Video: When Life Gives You Lemanana, Make Lemananade

Sixteen Months

Last Sunday, Avery turned 16 months and we were all so fortunate to be together. I wasn't working and we were all healthy. That is a first in the past few weeks so we tried to enjoy our time together. We went to the Farmer's Market with Deirdre, Ella and Charlotte and our neighbors Marisa, Mattias and Oskar. We didn't want to spend too much time outside as several parts of LA were in the midst of a firestorm and the air quality was terrible. On the way home from the market, Avery decided she could now say "Ella!" and proceeded to say it about 50 times that day, long after Ella had gone home. Actually now whenever I take Avery on long car rides anywhere (besides school) she asks for Ella because apparently we usually go on long car rides to see Ella.

Avery showed us at Oskar's how she can climb into a little chair to sit. We had no little chairs at our place, but now we do, thanks LEM:

She is currently infatuated with the moon. As we drove home from work last week she pointed out the window and showed me the moon when I could not find it in the sky (don't worry I was stopped at a red light). I knew she had found it because her incessant "moon? moon?" turned quickly into "moon!! moon!! heehee!". Since the fires we haven't seen the moon again so we have looked in books for moons and it is quite impressive how just about all of our regular reading with her has a moon on at least one page.
When she gives hugs, she will pat your arm or back in a soothing way like we have always done to her.
She likes to point at her belly button and say "button", although it has recently shortened to "butts" and no matter how many times I say button, she won't revert back.
She has started to eat sandwiches which makes her seem very grown up and yesterday at daycare she ate a whole graham cracker as Jon watched in awe (I had never thought to give her graham crackers).
Jon and Avery play a game of who can shout the others name louder, it goes something like, "Avery?", "Dada!", "AVERY!", "DADA!", "AVERY!!!", "DADA!!!" until they both burst out giggling.
We have taken care of my friend at work's Sheltie a couple of times in the past month and Avery LOVES Rally and she doesn't really understand that when Rally goes home she isn't at our house. She is always asking for Rally.

Video & Picture: Oskar (aka Ahshkah)

For a long time now Avery has known that Oskar lives next door, asking for him more and more frequently. She says, "ahshkah?" (sound it out, it's oskar, trust me) when we leave for school at 6 in the morning (oskar is sleeping, maybe we'll see him tomorrow). "Ahshkah?" when we return from school, grocery, a run, anywhere. (maybe we will play with him tonight). We sometimes can hear little footsteps down the hall and a baby knock at the door or jostle of the doorknob because when Oskar gets outside he likes to run on over to see Avery and Quincy. But then we'd get them together and they would have ver y little to do with each other. Well this changed Sunday when I dropped Avery off at Oskar's and ran back home. When I returned, Oskar's parents said that Oskar and Avery had kissed. Then Wednesday night they played together and she would say "Ahshkah" to his face like she finally understood that he was there and she could actually interact with him. With a little prompting from both mommies and Jon, they kissed again. We are so lucky to have Oskar living next door to us, he is such a sweet boy and a joy to be around. He is a big boy but very gentle only occasionally testing his brute strength on Avery. He has big paws like a puppy which is great for us because we now get to use his crocs that he rapidly outgrew.

We had to see him on Wednesday because Thursday he left to go to Chicago to look for a new house because he is probably moving soon. She still asks for him every day and even though she will not remember, my heart will break a little for my maemae when Oskar moves away.

Happy Halloween!