Quatre ans!

Notre petite Ava est quatre ans demain!

It was right about this time at night (22:30) on this exact day 4 years ago that we were packing up my overnight bag for the hospital for when I thought labour might start (not for another week or so). Little did we know that our little Ava would make an appearance less than 24 hours later!

I remember every detail about those 15 hours, from the time labour started to the time she was born and I held her in my arms. Her birthday will always be such a special day for me.

Today we celebrated her 4th birthday with all of her friends and most of her family. It was definitely a birthday party geared towards kids (which was kind of disappointing for the adults, but I hope they didn't mind too much). Ava loved the activities and enjoyed hanging out with her friends and cousins that came to celebrate with her.

Special thanks to tante Joelle for helping to decorate the cakes - they looked absolutely enchanting! :)

Bonne fete ma belle! Je t'aime gros comme le ciel.

PS - happy birthday to our nephew Phillip, who will be celebrating a birthday tomorrow too!

Haircut!

So I know it has been months since my last post...but I honestly didn't realize how quickly the time has gone by!

Ava had a great Christmas and tore right into her presents this year like a pro. Last year she was still unsure and I'm sure we opened most of her gifts for her. A couple of her favourites this year were a table and chairs from grand maman and grand papa and her own 'laptop computer' from Opa. She also received a Scar and Pumbaa stuffed toy from Alix and Sam, books, pajamas, a Strawberry Shortcake doll (that smells like strawberries!), art supplies, lego, games, a Playmobil set, gift cards and lots of love!! :) Ava really cleaned up this year!

The boys got a lot of 'Jets' related merchandise, which they really liked too. It was great to be able to spend quite a bit of time all five of us together because Marc was actually off for the holidays this year!

During the fist week of the New Year, Ava and joined Joelle, Jacques and Mikka at Julie, our hairdresser's. I had been telling Ava about how she needed to get a haircut to trim all of her ends to keep her hair nice and that today was the day. I was pretty sure it would be a fight to get her on the chair but she surpirsed her mom yet again! She hopped right up after Jacques was finished and sat extremely still and didn't fuss or cry at all! She was just chatting up Julie as if she got a haircut everyday! Pretty impressed!

Now we are planning and preparing for our trip to Disneyland! We are looking forward to seeing Marc's family in LA and seeing Ava's reaction to all the fun things in Disneyland and California Adventure (a first for Marc and I, too)! Yahoo winter vacation!

Long Weekend at the Lake

This summer has been so extraordinarily gorgeous that it has been difficult to find a moment to sit and write a blog entry. I do have a few minutes now, so I will do a quick update.

Ava has been enjoying summer a lot this year. We've been camping a few times and have a long camping trip coming up soon. She really loves her camper, and playing outside is the cat's pajamas! We were fortnate enough to get invited to a Savard family friend's cottage this past long weekend and we had a wonderful time.

Marc had to work all weekend, so Ava and I packed up and hitched a ride with grandmaman and grandpapa and tante Lisette. We arrived at the cottage (just past the Manitoba/Ontario border) around 8:00 PM and quickly settled in for the night. Ava had a little snack and got ready for bed. It took her a long time to fall asleep because the cabin is not very sound proof! Once she was asleep though, she was out.

Saturday morning had us munching on waffles and fruit, and then into the lake for a swim. There is something extremely relaxing and pleasant about swimming in a fresh water lake. Ava didn't last long in the water because she didn't like the cool water but she enjoyed playing on the dock and fishing with tante Lisette. After a nap in the mid-day, we continued playing out by the dock and in the cabin with Calla and Chloe.

Sunday was a day spent almost entirely outdoors. We swam, fished, played on the dock...all the wonderful summer things! Kevin and Joelle came with their boys, so the little cousins all had a lot of fun playing together! Jacques decided to spend the night at the cottage so he and Ava shared the bunk room. He slept all night and had a great morning on Monday playing in the lake and fishing again.

We were treated to a boat ride on Monday and Ava loved it!! She wanted to go longer and was disappointed when we came back in to the dock. Soon it was time to pack up our things and load the van to head back to the city. We were back home by 4:30 PM and while the weather, company and lake were amazingly wonderful, there is something to be said about being back home (and showering)!

Cheers to summer!

Physical

Ava had a physical at our health centre this past week (apparently at 3 they are no longer called "well-baby check-ups" but physicals). She did not want to get on the scale on her own so I had to hold her and get weighed and then get weighed by myself, but she mostly cooperated with getting measured for height (95 cm).

After that we went into the nurse practitioner's office where she asked about diet, activity, bedtime, etc and got checked over including getting her blood pressure taken and heart beat heard. We left with a clean bill of health and no concerns which is always good. The only thing the nurse practitioner suggested was to get her eyes checked just as a baseline in case of any future concerns.

After the doctor Marc and I dropped Ava off at Denise's as I had to work from noon to 8, and Marc had some around the house things planned for the day. I also had some running around to do to pick up donation items for my work's open house event.

We registered Ava in gymnastics this spring and she seems to like it so far (2 classes). There are a lot of kids in her class (9 or 10 3-5 year olds) and Ava is not super pushy so sometimes she misses her turn and the instructor doesn't realize that she has not had an opportunity to try something. I'm sure she will start speaking up soon!

Hopefully we start getting consistently warm weather and can start enjoying being outside!

Birthdays, cakes & parties!

We celebrated Ava's third birthday on Sunday, April 3rd at Gym Kyds. Gym Kyds is a pretty cool facility full of all kinds of gymnastics equipment like trampolines, climbing structures, rings, mats, balance beams...pretty much everything you need for a fun birthday party! After all her little friends (14 kids in all, including Ava!) had the run of the place for an hour, we headed up to the party room to eat. There wasn't much talking going on, so I guess the kids were hungry! Ava really liked her Buzz Lightyear cake that Joelle and I worked on. It ended up looking very cool. (Thank you again Joelle, for being so patient and helpful while sitting back and letting me decorate Ava's cake.) There wasn't really time to open her presents at the facility so packed them up into the car and opened them at home. She loved them all, and we are so thankful and blessed to have such wonderful friends and family who gave Ava such beautiful, thoughtful gifts. After Ava's party we had a little lull but then were back into party mode for Alix's 16th birthday. We had family over on the day of his birthday, April 12th, for a little BBQ, cake and ice cream. Alix seemed to really like his 'mini' party, and I think he really liked his gifts!! For Alix's cake, Joelle and I deocrated his to look like a Green Bay Packers football player (again, thank you to Joelle for her great ideas and patience). He seemed to like it a lot, taking pictures of it with his cell phone camera! Ava and all the little cousins loved being able to blow out Alix's candles (such a generous big brother/cousin!) and then eat the icing off the bottoms of the candles, too! Pretty soon, everyone headed for home and we got some relax time with the boys and Ava. Now we have Ava's actual birthday to celebrate on Friday and then nothing until EASTER! Thank goodness...! :)

Stomach Bugs!

We had a busy weekend on the 19th and 20th of March! Alix and Sam came to stay at our house from Friday to Sunday, Jacques' FIFTH birthday party (!!) was on Saturday and we had a brunch for grandmaman's birthday scheduled for Sunday morning. Friday night Marc and I decided to go out to a movie and grab some dessert (two things we have not done in a very long time!). We headed out to see "The King's Speech", and we both enjoyed it very much! Great film. After the movie we headed to Baked Expectations for a slice of cake and coffee. It was yummy and we were trying to remember the last time we had been there! Back at home, I was downstairs saying good night to Alix and Sam when Alix and I could hear Sam coughing a lot. It turned out he was being very sick in the bathroom - uh oh! Poor Sammy was not feeling too well and looked like he had a bit of a flu. He took a Gravol but was up again in the night not feeling well and spent the rest of the night sleeping on the couch. Seeing as how Sam was under the weather, he missed out on his last day of bowling for the season, Jacques' birthday party and babysitting for his cousins that evening! Marc stayed home with him while Alix, Ava and I went to Jacques' party. Jacques seemed to really enjoy his bowling birthday party! Ava had fun bowling, especially with the help of her big brother! She also very much enjoyed eating the Cheezies Alix bought for her! After bowling the party moved over to Joelle and Kevin's where we had a wonderful supper and all the kids had fun running around all over the place. Soon it was time to head home and relax from a busy day, just in time to get ready for another one! Sunday morning we all went to mass and then to the St. Boniface Golf Club where Ava really enjoyed playing with Jacques, Mikka, Calla and Chloe before wolfing down her breakfast! While Sam was feeling better on Sunday and ate breakfast and was back to normal, Ava woke up sick in the middle of the night. :( She was eating a little bit, mostly toast and some crackers and water but I knew she was not herself when she fell asleep on the futon with me mid-morning while watching a movie! Very unusual for our little energizer bunny! She stayed home Monday and Tuesday but was back to the routine by Wednesday. Hopefully that is the only little bug that she gets this year!

Skype-ing with Papa!

Marc went up to Wuskwatim (Hydro dam near Thompson, MB) again for 10 days. Marc usually quite enjoys going up but this time the camp was at minimal capacity (about 300 employees where they usually have close to 1000) so there weren't very many patients coming to the EMS trailer so he was more bored than busy. Before Marc went up we got his older laptop (about 6 years old) repaired and borrowed grandmaman and grandpapa's webcam so we could skype before Ava went to bed every night!

Skype-ing is pretty neat! Ava much prefers to talk to Papa when she can see him at the same time, so it is neat to see her reaction when he appears on the computer screen! Although skype-ing is nice, we are looking forward to Marc coming home tomorrow evening!!

Other than papa not being home, our routines have been pretty normal. I have been a bit more busy at work these days as I have a new project to work on which I am enjoying, and Ava has been going to Denise's and also sleep-overs at grandmaman and grandpapa's!

At Denise's, Ava is the oldest of three girls and there is a little boy who just turned one. All the kids play quite well together most of the time and lately the game of choice is 'hairdresser'. One of the little girls brings a comb from home and they use a little squishy lamb as the shampoo, taking turns washing and combing each other's hair!! It is so adorable. The girls especially like combing Ava's hair because it is so long (half way down her back)!

Well, one more late evening shift for me, one more sleep-over for Ava at grandmaman's and then pick-up Papa tomorrow! Can't wait!