For Stacie

I made a slideshow of Avery's photo shoot with Stacie. It is pretty long, but if you want to see her in all of her red-christmas-dress glory then have at it.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Christmas Morning

Typical of a Christmas morning, the Sauter kids are up a 5 a.m. to look at the tree and speculate about what they got in their stockings. You'd think that we grow out of this, but it is still my favorite thing on Christmas.The sleepy family on Christmas morning. I admit that I gave in to peer pressure. All of the adults were up and chatting and some people (the boys) were anxious to get the party started and so I woke up Avery. Yes, I woke up the BABY so that the big boys could have their presents. I think that this sets a bad precedent. Avery wasn't too sure about opening stockings and presents at first. She was still so tired. Then she opened up a gift from Grandma Texas that changed her mind. It was a book with a button that, when pushed, would laugh like a giddy little kid. Avery was so excited! She just wanted us to push the button over and over and over.

With a face like this I could read books to her ALL DAY LONG!

After our own Christmas festivities we headed over to the Jackson's for Christmas breakfast and more presents. The day was relaxed but filled with fun activities. At the end of the day Avery was supposed to be playing with Grandpa in the front room. When I went in to check on her I found that she had stolen her binky and blanket and found a cozy spot to put herself to sleep. That's when you know it has been a successful holiday; even the babies are happily tucking themselves into bed.

Christmas Eve

We spent Christmas Eve over at the Jackson's this year. The day consisted of games, food, picture taking and stockings. Avery also spent much of the day decorating and undecorating the tree. I dressed Avery up in her adorable Christmas dress (thanks Aunt Elizabeth!) and tried to get some good pictures of her. Taking pictures of a VERY active 1 year-old is way harder than I thought. Almost every picture I have of her in the last 2 months is a blur. Luckily Stacie got a bunch of cute ones, but I couldn't possibly post all of them here. It was great that everyone could come home this year. Stacie made it back from Texas and Stephanie and Lyle drove out from California so that we could all be together for the holiday. Avery had a blast being the center of attention for the whole day. She LOVES being around her aunts and uncles.

I think that Avery tripled her book collection thanks to Aunt Stephanie. Her stocking was full of Dr. Seuss board books that we can now add to our rotation of night-time reading. I think that if she could talk, Avery could quote Goonight Moon.

Opening stockings on Christmas Eve is one of my favorite Jackson traditions. It is kind of like an amuse bouche. It is just a little taste of what is to come the next day when we all gather together again.

After an exremely busy day and only one short nap, Avery was too tuckered out to even make through stockings. She was in her jammies and taking her evening night-cap while half of the group still had gifts to open. Oh, well. And another busy day ahead tomorrow.

Just Breakin' Us In

Children have a lot of milestones in their lives. They get their first tooth, they crawl, walk, talk, wave, and many other things that we feel the need to document. I feel that as parents we also have milestones that are meant to break us in to this life of parenthood. There is the first blow-out, fever, big fall, etc., that a baby goes through, but that we must deal with. Last night, or early this morning, Joe and I had a milestone; we had our first midnight run to the emergency room.

Avery woke up around 11 with this TERRIBLE cough that had Joe thinking a dog had snuck into her room somehow. We put her back to bed and she fell right to sleep, but I could not go back to bed without knowing what was ailing my poor baby. Into the car we went and over to Good Sam's ER. 1 hour, several tears, and $100 later, Avery has croup. Nothing to worry about really. I admit that when I heard "croup" I immediately thought of the movie Anne of Green Gables when Anne rushes over to the Barry's house in the middle of the night to save Minnie May from certain death by croup. I know that it is hardly so devastating now, but come on, how can anyone who has seen that movie NOT skip a beat or two while the mind processes the possibilities.

Avery is doing fine now. She is on a steroid to help with the cough and she is super cuddly. I admit to some extra crankiness. But, like I said, she is just breaking us in.

Success!

Have you ever thought of a cool project or craft that you would like to do but weren't sure you could do it? Have you ever taken on a project that just did not turn out the way you pictured it in your head? Any woman who has been through Young Women's or an Enrichment activity has had a craft put in front of her with a perfect example to follow, and then had her own craft fall very short of the example displayed.
I feel like this happens to me with every craft, sewing project, or artsy activity I have ever done. The reality NEVER matches what I saw in my brain. The edging is all wrong, the fabrics weren't the ones I was hoping for, my hand wasn't steady enough on the lines, etc.
I have had a stocking in mind for Avery since last Christmas. I have thought about it on and off for a whole year. What materials I would use, what colors, what details I would like. I admit that I almost didn't even want to try because what I had in my mind was so cute and I was just sure I could not replicate it. Especially since there was no pattern for what I wanted, I was going to have to do it all on my own. But the desire to create something for Avery was too overwhelming. I NEEDED to try and make her this stocking that was haunting my brain.
So, I headed to Joann's (all Christmas stuff is already 60% off) to see if I could find the fabrics and little details I wanted. And then a miracle happened; I did. I had such specific fabrics that I wanted and they were there! How often does that happen? My problem is that my ideas are usually so specific that I can't ever find what I'm looking for. My happiness overflowed.
I admit that the most daunting task was the actual cutting. I had to make the patterns for everything myself and I was worried that they would come out all wrong. And then another miracle happened; they didn't. They came out perfect. What was going on?
So it was time to put all of the pieces together and see if they really would work together, or if I could put it together the way that I envisioned. And the final miracle; they did and I could.
My finished project, Avery's Christmas Stocking, looks exactly like I wanted it too. For once, my project turned out perfectly. I am so proud of myself right now. I will cry the day she decides she wants a new one!

CONGRATULATIONS!

To Jon and Val on their new baby, Zoe!

Been Gone So Long

I was doing so well this year. I was blogging 1-2 times a week. I would catch up if I missed a week or two. Now it has been 5 weeks. 5 WEEKS! And as I sit to finally blog I find that I have very little to blog about. Thanksgiving came and went and I have no pictures to show for it. My house is all Christmas-y and I don't feel enthusiastic about sharing. Avery has gotten bigger, more developed, shoot, she is walking! and I can't get excited about blogging again. I am in a funk. An end-of-the-year funk and I can't seem to get out of it. The thought of backtracking the last 5 weeks to find something to share with you just makes me want to take a nap. But I will persevere. If you check back through the last month you will find posts that were not there yesterday. Hooray.

The Botanical Gardens

We were invited to go the the Botanical Gardens this last weekend to see the Luminarios that they do every year. Essentially it is those little bags with candles in them that people put on the ground at Christmas to light their pathways. It was cool. There were a LOT of them and it was interesting to think about the process of lighting all of those candles. But it was not really flashy or exciting, and we had all taken our kids and this was not really a kids venue.

The real entertainment was all of the bands that were there to perform all over the garden.

Had it just been couples we would have had the time to sit and listen to a flamenco band, brass band, bell (yes

, bells) band, and, best of all, a jazz band. While we got to spend a few

minutes listening to each one, the real party was when the kids were let loose at the jazz performance. Dancing and hijinks ensued. I think that Avery had a crush on the drummer. She couldn't keep her eyes off of him. Should I be worried already?

In the end, I would NOT reccommend this as a family outing. At $20 a person you really should stick to making it a night out with your honey. The luminarios were fine, but the bands are why you go.

Mystery Music

I love Christmas music. I have had it playing in the house since Thanksgiving. I was beginning to think that someone in the house liked it even more than myself because it kept getting louder and louder. I would turn it on and start chores and then it would suddenly be louder. Or, I would turn it on after it had been off for a while, and it would be blaring at full volume. What the heck? Who was messing with my music? Then Joe caught this on camera:

Up the stairs and through the gaps! Sneaky girl! What can I

say? She loves her Christmas tunes. I guess putting stuff up on the bookshelf doesn't ensure their safety.

Favorite Hang-Outs

Avery has a few select places that she chooses to play most of the time. When I'm busy doing chores around the house I can generally count on finding her in one of a few places.

At the playground. Okay, so she can't get here without me, but I think that she would live at the playground if I let her. This one is indoors at Barnes and Noble but she prefers the ones in the neighborhood that have slides. She is addicted to slides.

Nate's room. When she decides that she wants to hang with Nathan, and that is often, she can get down the stairs and in his room in about 8 seconds. She is speedy. What's not to like? The room is full of controllers and swords and books and Nathan himself.

In the kitchen. She would love to be sitting ON the counter to watch me cook, but that leads to premature grayness. She can actually climb up the couch and its cushions onto the bar and over onto the counter. This arrangement is much better for my nerves.

And her #1 go-to place: the bookcase under the stairs. Granted, most of her toys are located here, but really that just happened because she was already spending half of her time hanging out under that spiral staircase anyway. Now she thinks that going UP those same stairs is fun so that is a new drama to deal with 88 times a day.

Morning Routine

1. Have breakfast

2. Take a shower

3. Get dressed for the day

4. Make the bed

5. Brush teeth

The trick is getting her to STOP brushing her teeth.

Goodbye Texas

We will miss you and all the people we love there. Hope to see you again soon.

Halloween

What can I say? She was adorable, her cousins had a blast, and she was ready to call it quits after 2 streets. I don't blame her. She still can't walk on her own, she was overdue for a nap, and suckers, especially tootsie pops, don't last forever. Now that I know she reacts this well every time she has one (I have tried twice now) I think that I will not be giving her one again for a LONG time! Candy makes children crazy.

Scare on the Square

Joe and I both enjoy walking around downtown areas. It can be a nice big city like Dallas or sometimes it is even nicer when it is a smaller city like McKinney. We like the old buildings and the way they are renovated to house new fun stores or places to eat. We think that you can find some of the coolest places to shop in such areas. Due to the weather, Joe and I had to keep postponing our outing to Old Downtown McKinney. The day before Halloween the weather finally cleared up and we decided to venture out. What luck that we did!

When we arrived everything looked fairly normal. Spiffy restaurants, cool old hotels, antiques, boutiques, and lots of other awesome stuff. We noticed a few children in costumes with their parents and thought that it was cute that everyone was feeling so festive. About 30 minutes later we realized we had stumbled upon something amazing. The number of children in costume were increasing and the number of shops blocked by witches, wizards, ghouls and vampires was doing like wise. What we had found completely by accident was McKinney's "Scare on the Square."

How cool is this? Just after 4 o'clock all of the shops shut down and the owners come out all dressed up for the holiday. Then hundreds and HUNDREDS of children with their parents come down and trick or treat from store to store. We were lucky we showed up when we did because not even an hour later there was NO parking and there was a solid line of trick-or-treaters going around the whole downtown area! We saw some of the cutest costumes ever and the festive feeling was making me giddy. Add to that the yummy cake treats I had and I'd call this a marvelous afternoon!

The Dallas Aquarium

It is more like an indoor zoo, but they insist on calling it an aquarium. Our first few days in Texas were chilly, cloudy, and RAINY. We had all these great plans to visit pumpkin patches and enjoy the fall weather, and then had to make last minute changes to our plans. The aquarium was a great alternative on out rainy Monday.We had hoped that Avery was at least at the point in her life when she could enjoy watching the animals. She may not know what they are or what sound they make, but who doesn't like watching monkeys swing from the branches or manatees wrestle? I'll tell you who: Avery. With all of the up-close-and-personal animals available, Avery wanted to walk up and down the wet stairs the whole time. There were sharks to see and a jaguar up close and a sloth 6 inches away and sea dragons and penguins and white alligators and... get it?! And Avery wants STAIRS! Silly girl.

On our way out, but...

We are leaving for Texas in just a few hours and I still have packing to do, but I just got these pictures yesterday and I HAD to post them. There are so many more that I love but no one likes a slide show with 130 pictures! These were taken by my good friend, Ruth, so if you are interested, check out her blog and contact her. I have so many talented friends!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Nathan

I should have posted about this before, but my brother, Nathan, moved in a week ago. I'm pretty excited to have some family down here with me, but Avery is even more excited to have Nathan here. She has always loved to go down the stairs, but now that there is a person down there with a room full of things she has never seen, and probably should never touch, I can't keep her upstairs anymore. Luckily Nathan is very tolerant and is willing to entertain Avery a lot of the time. And he tries his best to keep his Wolverine claws out of reach.

Happy Anniversary!

Joe and I have been married for 4 years TODAY! I know, it seems like just yesterday we were celebrating Avery's birthday. Oh, wait, we were! And that is why I love October. The weather changes and gets cool and breezy, my baby was born this month, and, best of all, I met and then married Joe in October (keep in mind those two things were a year apart). I am happy to say that I still love being married to Joe and I can't wait to have more adventures with him in the future.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AVERY!!!

Today is the day. Avery is one year old!! She has become the most hilarious baby over the last year. She talks and giggles with her dad and grown-up friends (2 and 3 year olds!), she goes up and down stairs, she is the FASTEST crawler I know (still no walking yet), and she can get hours of fun from a cat toy (thanks Michelle!). She is the joy of our lives and we LOVE having her in our family.

Very last minute we had a little party for the monkey at our friends, the Hobbs, house. Just some cake, ice cream, and presents, but it was too fun to see Avery interact with all of her favorite people, both young and old. Well, older anyway.

Sorry, the slideshow is REALLY long this month.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Video Games...Already

I had a lot to do to get ready for my brother Nathan to move in. Lots of cleaning, rearranging, you know, stuff. I was afraid that Avery would be underfoot, bored, or just neglected while I tried to get stuff done. Luckily, Jared came over to play some video games with Joe. Little did I know that my little bird would LOVE them. I think that she could have sat and watched them play all day. I didn't let her, but she was definitely NOT bored that day. Something about Ultimate Alliance 2 just spoke to her. Thanks to Jared for the much needed escape for everyone!

Good Friends are Lemonade in Life

I learned this last week that I have very good friends. I think that I complain a lot that I don't have a lot of family down here. Really, besides my in-laws, I don't have any family. My mother lives in Texas and my sisters all live in Utah and Texas. (Brothers too, but you'll see why I list sisters specifically.)

On Thursday night I had a miscarriage. We weren't really telling people we were pregnant; we were afraid something like this would happen and we would have to un-tell everyone. It was pretty late at night when it happened, but we had just left Joe's kickball game so we knew a couple of our friends were up and about. After two phone calls I had people willing to babysit Avery, bring us food, come and sit with me, and generally do what ever I needed at that moment.

The next day was much the same. People wanting to know what they could do, what I needed, and if I was okay. It was amazing. A good friend even sent me flowers and red vines to cheer me up. Luckily I also have an amazing husband, so even though I had lots of friends willing to help out, Joe stayed home from work the next day and took care of me.

It was certainly a terrible and traumatic experience, but I don't think that I knew I had such loving friends until this week. So there we are; lemonade.

Special thanks to Anndalyn, Katie, Dom, Michelle and Ruth. And the most love and thanks to Joe.

Jazzercise

Remember when I left breakfast for Avery up to Joe? It was donuts. Powdered donuts. I sent him to change Avery's diaper before bed the other night; a not uncommon occurrence. But for some reason she came out looking like this:

What the heck? It's like he's never encountered a onesie and pants before and he clearly doesn't know how to use them. Poor jazzercise baby.

DoChara Photography

It's official; Avery is a model. She went in to have some pictures taken last week by my good friend, Jacqui, and now she is featured on Jacqui's official business blog: http://dochara.blogspot.com/.I told her that I would be MORE than happy to advertise for her so this is my pitch for her company, DoChara Photography.

If you live in the Phoenix area and need some photos taken, visit the above website or visit her official website at: http://www.docharaphotography.com/. You can see pictures of Avery there too! I'm only going to post a few of my favorite pictures for now. The rest of them will be in her monthly slide show in a few days. Isn't she the cutest?

Shoot

I thought I was going to have five minutes to post this morning but my baby just woke up and changed all of my plans. Later.

Playing Hard-to-Get

Avery loves to play hard-to-get. It doesn't always mean that she doesn't like you. In fact, it may mean that she likes you A LOT. She just loves to tease people when they compete for her attention. She will cling to one person while another one tries to coax her away. She will then turn away from them and hide her face like she is shy. As long as you are willing to play along, she is happy to play. When you stop playing, she will yell in your general direction until you start up again. Jared was her latest victim. While Avery clung to Elyssa (is that how you spell it?) Jared tried to woo her away. She would have none of it. She simply wanted to cuddle with Elyssa while Jared pouted at his misfortune. Then she would look his direction again making him think that he had a chance. Just as he would reach for her...BAM! She is cuddling up with Elyssa again. Little teaser.

Angela

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANGELA!!25 years old today. We love you!

Lemon/Lime

Do babies have a sour sense? Do their taste buds register tartness? I learned several weeks ago that Avery loves a good lemon or lime. Most of the time she just chews on a slice until she is covered in pulp or until it slips out of her hands. There was never any indication that the taste was unpleasant or sour. This week she FINALLY seemed to register that lemons and limes are tart. The funny thing is, this does not stop her from wanting the lemon or lime. If anything she likes the bitter bite and always wants more. Silly baby.

Are You Ready For Some Kickball?

Joe joined a kickball league. Did you know there are such leagues for adults? Well, there are. Every Thursday, Joe and group of friends and new acquaintances get together to test their skills, granted they are skills they probably have not used since the fourth grade, against other adults looking for some good old nostalgic fun. We missed the first game since we were in Utah but we were here in time for Joe to be part of a double-header on Thursday. Avery and I went to watch and cheer them all on. It was REALLY fun. I think the funniest part was that the other teams were literally playing drinking games when they weren't fielding or batting. What wasn't as funny was that the umps were drinking as they were officiating. It led to a couple of seriously questionable calls and tense situations. It may just be kickball, but we still want it to be a fair game! I should note that another hilarious point of the night was how SORE Joe was when all was said and done. Who would have thought that a couple of rounds of kickball could make a grown man so achy. I thought that I would have to leave early since the games started at 8 and 9, and Avery usually goes to sleep at 8. We were all presently surprised that she was not only awake the whole time, she was actually having fun. She sat through the first game holding on to a mini kickball, that her friend Effie had brought along, and staring intently at the players. It was like she was just wishing it could be her turn. So when there was a break between the games, Joe came over to spend a little time with us and he took Avery out on to the field. The next 10 minutes were spent doing this: She is already set for her first game! She was working so hard to kick the ball, though she mostly just kicked it backwards or bounced it with her foot. Still, it was awesome!