Knitting

With the new baby coming, I'm determined to learn to knit. Last night at Abby's art class, Miss Liz decided to teach us all how to knit. Yes, even Abby. Actually, mostly Abby. She has learned how to sew in art class, crochet at Granny Delma's, and now knitting. I don't know why I'm constantly surprised that she can do all of this stuff.....who really needs hands anyway?!

Abby knitting with my hand....

Abby knitting solo....

3 days and counting.....

That's how long Abby's room has been clean!!! If I weren't 7 months pregnant and were much more athletic, I'd be doing back flips!!! She made the mistake of asking me to do laundry last week, and I found some questionable items in her pockets. I decided to see what else I could find, and well, lets just say that it wasn't a good day from there on out. I found a TON (like 2 big black trash bags) of stuff that needed to go. When she got home, she had a ginormous pile of crap on her bed, and a mountain of clothes on her floor that I pulled out of her closet. She was pretty upset, but spent the next three days working her tail off cleaning it up. This is the first time that she's really put a good effort into getting it the way it needs to be, and she's done a great job of keeping it up for 3 days now. She's figured out that she doesn't get in near as much trouble, stays more focused without the mess, and can get it cleaned up in about 30 seconds if she stays on top of it. She's even been getting onto Ava for bringing things into her room. So tonight I decided to snap a few pictures of her room, and of course, they couldn't stay out of the line of fire. They love the camera:)

The pile 'o jackets on the shelf is my fault. There's a coat rack under her clothes that I need to hang up so that she'll have somewhere for her jackets.

We even have color coded laundry hampers so that she can put her clothes in the right hamper!

Ava's best smile:)

Just Shoot Me Now

Wanna know why I haven't posted in a looooooong time? Because every single time I think I'm gonna sit down and do it, a night like tonight happens.

We came home from eating dinner with Jake, and Ava wanted an orange. I was busy peeling the orange and Abby was finally getting her scooter out of the driveway after being told three times to do it. Abby came in whining about wanting an orange, and so Ava gave her half. Sweet for sharing, but Abby had already had 2 oranges and it was Ava's first one.

I fed the dogs, and of course, they got in a huge fight. It's been happening every day for 15 years....you think I'd be used to it by now. While the dogs were fighting, I noticed that the cat box smelled awful and told Abby to clean it out. After a minor dramariffic scene, she went to clean it. When she got there, another dramariffic episode erupted as she realized that the scoop ended up in the litter box and the cat had pooped on it. Tough crap. Put the scoop somewhere where it can't fall into the box, and scoop out the box.

While she was doing that, I peeled Ava another orange. While Ava was eating orange 2.0, drama queen came in bawling that while she was scooping the box, the cat pooped in it and pooped on her hand. Now I'm no rocket scientist, but if a cat were pooping in a box, I'd move out of the way.......just sayin'. She took the cat poop out to the curb for the next morning's trash, and headed straight to the bathtub. Of course, I made her wash her hands three times with antibacterial soap before she actually got to the showering part. She took a pretty uneventful shower, although she got yelled at twice for taking too long. You'd think it was hereditary, huh mom?

Anyway, when she got out of the shower I got her a little ice cream and took Ava's clothes off of her. I went to put them in the dirty clothes hamper and came back to put Ava in the tub, but she was already in there. Weird, since I didn't put her there and she never does that on her own. A new sign of growing up? Maybe, but there was a perfectly round wet spot in the floor in front of the toilet.

Me: Ava, what is that on the floor?

Ava: Abby did it. (This is her standard answer for every question. It's almost always a lie.)

Me: Ava, did you tee tee on the floor?

Ava: No, Abby did it.

Me: Really? What did Abby do?

Ava: She got dat stuff on da fwoor.

Me: What is that stuff on the floor?

Ava: It's water.

That didn't pass the smell test, as you can imagine. Another load of laundry. :/

I always wash Ava off and then let her play for a few minutes while I straighten up a little. I was straightening up in the office when I noticed a peanut butter spoon in the PLAY REFRIGERATOR. Ava doesn't eat PB, and as far as I know, Jake doesn't leave his dirty spoons in toys. Abby the drama queen let out another dramariffic wail and an excuse that she thought would surely fly. It didn't. She sure did clean it up fast though after she realized that my anger-o-meter was quite high. I didn't even have to ask her to go brush her teeth.

That's when the really good stuff happened. What could possibly happen while Ava's in the tub and Abby is brushing her teeth, you ask? Well, I'll tell you. Abby came screaming, with as much drama as possible, into the living room saying, "I was just brushing my teeth and Ava got my toothbrush and started pushing something brown all over the side of the bathtub with my toothbrush!!!" Something brown. In the bathtub. *this is a dramatic pause where I closed my eyes, took a very deep breath, and prayed* Here is the conversation....

*imagine dramatic sniffing and whimpering in the background as Abby is trying very hard to make the situation more dramariffic*

Me: Ava, what is the brown stuff?

Ava: I don't know.

Me: Where did it come from?

Ava: I don't know. (Surprisingly, she didn't blame it on Abby)

Me: Is it poo poo?

Ava: No.

Me: Did it come from your hiney?

Ava: I dus twied to poop a wittle but I can't.

Me: Did it come from your hiney?

Ava: I tink so. But Firss I hab to pway wif my toys.

Me: DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING ELSE!! NO, DON'T PUT THOSE TOYS IN THE WATER! DON'T TOUCH YOUR FACE! ABBY, GO TO BED!!!!

Abby: (in her most innocent voice) But how am I gonna brush my teeth?

Me: Well obviously you're not going to, and tomorrow when you do, DON'T STAND NEXT TO THE BATHTUB TO INVESTIGATE THE BROWN STUFF!!!!! GOOOO TO BED!!!!

I drained the tub and managed to get Ava washed off, again.

To Do List:

Laundry

Bleach the tub

Bleach the tub toys

I got Ava dressed for bed and her teeth brushed. (A funny side note.....or not so funny. Ava is using a new toothbrush because she was caught cleaning the inside rim of her potty seat with her toothbrush last week. Note to self....and anyone else who visits: hide your toothbrush!) We said our prayers (plus a few extra....feel free to add your own in) and I threatened them within an inch of their lives if they got up out of bed.

And wouldn't you know, not 2 minutes later, Ava comes into the living room with her nightly "mom, I hab to go tee tee."

Me: GO TO BED AND DON'T GET UP AGAIN!!!

Three minutes later.....

Abby: Um....I forgot to get some fresh water in my water bottle.

Me: Oh, that's a surprise. You forget every.single.night. GO TO BED!!!!

GAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A new lesson learned...

This morning I was feeling very ambitious, so I decided to clean all of the windows across the back of the house.  They were REALLY dirty because they haven't been cleaned since last summer.  I went outside and sprayed off all the windows and removed all the screens, and then scrubbed and squeegeed.  Ava was having a great time yelling at me through the windows, and even licked the door from the inside.  I clean 'em, she IMMEDIATELY messes them up.   The dogs were inside taking a nap, and Ava was playing by herself.  When I got to the 3rd dining room window, I noticed that the gate to the kitchen was open.  (we have a gate up to keep the puppies locked up on the tile)  I knocked on the window, hoping to see a dog run out of the dog bed.  No such luck.  I then heard a happy squeal and realized that Ava and the dogs were chasing each other through the house.  Sure enough, I then see Ava on the couch and Tucker take a leap from one couch to another.  I ran to the door, and to my great surprise, it was locked.  I knocked on the door and Ava let out a huge happy squeal/laugh and ran.  I had my cell phone with me, so I called the home phone and started talking to her on the answering machine.  

Me: AVA!!! Let me in!

Ava: NOOOOO!!!!!

Me:  Ava, go unlock the door right. now. (in my best mean mommy voice, of course)

Ava:  No mommy.  You cwean da windows some mowe.

I gave up, realizing that she was having way too much fun with this.  I walked around the house to the front door, of course it was locked too.  I rang the doorbell and heard a small voice yell "come in", but she never answered the door.  I rang again, and this time she came to the door after yelling "come in".  She had a very devious smile on her face and still refused to let me in.  Using the trusty cell phone again, I called mom.  Why, you ask?  Because the only thing that Ava enjoys more than being devious is talking to Grammy, Papa Joe, Bruce, and Granny Jan on the phone.  

Me:  Ava, guess who I'm talking to on the phone?

Ava:  BWUCE!!!

Me:  No, it's Grammy.  She wants to talk to you.

Ava:  OK mommy, I'll wet you in.  I can't unwock da doi (door, for those of you who haven't had Ava-ese yet)

Me:  You're turning it the wrong way.  Turn it the other way.

Ava:  Ok mommy.  

The door opens, and I hand her the phone.

"Hi Gwammy!  I wocked mommy outside!"

A little note to all the mommies......hide a key outside, or for goodness sake, give one to a neighbor!  Preferably a neighbor who is a homebody. :)

In the name of the Father, the Son, and........

We were saying our prayers tonight and helping Ava practice the sign of the cross, when Abby reminded me of a funny story.

One night a few years ago, we were saying prayers when Abby asked a very good question.

Abby:  Mom, if the Father is God, and the Son is Jesus, what's the Holy Spirit's name?

Me: Well, I don't really know if I've ever heard a name for the Holy Spirit.

Abby: Why?

Me:  Because it's just the Holy Spirit. 

Abby: But if God and Jesus have names, the Holy Spirit should have a name too.  That's not fair.

Me: What do you think the Holy Spirit's name should be?

Abby: Bubbles.

In the name of the Father, the Son, and Bubbles.  Amen.

A little conversation....

Ava:  My name is Iba (Ava) and wur (your) name is Abby, and I love you Abby, and you are not a doctor.

huh?  Where in the heck did that come from?

Ava funnies...

I just have a couple of funny Ava moments that I want to write down before I forget them.  I can't even imagine all of the things that Abby did that I can't remember now. 

Ava has decided that it's funny to lock the door to the car while I am trying to get her out.  I unlock the doors, get out and walk to her door, and she promptly kicks the door lock with her foot......with a huge devious grin on her face.  If the windows weren't so dark, I'd get a picture of it.  The only time I'm successfully opened the door on the first try in the past week is when she took her shoes off in the car.  It apparently hurts to bad to kick the door lock with bare feet. 

In the past week, Ava has grown up quite a bit.  Tonight she asked if she could go to Jenning's house.  Jennings is Abby's friend who lives across the street, not Ava's friend.  I guess she thinks she's old enough to walk around the 'hood now.  Note to self: turn the alarm system door chime back on. :)

Ava has also been asking to borrow the car.  She's asked me several times in the past week, and I heard her ask Jake about it once too.  Then, yesterday I saw a commercial.  Yes, the one where the little girl asks to borrow the car.  And I thought our little genius came up with that one on her own.

Easter pics, finally!

For the record, I've been trying to upload these pictures to the blog for over an hour, and I've had to restart it a bajillion times.  Karma for waiting until May to post Easter pics.

Language lesson, Part 3 and a bedtime story...

Here's the third part of your language lesson, a few more terms.

Gwuiwels:  Girls, rhymes with squirrels (kinda)

Fravrit:  Favorite.  "Mom, mackee is my fravrit!"

Mackee:  Macaroni and cheese.  Let's all just shorten it and get to the point.

Wittle:  Nothing to do with wood, this just means little.  For the past 3 days, EVERYTHING has had the word "little" in front of it.  "Mommy! Pwease put my wittle shoes on my wittle toes on my wittle feet." and "I'm not a baby, I'm just wittle."

And now the bedtime story....

Once upon a time, a beautiful mommy was putting her kids to bed.  The oldest read a book to the youngest, and then they all said their prayers (although the youngest still gets a little confused about how to do the sign of the cross).  Beautiful mommy kissed the oldest and tucked her in, and then carried the youngest to bed.  Then, beautiful mommy threw the youngest up in the air and smothered her with kisses.  The youngest said "Mommy, you give me too much kisses!  They are cutiful! (rhymes with beautiful) Now shut my feet.  Good night mommy.  Wub you."

Language lesson, Part 2

Here's a few more words.  

Tick:  Kick, as in a ball.  Or Daddy's leg.

Banilwa: Granola.  We have a thing for granola bars in this house.  And Ava loves her Banilwa Bars.

Muse-tick:  Music.  This is my personal favorite.  Jake is constantly playing the guitar, and I am constantly singing.  Ava is taking after both of us.  She loves to sing, play her little guitar, and play my little piano from when I was little. (We won't try to figure out how old it is, okay?)  She often brings me a musical instrument and says "let's do muse-tick! Pway wiff me!"

Free language class!

Visit the Lester house and learn to speak Ava-ese for free!  This language is different from Leeanese (those of you on my side of the family are fluent, and the rest of the world is lost), although just as unique.   Here are a few words to get you started...

Baby Jagwater:  This term is in reference to Diego's friend Baby Jaguar.

Chwocwut: Chocolate, duh.  As in "MOM!!! I NEED MY CHWOCWUT FWUM DA EASTA BUNNY!!!"

Milk and Bunny Milk:  Strawberry milk.  "Mom, can you pwease get me some milk and bunny milk?"  This took us a while to figure out, until she showed us the picture of the Nesquik Bunny. :)

Ceewo Cwunch:  Cereal Crunch.  As in Captain Crunch cereal.

Toppee:   Coffee, of course!

Bago:  Bagel

Bikiss:  Biscuit

Wipe:  White

Gape:  Similar to wipe.....gate.

Pa tot:  Pop Tart.  Not that they ever get them......

Baff:  Bath.

That should be enough to get you started.  Couple these words with fit throwing, food spitting, and lots of hugs, and you should be able to carry on basic conversations with Ava, or as she calls herself, Iba.

No pics, but a couple of funny things...

First of all, it cracks me up that Ava watches so much Dora that she is always talking about going down paths.  For instance, she says "mommy, you take that path" instead of "mommy, go that way."  

Yesterday when I picked her up from the sitter, her face was COVERED in stickers.  Like 15 of them.  They were on her cheeks, forehead, eyebrows, and even the eyelids and corners of her eyes.  It was HILARIOUS, and of course, she ripped them all off as soon as we walked in the door before I could grab the camera.  The irritating thing is that she had them on for 5 HOURS before I got there.  She put them on right around lunchtime at 11:00, and I didn't pick her up until around 4:00.  Little stinker.

By popular demand....

Some of you have already seen these pics on Facebook, but for those of you who haven't........well, they're a little strange.  I took these with the photo booth on my new MacBook that I got for my birthday. 

Here's Abby in the tunnel....

Me, Abby, and Bronson.

And introducing............BJ Leno! Ha! This one is my absolute favorite!!!

What other reason could you possibly have for wanting a mac? This stuff is too much fun. :)

Best shopping trip evah!

I know this is nothing about the kids, but I just have to share this. Many of you know that I've become quite the coupon clipper and I occasionally come up with some pretty great deals. Well, today was the best. I ended up getting 2 bottles of McCormick pepper mill grinders, 4 boxes of Quaker granola bars, 10 boxes of Nature Valley granola bars for.......drumroll..........$1.07!!! Yes, I know it'll take forever to eat 14 boxes of granola bars, but that's not the point! If I had purchased one box of granola on sale, it would have been $1.99. But by buying the ones on clearance (and not expired, by the way) and using coupons I got all of it for $1.07! The teenage boys that were checking and bagging were quite impressed too. :)

Wall Art

Mom got the kids some great wall art for Christmas, and today we got around to putting them on the walls. There are only pics of Abby's because Ava's closet vomited toys into her bedroom floor. I'll post pics of her's later. Anyway, after I finished cussing and figured out how to stick them to the wall, Abby helped out and the final product is pretty cool.

Grandpa's house

Last weekend we took a little trip up to Lake Tanglewood for Dad's 60th. We were going to surprise him, but our plan was foiled. :( We still had a great weekend and eating, drinking, and relaxing. And, as a great bonus, my brother and and kids came up Saturday afternoon.

Just some pics...

I just wanted to post some pics from Christmas. These are some of the cutest ones, although some are out of focus. Like this one.

Gotta love Cheetos teeth. Ewwwww.

My little model. She LOVES to pose for pictures. Now all the Lee's are remembering a little someone saying "go get the camera and I'll smile."

Shut my feet.

I know it's been a week since I've posted. Sorry Aunt Kelly.

Every night we do the normal bath, prayers, bed, etc. The funny exception every night is with Ava. Every night, she grabs almost every toy she can find and throws them in her bed. She sleeps with the Little People Farm fence, sunglasses, and most importantly.......her zebra slider toy that came out of the cereal box. I didn't even know they still put toys in there! We clear out a little space for her to sleep in the mound of toys, and I cover her up. Every night, she says "shut my feet." Let me tell you that it took us FOR.EV.ER to figure this one out, but in Ava-speak it means "please tuck the bottom of the blanket under my feet, and repeat with all of the blankets that you cover me with. All of them. Even the extra 5 receiving blankets that I beg for when it's over 70 degrees in my room and I'm in footie pajamas."

Oh, and don't think I let her burn up with all of those blankets. I remove them after she's asleep. :)

Fire the cook

Our conversation....

Me: Ava, what do you want for lunch?

Ava: Chicken. (the same as every other day)

Me: We're out of chicken. How about a star or heart sandwich?

Ava: I can't wike dat. Is not good.

Me: Why is it not good? You ate some 2 days ago.

Ava: I can't eat dat. Is not safe.

So what? Now I'm making poisonous sandwiches? Off to Chick Fil A.

Favorite Park Pics

You know, this has been a pretty mild winter so far. We had a nice play date with Abby's 3rd grade teacher over the Christmas break, so I thought I'd post some cute pics from that day.

Sometimes things fall apart at the park.

Loose something, Abby? Yes, that is Abby with a broken jaw on top of a huge spinning thing. You should have seen her panicked mother run over there when the teacher pointed it out. And no, I have no idea who the dude is who put her up there. Since I couldn't reach her, I let her spin

The Iggies

Last year, my little brother was searching for an Italian Greyhound. My first thought was WHY?! I only remember one of them coming into the clinic in Lubbock, and it was a total spaz that the owners ended up getting rid of. So, one day I was looking in our free local paper and saw an ad for IG puppies. They usually run at least $500, but these were much less. Mom jumped at the opportunity to come for a grandkid visit and pick up the puppy, and we were all instantly hooked. These little guys are hard to housebreak, but they are beautiful, elegant, cuddly dogs with great personalities.

At times, we had discussed getting a dog (meaning one), but we weren't really searching. One day in June, I got the bright idea of calling Bailey's (my brother's dog) breeder to see if she had something for Jake's father's day present. Turns out, her dog was in heat and she planned on gifting as many pups as I wanted when they were ready. We took the whole litter, of course. To make a very sad, very long story short, we gave one to a relative and kept a male and female. The male had Megaesophagus (a non-functioning esophagus=BAD), so he went to a rescue society.

Meet Olive the Other Reindeer (the blue one) and her new bestest friend Tucker. Tuck for short.

We Lost the Sick

I suppose this is as good a place to start as any. Many of you guys (ahem.....Aunt Jan and Aunt Kelly) keep asking me to start a blog, following in the footsteps of my fabulous sister in law. I love watching her kids grow up through the blog, and hopefully I'll keep this going. Of course, I know that my email will be overflowing with gentle reminders if I don't. You all remember the funny stories from when Abby was little, so I'll be trying to remember those as well as adding some from Ava (or Eba, as she likes to call herself). You thought Abby was funny, just wait for Miss Eba.

Ok, so here goes. This morning I was watching the today show (BY MYSELF!) and enjoying my coffee, when suddenly I heard "I NEED TO THROW UP!!!" Now, as this was the first sound that I heard from her today, I ran into her room, snatched her up, and ran to the potty. Ah, those fun memories from college. Anyway, she vomitted a little and immediately asked for some cereal. Again, those fun days from college. So we went into the kitchen and got a little cereal, dry of course, and a little Sprite. I decided to check her temp, as she and Abby have had the flu and Miss Eba is just getting over it. I checked her and said, "You're fine! No more fever." She said "Yeah, we lost it." I said, "We lost what?" Miss Eba said, "The sick. We lost the sick," with a very happy (and not sick) look on her face.

Told ya she was funny.