In this paper, the problem of switching stabilization for a class of switched nonlinear systems is studied by using average dwell time (ADT) switching, where the subsystems are possibly all unstable. First, a new concept of ADT is given, which is different from the traditional definition of ADT. Based on the new proposed switching signals, a sufficient condition of stabilization for switched nonlinear systems with unstable subsystems is derived. Then, the T-S fuzzy modeling approach is applied to represent the underlying nonlinear system to make the obtained condition easily verified. A novel multiple quadratic Lyapunov function approach is also proposed, by which some conditions are provided in terms of a set of linear matrix inequalities to guarantee the derived T-S fuzzy system to be asymptotically stable. Finally, a numerical example is given to demonstrate the effectiveness of our developed results.