Tis the Season. Again.

As we sit down to write this post about Christmas we realize that we've given Ava a rather odd view of the event. To coordinate with family from afar we've staged "Christmas" five times in her two years of life: February 14 2009, December 20, 2009, December 25, 2009, November 25, 2010, and her most recent one. This girl's cleaning up!

The concept is still pretty vague in her mind, but she was over-the-top excited that the Christmas season starts off with a bunch of lights. Her (self-appointed?) role during the season was to scream out "Lights!" whenever we passed some. Bless the eagerness of a child, she seemed just as surprised and proud to call out the 2,000th house as she did the first.

Tom, Emily (+1), and Ian flew in to Portland on Christmas Eve. Ian was so eager to start opening gifts that he woke up at 5:00 a.m. and started knocking over tall towers of stackable cups. It was a few hours before we actually started the festivities but Ava seemed truly excited to walk us around the tree and point to gifts saying, "That's Ava's present." With every gift, she let out a gasp as she ripped off the wrapping paper and then finished with an exclamation of joy of some sort. That is, until she opened the apron that Helen handmade for her (might I point out, my first sewing project ever). To that present she cried "Don't like it!" and actually ran away from the gift. A mother's heartache begins here.

Ava was, of course, very excited to spend a week with grandparents and the Boston gang. Weather aside (7 straight days of heavy rain), we had a great time hanging out with family. We spent almost all of our time inside, but that was fine by Ava--it just gave her more time to mother Ian. Here's the two of them in the bath together, with Ava kindly attempting to wash Ian's hair.

While the Edwards family was together, we had a photo shoot. We haven't seen all the photos yet, but here's a preview: 

 

Ava gets a haircut!

At long last, Ava got her first haircut! The build-up to the moment--kicking, screaming, and so so many tears--lasted a good 15 minutes while the haircut itself took 30 seconds. And at the end of it all, you could barely tell she'd had a haircut at all except for this beaming face and quite a grand certificate.

"This certifies that Ava bravely received a hair cut with high honors for great conduct and grown up behavior from Miss Aubrey on December 28th, 2010"

Little Clippers apparently has very low standards for grown up behavior.

Hula Girl

A week after our trip to Chicago, we were off again.  This time to sunny Hawaii. What can we say about Hawaii? It was pretty awesome.

Ava is totally a resort girl. She wows in a tankini. She loves the pool, but she likes to at least have the option of a sand castle on the beach. On cooler days, a game of tennis might be in order.

When it comes to hitting the surf, there's no doubt Ava loves the idea of the ocean. It's fun to look at, and, if you're lucky, you might just come across a sea turtle or two popping their heads up. Getting in the ocean, however, is a completely absurd notion to our cautious child. Not only did Ava not set foot in the waves, she also advised the rest of her party to avoid doing so. When we ignored her advice, she looked slightly horrified, screaming after us, "Mama, you okay? Daddy, you okay?" Ever the swimmer, Helen views this as a personal failure and has since vowed to head back to the pool for more starfish lessons.

Ocean animals, on the other hand, are right up Ava's alley. Here she is at the Maui Ocean Center:

But more than the beach, the pool, and the sharks, Ava enjoyed lots of east coast grandparent time. They spent their days eating on the lanai, coloring, reading, feeding koi fish, and playing games like "I'm Hiding" (more accurately, "I'm sitting under a glass table with my eyes shut"). All in all, pretty cute stuff.

 

Ava's 23rd Month

Ava was quite the jet-setter this month, logging plenty of miles with trips to Chicago and Maui.  As much as we would like to convince ourselves that all this departure from routine is the root of Ava's recent outrageous emotional outbursts assertiveness, we fear the terrible twos are upon us.  Wish us luck.