Look out: It's Captain Gavin Sparrow!

It's official: We have a walking boy! In fact, he's already working on running!!! I used to be counting his steps (he was stuck on 7 consecutive steps for awhile), but now I lose track. He's all over the house and the park and the library...and even the Chinese restaurant the other day. It's really a sight to see--kinda like the early days of Captain Jack Sparrow, hence the reference to our very own Captain Gavin Sparrow. We have been marveling at how quickly he went from taking just a few steps to taking the whole house by storm. We're so thankful for him and for the ways that he's growing and developing right in front of our eyes.

The dreaded haircut...

The before picture...During...

After...
The resistance to the cape and just Gavin's general squirminess validated our suspicion that we should not attempt to take haircutting shears to our son's hair at this point in his life or our confidence. Though it looked like a bowlcut for a few days, it's back to its adorable flip-up in the front and mohawk-after-a-nap style. His first haircut was not without incident: The handheld mirror provided to distract him was quickly thrown to the ground and broken. Oops!

Swimmies at the Bay!

Daddy got to join us at the Broomfield Bay the other day. For those of you who don't know, it's like a kid's haven for all things swimmies-related just five minutes from home. Gavin watched Mommy go down the big slide, and we generally had as much fun as you could have in a half an hour in cloudy weather. Sometimes you just need these outings, don't you?

Kansas Road Trip

We recently took Gavin on his first road trip to Kansas to visit the relatives. First we drove to Norton--where Brent's extended family lives--and then to Goessel--where my aunt & uncle and grandpa live. In general, Gavin did great in the car and better than we expected in the pack 'n play for naps and nighttime sleep. This is a precious picture of Baby Mohawk (very pre-haircut) with his Great Grandma Koel:This picture was taken at what Brent referred to as "Ron and Patsy's Paradise Ranch":
Here's Gavincito with Great Uncle Ron...(Ron & Patsy aren't sure what they think of the "Great" part of this title, but maybe it would help if they just thought of it as a synonym for wonderful.)
Ron & Patsy have a really fun, rather large inflatable pool in their backyard. Here we are enjoying the coolness of the water in the 1000 degree Kansas heat + humidity:
The Kansas trip marked Gavin's debut of the word "dog," though his version is much cuter: "dah." He has five words now: dog, bye-bye, Mama, Dada (my personal favorite) & ball.