Holidaze...

The past week or so has been a blur, as a lot of hoildays are. We spent 5 days traveling around WV trying to see everyone we could. Luckily, Ava slept pretty well at night, naps were another story.... thank goodness for the car!

pre-holiday smile... if only she knew what lay ahead

Christmas Eve 2009

On Christmas Eve we went to the 6pm service at Discovery and then headed home so Ava could have some play time before going to bed. We played downstairs, read some of Ava's favorite books, and then we all went upstairs to read the Night Before Christmas like we did last year.

Frogs & Friends... Ava loves to make the frogs croak.

Christmas morning we woke up early, as normal. Ava and I were downstairs before Nathan even woke up. I fixed breakfast, traditional sticky buns, and we waited on Daddy. Once it was time to open presents, Ava could have cared less about everything except the extra large box in the middle of the floor. It had been beside our tree for 2 weeks, and she never cared, but now, it was something to crawl on.

she also loved the candy cane in her stocking

Once she opened her extra large present, she was done...

it was time to play in the wagon, and that's what she did ALL day!

Ava with the scary baby doll.

Ava didn't have any baby dolls, so my Mom thought she'd get one for her. I still don't know why she got this specific doll, but after opening it, I about threw it out the window. The doll has a motion sensor and laughs when it senses movement.... which is all the time. It's arms also move up and down which makes it a bit more scary. Ava is terrified of this doll, yet at the same time intrigued. She cries whether it is on and scary, or off and not responding to her pushing its stomach. Go figure! Needless to say, the doll has been put away.

Saturday morning we traveled to Morgantown to see Nathan's family. After leaving there, the car was incredibly packed so we headed home.

Ava in the big rocker w/ Grandma

Ava with Uncle Todd & Jenna

(finally a picture of their faces!)

Tiger is 2x Ava's size, but she insists on carrying him and pouncing on him.

On Sunday we visited Vienna where we were able to see my Grandmother, Aunts, Uncles, and Cousins. We also had a nice visit with some of our Cowen friends at the camp Christmas party. I'm hoping to get back to camp this year, it's been two years since I've been there.

We then ventured to Charleston to see my Mom and Step-Dad. While there, we decided to take a little trip down to Scott Depot to visit my childhood best friend Tara (Ava's Aunt TT), and her husband Jason. We hadn't seen their new house, and let me tell you, its beautiful!

Tara wanted a picture of the three of us

Sarah & Tara...

...and as Tara put "can you believe at one point, people thought we were twins?" And they did! When we were little, we both had long blonde hair and looked quite a lot a like... didn't help we spent every waking minute (and some sleeping) together.

Ava waving by to Tara and Jason. She was so very sleepy

and refused to take her thumb out of her mouth.

We rounded out our WV tour with a stop in Bridgeport at my Dad's house. We have a lot of family, my Dad's side is HUGE, and we're all pretty close. Unfortunately, we didn't get to see my brothers, they were hunting. And the best part of the trip was that we forgot some of the presents and only had two for the boys... who weren't even there. This is the result of my scattered and overly stressed brain. We did enjoy our time with everyone else. And I think my sister Danielle really enjoyed her uninterruped time with Ava. Ava got a portable slide (cool!) and Danielle loved helping her go down it.

playing basketball with Daddy on the boys' new WVU hoop

By New Year's Eve we were so happy to be home. Traveling isn't the easiest with a toddler and so many places to go. But we spent Thursday morning relaxing and then headed over to the Spaniks for a few hours to hang out. Normally, we'd be with the Spaniks and Walkers, but Andrea is expecting their first baby any minute now (!) so they opted to hang out with family.

Ava and Hali haven't had much time together recently, we've all been so busy. And now that Hali is crawling, its much easier for them to play together.

Nathan trying to get Hali to smile

There was no way for me to get a picture of the girls playing. By the time I was ready to snap a picture, one of the two had already moved on. I understand the difficulty some of my friends have getting Christmas pictures of two+ kids. So we had a little photo shoot on the couch.

"here Hali, let me help you!" Hali kept trying to take her helmet off.

( a side note I figured Val would appreciate; Hali has a helmet to help her head develop and become less flat... and its working very very well!)

tea Hali?

New Years day brought more snow, and it hasn't stopped since. We got two more inches yesterday and at probably 2 today and its still coming down. Hopefully, if the tempature rises a little we'll get outside to play again.

Ava watching Daddy shovel the driveway

We hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!