Potty Training...

Avery is a little more than a month in and doing alright. She has great days and some really bad days. I am still having to ask her every couple hours as a reminder. She will occasionally tell me she has to go but it is usually when she has already started to go. Cleaning poop out of panties is not fun and neither are public accidents. Luckily, we have been prepared for everything so far. We are holding off on the night training for now and she sleeps in a pull-up. She is just in our bed too often and I don't want our nice mattress pee peed on ;). She also has this annoying habit of taking all of her toys potty with her and they all must pee first. Sometimes twice. It is really annoying and makes what should be a two minute trip to the toilet last 20 minutes.
I will deal with the occasional poopy panties and ridiculous bathroom antics to be free of the diaper bill!

more of our Juneau adventure

Avery riding Daddy's shoulders!

It has been chilly for the past week or so. Like single digit chilly. The plus side is that the sun has been shining bright and the downside is that it has been downright frigid. I know I can't complain, we could be in the Anchorage area or Fairbanks, but it is still cold and my poor hands are in constant need of lotion. It was finally cold enough for the lakes to freeze. So today we bundled up and headed to Mendenhall Glacier. There were dozens of people out on the frozen lake. We saw everything from ice skaters, skiers, people admiring the glacier ice, dogs having a blast and we even saw a guy on his bike ride right past us on the ice (he had studs of course).

Wilson even found his first porcupine, luckily it was only like 6 quills in his chin and Sam was able to pull them out. He seriously was only out of the car for 5 minutes and he found himself one. I am just glad he didn't cover himself in quills! Sam pulled them out before I could even snap a picture of this first for Mr. Wilson. Dang! Tasha and Wilson were sissies and refused to walk on the ice. They just ran up and down the shore the entire time worried about us. I thought maybe they'd see the other dogs on the ice and get with the program, but no.

Poor Wilson trying to walk on the ice. He didn't make it very far :(



I am always a little nervous walking on ice, but I knew it was safe and Avery did excellent walking on it. Hopefully, her progress on ice skates will be just as good. She knew to march her little marches when she got a little unstable and I even saw her fall and get up the way they teach them at ice skating lessons! The sun is still really low in the sky so it is in your eyes when you take pictures so she is squinting in almost every photo or not looking at all.


Avery didn't want to come off the ice.

A Huge Thank You!

I totally screwed up and forgot to take pictures of Christmas. I cleared off my card and everything and was going to video, but the morning of Sam got frustrated with my camera because he wasn't sure how to start recording and it got sat on a shelf and I completely spaced it. Avery was so cute and so excited. He did get a short video of her on his phone, but that is with him now at work.

I may not have the pictures, but I do have some words. Christmas Eve was wonderful. We went to our friends home for dinner. Jesse and Melissa rent this great little house on Auke Lake about a mile or two away from us. We had a scrumptious pulled pork dish and a rice/sausage dressing (Melissa is from Louisiana and loves cooking Cajun style things). Melissa even provided an activity for Avery! She decorated ornaments with stickers. I think she must have made 6 and hung them all on their tree! They even got Avery a gift, a Mrs. Potato Head! Now we TWO and tons of body parts to go with it! She was so excited. Avery must have sat on Jesse's lap for over and hour playing with him and the toy. So cute, she adores him. At one point I asked if she needed to try and potty and she begged for Jesse to take her. Avery was pooped and dead asleep by the time we got home. So we bypassed the whole "milk and cookies act" and just took her to bed and pulled the gifts out of the room they had been locked in.

Christmas morning Avery was up bright and early and screaming (not happy screams). She woke up in a terrible mood. Honestly, she should have gone back to sleep, but I couldn't settle her down enough to go back to sleep so we were up. We came downstairs and she was SO excited about her dollhouse. She couldn't keep her eyes off of it. She'd open a present and then go back to the dollhouse. She was TOTALLY spoiled. She got some beautiful clothes, lots of movies, a sweet new purse, baby doll accessories, books, a leap pad, play mobile people, a doll house and some new jewelry. I am probably leaving a lot out, but she got a lot and it was all awesome. Huge Thanks to all who made Avery's and our Christmas. Avery was not the only one spoiled. Sam and I made out pretty well too. It was so unexpected and wonderful. Thank you very much for spoiling us as well! It was such a nice surprise to have presents to open. You all are so wonderful to us! The rest of the day was spent eating leftovers, skyping with family, watching football and we went for a nice walk with the dogs. The only thing missing was being physically with family and well SNOW! All our snow had melted all 54.8 inches! Three inches showed up a day late.

Thank you again for all who made our Christmas! Love you all and hope to see you soon!

Even though the water is cold we really do love the beach. I love water, always have and always will. There is just something about seeing is that makes me feel more at home. I had forgotten how much I missed it.

We have been keeping busy with play dates, Kindermusik, swimming, ice skating, turf 4 tots, etc... Our last day of nursery school this year is next week. We are hoping to make another semester of it and we will be starting up a 16 week Kindermusik class in January (BIG Thanks to Grandpa Rick and Gigi for that!)

Sam has been keeping himself busy. He joined a gun club and is on a trap team for the winter. Smith Equine is slow, but that was expected as equine work is slow everywhere in the winter. Thanksgiving was wonderful. We had a great time with friends and met lots of new great people. Sam's work Christmas party was also a lot of fun. Avery has a growing crush on one of the other Doctors at the practice, "brown Jesse". There are 2 male Jesse's and one is bald and the other has long brown hair. She talks about him often and totally lights up when she sees him. It is pretty funny!

I believe Avery is ready to potty train, so we are going to make a go of it next weekend and the following week. Our normal activities are canceled so we are going to go on lock down and lose the diapers. She has been waking up dry and I have convinced her the past 3 mornings to sit on the potty and she has been successful in peeing in the big toilet each morning. She has started bringing us diapers and wipes to change her when she is wet or poopy. And she is obsessed with a few books that are about potty training and we have really been talking it up.

So Avery's Christmas present to Mommy and Daddy.....NO MORE DIAPERS! I hope it goes as planned ;)

A List of Reasons I Hate the House We are Renting....

1. It grows mold. Now I know this is a common issue of homes in Juneau, but this house has a real talent for this process. The landlord could care less and after 20 calls around the state I gave up because no one knew who could help with "tenant rights and the mold issue".
   
2. The driveway. Steep and long. It is a real bitch to shovel.
3. The leaky roof. The landlord has "fixed" this issue several times and it just keeps leaking.
4. The rock floor entry. I had my first slip today and was lucky I didn't break my wrist.
5. The odd smell that has arisen. I have looked everywhere for a dead shrew or mouse with no luck. It smells like sewage and seems to be getting stronger. We will see what the landlord wants to do about this.
6. No yard. This I could honestly deal with, but just another thing that bothers me.
7. Lack of garage. Well, there is a garage, but it houses the landlords collection of junk. With all the snow we have gotten it would be nice to have some covered parking. I am just whining ;)
8. The neighbors. The must be on stimulant drugs because they just don't sleep.
9. The lack of hot water run to the washer. I miss using cloth diapers and I need to be able to wash with hot water to clean them.
10. The odd placement of light switches.
11. The crazy landlord.
12. The carpet in one of the bedrooms reeks of cat urine.
13. A large number of walls are made of unfinished wood. This makes it really hard to clean.

I could go on and on and on...but those a just a handful of reasons that I am counting down until May 31 when our lease is up.

Ice Skating

I thought it would be fun to give this a shot and see how it went. The Treadwell Ice Arena over on Douglas Island has a "parent tot" skating time with a short lesson and rental for $10. I really had NO expectations, but Avery actually was pretty enthusiastic and I was able to get her on the ice for about 15 minutes and she kept her skates on for a total of about 45 minutes. She was able to walk with her skates on her own, but needed to hold onto something when on the ice. She was able to stand still for about 30 seconds on the ice on her own. They worked on how to fall correctly, how to get up and how to march. She was pretty much only interested in the marching part. As soon as we left she kept talking about how much fun ice skating was. We will definitely make it out there once a month or so until she gets more accustomed to it then we will make it a more regular activity!

Llama Llama

Last weekend the local bookstore, Hearthside Books & Toys, hosted a Llama Llama pajama party. The kids got to listen to the story, Llama Llama Red Pajama, eat cookies, color, get a balloon, get stickers and meet Llama Llama! Avery even entered a drawing to win her very own copy of the book and WON!



She was pretty standoffish with Llama Llama, but she did go and get a balloon. She mostly enjoyed looking at Llama Llama and watching the other kids meet him. She saw a few of her friends, Nola and Emberly and she did some coloring. All in all it was a fun outing. There were a ton of people and Avery was totally cool wandering around the store amongst all the other tots and kids. She is now officially obsessed with the Llama Llama character and we will definitely have to invest in other Llama Llama books!

this and that

We have been trying to keep warm and busy the last month or so. The weather has been really rainy and mostly in the 40's. We finally broke down and turned on the heat yesterday. I am surprised Sam held out until now. Sam has been busy at the small animal practice with a horse appointment here and there.

I can't believe it is half way through October and that Halloween is literally right around the corner. Avery is going to be a princess. Nothing fancy, just some random stuff I pulled together. We are probably not going to go trick or treating outdoors, but we will celebrate at nursery school and there is something going on the mall that we will try to hit.

Avery has been keeping busy too.

Mondays: we try to go to SE Gymnastics Academy for toddler open gym. But, not every week.

Tuesdays: we try to go to Turf 4 Tots. It is offered every weekday, Tuesdays is just the day the moms I know chose to make our regular day. This is always LOTS of fun.

Wednesdays: we have Kindermusik class. A friend who is also new to town was an elementary school music teacher and has started up this program. We were lucky enough to be one of her practicum dummies and got about 5 free classes. Avery's first official class will start on November 2. She really seems to enjoy herself. So we are doing the 4 week "ABC Music and Me" class this time and hopefully in January, Jenny will be offering the 16 week "Our Time" class.

Thursdays: she has nursery school, this is by no means preschool. It is really just a playgroup with 6 other kids. We do a snack and an activity and it is parent run. There is not a teacher, just the parents. There is a schedule and 2 parents each week are required to stay and the others can leave. I did leave Avery once and she did great. She could have cared less I was leaving her. She was too busy with the bean table.

Other things we do, but not on as regularly are swimming and the parks. The parks are awesome, but the weather lately has not been so great. Next week we are going to give ice skating a go. We are going with a little girl who is 3 that Avery has befriended. This will be a first for both girls and hopefully both girls like it.

Other than that it is just the daily battle to keep up with the house cleaning, cooking and laundry while managing Avery's social life. I have a book club that I am now a member of and so I have been getting to know few ladies, which is really nice. They all have kids about Avery's age too so we see each often. I also went to AquaZumba last week with a few of Sam's coworkers and that was fun. It is just a juggling act to get alone time with Sam's crazy schedule and Avery. Sam is planning on joining the gun club here in town and will start on a team this winter. It will be good for him to get out on his own and meet some other guys in town.

Happy Birthday, Sonny!

My baby brother is 25 years old today! We wish you a very happy day!

on to the third year...

I just had to share this picture. I am pretty picky about the photo's I post and tend to shy away from the awful ones, but this was just too funny. She was clearly enjoying her delicious cupcake!

Her 2 year well check went fine. Actually, she did better than she has ever done before, but that still is not without some major screaming and breath holding fits. I like the doctor and will be sticking with this one. A huge relief since we have literally been to 7 different doctors in Avery's short 2 years. Avery just had one shot and will need a flu shot in about a month or so. Other than that she is good to go until she is 3 as long as she is between 23 and 24 lbs by 30 months and doesn't get sick enough to warrant a visit to the doctors office. Crazy!

Avery has started nursery school. She has been twice now and really seems to enjoy herself. I am not sure that I will be able to sneak out yet, but may in a couple more weeks. She really likes another girl in her class and will follow her around and call for her. It is really cute to watch them interact. She has even started to attempt to play with other kids instead of just playing side by side and she has also started to get over her "hatred of boys". That was just embarrassing. I would have to go and explain to the other mom's what was going on because they'd think their kid did something mean to Avery.

Next week we are heading north to Haines, AK on the ferry for a few days. Sam will see a handful of horses up there and Avery and I will just hang out. It should be a fun short trip and it will be nice to get out of the house.