A brave, new world

Well, we have entered a brave, new world at the house of Albright. Ava has become the little pop star that we have been dreading for 5 years. She loves Barbie and cheerleaders and Hannah Montana and such. She still loves the kids stuff like babydolls and cartoons but she is entering this "tweendom" too soon! I love this stage of being able to reason with her (most of the time) and have her still love me more than anything in this world. I know that every parent faces the dilemma of allowing your child to fail (on purpose) for character-building but it is so super hard! Ava is such a perfectionist that failure is not an option to her! Oh well, she is like her mama...

John Griffin cracks me up every day of his life! He is my let-loose and party-down child! (Also some of his mother's worst characteristics....) He loves to belly-laugh and destroy anything his sister so carefully created. Lately, she has begun cutting out items from my Southern Living magazines to "decorate" our house. She tapes these pictures at every door frame in the house and screams VERY LOUDLY when Griffin rips them down. I know I shouldn't but I just have to laugh because my children are polar opposite! Griffin does have his quiet moments when he just loves to be in my arms as I am stirring spagetti noodles on the stove or talking on the phone. He is a mama and a daddy's boy.

Here is a photo of my crew during our pitiful little snowstorm in January. You would have thought we were going to have 2 feet of snow listening to the news. I know that our family in Chicago and Michigan would have laughed at us! We didn't even have enough to make a tiny snowman. We spent the day at Grayson's birthday party in Huntsville instead. Maybe next year....