write his name. (We taught his to write in all caps, now he can write it correctly.) He loves his art table. He is getting really good at amusing himself. He is obsessed with the Wii (Super Mario Brothers) and that is all he wants to do with me while A is napping. He makes the funniest faces and has the best reactions. He still loves to pretend to be Scooby Doo.

I love him and I am so super thankful for my grown-up little man.

9 months old

Ainsley is 9 months old! Another post again - I can't believe it! I wish I could slow down time, but for now we are just enjoying every minute of it!

1. Ainsley has become a huge Momma's girl this past month! She is usually fine if she doesn't see me, but as soon as she does, "ma-ma-ma-ma"! However, in the middle of the night, daddy just won't do. If I'm around, she's by my side. I am enjoying it too - because I know she's going to be daddy's girl soon enough.



2. The girl loves ice cold water, especially from mom's big pink cup. (She drinks from a straw.) If she sees my cup, she'll jump out of my arms to get it. Still breastfeeding, and we are lucky to get 1/2 jar of baby food in a day.


3. Ainsley is way on the move - she crawls, pulls up, cruises across her toys, uses push toys and is starting to climb. It's fun, but we definitely have to keep an eye for small objects.


4. At her 9 month appointment today, she was 18lbs, 8 oz (50%) and 27in (50%). Her head was 50% too.

5. She loves looking at books, with or without us. Evan never seemed that interested, but she'll crawl over and look through a book by herself. She loves Pat the Bunny and books that have pictures of babies.


6. Ainsley is starting to say her first words.. so fun! She will usually say "pat-pat" to pet dogs and "ma-ma" for me. She also repeats the songs on some of toys. She loves peek-a-boo and "So Big".

7. She lets us know what she wants with her "ah-ah" noise and jumping in the direction of the thing she wants.

8. This past month, it's been so fun to see Evan playing with her. He has been a great big brother, and he gives her lots of love.


9. Finally, Ainsley's 1st Christmas was this past month. It was so fun to get her dressed up and she had a great time pushing and climbing the boxes. She didn't take many naps, because she didn't want to miss out on any of the excitement!

New Year's Eve

Once again, we got to spend New Year's Eve with our fun neighbors. Matt & Genie hosted another fun party with duck racing at Ducky Downs. Evan was so excited all day because he remembered the previous year. He picked the same duck that he has last year - WonderDuck. All the kids lined up along the side to watch the ducks race down the water. When his duck won (after several rounds :)), Matt and Genie gave him a prize - a Spiderman bat and ball. He loved every minute of it. We had a great time visiting with friends as well.

Christmas

We had a wonderful Christmas this year!! One Christmas Eve, we went to my parents house to celebrate with the extended family. The kids were spoiled and we had lots of fun with the whole family there. My favorite part was singing Christmas carols, with Evan "leading" the band with this guitar (along with Jon - the real leader of the band). We acted out the Twelve Days of Christmas and Evan sang Rudolph more times than I can count!





We then had Christmas morning at our house, and it was super special. The kids slept until 8 (present for Mom & Dad) and Dad went down to get a picture of the presents that Santa had left..
All the food for Santa and the reindeer was eaten, so he must have come :)
This is the funniest face that Evan kept making - the I don't know what it is - but I'm excited to find out face. He did end up getting his telescope and hand-held video game, and he was so sweet and excited about everything.
Evan was also so sweet and made presents for me (a necklace and spoon). He helped Daddy and Ainsley open their presents too.




We then headed over to Grandma and Grandpa's house for the day. The kids were so good and everyone was so generous. Ainsley had so much fun that she decided not to nap at all :P She also decided that crawling on the boxes was way more fun than opening them!



On the 26th, we celebrated Christmas at Nani & Poppy's house. We had brunch and opened presents..


oh, an Evan got tossed out in the trash. What a wonderful Christmas!!!