Walking and (not) Eating

The latest on Ava is that she always wants to walk, all day long, holding onto my fingers (not solo yet). She also wants to go up the stairs making grown-up sized steps up them. I try to teach her to go up on her knees, but she's having none of it. Going down isn't much better. And she doesn't eat--naughty girl. Today I tried cutting back on the bottles to see if that would help, but it didn't seem to make much difference. She usually {usually=not always} eats one good meal a day, and the rest she'll barely touch the food. She likes cantaloupe and raspberries and strawberries, but that doesn't do much for weight gain. And if I put cream over them she doesn't eat them. And I put olive oil over fresh tomatoes, she's okay with that. Any suggestions for how to encourage eating? I'm already adding Carnation instant breakfast to her bottles, at the doctor's suggestion, to add calories.She likes hummus and green olives, which are nice and fatty, but not exactly a substantial meal. I try to feed her pasta, but she often spits it out.


She's doing very well though. She sleeps great and doesn't even get cranky from eating so little. Man, if I ate so little, I'd be cranky all day long. She likes bike rides, rolling her the ball back and forth with Ryan or me, balloons (especially with helium),kids,  and cats and dogs of any size. When she sees other kids or babies, she says "hi". I love being a mom.

P.S. I made that skirt for her.

Ava's First Birthday (Party)

The theme was stripes. (You can see more photos on my other blog).

I got helium balloons for the kids to take home with them, and Ava loved them. All afternoon she stared at them and pointed. When Ryan came home, she immediately pointed at the balloons to show him. And the next day when her balloon didn't float anymore, she loved it all the more because now she could grab it and squeeze it and bite it and push it around. (She got tangled in it a few times too). And by the way, she loves her bunny slippers.

She also got a set of Hello Kitty books from Grandma Cook (remember "kitty" was her first word), one of which, appropriately, begins with stripes!

The ULCER

No, not a stomach ulcer. THE ULCER. Utah Lake Century Epic Ride. Ryan did it last Saturday (it's a 109-miler around Utah Lake). He did well and Ava and I were there to greet him at the finish line. To me 100 miles is a big deal, something to train for. To Ryan, it's no biggie. But I'm still celebrating for him! Way to go!

Flat Out Broke (the tires, I mean)

How many flat tires have you had in your life? I bet Ryan can beat your record. This month alone, he has had 4 flats on the truck (the fourth was one of the new, two-week-old tires), and 6 flats on his bike in one day. I think he's on a first name basis with the guys at the tire shop. And when he got all the bike flats, he was riding with a seasoned bike mechanic, who also inspected and concluded it was just bad luck. I think we should probably invest in the rubber/tire market.

Camping and Hiking

Last weekend we went here:

and hiked this steepness:

To get to this lake:

 

Ava was a champ, did so well on the hike. Of course she wasn't the one carrying the weight...

(Pittsburg Lake, near Mineral Basin--back side of Snowbird--via American Fork Canyon)

It got very cold at night, so I had to share my sleeping bag with Ava. She's kind of a bed hog. I didn't get much sleep, but Ryan took her out for a drive (aka "nap") in the morning so I could sleep in. A fun time was had by all.

Ava's 11 month report

So the report and the photo are both a bit late. She's now up to 16lbs 8oz. Moving like crazy (I only got 2 still photos, the rest are blurry because she won't ever be still). Sleeping well (we got past that house-moving hump, thank goodness), and lots of fun. She likes to make fish lips and she does a one legged sit-crawl, which is giving the sat-upon leg some good rug burn. She likes when I walk my fingers toward her (she giggles); and when Ryan "attacks" her with his "claw" hand, she laughs and laughs!

See, blurry:

And this is how she likes to eat now. One leg up. Very lady-like.

And here's a cellphone pic of the fish lips, it's the only one I've been able to capture.

Ava's First Crawl

Ryan texted me this morning and told me that she finally crawled! She has gone in reverse a few times, but not forward until today. He said she looks like a spider.