Mimi's House

After looking at some fabulous homes in Nashville last Monday, we ended up in Hickman, KY on Monday night to see my parents, sister, and lots more of the Sanger clan. An ice storm on Tuesday morning was a bit stressful, but the rest of our visit was filled with playing, hanging out, dancing to musical dancing stuffed animals, and snuggling with Miss Avery Kate.

Dave was playing Guitar Hero and though Avery was an excellent backup dancer, Mimi thought she might want to open up this present early:

an Elmo guitar just her size! She's since moved up to the rhythm guitar position and now I'm the backup dancer.

Whew, Mimi's house is tiring! It's like Avery finally got into this whole Christmas thing and didn't want to miss a minute. She would wake up at 5am ready to play- no snoozing for this toddler- so we'd send her in to Mimi and Granddaddy's room to play. They didn't seem to mind =) By mid-morning, Avery was ready for a nap! We had almost transitioned her to 1 nap a day, but Christmas put her back to 2 naps each day. Here's a pic- one day she didn't even make it up to her bed!

Christmas Eve, we went over to my Aunt Nancy's house. Here are Avery and Granddaddy (and Elmo of course) before we left:

It was lots of fun to see all of the family, and it was nice to see how a baby can bring a whole new spirit to a family event that, originally defined by keyed up kids, hasn't seen a small child in basically 20 years. The cutest part of the evening was how Avery fell in love with my cousin Jennifer Sheehan. Avery is normally friendly to "strangers" but definitely doesn't let her hugs and kisses flow freely. Heck, she doesn't even give Dave and I that many hugs and kisses, but she gave Jennifer about 50! She would hug Jennifer, run to me for a goldfish cracker, wave to Jennifer while standing with me, and then run back to her for another hug and kiss. It was really funny since she repeated this literally 15 times. Here's some photographic evidence:

My cousin Henry was a bit hit with Avery as well. First, he fed her a whole bag of goldfish before dinner, and then gave her a Little People airplane as a Christmas present. As soon as she got that airplane, she was done with all of us- just took off with it to play with it by herself. Good gift!

Christmas morning was fun! Avery didn't quite get what was going on, but she loved all of her toys from Santa. (Well, from Santa's special helper, Mimi Sanger, since Santa was lazy and didn't want to haul her presents from Michigan).

One thing she got was a tea set, and took her job of serving tea very seriously:

Here are Dave and my sister Katie, glad to be spared from wearing Christmas pj's this year:Here are Avery and Mimi testing out the sit-n-spin:"Katie- show Avery how it's done!"

Here are Avery and Mimi in their regular early morning activity: watching Dora the Explorer while snuggled up in a blanket in their special chair. One morning Avery woke up at 2am so Mimi took her downstairs to chill out. Mimi said, "Ok, Avery, we're going to watch this Dora episode and then you have to go back to sleep." Avery didn't make a peep the whole time and went right to sleep in her crib afterwards. Whatever works, when you're on the road, right?!

Here Avery serves Granddaddy some tea the day after Christmas: "Gotta make sure he really drinks it" "Oh here's my new purse, Mimi- let's play lipstick"

She really loved this snowman that danced and sang- here she and Mimi are grooving to the music:
"Thanks for the dance, Mimi, here's a big fat smooch!"Even cousin Julie came to visit me- yay! Thanks for the fun blocks!
Aunt Katie took Avery to play outside- her favorite activity:

Here Mimi and Avery are snugglingDon't tell Dave, but they may or may not have bribed her with a sucker =)

That's what grandparents are for right?!

All in all it was a wonderful Christmas, thanks to ALL of our families- we love you and are so thankful to have spent such quality time with yall the last few weeks. We look forward to many more!Can you tell I'm totally smitten with this little girl? We even survived the car ride home!

Sorry for the long post and the million pictures!

Papa's House

Avery's next Christmas stop was at Dave's Dad's house in Cleveland, TN.  Avery had a blast, of course, especially with the 70 degree weather that Papa had delivered just for her. She couldn't get enough running around outside... here are Dirk, Dave, their Dad, and Avery hanging out on the golf course.

Avery also loved Papa's dog, Bogey... she would exclaim "Ooohh!! Daaaaag!!, oooff oooff" whenever she came around. They were big buddies by the end of our stay. 

We had a really nice Christmas get together at the club with Aunt Diane, Uncle Peter, and Scott's cousin Jeanne Anne.

Although, Avery was more interested in playing blocks than eating prime rib... luckily we were in the family dining area where she could do just that =)

Also in Cleveland, we attended a wonderful Christmas party at the Marr's house, where we hung out with Ms. Pam and Mr. Danny, Adam, Kelly, and Abby, Aaron, and his new wife Kate. Adam, Dave, Aaron, and Dirk were all childhood buddies... plus all of us, including me and Kelly, had gone to Baylor, AND we'd all gone to Vanderbilt with the exception of Dirk so it was great fun to see everyone again.  Abby was so nice to Avery and showed her all of the toys and cool Christmas decorations. 

Back at Papa's house, we also enjoyed spending time with Gee, Carla's Mom, and Avery's only living great-grandparent! Heaven forbid Avery to sit still so I could get a picture of them together... maybe next time we'll get a smile =)

Here are Carla and Avery snuggling in for some reading time

And here is Avery with her favorite uncle- Uncle Dirk! They were big buddies by the time we celebrated both the Carmon and Morris Christmases together. Avery would point up to Dirk, get a sparkle in her eye and say "Dirk!" He played with her lots and was a big help keeping track of this bundle of energy. We're sad he lives far away in California!

Nana's House

We've been having lots of fun in Knoxville the last few days! Avery immediately bonded with her Nana, Daddy Jim, and Uncle Dirk, as we knew she would =) We've pretty much been sitting around catching up and watching Avery explore all of Nana's Christmas decorations.

Here are Dave and Dirk reading their books... we've decided they really look alike these days!

Here is Avery opening up a present, she's getting the hang of opening presents- I have a feeling she'll be great at it by the time next week is over!

Here are Dave, Nancy, and Dirk with their Christmas spirit!

Tonight, Nancy and Jim threw a superfun dinner party with some of the family- here are Nancy and Avery dancing together to warm up before anyone got here.

Look at that smile of adoration for her Nana!

Avery really enjoyed playing with her cousins Jack and Woodson (Dave's cousin Brent's two boys).

They were really nice to her- she couldn't take her eyes off of Woodson, so cute! Scott's mother made this reindeer- wouldn't she have loved to see how two of her great grandchildren liked to play with it?

Stuck Inside

Nothing to report from this week! We've been cooped up in the house... trying to get Christmas presents wrapped and organized for the trip. Avery gets a big kick of getting "made up in the bed" so I snapped some pictures of her... she thinks it's hilarious to be right there in the middle of the pillows while I dramatically make up the bed around her:
I know, we're hard up for entertainment =) Another activity we've had was me trying desperately, to no avail, to get a cute picture of her in a Santa hat. She loves the hat- "ho ho ho"s at it all day long but refuses to wear it for a picture. Here are my attempts:

Cross your fingers that the weather between here and TN isn't snowy or icy this week... Avery can't wait to see all of her family!

New Camera for Christmas

Hello! We've had lots of SNOW and cold weather this week! Avery and I have been Christmas shopping and trying to get organized for our trek across TN in a couple of weeks. In case anyone is curious and wants to coordinate meeting up with us... we will be driving to Knoxville on Dec. 17th. to celebrate Christmas with Dave's Mom, etc. From there we will head to Cleveland probably on Friday, Dec 19th. After celebrating Christmas with Dave's Dad, the Marr's, etc., we will drive through Nashville on December 22nd. Let us know if anyone is around, and we can stop to say hi. Otherwise we will just hit up Hendersonville and possibly look at some houses (woo hoo), and then end up in Hickman on Dec 23rd. We will be visiting the Sanger clan, etc. through the rest of Christmas week. Anyway, just thought yall might want our touring schedule. Dave has the week before Christmas off on vacation which is how we are able to make such a long trip. Can't wait to see everyone!

Avery (and Jess and Kaitlyn) and I tested out Kindermusik this week! Thanks to Nana for this awesome Christmas present! I think Avery is going to get a big kick out of it when we officially start up in January. We were trying out the infant class this week (newborn-18mo) and next week we will try out the toddler class (18mo-3 yr) to see which is a better fit. Avery danced, danced, danced, but wasn't too keen on sitting in my lap for the exercises. In fact, she got mad at me at one point during the class because I wouldn't give her the juice out of my diaper bag, and she insisted on sitting in Jess's lap along with Kaitlyn so I had to sit by myself! It was actually pretty hilarious, she went over and reached her arms out to Jess then backed right up onto the other side of her lap beside Kaitlyn, and just made herself right at home. She totally ignored me for like 5 minutes. I'm afraid the terrible twos may be just around the corner =)

The other big news of the week is that I got a new camera from Dave for Christmas! My point and shoot was having trouble keeping up with an active toddler, so I asked for a DSLR. Here are Dave and Avery wondering why I was taking 50 pictures of them:

Last night was the Urology Annual Holiday Party at Fox Hills Country Club. The weather was a mess, but it was a fun party!

Here we are before we left home...Here is Avery dancing on the dance floor at the party. She did all of her signature moves- spinning, rocking, clapping. She even let Mommy have a dance.
Betsy and Avery (some of you may recognize the most worn dress in America- my 10 year old pref night dress!)

Avery sprinted around to every Christmas tree at the party, checking out all of the ornaments, ho ho ho'ing at all of the snowmen, and totally wearing me out by the end of the night!Santa was even at this party! Though we were #58 in line to see him, we finally made it

and she tolerated sitting there
for about 10 secondsand then she had enough!

so I rescued herthough Santa wasn't so bad once she got a present and she was back in Mama's lap- whoo hoo Elmo books!
It was definitely bedtime by then so we threw on the pj's and headed home. Too bad we had to miss the "adult" portion of the evening with open bar and karaoke. Oh well! This cutie is totally worth it =)