I'm mobile and eating new foods!

Gage is all over the place these days. His crawl has turned into a gait, and I will not be surprised at all to see him standing up one of these days. He just knows that he has to try to keep up with his big brother. And now it is exactly how I predicted it would be: I'm running around the house disciplining one child and wiping up spit-up from the other...and hustling to get there before he crawls right through it.

I think that these pictures were actually taken to capture him sitting up, which preceded the crawling. It's amazing how quickly they pick this stuff up!

We started with rice cereal about three weeks ago, and now we're feeding him barley cereal. I tried to give him some banana during our picnic at the park today, but he was actually more hesitant about it than I thought he would be.

The mess is amazing, isn't it? Gavin likes to watch this whole thing, and he even wanted to feed Gage himself the other day. I think that it's probably a relief for him to see someone making a bigger mess than he makes at mealtime.

Summer fun...

This $5 pool from Walmart has been much more successful than its $25 counterpart for Gavin. Gavin's was busted in a few days and now has multiple patches, making me wish that I had skipped the inflatable ones and gotten a sturdy plastic one, especially considering which toddler we're considering here :) It's fun to watch Gage splash around in this little pool.

Aunt Jaan was visiting from Florida recently and got to meet Gage! It was so fun to have her here for the day, and we got to spend a rather quiet afternoon together after Brent took Gavin camping for the first time. (Stay posted for the full report in the next entries.)

My mom just turned sixty on July 14 (!) and we had a fun weekend of celebration. Somehow the only picture I have to document the event, however, is this funny one of my brother (aka Uncle Zachie) taken at Chautauqua Park where we had a great picnic party for Mom.

4th of July...

It's a good thing that Sweet Gavin didn't know the difference, but the only "fireworks" that we did this year were the ones that Mommy found at the grocery store in a multi-pack: confetti party poppers. (I did think that it seemed a little odd that they were selling real fireworks at the store.) Even the big display was canceled this year due to weather, so I can't wait for next year's fireworks. It's so fun for us to do all of these things with our kids for the first time.

Gage up close...

OK, which contest do we enter this picture in?! Brent caught an amazing shot of Gage here, didn't he? Those two baby teeth are still the only ones for now, and they're getting quite sharp and long. He's starting to sit up by himself from this little tripod position, and he rocks back and forth like his brother did to practice crawling. I think he's taken one or two little crawls forward, but he's not on the move yet. I'm so thankful for that. I have visions of chasing him around the house with a burp cloth to prevent him from flooding our carpet with milk. (Have I mentioned that this child spits up A LOT?)

You can't go wrong with a naked baby picture, can you? Gage's six month check-up is on Monday (what?!), so we'll have to post again soon with his height and weight stats. We'll ask the doctor one more time about the excessive amount of spit-up; we hope it's not acid reflux. It definitely doesn't seem to be slowing him down weight-wise; he's probably up to about 18 pounds by now. We are so blessed by all of his smiles and laughter.

Fun at the Bay....

This was Gage's premier swimming experience. It was so cute to see him in Gavin's old swimming trunks. We have a fun, outdoor water place near our house (The Bay), and I'm glad that we all got to go together.

Here's Daddy with Gage. I loved Brent's attempts to keep the sun off of his son: the cute hat and the long-sleeved onesie. That's my conscientious husband for you!

Gavin could pretty much navigate the baby pool all by himself, which was nice. There are a couple of little slides, and the water is shallow enough that he has a great time there. I've thought of a couple of the things that Gavin has said and done lately that simply must be shared. We were reading about dinosaurs the other day, and when Gavin climbed into bed he said, "Now I'm a dinosaur in a Gavin suit." Today he asked, "What day is it? Friday? Oh, Saturday...well, we don't put up hugs and tisses on Saturday. We're all out, sorry." Where do these adorable things come from?! He's been asking his food lately, "Where are ya coming from? The window? The door? Oh, there you are!" His role-playing and vocabulary crack us up these days!!

Gavin hears me calling Gage a "sweet factory" sometimes, and today Gavin's variation was a "wild factory." Hmmm, I don't think so, Buddy, not half as wild as you are in any given moment I'm afraid. Gavin's been acting in extremes with his baby brother lately, either extremely sweet and thoughtful and protective or extremely everything to the contrary. My heart melts every time I hear Gavin say, "I love you, Gage." My prayer is for them to be lifetime buddies and confidants.

These boots are made for walking...

So you may not be able to tell from the picture, but Gavin put on his own boots, hence they are on the wrong feet. (I shouldn't make it sound like that's always the case, I guess, because he did put on his own Crocs the other day...on the right feet!) He LOVES these "fire boots," given to him by Lukas Goodworth a year or two ago and just now fitting him, though he's worn them the whole time in between.

Gavin's a real ham, in case you were wondering. He's been saying the funniest things lately, and I've been so bad about writing them down or even remembering a lot of them. He's been asking Brent to check his room at night: "Any bugs? Spiders? Anteaters?" I may have to write a separate post one of these days when I remember some more of his funny stuff. I really want to remember it for myself too.

Remember this cute robe?

It's so cute and funny for me to see Gage in Gavin's old things. I remember the pictures of Gavin in this adorable, little bear robe...and now our second little one is posing for a picture in it. (Let's be honest: It isn't exactly the most functional thing for a baby at this age, so it's all about the photo op and MAN is it cute!)