Birthday, Thanksgiving, & photo shoot...

Can you tell what that says??? 30!!! (My Mommy made that for me!)

Yep, I'm 3 decades old now.

My birthday was the day before Thanksgiving and my hubby took me

out to P.F. Chang's, my fav! It seriously took us a half hour to eat and then we just went to get the kids. Kind of lame on our part, but oh well. And he feels bad that he couldn't

think of one thing to get me, so he told me to go spend some money, which I've done just a little of. With Christmas soon, I feel guilty spending too much.

Then Thanksgiving morning we headed up to feast with my Mom & stepdad, Grandparents,

Uncle & family, and brother Brian and fam. We had 19 people total, I think.

Good food, good times!!!

And it snowed in WA a couple days before, so pretty.

(We NEVER have pics of us together! So I made sure my Mom took one)


The snowman! Jeremy and my twin cousins, Jess & Josh.

Poor freezing girl. I hadn't bought her snow gear yet, so she was in a sweater jacket and knit gloves and sneakers. But she had fun!

My Mom & Mya

Isn't that baby so dang cute??? :)

Speaking of cute, here she is again. I attempted a photo shoot with

the girls before church yesterday, with them in their new Christmas clothes.

Ya, my camera is just a lame regular digital one, not the greatest.

But I'm not ready to spend money on formal pics yet, got to recover from

inadequate funds while on maternity leave.

Ava was a gem, as usual.

I did get a couple cute ones, which I put on our Christmas card

and didn't post here. Had to bribe that kid the whole five minutes it took.

She did everything opposite of what I told her to do.

But she's still beautiful!

"Haha, I'm a goof"

Now I get to play the single parent card for the next three weeks. Jeremy is in Seattle training, which is good because we get to go up on the weekends when I'm not working. It could have been somewhere much farther, where I couldn't go. I'm going to have to pull out my "Super Mom" that is somewhere within me! Thankfully, Ava was pretty dang good today during all the errands we had to run. I'm just counting down to Friday, that means that the RS Dinner (church, womens dinner) I'm in charge of on Thursday night will be over.....it's stressing me out!

All smiles!

I never load the pics right, so we'll just start with a reason NOT to smile over.

Notice the chin??? Lovely, huh? This is what happens after Mommy warns you

10 times to stay away from the oven and all things hot. I told her to stay back and she

walks up and rests her chin right on the cookie sheet I just removed from the oven!!!

Christmas pics will have to wait now!

But here's a reason to smile!

She's so dang smiley now, we just love it.

Most her pics have spit-up splattered all over her shirt, she's quite the spitter.

Mya @ 2 months

Have to document the growth of chub, the thighs are starting to roll.

Too sweet. Just checking out the entertainment.

Which would be Ava and Daddy dancing around the living room.

Ava and her favorite playmate, Daddy.

Precious.

Playing at the park.

Mya is doing AWESOME at sleeping through the night, normally from 10-10:30pm to 6:30-7am. Last night she woke at 3:30, but that hasn't happened in awhile. Her afternoon naps are all over the place and we can't get her to sleep much before 10pm. But I'll take what I can get. Ava on the other hand, rarely sleeps through the night....which is driving me CRAZY!!! She'll either wake up crying or just walk into our room. We always take her back to her bed, but takes a couple times for her to stay.

I go back to work in less than a week, on the 23rd. I'm surprisingly excited! I know, I know. I should be happy being home with my girls, but I'm not used to it. I don't know what to do with a 3 year old all day, every day. 3 days a week is a good break for us. Plus, I had all these things I wanted to accomplish while home, but I get unmotivated and end up doing nothing with my spare time. Working keeps me motivated with my time at home. Kudos to those who can be a SAHM, but I'm not sure I'm cut out for it.

And in a week from today..... I turn 30!!!!! Ugh! Though I'm looking forward to my 30's being happier times than my 20's were (or I'm just hoping they are).

If I don't post again soon, Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!!!

Minnesota 2010 Trip

We survived our 1st trip with 2 girls!!! (But just barely)

Let me rant first about the plane rides though....

We took off from Seattle (my mom watches our dogs) 2 1/2 hours LATE, due to

a crazy wind storm in MN. While waiting in the airport, they told us to go to the wrong gate. So we here this call "final boarding to MN from Gate S15", well we were at S5. We book it across the terminal and tell them that some lady going to MN was in the bathroom and may not have heard. They waited about 15-20 min for her and she finally made it, but then we had to sit on the runway for 20 minutes. Arrived at 2 am with all Jer's family worried sick about us!

As for the ride home....we arrived at the airport 1 1/2 hours early, noone was in line. Then discovered that their computers were down, so we wait and wait. They start calling people whose flights were leaving the soonest and manualy checked them in. Then they put us in lines, Seattle was on the far end. So we drag our kids, carseats and big bags to the end......to then get stuck at the END of the line, when we were FIRST! I was fuming!!! By the time we got checked in and ran through security, we heard "final boarding call for Seattle!" Just made it! WORST TRIP EVER!!!!! (not the time in MN, just to and from) Now on to the pics....

Ava got some new hats from a relative there.
Jeremy & Mya

Top: Terry, Joe, Carole

Bottom: Me, Jer, Mya, Ava, Lester

(Jeremy's siblings and parents)

Lexi, Ava, Great-Gramps Lipovsky, Jimmy, Great-Grams & Mya

All their Great Grandkids!

Al & Trish

Al is Jeremy best buddy from his High School days working at Toys R Us
(He's my buddy too)

Jeremy & Al

Terry & Mya

Ava, Mya (not too happy) & Great Grams Frey

Terry and Ava doing some painting.

Terry was soooo EXCITED to have Ava come, so she got her lots of

fun stuff they could do together and made up fun games.

Terry became Ava's secret Cinderella who would hide toys and candy under her pillow!

Ava came to expect it ALL the time, she was constantly checking her pillow.

Thanks Terry for entertaining her so much!!!

What a terrific Aunt Ava has!!!

Grandma Frey (Jer's mom) napping with Mya.

Grandpa Frey stealing smiles from Mya!

We had a fun trip visiting all Jeremy's family and friends,

though Jer & I ended up sick by the end and Ava 2 days later, but that's how it goes!

Doctor check-ups!

Miss Ava

3 yrs old

41 lbs

43 inches

98 percentile=GIANT (but we knew that)

Hated shots and is currently sick, poor baby.

(Not because of the shots though)
And she did NOT want to wear that gown! Or let the doctor check her ears, which has never been a problem before.

Little Miss Mya

2 months old

12 lbs 14 oz

23 3/4 inches

91 percentile for both H & W=mini Giant

(Crazy to think that Ava was just over 3 lbs more at this age)
Didn't like shots either, so she slept most the day afterwards.

But today she is a happy little clam.

See! I told you she is happy today.

Her favorite place is the floor, just flapping her arms and legs all about.

And she smiles pretty easily right after a feeding, just precious.

The late night crankiness is starting to dissipate more and more,

makes Mom and Dad happy!

And the chub is starting to form..... :)

The Princess and the Spider!

Presenting Princess Cinderella
Though she forgot how to smile and kept sticking her tongue against her teeth.

This year we spent Halloween and the week before in Minnesota, visiting all of Jeremy's family. Above is the girls with their Great-Grandparents.

And here is my little Spider! Should have made her a frog, then it could of been "The Princess and the Frog." Though Ava would have to be Tianna then.

On Halloween we hit of the Mall of America...it's the biggest mall ever!

Lots of little ones were there to Trick or Treat the stores, so fun.

Me and my silly girls.

I love how Ava just stared down this chic. She wasn't very good at talking to the people,

but was happy to get the candy.

We met up with a friend of Jeremy's and his family. Their little

girl Kloe is 3 yrs old and son Ethan is 6. Ava and Kloe had a blast together.

She keeps asking to play with her friends again.

Oh so serious.

Thanks to my bro Mark for the costumes!!!

More MN pics to come soon....

Look who's 3!!!!

How was she ever this small?
Or this peaceful! :)

(1 year)

Oh how I miss the spiky, funky hair.

What a beautiful 2 year old!

And now so energetic and full of personality at 3 years old!!!

Now she wants to grow tall like Mom and Dad.

And oh what a SASSY girl she has become!

This picture says it all! She just loves her little sister, but sometimes

a bit too much and Mya already knows how to react when Ava comes near.My favorite things about Ava:

-Her big, beautiful smile

-Gorgeous silky straight blonde hair

-Her hugs and kisses at bedtime

-Her singing and making up songs

-Her love of babies

-How much she loves her Daddy

-When she tells me that's she's Princess Ava, not just Ava

Ava's favorite things:

-dollies and babies

-princesses

-color Pink

-CANDY (our bad for using it to potty train)

-Playing with Daddy

-Cooking with Mommy

-her "favorite friends" Kaelynn & Kiera

-kittie pj's (which I just hid the other day, way too small)

-Baby Mya

And as usual, she's way too tall for her age and gets mistaken for a 4 or 5 year old all the time.

But she wants to grow tall like her Mommy!

We love you Ava and are so grateful you came to OUR FAMILY!!!