2012 New Year's Resolutions

I like to make New Year's Resolutions every year. I know that I rarely look back at them throughout the year, but I do keep them in the back of my mind. I feel that I can start the year with a fresh new look on life.

I think this year, I am actually going to get these printed up and posted somewhere in the house!! These are good goals to work towards. Maybe I need to make one of those inspiration boards with the help of the kids!!

So here it goes:

1. To be able to do 25 "real" push ups and 5 pull ups. I added the pull ups this year to give myself a challenge and a challenge it will be. I tried doing one the other day and it was a complete FAIL. I was told to try and do a negative pull up. That is to start in top position and lower down, but I couldn't even get into top position. I am going to have to have Mike help me, but I am determined!!
2. To be more patient.
3. To save more money and actually stick to a budget. We printed out our budget and we are going to log our spending weekly to see what we have left for the month. I want to be better about spending. I tend to buy a lot of stuff that I don't need.
4. To spend more quality time with the kids and less time cleaning.
5. To take the kids to new places more often.
6. To eat healthier. I think we do a pretty good job, but I think there are always ways to eat better and get the kids to eat better. I have been lazy with giving Ava fruits and veggies with every meal. I am getting better because I get them for Noah, so I am adding them to EVERY one's meals.

I think that is it for this year. I hope that 2012 is as good, if not better than 2011!

The End Of A Great Year

What a great year 2011 was for our family.

Noah joined our family of three making it a family of four. Ava became a big sister and is learning exactly what that means! 

Noah was born on January 9th, 2011 at 5:44am. He weighed 9 lbs 2 oz and was 22" long. He kicked off our great year.

We took a couple of trips, one to LA in which Ava and Noah took their first plane ride and saw the beach for the first time.

We also made some trips to Prescott.

We met up with friends for playdates and took many trips to the Phoenix Zoo.

October. Seeing Dora from afar.

Checking out the toys at the Fisher Price Toy weekend at the zoo.

Ava grew up from this... a diaper wearing, barely talking, shy little girl to .....

THIS....

A fun loving,potty trained, big girl bed sleeping, non stop talker, who loves her big brother so much she doesn't even know it.

And Noah grew up from this...

to this..

a babbling fool, who's almost walking, eating and drinking on his own and loving his big sister!

I can't believe how much they both have grown and how much my love for them grows every day.

Personally, I was able to get back to my pre-Noah weight.
I think I was able to get a handle on taking care of two kids at one time, but I am still learning how to balance being a good mom, cooking, cleaning and making sure that we are all alive at the end of the day.

I like to go back to my new years resolutions and see if I was able to keep any of them, so let's see:
1. To be able to do 25 real push ups. WELL, I DIDN'T QUITE GET TO 25, BUT I DID GET TO 10 ND WILL CONTINUE UNTIL I CAN GET TO 25.

2. To get back to my pre baby weight. CHECK!

3. To learn the art of patience. UMMM, WELL.... SORTA. I HAVE GOTTEN BETTER, BUT I HAVE MY DAYS.

4. To be the best Director of the Leptuch Household. I THINK I DID PRETTY GOOD, BUT AM VOWING TO DO EVEN BETTER NEXT YEAR.

5. To find ways to cut our daily/monthly expenses. WELL, NOT SO MUCH. I AM REALLY GOING TO DO THAT THIS NEXT YEAR.

6. Get involved with other mommies. CHECK. WE HAVE A COUPLE OF FRIENDS THAT WE MEET WITH ON A WEEKLY BASIS. I REALLY ENJOY TALKING WITH OTHER MOMS AND I LIKE TO SEE HOW AVA HAS GROWN UP SO MUCH AND IS NOT SO AFRAID OF OTHER KIDS.

7. Take Ava and Noah some place new each month. NOPE, UNLESS YOU CALL A DIFFERENT STORE A "NEW PLACE."

8. To make one new meal a month. CHECK. I ACTUALLY HAVE A WHOLE NEW ROTATION OF EXCELLENT AND LOW CALORIE MEALS.

9. Start some family traditions. YES, BUT SO FAR IT HAS REALLY ONLY BEEN CHRISTMAS ONES.

10. Make sure to take time for myself and stop feeling so guilty all the time when I do. SORTA. I DO TAKE TIME FOR MYSELF, BUT I STILL FEEL GUILTY DOING SO.

11. To be present in life and enjoy every moment. WORKING ON IT. I DO ENJOY MY TIME WITH MY KIDS, BUT I HAVE TO BE BETTER ABOUT NOT WORRYING ABOUT CLEANING UP THE HOUSE SO MUCH OR MY TO DO LIST.

So there you have it. A year in review for the Leptuchs. I hope next year is even better, if that is possible!

I can't wait to see how things change in 2012!

Hopefully they will continue to play nicely!

Christmas 2011

The Leptuch's had a great Christmas this year.

My favorite part was Ava saying "This is the best thing I have ever seen" when she was opening her gifts.

Christmas came and went so fast.

On Christmas Eve, we all dressed up and went to my step brother Brian's house. He does a pasta and seafood dinner. Mike went to church with my mom and grandparents and met up with us there later. Because of a "freak" snow storm, Santa has to drop presents and dash! We used to have my brother-in-law dress up as Santa, but the kids were getting older and would probably figure it out.
Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures. I just got one of Ava after I got her all dressed up as she was eating jelly beans from her papa Ron.

A DeMario family tradition that I wanted to pass down was opening one present on Christmas Eve. Since Ava would be tired when we got home, we gave her one Christmas Eve morning for her to play with all day, and that is exactly what she did. She got a remote control puppy that you can make walk and bark. She named it Meesha.

Here she is opening it.

Taking a nap with it and Daddy.

And of course putting stickers all over it!

I set low expectations for Christmas morning.I get so excited and want everything to be perfect, but with kids you can never tell what kind of mood they will be in. So I told myself ahead of time if Ava is cranky or wakes up early, that it is ok. I was pleasantly surprised. Ava slept through the night and woke up in a good mood. I mean, what kid wouldn't be excited when you go in their room and tell them that Santa came.

Noah on the other hand, decided that he was going to wake up at 5am and start crying at 5:30 am. He NEVER does that. I mean, he wakes early, but he usually talks until we get him at 6. So we brought him in our bed and let him crawling happily around until Ava woke up at 6am.

Santa was good to the kids this year as was the family. I wish that I would have gotten a picture of all the mess, but I didn't.

Ava got a Dollhouse and LOVED it. Here are some pictures from our day. Get ready for picture overload.

Ava walking out into the living room with her bed head.

Ava seeing her dollhouse for the first time.

Noah opening his first present of the morning.

Ava playing with her dollhouse and Noah eyeing it all!

I love this picture, Ava is playing with Noah's toy and Noah is playing with Ava's toy!

Ava playing with Noah's toys again. A construction helmet and truck.

Ava opening her doctor kit.

Checking Bobo's vitals

Her new laptop

Noah's truck

A family picture

 We had a great morning and we were able to extend it all morning long. We let Ava open a couple of gifts first thing. She mostly opened some of the rooms for her dollhouse. Then she played with her stickers while we waited for Grammy and Papa Dee to come over. I got the ham in the oven and then we opened some more presents. At that point Ava did get a taste for the fun of opening gifts and kept wanting to open them. I let her help me open mine and Noah's.

The family came over to our house for brunch.

The dessert table. Yummy carrot cake and lots of chocolates.

 The day wouldn't be complete without stickers EVERYWHERE. 

 Ava put heart stickers on everyone. You either got it on your face or your hand.

After naps, we headed back over to Brian's house for a prime rib dinner. The kids were pooped by the end of the day. I think soon, that Christmas is going to have to be a one meal kind of day. It is a lot to have people over for a meal and then go to someones house for a meal. It does make it hard to be able to enjoy the day. I don't think I sat down until 2pm that day. I can't wait until next year. Noah will be more into it and Ava will be all over it!!!

A Healthy Habit

As I have mentioned in previous posts, the kids and I have a dance party every morning while I work out. I can only hope that they will grow up knowing that exercise is a healthy part of their life.

Ava will sometimes sit next to me and try to do the exercise that I am doing (with a 2.5lb weight though). The past couple of days, Mike and I dusted off the ol' treadmill and started running. Ava has been very interested in it. She likes to come out and watch and today, she really wanted to get on. So we let her!

She walked at the slowest pace that it will go .6 miles per hour! She loved it. I stretched next to her while she got her exercise.

A Snapshot of Ava Grace at 34 Months Old

She is one of a kind! I guess they all are. She has such an imagination, says the funniest things and does even funnier things.

Someone once asked us if Ava is into condiments. At the time, I thought, weird and nope, she doesn't like ANY. Well, that is not the case any more. She has recently discovered the liking for ranch dressing. We eat it with our pizza and naturally with her curious mind, she asked if she could try it one time. And she liked it. She liked it so much that there really isn't a need for pizza, right? Right off the finger or sipping it from the cup is perfectly fine for her.

She also discovered she likes mayo. We eat it with our sweet potato fries. (It's really good, so don't knock it until you try it). The other night we made BLAT's (Bacon, lettuce, avocado and tomato sandwiches). We had the mayo on the counter and she kept pointing to it saying she wanted ranch. After I realized she wanted the mayo, I gave her some. And, what do you ask did she want it for? Well, she wanted to dip her bacon in it. Yup! And here are the pictures to prove it.

This morning she was taking Bobo for a walk on some string that she found in my craft room. Her imagination and the things that she does with Bobo, crack.me.up!

She is currently really into stickers. They are everywhere. She likes to put them on paper first. Then she likes to take them off one piece of paper and put on another and then she likes to put them all over me. We have been giving her stickers when she sleeps through the night. It is sorta working. She is sleeping better, but she doesn't sleep through the night consistently. We are lucky to get one day a week.

Speaking of sleep. She hasn't been sleeping through the night, so I have been doing a couple of things to work on it. First, we took away things, like a favorite whimzy toy, her nap time paci and TV. Then I started staying in her room for 5 minutes after we read books at night. That really helped with the 30-45 minute night time battle that we used to go through. She would call for us and come up with every excuse in the book so she didn't have to go to bed. I am hungry, my knee hurts, I have to go poo-poo and the list goes on. It would be a battle. We seem to have that under wraps now, but she was still waking 1-4 times a night. She is doing better though.

She loves to dance. We do dance party every morning while I work out. She runs in circles and does the occasional booty dance.

She has also started making baby noises to get things because that is what Noah does. I hope she doesn't start biting, because Noah has been doing that a little lately.

She's a dandy and we love her. She will be 3 soon:( I tell her every day to stop growing and she looks at me like I am a crazy lady!