Happy New Year's Eve

What a great 2010 the Leptuch Family has had. So many exciting things have happened this year and 2011 should be even better. Ava grew up right before our eyes. We are looking forward to meeting Noah and having him be a part of our family. He was trying to grace us with his presence this year, but I guess he wants to wait.  The past 2 days I had been having quite a few Braxton Hicks Contractions. They started on Wednesday night and went into yesterday. They seemed to have let up now, so today, I am going to get out for a walk in this brisk AZ weather. I am most uncomfortable!!!

Mike was off this week and we got a lot of things crossed off our to do list. I am nesting and therefore making lists for my lists and trying to get Mike to get everything done. I think we are pretty much ready for Noah, just a couple of last minute things that aren't the end of the world if they don't get done before he comes.  My mom was down here for 2 days which helped us get those things done.

Now it's time to think of our New Year's Resolutions! We won't stay up late tonight, but we will have our Friday night pizza and enjoy the rest of the year. Happy New Year to all that read my blog and to a great year ahead!

Update on baby Noah

Here is me and baby Noah at 35 weeks. I am now 36 weeks and have just one more week until I am considered full term. Yay! It has been a long road. Last week, I really noticed a drop in baby Noah's movement. It was a drastic drop, so I was worrying and counting kicks like crazy and noticing when he was kicking and when he wasn't. Usually whenever I eat or drink juice or have any type of sugar, he kicks within minutes. By Monday, he wasn't responding to any of that, so I headed over to L&D. They checked him out and everything was fine. I had my Doctor's appointment on Wednesday and she decided that I should get twice weekly stress tests on the baby to make sure that his heart rate, fluid levels, breathing and muscle tone were fine. I got the test done that day and all looked good. It made me feel a little sigh of relief. I go back on Monday for another test. As of yesterday, he started kicking more, so I am going to see if I can go once a week because this is going to cost me an arm and a leg.  Other than that, I am feeling big these days. By the end of the day, my feet hurt and my back hurts. I am just ready for him to be here.  The big day  is less than 3 weeks away. I have been telling everyone that he is going to come early, which means he will now wait until his scheduled c-section! Mike is off this week and will be helping me out a lot and I couldn't be more grateful for. I might have my nanny come next week and help out in the mornings. I just can't get up and down off  of the floor a million times, so it is nice to have someone who can. Then I can get some last minute things done. I am officially done working. It really hasn't sunk in yet and I am not sure when it will. I am going to enjoy this time!!  

Merry Christmas

 Merry Christmas to everyone. We had such a great Christmas and Christmas Eve.

Every year for Christmas eve, we go to my step-brother's house for a pasta and seafood affair. We all got dressed up and headed over. The food was amazing as always and it was nice to spend time with family.

 Here is Ava in her Christmas eve dress.

 Here is our family picture in front of their tree. We have the exact same shot from last year and what a difference a year makes.

We woke up early Christmas morning, well, I guess I should say Ava woke up around 5:20am. I just decided to get her up because we had to be at my sister's house around 8:30 for brunch.  Santa brought Ava a new kitchen.  Santa's helper put it together during her nap on Christmas eve. He was smart to do it ahead of time. Ava came into the family room and saw it right away. She loved it!!!

 Here she is opening the plastic food that is going to be everywhere in our house until we can get a good storage bin to put it in!!

Ava didn't really get the part where she had to pull all the wrapping paper off, so I helped, but she was all ohhhh and ahhh's when she saw everything. Of course, we had to pull everything out of the boxes for her to see.

**Note to self next year: pull everything out of boxes and cut all strings, put back in box and then wrap...

Next year, we will have an almost one year old and an almost 3 year old. It will require some serious organizing.  Ava got tons of toys and I know was way overwhelmed by the time we were done. She got lots of toys and clothes. I wish I didn't take everything out of the box and held on to some for later. I may still do that.

 After we opened gifts, we all went over to my sister, Jacy's, house for brunch. Here is Ava in her Christmas outfit. Super cute.

We gave her a couple of gifts to open while everyone prepared breakfast. Her Auntie Jackie and Uncle Nick got her the Thomas the Train beginner train track set and she LOVED it. She was so excited and yelling and screaming. Her Aunties said that they haven't seen her this excited before. 

 After we ate our brunch, it was time to open gifts. Ava had an easier time opening presents in tissue paper.

 Here is a dress from auntie Jacy.

 And one of her favorite gifts from Nana and Papa Ron... It is a Sesame Street Riding toy. She loved it and rode it around saying bruuuummmmm the rest of the morning. That allowed us to open our gifts..

After opening presents at my sister's house, we headed home to get Ava down for her nap. She was super tired and way overstimulated from everything and needed a good nap in her crib. She slept for 2 hours and was refreshed when she got up. Then we headed back to Brian and Melissa's for a Prime Rib Christmas dinner. It was so good. In fact, these past 2 days, I don't think I have felt hungry as the food has been plentiful and I have no room, so just a couple of bites fills me up. Do you think I stop after a couple of bites, nope, so I have been a bit uncomfortable. Today, I detox!! We had a nice afternoon, in which Ava played in their playroom and ran around outside. Below is a picture of Ava with her cousins. When we put Ava down on the step, she moved away from her cousin Alex, but in order to get the picture, we left her there.  These 2 were the best, even though Ava has red eye. I just can't get the red eye reduction to work on my camera and when her eyes are so small it won't correct it either. (Patty, I will upload to snapfish for you today or tomorrow).

After this we went home for Ava to take a bath and play with her toys that she had yet to play with. As soon as we got home, she was looking for her kitchen. She just loves it!! She played for a while then off to bed we went. I think next year, we are going to have to invite the family over for brunch at our house so that we can enjoy the day a bit more. All the driving around was a bit crazy, but still fun to be with family!

What a great Christmas we had. It is always over too fast. Next year will be twice as fun!

Ava is 22 months old!

 Ava is 22 months old today. I say it every time, but she is growing up so fast. It is hard for me to sometimes see the changes she has made until we hang out with someone that hasn't seen her in a while. You remember when you were little and people would always say to you, "wow, look how much you have grown." and you thought to yourself, really?? That is how I feel about Ava.

She is talking so much more. She will repeat at least one word from every sentence you say. She is learning new words daily. I am amazed sometimes that she knows what something is. She has started to string words together to make phrases, like "No Way", "Oh Wow", "Oh Man" and "See it", to just name a few. She will also say a bunch of words together to tell a story. For instance, she will say "Choo-choo", "Mall", "Ho-Ho", "Car", which translates to, The Choo-choo train is at the mall and so is Santa Clause (ho-ho is how she refers to him) and you have to get in the car to drive there to see all that. The other day, I asked her if she had fun at the park and she said "boy" because there were some boys there that were running around. She is learning the art of conversation. She likes to describe things to you when she sees them. The other night she was pointing out the body parts on one of her animals. She does it on her own, without us having to ask. She will just start to say words that describe something. My favorite thing that she does is that she will stop somewhere, sniff the air and say "good". Every thing to her smells good.

She has become aware of people even more now. When Nick, Jaclyn's Fiance, came over the other day, she put her arms up in the air as to hide her face and clung to me so hard. It took awhile, but she eventually warmed up to moving around. By no means was she going to go near him, but she was at least not going to cling to me.

I have been taking pictures of some of her favorite things to do as of right now...

First, is flying bo bo. I already posted a picture of Mike and her playing it, but this time, bo bo got stuck on the ceiling fan! Mind you, Mike and I are the only 2 that can play this with her!!




 

She loves to color. She will ask you to draw something and then she colors on top of it.

She loves to play with her magnets. They spend most of the time on the floor than on the refrigerator. She will put them in buckets or in this case, a beer holder, and then pour them out and play with them. She has a bunch of horses that she loves...

She loves to help sweep. She is such a great helper and will be more so when she can actually learn how to sweep the crumbs up!!

The latest thing is that she loves to line things up. She just started this a day or two ago. She picked up all her shapes and lined them up. They have to touch each other! Then she will call someone over to see it....

She is such an amazing little person and seeking her independence daily. Her life is about to change drastically with the arrival of her baby brother, but hopefully she will love him as much as we do. If not now, in the near future!

Posing for Pictures

 

This morning, I decided to take a couple of pictures of Ava because I am trying to finish up one last Christmas gift. Immediately when she saw me pull out the camera, she said "see it". I told her to stand by the tree and smile so I can take a picture. She is starting to get it now that in order to see something on the camera, I have to take a picture first. Here is what I got today...

This is what I get when I say "smile"...

Holy Guacamole!

Mike took this picture at lunch yesterday. We had Baja Fresh for lunch because we had a coupon and when Ava saw the basket of Chips and Guacamole, she went right for it. She used the chip as a spoon and scooped up the guacamole and sucked it off of the chip.

He was so proud because we love Mexican food in our family and he will be devastated if she doesn't like it!

To our Mexican lover in training!



Flying Bo Bo

This is Ava and Daddy playing flying Bo Bo, or as Ava says "frying bo bo". It all started about 2 weeks ago when I was trying to get Ava to laugh. I took Bo Bo by the ears, spun him around and threw him up in the air. She laughed so hard at the sight of it. I kept doing it and she kept laughing. I could listen to her laugh for hours. So it became a game that transformed into daddy and Ava lying on the ground and throwing bo bo up in the air and lots of laughs. It is too cute!