Happy Birthday Gavin! {Thomas the Train party}

Our baby turned 3 the day after Thanksgiving. 

He came up with an easier way to show 3 on his fingers, all on his own.

This was him before bedtime the night of his actual birthday.  Turning 3 is hard work, and it wasn't even party day.

 I kind of knew how he felt.  It was a whirlwind of a weekend. 

Thanksgiving on Thursday.

Birthday party baking, cleaning and decorating on Friday.

Dave and I were gone all day Saturday for the K-State game.

Sunday off to church and home for an afternoon party.

Whew!

Gavin talked about a Thomas party for months. 

And after I got it all decorated, he stood and looked around and said 

"I no like Thomas anymore...I like Percy"

Seriously this child cracks me up!

I'm pretty sure he was just trying to see what I'd do.  Where do they learn these things!?

Good thing mom was on top of things and made sure Percy was a part of the party too (in just a few places).

We got him a birthday shirt to go with his engineer hat from Silver Dollar City.

 The shirt was a little big so he wanted it tucked in, with a belt.  Just like big brother has to do for school everyday.

I hope I never ever forget how funny Gavin is at this age.  Maybe he'll always be that way.

He makes us laugh daily.  He cracks jokes, has the funniest faces and can be quite the little ham.

He's Mr. Independent.  Most days he has 2-3 shirts on because Daddy wears 2-3 shirts to work to stay warm.  They are 100% of the time on backwards.  To the point that I do not understand HOW he is so consistent at getting them backwards, you'd think that at least SOMETIMES he would get it on the right way.  But no, never. And typically you'll find him wearing a belt that is either only through 1-2 loops or on backwards with the buckle in the back.  I still don't even know how he gets it buckled that way.  Oh yeah, and he has some Mickey Mouse slippers that he loves and insists on wearing them grocery shopping most of the time.

He is still a Daddy's boy, as he's always been.  Lately he talks about how he's going to go to work with Daddy the next day.  Which has still yet to happen.  Poor thing.

He would be happy if he could throw a football or wrestle with Mason and Daddy all day, every day.

And he's be far our most social and outgoing child, also the one who wanders the furthest, experiments the most, and holds his own in any fight. It's a little disturbing to me to see how well he's picked up how to fight and go into attack mode. But I guess when you're the baby sometimes you just have to learn that to survive.

Yesterday in the checkout line at Walmart he was singing his Sunday School song "jingle, jingle, happy bells", so loud that I'm pretty sure 2-3 lines of people could hear him.  I didn't realize it was that loud until I looked up and saw people on all sides of me smiling, pointing and listening to him. 

 

"The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear!"

Thank you Buddy the Elf.  Gavin is helping you out with that one.

It sure is fun being the baby of all the cousins. He gets spoiled and they are all so sweet to him.

When you have a child who needs NOTHING, and I can't even come up with ideas. 

Then a Thomas overload it is. 

Thomas books, puzzle, toys, flashlight, water bottle, bathrobe, pillow case and I'm sure there was more I can't remember.  And I'm guessing maybe even more coming for Christmas!

But the superhero cape was quite possibly the hit.

3 year old birthday parties are the best!  It seems like it's the first time they actually know what's going on.  But I'm super sad thinking about how it's probably the last 3 year old party I'll ever throw.

 I remember how I felt between ages 3 and 4 with my other kids.  And I'm kind of dreading it again. There is a lot of growing up that happens.  They move from toddlers to preschoolers and a lot of the "little kid" talk, and cute things they do go away.  I tried my hardest to hang on to my bigger kids as hard as I could and slow down this growing up process.  But it didn't work.

Hopefully I can figure out how to make it work this time around. 

2.5

Today, our littlest one is 2 1/2.  I hadn't been keeping track, but just yesterday Dave and I were thinking about it and we realized today was his half birthday.  5.28.14.

I've been a little quiet on the blog lately.  Not intentionally.  But I ALWAYS have things to say about this guy.  He's something else I tell ya.

When Dave and I left at the end of March for our cruise, he was saying minimal words, and hardly putting two words together.  When we came back 8 days later, he was a total different child. And he's been talking like crazy ever since.

I'll let you find what's wrong with this next picture.

Geesh, I can't turn my back.

 

 This past school year, it was just me and him 3 days a week.  Starting in August, it will be just us two, every morning.  sigh. (that's a good sigh and a bad sigh)

Poor last child, doesn't know how to play alone.

And doesn't want to be with mommy most days.  I'm kind of kidding, but not. 

He's the biggest daddy's boy ever.  As in...

I wake up every morning to him crying for Daddy at the door of his room.  I never know what kind of emotional condition he's going to be in once I open the door.  There have been some mornings he has shoved the door back closed on me because it wasn't Daddy coming to get him.  If he does let me in, the first words out of his mouth every.single.morning. are "daddy home?"  And 5 out of the 7 days a week the answer is no.  This is when it can go 1 of 2 ways.  He will decide to be okay with me.  Or he'll decide to spend the morning screaming and crying because he just wants Daddy.  Poor Daddy gets many calls on his phone, because it's the only way I can get him to calm down many times.

He wants Daddy to get him out of his car seat.  He wants Daddy to carry him.  He wants Daddy to play with him, rock him and put him to bed. And he so badly wants to be able to go to work with Daddy just like Mason.

Now, I'm not complaining.  I love their connection.  And it's a nice break for a mama most of the time.  BUT, when the person he wants is gone 80% of the day, it's a little bit of a challenge.

Hopefully it's a phase, and we'll have lots of fun just the two of us this next year.

 Oh, what a little helper he is.  He liked to try to pick the flowers I was about to buy, he loves to smash the bread in the grocery cart, and he loves loves loves to empty all of my expensive bottles of real maple syrup into his bowls of oatmeal. Therefore ruining the oatmeal. The bottle I have now, was bought by a sweet friend that came with a note that said "NOT FOR GAVIN".  We'll see if it stays that way.

 But he also loves to cuddle on the couch with his mama.  And watch Barney.  And he loves to be rocked and read to before bed.  He loves to dance.  And he sings the "Hot Dog, Hot Dog, Hot Diggity Dog" song and "Lord, I Need You".  He takes off into his Sunday School class better than either of the other two kiddos did, and he loves to wave and say hi and bye to strangers.  I've never had a child who will interact with strangers at all, so I think it may be safe to say this one may be our extrovert.

 His facial expressions are quite hilarious.  There is a lot of personality in that little body. 

Everything is categorized into Mama, Dada, and baby.  Size of fruit, size of trucks, size of bites, size of everything.  And daily when I ask if he's my baby, he says "no, I da mommy, you da baby" or sometimes "daddy baby, I da mama".

And he gives the best hugs and kisses.

He's a pure joy.  I can't count the number of times I've caught one of the other two kids or Dave watching him or listening to him and then turning to me with such a content smile as if to say "he's so cute, I can't believe he's ours".   Of course Dave and I think so.  But to see our big kids get stopped in their tracks, and look at him with eyes of endearment and just take him in...it's just a precious thing to see.

 And then there's this...a 2 year old riding a bike.  I don't know what ages most kids start to ride bikes.  But I know my other 2 did NOT ride this early.  They rode trikes and push toys.  Not bikes.  Bikes are for big kids.  But this baby of ours has decided to skip the trike and go straight to the big stuff.  It baffles me every time I see his little body pedaling all over the driveway.

2.5 is just plain too little to be doing this.

But I can't stop him.

Gavin {18 months}

Our baby is 18 months already. And boy does this child have a lot of things to say about him at 18 months.  I wanted to get some good pictures of him to document this milestone but I didn't know how we were going to fit it in. So I got sleeping pictures of him, thinking that's the best I'd probably do.  But that evening we ended up heading to the trail to hike with friends, so we dressed him up and did a little photo shoot for 5 minutes before.  I didn't have much time. We found a place, set him on a bench and I had to move fast, because he moves fast.

 

 

Oh Sweet Gavin.  There are so many things I want to remember about you at this age.

You are craaaazy! You are sooooo much more boy than your brother was.  Maybe that's because he just had a sister at the time he tried to keep up with all the time.  But you, you have found the mud, the rocks, things to climb, cupboards to open, and you don't stop moving unless you are sleeping.

 Your tear duct surgery really helped your eyes.  We haven't dealt with yucky, red looking eyes sense.

But you still have skin issues, bad outdoor allergies and you're the only one in our family who has to stay away from eggs and nuts.  But it could be a ton worse.  We are hoping you grow out of a lot of this.

 

 You are talking a lot more these days.  But still not a ton.  You have always been good at your head nods and sign language for please, more, thank you, all done.  So we usually communicate pretty well with you.  Your most common used words are "ma" and "da".  All day long we hear you saying "MA!...MA!...MA!"  or "DA!...DA!...DA!" and then if we are both home it's "MA!...DA!...MA!"

You also say "no, no", only when talking about going into the street.  Although you have been caught saying it, and the darting into the street just to be naughty.  But for the most part you know that you have to stay away and you steer your scooter into the grass at the end of the driveway every time, so you don't roll into the street.

You also will say "da" (sounds the same for both dog and ball), "bubu", "sissy", "nana", "pa"(papa), and "ba"(for aunt barb and for your friend Brahm). And you're really starting to repeat lots of things we are saying.

 

 You love to be outside. If anyone walks out the door, you throw a fit until you can go out too.  You love your scooter, and your legs move so fast as you push yourself up and down the driveway.  You love ladybugs and roly polys, but most of the time you put them in your hand and squash them on accident as you walk around with them.

You love the sandbox and the mud.  You love to climb anything you can get on to get higher.  You were very angry that you couldn't swim in your brother and sister's pool so we had to get you your own.

 

 

 

And you are also our runner.  We haven't had a kid who likes to run in the opposite direction they are supposed to, but you are that kid.  One time you even took off riding your scooter down the street while Daddy chased you.  You knew Daddy was chasing you and you just went faster and didn't look back.  You've also been known to make it to the neighbor's house before we notice.  (man, that makes us sound awful, but seriously kid, you are fast and always on the move).

 

 

You love books, but you are always done after 1 or 2, and point to your bed to be laid down.  You are still our very best sleeper!  We took away your morning nap for awhile because I thought surely you were old enough that you didn't need it, but after a few rough weeks we went back to it and you are much happier.  You nap in the morning and afternoon and go to sleep at night and never ever wake up.

 

You love playing chase and wrestling with your brother, and you love playing kitchen and baby dolls with your sister. You have the funniest faces and expressions and you think you're pretty funny yourself.  It doesn't help your antics to have a big brother and sister who laugh at you all the time too.

One of the funniest things you do is your back float in the bath tub.  You began doing this all by yourself when you took baths with Taylor.  You'd lay your head back in her lap.  She always had to be ready because we never knew when you'd just plop yourself backwards.  But you got better and better to the point that you can now lay yourself back without anyone holding on to you and pretty much really float.

 

 

 

 

 

You love to put on every else's shoes. I think I could lock you in a shoe closet and you'd be happy all day wearing one pair after another.  It just makes it hard for us to find our shoes because you string them all over the house.

 

But one thing that I love about you is that no matter how crazy you are, you still like to cuddle with your mama, and your daddy too.  You give the sweetest kisses and hugs. And you say "mama" in the sweetest voice as you snuggle your head into me. 
 

 And you MUST do what everyone else is doing at all times.  Even if it means insisting on fishing all by yourself with Daddy's pole.

 

 You're a busy, busy boy.  You are full of spunk and personality.  You make us laugh so much.  We love you so much sweet boy.  We thank God every day for blessing our family with you.