Ava's New Table

While Grandpa and Grandma were here, we went shopping for her Christmas present. We wanted to buy her a table and chairs set and we found the perfect one at IKEA. Ava loves it and does everything at this table now, including cooking, coloring, play-doh, eating, tea parties, etc. We put it close to her kitchen and she will go back and forth pretending. It is the cutest thing ever. I will try to get a video of her soon.

Playing Tea Party with Grandpa.

Grandma's turn now!

Visit From Grandpa & Grandma

This past weekend, Grandpa and Grandma came down for a visit. We had a great time and really enjoyed spending time with them. Unfortunately, Ava has not seen them since last March so we were a little concerned with how she would do with them. She loved them! She was obsessed with making sure that they were always near her and would count heads whenever we were going anywhere. She had a great time! We kept ourselves very busy with a trip to Vero Beach to see Curt's Uncle Tom and Aunt Paulette, went to a home and garden show in Orlando, and did a little shopping in between everything. Here are some pictures from our great weekend!

Grandpa reading a story to Ava

Grandpa and Ava watching TV. Ava was in her favorite spot in the corner all covered up in a blanket! So cute!

Grandma and Ava reading a book.

We had to make a visit to the local Red Lobster! It was so good and we all ate way too much!

All ready for church.

Bath time! Daddy did her hair in a mohawk and Grandma thought it was the cutest thing ever! :)

In the hot tub at Uncle Tom and Aunt Paulette's.

Grandpa reading another story to Ava.

THANKS FOR COMING! WE MISS YOU ALREADY!

Ava's Big Girl Bed

One of the things we wanted to get done before baby Isaac arrives, was refinish Ava's future big girl bed. This was my bed frame from when I grew up. We are converting Ava's crib to a toddler bed and she will sleep in that until May sometime. Isaac will just sleep in our room in a play yard until Ava moves into this bed, which is also our guest bed. Whenever guests come, Ava will get to have a slumber party in Mommy and Daddy's room on the floor! What a lucky girl! :) Last weekend, we had nothing else planned and it was extremely cold out (high in the 40's!) so we decided to refinish her bed. As you can see, we forgot to do the nightstand but Curt will do that some other weekend and it won't take a long. It was a lot of fun and we are very happy with the finished product. This is the bedding that I bought at TJ Maxx and we will repaint the room sometime in the next month. We haven't decided how we are going to pain it yet so if any of you have any suggestions, please send them our way! :)

Finished Product!
Finished but not put together!

Before Picture!

Big Girl

I took these pictures this morning. I wanted to see if her hair would fit into pig tails and sure enough, it does. Isn't she so cute?! She reminds me of my niece Emily. This outfit used to be Emily's too so that helps a lot! She is getting so big and days like today make us realize how fast time flies. We can't believe how independent she has become and what a wonderful, beautiful little girl she is turning into.

Merry Christmas from the Cattanach's

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

We hope you had a very good day and got a chance to relax as much as we did. We ended up staying here in Orlando this year by ourselves. It was sad not seeing family but it was so nice to just relax at home and not have a lot to do. Overall it was a great day! We opening presents, ate cinnamon rolls, took a walk in the 75 degree weather (sorry for all those with snow...I couldn't resist), ate Christmas dinner and played a ton of Wii. We bought ourselves a Wii for Christmas and it has been so much fun. I think we are already addicted. I hope you enjoy the pictures. They are a little mixed up but I am tired and off to watch a movie. Merry Christmas!

Ava and I snuggling in the morning when she woke up. This is before she saw what Santa brought her. As she walks into the living room and sees the kitchen, she wasn't quite sure if it was okay to go play with it and looked back at me several times for reassurance. (And don't worry, it may look like Shadow is about to attack Ava but she is just yawning! :)Look at my kitchen everyone!!!!
Investigating all the doors and looking to see what was inside....lots of food and utensils.
Just a picture of Shadow. She had to make the blog since it was Christmas. :) She even got some ham today!

Daddy and Ava looking at the Mickey Mouse movie from cousins Emily and Alex. Anything Mickey Mouse was definitely the hit present this year!

Puzzles from Aunt Mel. She loves them!

More kitchen pictures...On her tip toes .

Putting a pretend hot dog in the microwave. Guess she helps mommy out when I warm up her hot dogs.

This is one of the many many videos that we took of her playing with her kitchen. She knew exactly what to do with it and didn't stop playing with it all day. She was exhausted by the end of the day.

Ava opening up the Micky Mouse DVD from her cousins. This was the best video we got of her and it shows just how excited she was to get it. Unfortunately, we were not aware that it was Mickey Mouse and opened that first. She didn't want much to do with the other presents for awhile so we had to take a break until she got distracted by something else. But, we did watch the movie this morning already. Thank you Nelson, Jenn, Emily and Alex...she loves it!!!

GRADUATION

On December 18, 2009, Curt graduated from the University of Central Florida with his MBA. We are so proud of him! It was a long three years taking classes, being away from home 2-3 nights a week, and studying every weekend. But it was definitely worth it. He graduated from the largest university in Florida and the 3rd largest university in the United States. It was an incredible ceremony that even included bag pipes playing during the processional. Unfortunately, the lighting was awful in the stadium and I couldn't get many good pictures. Sorry that they are so dark. Congratulations Curt...we are proud of you!

The Graduate!
The graduate with Ava. She doesn't know what to think of Daddy's outfit!

Curt is walking up the steps.

Walking across the stage as they butcher our last name! And we even spelled it out phonetically and they still got it wrong!!!

YAY!!! He's graduated!

Mickey Mouse...

...ADDICTION!!! Sweet little Ava is completely addicted to Mickey Mouse. She could watch him and his friends over and over again all day long. If you want to see a smile on her face, show her one of the characters and she will get the biggest grin ever! We were in Best Buy yesterday and she saw Minnie Mouse flash on one of the TV's but then disappeared. She went crazy! She was yelling "Minmie Minmie" throughout the entire store because she was so excited that she was there in the store. Luckily, she didn't start crying when she never showed up again but that is how addicted she is. We have to take at least 2 of the characters everywhere we go...Minnie is usually one of them. For Christmas, her friend Haley-Reese got her a set of plastic characters and she loves them. Here are two pictures that we took while she was watching a Christmas episode of Micky Mouse Clubhouse.

Don't even think about interrupting her when Mickey is on TV!

Another Visit With Family

Curt's cousin and their family were in town for two weeks and we enjoyed getting together with them. Jerome, Helen, Jake and Missy were kind enough to invite us over to their resort to spend a day in the pool and just relaxing. Jake and Missy have four kids (Timmy, Becca, Isaac and Caleb) and Ava loved hanging out with all of them. Her and Caleb are only about 5 months apart so that was nice. She thought she was such a big girl since she was hanging out with older kids. :) Here are a few pictures of the kids playing. If you can't tell, Ava really liked Timmy! It was great to see you all!

Ava and Isaac

They watched movie in the bedroom while the adults played a game. Ava thought this was great. And they eventually got popcorn in bed too! I think we started a bad habit! :)

Before Christmas Events!

Just a few of our before Christmas events. We had a lot more but I forgot to take pictures and will get those from friends soon.

This past Monday, we drove down to Vero Beach (a little less than 2 hours) for the day to visit Curt's Uncle Tom, Aunt Paulette and cousin Matthew. We had a great time and just love getting together with them. Ava was such a big girl and even took a nap! :) We enjoyed visiting wtih them, eating lots of great food that Paulette made, and sitting outside in the believe-it-or-not cold weather (high of 60!). I know for all of you up north, you would love a 60 degree day but 60 here is actually really cold, especially when you have a wind. Here are a few pictures of Ava opening some gifts. That seems to be the only pictures we took all day. oops!
Ava got a "I'm a Big Sister" book. It's her first and she loves it!

Ava opening a gift.

They got her some Mickey Mouse books....her absolute favorite!! Couldn't have gotten a better gift.

And Sesame Street Books too...her other favorite!

Looking at the Sesame Street books...they squeak!

Ava and her buddy Gavin at our town Christmas parade. It was very cold this day too.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Early! Here are some pictures of us decorating our tree and just having fun.

Mommy and Ava "Santa's helper"
Ava decorating the tree

Ava all ready for church...and reading her Bible! How Sweet!

Ava and Mommy sitting on the porch.

Ava and Daddy decorating the tree

Ava the reindeer! :)

Here is a video of Ava helping me decorate the tree. She loved decorating the tree. Of course, all the decorations were put on the bottom half where she could reach. Then about 40 minutes later, they were all taken off and carried all over the house. She even threw a few ornaments and they shattered all over the kitchen. Now our tree is decorated on the top half only. Off to buy some shatter proof, child friendly ornaments this year! :)