A date with my Booooyfriend

Ava had a playdate with Gavin this past week. They had so much fun playing together in her "baby jail" and even enjoyed a ride together in her wagon. The diva inside couldn't help but come out while they were playing together. While Gavin was trying to crawl around in the "baby jail" Ava put her arms on him and was letting Gavin pull her around....and that's not all. Read below for more!


If only they could drive themselves on their dates!

Playing together in "baby jail".
Ava says "You had better give me a ride Gavin!"
"Say Mercy"
"What do you mean I have to stop Mom?"
Gavin must not have been crawling fast enough, because she BIT him on the bottom!!
I guess Gavin was just that irresistable. He says "Get me out of here! Girls are CRAZY!!"

Before saying goodbye, Gavin vows to break her out on his next visit!

We May Be Going Green...

...In our own way. Ava and I are trying out cloth diapers. I purchased three Bum Genius 3.0 and I love them. They are a one size diaper, which means that they grow with the baby from birth to potty trained. They have velcro tabs and snaps that let them become smaller or bigger. I wash them (poop and all) and dry them like any other load. There are a few restrictions- like using or not using certain ointments/creams, and certain detergents, but otherwise they are VERY user friendly. Nothing like the old days of prefolds and diaper pins. :) Here are a couple of Ava showing off the cloth diaper. Aren't they SUPER cute?! (She has a pink, yellow and green.) http://www.bumgenius.com/one-size.php

There are several things that I have been reading that have led me to want to try cloth diapering. Here are a few:

Disposable diapers contain traces of Dioxin, an extremely toxic by-product of the paper-bleaching process. It is a carcinogenic chemical, listed by the EPA as the most toxic of all cancer-linked chemicals. It is banned in most countries, but not the U.S.

Disposable diapers contain Tributyl-tin (TBT) - a toxic pollutant known to cause hormonal problems in humans and animals.

Over 92% of all single-use diapers end up in a landfill.No one knows how long it takes for a disposable diaper to decompose, but it is estimated to be about 250-500 years, long after your children, grandchildren and great, great, great grandchildren will be gone. (This one really got me!!)

Disposable diapers are the third largest single consumer item in landfills, and represent about 4% of solid waste. In a house with a child in diapers, disposables make up 50% of household waste.

Disposable diapers generate sixty times more solid waste and use twenty times more raw materials, like crude oil and wood pulp. Over 300 pounds of wood, 50 pounds of petroleum feedstocks and 20 pounds of chlorine are used to produce disposable diapers for one baby EACH YEAR. (WOW!!)

Diaper rash was almost unheard of before the use of rubber or plastic pants in the 1940s.

Sadie is on the mend

Sadie finished her antibiotics and is healing quite nicely. Right now it is a big scab- which is way better than looking at her flesh right after it happened. It would just make my stomach churn for my poor baby. She will end up having a scar, but she will always be beautiful to us!

I (heart) Cheerios!!

I must have a little Diva on my hands. As you know Ava refuses to eat baby food. She even gets an eye twitch if I try and feed her some. She only likes a few veggies we cook for her- but one thing she will open her mouth for EVERY time is Cheerios! Good grief!!

Hip Hip Hooray for Cheerios!

(I break up each Cheerio before I give them to her- for every person who just had a little heart attack that I was giving them to her whole.)

Bird Watching Update-hehe

My Aunt Jo emailed me and told me that the colorful bird I have been seeing in my backyard is most likely a male Painted Bunting. I looked it up, and that is exactly what it is! You can see how colorful it is, and why I thought it was someones escaped pet bird. I think I am going to name them Barney and Thelma Lou after The Andy Griffith Show. (Jamie loves that show-a childhood favorite. He is actually the one that suggested the names- against his will. He said he didn't want to participate in something so silly as naming birds. He is going to kill me when he reads this! LOL)

The female (girlfriend) is less colorful...just a greenish color. Leave it to a male to need to be flashy!!

Tooth Watch

We are officially on tooth watch!! Ava has had a bump in her gums for like a month now, but no action. Today I could finally see the white of the tooth through her gums. AAAHHH!! My little girl is growing up! *wiping tears*

Happy Mother's Day!

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY to all of my mommy friends!! Although my Mothers Day had some unexpected rough patches, I got to spend it with family in Dallas. I was very sad to have to leave them and come back to Bastrop.

Here are the cupcakes Dee Dee and I made. If someone took a cupcake, we had to jumble the letters to try and spell something new. I think one of the last phrases was "toe pady". haha.

Here is Ava and I inside our friends Serbian church. We just popped in to see the inside.
We spent most of the day at Diana and Eric's playing a bean bag game similar to washers or horse shoes. You toss the bean bag across the yard and try and make it in the hole. Here is Diana and Ashleigh getting ready to toss. Ashleigh is praying to the bean bag gods that it will go in!! I think I was the worst at this game seeing as no one ever picked me to be on their team...even though I was jumping up and down to be chosen. LOL.

My mom and baby Lawson decided to take a nap on the couch.

CONGRATULATIONS LINDSEY!!!

This past Friday, Jamie's baby sister- Lindsey graduated from A&M! She is the 5th and last of the 6 Harris children to graduate from A&M! (Not to mention his Jamie's father graduated from there, along with the three older brothers wives.) She will start St. Mary's Law School located in San Antonio this fall. Way to go Linds!! We are so proud of you!

Here are some pictures from the day!

Lindsey with Jamie's parents.

Ava thought it was more important to check out Aunt Lindsey's hair than to try and take a picture!

Aunt Lindsey with most of her neices and nephews. Just a few more weeks until the rest move home from Germany! WOO HOO!

Lindsey with her cake, balloons and flowers at lunch.

This Blog is Sponsored by the letter B

While learning our letters today, I told Ava that the letter B could stand for Beach. I told her of how much fun we were going to have at the beach this summer as well as the pool. She is impatient like her mother, and just couldn't wait that long. So we decided to test out her floatie in the only place we could....our bathtub! She of course loved it, since bath time is her absolute favorite time of the day! Now she really can't wait for summer!

She had a blast! (And we know the floatie works.)

(In case you didn't get the title, when I was growing up Sesame Street was always sponsored by the letter of the day. Not sure if they still do that.)

"Working Hard for The Money"

Ava loves loves LOVES my laptop! Like a moth to a flame. So I put her to work to try and pay off some of the shoes she just HAS to have. I think she has 5 or 6 in her size right now! (Following in her mothers footsteps!)

So I dictate my emails and blogs to her during the day. I mean who do you think is writing this right now? (My mom is just the photographer.)

Here are some pics after she got off of "work". ;)

AHHH!!

Okay, so yesterday I hear Jamie yelling at me frantically from the other room to hurry up and come in there! I grab my camera thinking he spotted the elusive colorful bird in the backyard and wants me to take a picture. I wish that was the case.

Instead this is the face I see.

And then I notice a cup in the middle of the floor.
Underneath the cup is this...a SCORPION!! It is about 3 inches long! I knew that living out here in this community- large wooded lots -and most of the community will not ever be developed, so there will always be wildlife and (GULP) insects and snakes. I was willing to live with that. But I never thought they would invade the inside of our home. Especially SCORPIONS!!
AAAHHH!
Jamie was prepared, and had already ordered some blacklight flashlights. For those of you who don't know, scorpions glow when shined by a blacklight. Here is what they look like.
So, if you come to my house and find a flashlight as a new appendage, and see me constantly sweeping each room with it, that is why. I am not crazy.

On a side note: This blacklight also illuminates every spec of white lint that is on your carpet which shouts to you to PLEASE VACUUM! Urg! :)