Christmas with the Straebs

Scott's sister Kisty and her daughter Jordan came to visit us the week before Christmas. Ava loved seeing them, and Lyla got to meet them for the first time. Everyone has fun exchanging presents....and as you can see below, Ava loved her new chefs outfit. Scott's whole family was able to come over, and we had a wonderful time being together!

The Rhoades Family Overalls

The overalls that Ava is wearing in these pictures are over 60 years old. She is the third generation to wear them proudly and have her picture taken in them. These pics are from August....and all the sunshine and pretty green foliage is making me wish for summer! :-) The overalls were originally purchased by my Grandmother Helen for my Uncle Dusty when he was 1 year old. They were then worn by my dad when he was 1, followed by my cousin Steve, then me and my sister when we were 18 months old. The third generation to wear them includes Steve's 4 children and now Ava. Next year, Miss Lyla will get her turn to model the overalls! It's a family tradition that we hope will continue on for quite sometime. The funny thing is that these overalls are distressed and very vintage looking.....and just like a pair of $35 overalls that I saw at Baby Gap last year. Moral of the story....every style comes back around at some point in time!!!

More of Miss Ava...

Helping Mommy make a blackberry cobbler. I keep eating all the berries before mom can get the crust on!

Playing on the big kid playground

Riding the carousel at the mall with PawPaw

I'm PawPaw's girl! Ava didn't want to sit at the table for Thanksgiving dinner...so my Dad went along the buffet line and fed her bites from each dish. Sigh....

Ava Marie....What a big girl!

Going to MaMaw and PawPaw's house to spend the night!

I'M ONE!!!

Helping Daddy with the turkey on Thanksgiving. What a big helper!

Rockin' the skinny jean! I'm ready for my close up!

Playing bubbles with Nanny on a beautiful November day. I LOVE BUBBLES!

More pics of our first few weeks at home

Lyla and Daddy

Sportin' my "I Love My Auntie" outfit!

Chillin' in my Boppy chair while Mom cooks dinner

Lyla and Aunt Mollie

Lyla with Nanny and her cousin Clayton

Settling in at home

These are some pictures of Lyla's first couple of weeks at home. As you can see from the picture of her and Scott....she is quite the cuddle bug. She had a petty hard time sleeping in her bassinet for the first month or so. She only slept well when she was nestled in between us in bed. So, that is what we did! She is now sleeping in the bassinet next to our bed, but wakes up to cuddle with us at about 6 am every day. It is so sweet to have her snoozing in between us!

The second picture is of her first bath, which had mixed reviews. She liked it at first, and then started screaming about half way through. She now loves bath-time, as long as I am in the tub with her. Scrub-a-dub-dub!

Playing catch-up!

Hello everyone. Well, with the best intentions, I created this blog over 2 months ago. I quickly found that 2 kiddos under the age of 18 months would be a little more busy than I had anticipated! So, I am going to attempt to post all the happenings at the Ventimiglia house over the next few days.

So, obviously, the most noteable event has been the birth of Miss Lyla Grace on November 3rd. She is such a wonderful baby, and we love her more every day. We had a great experience (once again) at St Joeseph Medical Center where Lyla was born. I cannot say enough good things about the staff there. Here are some highlights....

Happy Halloween

Happy belated Halloween from our little bumble bee!  Ava had lots of fun trick or treating in our new neighborhood.  It was a fun evening, with lots of friends and family who came over for our 1st annual Halloween chili supper.  Ava was a bee, and as you can see above....Scott was a Pimp!  Although it would have been comical, I did not dress up as his 9 month pregnant "ho."  I"m sure Ava will appreciate that when she is older :-)   Ava went trick or treating with the Myers family, and her new friend Emery.  She had lots of fun.  I'll be posting pics of Baby Lyla as soon as I get a few more free minutes to spare!  

The V's are Blogging!

Hello everyone!  In light of the anticipated arrival of Baby V #2 next Tuesday, I am going to try blogging to keep everyone posted.  I loved creating Ava's website for the first year, and thought a blog might be a better choice to help everyone keep tabs on the growing Ventimiglia family.  

As for us, Scott and I have kept very busy over the last few months.  As most of you know, we sold our old home in Red Bridge to make room for the new baby.  We loved our old house, but needed more room for our growing family.  We didn't think the new baby would appreciate a room in the basment....which was about the only place for her!  So, we headed out east....Lee's Summit that is.  We love our new home, and are happy to say that after being here for 2 months, it is FINALLY starting to feel like home.  We LOVE being closer to our parents and friends as well.  Ava did as well as can be expected with the move.  I think it shook her up a little more than we anticipated.  She is a very routine oriented, structured kiddo, and all the changes were a little hard on her.  The new house and new daycare really threw her for a loop. I am happy to report that she seems to love the new house, and the new school!  Which is a relief since the first month and a half were pretty touch and go.    

Speaking of Ava, my what a busy lady she is these days!  She is walking, talking and really developing a personality of her own.  She is talking up a storm, saying everything from Cosmo (the neighbor's dog) to Uh-Oh.  She is doing well with sign language, and knows the signs for more, milk, dog, juice, book, pig, eat and drink.  She is leaning all her animal noises and where her nose, tummy and ears are!  She is very into animals of any sort right now....toy animals, stuffed animals, real animals, dogs, cats...anything she can get her little hands on!     Her other favorite things are reading her nursery rhyme books and anything involving being outside.  She actually bangs on the back patio door to go outside to play.  This has caused a temper tantrum or two on rainy days when we can't get outside to play.  

The above pictures are from our visit to Johnson's Farm & Pumpkin Patch last month.  No shocker here, but she had a blast checking out all the animals on the farm!  

I will try to post some additional pics of what we have been up to the last couple of months.  

Thanks for checking out the blog!