Yes, I am finally posting Christmas pictures! I'm still not finished editing them all and since Shayne and I got a little camera happy, I'm going to put them in separate posts. So here's the first batch!
Christmas with my family....
I know, I know, this is a little late but as I said before, I am trying to play catch up. I will start out by saying that our little Poots went through a transformation over Christmas break. She went from army crawling to completely "normal" crawling, and from grabbing onto furniture to pulling up and then cruising. For a while, she wasn't able to get back down from her new found standing position, but she quickly fixed this problem by pointing to her mommy or daddy and saying "deh" (for "down") for assistance. Yesterday, she started bending over to reach toys as she stood and today she has learned to sit back down on her own. She shows pride in this by clapping for herself after she sits. Since she is now more mobile, she has decided to embark on the rest of the house rather than sticking to her play area in the living room. Unfortunately one of her favorite places to go is the bathroom, and it did not take her long to discover the toilet...the bathroom door now remains closed.
Avery is still a little chatterbox. She will say "deh" when she is done with her bottle, which is usually followed with a throwing of the bottle (just in case you didn't get the hint with the "deh"). She is using her "more" sign all the time when she wants more food. She attempts to sing the "Hip Hip Hooray" song from her favorite show, "Super Why" (wait, I don't let my small child watch TV, not even when I need a break....I have no idea where she learned that song:) ). You can ask her what a duck says and she'll say "cack cack cack," a monkey says "ah, ah, ah," and a sheep says "baaa." She likes to say "pretty" and "aw, man!" Dixie is beginning to become a two syllable word....and something with fur, which is fun to pull out by the handful. She loves to look at pictures displayed around the house and she will occasionally say what sounds like "who's that" as she looks at them. Avery loves to read books and sometimes she will pretend to read them herself. She also loves pretending to talk on the phone. She'll hold one of her 200 phones to her ear, say "hey" and "bye bye," and sometimes blow a kiss.
It's so hard to believe that she is only weeks away from turning a year old. These little, precious beings simply grow way too fast! 
I am SO behind in my postings! Christmas was a whirlwind and we are gearing up for the big birthday this month! I plan on an 11 month post soon in addition to all about our Christmas shenanigans. And Shayne and I purchased a new camera (a little Christmas present for ourselves) which we are are too excited about, thus resulting in picture overload...so be prepared!
Could it be that we actually got a decent snow for the first time in forever or did I just dream it?!? Nope, we did indeed get a good snow...for real!
Last Friday I decided to go on to work. I figured I wouldn't be there for very long with the anticipated snow storm threatening to close the center (or at least send my "too scared to drive in snow" self home, whichever happened first), but I at least wanted to get some things to take home to work on. Well, that turned out not to be the best idea. On my way to work, it was already starting to snow and cover the ground...this was at 6:45 am. Let's just go ahead and get this little disclaimer out of the way: I insist on owning a 4-wheel drive vehicle, but by no means does this make me comfortable driving in the snow...moving right along....
I was driving Shayne's truck because both (yes both) of my headlights were burned out in my Trailblazer. This should be fine, I thought, driving a truck and all in the snow. WRONG! The center closed not long after I got there and when I struggled to pull out of my parking spot, I knew I was in trouble. So here I go, swerving down the road as if there were a 9 year old behind the wheel driving the speed of a 90 year old. In the meantime, I am totally freaking out and sharing the freak out with my mom on my cell phone (sorry about that mom...specifically the part where I'm letting you know how I'm rolling through an intersection without a working stoplight and without brakes). Needless to say, I immediately pulled over to the nearest parking lot and put my shaky, not-so-happy self in park. My wonderful dad came to my rescue and took me on the long trip home. The roads were treacherous, but the snow was beautiful. We ended up with at least a foot.
Friday night around 7:00 pm we finally lost power. Shayne, Avery and I piled in our bed that was covered in a massive amount of blankets. The next day we decided to hang out at Shayne's dad's house, since we were still without power and he has a nice wood furnace that kept us toasty. Later in the day, Shayne's dad took him to Waynesville to get his truck and ended up wrecking on the way there, which is a whole other story in itself. Both made it out okay, although the truck suffered a little damage.
Despite all the craziness, we loved the snow. I can't remember the last time we had a snow this big and it has been long awaited. Avery seemed to enjoy it too, although she was afraid to touch it or basically move in it at all. We did get some great pictures of her, though, which I am of course posting! We hope to have more snows like this with opportunities to create great memories with our little one... just don't expect to see me driving in it!
So I've decided to change my "Video of the week" to "Random video," being that I've become such a blog slacker lately. Now I will periodically post a random video instead of posting one weekly, so keep checking back because you never know when one may pop up!
This video is pretty cool and I'm pretty sure I'm going to ask Shayne to do our lights this way next Christmas...he has a year to get started so it shouldn't be that big of a task, right?!? Make sure you pause the music in the right column of my blog so you can hear the video. Enjoy!
