And I think to myself, what a wonderful world....

I cannot help but feel incredibly blessed to have Ava in our lives. She is growing so fast and surprises us with something new each day. She recently started taking a pacifier (still hit and miss) which has given us more options of places to go on the weekends without worrying about her crying. She also has been grabbing and swatting at things for a while now, but today instead of just hanging onto her raddle, she shakes it and puts it into her mouth! We just eat up her every move. She also enjoys watching Dave and I do p90x. She will smile and giggle at the different moves that we do and then will coo at us while we do it. Sometimes I feel like she is my little cheerleader helping me through the workouts! I looked at her tonight and felt so grateful and honored to be her mother. I was also filled with gratitude for all that my mother has done for me. The love that Dave and I feel for Ava is so unique. She didn't have to earn it by any means, and it is stronger than anything we have felt before. We would give up anything for her and her happiness. She has truly made us feel complete, accomplished, and teaches us so much. I now understand why my mother would do anything for me. I understand why she tucked me in at night, why she stayed up late to make sure I came home safe, and why she cared so much about my success and happiness. It all has come together, and I am so grateful that she exemplified the mother that I need to be for my daughter. I am so blessed. Ava is now 3 months old. She rolls over now to her side, coo's all the time, and has the cutest little giggle! She also has started to sleep with a bunny her Grandma Holley gave to her, we just melted when we saw this.  Here are some new pictures of our little doll:

Valentines Day

So I know that you all already know how madly in love Dave and I are so I won't bore you with all the mushy details of how amazing my husband is. But I will let you know that we had a wonderful valentines day with our little girl!! We ordered out Thai food, and then watched a movie together at home after Ava went down for the night! He also got me some beautiful roses... He is so sweet! We also enjoyed dressing Ava up in a little cardigan we got for her before she was born. She looked super cute, it made not being able to go out for valentines day worth it. Plus, around this time last year Ava become more than just an idea :) So valentines day for us will always be special whether we get to go out or not because we have our precious daughter now! Here are some pictures of our day, as well as Ava enjoying valentines day with us!! Where does time go?!?

Adorable..

I couldn't help but take pictures of Ava today. She just looked adorable in her jacket from a girl friend of mine. You know those days when you get excited because your child can finally wear something that has been hanging in their closet waiting for them to grow into it? Well that was me today! We took some pictures of us last night watching the super bowl with some friends but I am not too sure I want to put those pictures up...we all seemed to be caught off guard in each photo. So to make up for it, I took some today! Here is our little princess looking so cute:

This is what we do when Daddy is at school... How will I ever get homework done with a daughter this cute! This last and final semester is definitely going to require some divine intervention!

Ten Weeks Old

Where has time gone? Ava is now 10 weeks old and learning more everyday. In all truthfulness it amazes me how quick they learn new things at this age. She currently has started to smile all the time. It just melts our hearts. We can be having the worst day and with a flash of her little smile we feel so much better. She loves staring at Daddy and smiling when he isn't paying attention. I will look over and she will just be studying him. Then when he turns and looks at her, she gets a big grin on her face! She also smiles when you talk to her.... It is nice to have a person who you can talk to anything about and they still smile!
She also loves to be read to (when she is not too tired)! This morning I read her The Very Hungry Catepillar by Eric Carle. She just cooed the whole time we read it (too bad Dave was sleeping, he could have taped it for me). It is so sweet to see her so attentive and aware nowadays. She also has been so much better at night when it comes to fussiness. She had a couple of weeks where she would just cry at night, and it would take us forever to get her to sleep/soothed. We honetly wondered sometimes if she might have had some minor collic. Right when we were just so worn out, she seemed to just snap out of it. Now, she falls asleep on her own again ....or with VERY little assistance from me holding her with the sink on. and believe it or not she gets tired of us. There are times she just wants put down and left alone to play in her swing or on her play mat. (This has helped my sanity so much!) 
Also believe it or not, she is getting cuter! Her eyes are super blue, and she loves to just stare at you and coo back and forth. Recelty she started doing a little talk/holler. When she is playing with her toys that hang from her play gym she kinda yells  or something similar to yelling. But she is not sad or mad when she does it, she is just trying to talk to her animals.....loudly with a scrunched up face! lol It cracks me up. She also loves my pillow. After a long morning I will lay her on my pillow and just snuggle with her in the mornings. And before I know it she pushes me off the the pillow I am kindly sharing with her, spreads her arms out, and grins! What a little stinker! I found the funniest depiction of this sort of thing and thought I might share:


(mind you this is an exaggeration since she doesn't sleep with us...but I still thought it was pretty funny... can any of you out there relate??)  :)

Ava's Blessing Weekend

On Sunday January 15, 2012 we had the opportunity to bless Ava at church. It was such an amazing experience to have family and friends come to join in our special day. We are so happy to have Ava in our lives. She is growing up more every day. I remember always hearing my parents talk about how we all grew up right before their eyes, and now I know what they were talking about. It seems as though Ava learns something new everyday. Today Dave and I both noticed that she has the preference to stand when you hold her, and she will talk little steps. It is bizarre because she is only 2 months old (9 weeks to be exact)! She also has started to smile at us, coo, and loves to be read to. Her grandma holley got her some books and she just loves the pictures in the books. She is so patient as I read them to her in the evenings...or during the day if she lets me! We are working on tummy time with her, but she happens to hate tummy time. I mean our little miss goes into ticked off mode if you leave her there longer than 2 minutes. But knowing how important tummy time is, we have had to get creative. I just place her propped on my knees facing me, and if she wants to look at me when I talk to her she has to hold that little head of hers up. We also carry her around facing our shoulder so she can look around and use those muscles in her neck as well.... and then last but not least I have her sit in her bumbo seat, or just sit on my lap! I naturally want to pat myself on the back a bit, because it has really worked! She holds her head up like a pro! (alright, I will get off my high horse now) I love being a mommy...what can I say? :) I have spent the last 4 years studying about children, and now I get to apply it. It is a blessing in a way, but also at times my Achilles heel. Because of all the things I have been educated on with children, I am quick to worry about the smallest things!!.... But I am learning that the worry is not worth it!

On a complete separate note, my mother in law read Dave and I a blog entry from someone she works with about the things that they do for their little one to meet their babes needs. It was really unique and perhaps something I don't want to forget, and so after a couple of months I thought it would be fun to do the same:

1. Ava has a love hate relationship with swaddling she will go into a completely red faced cry, and make you think she is miserable, but then sleep 6-7 hours throughout the night without a peep! Thus, she will continue to be swaddled! :)

2. Come 9:30 she has caught on to the fact that her bedtime routine has begun! We read, change into jammies, and then do everything we can to soothe the poor girl as she cries and tries to fight her sleep to the death!

3. Just tonight we were looking up why babies cry (we have totally reached a new level of desperation) and there was a neat fact on the mayo-clinics website (I should send them a thank-you letter) that said some babies cry from over stimulation, or because they have too much energy still built up at night. So to try white noise like running water! You best believe I was up for anything... and let's just say our landlord might not be happy with the water bill next month! running water = one out cold baby


4. Ava loves music, especially to be sung too. She also likes Chuck Mangione which was quite the surprise! In all reality though, you can sing that girl anything, and she just eats it up!

5. She loves bath time. She would stay in the bath for hours if we let her. We set her bath up by the mirror and she just stares at herself. She recently learned to kick in the bath and make little splashes... I can't help but thing it is quite cute!

6. She likes to be bounced on a the exercise ball.... but is slowly starting to grow out of becoming relaxed this way. I can only bounce her for so long. My back is beginning to hate me! Thank goodness for our running water discovery.

7. Ava loves books! Grandma Holley would be proud....

8. Mornings with Ava are the best! Dave and I just oogle over her in the mornings. She is SUPER smiling in the morning. We un-swaddle her and she just stretches her little body our and grins ear to ear at us.... (almost like she is thanking us for letting her arms free!!)

9. Ava is a momma's girl.... but at times momma would love for her to learn to be a daddies girl. I think once she stops breastfeeding I will no longer be preferred....let's face it, anyone who knows Dave knows that he is way funner than me!

10. Ava is the most beautiful little girl we have ever seen... don't believe me? Come hold her, she will make you think that exact same thing. She is just so darn cute....


Here are some pictures I have been promising to put up form her blessing (I will put up videos soon too):

   

   

     

                            

Happiness.

I can honestly say that I have never been happier at any time in my life. Having Ava in our lives has brought us so much joy, she really is a perfect fit for David and I. The other amazing thing is that I have fallen in love with David all over again, who would have known I could love him more than I already do?It is amazing seeing him be a daddy, I could watch him love on Ava all day.... In my opinion the measure of a man truly is in the father that he is, and Dave is an amazing father! There are times we feel as though we could just stare are her all day!

She has grown up a lot already. She is 6 weeks old today, and is currently 10 lbs 6 oz. (clothes and diapered). We took her to the doctor this week for an upper respiratory infection that she came down with and they let us know that this was her current weight! I believe it though, because my back is so sore from carrying her around. Luckily, since my husband is SO amazing, I got a one hour massage for Christmas that I went ahead and scheduled for this coming monday at the Spa. I could not be more excited! So basically what I am trying to say is that life is pure bliss...

Here are some pictures of our beautiful princess Ava... (Thanks to our friend Calli Zickgraf view more of her work here: CDZ photography)

Aren't her eyes just beautiful in this picture? 

Baby Ava Lynn Holley

(Thanks Jer & Rach for taking these...and letting me steal them from your blog!!)

She is here!! Where did the time go? I cannot believe that we actually have a little baby now. The realization is still setting in for David and I. She is precious beyond all belief. Her temperament is just adorable, and her pouty lip just melts her daddy and I's hearts! Ava came into this world Thursday November 24, 2011 at 1:09 a.m. We went in to be induced on Wednesday at 12:30. They started me on pitocin around 1:00 and then we waited for the doctor to come and break my water. Well, that didn't exactly happen right away! Since it is Rexburg, there are a million pregnant women out there, and since my inducement was optional the timing of my birth was the first thing to get pushed back. So after waiting 3 hours for the doctor to break my water he finally did around 4:30 p.m. the contractions started right away but didn't seem all too bad for the first 3 hours. I just sat on an exercise ball and enjoyed the company of Dave. Well around the 4th hour the contractions were ridiculous!! Seriously, I have NO CLUE why anyone would do this whole birth thing all natural! I requested to get the epidural and by 8:30  p.m. I felt like I was on cloud nine! I could no longer feel the pain, and decided to tell Dave to go get himself something to eat (I needed a fully fed David to help me through labor). So after the BEST nap i have ever taken in my life the doctor came in and told me that I went from being dilated 3 cm to 10cm in just 2.5 hours!! I was pretty proud of myself, and once again felt no pain :) (I LOVED birth because of the meds)... The worst part of birth for me actually was getting the IV stuck into my hand at the beginning...it hurt worse than getting the epidural! I then pushed for 1 hour and 30 minutes and our little angel was here!! She swallowed fluids on the way out and so she was automatically admitted to the NICU to have her stomach pumped, IV's put into her belly (she wasn't oxygenating her own blood for some reason), and then they hooked her up to oxygen. So I didn't get to hold or see my baby for about 5 hours!! By that times they wheeled me down to the NICU to see her! IT BROKE MY HEART to see her with all the tubes but I knew it was only temporary until she would be off of them and home with us. She was admitted for about 5 days, four of them were because she had to have antibiotics to make sure that the liquids she swallowed did not cause an infection in her lungs, and then the last couple days she had sever jaundice. After a long week, we finally got to bring her home with a billy blanket for a couple of days, and then we finally had a baby with no cords attached!! She is now home and growing bigger and bigger each day. She is such a well tempered baby, and only gives out a short cry when she has reached her last string of patience with me! We love her to pieces (and so did all of her family who has come to see her, especially her grandparents), and are so blessed to have her sweet spirit in our home. We are still very tired, but thanks to family coming to town and helping us adjust, we are do much better! She truly is our little princess who has stolen our hearts...