October: Scorcher in Texas

It still feels like summer here in Texas with 90+ degree days! One evening our HOA had a party by our park and swimming pool when Brent was at class. They had this blow up obstacle course which Ava was crazy about. I was a little worried to let her go in it at first since she was smaller than all the other kids going through it. If she couldn't reach to climb out, I did not want to get in there 8 months pregnant to help her! Luckily she's our climber baby and made it just fine. Over and over.

 They were grilling hamburgers and everyone in the neighborhood was out enjoying each other's company. We have a lot of LDS people in our HOA so we saw quite a few people we knew.

Here's Ava and I playing one day- she decorated our faces with stickers.

I've been trying to give her lots of attention and one-on-one time since I know the days of just the two of us are limited. Now I understand why it makes moms feel kind of sad when it's almost time for the new baby to come! She has been very attached to me and wants to sit in my lap and gets a little frustrated when there isn't room anymore.

In the past week or so she has started acting like how I imagined she would when the new baby comes- extra tantrums, screaming, crying, wanting my attention. I'm not sure if she can just sense the baby coming or what is going on! Poor little thing, she's had some really rough days. Here she is all tuckered out after tantrums:

And you can see she has been extra clingy with her baby doll.

Some more mommy-daughter time: picnic at the park.

  (Case in point: wanting to lay in my lap)

We made roast and potatoes and gravy. Ava is a huge gravy fan. She made sure every last bit of her gravy was off her plate, and off her hands.  

She is still a great eater, although some days are "non-eating days" and she just doesn't want to eat 

much. But when it's an eating day, she'll eat anything (except chicken a lot of the time). It was funny after dinner one day she still had one piece of broccoli on her plate. Brent told her to eat her last piece (she had eaten like 8 pieces) and she said, "no, daddy eat it." And I looked at Brent and said, "yeah dad, you eat some broccoli." Hahaha.

A week ago, Ava's best friend, Lillian, had a birthday party at the park. (Lillian's mom has been watching Ava once a week for about a year and they are such cute little friends. When we drop off Ava at the house, they hold hands and run off together). 

When Lillian opened Ava's present (girl clothes) Ava asked, "baby brother??" She thinks everything and anything is for baby brother.

Ava loves story time at the library! 

At the end they have the kids line up at the wall and sing a little song. Ava gets a little nervous to go up there for the 30 second song and as soon as it's done she bolts back to me, so proud of herself :)

Yesterday at story-time it was a special "donuts and dads" theme, which was fun! 

Last Sunday we had a Disney movie night and our friends brought their dogs so they didn't have to be cooped up and left at home. Ava went crazy for the dogs and was trying to pick them up, letting them lick her face, etc. It was the first time I've seen her play with dogs. She usually likes them but doesn't actually want to touch them.

Here's a video of her playing with the dogs:

One sweet moment this week came on Monday after Ava had been a little monster with apparent pre-little-brother-invasion syndrome. I have been recently starting to have FHE with real lessons for Ava and this Monday I thought we should still try even though she would probably just throw fits during the lesson. We did a 5 minute lesson on the Book of Mormon and she actually sat still and listened! Then I asked Brent to tell Ava his favorite Book of Mormon Story. He told her about the Tree of Life. I wanted to remember the look on her face so I took a picture:

 Here she is "reaching up for some fruit"

 And here she is saying "mmmm" because Daddy told her the fruit is so yummy.

One small victory in what felt like a week of tantrums!

We went to my doctor appointment this week for another ultrasound and check-up (apparently I get ultrasounds every time because I'm high risk? I guess the diabetes does that?)  You can hear at the beginning of the video, Ava kept saying during the ultrasound that it was her baby brother!

After the appointment we went to get hamburgers and the restaurant had this cool chalkboard, which Ava loved. She thought it was soooo funny to erase my drawings!

A few weeks ago I made a big list of everything that needed to be done before baby #2 comes. I have been working steadily on it, choosing just one thing every few days to get done. I have cleaned the baby car seat, gotten Ava some activities and crafts together for when the baby arrives, bought Ava a new car seat for our small car that will fit better with the baby's car seat, and washed baby boy's newborn clothes.

Washing clothes makes it feel more real.

We also bought a mattress and a base for Ava to sleep in a big girl bed. It will also double as a guest bed so we bought a twin mattress and put it on a low base so that it will still be ok for Ava (and hopefully the grandmas can still get out of the bed with it being so low ;) I also spent time picking out a comforter and sheets. Brent got the bed set up this week. Checking things off, slowly but surely!

The other thing on our to do list that we checked off yesterday was to clean out Ava's room. She still had 18 month size clothes hanging up in her closet and everything had just eventually become a mess in the bins on the wall. We needed to make room for baby #2.

Here's a before and after of the process:

 Finally to end, here's a picture of me at 35.5 weeks!