Ava is 11!
So this post is SUPER late but life has been hectic since school started and I got very behind on things. I also kept wanting to take more pictures of Ava but that never happened. We took these pictures when her hair was straight and I wanted to get more when her hair was in it’s normal curls but she isn’t a big fan of having her picture taken anymore so I decided to just stick with the ones I got.
It is crazy that Ava is 11 years old. She is a true tween and we are having a hard time believing she is almost a true teenager! I asked Ava her regular birthday interview questions again this year to give a glimpse into her life at 11 years old.
How old are you?
You know how old I am, I’m 11.
This question made more sense when she was younger, I’m starting to realize that I might need to change up some of the questions as she gets older. At 11, Ava is growing so much into a young lady. She is getting so tall and looking so grown up. Her stats are:
Height - 61” (91st percentile)
I won’t share weight as she gets older since girls are more private about those things.
She is wearing mostly size 14 clothes, although the pants are big in the waist, she needs the 14 for the length. She can wear a women’s 7.5 or 8 size shoe…which means most of my shoes fit her now!
What is your favorite food?
Mama’s tater tot nachos with cheese, chicken and beans
This meal idea came from her elementary school. Tater tot nacho bar was her favorite lunch item at school so she asked me to recreate it at home. It has definitely become a family favorite. Her other favorite meal that I cook is lasagna soup. She also likes black bean burgers and any form of tacos/nachos.
What is your favorite color?
Navy blue
She had a hard time deciding on this one. I think she had a hard time deciding because she doesn’t have a true favorite. She likes navy, light pink and mint green a lot. Those are the colors she’s working towards in her bedroom.
What is your favorite show?
Wednesday
This is a new Netflix show based on Wednesday Addams from the Addams Family. It definitely has some horror scenes in it and surprised us that she liked it since it is very different from the original Addams family. She also loves Fuller House, Sam and Cat, Sister Sister, Hannah Montana, and KC Undercover. She’s also a fan of baking shows, especially baking competition shows. I think her favorite ones are the Kids’ Baking Championship and Bake Squad. Now that she’s older and staying up later at night, we’ve been watching shows with her in the evenings. We introduced her to Full House, Fresh Prince and her favorite Family Matters. It is fun to rewatch these shows with her. DJ also started watching some of the Marvel movies with her and she is enjoying those.
What is your favorite toy?
My iPad
Sadly, Ava is not playing with toys anymore. This is another question that will need to be changed now that she is older. It is so hard to believe she is this old! But there is no doubt that the iPad is her favorite thing. She loves playing Roblox and other games like it.
What is your favorite song?
Set Fire to the Rain
Ava recently started listening to Adele and loves her music. We love that she can recognize the quality in Adele’s voice. She also loves Kelly Clarkson and is starting to really like Taylor Swift. She also likes boy band music like One Direction and Backstreet Boys. She’s still a fan of Lauren Daigle, Jamie Grace and Toby Mac as well. And of course, she still loves Disney music and some Broadway music.
What is your favorite book?
Number the Stars
Ava read this book in 5th grade and fell in love with it. It is about a girl in WWII and how she helps her Jewish friend. She also enjoyed reading The Diary of Anne Frank in school. Ava is a big fan of graphic novels these days and there are a lot of different ones that she looks for at the library. She is also really enjoying the Dear America historical fiction series. And she recently started Harry Potter because she wants to go to Universal and see Hogwarts at some point so we said you need to read the books first to really appreciate it.
What is your favorite restaurant?
Mexican
She still loves going to eat at Mexican restaurants. Our favorite is Molina’s. She even branched out this year and started ordering bean nachos instead of just the quesadilla. Of course the chips and queso are her favorite part of the meal. She also loves Tropical Grille, Cheesecake Factory, Culvers and Moes.
What is your favorite outfit?
Light colored distressed jeans with the light pink shirt
Ava is very much into clothes and fashion these days. She loves to go shopping and is all about the clothes. It is crazy to me to see how so much of what she likes is what I wore at her age or a little older since the 90s fashion is so big right now. The jeans she likes are the flare jeans, exactly what I wore at her age. She has a couple dresses that are so similar to ones I wore. I remember my mom commenting on my clothes at that age saying so much of the style was similar to what she wore…it always comes back. Ava definitely prefers pants/shorts over dresses these days. And she is getting into the athletic wear, like all other girls/women, and realizing how comfy it is, which I cannot blame her for wanting to wear it all the time.
Where is your favorite place to go?
Trampoline parks with another kid or Frankie’s Fun park
Ava loves trampoline parks. We went a few times this summer (including her birthday) but she decided she prefers to go to them with other kids instead of just us. She said they are fun but are way more fun when there is another kid (other than Zoe) to run off with, which makes sense. She is a huge fan of Frankie’s Fun Park, the arcade place in town. She loves the challenge of trying to get as many tickets as possible and the ever challenging claw game. She didn’t mention this place, but she also loves the waterpark and especially loves the slides there. But I think she would agree that the water park is also more fun when we go with kids her age.
What is something special to you?
My family
What a sweet answer! She may get irritated with us (she’s at that age, ha) but it is nice to know that we are something special to her, not an object. She loves her family dearly and that includes extended family and birth family. We pray she always feels that strong pull to keep her family close.
What is your favorite thing to play?
Roblox
Like I said before, the iPad and Roblox are her current favorite activities. A friend from elementary school introduced her to Roblox and it instantly became a favorite.
Who are your friends?
Karis and Maisy and Ella
These are three super sweet girls from church. Karis and her family are newer to church but she and Ava hit it off really well. We’ve had a few play dates with them and it is sweet to watch the friendship grow. Ella and Maisy have been Ava’s friends for several years now and we are so thankful for them. Maisy and Ava are so similar that even though they are 2 years apart, they are the best of friends. Ella and Maisy even celebrated Ava’s birthday with her very first friend sleepover and those girls had a blast, even though there wasn’t much sleeping that happened.
What do you like to do with your family?
It’s always fun when we play a game together
For a while DJ, Ava and I would play card games after Zoe went to bed. Our favorite was Monopoly Deal. Ava also really enjoys playing Quix with DJ. If we all play a game together it is usually Uno or Go Fish. A fun “game” Ava started with us at dinner some nights is “Would You Rather” where each person asks a "would you rather” question to everyone else. It is always fun to hear each other’s answers to the sometimes very crazy scenarios the girls come up with.
What do you want to be when you grow up?
I’m still figuring that out right now. I want to be with animals. I want to be a singer, that would be awesome if I could become famous for singing.
Now that Ava is getting older, she is really thinking about this question more. Although we keep telling her she has PLENTY of time to figure it out. She does love animals but knows she could never be a vet because she couldn’t bear to watch an animal suffer. Plus, she is grossed out by any medical thing so a vet is definitely off the table. She does love to sing and sings all the time. She has a really great voice and enjoyed her time in chorus during elementary school. Her voice is changing a little as she’s getting older and she can’t quite hit the notes she used to be able to hit so I told her she seems to be developing a really nice alto voice. Another future career she’s talked about is a baker and wanting to open her own cafe. DJ and I are gluten and dairy free so she says she wants to open a GF/DF cafe that serves breakfast and lunch. Her cousin, Grace, is also DF and has an interest in baking so they talked about opening their restaurant together. It will be so fun to see what path she takes as she gets older and figures out more what she likes to do/wants to do with her career.
What is one thing you hope to do before your next bday?
I want to get back into ice skating. I also want to go to New Orleans.
Ava recently started talking about how she regrets stopping ice skating and how she misses it. We took her cousin ice skating when she came to stay with us for a few days and Ava remembered even more how much she does love it. We are hoping this is something we can get her back into soon so she can get back out on the ice regularly. The trip to New Orleans is something she just started talking about. She loves that her American Girl doll is from New Orleans, as well as Princess Tiana, so she said she wants to go see where their stories take place. She’s also seen pictures and videos of New Orleans (especially the French Quarter) and thinks it looks like an amazing place to visit…not to mention the beignets.
What is the best thing that happened to you when you were 10?
I made it into Bob Jones for middle school
This was a pretty big deal for her. She had to take extra standardized testing because BJA didn’t accept the state testing, it had to be national testing. I served as the proctor for these tests and we did them over the course of a weekend. She did amazingly well and scored high on all of the tests, even though some of the questions covered topics that she had never learned about. It is still so hard to believe that her time in elementary school is over and she is going to be in middle school. In some ways it seems like just yesterday that we were dropping her off for kindergarten but then it also seems like a lifetime ago. She is just growing up so fast!
Since this post is so late, her answer to the last question is actually out of date. She started middle school at BJA but it ended up not being the right fit for her. After a lot of prayer and consideration, we decided the best move for Ava was to pull her out and let her do virtual school. So she is now doing Connections Academy online. It definitely seems to be what she needs at this stage in life.
We truly cannot believe that the tiny baby girl we met in Texas is now 11 years old, a preteen! That tiny baby is a beautiful young woman now who gets compliments on her hair or how pretty she is all the time. She feels big feelings but that makes her very empathetic as well. She loves big and that love is what gets her through the hard days of being a tween girl. We are blessed to be her parents and to get the chance to watch her grow into the young lady that God has planned for her to be. But, as I always say, we know that us having that front row seat means that a very special person is missing out. We never take that for granted and we pray that her amazing birth mama knows how loved and missed she is in all of the big moments and in the daily moments of this beautiful girl’s life.
Happy 11th birthday, Ava girl! We are so thankful for you and we love you to the moon and back!
Straight Hair
Ava talked me into straightening her hair one evening. It killed me to straighten her beautiful curls but she convinced me to try. She definitely looked even more grown up with straight hair and she loved her straight hair. It took a long time to do so I doubt we will do it often but she was so happy with it that I am sure we will give it a go again sometime.
Ava’s First Days of School
A little trip down memory lane to all of Ava’s first days of school…
Ava’s First Day of Middle School
This school year is a big year of transitions for Ava. She started a week after Zoe because not only is she no longer in elementary school, but she is in a completely different school all together. We decided to take her out of the public school system and put her in a private, Christian school. She began 6th grade at Bob Jones Academy Middle School. This has been the best decision we could have made for her. She absolutely loves Bob Jones and is making great friends already. She’s not crazy about the uniforms but it is nice to not have to worry about fitting in with clothing choices. Her teachers are all great. The school has been amazing at welcoming her and the other new kids. They connected us with another girl in 6th grade who we met over the summer. That girl made sure Ava was never left alone the first week of school. They also had a special welcome night for all the new families before school started where they had an older middle schooler walk the schedule with each family and Ava got to set up her locker (and practice the lock) without the chaos of the whole middle school being there. Then, she went back for the full back to school night and got to do it all again. We are so thankful for how well Bob Jones is taking care of her and how happy she is there! We are so excited for this new adventure in her life.
DJ’s Birthday
DJ’s birthday fell the day before Ava started back to school. So, we had a little celebration by riding up to Skytop just for the apple cider donuts (and apple cider slush for me since I can no longer eat the donuts).
Zoe’s 1st day of 1st Grade
I cannot believe Zoe is already a 1st grader! She started school on August 8th this year. We are excited about her teacher, Mrs. G as she is known, because we’ve heard nothing but amazing things about her. Zoe already likes her a lot. Unfortunately, Zoe’s best friend from last year is not in her class but she gets to play with her at recess every day. There are only 16 kids in her class and I remember that small class being such a sweet year for Ava as well. Zoe is already making sweet friends and we cannot wait to see what this year holds for her!
Back to School Treat
The day before Zoe’s first day of school, we took the girls to Clare’s Creamery for a fun back to school treat (and a treat for Zoe letting me fix her hair for school). It was a fun way to end summer break.
Zoe’s First Day of Dance Fall 2023
Zoe began her 4th year at Dance Without Limits with a new dance class this fall. After a 6 week summer class in Acro, Zoe fell in love with that and was even able to move up to Acro 2 for the fall semester. The acro class is basically floor gymnastics with some dance components added. Zoe has been asking to do gymnastics but there isn’t a great gym near us so we thought this might be a good compromise for her. She is already learning so much and practices her skills all the time at home. She’s determined to figure out a handstand now and I don’t think it will take her too long before she masters it. It is fun to watch her do something that fits her so well.
The Girl Gang at the Zoo
Zoe and I had so much fun meeting up with my cousins and their girls at the Atlanta Zoo. We did miss Elizabeth and her girls but we understood traveling with a baby who does not like the car is just not fun at all. It was so fun to see the girl gang cousins (as Elizabeth coined them) all having fun together at the zoo. My cousins and I were so close growing up so we love seeing our girls together and we hope they always have a sweet relationship. We are all excited for Lauren and Caleb to welcome the first boy to the family in January after 7 little girls!
