Take me to the zoo...

As always, we're loving the zoo! These pictures were taken on a recent excursion with our friends, the Schmidts. Mama's dear friend, "Auntie Andrea," has two children the same ages as ours (literally within two weeks in both cases!), and the zoo is a good place for us to meet up and share our love of animals, the sunshine (we're sort of fair-weather-zoo-goers, I have to admit) and of one another. :) Note the monkey in the background. These guys were in rare form that day, and the class clown was definitely the monkey who would occasionally hurl himself at the window where we were all standing and then get up and do it all over again. He had us all laughing!

This is my littlest monkey. Wow, he's precious! And he's at such a fun age for the zoo. His animal awareness and animal sounds have expanded dramatically in the past several weeks--way beyond "dog"--though that still appears to be his favorite to spot, pet, say and sound like.

Here are Gavin and Caleb Schmidt playing the African drums down by the gorilla exhibit. It's fun to watch these boys grow up together and interesting to see the common developmental patterns. For example, the fun three-year-old habit of choice that day at the zoo was spitting. Where does that come from? Why is it so much fun to do, especially when Mommy is disgusted by it?

Lego mania!

Our eldest son LOVES his Legos! We're thrilled with the focus that they give him, but occasionally his plans and the outcome don't coincide and this results in some major frustration. This is related to his struggle with perfectionism. We really try to praise him for the finished products (like the awesome firetruck above) and commend him for his sense of accomplishment.

Grandpa Koel visits: part 2...

Bruce swam with Gavin after Gavin's swimming lesson, and they had a lot of fun together in the water.

Gavin loves to see anyone being goofier than he is!

They went down the slide together a number of times. I keep being reminded that we really do have an awesome local rec center.

Can you see the resemblance here?

Bruce, it was nice to have you in town. Thanks for helping Brent with the house projects. The boys really enjoyed their time with you.

Grandpa Koel visits: part 1...

Brent's dad, Bruce, was in town from New Jersey recently. It was fun to see the way he made Gage laugh.

Knowing the way he manhandles Brent's glasses, it's likely that Gage was doing the same in this picture with Grandpa Bruce. (Sometimes he's "Grandpa Bruce," and sometimes he's "Grandpa Koel," and the title may depend on the time or the speaker.)

Everyone's biking these days!

Gavin's riding a big boy bike now! No training wheels! We're so proud of him, and he really takes after Daddy in the biking department. Brent took the training wheels off about a month ago now and committed to helping Gavin every night after work for about a week. He was confident that it wouldn't take more time than that for Gavin to get the hang of it, and he was right.

Gavin started just going up and down our street. Then he graduated to the sidewalk, and pretty soon Brent was taking him to the school park by our house. Now I have to haul with Gage in the stroller to keep up with him!! He really is a force to be reckoned with on the bike, and I think that he's inspired several of his older buddies on our block to ditch their training wheels as well.

And with the advent of Gavin on a bike with pedals, that left his old balance bike (the Strider) open for business. So Gage has started practicing on it, and I think at this point he gets as big a kick out of wearing the helmet as he does riding the bike.

It's crazy for us to think that we gave Gavin the Strider when he was only 18 months old! Here Gage is fast approaching 16 months, but he's only taken the balance bike for a "spin" a few times. It's notable that Gavin must have been significantly taller at Gage's age, because Gage can hardly touch the ground with the seat in the lowest position possible. I guess time will tell if both brothers will be bikers like Daddy.

Whether he bikes yet or not, nothing is hindering Gage from sporting the tiniest (and cutest) bike jersey you've ever seen! This was all for Daddy, but man was he a cutie!!!

Family picture...

We had a birthday dinner at Brent's mom's house the other day, and it was a miracle that most of us were facing the camera in this shot if you ask me. We are joined by Brent's mom and step-dad in the back row, and in the front row are Brent's sister, Jackie, and her husband, Karl, and their daughters, Madison and Sarah. Sarah is the latest addition to our family. She was born last month (March). Uncle Mike, Brent's half-brother, is the other guy in the front row. He's a freshman at C.U. this year.

Gage at 15 months...

Gage loves to give kisses at the gate at the top of our stairs. I close the gate sometimes for no particular reason at all, except--that is--to get one of his priceless little "tissies." One of Gage's favorite games these days is peek-a-boo. I wish we could catch a picture of him leaned over saying "boo" because that's as cute as it gets. That and hearing his little "wee, wee, wee" when I so much as hold up my finger for "...and this little piggy."

Though he's our little walking man these days, he still resorts to crawling fairly often...even on pavement. Ouch! At least he's got pants on.

He's wearing Brent's old Levis in this picture. I think they're so cute, but apparently they're a little too dark and straight and emphasize Gage's tummy too much :) for Daddy's style. Speaking of Daddy, the first thing that Gage says when he wakes up these days is "Daaah-DOW!" He even does it after naps, though Brent is never around then to get him. We wait for his stretches and other cute sounds, but once he's thrown out the Daddy call a few times he's serious about someone coming to get him.

The older he gets the lighter his hair is becoming. Notice the size of his cup in this picture? If you're around for very long at our house you'll hear a "oooh-oooh-oooh" coming from Gage, and that always means that he wants some of Mommy's or Daddy's drink. His little lips make the tiniest "o" when he makes that sound, and then when you see his brush-brush version of "please"on his chest you're done. We always end up passing off our drink at some point during the meal. He does surprisingly well with a cup that size. In other eating-related news, Gage has just started using his own spoon/fork. He ate a whole bowl of Malt-o-Meal the other day, and the next day he ate a whole bowl of apple sauce by himself. I'm shocked at how quickly he seems to have picked that up! It's not even as messy as you might expect.

Our Bob the Builder...

Gavin's been playing with Uncle Mike's old tools and stuff lately, and I love to see him working hard and really concentrating on a project.

He feels so accomplished when he's done, and I like his determination and "stick-to-it"ness.

He was doing all of this in our cold basement with his shirt off, but he was so focused on his project that he didn't seem the least bit affected by the temperature.

Brittany & Sierra visit...

My cousins, Brittany & Sierra, just came out from Kansas during their spring break. It was their first "sisters" trip, and they spent the weekend with my mom and Jim in Lafayette. We hung out together at our house one day, and my little goof pants was in his usual, not-so-rare form when we asked him to pose with the girls for a picture. This shot with him doubling as a prairie dog behind my cousins was the closest we got. Of course, he was psyched to be in the pictures once I was trying to get a picture of the girls together by themselves. I suppose that I should tell him not to be in the picture first next time, and then I might actually catch a great shot!

Oh yeah, this was the picture I caught later when I was trying to get a good one of the girls all by themselves. It actually turned out really cute! This was the trip when Gavin started pronouncing Sierra's name correctly, instead of calling her "Sierria." Oh man, who had to correct him so much?! I liked it better the other way. :)

We were singing my cousins a song from church, just in case you're trying to figure out what in the world I was doing in this picture.

Cute picture, Girls! I'm so glad that you came to visit! And thanks for staying with the boys while I went to get my bangs trimmed.

At the pool with Gage...

I've been trying to take Gage in the pool during Gavin's swimming lessons lately. He really loves the water!

He loves to sit and splash in the fountains.

And Mama loves to hug and "tiss" her precious baby boy.

"Grandma & Grandpa Mike" came to watch one of Gavin's recent swimming lessons.

This might have been the day that the pool felt ten degrees cooler, so it's no wonder that Gage looks so chilly.

Brothers,,,

There are more and more moments when these little dudes are just pretty precious together. Of course, there are still quite a few terrifying moments too, but it's good for us to capture the precious moments on film and in our hearts too.

Hey, shouldn't this be the other way around?

It kind of looks like Gage may be waving here, which he just started doing recently. His signs are pretty good, as confirmed by one of his deaf MOPS teachers the other day. I felt so proud of him!! And it seems like he has new words all the time. Among them are "hot," "more," and I can't believe that I can't think of any others right now. Brent always says that the one word he says perfectly is "no." Hmmm, I wonder why he hears that around our house so much?! I can't imagine.