Snow

For the second year in a row it snowed in Kingwood! We're not talking about a few flakes...we're talking lots of flakes for hours! The kids were on cloud nine! It was the first time Avery was in snow....her hands were frozen because she didn't want to keep her mittens on. Alas it only lasted for a day, but what a great treat...SNOW in Texas!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Look who's walking!

Well she took two months longer than Ken and Valerie but, Avery is now walking full-time! It started of course with the few tentative steps one day and literally she was walking around the kitchen island the next day! Here we go...........

Blueberry pickin'

We went to pick blueberries this past weekend at King's Orchard. They had beautiful blueberries even though it's a little early in the season, but it was way too HOT! Imagine that! Avery was a little trooper with her rosy cheeks in the jogging stroller. Ken and Valerie were a little more vocal about how hot they were...then there was the issue over the Spiderman cap (I won't go there). We picked about a half a bucket full and they are delicious! To be honest though it is a heck of a lot easier to go to HEB and plop down $2.99 :)

Easter-Bunny-Love.

We were concerned that Avery was going to be scared of the Easter Bunny! Ha! She was the biggest ham. Ken and Val adore the Easter Bunny...they chatted his ears off...almost.

Houston...We have Mantises

Our mantis egg finally hatched! After waiting for about six weeks we have over a hundred baby praying mantises! They are awesome...and SO many. Scott was up Sunday morning with Avery and noticed that Wolfgang was looking up at the mantis pagoda. When he looked at it all of the babies were crawling around, but after a little while they froze. They're active only one or two times a day that we've noticed, but for the most part the sit very still...praying! :) We let some go in the garden and we plan to let some more go today. We'll keep a couple and try to feed them tiny bugs...the mantises are only about the size of my fingernail! Hopefully we can keep them going for a while....they can grow up to 6 inches and live 6 months. Cool!

Happy St. Patrick's Day from the Huff kiddos!

Avery - 9 months of cuteness

Avery turned 9 months old last Thursday. What an adorable baby...even if we say so ourselves. If you look really close you can see her first tooth peeking out...bottom left. She can officially crawl and can pull herself up on just about anything. (The fireplace is the perfect height much to mommy and daddy's chagrin.) She can say "mama" and clap her hands when you sing patty-cake. She stills loves her food but now she wants "grown-up" food like pasta, veggie puffs and french fries:) Mommy caught her chewing on some cat food this morning...YUM! She's getting pretty good at using a sippee cup and she's a hefty 21 pounds already. Her laugh is a riot (big 'ol belly laugh) and she smiles ALL the time. Ken and Valerie are really getting into entertaining her and she's now taking a bath with them which they get a kick out of. We're still working on getting her into her own room and we ordered her new furniture last weekend...it will be sad when she moves upstairs and obviously Mommy has prolonged the process, but it's time:( We love our baby Averina!

Make a Smilebox photobook

The Houston Zoo

February 27, 2009

Meet Miles the baby Masai giraffe at the Houston Zoo. Miles was born on January 30th (which makes him 28 days old!) and he's currently 6'5'' and 155 lbs of pure cuteness! He's one of the most precious creatures Mommy has ever seen (I'm a little obsessed about him...check out www.houstonzoo.org/babygiraffe if you're interested in Mr. Adorable) Mommy is also a little partial to his name...for those in "the know";) We are all looking forward to visiting Miles and watching him grow which apparently giraffes do pretty quickly.
It was Avery's first time to the zoo and she had a blast. She's very observant and when we would put her in front of an exhibit you could see her look at the animals in amazement. Ken's favorite was the lion (that's him in the background being lazy ...like cats sometimes are:). The lion's name is Jonathan , but Ken and Val call him Alex...as in Alex the lion from the movie Madagascar. Speaking of Madagascar... we found out that there are REALLY animals called fossa and over 50% of there diet consists of lemurs! Ha Ha!

Valerie's favorite was the meerkats. They are so cute and interesting. This picture is hilarious because you can't see the glass separating them!

The Houston Zoo is constantly improving and expanding (as much as they can). It it one of our favorite family outings. We usually ride the Hermann Park train , but this trip we missed it. They closed just before we got to it, but we are looking forward to our next visit when the new train depot will hopefully be finished.

Happy Mardi Gras!

Happy Mardi Gras to everyone! We are all sick and miserable, but we plan to have some gumbo and beer anyway (Ken, Val and Avery opted out for the beer). Hopefully it will help with our sore throats.

There was a Mardi Gras parade that we went to on Saturday. Of course it is NOTHING like the "real" Mardi Gras in New Orleans, but it is the closest Kingwood can come up with. There are people riding on flat-beds and in cars throwing beads and candy. Ken was really into the candy and Val took to the beads (as you can see). It was a little chaotic and loud, but hey that's Mardi Gras for ya!!

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day from all of us!

A Baby Fairy Godmother, A Princess and A Pirate

The kids (Ken and Val) love to dress-up!

Ken is still obsessed with pirates-over a year now! He loves Indiana Jones and Spiderman too, but he really gets into the whole swashbuckling thing pretending to be Captain Jack Sparrow!

Valerie is of course very "into" Princesses. Every night we read some Disney Princess books and every night her favorite princess changes. Currently it's Snow White, but yesterday it was Aurora (from Sleeping Beauty for those who are Princess challenged).

Avery isn't really into the whole dressing up from head-to-toe thing yet, but occasionally I can get a tiara or funny hat on her and she looks as adorable as ever.

Playing dress-up is cute, but it is really amazing to watch their little imaginations take off!

The Bridge Fest 2009

Yesterday was the 17th annual Bridge Fest! It's a 5K run/walk over the bridge that connects Kingwood and Atascocita. It was a beautiful sunny day-low 70's- for the walk. It was the first time both Ken and Valerie went (Avery stayed home... just because we didn't have a jogging stroller for three!) It was the third time we participated -Ken's first time was when he was 3 months old! We actually walked the whole 5K this time (not like the Jingle Bell Walk where we turned around before the halfway point). Somehow we ended up almost in last place , but we had a relaxing walk...talking, people and scenery watching and of course laughing. After the walk there is a golf ball drop . They took 1000 golf balls that people had "bought" and then dropped them out of a helicopter- the ball closest to the flag wins the grand prize, but there are lots of other prizes. We didn't win anything! We're looking forward to next year's walk so we can take Avery and enjoy the day with our whole family.

I'm ready for some snow! Mommy couldn't resist the precious hat and mittens (they were on sale too!) even though it was 70 degrees today.

The latest addition to our menagerie...our little fish. Ken, Valerie, and Avery got an aquarium from Santa. We set it up a few days before Valerie's birthday then got out first two fish on her birthday. Ken named his Nemo and Val named hers Dori...go figure. We got Avery's fish this past Sunday. Ken finally decided on a name...Baby. Ken is in charge of turning their light on in the morning and off when it's bedtime and he has been doing a fantastic job. He's very responsible. Val and Ken both feed them with Mommy's help and they get a kick out of then eating the little "lily pads" as Val calls the food. So WELCOME Nemo, Dori and Baby. Mommy and Daddy will get their fish a little later:)

January 25th already!! It was a cold, cloudy day so we took Ken and Valerie to see Hotel for Dogs at the movie theater. Valerie is too cute when see says "the-ate-her". The movie was really cute and they both did fairly well. There was a bathroom break in the middle and Val got a little antsy towards the end saying in her not so hushed voice..."I'm ready to home now." We went eat at Chuy's afterwards then went to Petsmart for our latest addition....more on that later. Ken was pretty obsessed about going to the park, but since the weather sucked we had put it off as long as we could . We finally stopped at Foster Elementary School to play on the equipment. They had a blast as usual. Another fun Sunday afternoon with the toddlers.

Hi there from the Huff family. This is one of my new year's resolutions...start a family blog. So I'm on my way. As I fumble my way through this I hope everyone enjoys.