Avery Turns 2!

Since when does time go by this fast?  Wasn't it just yesterday that we were in the hospital just meeting our sweet little baby love?  I'm ready for time to slow down, that's for certain.

We are still riding on our Disney World high and that carried over into Avery's party.  I gave her the option of a Minnie Mouse party or a Frozen party and much to my relief surprise she chose Minnie Mouse.

I made all of the decorations and I will say, it was a labor of love and it was well worth it.  My fantastic sister-in-law helped and made all of this totally doable.

The mantle set up. 

Avery's first set of Mickey ears on display.

I spy some Minnie Mouse ears...

The amazing tassel banner

Minnie Mouse cupcakes

Minnie Mouse cake

The cake and cupcakes were out of this world.  Our sweet friend Catherine owns her own bakery and hooked us up royally with the most beautiful stuff.  She made Avery's smash cake and cupcakes for her 1st birthday party last year and I foresee she'll continue to get a lot of business from us.  Check out her website Sweet Louise Bakery

Our sweet Avery Grace, what a joy you are.

Literally in the last half day Avery has started saying "cheese" on command.  The below picture is usually what we get when we ask for her to say "cheese".  We deserve nothing less.

Eating her snacks before digging into her cake.

So what you can't see is the sheer panic in Avery's face and cry while we were all singing Happy Birthday to her.  It's ok, it's a memory.  She refused to blow her candles out, twice.  It's ok, it's a memory.

"Momma make it stop!!"

Calming herself down

How many Aggies does it take to cut a cake?

Well worth being sung to in order to eat this cake!

After cake we sat down to open presents.  At first Avery was totally in to pulling the tissue paper out of the bags....but then the utter confusion set in as to why we were letting her open presents and then making her put them back in bags.  So rude, mom.  So rude.

Avery Grace,

     What can I say baby girl, it's been quite the year!  You've learned and loved leaps and bounds above what we expected!  Parenting you has been such a journey and in the highs and the lows we are blessed to have been chosen to walk beside you.  Don't forget you special talent of big hugs and sweet kisses- they have the special ability to make any bad day better.  We are looking forward to each new day with you and can't wait to see where the Lord takes us in this next year.  You make our lives much more entertaining, we are truly blessed by you sweet girl.  

                                      To the moon and back, and back again,

                                                           -Momma and Dada

Weekend Wrap Up- Birthday Edition!

After getting back to Austin from Bestie Weekend 2015, it was time to celebrate my birthday!  Woot!

Saturday:

Avery helping Dadda make birthday cookies...

She was a pretty tough inspector of the cookie making...

Helping with the flour....and surprisingly not wearing much of it.

"Fwour for you?"

Taking the cookie dough.  She approved.

 Sunday: Happy Birthday Momma!

Spending the 4th Anniversary of my 25th Birthday with the people I love.

It was a "Momma gets to pick out what we do today" type of day and after nap time we headed out to my favorite place, Target.  Because let's be honest, who doesn't want to spend some quality family time at Target.

Sharing her Icee with her dada.  What you don't see or hear in this picture is how she was controlling exactly how much she was sharing with him.  She would only let him take a small tiny sip before she would tell him, "all done dada!"  Give it like 30 seconds later and she was asking us, "want some?".

Overall it was a great low key birthday!  29 is starting out with a bang and I'm anxious to see where we go, who we meet, and the impact we have on the next 365 days.

Bestie Weekend 2015

The bestie and I take an annual trip together every year to our state wide speech therapy convention.  It's always in a relatively cool place (Houston, Dallas, Ft. Worth, Austin, or San Antonio) and it's a great time for the 2 of us to get away for at least the weekend.

This year around 4,000 speech therapists came in hot to San Antonio and set a Guinness Book of World Records record.....largest amount of people in one room rapping (yes, rapping) the same song. I'm not going to lie, I thought it was a bit on the hokey side when I heard about it - but- like a good sport we went and it was actually a lot of fun to be a part of.

Some picture highlights:

Our annual escalator picture.  I nearly fell face first off of it about .5 seconds after this was snapped.

Staci found her new favorite book.

Being studious.  Where else can you get 10+ hours of continuing education AND have a bestie weekend?  No where.  Just TSHA.  We've looked into it.

(no words)

After our first day of sessions, we went and visited the Alamo.  On the walk there, Staci mentioned that she had forgotten that the Alamo was "here".  ....and she calls herself a Texan.

...shame.

We stopped for some ice cream on the River Walk because when you're on the River Walk, you get ice cream.  We decided to go back to the hotel after our ice cream adventure and take showers and just go to bed....and then we looked at what time it was- 7:45.  Cue the Golden Girls theme song.

After our last session on Friday, we headed North for an overnight stay at Dana's Diner.  Dana was Staci's mom's best friend and there are some stories there that will make you spit things out of your nose.  Trust me.  We were spoiled rotten with a good home cooked meal, rowdy games of Skip Bo, and coffee on the porch in the morning.  Ya'll, I slept until 8:30 in the morning.  8:30.  I honestly don't remember the last time that happened voluntarily.

Can't wait for Bestie Weekend 2016!

Weekend Wrap Up

It's been a while since we did a weekend wrap up!  I have to say- I missed it.  :)

Saturday:

Girl's morning started out bright and early with a trip to our favorite location.....Target!

For some reason, we thought it was a good idea to suddenly need to find Minnie Mouse all through the store.  I'm not complaining, it kept her occupied in the store...granted she was nearly screaming, "Minnie!!" as we searched, but you know.  Whatever.  I don't think the 15 people in the store minded all that much.

The weather was GORGEOUS when we got home so I got the Nikon out and we went upstairs to the balcony porch for a mini photo shoot.  These are my favorite 2 shots from the morning.

Jacob got home from the gun range and we headed out for round 2 of errands.  It got down-right warm outside so Avery had to shed her sweatshirt for a short sleeve number and "sandies" (read: sandals).  The expression on her face really encapsulates my feelings on Tractor Supply as well.  Utter confusion.

 Wait- what?  A second trip to Target?  We live the exciting life around here.

"What.  Move on.  I'm wearing my sunglasses inside and I look completely fabulous."

"Hum on momma, 'es go"

 After Target we went to Jacob's favorite restaurant- CiCi's.

Someone may/may not have gone through 4 pieces.  There were 2 witnesses but they're not talking.

After CiCi's we took Avery through her first car wash.  We were reallllly close to tears, but she handled it very well.  Don't let the super relaxed body language fool you- sister was intense.

Sunday:

I don't know about you, but I'm still having trouble with the losing an hour of sleep business.  Sound check for church seemed extra early this morning.  Extra coffee was a must.

We did some work on our duck faces.  She's better than me.  As usual.

I found out who's been stealing our K-Cups.  Apparently it's not the coffee minions....

More Sunny Selfies!

Hope your weekend was spectacular!