Happy Birthday Mommy!

Avery helped me celebrate my "golden" birthday with a day at the zoo, dinner and pup-pups (cupcakes)! As you can see, the pup-pups were a big hit.

Do I have something on my face?

I LOVE chocolate!

Cheese!

Ready for the zoo guys!

There's a tiger back there dad!

Old Macdonald!

Avery got a Fisher Price "Little People" house for Christmas from her Nina (grandma), but we couldn't get it home with us on the airplane, so we returned it so we could buy it again once we got home. Well, a few Targets later and we couldn't find the house. So, we got this awesome farm instead. Which really, is perfect. It can remind Avery of where her mommy grew up! And, she does love all the animals and animal sounds it makes.

Girls weekend (+Bennett)

Avery and I ventured to the small town of Home to the Pinneo's beach house for a weekend of R&R and great times with great friends. Avery came home on Saturday to have a little daddy time and give mommy a little baby break. It was great to sleep in and lounge for a couple days (thank you Chris!), but I was very ready to get home when the weekend was done. That was the longest Avery and I have been apart and we were both really excited to see each other when she woke up Monday morning. The weekend was filled with a lot of laughter, food, relaxation, more food, and great friends. This has been a tradition for the last 6 years and it is more fun each year. Enjoy the pics!

Our view from the house.

"The girls" (+Bennett, sorry buddy)

Lunch time!

And more eating.

Ready for some exploring

Dance Party!

Story time

Silly Girl

Avery is becoming quite the clown as she is getting older. She is learning new tricks every day. I think she says at least one new word a day, usually more. They are hard to understand if you don't speak her language, but once you get it, it's clear. She now knows the signs (sign language) for more, eat, thank you, and all done. We are working on please. She says her version of the word when she does the sign too. For example, "mo" is "more", "hup" is "help" and "tankssssss" is "thank you". She also knows what the bear, tiger, monkey, dog, cat, cow, and crow say. She is always doing things to try to make us laugh too. She has a lot of funny faces that she does to make us laugh. Then she'll do things like this photo that just kill me. She found Bennett's hat this morning and hid by the stairs to put it on and came out with this grin on her face. She has also discovered how the trash can works, and searches for anything she can to throw away. This could work to our advantage....

Goofball!

Woodland Park Zoo

We got a membership to the Woodland Park Zoo for Christmas, so the babies and I took advantage of the semi-nice weather and visited some of the animals and then played in Zoomazium. The zoo is only a few miles from our house, which will make it easy to go as often as we want. It was great to get out of the house, the babies had a great time seeing the animals (though it must have been nap time, since there wasn't a lot of movement from the animals) and playing with all the kids there. I can't wait until the weather is much better so we can make trips to the zoo a regular occurrence.

I wonder what's in here???

Nap time for the gorillas.

See the jaguar? It was nap time for him too.

Family Fun at Alki!

I was suppose to work all weekend, but got a day off on Sunday. We were feeling lazy, so we decided to take a trip to West Seattle, to Alki Beach. We like to walk along the water and take in the great views of the mountains, ferries, and the city. Avery enjoys all the dog watching she can do.

Weekend Fun

We decided to get a membership to the Seattle Children's Museum with some of Avery's Christmas money. We had to see what it was all about this weekend. It will be a great way for Avery and I to get out of the house on rainy days. I think Avery is really excited! This was also a bit of a hard week as Avery is getting over a cold and getting more teeth. She didn't have any trouble getting her first 8 teeth, she barely let us know. Not the case now that we are onto the bigger teeth. Let's just hope they all come at once, and QUICKLY!

Teething is not fun!

Ready for a run.

Not enjoying the fountain at Seattle Center.

Christmas in Seattle

We celebrated our family Christmas on January 1, after we got back from Michigan. We decided there was just not enough time to do it before. It was a nice day, except Chris woke up with the stomach flu and was not excited to do much. We opened gifts in the morning and just had a quiet day together. We had our Christmas dinner on the 2nd, once Chris was ready to eat again.

We forgot to tell her the stroller is for her doll....

Happy New Year!

I've decided that one of my new year's resolutions will be to be better about keeping our webpage updated. I've also been wanting to start a blog instead of the babypage, what better time to start? We had a great time at home with all our families. We had Christmas on the 25th at Grandma Beth's, Great-Grandma Gene's, Great Grandma Joyce and Great Grandpa Phil, and finally with her Nina at Uncle JT and Aunt Jessica's. The 26th was spent celebrating the Manchester Christmas. Finally, on the 27th we went to Grandpa and GB Johnston's to celebrate with them and Anna. We were all spoiled, as always, and were sad to leave everyone, but happy to get back home and relax a little!

Ready for the flight home (she didn't really fly like this).

Our awesome new nephew, Grady. Such a cutie!

Ready for sledding!

Not so fast Uncle JT!

Flannery graciously sharing her new gift.

Avery's not so sure about Uncle Steven just yet.

Opening her first gift of the day.