Christmas (#4)

After Lunch at the Tarlton's we head down the street to do dinner at the Marshall's.  Thankfully Avery and Anna both took a nap so they were both in a pretty good mood entertaining their audience.

Avery was given an Ariel doll which quickly became her new favorite thing as we have only (and I mean only) have watched the Little Mermaid related television programming over the past 2 months.

 Taking care of Ariel while playing with Lucas's incredibly large stuffed animal.  She got to have some good play time with her 2 older cousins and Anna jumping on and off this dog.

Gigi isn't going to miss a chance to play with her two girls.

 Avery and Anna being extra silly.

Christmas (#3)

After opening the presents from Santa, we loaded up the car and started a tour of 4 days and 5 Christmas visits.  First up was the Tarltons.

Ready to go!

 The nice part about how the Christmas's were scheduled this year is that Avery got to spend a lot of time with her cousin Anna.  Now that Anna knows a lot of words, they have a lot more fun together rather than Anna just following Avery around.  My mom bought them matching water bottles.  Both were full when she handed them to the girls.  You can see that Anna is almost finished with hers while Avery has only taken a sip.  I think Anna drank two full bottles of water that morning.

 If there is a book around, Anna wants it read to her.

 Avery and Paw.

 Ready to open presents and be the center of attention.

Cookies and Nanny Crunch!

 After they opened presents, the girls played grocery store with Anna's new buggy.

 I don't know who convinced who to walk down to the pond, but the lighting was pretty cool before we left.

Our Christmas (#2)

So for our Christmas, we actually were home.  We both had off on the 24th so we decided to have some fun with Avery and head out on the town to look at the tall buildings and have lunch out.

I think Avery did a pretty good job with her outfit.

In uptown they had a display of mechanical bears singing and playing Christmas songs.  There were a ton of families watching including us.  However Avery was more excited about the escalators and elevators so we ended up just walking around in search of those to ride up and down.

 When we go home we let her open one present from us.

 Intense focus.

 NC STATE JAMMIES!!!

 The result after her bath.

 The next morning we actually didn't have to wake her up to get her up and going.  Take a look at that face and that hair.  She was pretty excited to meet Santa.  We kept on telling her before Christmas that Santa was going to come and leave her presents.  I think she thought Santa was going to stick around and watch her open them.  She was kind of disappointed that he wasn't there when she went around the corner.

She was pretty excited about her telescope and her presents wrapped in Ariel wrapping paper.

 Opening her presents.

 Showing off her Disney bracelet!

Christmas Time (#1)

So this is the first of several posts about our travels over Christmas.  Looking back we didn't take as many pictures as we might have liked, but got to see a lot of family over the course of the past couple of weeks, so hopefully everyone took some good memories.

First up was a weekend in the mountains with the Gibson family.  As you can tell Avery was pretty excited about it all.

Aunt Stephamie!!!

 Of course Avery came away with quite a few presents from such a large family and being the only great-grandchild.  We had taken my car and it was loaded to the top of the windows on the way down the mountain.

 Playing with her papa.

Selfie Game

Avery has figured how to get to the camera on both the Ipad and on Laura's phone.  That in itself is not too crazy, but she knows how to turn the camera around and take selfies of herself.

She seems pretty happy with herself.

A selfie with Pink in the makeup aisle.

Taking a good picture of mommy.

 Catching Laura looking at cleaning products.

 She got me on the couch with the Ipad while Laura was in Colorado.

Birthday Party Part 2

So Avery's day of birthday parties last weekend (or two weekends ago) concluded with a birthday party for her friend Hunter from school.  The place was down the street from the house, so I dropped Laura and Avery off so that I could work out.  Upon picking them up, I think I missed a lot of fun.

Avery and her BFF Lilly playing one of the arcade games.

 Lily, Avery, and Jackson taking a ride in a car arcade game.

 Avery, Lily, and Hunter.  They are a 3 headed monster at school.

 This picture is just funny.

 Avery playing one of the arcade games.

Laura did not teach her how to play this game.

Birthday Party 1

Last weekend we got to go to 2 toddler birthday parties.  One in Greenville for Easton and one down the street for once of Avery's schoolmates.  More on the second one later.

First up was the tall slide.

I think she had fun.  She must have done it 15 times.

 In one of the rooms they had a mini basketball court.  I couldn't turn down the opportunity to teach Avery how to dunk.

 We tried to get Easton and Avery to take a picture with each other, but Easton kept on tackling Avery and tickling her.

 They even helped each other inside one of the obstacle courses.  Avery would push Easton over the obstacle.

 And Easton would try to pull Avery up on the other side.

 Eating pizza and cake.

Anna Banana

A few pictures from Avery hanging out with her favorite cousin during and after the gender reveal party.

They were both laughing at the top of their lungs.

 Laughs and smiles sharing a rocking chair.

 I wonder who is copying who...

 The morning after the party they had a lot of fun with the balloons left over from the party.

 Anna also came with us to the Thanksgiving parade in downtown.

 Anna and her family.