happy birthday!

Here he is, the 2-year-old Gavinator!


Scott took pictures of G blowing out the candles on his birthday cake, and I'll share those once we've downloaded them from the other camera. I think he said he got one whole birthday cake picture. Stupid camera.

Luckily, I now have a new fancy camera that doesn't have those same issues, and I used it to take a little bit of video of the birthday boy playing with a new puzzle from Grandma Joy and Grandpa Mark. He's such a funny kid!

Gavin has been very excited about his birthday (for the past month or so) - I'm pretty sure it's going to be a rough road when he realizes that his birthday isn't every day. Luckily for him we still get to celebrate his birthday with Grandma Lora in Dallas this weekend and again in Tucson with his Durham grandparents, and then Christmas brings even more presents. January will be hard, but at some point I'm sure he'll figure out that the present train has left the station.

long overdue pictures and a new big boy room!

First, here are some long-overdue pictures taken when Grandma Lora was in town a while back, as well as some with Uncle Sam during his latest visit:

Here are Grandma Lora and Gavin in the backyard. Gavin was showing off his driving skills - check out the videos below!

Here is Gavin driving, part 1:

And Gavin driving, part 2:

Gavin and Uncle Sam enjoyed reading together.

Okay, hopefully that is sufficient coverage of the recent past that has up to now been sequestered on my camera. Sorry for the delay!

Moving on........

The news around here is that Mr. Gavin will be turning 2 on Friday, so it's about time for him to move out of his baby room and into his new birthday big boy room! He's been sleeping in his toddler bed for a while now in his original bedroom, and we've slowly been cleaning out the front room to make it Gavin's. I was initially hesitant to move Gavin - I didn't want him to feel displaced by the new baby - but I think it's turned out to be the best thing ever.

Reasons:

1) The new baby's room is ready without any fuss, because it's left just as it was when Gavin was in there.

2) Gavin gets to feel special moving into his own big-boy room, and he helped put together the furniture and get everything set up.

Here Gavin is helping Daddy hammer in the nails in the back of his new dresser.

Gavin really loves using his hammer. He had a blast "helping" put together all the furniture.

And here is the (not yet fully complete) bedroom!

The room is still very bare. We're looking into what we can put on the walls to liven things up a bit, and the round baskets hanging on the wall are going to move to a more appropriate area (right now they're just hanging on an existing nail where a picture used to hang). The cult of Ikea has taken over the room! I'm pleased with the furniture we chose - the white dresser and storage shelf are actually very nice, and the green, red, and blue things work well. Gavin seems to really love his new "big boy room" and he's now fallen asleep in it twice with no issues whatsoever. Yay! Once we accessorize the room a bit I'll post updated pictures.

I've had a harder time with the move than Gavin has, I think. Poor Scott - last night, we put Gavin to bed in his new room for the first time, we shut the door, and I burst into tears! Stupid hormones :) I laughed at myself while I cried, I admit it, and I know he's growing up and that's not a bad thing, it's just happening so much faster than I thought it would. He can't be a baby forever. Every day is better than the one before. Still...... I wish he's slow down just a bit.

as requested...

Here is a picture of the baby belly at 28 weeks 3 days:


You can't tell by looking, but man, my tailbone is killing me! According to the interwebs and all their wisdom, it's a fairly common pregnancy thing, so I'm not freaking out thinking something's wrong with me, but I'm still uncomfortable. Hooray 3rd trimester and all the joys, aches and pains you bring with you.....

Gavin is very excited about his upcoming birthday and will tell you with very little prompting that he will be two. He'll even hold up his fingers to show you how many - either one finger, like he's pointing, or all 5 like he's going to give you a high five. Very funny. "Dawa dirday? Two!"

Gavinese cracks me up. I know I should write down all the things he's saying (perkle = purple) so I remember it later on down the road, but I never seem to actually do it. "Gavin did it!" is cute, though frustrating when he insists that he do things himself - yay for independence, boo for stressing out the tired momma when time/patience levels require mommy to do it instead.

Grammy and Uncle Sam (umple sam, according to the bug) came to visit this past weekend. As soon as I find the camera hiding in the mess that is my house I will upload and post more pictures. Here's one from my phone to hold you over:

They are definitely buddies now! Gavin had a great time with all of his playmates over the weekend and he's excited to see his grandma again for his dirday :)

potty training - to be continued?

Well, we had some luck for a while with Gavin being all jazzed about using the potty, but apparently his own personal throne has lost its appeal. He was insisting that "I want potty too!!" anytime he saw one of us on the toilet (hooray for no privacy). Since he usually asked to go potty just after going in his diaper, he would just pee a little trickle, so it went from "YAY!" and clapping for himself for each little trickly effort to "I'm done" after a half-hearted pee effort. He is more interested in flushing the toilet (I'm blaming the engineer genes for that) than in actaully using it these days. He no longer asks to go in the potty like he had been, and when I ask him if he wants to try he says no. He will tell me right after making a poo that he wants his diaper changed, so he's still aware of what's going on down there, he's just not so terribly interested in making it happen in the potty.

I don't really care if he gives up for a while. At least I know he knows what to do on the potty. It's just a matter of realizing it before it happens. Since he hates having a poopy diaper, that will probably help us out later on. He doesn't care about a peed-in diaper, but when I'm home all day I can put him in underpants so he gets really uncomfortable really fast if he pees (if necessary). Plus, with the baby coming in 3 months (ack) we'll undoubtadly hit some road blocks again. So, yeah, not pushing it. When he's ready, he'll go on the potty. He's too much of a neat freak to go in his diaper forever :)

2 blog posts in a row all about Gavin's poop and pee. Ah, the joys of motherhood.....

potty training

Oh boy.

Last night, when Gavin and I got home from dinner with Missy and Bryant, I had to pee. Like, 10 minutes ago. So I went into the bathroom to take care of that, and Gavin followed me in, saying "want potty too!" He was covered in applesauce due to a spoon malfunction at dinner, so I stripped him down (it was bathtime anyway) and he sat on the potty, holding his milk cup. I took his discarded clothes to his hamper right next door, came back, and noticed that something had happened - Gavin was staring at his boy parts in wonder? shock? who knows, and there was pee in the potty! We clapped, we said "Yay!" and threw our hands in the air, and generally celebrated like idiots. I was proud of him. He enjoyed the praise so much, in fact, that getting him off the potty and into the tub for a bath was a bit of a struggle. :)

Today, we had fried chicken with macaroni and cheese for dinner. (Not the healthiest, but it sure was tasty!). Gavin gave up on his fork very early on and took to shoveling the mac & cheese in his mouth with his fingers. He was c.o.v.e.r.e.d. in cheese sauce by the time he was full. Yuck. I got a washcloth, cleaned him up a bit, and stripped him down. Before starting the bath I asked if he wanted to sit on the potty, and he sat right down. (The potty is a favorite place of his. Like father, like son, I guess.)

I asked him if he could pee, and he started pushing/straining/whatever, and a little pee dribbled out. The look on his face when he looked up at me was priceless! It's like he peed gold or something, he was so tickled. He clapped for himself, I clapped for him, and then he tried again. He peed about a gazillion pee dribbles, and a few short streams, in the little while he was on the potty. Then we heard it - the fart. Little boys make big noises. And where there's noise.... A minute or two later, Gavin pooped on the potty! He wasn't quite as shocked by the poo as he was by the pee (he's more used to the poo in his diaper I guess) but he really did like pulling his feet up so he was squatting on the little potty so he could have a peek at his handiwork. Weirdo. He was so proud of himself. He asked me twice for a hug while he was still on the potty. Goofy, and adorable, and I can't believe he's starting to use the potty.

My little baby boy is growing up! (Is there a way to make it stop???)

photostory

We had a technology training at school today, and I used Microsoft's Photo Story 3 for the first time. I made a quick little thing about Gavin, so I thought I'd post it. You can download the program for free here. I made this photo story at school, so I used some pictures I had on my computer here, but I am a little geeked out at all the possibilities with the pictures I have at home. It's just another way to make a slide show, but it's fun to play - why yes, I am a big nerd. :)

Oh, and the music is kinda odd, I do realize that, but I didn't take the time to go back and change it.

happy halloween!

Before we could put his costume on, Gavin had to sit for Daddy in the make-up chair.

Gavin was awesome - he was really patient and sat nicely to get his face painted. Doesn't he look great already??

Then he had to go to the wardrobe department - me - to get into his costume. Jake helped.

The hat was the final touch. It really finishes off the outfit!

Gavin was the talk of the neighborhood. Even people we don't know were commenting on how he had the cutest costume they'd seen all night. Can you blame them?


After we visited a couple of houses on our block, we spent the rest of the evening hanging out in the driveway passing out candy.

Gavin and his daddy are the two cutest boys I know!

We finally went inside about an hour after Gavin's usual bedtime. Can you tell he was ready for sleep? :)

He had a quick bath and was out like a light almost before his head hit the pillow. I'd say this Halloween was a success!

news and new words

We had our anatomy ultrasound today for the new baby! If you don't want to know what we're having, don't look at pictures 4 & 5.

Picture 1: the skelator picture...
Picture 2: what a cute profile!
Picture 3: profile is still cute! The kid's face is right up against the placenta - guess we've got a snuggler coming.
Picture 4: I don't think you even need the label and arrow to tell you what you're looking at here.
Picture 5: see? no arrow, and it's still pretty apparent :)
It was so freaking cool to watch the baby moving around during the ultrasound.

Gavin has just started saying his /k/ sounds lately, though most of them are still pronounced as /t/. His r's are still more like w's in some words, though he pronounces them in others. Listen to him say "fork" as he practices his new sounds. He says it twice in this video, and the 2nd time was especially funny to us.

He is also working on being quite the ham when I take his picture. He was saying "cheese," until riiiight before the camera took the picture, when he turned into demon baby. Priceless.

sick baby. again.

Poor Gavin. He's finally kicking the sinus and ear infection, and along comes the fever virus. The only symptom is a high fever, at least, so hopefully no more snot or coughing will accompany this round. I'm hoping he's feeling better soon. I'm also hoping that, once he's healthy, he stays healthy for a good long while. His mother's day out class will forget what he looks like!!

Tomorrow is the anatomy ultrasound for the new baby. I will not be keeping it a secret, so if you don't want to know what we're having, stay away from here tomorrow! I'll post pictures as soon as it's possible to do so.

shenanigans

Gavin decided to take his pajama shirt off himself this morning. In the kitchen. So it stayed on the kitchen floor until mommy was awake and decided it needed to move to a more appropriate place. Like the hamper.

The early morning shirt shenanigans resulted in a half-naked baby boy eating his Cheerios at breakfast. I guess the bright side in all of this, aside from Gavin's general, all-around cuteness, is that his PJs don't smell like milk now.

Grammy, I promise that the book you gave Gavin does get used for more than just a step stool.

See? Told ya! He loves lifting out the pieces to see what's underneath. We just need to work on putting them back where they belong before we lose them all :)

Jake was being extra cute today, so he got his picture taken, too.

We went to the new Salt Lick restaurant that opened a few weeks ago in Round Rock for dinner tonight. It was good! At least, I think it was - my head is all stuff and I can't really taste much, but everyone else thought it was yummy. Gavin felt warm afterwards, and sure enough, he's running another fever. Poor kid! It sounds like he has what one of his friends had last week, which was a fever with no other symptoms at all. He was warm, and snuggly, but otherwise his same little Gavin self. Hopefully this will pass faster than his sinus/ear infections last week. I want my healthy self and baby boy back!!

good times

Kelly gave Gavin some clothes that Blake had grown out of. Gavin really enjoyed the box she sent them over in.

He also spent some time playing drums on the box, but I was too busy playing with him to take pictures or video of that!

We flew to Madison, WI last weekend for my cousin Ryan's wedding. Gavin enjoyed swimming with his daddy in the hotel pool. The camera turned itself off right before Gavin went underwater - must remember to bring batteries next time!!

He also developed a fever sometime between the wedding ceremony and wedding reception, poor kid. Finally, today is a fever-free day, but Gavin was a trooper through the whole deal. Even with fever-eyes, he's pretty darn adorable!


He even showed off how he's learned to say "cheese!" when having his picture taken!

I took some video (tried, anyway) of Gavin playing in the living room the other day, but it was impossible to get anything good when he kept trying to come to my side of the camera and see what I was taping. Exasperating, but still cute - for now, at least!

Now that Gavin's feeling better, he's eating better as well (slowly but surely his appetite is making a comeback). We had cheddar and jalapeno sausage for dinner tonight. I'd cut pieces for him to stab with his fork, but that took too long, so he just shoveled them into his mouth with his hands. Then we put a couple of "spears" on his plate - pieces we'd not yet cut up - and he grabbed one and starting taking bites off the end. My little carnivore.

He was so excited about his yogurt tonight that he used 2 spoons. Silly.

I'm working on updating things regularly, but failing miserably. Being sick myself doesn't help! At least I can admit to my shortcomings :)

dance party

Gavin loves Rage Against the Machine. It's loud, angry, and, for some reason, it's just the thing to get Gavin dancing like a crazy man.

in the backyard

It was really nice outside this evening, so we spent some time in the backyard. We'd been anticipating rain and wind from Ike to come our way, but we didn't get a single drop of rain. It was windy, sure, but no rain. So we took advantage of a breezy, not super swelteringly hot evening outside.

Scott was reading for school.

Gavin enjoyed climbing and sliding. Apparently, someone has taught him to say "cheese!" when his picture is being taken, which explains why he's making a silly toothy face in some of the pictures.

He's very independent when climbing now, which is awesome. He used to want one of us to hold his hand or be there at all times and now he couldn't care less where we are (as long as he can see us!) while he's clambering all over the place.

It wasn't terribly hot, but it was still warm, as evidenced by Gavin's sweaty head. Ah, boys.

Scott took some video of Gavin on the slide. The camera cut out in the middle, so we have part 1 and part 2.

Part 1:

Part 2:

1st day of school

Gavin had his first day of "school" yesterday. My baby's a big boy now!! He is going to a Mother's Day Out program 2 days a week. He even has a little backpack! I didn't get a picture of him with it before he took his backpack to Kelly's house, but I'll try to get one to post soon. So cute!! Kelly told me he had an "okay" day, whatever that means :) He didn't eat much while there, which doesn't surprise me with his history of hunger strikes in new situations, but I'm sure that will work itself out as he gets more comfortable with Ms. Janine and the rest of the Jellyfish class.

I feel terrible that I wasn't able to take him to his first day. I still haven't met his teacher! This working thing gets in the way.

finally!

Now that school's back in session, I just never seem to find the time to get on here and post anything. So, here it is, the big fat update of what's been going on with us here in Durham-land.

The week before last, I felt the baby move for the first time! It's such a wild feeling, and it's what I missed the most about being pregnant. This past Friday was 15 weeks. We have our 16 week appointment on Tuesday (so it's more like 15.5, but whatever) and hopefully we can schedule our anatomy ultrasound at that time. Yes, we do plan to find out the sex, and yes, we will be shouting it from the rooftops. Don't worry!

Gavin will be starting a Mother's Day Out program this coming week. Kelly will drop him off and pick him up (her kids are going there too) every Tuesday and Thursday, 9am-1pm. I'm excited to have him in a class with other kids his age. He's wary of new people, especially new grown ups, and it's going to be weird for me to hear all about everything that goes on at his school third hand, but oh well. I'm sure everything will be fine, even if there's some adjusting at first, and I know he'll end up having a blast.

Sorry, I guess I'm making you read a bunch (if you're actually reading and not just scrolling down) before getting to the Gavin gallery. Here you go!

Here Gavin and Scott are watching TV. Male bonding, baby - especially now that football's back!


One of Gavin's new favorite things to do is washing his hands. Whenever we go into the bathroom, or use the sink in the kitchen, or just walk past the sink in general, he rubs his hands together to ask if he can wash his hands. Good hygiene starts early! Oh, and so you know, Gavin went to the library the day we took this picture - that's a stamp on his hand/wrist, not a bruise!

They don't just watch TV on the couch. Here are Gavin and his daddy enjoying Gavin's "DOG" book.

Could he be cuter? Nope, I don't think so either :)

This is video of Gavin in his highchair. He wanted pizza for dinner (as you can tell) and was reading his daddy's bike magazine. Though we didn't get footage of it, Gavin can now point to the pedals, handlebars, wheels, seat, helmet, and probably more stuff I'm not thinking of. He's a bike lover, just like Scott. I'll have to get video of him riding his own little bike. Note to self.

And here he is in our closet. He was doing pull-ups on the bar before I got the camera, but when I returned to take video he got all shy and refused to do cute things, aside from just being cute in general. Oh well. Enjoy it anyway.

uh oh....

Gavin has a new skill. I don't know when exacty he mastered it - today was the first time I watched him actually do it.



We are in some serious trouble. It's time to hit the store for some more kid-proofing supplies - fast.

I am sorry that posts have gotten to be more widely spaced than earlier this summer. I'm really busy getting my classroom together and will most likely be keeping posting to weekends, when I have time to take and upload pictures and put them up for all to see. I'll do the best I can to keep up with the Gavin updates!!

special visits

Gavin's Grammy drove down from Dallas Thursday night to spend some time with him. The dynamic duo spent all day Friday playing together - coloring, taking a walk, building big block towers - while I went up to school to work on things in my classroom. It was great to come home and find them happily eating a snack together. Gavin and his Grammy had a great day!

We ran to the grocery store to grab a couple of things, and my mom decided that Gavin needed a new toy. So he came home with an Elmo that talks when you shake it. Gavin was quite a fan.



Gavin decided that Elmo needed to sit in his little chair.

We had a little bout of cranky after our trip to the store. Gavin makes a pretty sour face when he has a mind to:

Thankfully, Elmo and Grammy were able to bring Gavin out of his funk and get him back to his happy self.

like father, like son

Scott was teaching Gavin how to play the X-Box after dinner.

Gavin was very in to it. Oh boy.