A Fun Birthday for Ava and a Great Weekend with Mema & Papa

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AVA!

We can't believe our little peanut is one year old!  

She has been walking for several weeks and is good on her feet.  She can bend down and pick things up while walking as well as stand up without holding on to anything.  At her one year appointment, she weighed 22 lbs.  She is ALWAYS on the go and we call her Ms. Ferocious.  She is a big eater and devours everything we put in front of her.  Ava and Sam are best buddies and they love to play (and get into trouble) together.  She loves books, paper, iphones and anything Sam is doing.  She makes us smile every day!

To celebrate, we had a little party at our house with Mema & Papa, The Cooke Family, and Robert, Brooke and Ava.  We had pizza for dinner and, of course, Birthday Cake!

Sam and Ava were very excited for the cake and Sam insisted on keeping a close eye on it.

Ava was a pro with the birthday cake!  We all gathered around to sing and right as we finished, Sam ran over and blew out the candle.  It was pretty funny and he was all about being Ava's birthday helper.  Ava dug right into her cake and loved it.

 

Christmas was only a couple weeks ago so Ava understood presents and opening them.  Sam helped her but she went after him and any present he tried to open without her.

 

It was so fun to celebrate with the cousins and a special treat to have Mema & Papa here for the party.

- A family picture from the night -

We also had a very fun week/weekend as Mema & Papa flew into town on Wednesday.  Sam and Ava had two whole days home with them while mom and dad were at work and they had a lot of fun.

Papa reading books with Ava

 

Mema took great care of Sam and Ava - she also played a lot of hockey with Sam and did lots of puzzles.  Sam cooked for Mema & Papa in Ava's gourmet kitchen and also was Papa's work helper, retrieving copies off the printer whenever he heard it start up.

Mema & Papa also took Sam and Ava to the Aquarium - I heard it was a lot of fun and the kids loved seeing all the sea life.

 

 Sam and Ava were spoiled with lots of love and attention!  Mom and Dad were spoiled as well and were treated to a hotel so we could go on a date.... our first night together without kids - long overdue and GREATLY appreciated - we had so much fun (and will not be waiting 2 1/2 years to do it again).

Since we had the hotel room, we did take the kids to the pool in the afternoon and had fun.  Sam was so excited to go swimming but was a little afraid once we got there.  Ava loved the water and had a great time splashing and kicking around.

We had the BEST weekend and were sad to see Mema & Papa leave and can't wait to see them again.

It was such a fun time celebrating Ava's birthday and thinking about how much she has changed and grown in the last year and what a blessing she is to us!

We officially have a walker!!!

More proof we have a ways to go on potty training!

I was going through hand me downs from Braden and Sam grabbed the underwear and put them on his head!

SNOW!!!!!!

CHRISTMAS 2012

Christmas was a lot of fun this year, particularly as Sam was so excited about Christmas and everything was new and exciting to him - from the Christmas tree to Christmas lights, snowmen, Santa, Elfie and Baby Jesus...!  Every time we drove in the car, it was nonstop of Sam, "Mom, Christmas lights,", "Daddy, Look - Christmas lights!"  Dad and Sam actually put some lights up at our house and every night Sam helped plug them in.

 Sam Loved helping mom & dad decorate the tree - he helped hang lots of ornaments!  Ava and Sam both loved the tree.  We had to keep an eye on both of them and most of the time the tree was barricaded with the ottoman and chairs. 

  Ava was more interested in removing all the ornaments and attempting to EAT them!

Not surprisingly, our tree was pretty bare 1/3 of the way down!  It was easier to just move all the ornaments higher as Ava removed them.

We did have a couple of "incidences" of pre-Christmas package unwrapping we had to stop.  Mom rewrapped at least 4 or 5 items....

Christmas Eve was spent at Grandma and Grandpa Vander Stelt's house - Sam was SO EXCITED to see and play with all his cousins - he has so much fun running with the pack!  Below was a picture of all the cousins - with one on the way!

 Sam and Ava had lots of fun playing and opening presents - Sam loved helping being the "Elf" and delivering presents as well as helping to open them.

 All three of the little boys help Papa open his presents!

Playing with some of the Christmas loot!

 

Christmas morning was stocking time!

 

Christmas Day was very laid back with just our little family, a yummy brunch, and lots more presents to open.  We had a couple face times with Mema & Pappa and Aunt Stephanie to open presents and say hi.

Sam got lots of fun gifts - Thomas the train books and a train, PJ's, an art easel from Mema & Papa that Sam LOVES and a Clifford book that came with a stuffed Clifford dog - which has been inseparable from Sam and is sleeping with him in his crib!

 Ava got a big kitchen from Grandpa and Grandma Vander Stelt that is yet to be built - she also loves her chair from Mom & Dad and loves to sit in it.  She also got a talking/singing pink teddy bear from Mema & Papa that she loves and dances to when it sings!  And, of course, she loves all of Sam's toys and drives him crazy trying to tear it all up!

 Sam enjoyed playing with his new train and truck set from Grandpa & Grandma - it's almost a full time job keeping Ava from tearing up all his track!

All in all, it was a great Christmas and we had so much fun just being together and enjoying all the festivities.  We feel very blessed!

Sam loves Braden's tractor!!

Sam loved Braden's Tractor - so much he jumped on front for a ride!

 

Potty storage?

Sam was carrying around his potty this morning and we quickly found out why! Car storage? Looks like we have a little work to do here.