Saturday Playdate

Please join me over at The Life of Rylie...and Bryce, Too! Gage and I took a quick trip to FL for the day!

A Week of Firsts...

This first week of March has been a long one, but a productive one.  Gage has hit a few 'milestones' this week and it's just amazing to me, as I always say, how much he is learning every day.  On Tuesday, Gage had his first REAL haircut, not just Mommy and Daddy chopping off long strands in the bathtub.  He did awesome and looks so handsome!  He doesn't have much hair, but it sure looks better now that it's even and not in his face.

We also had a much needed playdate this week, not a 1st, but definitely still fun!  I'm sure you remember Sawyer from last summer.  Sawyer 10 mos., Gage 16 mos.





As of this week, Gage is officially walking.  He walks all the way across the room and is walking to get  to places now, not just b/w couches, tables, to toys, etc.  Gage is transitioning into the toddler room the week after next in daycare and has to be able to walk in order to do this....we were worried he would be delayed.  We are feeling less nervous now and his new teachers have even been in the baby classroom to spend time with him this week.

Although vocabulary is nothing new for Gage, he has made quite a few strides this week.  I stopped posting how many words he has b/c it was getting out of hand and I couldn't keep up, but some of his new ones this week are 'really?', 'stop', 'clock' and my personal favorite, after getting his hair cut and having someone hold the door open for us....'thank you'.  As.plain.as.day.  I have to say I was pretty shocked.  Another vocab first and probably more exciting than thank you, Gage said 'Bobby' today when I came home!  Nothing like a day w/ your Daddy to miss your 'Bobby';)  (As you all know, Gage hasn't said Mommy yet to me and also can't say a 'b' sound.  But hearing Bobby today was pretty exciting since it was a first!)

Gage seems to also be understanding alot more as of late.  He obviously has good expressive language skills and uses his words in context, however, I was a little worried about his receptive language.  He wasn't able to point at things in books when I asked him or didn't seem to understand when I said 'bring me this or that'.  He always pointed and named things, but wouldn't do it if I said 'point to the star....'.  This week he has started to do it, it takes him a few seconds to process what I ask, but he is damn accurate when he does respond.  Yesterday I asked him to point to Mommy and after a few seconds, he turned around, pointed right at me and said 'Bobby!'

Finally, probably not a 'milestone', but we still think it's pretty darn cute, Gage can now tell you what a duck, cow, pig, cat, sheep, elephant and snake say.  The snake and elephant are my personal favorites.  I'm hoping to get it on video soon.  Have a wonderful weekend. 

What is worthy of a post?

Doesn't look like I've written anything of substance this week, huh?  I'm sure some things have happened, in fact, that's why I haven't had the time to write....clearly, I have been doing other things!

While doing these other things, I keep thinking...I need to blog about this, or blog about that....and well  at the end of the day, I'm too damn tired most of the time.  I'll start with telling you what I've been up to and maybe I'll get inspired...

Every Thursday, Gage and I get together with Sawyer and his mom Sarah. This past week it was too hot to swim so we decided instead to hit up our local Carter's store (which I didn't know existed until this week) to buy some fall 'school' clothes.  I usually love Carter's clothes and get them from either Target or Kohl's.  I didn't know I had my very own Carter's store w/in a half hour of me.  Anyway, if you are a Carter's fan, you might want to look up where your local store is...their prices are lower than any of their other retailers (understandably so).  AND if you bought $40 worth of stuff, everything was 25% off.  I love me a good sale!  So needless to say, I bought Gage a few new outfits, mostly PJ's and Halloween gear and saved about $30 or so. (Their Halloween costumes are also on sale for a super low price right now, too.)  Luke was so impressed with my savings that he said we could go back tomorrow and buy some more stuff  to celebrate the tax free weekend in VA!  wahoo!  I can't believe I am buying 12M clothing, my little guy is not so little anymore:( and they don't have cute little one  pieces anymore, I actually have to buy little BOY clothes.

Yesterday, Gage hung out w/ Daddy while I worked for a day.  Being a special education teacher, there is always TONS to do at the beginning of the year and something else always pops up, so anything you can get done over the summer is worth taking the time to do.  I was somewhat productive b/c I was happy to know that Gage was home with Daddy.  However, being back at work reminded me of our looming decision to pick a day care and the fact that this time whereever we pick, we must commit to for 10 months.  We think we have settled on one, but of course it's like the 2nd most expensive place in the area....how fun!  Luckily, both Luke and I are making a little more than last year, so we should be able to swing it.

Finally, today, was one big disappointment!  I had blogged a week or so ago about our upcoming 1st birthday party for Gage's BFF Jake.  He turned one last week but his party was today at 3pm, or so I thought....
Originally, Jake's party had been scheduled for a different day and for one reason or another his parents changed it.  When they changed the date, they also changed the time; however, noone told me:(  I still had the original time written down and rearranged Gage's entire day based upon it.  We got there 2.5 hours late and everything was done.  The presents, the cake, the singing of Happy Birthday....we missed it all.  We got no pictures and Jake took a nap shortly after we got there....yeehaw!  Some birthday.  I guess in the end it didn't matter since my camera batteries were dead anyway, but it would've been nice to not have to get Gage up from a nap to go to a non existent birthday party.  Crazy to think that in exactly 14 weeks it will be the eve of Gage's 1st birthday, not to mention that in one week he will have been outside of my belly longer than in my belly.....my how time flies.  Since this post was random and boring, I'll post some new pictures soon.  Everyone loves new pictures!

Playdates Galore...

Last week we had 3 playdates back to back, then skipped town to see the grandparents. It was so exhausting we didn't even have time to write about it. I am looking forward to a much quieter week this week.

Last Wednesday, we set off to Stafford (about an hr. drive) to go and see my friend's new house and have our kids meet. Her son, Theo is 2 months older than Gage and again, those 2 months are HUGE at this age. Although Theo is almost as toothless as Gage (he has 2 halves) Theo of course can crawl and stand unassisted. He isn't quite walking but can get around quite well alone. As usual when it comes to babies, their nap/lunch times didn't mesh and Theo and Gage only really played together for a few mintues. I didn't even get any pictures, as I had promised. I did get one picture of Malisa's older son, Gus and Gage.

Gage, 8 months and Gus, almost 5

Thursday was our weekly playdate with Sawyer and although it's next to impossible to get pictures of two babies at the pool with only two mommies, I did get a few pictures here before we left for the pool. Gage has recently become very interested in Sawyer and crawled up to his carseat immediately after he arrived. He wanted to touch him and looked as if he wanted to get in the carseat w/ him. Hopefully we'll get more pictures as the summer continues.




Friday was our final date with Jamie and Jacob at the pool. It was soo hot but we actually stayed longer than usual. Jacob was in a pretty good mood, but Gage wasn't (and hasn't been) in such a good mood these days. Not to mention Gage's float got a hole in it and he can no longer 'walk' around the baby pool. We were supposed to have a Mommy lunch but the boys were both tired so we both went home instead.

More to come on the weekend with the grandparents.

Summer time...and the livin's easy..

Ah...the summer time. This is the 1st summer in a LONG time that I haven't worked somewhere. Although summer school is great money, what teacher could ever resist staying at home with their new baby all summer long? We have had some fun already and it's only 3 weeks in. This week seems to be extra busy, w/ today being our only 'day off'.

Last week on Wednesday/Thursday we started our weekly play dates with Sawyer. I think I have mentioned Sawyer quite a few times now and yet no pictures, I know, I am bad. I will try and do that this Thursday. On Friday night, we went to a friend's for dinner. They have a 2 year old and one on the way, so it wasn't exactly a play date, plus Gage went to bed shortly after we got there. Either way, it was nice to have an adult dinner. On Sunday, Gage's "Aunt" Kelly came to visit and I'm so ticked I didn't get ANY pictures of them together. What was I thinking? He doesn't see Kelly very often and maybe I was so excited b/c I don't either but shame on me for not getting any pictures of the 2 of them. I guess I could Photoshop one together;)...ha, or just wait for next time:(

Yesterday we went to lunch w/ an old college friend of mine and Gage was a dear, as usual. We almost drown (from rain) but that is a whole other post. Finally, as you know Gage started 3 meals a day last week and this week is starting finger foods. We have begun giving him puffs and it's pretty hilarious. We'll have to get it on camera while he's still unsure. He has no idea why I'm putting a lump in his mouth and tries to spit it out. He has successfully gotten a few down and has pretended to choke/gag in the process. Oh well, just like anything else, he'll learn with time. I did try a sippy cup today for the 1st time though, w/ just some water in it and he seemed to love it. I guess we'll see how that goes too.

Anyway, we're off to Target when Gage gets up from his nap and tomorrow we have a play date with Theo (I'll promise to get some pictures this time) and Thursday with Sawyer. Fri. am we are supposed to have breakfast with another old college friend of mine and have yet another play date that afternoon with Jamie and Jake at the pool. Fri. pm we're headed down to Grandma and Granddiddy's for the weekend. See you tomorrow, when Gage is EIGHT months old!

Happy 4th of July!

Now that I think I have most of my blog issues fixed, thanks to some web strangers out there willing to give a HTML novice some advice, I am ready to post my pictures from our 4th of July and I guess I owe you some pictures from Grandma and Granddiddy's visit.

Every 4th for the last 4-5 years we have gone to our friends Jamie and Brad's house. They live near where the city lights off fireworks so we have always cooked out at their house and then walked to see one of my very favorite things- fireworks. This year however, we did not walk to see the fireworks. Jamie and Brad also have a <1 year old son and we didn't think the boys would like it too much. Plus my guy's bedtime is pretty much non-negotiable. He slept like a champ in the Pack n Play and the fireworks didn't even wake him. This year Gage and Jake got matching outfits from Old Navy. We didn't manage to get any good pictures of the two of them though. I was the only one concerned w/ the pictures, but I figured if we bought them matching outfits, we should get proof, right?

This was the best picture that we got. Although they're not looking at the camera, you can see their outfits.

This is Jamie holding the boys as they try to beat each other up.

We did however get a few super cute shots of me and Gage before we left. One of them is in my new banner, but it's kinda small so I might post it again!



It was a fun night, probably not as fun as in the past, but what are you gonna do when a couple of babies ruin it for you?:) Just kidding, people, just kidding!

The weekend continues....

Fortunately for us, the weekend got much better than our portrait experience. Gage has still been in a slightly foul mood and hardly napped today or yesterday but we were super busy and under the circumstances it was understandable. Yesterday before it got too hot and before there were tons of people there we took our 1st visit to the neighborhood pool. Gage loved it and it was SO much warmer than the indoor pool...go figure! His favorite part were the little fountains of water. I took him in the big pool with me but I think he liked just sitting in the baby pool splashing around the best.






After the pool we went to cook out at Howard and Sherri's. Most of the big kids were outside so I didn't get very many pictures, but here is Gage hanging with Adelyn, a 10 month old cutie with HUGE blue eyes and 9 teeth!





Today was filled with LOTS of shopping. We spent way too much money, but got some things we defintely were in need of. We wore poor little Gage out in the process. Here are just a few other pictures from the last couple of days that we think are particularly cute. Btw, we're thinking of entering Gage into the Parents magazine contest for their photo contest. We have to have 6 pictures taken within the last month, so we'll definitely submit some of the professional pictures, but we need a few others with his dimples showing, since he REFUSED to show them on Saturday.

Another week....

Another week has flown by since I last posted. Only 32 days 'til I get to spend the 1st summer w/ my little man. On Sunday we had Jamie and Brad over for Jamie's 32nd birthday. Gage and Jake hadn't seen each other in MONTHS so it was pretty fun to watch them interact. Gage kept wanting to touch and pet Jake and Jake was just more interested in cruising around a new place. There's only 15 weeks between them but in baby land it is an amazing difference. Jake has 2 teeth, is crawling, pulling up, cruising, and eating table food while Gage is just now deciding that he might want to try and move when on his belly. I've heard it numerous times but wasn't sure I believed it. Being mobile makes a HUGE difference in chub, check out the difference in Gage and Jake's legs. Pretty funny. Here are a few more pictures from Sunday, although we couldn't get a good one of the boys b/c Jake is constantly on the move.





This week was long and short all at the same time. SOL's have started at school so the schedule was all jacked up and the official end of school is coming quickly. I can't complain though, another week under my belt and that much closer to the summer time. We tried to make it to the pool again this week but didn't have much time.

Yesterday Gage had his 6 month dr's appt. and everything checked out great. Dr. Bauer said he was 'perfect' and of course she is right! He wasn't quite as heavy as we thought (he sure seems like he's gaining weight) but I guess what can you expect having us as parents? His head is still small and he apparently is right on track for height.

Stats:
Weight- 15lbs. 13oz. 30%ile
Height- 26.25" 50%ile
Head circumference- 17" 30%ile

We are now starting 2 meals a day, I can't believe how much he eats these days! He can start to have a larger variety of foods and start on pureed meat....sounds yummy! She says that at 8 months he can start on Cheerios and puffs...OMG, my baby will be eating real FOOD before the summer ends!! Also, she said to give him a sippy cup soon so he can get a feel for it before he actually starts using it around the end of the summer! Everyone says it and it's so cliche, but it's really true....babies grow up soo fast! We cherish every moment with Gage and thank God every day for our perfect little boy! Gage did ok w/ his shots, but seems a bit sore today. He slept alot yesterday and was a little cranky today... hoping for a better day tomorrow, BECAUSE......

Tomorrow Gage has his 1st Picture People appt. scheduled! That's right, hopefully tomorrow evening I will have some super cute new professional pictures to share! We are super excited to see how he does! As for the rest of the rainy weekend, we'll do lunch w/ Howard, Sherri and Evie on Sunday. That's all for now. Keep you updated on tomorrow's pictures!

Snowtorious B.I.G

Big surprise....tomorrow is Saturday and it's snowing! Gage already experienced one blizzard in his short life and now we're on #2. We have about 7-8ins right now outside but by morning there is supposed to be 2 feet and it's supposed to surpass 30 ins by tomorrow night. I can't complain though, I got to stay home twice this week with my hubby and baby and perhaps will get some more time off next week. Many are predicting we'll be out all week. If it weren't for snow mid week next week, I'd say we'd be back Thurs. or so, but who knows? AT least this will be one Super Bowl we don't have to worry about getting up early for work the next day. So Gage is becoming and having more fun by the moment. He loves to try and sit up, loves Phillip, a fish that hangs on his wall, is beginning to like tummy time and loves his activity mat. He had a play date with Jake this week and Jake tried to eat the lions on his feet! He is becoming so much more interactive and every day it is something new. Is it possible to love my baby more every day??


The following is a video of him talking to Phillip.

Play Date w/ Jake...

Last night Gage went on his very 1st play date (if you don't count the one where he slept the whole time). The boys decided beforehand it would be fun to wear their favorite band shirts and rock out, so Jake is dressed in his Zeppelin shirt and Gage in his Kiss shirt that Uncle Brian bought him. The boys played and ate and checked each other out. Jake is a sissy and went to bed at 8pm and Gage stayed up all night and partyed w/ the adults. Finally we captured his sweet, round smile....after many, many takes.








Here is a full lenght shot of Gage's sweet shirt. This was from the tour of his very 1st concert when he was minus 4 weeks old.