Ava started nursery!

So Ava went to her 18 month check up last Friday. She is still just a tiny little peanut at 18 pounds!!! I wonder when she will actually get back on the growth chart in terms of her weight. I thought Ava was a string bean (long and lean) but she's apparently also a shortie at 30.5 inches (25th percentile for height). At least her head is growing well.

Ava seems to be growing up quickly. She's still not saying too many words and she doesn't put words together, but here are some new ones: bee, sky, day, baby, bow, bowl, apple, cookie (and also Cookie in Sesame Street), Elmo, Abby, home, hot, uh-oh, hat, "how" (help), ducky, pee pee, egg (pronounced egggee), night night, Ami (Amen), honey (she says this when she puts a phone up to her ear), toe, knee, shoe, "Ah Nu" (I love you) and "He Mi" (her vision of "drink milk" in Chinese).

Ava started nursery yesterday at church. She just went right in there and didn't turn back. I checked on her a few times. She didn't see me but she was too preoccupied with the toys in the room. So, I don't get this girl. She won't go to child care at Peak Fitness but she'll go to nursery without blinking? Part of me wants her to be sad when she goes into nursery...letting go is hard.

Some other new developments: Ava is scared of taking baths now. We were in NYC last week and one of the bathtubs had a loud drain. So now she is afraid of the drain in her own bathtub. She'll start crying when we put her tiny little buns into the water. Not sure what to do! David won't let me take a shower with her because he says I will drop her. Probably so, since I am very clumsy.

Since January of this year, Ava has been sleeping a lot better through the night. It's like something clicked in her brain and she realized sleeping in her own bed and not harassing me to breastfeed her in the middle of the night was the way to go. I would say she sleeps through the night about 50-75% of the time now. We still have some rough nights (like last night) but the improvement makes me shout for joy. Of course now I've jinxed the whole thing because I typed it on here.

Ava is becoming more of a social butterfly. In our library reading class, sometimes she will go up to other moms and sit in their laps. She likes to say "hi" to lots of people and will even give hugs on command. She is starting to enjoy her class at My Gym more and loves her music class. Well, thank goodness she doesn't take after her mom in social skills!

Will post some pictures of Auntie Michelle's visit and trip to NYC later.