Update

Yes I have been WAY behind at posting here.  What can I say other than life gets busy.  Darren noticed that my last post was Oct 31st..that is sad and I promise to try to do better!  Anyways, I have now updated the blog for the month of November and will update you here in this post on what has happened at the beginning of December.  That sentence makes it sound like I have exciting stuff/news to share but I don't!

Anyways, after Thanksgiving we got home and starting decorating for Christmas.  Everything other than the lights on the house is done.  Woo hoo!  This is probably one of Ava's favorite days since she loves to put out all the Christmas stuff and hang ornaments on the tree.

For some reason, we still put out our very breakable nativity set each year.  Usually it gets put somewhere safe where little hands won't play with it.  Apparently this year, that did not happen.  And the other day while I was getting dressed, I came out to hear Ava say that baby jesus was broken.  I asked how that happened and she told me he fell.  Of course she did not tell me at first that she had been playing with him!  Anyways, I tried to fix him but he was in too many pieces so he ended up being unfixable.  Ava though, had an idea.  She led me to her dollhouse, picked up one of the little baby dolls and said "His name is Jesus" and then she proceeded to carry him back to the nativity and place him in his bed of hay.

Guess it works for now!

 Pretty sure when we get a new nativity, I am going to search for a child friendly one...maybe wood or something.  These were apparently too tempting to Ava to not touch.

Arf, the Elf came back to our house on Dec 1st.  He is our "Elf on the Shelf."

Ava was excited to see him on our mantle waiting for her.  He even had a name tag so she would remember him.  The day before he flew back to our house, Ava's friend Sienna was over and telling us how her elf, Jingle Bell, came to her house.  She was telling Ava all about how you can't touch him or he'll lose his magic.  She was very serious about it and it was hilarious to hear the 2 girls talk about how the elves fly to their house and get in with magic. I love being a fly on the wall to 4 year olds' conversations.

 Day 2, Arf found himself hanging in the blinds.  I don't know if Arf is as creative as some of the elves out there I have seen, but maybe when Ava is older, he'll be braver and do crazier things.  Maybe when he has more time.

 Yesterday, Ava & Ryan actually played side by side for the first time.  This was Ava's old barn when she was a toddler and we had taken it a few years ago to Granny & Pop's house as a toy the kids could play with when they visited. At Thanksgiving, Ryan found it and loved it!  I kind of thought it would be too old for him because of all the smaller figurines but I was wrong.  They aren't choking hazards and there is enough there that Ryan will actually sit still and play..something he really does not do as he is too busy crawling everywhere!

 Then this morning, Arf flew back and decided to sit in one of Ava's teapots...Ava thought it was silly and kept telling us how she was surprised when she saw him. 

We have also started our advent calendar and just like last year, the boxes contain activities.  So far, we have gotten the Christmas books out and read them, gone to dinner (Ava's choice) and written a letter to Santa and mailed it.  These are always fun family activities and Ava is already enjoying them.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  We had a super yummy meal at Rudy & Jeanie's and just like the past few years, my dad came (along with a friend this time!).  Dad also brought the amazingly delicious pies from the Flying Saucer again.

Of course I have no proof of this as once again, I did not take any photos.  I had every intention of taking some pics of dad and the kiddos but then Ryan laid down for a nap and I forgot. Sorry Dad!

After lunch and after our guest left, Ava (who had been showing off her soccer skills and uniform), we caught up with the neighbors. Their granddaughter Caroline was over (you might have seen her a long time ago on the blog).  I think it has been at least a year since Ava has seen her but she remembered her and the 2 of them had a great time running around together.

 Ryan woke up and since no one knew where his jacket was (and it was a little chilly), he borrowed one of Ava's hoodies...thankfully not one of her pink ones so that he could join in the fun.

Thanksgiving Holiday & Twister

Once again we headed down to Conroe for the week of Thanskgiving.  For many reasons, I did not take too many photos.  One, I think having 2 kids (one of whom is a baby that I hold) limits the amount of photos I can take.  Second, Darren & Rudy did a lot of work on the dock that week (since there is no water in the canal - sad but true) so that made it so there was one adult per child.  Third, well I'm just not as good at busting out the camera as I used to be.

Anyways.  While in Conroe, we went over to Ian & Emily's other grandparent's house (so Uncle Mike's family's house) to see the cousins and Donna & Mike for a bit since they were not spending Thanksgiving with the Okruhliks this year.

And Ava played twister for the first time with Ian...think she liked it?

We are all excited for Christmas this year since we will get to be with the Friends.  Ava always enjoys the good cousin quality time!

Silly Faces

You can really see the similarity here between these 2 (not that you can't normally see it anyway).

Soccer Trophy

Yep this is the size of the trophy you get for participation in U5 soccer in Lake Travis.  I would hate to see the size of the trophy if they actually played in a league where you could win.  They would probably be enormous!  I think when I was a kid the trophies like this were for 1st place and the participation stuff was about 1/5th the size of this.

Ava of course was excited about it.  This is her very own "soccer trophy" pose..too funny with the leg up.  Not sure why she thought to do that.

Happy Halloween!

Finally the big day is here!

And the winning costume is....

Alice in Wonderland!

 Ava, as usual, had to put on a big show while taking photos.  This is one of my favorites.  Crazy, silly Ava.

 Because I did not wash Ryan's 2 previous costumes (I forgot!), we ended up dressing him as "Mr. Smee" or "Pirate."  Ava said he looked like Cubby, a character off Jake and the Neverland Pirates...mainly  because he has a doo rag on his head.  In hindsight, we should have dressed him this way when Ava was Captain Hook.  Oh well.

 Ryan surprisingly enjoyed the stroller ride while trick or treating.  I wasn't sure he would since he likes to be free and move about but he did great!

 About 10 minutes in, we ran into Ava's friend Emma, who lives down the street and is on Ava's soccer team.  Ava was super excited, and Darren ended up pulling the girls around in the wagon for at least half the block.  Good thing we brought the wagon this year...Ava enjoyed riding and did not get as tired walking down the street.

We had a great Halloween but got WAY too much candy.  Plus we only had 2 visitors to our house to get candy so needless to say, we had  a ton of candy leftover.  Thankfully we can donate it up to our school (they take it to the firefighters and other groups).

360 and Crawling?

A few weeks ago, Ryan starting doing 360 turns on the floor.  He has gotten really fast at turning around and we were just waiting for him to crawl.

Last week or maybe the week before, Ryan starting getting up on his knees and rocking back and forth.  I thought for sure he was going to crawl.  But he made us wait.

  This past weekend he started trying to move when up on his knees. He failed (because he hasn't figured out you have to move your arms and legs at the same time) and was a bit frustrated.  But then he decided to do his own form of crawling.  It is part army crawl, part frog crawl and part dragging your legs as you use your arms crawl. Which form he uses (or whether he uses a combination of all 3) just depends on what time of day it is.  We have found that he gets really excited and will start to crawl if you put one of the following out in front of him 1) a bottle of milk 2) the remote control or 3) an iphone.  These all really motivate him.

Here is a video of his crawl this morning...this is more of the "let's just drag our legs" crawl.  Maybe a touch of an army crawl too.  Quite interesting to watch how he gets around.  Maybe once he masters crawling, he'll sit still for awhile...Ryan can sit upright but you wouldn't know it if you came for a visit.  The second you sit him down, he lays down so he can roll or crawl around.  No sitting for him!

In other news, I really hope he is getting a tooth because he has not been himself lately.  Been a bit cranky sometimes (which really never happens..he usually is SO happy) and his sleeping situation has detoriated.  I've broken out the Tylenol and Oragel and am hoping these help.  Of course, the situation probably isn't that bad, it's just hard to go from extrememly good to just so so.  If you know what I mean.