Avery's 1st Birthday Party!

I know everybody says this but this year has really flown by! I can't believe she's a one year old:) I somehow lost all of her birthday weekend pictures so I had to borrow some from Mimi-Thank You so much Mimi! We had a nice family party at our house on June 19th. Everyone got to come but my mom. Yes, it was sad, but she was gone to her sister-in-laws funeral in Florida. We missed her but she was back on Sunday and we got to hang out for a couple more days. We went for Avery's one year check up June 18th and she weighed 22lbs (50-75th percentile) and was 29 1/2 inches long (75-90th percentile). She is a growing girl. She is so sweet and smiles a lot-unless she is tired and traveling in the car. Those are two bad things to do together.

She had a cupcake party. I had pictures of all of the cupcakes and decorations but that has disappeared. Sorry. So there's this one picture of her special cupcake. I think she enjoyed eating it.


Alex kissing baby Tristan, my nephew.

Alex got some presents, too. He was so happy!

Avery (in her birthday dress my mom made her) with Mimi.
Elly and Uncle Danny having some cupcakes.


Grammy with Avery. Grammy made her a super sweet pink and green pillowcase top with bloomers. Sorry, no picture, but I have some coming up in later posts!:(


Uncle Parker having a great time at the party!


Russell, Nan, Dad, and Tristan.
Mimi and Granddan gave her this faux fur jacket. She immediately started rubbing her cheek on it. It was so cute!


All of the cousins, Abbie, Avery, Alex, and Elly.

Playing with her piano Nanny and Great-Grandaddy gave her.


Her one year information:
She is not walking a lot by herself yet. She will take a few steps by her self sometimes, but not always. She usually likes to hold your hand, crawl, or for you to hold her. She drinks from a sippy cup and straw-no more bottles! She says "mama" and "uh-oh" pretty consistently but nothing else is plain yet. She loves to play with Alex. Anything he is doing she usually wants to do too. But she will also play by herself ok too. She'll crawl off to the playroom and hang out in there by herself. She didn't love to sit down and read a book for a long time but in the last month or so she will sit in your lap and let you read to her or she'll just want to turn the pages by herself. She loves touch and feel books! She's not much of a snuggler so it's nice when she'll lay back and put her head down so I can read. She eats rice cereal, fruit, and yogurt for breakfast and then lunch and dinner are always just whatever. Pretty much always a fruit and vegetable, she really likes bananas and green beans (fresh from the garden). She likes Gerber meat sticks (I know it's gross!), cheese quesadillas, and pasta (even though she doesn't loves Gerber's pasta pick ups).

She seems to be somewhat girly. She seems to like to dress up. She loves to go in her closet and pull out her shoes and hand them to me to put on her. She likes headbands (even though she doesn't wear them) and hates when you take them off of her. She will clap her hands and play peekabook and dance. She loves the songe "It's a small world" and everytime she hears it she stops fussing and starts bobbing her head and smiling.

She still takes two naps but I think she is either ready to phase out the morning nap or take two naps every other day. She goes down about 9am and 2pm every day and goes to bed usually by 7pm. She wakes up between 6:45 and 7:15am but I don't usually get her out of bed till 7:30:) She always wants to go straight to her toy box in her room in the morning. She loves water, the pool, the tub, whatever. She just kicks around in her float and I put her under and she seems to really enjoy it.

She is a sweet, crazy girl that I'm afraid may have a touch of drama. :) BUT we love her!

Avery's birthday Day

Her bedroom door all decorated! When John and I were decorating we had to cut and do everything out in the living room because we knew she would bust us if we made a sound in her room. And John also reminded me we couldn't hang anything from her bed because she would be eating it in the morning. So true!

The birthday girl looking beautiful first thing in the morning! Happy Birthday sweet girl! We are so happy you are ours and we can't wait to spend so many more birthdays with you! Love you!
That night we celebrated at Cypress Inn with Mimi, Granddan, Danny, Dru, Elly, and Alex. John was on call and couldn't come meet us:( She had a cupcake with a candle and loved having "Happy Birthday" sang to her.

Cheese Face!

More fun June Days!

Avery's first movie ever...and last for a long time! Maybe next summer we can try again but all she wanted to do was go up and down the stairs in the aisle and crawl all over the nasty floor. I had had a workout by the time I left the movies!

Alex's cousin, Elly, came to visit from Atlanta for a week. We had a blast doing all kinds of fun things with her all week. We went to the movies, gymnastics, the tumblebus, swimming, and did lots of playing! Here they are at the movies with Caden.

Swimming with Elly, her Nana, Grammy, and Avery.

Alex coming off the diving board! He loves it-he will run off of it and hold his noodle and try to jump on it. I guess he is bored just jumping off:)

Elly thinking about coming off the diving board...

Look at his hair! This was just a few days before we had it cut. Look how curly it is!

Avery driving with Papa.

Alex and Grammy making sure Papa doesn't hit anything.

Avery's first present

June 11th Caden and Mrs. Ally brought Avery her first birthday present to open. She was excited but I think Caden and Alex were more excited!

Getting help with her present.

It was a vtech rhyme and discover book. She loves the sounds and songs!

After opening presents everyone needed a snack. They were so sweet feeding her their goldfish. She can't have her own because she puts way too many in her mouth at one time. She can only have one at a time:)

June Fun Days!

Riding the horse with Grammy.

Avery and Papa.

Avery loves following Bella around at Grammy and Papa's house.

Walking with Grammy. She is still not walking on her own. She will hold only one hand and walks well but not by herself, yet.

Alex and Papa playing ball.

Being Bella...Alex loves being different animals...it changes minute by minute. He could be a giraffe and then the next time I talk to him he says, "no, mama, I'm a horse." He is almost always Bella (Grammy's dog) when he is with her.

June 7th Avery moved to her big girl car seat! We took a maiden voyage around the neighborhood before bedtime. Doesn't she look so proud? She's growing up so fast!

Chattanooga Fun!

The first weekend in June we headed to Chattanooga to visit the aquarium and take a train ride. We ended up heading to the Children's Museum instead of taking the train ride because it looked more fun. This was Avery's first time in a hotel and her first family road trip. It was a lot of fun! Alex and John checked out the penguin video on the aquarium's website and Alex was super excited about seeing them. It's all he talked about on the way there, while we were there, and for a few days afterwards. Little Debbie and Bud were his favorites!
Checking out an exhibit with Dad! I didn't realize Chattanooga had all of these fun public places to get wet. I wish we had taken their swimsuits we could have had a lot more fun. Alex was soaked by the time we went to dinner. I love seeing them like this! Reading up on the penguins:) He loved throwing toys at her in her packnplay. We went to the train station to see if we wanted to take a train ride. He was perfectly happy just playing on the trains.
Watching her brother play in the water. Standing in the shark cage! He was getting a stamp on his hand. Avery wasn't a big fan of getting stamped.
The next day we went to the Children's Discovery Museum. They had a blast! There were lots of fun things to do. Avery loved the water.
This bubble maker was out in front of the museum. He loved seeing how high he could get the bubble before it popped! He ended up stepping right into the bubble juice as we were about to leave and John had to go clean off his shoes:) Fun times! She had the best time in this place. It was just for babies and she loved having it to herself. Of course, it didn't last long-her brother wreaked havoc on the place. This was both of the kids about 20 minutes down the road. Too bad it didn't last! She fussed off and on the last hour home and he whined so much he got his movie turned off. Whoever thinks kids don't need their naps should have been in the car with us that Sunday!