Well, long time no see followers! I've been busy relaxing with Avery on my summer break from teaching. Since we're over the 12 month mark and my cute little monthly stickers all ran out, I decided to try out a new idea...a chalkboard sign. It was getting harder and harder to put Avery in the same rocking chair each month, so I knew I needed something that would allow her to move and go (as she likes to do). The only question was, would she hold the sign long enough for me to snap a picture? Let's see... |
| Happy 13 Months Old Girl! |
...she would throw it!
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| "What can I say? I like to make photo shoots exciting!" |
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| "I like to laugh too." |
Wonder what life is like for Avery now that she's 13 months old? Here's some of her favorite things:
1. Favorite food: strawberries
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| She has them for breakfast nearly every morning. Yum! |
2. Favorite word: noodles (Avery pronunciation: "no-nos")
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| Noodles everywhere! |
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| She could listen to this book being read over and over, and over again! |
4. Favorite activity: watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse
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| Every morning after breakfast we watch a little Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. She loves to dance and wave at all the characters. |
5. Favorite move of the month: Hands up asking "Oh?". Anytime you ask Avery where something is ("Where are the dogs? Where is Dad?") she'll put one or both hands up like this and say, "Oh?" as if to ask, "I don't know, where?" Too funny.
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| Swinging won't stop her from "Oh?" |
Other favorite move: blowing kisses!
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| Every time we say "goodbye" to someone, or even "hi" it usually will come with some blown kisses from Avery! |
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| Gotta show some love for my mom! I couldn't do it without you! ( : |
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| So many choice...to swing or not to swing? |
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| Playing peek-a-boo with Grandma and Uncle Austin. |
Another fun thing that happened this month is that we got a fun, pink tent for Avery (thanks to my friend Erin, for passing it on to us!). And boy, has she loved it!
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| She loves to stand in it... |
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| ...read books in it, |
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| ...be silly in it, |
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| ...and of course, play hide from Mama! |
As I said at the beginning of the post, I finished up with school this past month, which meant that Avery finished up with daycare. Granted she was never in an actual "daycare" since she was with her grandma three days a week, and a friend of the family for the other two. But that didn't stop me from taking some pictures to document the change I knew would take place between the nine months!
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| Here she is on her "last day of daycare" this May. |
I think it's safe to say this girl has gotten "BIG!"
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| "See I'm a big girl guys!" |
Now since some of the big milestones are over and done, like rolling over, crawling, walking, saying that first word...I feel a little bit at a loss of words of what to post about this month. Don't worry though, I've got lots of pictures. So here's some more fun stuff we've been up to this past month.
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| We put our "fancy clothes" on and went to a wedding. |
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| Someone always has time for kisses with Daddy. |
We also managed to get away from Avery for one of my New Year's resolution's on going on a date night every month. This month's date was simple with no frills as we just went out to eat at a new restaurant. If you have followed my blog for a while you know that one of my favorite types of restaurants is Mongolian BBQ. This type of restaurant rocks for people with special diets, like me who's a gluten-free vegan. Our restaurant choice was Genghis Grill.
They had a similar format to most Mongolian BBQ restaurants where you get to choose your own veggies, noodles, meat or no meat, seasonings and sauces. Genghis Grill has one of the best allergy-aware environments I've seen. I was able to tell our waiter I had a gluten allergy and he wrote it on my "order card" that I gave to the chef once I created my bowl. With this card, they then made my bowl on a separate gluten-free grill. Sweet!
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| My bowl had: brown rice, tofu, broccoli, carrots, onions, mushrooms, green beans, and their Sweet N' Sour sauce. |
On top of that, they listed all the ingredients to the sauces above each of them...so that made it much easier to choose which ones I could have. You can read more about their menu and ingredients in their brochure here.
Other things Avery did this month were...  |
| Skateboarding on the hot pink skateboard she got for her 1st birthday. |
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| Swinging, as you already saw above. |
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| Swing time= Happy time. |
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| Ever wonder what Avery likes to do in the back seat while we're driving? Read books! Well, not literally, but you know what I mean. That girl is a book lover. |
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| Another favorite thing to do in the backseat? Smile and make silly faces. |
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Inspiration: Technically this wasn't something I found on Pinterest, just something I saw on Etsy (here) and thought, "Hey, I bet I could do that!"
Supplies:
- 1 large sheet (poster board size) of black foam board
- 1 can of Valspar Chalkboard paint $15, I figured I'd use it for other projects as well
- 1 small container of white paint (I use soy paint)
- 1 roller and a small paintbrush
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| The Valspar Chalkboard paint I used. |
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| 1. We painted the foam board with the first coat. Then waited 24 hrs. and painted a second coat. (instructions per the paint can) |
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| 2. Next we (my crafty mom) drew on the quote bubble shapes I liked the best from some Google searches. |
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| 3. We painted a thick, white border around each quote bubble. This took a few coats. |
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| 4. The quote bubbles were then done and ready to be used! |
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| Just in time for the 13 month photo shoot! |
2nd Pinterest Craft of the Month: Framed Photo Collage
Inspiration: This awesome framed photo collage I found on Pinterest. One of my goals this year is to start doing things with all the pictures I have just sitting around on my computer, other than post them on my blog. Whether that means online scrapbooking (which I've done in the past, but struggle to find time to do now), to just putting them in frames on the wall, I'm really trying hard to get them off my hard drive and into my house and hands.
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| source |
What I loved most about this picture were the awesome frames, but upon Googling, I discovered that they were a very cool, yet expensive brand of frames called Organic Bloom. I love a good frame, but these are only sold through independent photographers, and it seemed like too much trouble and money to buy them, so I let it go for the time being. But, all that changed when I walked into Hobby Lobby one day and found these gems...
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| I hit the frame jackpot! They were all 50% off and with that discount ranged in price from $5-20 a frame! |
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| I knew exactly where I wanted to put them: above our entertainment center in our living room. |
Now I have pictures on the wall, instead of collecting dust on my laptop's hard drive!
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| The finished product... |
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| Avery loves to point at this one and say, "Shoes?" Thanks Tiffany for the fun pic, it's one of our favorites! |
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| I love the way the pictures turn our house more into a "home"! |
Do you have a framed photo collage wall somewhere in your house? Post about it below. I'm loving ours and feeling a little inspiration to do another one somewhere in our house! You can bet, I've got enough pictures of Avery to do several!
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| See you guys next month. Until then, you'll know where I'll be. |