Nine months!

Drew is nine months old today! He has gotten really chatty and playful lately; it's obvious that he knows what's going on and he wants to be a part of things (like eating, playtime, etc.). Some things about Drew at nine months:

- He is starting to act a little upset if he's holding something and you take it away from him....but most of the time he just goes about his merry way and finds something else to play with.

- The past few days he has been standing on his own for 3-5 seconds at a time!

- His top two front teeth are just starting to poke through (teeth #3 and 4).

- He thinks it's so fun to be chased. I'll say, "I'm gonna get you," and he starts crawling quickly in the opposite direction! And if Grant starts coming down the hall in his tricycle, he laughs and laughs as he crawls away from him.

- He is a ravenous eater! He can eat two cereal bars or two waffles in one sitting, on top of cheerios or other finger foods I give him. In the past couple of weeks, it's been hard to spoon-feed him at all....he only seems to want finger foods. Tonight I could only give him a few bites of his cereal before he started pushing it away. I guess that's good, except for a couple of things: 1) Since he only has two teeth, it's hard thinking of a lot of things that he can eat (and that don't require cooking, because that's the last thing I have time to do right now!)..... and 2) things that he can eat (like cereal bars, bread, waffles) end up all over the place! I've just ordered a splat mat for our kitchen floor, because right now our floor gets so messy every time he sits in that chair!

- Today he and Grant had a couple of true wrestling matches. Drew loves instigating these.....he'll crawl over to Grant and pull at his pacifier or mess with his hair, and Grant then lays on top of him and rolls around with him! I really have to be careful, though, because Grant doesn't know how to be anything but rough.

- I think he might be learning how to wave "bye bye." The past few days, when I'll grab his hand to wave to somebody, many times he'll pick up his hand afterwards and slap it around a little bit. He doesn't do this every time, though.....so I'm not sure!

We have his 9 month checkup tomorrow so we'll see how he does!

First pool trip of the summer

My parents came down early this week to spend some time with us. On Tuesday morning, we went to our neighborhood pool for the first time this summer. It was Drew's first pool trip, although he was so tired and drowsy that I'm not even sure he noticed! His expression never changed as I took him into the water, or for most of the time we were there. He finally gave up and fell asleep in my arms when we were about to leave.

Grant had so much fun....he's still wary of jumping in the water (thankfully), and he quickly grew tired of being carried around in the big pool, but he loved playing in the kiddie pool. Our neighbor Brynna came with us....Grant loves playing with her, and he had a great time. He especially liked watching her jump off the diving board!

I had been nervous about going to the pool by myself with the boys, but as long as Grant stays in the kiddie pool, I guess I could handle it! Hopefully I'll make it back there with them at least once per week or so......

Drew did really well with Grandma! Aside from me and Dean, she's the only person he feels reasonably comfortable with!
We tried taking a picture of Grandma, Grandpa and the boys. It was impossible! Every time Grant looked at the camera, Drew would look away (and vice versa). It was quite funny!

Grant and Brynna:

Whew.....

It has been a long, hard week. I volunteered to work at VBS for our old church.....I figured it would give us something to do this week, to break up the monotony of the summer. What was I thinking??! I only committed to Monday, Weds and Friday, and I don't know how I would've survived all five days. I worked in the infants' room with Drew, and Grant was right across the hall (which was a problem at the beginning of every day and a sometimes when he'd randomly see me, but for the most part he did really well). We had six babies in our room each day, and it felt endlessly chaotic. At the end of the week, I'm glad I did it.....but I just feel so beat right now!

Plus, Grant has been such a struggle this week. I feel like I'm yelling at him or putting him in his room all the time. He is constantly ignoring me, pushing Drew, running into Drew with his tricycle, taking away toys that Drew is playing with (even if they're Drew's toys!), finding creative ways to reach things he's not supposed to have.....on and on! Yesterday I had had enough, and after Dean got home I left the house and let him put both boys to bed (for the first time ever). I took dinner to a friend, then I went to Marshalls and looked around for almost 2 hours! It was so nice.....I don't even remember the last time I was able to shop for so long without having to worry about a baby needing something from me at home. And Dean did a great job......I felt justified doing that to him because he's playing in a golf tournament this afternoon, and probably won't be home until late. I don't think I would have made it through today without having a break last night.

Drew is doing great, though....he is so happy and this afternoon didn't even fuss when I left his room to take a nap. Yay! Yesterday I think he might have waved "bye-bye" too....I will hopefully post some pictures of both of them soon....

Everybody move back!

Now that I haven't posted for a few days, it's hard getting back into the routine! I have lots of things I want to write about, but so little time!

Grant had fun a couple of weeks ago.....he was playing with Dean's safety glasses before bed. He kept saying, "everybody move back!" When I asked him why, he said, "because I have tools." He is quite the little Mr. Fix-it these days, always grabbing a screwdriver or wrench and saying he has to go fix something. Once he grabbed a piece of one of our window blinds (it had fallen off and was laying on our dining room table). He set it on the floor and said, "let's get to work" (just like Handy Manny!).

We've been working a lot on our bathroom, and today he said he needed to paint (even though we were in the study, not the bathroom). I asked him what he was going to paint, and he said, "I need to paint this wall." He's definitely Daddy's good helper.....

Last Day of School

Grant has already been out of Mother's Day Out for two weeks now! He learned so many things this year......he's such a different little boy now. I look back at pictures from September and can't believe how little he was! Here he is on the first day of school, in late August:
And here are some pictures from the last day:

Waiting for Mommy at the gate (he was always standing here waiting for me, and would start jumping when he saw me.....which always made me smile!):Grant and his friends Avery Rhea and Leah:
He loved his teacher, Ms. Lisa:

I'm really glad we did MDO this year; I think the routine and social interaction were wonderful for Grant. His teachers always wrote that he loved song time and playing outside, and he was always proud of the art projects that he brought home (even though I'm not sure how much of them were actually done by him!). Now he definitely understands the concept of cleaning up and sharing a lot more than he did before. Every day when he got to school, Ms. Lisa or Ms. Lynne would always tell him, "I'm so glad you're here!" Now he'll randomly give me hugs and say the same thing to me!

Some songs that he learned at school and can sing himself:
- The clean up song: "Clean up, clean up, everbody clean up"
- Circle time song: "Circle time, circle time, it's a very special time. So come along and have some fun, circle time for everyone!" (we're still not certain what the tune of this song is....he doesn't change pitch when he sings!)
- Jesus Loves Me- this one is his favorite and he always wants to sing it at night before bed.

That morning, I took Drew for pictures at JCPenney. He did okay, but he was tired (even though he took a nap in the car on the way over), hungry, and not very smiley. We still got a few cute ones, though. Here Drew is posing with his toothbrush after we all got home that afternoon.
It's hard going outside with Drew now, because immediately when I lay him down, he crawls over to our flower pot and starts picking flowers and eating them. He is fast.....as soon as he stands up, he's got a flower (or leaf) in his mouth. Here Grant is telling him not to eat the flowers! He likes to watch out for his little brother (that is, when he's not pushing him or telling him to get away from his toys!).