Spa Day

So the other day Avery wanted to paint me toes.

Avery: Mommy, can I paint your toes with pail polish (nail polish).
Me: Sure!
Avery: Really?! All by myself?
Me: Yep! That sounds great!
Avery: Yay!  We can play nail store.  I will be the nail store manager. You can call me Rainbow.

Seriously! Where does this girl come up with this stuff? 

I let Avery pick out my color.  Pink.  Big surprise.  And then I let her paint my toes all by herself.

It's very serious work being the nail store manager! Avery takes great pride in her work.

I've never had a better pedicure by a 4 year old!

  Avery was so proud to paint my nails. I'm pretty sure I kept them that way for several days because I was too lazy to fix them so Avery would know how much I loved them.

It was a fun mommy daughter time. I'd do it a million times!

Bubble Blast

Recently I have been helping out my bestie and watching her girls a few days a week.  Being the awesome "aunt" I am, I am always trying to find fun things for the girls to do.  Plus it gets us out of the house and usually provides a few hours of entertainment.

Our local community center offered a Bubble Blast one morning so I signed us all up to go.  The activity was supposed to provide lots of different ways to play with bubbles. 

The first thing they did they got a small container with bubble solution and a straw.  They could blow through the straw and makes lots of bubbles.  The girls seemed to enjoy this.

Well, Avery and Hannah seemed to enjoy the activity.  Chloe refused to participate.  Apparently she is too cool for bubbles!













See, Hannah having a good time.  Chloe not participating.  Can't please everyone right?

There were also other bubble activities too.













All in all I think we were all a little underwhelmed. I was expecting more organization and everything was just haphazardly set out.  But I think the girls had a decent time and it gave us all something to do.

Plus there was a snack involved. Bonus.

Can we all agree that snacks make everything just a little bit better?

Avery has enjoyed having her friends over.  And although there is usually some bickering and tears (usually my child- she's kind of a drama mama) I know deep down they all love each other.

They kind of have to since their mama's are such good friends.

More adventures to come.

Craft Time

I have officially had a new job title of Stay at Home Mom for 7 weeks.  This Monday marks my 8th week.  You would think by now I would have some sort of schedule and have this thing figured out.  But alas, I don't.  I'm still winging it around here trying to convince Ronnie I've got my act together. 

Avery and I are managing to get along though and one thing she really does enjoy is when I bring out a craft or two.  The last few weeks I've pulled a couple things for her and she's loved it.

Hobby Lobby had their summer crafts on clearance not too long ago for like a bajillion percent off.  I picked up a package of foam visors on the cheap thinking it would be fun for Avery.  I was right.

The package was actually a pack of 6 with pink and blue visors.  Can you guess which color Avery picked?

Crafting is serious business and Avery does not take her responsibilities lightly.

Although Avery does know how to spell her name (A-B-E-R-Y - per Avery) she doesn't quite know her letters.  I did help her with her name addition.

Avery was quite proud of her finished product and wore her visor around for a while.  She even wore it on a trip to Sam's with her cousin.  We lost the visor for a brief moment, but thankfully it was found.

One of Avery's favorite things to do is paint.  But lets be honest, what 3 year old doesn't love to paint? I picked up a wooden car at Walmart on a whim one day and finally pulled it out and let Avery create a masterpiece.

I love watching Avery concentrate so intently on her projects.

Ronnie came doing during the time she was painting and had to "help" with her car. Avery was sweet enough and let her daddy get his paint on.

After lots of work and lots of paint, Avery and Ronnie both finished the car.

The picture on the left is Avery's side of the car.  I think it's perfect and beautiful.  The picture on the right is Ronnie's side of the care. Not too shabby. 

So there you have it.  Craft time at our house. It should be a regular occurance. It doesn't get much better than this.

Do you have a favorite craft you do with your kiddos?

More adventures to come.

Random Vidoes

I haven't blogged in a while.  I have some pictures from some recent adventures but haven't been able to actually get them from my camera to my computer.  So in the meantime I'd thought I'd post a few videos I've taken of Avery recently.  Grab some popcorn and enjoy!

Avery loves to do flips off the couch.  R taught her how to do this.  I'm pretty sure he regrets it.  I'm constantly afraid she's going to break her neck.

Since I've been staying at home with Avery, I try to take a picture of video of Avery every day and send it to R while he's at work.  It's usually not much but I think he enjoys it.  This is one that required no prompting from me.

This video cracks me up.  Avery was singing a song she made up and I was trying to get her to sing it to me.  Then she started doing flips.  The girls loves to be upside down.  PS- please disregard all the laundry on the floor.  My maid hadn't done her job for the day. PPS-she's wearing this bib/smock because she was either getting ready to paint or had already painted.

Alright, last video.  This summer, we've tried to spend a lot of time outside.  The weather has been hot, hot, hot but we've really tried to power through it and be active.  One of Avery and R's favorite games is "Blast Off".  They've done this since Avery was small.  I love hearing Avery's laughs and giggles. And I love how great Avery's dad is!

So it's not much but a little glimpse into some actual video of Avery.

More adventures to come!

No More Mondays

Not too long ago, R and I made a pretty big decision.  Well, besides the decision to have a baby. 


We decided that I would quit my job. 

Let me tell you.  Before I had Avery I always thought I would work and have kids.  I mean, I am a woman of the 2000's right?  Both my parents worked and raised my brother and I.  Ronnie's parent's worked and raised he and his brother.  So I just thought that's the way it would be.

Enter this cutie face.

And for about a year I was content.  I was somewhat successful at work, worked for a fantastic company and Avery was having a ball playing with her cousins everyday. 

Peyton- this is the cousin Avery usually wants to say 2 prayers for.  She loves her Peyton!

Kelli Lynn-Avery's playmate and teacher.  Everything Avery knows she says she learned from Kelli.

Mason- The oldest of the great-grandkids.  Avery is the youngest for now.  Love they got to spend so much time together.

And then I realized I wasn't THAT happy.  I wanted to be at home with Avery and any future kids.  R wanted to the same for our family so we worked to make it happen.  We had a goal that by the time kid #2 came along, I would stay at home.

I could dedicate an entite post to what we did to prepare for one income.  Most importantly we took a hard look at our budget, made some cuts that weren't easy (getting rid of OU football season tickets and cable, for example) and started living on 1 income. Some things were easy, some were hard.  But we had to remember what we were doing it for.

Tommorrow I start my new job.  Stay at home mom.  The hardest thing I had to do was tell my supervisor I was leaving.  I worked for a great company and had an even better supervisor.  I made some wonderful friends that I know I will be keeping in touch with (in fact, one will be my neighbor, yay!) and I will miss those friends dearly.

But, for our family, this is the right decision. A decision that took a lot of prayer, thought, and a big leap of faith.  I look forward to spending some time with Avery before New Kid comes along.  I know it won't be easy and there will probably be times that I want to go back to work but for now, I'm going to appreciate the blessing we've been given.

All in all, I did it for this girl.  The love of my life.  The one I can't imagine my life without and can't remember my life before her.  And for New Kid.  Who has already captured our hearts and I know will be loved beyond measure.

Tomorrow starts No More Monday's for me. I'm nervous, excited, anxious, scared and many many more. And I can't wait.

More adventures to come.