Well month #10 has arrived. Double digits. We're breaching in on one year and it's hard to imagine what life was like before Avery was here...oh wait, I bet I was more rested, I got more blog posts done (on time!), and my house was much cleaner. But what fun is all that without this little cutie to love?
So let's move right along to her 10 month post. As you can see the growing continues. This month her face has taken on new and hilarious expressions, her hair continues to grow, and she is getting more and more mobile.
Let's take a look at how much she's grown since month 1...
One Month
Ten Months
As you'll see from her stats, she has gained one pound this last month and grown one inch. This puts her in 90th percentile for her weight and above 100 percentile for her height.
The highlight of the photo shoot this month was practicing her new skill called "feet first". These are the words we use when she is trying to go down the stairs, as opposed to just nose-diving it all the way down. She picked up on the "feet first" cue pretty quick and now uses it almost always on the stairs.
Practicing "feet first" on the stairs.
She's also transferred the idea to other surfaces, like this chair, which doesn't pan out so well when you're trying to take a still shot.
Time to get out of here.
Feet first right?
I made it down!
Oh and she also does "feet first" to get down from our platform bed!
Here come the feet.
Easing down.
Dropping...
And down!
Where to next?
Here's some other outtakes from the photo shoot...
My favorite "scrunchy face".
A common Avery-position: side hurdler stance.
Touching her favorite picture in the whole book of the... dog!
Speaking of dogs...they have become her new favorite thing this past month. I guess you could say that's her first official word, other than the "Da da, na na, ma ma, ga ga" we've been getting for the past couple of months. She loves them so much that first word she says when wakes up everyday is, "Dog!" and she will usually want you to take her downstairs to go see the dogs right that instant. Luckily she sees dogs everywhere she goes, with two at our house, some grandparents' houses, as well as our sitter's house. On top of that our dogs have been doing pretty good to adjusting to her (with some help from Brandon).
Jilly and Avery
"I love that dog!"
"Hi Jill."
Something fun she's been doing a lot of this month is standing. She stands a lot during her playtime while holding on with one hand, or sometimes no hands. Crusing along our furniture and the walls is a favorite activity of her's right now as well too. Occasionally she'll venture out and take a step or two on her own, especially when her hands are occupied or a dog is nearby. It sure seems like walking may be around the corner, we'll see what the next couple of months hold for us.
"Watch me stand guys."
Wonder who she's watching? The dogs of course.
"Where could they be?"
"Look dogs, no hands!"
Standing on her own.
She also likes to stand at the windows.
"Oh yeah window are fun too."
At the fridge.
"Organic spinach is my favorite."
At the cabinets...that she loves to open. We just had to install the child locks onto these due to one curious little girl!
We've even cleared a shelf in our pantry where I keep "Avery-friendly" items for her to play with...like my Larabars.
During this past month, Avery got to celebrate her first Valentine's Day. Although she celebrated it with a fun little tutu, I got into the decorating spirit once again (remember Christmas?) and added several Valentine decor items all around the house. It cracks me up that I hardly decorated for holidays before, but now that Avery's here I feel the urge to decorate the house.
Decor from Hobby Lobby.
Also from Hobby Lobby.
Sign from Wal-Mart.
My para at school even found some Valentines that were right up my alley: Ecofriends Valentines! ( :
Avery then had some fun with her Valentine's Day outfit...
"Happy Valentine's Day!"
"Is this how you wear a tutu?"
Then Avery did her very own Pinterest craft...a heart made out of her foot print for Valentine's Day. I did this craft with my preschool students for their parents and I thought it would be fun to try it with Avery. So one night after dinner, we kept her hands busy and painted her feet!
Then stamped them on a paper.
The finished product. I think I will have fun looking back on those tiny little feet in years to come.
Unfortunately around Valentine's Day, Avery got sick with her first real "cold". She didn't have much of a fever, but she did have a cough, runny nose, sneezing, and I could tell she was in some kind of pain (head/ear/or teeth...I didn't know). As you can imagine, I tried every "green medicine" I could find, but after 5 days of a miserable, sick, and not sleeping baby we had to do something different. So we took her to Urgent Care and discovered that she had an ear infection...the medication: antibiotics. Duh duh duh. ) :
Sick Avery ) :
Normally I'm anti-antibiotics just because I feel like they are way over prescribed to babies and adults alike. But in this case, Avery was miserable and I was ready for her to have some relief. So, I put my green pride aside, gave my baby some amoxicillin and within a day or two she started to get better. Thank goodness. I'm sure other green mamas can relate that green remedies can only take you so far. Sometimes you have to rely on conventional medicine...and that's okay. I'm glad it's there when we need it. Avery's glad too. She's right back to her old, happy, silly self and at the end of the day, that's all that matters.
New Year's Resolution's Update... Last month I told you about my two New Year's Resolutions, as inspired by the book: The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin: to go on a date night once a month and to do one Pinterest-inspired crafts each month.
For the date night resolution, we headed out to a restaurant we hadn't been to before: BD's Mongolian BBQ. If you have followed my blog for a while now you know that I love Mongolian BBQ, and specifically, Genghis Khan (a local restaurant here in KC). This style of restaurant appeals to me because I can make my own meal by choosing my noodles (rice), veggies, sauce/seasonings, and protein (tofu). BD's did not disappoint. It was delicious, fun, and gluten-free/vegan-friendly. Granted if you have a gluten allergy or are vegetarian, you can tell the guys that "work the grill" and they'll cook your bowl separate...in the back ) : No show for me of watching them cook it all on the big, mega grill like everyone else. But I'd rather do this than risk getting a wheat noodle or soy sauce in my meal any day.
My dish: rice noodles, broccoli, carrots, tofu, onions, mushrooms, cilantro, 1 scoop of Chili Garlic sauce, 2 scoops of Sweet & Sour sauce. It was awesome!
After dinner we headed to do something we haven't done in a long time...bowling! Despite being clueless about my form, (you just roll it down the lane right?), Brandon managed to give me some pointers.
Time to lace up some bowling shoes. So styling.
No clue what I'm doing-lol.
Check out his rockin' bowler stance...so cute!
We both couldn't help but think of this scene from Parks & Recreation. Hilarious! Any other Parks & Rec fans?
Clearly from our scores, you can tell that bowling isn't quite our thing, but it was something fun to do together.
Ouch...I'll let you guess who "A" was.
After we were done we headed back to my parent's house to pick up this little one.
Resolution #1 for February...cross it off the list.
On to resolution # 2: "Pinterest Craft of the month": "Mudroom Makeover". Okay so I don't officially have a mudroom, but I do have a dropping ground where all my coats, shoes, bags, and miscellaneous items tend to get dropped and kept. Unfortunately, it's what you see when you walk in my front door.
Diaper bag, coats, and other bags all right when you walk in.
Now I'm not the feng shui fanatic I used to be, but I still believe that the placement of items in your surroundings has an effect on you. So, to open the front door to this dumping ground each day, was not very welcoming in my opinion.
I do have one small little hallway to the left of that "dumping ground" where we keep our shoes and I began to wonder if that was maybe the place I could start storing some of these things.
This area had some potential.
That's when I came across my Pinterest inspiration...
In order to get this organization going on, I knew I had to move the hooks/racks/and mail storage out of the line of sight, and back by my laundry room in that space I showed you before. But, what would go in place of the dumping ground? An awesome mirror of course! Mirrors are pretty much my favorite decorating accessory. I love how they can make a room look bigger and give it some fun flair. My rule with mirrors, the bigger and funkier...the better. So when I found this mirror for 50% off at Hobby Lobby, I knew it hit the jackpot.
Next step, figuring out the organization for the mudroom area. I took the cue from the Pinterest picture for the mail storage system...which I've had on my vision boards to get for years. Then I found the 2 matching coat hooks from Lowes. Here is how it all came together.
Coats, bags, shoes, and mail all in one place and out of the way. Love it.
How it all came together with the mirror.
Storage for mail, keys, and other papers.
Here's a special mailbox I had left from my Valentine's decor that I decided to put on our mail organizer for Brandon and I to write little notes or Post-Its to each other from time to time. Which ties into The Happiness Project book in one of her resolutions to "give proofs of love." She has a good discussion in that section about how it's more what you do every day, than what you do once in a while. I like that idea. Time to do the little things. Now if we both could actually remember to check the mailbox, we'd be good. ( :
Our little mailbox.
.
Enough jabbering about me...I'll send you off with a few more fun pics of Avery from the month.
She loves hanging out in the back seat (with Grandma next to her) while I load and unload the groceries.
Would you look at all those teeth!
Loving the view from above with Dad.
See in you a week or two for the 11 month (gasp!) post.
