Into the Third Year III

Ava spends more time these days looking out the window at the snow than she does playing inside her pink castle...

 

...but that doesn't mean that the castle stays empty.

 

And Ava & Mommy do still use it sometimes...

 

Grandma Stella with all nine of her great grandchildren on her 92nd Birthday.  You get a halo when you turn 92....

 

She wants her ponytails in all the time now.

 

Listening to me one morning as I tell her that today is Picture Day at daycare, so she needs to skip the ponytails for once and let me comb her hair out.  She's not too sure about that.

 

Mesmerized by the many books and toys during a return visit to the special Children's Reading Room on campus.

 

The Reading Room has better light for pictures than at home, and certainly it has way more books, the sight of which keeps Ava still momentarily, allowing for photos like this.

 

Fridays now mean she's at home all day with Daddy.  Here, she thinks about what we are going to draw.

 

Easter 2005...playing a Wiggles-themed colorforms type game with Aunt Sessie and Cousin Valerie.  The big white bunny who seems to be playing was one of Ava's gifts from us earlier that morning at home.

 

Still playing....

 

Easter egg hunt time outside later on.  Got one!

 

And another one!

 

Got 'em all!

 

A collage done from stickers.  Ava likes stickers a lot.

 

She likes sweets, too.  Here she and Mommy look at the pie selections at a restaurant.

 

Ava sees one that she likes!

 

Anoushka Shankar giving thanks for the audience's applause after her sitar performance in The Concert for George.

 

And Ava imitating her as she watches.

 

She also has been imitating real guitar playing lately when she picks up her Wiggles guitar.

 

7:38am...parking lot at Day Care.  She lets me take a picture or two...

 

Then it's time to let me know she's had enough.  She was giggling, though.

Here's a video (5.6 mb) of Ava spotting me when I arrived at daycare to pick her up one afternoon.  She may give me a tough time some days (mostly because she's two, I figure...), but having scenes like this to replay shows me how she really feels about me, and I get a nice greeting every day.

Inspired by The Onion... The picture is authentic--the blimp was there, as was her frown at that moment.

But she was all smiles for her Hanami pictures a few weeks later.  This was the third year that we did this with her.  The first time two years ago she looked like this.

 

Another...

And another...

With Cousin Morgan at her First Communion party.

Later that day, holding some of her beloved big dandelions.  Strangely, it wasn't windy at all that day...(Mommy's joke).

 

On the swing at Uncle Mark's the same afternoon.

Home