Do DoDo Doooo! Our little one is now 22 months old!!
And where was Ava when she was turning exactly 22 months old? Sleeping on her mat on the ground with a bunch of other kids. But at pick-up time she was wide awake, chattering, and eating a graham cracker.
This past weekend we made a trip up north to visit Eric for his birthday. Before we hit the road for the long long drive, we stopped in Santa Barbara for dinner at our favorite restaurant, Pascucci. Yumm. While we were enjoying dinner on the patio, a No to H8 rally passed by us several times. Ava didn’t know what to think. Mass amounts of people. Signs. Candles. Chanting. I was proud that Ava got to witness her first rally. It took all I had not to leave my dinner behind and have us join the rally. I’m so thankful we live in a country where people can speak their minds freely. I only wish we were all treated the same.
We took Ava to the water fountains so she could make a wish or two or three. Hopefully for a better future… and not for more Dora crap. 
As soon as I got out of the car after our long drive, I was sick. Sore throat. Body aches. Blah. So my pictures from the weekend suck. Big time. On Saturday we took a walk and quacked at geese… and showed them our bellies.
On Sunday, we went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Ava got to put on a smock and play with plastic fishes in the water…
… and see penguins for the first time too. Told you my pictures are crap. Damn this cold!
The birthday boy and Ava got to pretend they were whales and dolphins too.
Ava pet her first starfish at the Long Beach Aquarium a few months back and she still talks about that moment. Glad she got to do it again.
This week Ava has started to hold our hands everywhere we go. It is so cute. I love it.
She is also getting really funny. Here she is reading a book and telling us that this is ‘Nona Elmo’. HAHAHAHAH! Elmo DOES have Nona hair in this picture. HAHAHAHAH!
She knows she’s funny too.
Ava also has started counting a lot more. She counted up to 9 in English all by herself the other day while stepping on stones during a walk.
During some of our walks, Ava sometimes asks to be held for a good portion of the walk. It is too much for me to carry her upright. She’s over 30 pounds by now. My poor back. So one day I told her I was going to hold her like a baby and she thought it the best thing ever. Now she specially asks for it and I sing her a baby song that I used to sing to her and she closes her eyes and pretends to sleep. Baby Ava returns… all because I have no muscles.
Hey. It’s time to come down memory lane. Remember the teddy bear that Deets bought Ava when she was just a couple days old? The one that made her smile like a drunken sailor in this picture? The one we call Medo?
Well at night, Ava has started to sleep with her Medo. She tucks it under her right arm and then tucks her loyal prairie doggy under her left arm. Every night. For the past week. And a few nights ago, Ava woke up at 3am and screamed DEETS! DEETS! DEETS! several times and then passed out again. Coincidence? I think not.
Ava is obsessed with Little Red Riding Hood this week. Totally obsessed. But at least she isn’t scared of the wolf anymore. And she actually doesn’t say Little Red Riding Hood. She says it in Croatian which is Crvencapica. And she totally says the word like a pro. Ava got this soft book from Dan’s old kindergarten teacher and she loves making Little Red Riding Hood walk through the forest.
And then she kisses all the finger puppets too.
Her obsession continues at school when she insisted on wearing her red jacket just like Little Red Riding Hood… and the hood MUST be up on her head or else. She has been saying Crvencapica all week to her teachers but they had no idea what she was saying. I translated it for her new teachers so they are all on the same page with Ava now.
And speaking of school, Ava is adjusting well to her new classroom. The daycare director says she is doing well keeping up with the big kids but is still a little small for the bigger kid playground so we might notice some bumps on her legs during the learning curve. Here she is with her classmates Max and Nathan. Max kept pointing to the mess Ava was making with her cookies and saying ‘What happened?’. Hehe.
Our week hasn’t been all fun and games.
Ava’s second back molar came in…
… and she got the case of ‘the goopy and swollen eyes’.
Okay, you have a wonderful weekend. Yes, you. Bye!
