On the way to 3

I'm almost afraid to say this! Ava is pretty amazing. While she has some quirkiness, she is pretty good. This morning I went to get Ava out of her room (yes, she stays in her room ALL night long, and won't come out of her room unless her dad or I go to get her) and Ava had made her bed. Ava's bed was made. I've never, ever taught her or told her to make her bed. But maybe she was so excited with the new bedding I put on yesterday she wanted to make sure it looked pretty. Ava is actually pretty good. Most of the time, she will clean up after herself, throw (literally) her dishes in the sink (good thing they are plastic), she mostly picks up her toys in her play area. Ava loves to read. The only problem we have is that she likes to read so much she pulls more books off the shelf than she can put away! :) No problem, really. My mom and Grandfather were avid readers. I will not discourage this behavior in anyway. Actually, we use book reading as a reward. If Ava brushes her teeth she gets to read books at bed. This works really well because Ava loves to read so much that she will usually brush her teeth, unless she is already grumpy and unreasonable. Thinking back, I wonder if her behavior is changing because she is now eating. We've come up with a new routine in the morning. We bought a huge box of the mini cereals from Costco. She gets to pick her box of cereal for the morning. She gets to school, we open a container with milk in it, she pours in her cereal and usually will eat ALL of it! This week has been successful with lunch too! She has eaten lunch everyday this week. Dinner on the other hand has been a bit more difficult. But she still drinks pedi-sure in the mornings and if she doesn't eat dinner she drink 1/2 a bottle of pedi-sure. This week has been pretty good. We've had a good routine going. Cereal in the morning, drop off at school has been pretty good, pick up around 3:30 or 4pm. We usually do something or go somewhere for a little bit. Come home, eat dinner and then at 7pm go on a walk with the neighbors. By the time we get home Ava gets to spend a little time with daddy then off to take a bath, blow dry the hair, read stories and go to bed. Ava still sleeps anywhere from 9pm-6 or 7am. She takes about a 2 hour nap at school. Her naps have been going well. I think eating more has been helping her attitude. I also think a lot of it has to do with her hair. Mornings and nights are no longer a nightmare. While Ava and I still battle sometimes, we battle a lot less now that her hair is short and not tangled. Ava is a lot of fun. Her favorite thing this week is playing outside in the water. She learned how to spray the hose. We also learned that Ava likes to kill bugs. Poor bugs. I guess its really "poor" bugs now. We had the exterminator come out today. LOL The bugs were a little out of control. Moths, flies, carpenter ants, etc. Yuck. Still can't believe Ava will be 3 in a little more than a month. Hard to believe!