More from the quiet book...

I was able to steal my sisters sewing machine again (man I really need my own) and finish up some loose ends. So here are a few more pages. I actually am almost done. I am now working on sewing the pages together. This went a whole lot faster than I had imagined. Which is good because I have another book to work on. If you notice some of these pages have numbers on them. They will eventually go in order so Ava can count the objects on the page and at the end work on the button counting. Here we go...

I really love how this page turned out! It is so cute. Inside as in an iron on that I found at Joanns.

The apples on this tree were iron ons. (love iron ons!) all the apples get placed in the basket while counting them.

I really like this one too. The little chicken, cow, and pig are finger puppets. really easy to make

Tic Tac Toe is always fun to play.

This doll actually scared me to make. I thought it was going to be really difficult to sew everything together. Suprise! It wasnt hard at all. I used an iron on face for her because I knew I wouldnt be able to make it near as cute. I decided with her to have two objectives. Play with her hair and getting her dressed.

Ava's number page. You can first flip up the flap and count the buttons then when she gets a little older she can take off the flaps and match the number with the amount of buttons

Slow? Busy?

I really feel like this week has flown by and yet at the same time I feel like I really havn't done anything to make it fly by. This week has been a regular week. Gym, play with Ava, work in the yard, work... Same old, same old. The weather is starting to finally pick up and be nice and warm letting Ava and I play outside more. I am so happy about that! Jay has been working over time in our yard. Digging out curbing leveling out the dirt and planting more grass, planting and re-planting trees. Yes, I said re-planting. It's a pathetic story so lets just say I didn't like the place a tree was planted and Jay being the amazing husband he is, made fun of me and re-planted the tree a whopping 1 ft. further down. I know, its strange but it was taking away from the view of my mountains. I couldn't have that. Well I think the yard, except for the rest of the flowers is done. Unless Jay wants to change something else.

I have been working more on my quiet book. I am actually having a lot of fun making this book. I was nervous at first thinking of all the things I needed to do for it but it really is quite easy. Here are a few more pages I have done. Minus the finishing touches.

I think this lady bug page is my second favorite (right behind Mr. monster head).

The balloons so far is one of the easiest pages to make. Iron on Pigglet, cut out colored felt, sew/glue yarn. Done :)

First Few Pages

So here are some of my quiet book pages so far. I have not written on them yet but that will be the last thing I do before I sew all pages together. If you have any suggestions for sayings to put on the pages let me know I'm always looking for what to say.

I was planning on making a Mr. Potato Head(ish) face to interchange eyes, mouth's etc. However, while I was at Joann's my sis-in-law showed me these monster face parts and I fell in love so instead I made a Mr. Monster Head. I think this page will be my favorite one. I love the idea so much I made a separate 12" stuffed monster head for Ava to play with. She absolutely loves the furry soft fabric I used. So much that she became upset when I took it away to sew the monster, so I made her a scarf she wears and walks around with petting saying "soft, soft."

So cute!

This heart is to learn sewing. I placed eyelets all around and have a shoe string to sew with.

These shapes Velcro on the back.

"What Time Is It?" Movable clock.

Quiet!

So for the past few months when we go to church I am always worried. Ava is a pretty loud child. She walks around trying to bang on the metal chairs, yelling "HI!" to the teachers and others, getting mad if I make her sit still or take her out of the class. Oh man, does anyone else have this problem? I try to keep her entertained with books and food but she can look at those books for so long. So, I have decided to find her a quiet book to help keep her busy. If you have never heard of a Quiet Book it's an activity (hands on) learning book with pages that have snaps, colors, sippers, ties, etc. The problem is the ones I have found online are not that cute or just too much money for not a lot of activities. So I decided I am going to make a book for Ava. That way I could get all the activities I wanted and have my own style. If you know me at all I sometimes get a little excited about doing crafts. This quiet book started out with 10 pages of cute, fun things to do. It is now 20 pages and I am going to make another book because I have so many ideas of what I want, and figured with two books she will be even more entertained. Oh boy! Well, the reason I am writing about this is because I want to have both books done by Christmas. So if I let everyone know what is going on I really have to have them done by then. No excuses. Once I finish some of the pages I'll show you guys what I've done. I hope you like it. To the side of this blog page I am going to have a link to a separate page showing all the pages I have done. And possibly templates of what I have done if you would like to use any. I got a few ideas from some others blogs I found showing their own quiet books. The main one I looked at is "How to Make A Quiet Book" blog. She has links on the side to other bloggers pages. Enjoy! I know I will.

Here Fishy, Fishy, Fishy!

So thursday my friend Ashley and I took our girls to the Living Planet Aquarium. I haven't been there in the longest time. It was really fun going and even more fun with Ashley and re-discovering all the fish with Ava. Everytime Ava saw a fish, which of course was all the time, she would sign over and over "fish", "fish". She actually got annoyed with Ashley because she wasn't watching Ava sigh fish. She leaned right into Ashley's face with "the look" and signed it. So funny so cute. Ava really loved the most the open water area with the sting rays. She loved splashing in the water and watching the Sting Rays swim up next to her and flap around. Thanks Ash for thinking of going there. I had a blast!

Here are some pics of Ava at the Aquarium. Sorry the photos aren't great. I forgot to turn the flash on.

On saturday, Ava really wanted to go swimming. So Jay filled the jetted tub with bubbles and he and Ava got in their swimsuits and went for a swim. So funny!

Bees!

May 16th, Jay took Ava my brother Clint and me to a Bees game. It was a perfect day for a baseball game. Sunny, warm, great company, and lets not forget great seats. 7th row behind the teams dugout. They lost but it still was a great time. I was amazed at how well Ava did. We figured we would have to hand out behind the outfield grass so she could run around and burn off energy. She surprisingly did very well, hung out in the seats the whole time (3 hours), watched the game and talked up a storm. This is the pic from our seats. The guys head you see in the pic was absolutely hilarious! He was yelling, mocking, and just flat out trying to be annoying to the other team. I couldn't stop laughing at him!

Moab/Birthday

April 30 to May 2 Jay Ava and I went to Moab to hang out for the weekend. It was so nice to get away even if it was just for a few days. We usually go down there every year around the same time. Which is usually the weekend of Jays birthday. Though Jay's birthday was on the 3rd we still did a little celebrating down there. On friday Jay got to go golfing for free which he loved. Ava and I went along to hang out and play around. Ava loved it! She really loved driving the golf cart (like Mother like Daughter). On one of the holes Ava was hanging out on the green and Jay was behind a hill getting ready to hit. As I was going after her to grab her, she of course was trying to run away from me, Jay hit the ball thinking she had moved and low and behold he actually hit her. Now before I go on with this story let me tell you Ava is happy and alive and no we are not horrible parents (I dont think). So any way, I had never seen someone get hit

by a ball before. No he didn't hit her in the head, thank goodness,

the ball hit her right on the shin. She dropped to her cute little bum and let out the saddest scream/cry I had ever heard. At first I thought for sure she broke her leg, I mean I heard the ball hit she went down so fast and by the time I had her in my arms there was a nice golf ball size bump and red feelers spreading out from the mark. After about a minuet of sobbing she wanted to drive the cart again. So as we were watching her making sure everything was ok she was playing with the steering wheel with a mixture of sniffles and giggles. When Jay went to the tee to hit his next ball Ava was out running down the cart path looking for rocks. I will tell you what, she is one tough little girl! I would be down and out for the rest of the day and 10 minuets later she is sick of sitting still and wants to run. Well, to make this story shorter, no broken bones just a little bruise and good to go for the rest of the day.

There was a pool where we were staying so we of course had to go for a swim.

Ava LOVES water and Saturday was no exception. She was splashing kicking dunking her own

face and watching Jay go under water then asking "Where'd he go?" Then laughing histericaly when he would pop up. We decided to see if she would stand on the edge of the pool while we held her hands and jump into the pool to us. That took no coaxing she didn't even hesitate the first time. She just walked right onto Jay's chest laughing the whole time. I love this fact and am a little nervous about it at the same time. I love that she isn't afraid of water and loves to play in it but I also am nervous that she loves water so much that she is willing to just jump right in to the pool. Lots of extra watching her from now on when we are by pools.

So if you ever head down to Moab there is a great place to eat called Pasta Jay's. I have to go there every time we are in Moab. It's so good! You have to try the Alfredo Williams. It's

breast of chicken lightly breaded and baked in Alfredo sauce, served over fettuccine. AMAZING! If you do order it I would recommend sharing it. There is a lot of food. Jay and I shared it and still had a hard time finishing the meal. Of course you should get the cheese bread to go with it. Im telling you, if you like Alfredo you should get this.

Sunday we did a little hiking. It's so beautiful out there, sometimes I forget how amazing it really is.

Here are some pics of our weekend...

Ava had a great time in the Hotel room. She of course found the toilet paper and marched around for 10 min. dragging it around and laughing at how funny she thought she was.

This is Emma at the hotel waterfall. She loved swimming in it!