Kansas Part 2 - Ava's first trip to the Little Apple

Wednesday was another early morning for our family of three. We took off for Manhattan around 8:00am Our first stop on the list was Amanda's my college room-mate. It was so nice to get to spend the morning with Amanda it had been a long time since I'd seen her.

After spending a few minutes at Amanda's the four of us headed up to the Vet School. I knew this would be a big stop for Ava. All the ladies at the Vet School have a case of baby fever and rightfully so with several of them expected babies themselves. Ava got passed around and handled it beautifully. I was so excited to see all the ladies I miss them everyday.

After spending a good hour at the Vet School we swung by my cousin Sarah's house before she had to scurry off to work. Then we headed out for lunch and we of course went to Willie's! Lunch was great James came and met us along with my cousin Jodi and Jeremy's old room-mate Zach. The food once again was awesome and it was one more reason we had to miss Manhattan.

After lunch Amanda left us to go to class and Jeremy, James, Ava, and I headed to the mall. Here we bought Ava her K-State sock monkey we named Socks. It is perfect size for her and she already grips onto it and won't let it go.

We headed back to Seneca and had a great evening in Seneca with Jeremy's sisters and their kids again.

I know this post doesn't have any pictures which makes me sad but I'm not very good at remembering to take pictures. I'm always to busy talking with people! I hoping I can talk Jeremy into doing the post for the next two days because I'm sure you're all bored with my writing by now!

Kansas Part 1

So I wish I would have had time to blog everyday we were in Kansas because it would have made this overwhelming trip a lot easier however I didn't so I'm going to try and recall everything that happened.

We arrive Monday afternoon in KC and Jeremy's dad picked us up. Ava did amazing on the plane she was a little fussy in the beginning because she was hungry but we fed her and she pretty much slept the rest of the plane ride. Everyone was asking us about her and how old she was they all thought she was adorable. (this was at the end of the plane ride when the realized she was quite the whole time, might have been different had she screamed the entire way) The flight attendant even gave us a pair of flight wings for her which I thought was really cute! So our journey started at 6:00am that morning and we finally arrived in Seneca sometime after 3:00 PM and the SPOILING began.

Jeremy's sister Julia and her son Kendal pretty much came out immediately. They happened to arrive at the house the same time Jeremy's mom did and it was a little bit of an argument who got to hold her first. From this moment on I don't feel like Ava was ignored for 10 days. That evening Jeremy's sister Janelle and her kids came over, it was so fun to have all the cousins together for the first time.
On Tuesday Jeremy and I got up early and headed to Marysville so I could get my hair cut by Lacey. On our way to Marysville Jeremy asked me if I wanted to go to Hanover to see Max and Dean since Emily wasn't working that day. I of course said yes and Emily of course was all for the idea. So we ventured on down Hwy 36 to meet the Dragastin cousins. Max was so excited when we first got there however his interest in Ava last about 2 minutes then he was back off to his trucks. Dean, with his laid-back personality, just looked at her a grinned. Aunt Emily thought she was pretty special also will all her bows and ruffles.

Jeremy and I decided to take Max and Ava over to Washington to see/meet Papa Tom and Uncle Justin. We stopped by Justin's office first then out to the clinic to see Papa. My dad was so surprised and I know excited to see us. He was telling all the "old farmers" in the clinic that Ava was his grand-daughter and this was this first time he got to meet her. We swung by my house to see my mom over her lunch hour and she was excited we decided to come over. Jeremy, Max, Ava, & I headed back to Hanover and ate Ricky's for lunch with Emily and Dean.

We then headed back to Seneca to go meet Uncle James who was coming home for the afternoon. Uncle James was very proud and held her for over an hour while she slept. Ava has a thing for men with big shoulders.

That night we headed back over to Marysville for Pizza at Janelle and Ryan's. My entire family and Jeremy's entire family was there. This was very special for us. We love that our families get along and can spend time all together. Ava of course was passed around after she "wet" Aunt Janelle's floor. However we will blame this on daddy because he was a little slow with the diaper change.

So I've only made it through 2 days of our trip and the post is already lengthy so I will try to post again tomorrow about the day we spent in Manhattan.

There is No Place Like Home

So it is currently 4:30 am and once again I'm to excited to sleep! We are leaving for Kansas today and I'm so excited for Ava to meet everyone in Kansas. First however we have to get through the plane ride. I haven't been this nervous to travel on an airplane since I was a young girl going to California with only my brother and younger cousin. I just hope Ava can sleep through most of it and the other passengers on the plane don't hate us before it's all said and done!

Once again Kansas is going to be a jam packed trip with us trying to see as many people as possible. We are starting the trip out in Seneca, going to make a day trip to Manhattan on Wednesday, then Friday we will be Washington. Friday night I'm hosting a shower for Staci and Schuyler. I'm so glad I can do this I hate not being closer for all the wedding preparations. Saturday is going to be clean-up/set-up (again) for everyone on Sunday. We are having Ava baptized in Washington on Sunday evening. I'm really excited for this special event. Both Jeremy and my families will be there and that is very special to us. Ava will be wearing the same gown I was baptized it which also happens to be the same thing all my Dragastin's cousin's wore!

I know once again I'm posting without pictures but I promise when I can blog again I'll have lots of pictures of our Kansas trip!

31 Days

Our baby girl is official 1 month old today! I look back to that day and think about how everything happened so fast. A lot of people aren't able to say that about their labor but I can! My water broke approx 7:45am and she was born a quick 6 hrs later at 1:42pm. Jeremy and I still talk about how for the first couple hours of her life she hardly made a peep and we were wondering if she'd ever cry. Seems extremely foolish to us now!

Even though I couldn't see Ava for the first few moments of her life everyone in the room tells me she just came out and started looking around taking everything in. I remember holding her for the first time thinking that she was going to have her daddy's personality because she already seemed to be so laid back. At that moment I thought she might resemble me but it only took about 24 hours for her features to change and to realize she was her daddy all the way through.

This past month has been the best month of our life and Jeremy and I would like to thank everyone who has sent us a card, text message, e-mail, gift, or said a prayer for us! We are anxious to get to Kansas next week so little Miss Ava Ann can meet the rest of our family and our friends that we miss everyday.

Three is not a crowd!

So we are going to try this blogging thing out. I told Jeremy he HAS to contribute because if this is just up to me it won't be very successful. I can't even get pictures loaded onto facebook in a very timely matter!

Obviously this blog is going to focus around our pride and joy: Miss Ava Ann Stallbaumer

We are loving parenthood. Even though both Jeremy and I are exhausted we have so much more love for life and each other and our hearts doubled in size on March 13 for our daughter.

Jeremy has been an absolutely AMAZING father. I always knew Jeremy would be a great role model for our kids and when they got old enough he'd dedicate all his free time playing with his kids however I never imagined he would be as much help to me in these "early days" as he has been. Since I've been nursing (which has been going extremely well) Jeremy will get up after I'm done and help burp her and putting her back down. This may not sound like a lot but it has been EXTREMELY beneficial for me. Lately Ava has been pretty consistent to where she goes down around 10:00 wakes up around 2:00 takes an hour to eat and go back down then sleeps to around 6:00. This has been AWESOME. We are following the suggestions of a book called "Babywise" by Ezzo & Bucknam however I can't say we are doing it perfectly since neither Jeremy or I have read the entire book. We just read bits and pieces and then wing the rest of it! However I do feel it has great values and ideas in it.

This post is already fairly long so I guess I'll stop here for today. We are excited to be in Kansas in a little over a week! Hope we can see as many people as possible!

PS I've been working on getting this written for 3 days now so this one is not going to have pictures because I don't want to take more time to do it. Next time I promise!