Yes.....we're still here

and still a little sleep-deprived!! We are still working on Avery's sleep routine. We thought we made a break-through last night. She slept from 11p-2a and then from 3a-10a. Tonight though....not so good it is now 11p and we have put her down several times and she just cries and cries as soon as we pick her up she is raring to go and then 10 minutes later will fall asleep against me, then we repeat. I have been assured that this is normal and things will get better soon! The funniest thing is that when she is crying and we leave her for several minutes (to see if she will fall asleep)when we finally cave and pick her up the first thing she does is give us that sweet, sweet smile! We are suckers for that smile!!!!

Now on to non-sleep related things:

We have had a slew of visitors the last few days. Avery has definitely been the "belle of the ball" she smiles and sticks out her tongue for everyone who admires her. We can hardly believe it was just 2 weeks ago that we were handed this precious little girl. We are so in love with her!!! Paul and I still get a kick out of calling each other mommy and daddy, we sometimes still think it is not real and that we are just babysitting someone else's child.

Now on to the real reason you check in on us, pictures of our little gem:
Avery made no attempts to hold her own bottle and when we were in China we spotted these bottles with handles. She still did not seem interested but yesterday for the first time she held it herself!! She is already changing so much!!

Yes, papa is already being a bad influence on her!! She loves whip cream and her grandparents can't help but indulge her and bought this can of whip cream just for her!!

She loves to lay on her back and bring her feet up. We think it is because she was so layered in the orphanage that she is not used to being able to move so freely. Her new thing is to put her toes in her mouth. We figure "hey, they're as clean as her fingers so why not?". Seems like we may already have a contortionist on our hands.

She also loves sitting in the highchair (or anything to do with food for that matter!).

Paul's parents stayed with us the first couple of days we were home and were such a big help. Here is Mimi, Avery and Daddy. Cliff and Sandra are thrilled to finally be grandparents!!

Sunday evening my grandmother came over for her first visit with Avery. So here's our 4 generation picture!!

After a couple of days Avery is finally exploring some of the activity centers we have for her. This table and her bouncing horse seem to be big hits!

That's about all that is going on here these days!!!!