July 16, 2009 by hibnerfamily
I’m a list maker. I just like making lists. They are so nice and organized. Today, I decided I’m going to make a list of what my favorite things are right now (sure beats working, ha!) and though I’m not going to list this below because it is understood, I love my family more than anything.
The List:
- Receiving kisses from Avery (the kind where her mouth is wide open); she is so loveable!
- Knowing that we will have a relaxing weekend at home this weekend
- Target (I’m headed there in a few minutes)
- Eating sushi and having a cocktail after a {insert here successful/long/boring/terrible/productive} days work
- Hearing Avery say new words and trying so hard at it
- Looking for new business opportunities (might teeter on being obsessed with it)
- Shopping on Etsy
- Reading the following blogs: momtog.com, kellykornerblog.com, brendaacuncius.com/blog, and about five more that I like to read on almost a daily basis
- Taking road trips and traveling in general
- Mexican Food (always, that will never change)
- Reading books (I’m trying to make a transition from TV to books in the evening during my down time)
- Scott’s tortilla soup (means I don’t have to cook and it is yummy)
- Walking into William Sonoma
- Looking at Pottery Barn catalogues
- Avery’s Bathtime Ritual
- Bentley sitting on my lap during the day while I work
- Drinking Diet Sunkist
- Shopping at Central Market (I love grocery stores)
- A clean house
- Taking pictures of Avery
Posted in Living | Leave a Comment »
July 15, 2009 by hibnerfamily
Did you know I spoke spanish? Ha! My Spanish vocabulary is very small and in comes the beauty of the google translator. Translation in English: My Growing Daughter. I actually have written notes for my housekeeper using Google translator if I cannot act out what I need. Luckily, now she brings her sister to help her whom speaks perfect English.
Check out my little girl in her pretty Mexican dress:
Avery will be 15 months next week and I want time to slow down! She is still going to school because Dee is still in the hospital and we are hoping for her speedy recovery. I feel like she has blossomed so much in the past few weeks. Her fine motor skills are amazing and she loves to put things together. Her school teacher says she is very creative and loves arts and crafts time where they do simple gluing of objects, etc. She is really trying to talk a lot more, too.
Her list of words:
ball – she says it perfectly
dada – daddy with real meaning
baba – bottle
t – light and points to light
sh – shoe
puh – puff (her little organic puff snacks)
buh – book
moo – When you ask what does cow say?
wo,wo, wo – When you ask what does doggy say? (woof, woof, woof)
mo – more
daw daw – Auntie Dawn said she called her this this past weekend when she stayed with them.
Buh – Bear, Auntie Dawn and Uncle Matt’s dog
Chase – Dawn said she said it almost perfectly this past weekend getting both the /ch/ and the /s/ at the end. Chase is our cousin.
I’m sure there are more but the last few days she has been verbalizing non-stop. It’s really cool to be able to communicate with her and have her reciprocate.
Things Avery loves:
- Yogurt and raw Manuka honey (the kind that you can give to babies, not to be mistaken with pasteurized honey) are her all-time favorite food. She licks her lips at the sight of the yogurt jar.
- Her Bentley doggy; She gets so excited to see Bentley and pet her.
- Her blankets; She loves covering herself up with blankets and playing possum. She loves the feel of them and rolls around in them.
- Her boppy pillow; She squeals in delight when she sees her pink boppy pillow. She likes to sit in the middle of the U shape and lay on it, roll over it, etc. She gets a huge kick out of that pillow.
- Buckles; She is obsessed with putting her buckles together on her chair that she eats in, in her wagon, and in her car seat. She is also very good at getting them fastened.
- Running and also forward rolling. She loves it when I help her.
- Being outside; if she could stay outside all day, she would.
- Of course, all of her family!
Posted in Baby | 2 Comments »
July 14, 2009 by hibnerfamily
I dropped Avery off Thursday morning in Columbus with Nana and Grandma Raab. It was a bit of a hurried drop off because it took me much, much longer than expected to get there. I met up with Scott at home, threw my clothes in a suitcase (almost literally) and we were off to the airport. Upon arriving, it was very cloudy and the forecast for the weekend was cloudy and rainy. However, it actually turned out really very nicely. On Thursday evening, we kept it low key and stayed at the hotel. We ended up staying at the Mandarin Oriental and they have a great restaurant called Azul. It was very yummy and the decor and view were gorgeous! On Friday, we went to early lunch at Senora Martinez’s, by famous chef Michelle Bernstein, followed by an entire afternoon of shopping and more shopping. It was a cloudy day and it was nice because all the shopping was outdoor so the temperature remained tolerable. We went to the Design District, shopping on Lincoln Rd, and I think one other place. It was a lot of walking! On Saturday, we decided to do some exploring and took a private boat tour of Miami which was a blast and spent some time at the spa at the hotel. We had a fabulous dinner at Il Gabbiono (our mutual favorite) and I highly recommend it to anyone traveling through or to Miami. Yum, Yum and the view is awesome! Sunday was our last day so we mainly just pittled around since we had a late flight (8:30pm). We left the hotel around noon, drove around for about 2 hours and settled at Smith & Wollensky’s right across from Fisher Island watching monstrous boats come in and out of the bay. We walked down to the beach after eating lunch (it was scorching hot) to see thousands and thousands of people on the beach and in the water. I’ve never seen so many people in the water in person. They looked like little ants! It was kind of cool to see. We decided to stay cool and went to a movie before heading to the airport around 7pm. We ended up having beautiful sunny weather and a great time! We missed Avery tons though and were ready to get home to see her 
Menu Memento:
We might look a little windblown here. The house in back of us is one of the famous stilt houses out in the middle of no where ocean. It’s crazy really! These stilt houses were all built in the early 1900’s and they are not allowed to renovate them and they have made it through countless hurricanes. They cannot be sold either so they are heired. They are mainly used for parties or weekend hangouts.
Boat Tour of Miami (we learned a lot of really cool things including some history):
Dinner at Il Gabbiano’s:
Bewildered at the amount of people on the beach (south beach):
Posted in Travel | Tagged miami | Leave a Comment »
July 8, 2009 by hibnerfamily
Scott and I constantly remind each other about how much we “love this life.” I named this blog after our family motto because this blog gives me the opportunity to sit down and savor important moments that make life so wonderful. Life can get very hectic and it is so easy to lose sight of what is truly important, especially in todays world where everything is go, go, go. Being able to step back, slow down, and really realize what blessings we have allows me to really get a different perspective after a long, stressful day, especially after weeks like last week where everything seemed to be going the wrong way. Life throws us curve balls but some are actually really small in the grand scheme of things though they may seem large at the moment. My family is a constant reminder of what is most important. Scott and I love to live life to the fullest and I see that same fire in Avery. She is so beautiful inside and out.
Tomorrow, Scott and I are headed to Miami for a nice little getaway. I’m really excited about it! Nana and Papa and Auntie Dawn and Uncle Matt are keeping Avie while we are away and I know she will have a great time. She is still going to daycare while we wait for NeNe to get better. We went to see her on Monday and she has a few more weeks of recuperation but she is in good spirits and should be home by the end of July.
Posted in Baby, Family, Living | Leave a Comment »
July 7, 2009 by hibnerfamily
This morning unfortunately we had our first emergency room visit with Avery and hopefully the very last. She had such a rough night last night and could not sleep because of stuffy nose. Then this morning I took her up to our room to play while I made the bed and cleaned up. She was in good spirits and when she is excited, she likes to run. As she was running across the marble floors of our bathroom, there was a puddle of water and she slipped and hit the back of her head. She only cried for a minute and wasn’t showing any signs of complications but she hit her head so hard and I didn’t want to risk it so we rushed off to the emergency room. Heck! They make you wait forever so it was a good thing she didn’t have anything wrong with her. I was so relieved! I suspected she was okay but you just never know, especially with head injuries. It’s so scary with kids. Avery falls down all the time and hits her head on the wall, the floor, her crib, corners, etc. The water ended up being on the floor from a gutter issue. It’s been raining all morning and our “home repair/builder” guys suspect that the gutters are stopped up by a bird’s nest somewhere along the way down. I’m just very happy Avery is okay!
I’m still on my lunch break right now and I sat down to watch a little TV just a few moments ago to relax my brain. Michael Jackson’s memorial service is on every channel (literally). It’s really very sad that his life ended so soon. I thought Stevie Wonder’s song tribute was really beautiful! I only watched about 10 minutes of it so I’m sure there were other very touching moments. I just wanted to make a note of this for Avery’s blog of major current happenings.
Posted in Baby | Tagged emergency room visit, michael jackson memorial service | 1 Comment »
July 6, 2009 by hibnerfamily
I’m back! I took a break from blogging for a few weeks. Life has been extraordinarily busy with work. Now that the holiday weekend is over, I’m looking forward to a much more relaxing week ! This past weekend, we celebrated Independence Day in Shiner. We drove down on Friday and had a wonderful weekend. We took Avery to the parade on Saturday morning. She waved at the people passing by on the floats and enjoyed sitting on her blanket while playing. We also met up with my high school classmate, Becky McCord. I keep up with her through email and her blog and it was so awesome to finally meet her daughter, Riley Jane. Then Mom and Dad had a cookout at their house so we partied all day with the family. The weekend was filled with fun from BBQing and eating lots of great food to playing washers and watching fireworks. Avery even got to swim in her blowup pool. She wore herself out! I love weekends like these. Going to the parade and seeing Avery play in the pool reminds me of being kid all over again. I just love that feeling inside being able to watch her experience being a carefree kiddo. I’m not sure how we didn’t get Dawn and Matt in any of these pictures.
Alway scrunching her nose:
At the parade:
Hillary and Chase:
Spending the 4th on the farm:
Posted in Family, Living, Travel | Tagged 4th of july, independence day | 4 Comments »
June 19, 2009 by hibnerfamily
I missed Kelly’s Home Tour last Friday since we were out of town. We’ll be out of town a lot from here going forward so I believe this will be our home tour finale for the Show Us Where You Live Friday. The summer is so busy! Kelly, I’ve had so much fun getting ideas from everyone’s homes
Before I get to the home tour, I have make a post about Avery’s hugs and kisses so when I’m older, I can read back and remember these moments. Avery is really into giving hugs and kisses. Last night we were upstairs playing and I was holding Avery while talking to Scott and she wrapped her arms around my neck, started patting my back with her hands, and was saying Ahhhhh, Ahhhh while smiling. I am so in love with her! A little later, she was playing with her toys and I was still standing and talking to Scott and she came over, wrapped her arms around my legs in a big bear hug and rested her head against me. If heaven were a feeling, that would be it. Pure bliss! I just love those open mouth kisses and big hugs.
Okay, so now on to the home tour. I need your opinions! Let me know which house style you like best: A or B Please post your comments! Scott and I are trying to decide and I’m having a really hard time between the two. Weigh in on which you like best. I know there are plenty of gorgeous house styles out there but these are the two we’ve narrowed it down to. They are both Greek Revival but slightly different. I like the clean classic look of both of them.
House A:
House B:
Here is our Master Bedroom/Bathroom. The rooms are both darker because I forgot to turn the lights on. I just ran into quickly snap the pics and am too lazy to go back and redo them. The bathroom is my favorite part of the house. Our bedroom is unfinished. Once we decided we were moving, I really quit decorating. I actually don’t mind the minimalism. It’s kind of peaceful
Posted in House | Tagged home tour, show us where you live friday | 32 Comments »
June 18, 2009 by hibnerfamily
Oh dear, I’m so behind on updating. June has been exceptionally busy. We have been going, going, going non-stop. Last week we went to the Frio River for the week. This week, Dee, Avery’s nanny has been sick all week so luckily I was able to get Dawn to watch Avery Monday and Tuesday. She’s been going to a little daycare down the road for the last two days and loving it. I hope Dee gets better soon! There is so much to catch up on really so I’m going to write along with the pictures.
Two weeks ago were were in Shiner and we let Avery play outside in her pool. If I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: she LOVES water! What a cutie Patootie! Bear with me, I love all these pictures.
The aunties lifeguarding:
I love that lil scrunchy nose:
This is the pool and balls that Nana and Papa gave Avery for her birthday:
The water was very cold (well water) so she wanted to stand up:
Nana and Papa watching Avery swim:
When we got back from Shiner, I took that Monday off and Dawn came up to Houston to spend the day with me. We went “riding” as we like to call it and drove all over the Woodlands scoping it out to see if it really is what everyone says it is. We spent all day looking at houses. I have to say that I was very impressed!
The following weekend, the weekend right before the Frio, Scott and I with Avery in tow, drove back out to the Woodlands to look at properties. I think we decided to scratch Brenham for now and move to the Woodlands. Brenham would be a HUGE transition from the city, possibly too much of a culture shock from what we’ve grown accustomed to so we are now honing in on a new possibility of living in the Woodlands. I feel very comfortable with the decision and we are super excited! Avery had a long day of sitting in the car for many hours as we drove from lot to lot within Carlton Woods and was quite content.
These are pictures of the backside of a lot I really liked on the Fazio golf course. We had to walk through a lot of brush to get to the backside because the lots themselves are fully wooded with pine trees so I was itching up a storm. I personally loved this particular lot. The views are gorgeous!
As Avery would say “Whusat?” She says this all the time and points to things. She said that here as she was looking to pick up leaves.
How cool is this shot…totally unplanned:
Posted in Baby, Family, Living | 2 Comments »
