christmas extravaganza!

so we had a super busy holiday season...complete with family, friends, travel, travel, and more travel! we are totally exhausted, but had a wonderful time visiting with everyone! ava got so spoiled and i fee as if we are living in an F.A.O. Schwartz toy store! she got sooooo many new toys, i have started going through her old toys and packing them up...should have started that before christmas...oh well, no time then, to busy shopping, wrapping, baking, decorating..... anyway here are a few shots from the first few days of christmas for us...i'll post more later from the last few days of christmas...

ava on the potty...she'll love this when she's 16!
playing with her blocks, and giving me her new "cheese" face!

kissing her new baby


poking her new babies eye....

ava with her christmas morning toys!

thank you for the pressies nonna!

nonna and ava

ava riding her christmas pony!

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the best aunt jen ever!!!!

hi! ava here! mom's busy doing the dishes so i thought i would hijack the blog!!!! i got such a special package in the mail today from my favorite aunt jen and uncle jon! my very own chatterbox elmo...he is very chatty, just like me! i love him! i even got to open the present all by myself, it was so exciting! thank you so much aunt jen and uncle jon...you're the best!
oh, and mom loved her little pressies, too! she says, you shouldn't have...but you should have seen her dancing around with that target gift card! she's so excited...i guess we'll be going back to target again very, very soon!!!!!
love you,
ava

elmo gets ava sloppy kisses...the best kind!

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christmas season

soooooo, it's been a while....sorry!!!! nothing too exciting going on here. thanksgiving was wonderful, hope everyone had a beautiful day! bo had the day off, so we got to be together all day long, a special treat! now bo got switched to a day shift (yay!!!), so hopefully life can be somewhat "normal" (whatever that is) for us now! it has been about 2 1/2 years since he started at the railroad and has always been on the night shift or second shift...so day shift is a first for us! hopefully it will be as good as i think it is! still has crazy days off, but oh well...we will get him every night now :)
so, grams and i took ava to see santa claus at hulen mall tonight...she loved santa from a distance...waving, saying hi, wrinkling her nose and making her super cute silly face! we were the second people in line, a small baby before us. that baby screamed and screamed...i think that tipped ava off that maybe this wasn't as much fun as she thought originally. so of course, she screamed, too! even with the tempting bracelets grams secretly handed to santa to try to sway her to love him...oh well, we got one shot with her looking at santa and of course, the notorious screaming child with santa shot! i'll post the other one another day, only had time to scan one!

We also took ava to a christmas tree place to try and get some shots for the christmas card....that was a bust. she didn't want anything to do with it, got one or two decent shots, but nothing good enough for the christmas card...i'll keep trying! thought i'd post a few anyway....

thought this one was cute, smelling the christmas tree...or maybe licking, not quite sure what she was up to in there!

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kenton, kamrynn and miss jewelia

last weekend i went out with liz and her kiddos to take some pictures in burleson! we had such a great time and i was really happy with how they turned out! here is a little storyboard of kenton and kamrynn...and then one of miss jewelia...they are such gorgeous kiddos and so much fun to be with!

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slow blogging...

sorry for the slow blogging lately...nothing exciting has been going on. bo has been working a lot and ava and i have been trying to keep busy...she is just such a busy little bee as it is, hard to keep up with all that one year old energy! she loves to play with the dogs and her daddy and she loves to sing she'll be comin' round the mountain (or at least the toot toot, whoa back, scratch scratch parts...you know, the fun stuff!) she is also quite the dancing girl...i'll have to post some pictures or video of that...if i can ever figure out the video on here...she is also constantly walking on her tippy toes like a little ballerina! anyway, thought i'd share one of my favorite pics...and oldie, but feels like yesterday...

ava and mommy, july 2007

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splashin' around

here is missy ava playing in mimi and poppy's bathtub...she had so much fun splashin' around!

btw: if you click on the image it will show it bigger :)

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pumpkins...

friday, ava, grams, and i were running around and we stopped at calloways nursery...anyway, they had tons of pumpkins so i grabbed my camera, we threw on ava's halloween costume and i snapped a few shots of her before they closed...i think we had five minutes...anyway, isn't she just the cutest little butterly....

oh and on the way there she was being so silly...she was wearing her sunglasses and then when i looked back at her she had pulled them half off to she could see her book better (at least that is what i'm guessing...she is such a bookworm)! and that last picture is terrible, i know, but i had to show all of her teeth...she went from 0 to 7 what seemed like overnight...she even has one molar...i miss that gummy smile...she looks like too much of a big girl!

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there's no place like home { seriously }

so we got back from minnesota yesterday afternoon. we spent the afternoon just being lazy around the house, watching some cowboy football..sigh, and making a trip to the grocery store to restock the cabinets...things were sort of empty! we had such a great time in minnesota, we got to visit with tons of family and kirstin and alex's wedding was absolutly gorgeous, such a beautiful day they had! i am slowly going through pictures and wanted to post some from our first weekend at the lake. we got to spent the weekend with my uncle mike and aunt delores and had such a wonderful time. it rained most of the time we were there, but it didn't even matter, we just enjoyed visiting and hanging around the house. i was so amazed by all the colorful fall leaves...trees don't really do that in texas. i kept saying "look at the trees" and bo kept saying "look at the lake", it was beautiful! i'll post pictures of the rest of our stay as i get to them...but here's a start!

a double rainbow...the second one is faint, you can sort of see it on the left

look at the lake!

look at the trees!

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no place like home {continued}

ava reading to daddy...so sweet

papa mike reading to ava...she's in heaven!
grama delores, ava and papa mike
ava's upside down daisy hat i knit for her...she finally got to wear it!
ava and daddy...thick as thieves

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out of town...

so i am frantically racing around trying to get three people packed for an eight day trip out of town...how did i get this job??? i am exhausted after a busy day of running from here to there trying to get things ready and now i'm doing dishes and laundry and of course...packing. we are leaving for minnesota in the am, and will be gone all week long. i'll have tons of pictures to post when we get back :) see you then!
amanda, xx

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time flies...

so time has been flying by...the days just go way too fast! we have been keeping busy with ava...she is working on cutting some teeth, so she has been extra fiesty lately, but still oh-so sweet! we are getting ready to go to minnesota next week...we will spend some time with uncle mike and aunt delores up at the lake, see lots of family, (including little missy kaitlin...so super excited about that) and i am going to be in alex and kirstin's wedding! can't wait! they are such a sweet couple and i am so excited to be a part of their day...hopefully, i'll get lots of pictures! i spent the afternoon with my niece sydney the other day and took some pictures for my workshop...had to get some practice with a "cooperative" subject since ava has been very anti-camera lately :) we had such a good time playing, and before i left, sydney tried on her halloween costume for me...she is soooo cute!

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drama...drama...drama...

oh lord, have we been dealing with a little drama queen lately...one minute all sugar and spice and the next minute caught in a tornado of a tantrum...grrrrr...needless to say, i'm exhausted! (i love how in that last piccie, you can see her bottom two teeth...so cute!)

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botanical gardens

so we have been to the botanical gardens twice this week trying to get some shots for my workshop...unfortunatly ava has been sooooooo uncooperative! thought i would post a few anyway...she loves the botanic gardens, she loves the flowers, stairs, running in the grass, finding sticks on the ground, the water fountain...there is just so much to love, she can't be bothered to look at the camera...such a stinker with a capitol "S"!!! she loves being outside, and she had such a good time. daddy went with us on monday and grams went with us today...the weather has been so beautiful it's nice to get outside and not feel like you are in an oven!

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baaaaad blogger!!

so i have been a busy girl latley and haven't had a lot of extra time...soooooo, going to catch up a little bit now! it's been a busy week/weekend! spent a lot of time with the family, studying my workshop stuff, and knitting (i finished two hats this week! yay!) posting a few pics of little bit! she is so funny! she is trying to pop her top two teeth through so she has been having some trouble sleeping. my 8pm to 8 am baby didn't go to sleep tonight until 10:30....does that mean she will sleep until 10:30am???? i guess we'll find out and cross our fingers! bo is taking tomorrow off work so hopefully i'll be able to catch up on the neverending housework! ugh!

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