Picnic & Dexter

Saturday was my annual company picnic (i.e. the one day I come home each year utterly exhausted, sweaty, drained, and sunburned).  I am in charge of organizing this 475-person event, and I will sum it up by saying that I was in bed at 7:30 pm. 

Josh and Avery made an appearance at the picnic before her naptime.

Avery taking a swing at the pinata (after taking a fall into the mud):

A fun but long and hot day!

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Meet Dexter.

Dexter was found next to the 5 Freeway by a Caltrans worker when he was about two months old.  He was rescued and brought into the Orange Olive Veterinary Hospital, which is where we take Piper and Tyson for vet visits (and where we originally adopted them).  After his arrival, the staff at Orange Olive got him cleaned up, vaccinated, and nourished him back to the appropriate weight for his age (he weighed only 1.5 pounds when he was found, which is only about half of what he should have weighed for his age). They have been looking for a home for him for the past two months.

I walked into the hospital earlier this week to purchase a bag of cat food, and I happened to see this little guy in a cage next to the food shelf. He looked up at me and I put my fingers in to pet him, and then let him bat at my keys through the wires of his cage.  There are often kittens in the lobby that are up for adoption, and I try not to look at them because when Josh let me get the first two, it was under the condition that there would be no more pets in our house.  And of course I want to take home all the homeless animals in the entire world. 

But this little kitty looked so much like Piper, and something about his rescue story really tugged at my heartstrings, so I spent the remainder of the week begging Josh to let me breach my contract and take him home. "What's one more cat?"...... "He's tiny, you won't even notice him"......"Pleeeeeease"......"He has no home!" 

I even went so far as to have the vet staff send me a picture of "Angus" (as they had named him) so that I could continue to pester Josh at work via email.

By Friday, Josh had had enough of my whining, and he caved in.

So we now have a new furry member of our family.

And just for the record, Josh was scooping him up and kissing him and squeezing him within the first five minutes of getting home from work.

Avery loves him because he isn't as scared of her as he probably should be.  The other two cats do not share this love of Dexter, but they are getting there.

Hopefully soon we will all be one big happy family!

Avery the Entertainer

This morning in the car, Avery said to me out of the blue, "Oh-oak." Normally when she says something I don't understand, I either repeat it back to her, or I just say, "Yeah! That's right," or "Good job Avery."  Usually that will satisfy her long enough for me to change the subject to "trucks" or "doggies."  But this morning she wouldn't let up:

Avery: Oh-oak.

Me: Yeah...

Avery: Oh-oak!

Me: Oh-oak?

Avery: Oh-oak!

Me: Yeah, oh-oak....

Avery: Oh-oak! Oh-oak!

Me: Oh-oak? ...........What is oh-oak?

Avery: Pih!

Me: Pig? ...... OH! YES! A pig says "Oink Oink!" Good job Avery! 

Although we have been working on her animal sounds, this was the first time I had heard her do the pig sound.  I could tell by the grin on her face that she was delighted to be understood.  I was smiling too, as I thought about how nice it is to finally be able to communicate with her, but also because I was amused by how happy we both were over her making a piggy sound. 

But the truth is, with her expanding vocabulary (and manipulation skills), she is becoming quite the entertainer. 

When Josh took Bo and Zac to the Angels game a couple weeks ago, Ludacris performed after the game, and of course sang his hit "Saturday."  The boys came home chanting his signature, "Oooh-OOOH!"  Naturally, Josh worked on teaching this to Avery (because it's appropriate to teach gangsta rap to toddlers, obviously), and before long she picked it up:

VIDEO: LITTLE MISS LUDACRIS

So a night or two later, I was rocking her to sleep in her room, with the lights out, singing Barney's "I Love You" like we do every night.  She had her head down on my shoulder atop her pile of monkeys and blankets (she now refuses to be rocked to sleep unless I am holding her along with TWO monkeys and TWO blankets), and in the middle of this peaceful moment, she popped her head up with her eyes wide open, and shouted, "Oooh-OOOOH!" right in my face.

I wish I could say that I successfully quieted and calmed her and swiftly lulled her to sleep.  But the real story is that I burst out laughing, and then she burst out laughing, and then she was totally wound up and kept doing the "Ooooh-OOOOH!" because she knew it would elicit endless giggles from Mommy (and from Daddy out in the living room).

Her other new favorite thing is Ring Around the Rosy. I guess one day I sang it, and jumped with her in a circle, and it was maybe a bad idea on my part because now that is all she ever wants to do.

It starts with a really sweet and pathetically sorrowful plea for "Rosy?":

VIDEO: "ROSY?"

And then this happens (Over. And Over. And Over):

VIDEO: RING AROUND THE ROSY

A Full Sentence!

On Tuesday night, Avery wowed us yet again with her ever-growing arsenal of words by arranging five in a row to form a perfect sentence. 

"I gave Manuel a hug!"



Brandi, Bo & Zac's Visit Part 4

We spent our final day together hanging out at home playing the Wii, and at the pool (where Avery had a mega-meltdown), followed by dinner at my mom's house with the "Guncles" and Avery's Great-Grandparents.

Another attempt at a "cousins" picture with Avery making her escape...



Avery woke up both Thursday and Friday morning asking for "The Bo" and "Gac." She will miss her cousins and Auntie Brandi greatly until next year! 

Brandi, Bo & Zac's Visit Part 3

Today we spent a gorgeous afternoon at Emerald Bay in Laguna, first on the beach and then at the pool for a little while. Avery of course did not like to touch the sand, but she was really excited about the water and actually seemed to have a good time despite the fact that there was sand everywhere!

VIDEO: AVERY TALKING TO THE OCEAN

VIDEO: AVERY JUMPING IN THE SURF

Standing in the "pool" we all made for her (but taking special precaution not to touch the sides):

At one point I took Avery out of the water and brought her up to wrap her in a towel and warm her up. I took off her water shoes and set her down on her feet in the sand, swaddling a towel around her. She was cold so I thought she would be happy to get dry and warm, but instead she started shouting, "No, no, no, no, no!" and shoved the towel off. It took me a minute before I realized that she was upset because her wet feet were now covered in sand. She kept saying "Off?" because she wanted the sand off of her feet. I tried to tell her that it was okay, and my feet were sandy too and it's okay to have sand on our feet. But she did not care what I thought.  She sat down to try to take off what she must have thought were shoes made out of sand.  But as soon as she sat down, then her hands and butt were also covered in sand, so there was nothing left to do but freeze in panic and burst into tears.  Luckily Josh walked up and we got her all cleaned off and set her on a clean towel. The towel worked as well as a playpen because she wouldn't leave the towel for fear of touching the sand again.

My somewhat decent attempt at a "cousins" picture today:

The pool was warmer than the ocean, just as fun, and less sandy:

Saying hi to Grandma from the kiddy pool:

VIDEO: SO EXHAUSTED BUT STILL SO HAPPY TO BE JUMPING IN THE POOL WITH GRANDMA

Stay tuned tomorrow for our last day with Brandi, Bo and Zac...



Brandi, Bo & Zac's Visit Part 2

On Sunday Josh took everyone to Venice Beach, so Avery and I hung out at home together, since we couldn't all fit in one car and she needed to take a nap anyway.



When the gang arrived back home, Avery was very happy as she had been asking for "The Bo" and "Gac" the entire time they were gone. She spent some time playing catch with the boys before they took off to take an evening swim at the pool.

I took her over to the pool just for a few minutes before her bath so she could watch the boys swim. But of course she wanted to get into the pool when she saw them in the water. Next thing I knew I was thigh-deep in the pool holding onto her in her diaper.

This morning we slept in (Avery slept until almost 8:00!) and then hung out at home again until her nap was over.

At 2:00 we ventured to the Santa Ana Zoo.

Avery was marginally more interested in the animals this time than she was last time. 

She spent most of the day running from us, and pushing the stroller.

There was some added excitement when Grandma showed up!

Brandi and I had one goal today... To get a frame-worthy photo of the "cousins" for Boompa and Sheila.  After taking many like this:

We were finally able to get a couple like this:

Stay tuned tomorrow for our trip to Laguna Beach!