The Best of Intentions

I sat down at the computer at 9:00 pm on Friday night with the best of intentions of writing out an update on Garrett this weekend. It’s now Sunday at 10:25 pm and I still haven’t published this crackerdy old entry. Looks like it’s been over seven months since I’ve written anything significant about G’s happenings. His 2nd birthday party was the last real update on file.

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He’s going to have 31 months under his belt in a week.

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How the Béla Fleck does that happen, yall?

I was doing so good for so long, writing semi-monthly updates about every little gurgle and spit up and cute thing he did that chapter of his life. But along came the terrible twos and I gave up trying to keep anything updated here on the blog. Maybe it was the explosion of words and sentences and energy and tantrums that erupted somewhere along the way that overwhelmed me. There’s just too much to write, so why write anything at all?

I have a feeling that I’m gonna regret that one day. I absolutely love going back and reading all those old blog entries from when he was a newborn. It makes me relieved to see just how far we’ve come from those days of no sleep. Two may have it’s challenges but they are NOTHING compared to those first six weeks of his life.

So here’s what G looked like when I last posted a monthly update:

And this picture from early this year is just too cute not to include on the blog:

Fast forward over six months and he’s grown about 5 inches and completely skipped over sizes in shoes. Those shoes in that last picture were size 7s, and now we’re buying 9s. Serious growth spurts these days.  There is also this new level of comprehension that never ceases to amaze me.

Since he was a baby I’ve always known that G could understand a lot more than he could say.  But now that he’s older he will actually follow directions when I ask, which is SO helpful.  I can ask him to take his cup to the sink, and he will DO IT.  If I ask him to take off his pants and put them in the laundry chute then put his diaper in the trash, he will do it!  I’m amazed!  If we are having a photo shoot out in the yard and I say  “Go sit on the bottom step and smile!” and he actually does it.

Or if I say “Go hug that tree and smile at mama.” Guess what?? He does it! I’m so proud of him!

It’s really amazing how much he’s soaking up these days.  Just today I learned that he knows how to plug things into electrical outlets.  I thought nothing about him running around the house with a hot glue gun in his hand until I looked over and realized he had plugged it into an electrical outlet and it had started dripping as he was holding it.

He didn’t touch it THANKFULLY, but he was pointing at it and about to stick his finger in a big glob of glue when I saw him and yelled at him. I scared him to death and he started crying but he didn’t get hurt. Man, this kid is way smarter than I give him credit for some days.  I will be much more careful about what he gets to hold from now on.

When we moved in May we converted his crib over to the esteemed Big Boy Bed!!! Here is G’s new room:

Yes I’m aware he has major high water curtains. I intend to add some length to them one day. You know, five or ten years from now.

I had so much needless anxiety over that crib-to-bed thing.  We changed him over the day we moved into the new house.  Kind of like ripping off a bandaid… just get all those transitions over with at once.  Speaking of Bandaids– Garrett calls them “BooBoodaids” now.  He also calls prayers “prayersies” How cute is that?

I think most parents worry about setting their kid free from the crib. I was no different. I had visions of him roaming freely around the second story of the house, climbing up into the attic and chewing on the fiberglass insulation and then falling down the stairs or worse yet– climbing over the balcony to the hardwood floors below. Pssssssht. That was all for naught ( so far, anyway…knock on wood)  Moving to the big boy bed was like the smoothest transition in the history of the world. G never moves from that bed once he climbs in it.  He won’t get out of bed until we acknowledge that he’s awake. For all these months one of us has had to physically go upstairs and make our presence known before he would think about moving from his bed in the mornings.
 
Just last week I wizened up. Instead of walking upstairs to get G out of bed I just yelled up “Good Morning!! Come on down!” and it actually worked! He got out of bed, turned on his light, turned off his fan, turned off the light again and came downstairs all by himself. Shocked the heck out of me.

Big boy bed indeed.

Don’t get me wrong– there have been a few glitches along the way.   Moving into a new house combined with an over active two year old imagination has proven to be a challenge.  Garrett’s most overused phrase this summer has been “What’s that?”  Well in the new house every single little noise evokes a sharp intake of breath and then “WHAT’S THAT?” The air conditioner kicks on….”what’s that?” … the ice maker drops some ice…. “what’s that?” The washing machine rinse cycle begins… “WHAT’S THAT??”  Along with this came a new fear of the dark and his new bedroom. And also a fear of all of his stuffed animals.  We’ve had to take down his moose and bear head along with most of the toys with eyeballs in a twenty feet radius of his room.  It’s kind of sad to decorate a new room and then strip it of all the cutesy stuff within just a few weeks, but you do what you gotta do to get some sleep.  Somewhere along the way Garrett learned the word “ghost”, which opened up a whole new can of worms.  Like I said… he’s got quite the imagination.  He’s also started telling us about his dreams.  There were many mornings he would wake up and tell us all about the crazy things he had done the night before, like flushing worms down the toilet and seeing a snake in his playroom.  There was one morning that he said “I fly high in the sky!”  He was very excited about that flying dream, which made me smile from ear to ear.

I love having flying dreams too, kid.

His imagination extends to his toys now, too.  He makes up stories as he plays… acting out scenes from Thomas and Friends or making up new ones right off the top of his head.  I’m so happy to see that he has learned to play alone happily since the plan for now is for him to be an only child.  I have found a great stand-in older brother for him on Youtube, though.  This random kid on Youtube has made all these videos of himself making up stories and playing with his Thomas the train set, and Garrett LOVES watching them.  He will beg me to see Thomas on the computer so much that I’ve had to make it a special treat when he does something good.  I totally credit sklepowich on Youtube for teaching my son all about imaginative play.  Thank you, sklep!

Back in July when I was in Minneapolis G got to see his very first movie in a movie theater. J took him to see “Despicable Me” for a Saturday matinee. He got his very own smoothie (aka strawbee juice) and popcorn.  J called me when they were finished with a HUGE smile in his voice.  He was so happy about their day out at the movies.  Said G did great!!  He did so great that he’s seen two other movies at the theater since that one– Thomas and the Misty Island Rescue with Pop-Pop and Toy Story 3 with me!  He did great at all three.  I am so proud of him!

This summer has been one of just having fun and being a little boy.  Doing what little boys love to do. He got to ride a horse for the very first time at Liberty Day in Columbiana! Nana held on tight while he circled the field a few times. He was fearless on that horse! Meanwhile I was freaking out on the sidelines. But Nana knows what she’s doing around horses so that made me feel better.

He also danced in the street at Liberty Day. My friend Lori was singing with her husband’s band and Garrett was her little groupie. He loved it!

He’s spent hours kicking around the new swimming pool. He learned how to float on his back and blow bubbles with his face underwater and even jump off the diving board!

This kid loves the water. 

He is an Aquarius after all.

We’ve tried our best to keep his fair skin slathered down in sunblock but still he’s got freckles across the bridge of his nose from being out in the sun for the first time in his life.

We’ve read about thirty new books this summer.  There are some we’ve read so often that G can recite them along with me now.  You should hear him say “terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad day”.  It’s priceless!  The stand-out favorite right now is “If You Give A Moose A Muffin.”  He loves that book and requests it nearly every night before bed.  One day I decided to make a sock puppet like the Moose does in the book.  He loved the idea at first, and he loved looking through all the buttons in the jar to find the perfect eyes for our puppet, but when I actually started sewing he got bored really quickly.  I think I’ll save that craft project for a later date when he’s older.  Another day I was unpacking a box in my office and ran across my old face painting kit so we had an impromptu face painting session.  He got a Nemo on one cheek and a Dorey on the other.  So you wonder why I haven’t been bloggin as much these days?  This is what had kept me from blogging– just sewing imaginary eyeballs onto socks and painting fish on my son’s cheeks.

Fun stuff.

When it’s not too hot outside he’s been running around the backyard chasing and being chased by Gus and Woodrow.  The dogs love it as much as he does.  They are digging their new house.  No stairs to climb and a huge industrial sized fan blowing on them beside the pool all day. Life has never been better for these puppies.

Let’s see… what else have we been doing this summer?  We’ve laid on our bellies in the grass in the front yard and examined bugs.

Here he is checking out the cricket for the first time.  Every time it would jump he would squeal like a little girl.  Kids got some bucking up to do if he wants to be a fisherman like his mama.

He did go fishing this summer.  No hooks yet, just pretend fishing, but still lots of fun. 

One day he’ll be a pro bass fisherman.  I just know it.  Watch out KVD.   Garrett, please, when you make it big– please promise me that you will set up a date between your daddy and his man-crush Mark Zona.  You will make him the happiest man on the planet.

The previous owners of our house left this huge tomato plant for us to tend.  I loved watching his little mini-gardening skills come out. 

Garrett loves tomatoes, so we would go pick the ripe ones and after we washed them off inside he would eat them like an apple.  I don’t know where he inherited this raw tomato eating gene.  Certainly not from me.  Yuck.   I’m not complaining, just observing the differences.

Some of the best fun he had this summer was at his new daycare!  This was yet another big transition that I had some anxiety over.  But this time it turned out that my anxiety was for a reason, because the first daycare that I enrolled him in turned out to be a big FAIL.  Long story short– Garrett HATED going to daycare, but for two weeks I braved it out and sent him in there crying, thinking it was just a phase that would get better.  But this crying was much different than separation anxiety crying.  I am well acquainted with that type of crying.  He’s been in preschool since he was six months old, afterall, so it’s not like I haven’t witnessed plenty of drop-off anxiety.  But this?? This was flat out fear and loathing type wailing that began way before we even left the house.  Finally after the 2nd week I listened to my gut and sat in the lobby for about an hour one day watching his teacher on the video monitor break a whole slew of rules in the classroom.  It was not a good day.  I withdrew him from that daycare immediately and moved him into a new one where he did MUCH better.  The new teacher at the new daycare quickly became his new favorite person.  Ms. Jami ROCKED!  All summer long he had Splash Days on Thursday and Ice Cream Day every Friday and life was good again.

Here he is holding his dollar for Ice Cream Day. 

Miss Jami taught him to sing his ABC’s and count his 1-2-3’s.  He hasn’t quite mastered them yet, but he’s got the gist of it.  He would come home from school singing new songs that I had never heard before.  Summer daycare was excellent for him!  I’m so glad we stuck it out and found a good place for him to be happy and thriving.

He’s also learned some manners lately, saying “Please” and “Thank you” appropriately, which just melts my heart every single time I hear it.  To refill his sippy cup and hear “Thank you Mommy!” when I hand it to him?? Man oh man… that’s awesome.  He has also started saying “I love you” consistently too, which is a new thing.  I can’t even talk about it without tearing up.  The heart bursting joy of hearing that sweet voice say “I love you Mommy” is what parenthood is all about right there.  Indescribable until you’ve heard it for yourself.  It’s amazing.

I love you too, Garrett.  And I’m so proud of you!

Love, Mama