The Joys of being a Mommy

I must say that in the past 3 months I have found such an unbelievable joy that I had lost somewhere along the way.  How is it possible that one little person can do this?  It is to me like looking into the face of our Father.  My cousin Kerri put it best when she said that Ava still has Heaven in her eyes.  What a beautiful and telling statement.  I think about how much I love my sweet girl and I am struck by the thought that God loves us one hundred times more.  WOW!  I love this girl with every beat of my heart and every inch of my being and my God loves me more than that.  I am more than blessed and humbled by this thought. I know that there will be trials among the joy but I hope to always look back and remember those sweet smiles that Ava wakes with on her face.  I have never prayed so fervently for anything as I do for my child.  I pray that I can bring her up to know Christ and to always take the narrow road.  It is not the easiest but oh the amazing prize that is waiting at the end.  I love you my sweet angel and cannot wait to see what amazing things God has planned for you!

Ok...enough heavy talk...let me tell you what little tootsie is up to these days!  She will be 3 months old this Friday.  How is that possible??  We have had a few firsts in the last couple of weeks with more to come soon.  We went on our first road trip to Oklahoma.  It was just us girls--mommy, Ava and Aunt Erin.  It was Erin's 10yr reunion at OBU so Ava and I tagged along to see some old friends.  I was a little nervous to see how she would do and I must say--I have the BEST little traveler out there!!  She slept the whole way there and back.  She only took little cat naps here and there but was never fussy.  I am so blessed that she is so happy!  Tomorrow is another big first--our very first plane ride!  I am hoping that she will love it as much as she does riding in the car.  We are headed to Kansas City for a few days to spend some time with Hue's mom for Thanksgiving.  Ava's Mimi has not seen her in person since she was a week old so she is really in for a treat!

The other big news is that she is sleeping in her big girl crib in her fabulous room!  She absolutely loves it.  This baby turns herself all over that crib.  I guess she got a taste of that freedom and loves it because she sleeps from about 8 or 9pm until about 4:30 and then goes back to sleep until 7:30 or 8!  It has been really great to be able to turn over in bed without worrying that I was going to wake her.

That is pretty much the new happenings in our lives right now so I will sign off for now with a few pics of Ava and her sweet cousins--Macie and Beckett.  Stay tuned for blog updates and pics from our trip :)

I hope you all have a WONDERFUL Thanksgiving.  Enjoy this time with family as it is so short but such a time to be treasured.

Macie and Ava

The Three Musketeers

She sure loves her Macie

Oh this boy melts my heart!

morning naptime--love her holding the pillow!

modeling one of our turkey shirts from Nana

worn out after our trip to OK

my big girl loves to lay out and stretch!

Much love to all of you!

Too big for her britches...

Miss Priss is 2 months old!!  Man how time has flown by. I can't believe that it has been that long already.  Everyday she is changing so much and I just love watching her discover new things.  We had our 2 mo. check up today and Dr. Mehendale says she is "just perfect".  She is a little small but developmentally she is amazing so no one is worried.  Just my petite pumpkin!!  Here's what Ava is up to at 2 months:

*weighs 8lbs 13oz and is 21.5in long (mommy measures her at 22 but who is counting!)

*still wearing newborn diapers to cover that tiny hiney!

*still wearing mostly newborn size clothes but anything with feet we have to wear 0-3mo because of the length--where in the world did this girl get a tall gene?!?

*has found her voice and loves "talking" to mommy all day long

*would rather sit up than anything else--we have broken out the bumbo seat as you will see in the pictures and she LOVES it.  

*holds her head up ALL the time and is so curious that she just looks at everything around her.

*has slept through the night ONCE--woo hoo-- but mostly still wakes at 2 or 3am for a night time feeding

*we are working on sleeping in our crib but is having a little trouble with that transition so far

*absolutely loves her bathtime now!!

*takes 2 really good naps during the day---mommy is now starting to take advantage of this time to get somethings done rather than just sleeping too!

As you can see...that is why I titled this post as I did!  She is just growing up so fast and wants to be so big.  Thankfully right now she still loves to snuggle with her momma so I take full advantage of it. Here are a few pics of what we have been up to lately--

I love my bumbo seat!

Having a little tummy time

worn out after my shots--btw..this gown and hat are hand-me-downs
from miss layla and we LOVE it!

my sparkly bandaid

2mo old

"hey mom, i'm not sure i like this"

"thank goodness i'm outta there!"

I know mom of the year---sitting in my bumbo watching Ellen!

I just love this juicy little baby!!  I'm hoping to get some cute crafty projects done soon so I will post a few!  I have a fun stack of fabric in my sewing room just begging to be made into something cute so we will see what I can come up with!!

love you all--

Sweet Family Time

Today Ava and I got to meet her cousin baby Ruby for the first time!  Ruby is my cousin Summer's baby girl and she is named after our sweet grandmother.  Grandmother passed away just a couple of weeks before Ruby was born so she never got to meet these two sweet girls.  Well....she never got to meet them here on this earth.  I KNOW without a doubt she rocked and kissed both those girls before they left Heaven.  And I am sure she sang them a little hymn too because that is what grandmother did best! Here are a couple of pictures from the day.  Cousin Makayla also joined the photo fun as well!

Ava, great granddad and Ruby

Ruby, her momma Summer and granddad

Granddad and his girls

this is the only picture where all eyes were on the camera!

Makayla was eyeing Ava's bow...then she
tried grabbing it off her head!!

Aunt April and her girls

Speaking of my grandmother.  She swore by something called a bumper chair.  Now to most people, it looks just like a normal straight back chair but to grandmother it was a miracle chair.  She believed this chair could cure anything that was wrong with us when we were babies.  It is the BEST remedy for gas and upset tummies.  Well, wouldn't you know that my little girl has quite the tummy issues...gas, reflux, hiccups.  If it has to do with the GI tract, it plagues my baby girl.  So I have been on the hunt for my very own bumper chair.  My cousin Kerri came this weekend and that was our mission.  Who knew how difficult it could be to find but, those who seek shall surely find and find I did.  I got my chair for $5!!!  That's right....I said $5!  Thank you Frisco Resale for this awesome and much needed find.  Here is a pic of Ava's first "bump"!!  Oh how she loves it!

Thank you Kerri for pointing out this
very special chair!

Like I said....Kerri came for a little baby Ava time this weekend too.  We have been so blessed to have such great fellowship with our family this week.  Ava loves her "auntie" Kerri.  She just slept, cooed and smiled for her all weekend.  

taking a little morning nap

great Sunday morning--a good cup of coffee
and a cuddly baby

sweet sleep....we love you Kerri

Like I have said so many times before....man I am so blessed.  Thank you God for such and amazing family.

Remembering

Yesterday was worldwide pregnancy and infant loss remembrance day.  It is still so hard to believe that just a little over a year ago our sweet angel, Ian, was born into the arms of Jesus.  Here is a link to the video our sweet friend/photographer DeEdra made for us with pictures she took when Ian was born.

http://web.me.com/whitt2679/Life_According_to_Whitney/Movie.html

We love you and miss you everyday sweet boy.

So many things have happened in our lives this past year.  We have been so blessed with our baby girl.  We have learned so many things, the most important of those being that life is so short and we must take advantage of every precious moment we are given.  SO....we are doing just that!!  We have taken Ava LOTS of places so far.  Here is her running list:

*church

*high school football game

*pumpkin patch at the Arboretum with her fav cousins

*TONS of dinner/lunch/brunch dates with lots of friends

*Dallas Mavericks game

*Dallas Stars game

*the Texas State Fair

*of course....shopping trips!!

We are having so much fun with this precious baby that God has graciously loaned to us for awhile.  She too is teaching us a lot of things.  The most amazing of those is how great love can be.  I never knew I could love something or someone so much.  I love my husband so dearly but the love I have for both Ian and Ava is so completely different.  I thank God everyday for the gift of being this sweet girl's momma!  I am so blessed and my cup truly is so full.

Enough of my blabbering....here are some more pics of my sweet girl---I know that is what everyone wants to see anyway :)

Rough day at the fair

Ava and momma with Big Tex

Oh how I love that dimple!!
I love waking up to this every day!!

My serious little thinker

We cannot wait to see what else the future holds for our little family!  Please take a minute to really think about all the blessings you have been given and be thankful for each moment.

Long Overdue

Well, this post is LONG overdue!  I decided to join the blogspot family to chronicle this new phase of our lives.  As many of you know, I had a previous blog that went through our journey of becoming parents for the first time and the loss of our son Ian.  For any of you that would like to read those posts, you can follow this link:  http://web.me.com/whitt2679

A lot has happened in the past few weeks.  We welcomed our sweet baby girl, Ava Kate, into our family!  We are so in love with her.  I feel like we have waited so long to have this baby in our arms.  God is so good and we are feeling so blessed.

Ava decided--on her own I might add--that she wanted her birthday to be September 3, 2010.  She weighed 7lbs 6oz and was 20.5 in long.  So that will make her 6 weeks old this week!  How is it possible that 6 weeks have passed already??  Man this little pumpkin changes everyday....sometimes right before my eyes I think!  Here are a few of her stats as  of her 1 month check up:

* weight is up to 7lbs 13oz
*now ~21 inches long---she really doesn't enjoy being measured and squirms the whole time!
*she LOVES music
*we enjoy outings most every day--lunch with friends, trips to target, etc...
*she finally loves her bath and MUST take one every night or she DOES NOT sleep well
*daddy feeds her a bottle every night before bed and I think this is a huge reason she sleeps so good
*she is sleeping 4-5hrs at a time at night---woo hoo!!
*she and mommy have started going to church and I think she really likes it--especially the music
*morning times are are best times--this is when she is the happiest and smiles the most

Here are a few of my favorite shots of her these last few weeks!

Janet the giraffe--our new love and paci holder!

Ava and her bestie Jillian

Yea for bath time!

we love getting dressed up for church

with Macie at the pumpkin patch

we were about to lose her

mommy and Ava at the pumpkin patch at the Arboretum

Thanks for joining us in this amazing new chapter of our lives!