wonderful west virginia

first stop: steve's house

thanks to mr. steve for cooking an amazing carnitas dinner for us the night before and then promptly making a little something for us to eat in the morning!  we all enjoyed ourselves thoroughly!  

second stop: grammy's house!

we were so happy the weather was BEAUTIFUL and we were able to hang out on the front porch the entire time we were visiting.  only inside for a second and graham was able to find the best teething toy...a measuring cup!

we enjoyed walking around grammy's house and looking at all of her beautiful flowers too!

grammy and graham braved the cold water and jumped in the pool.  

we were also lucky enough to catch sam, justina, and garrett at grammy's house too.  i think graham might have a new girlfriend!!  :)

perfect way to end our week off!!  

love it!

i've been waiting for this little charm since before my birthday!  grana and grampa graciously bought it for me for the big 3-0 milestone!  now that i think about it, i've actually been waiting for this charm since before the little dude arrived.  there is a particular jeweler i always visit at the gem and jewelry shows and one of the last times i was there i saw these at his booth.  grady and i hadn't determined what exactly the 'chickadude's' name at the moment would be, so i couldn't get anything.

well we definitely know what the dude's name is and i'm SOOOOOOOO happy to finally have this little charm.  curtis of curtis j. lewis fine jewelry specially drew this 'g' since he hadn't done a small 'g' yet.  it's 14K gold, 1.5 point diamond, and a small peridot bead to top it off.  i absolutely LOVE it and couldn't be happier.  thank you grana and grampa!!!  <3

red robin, yummmmmmmmmmmmmm!

woo hoo...we refinanced!!!  and what other way to celebrate, than a trip to red robin!  

this was the dude's first time in a 'big boy' restaurant high chair and he did awesome.  it was also his first experience with a balloon!  LOVED IT!  by the end of our dinner he got the hang of holding onto the string and pulling down so the balloon bounced off his fist.  too cute!

we should have bought a lottery ticket that night too since when we got our bill, we got $10 off because of my rewards card.  bonus!

my next new trick for the week!

so the dude's second new trick of the week....sitting up in his crib when he wakes up...all by himself!!!  guess it's time to lower the crib once again!

oh hi!  :)

eight months!

eight months already!  three quarters of a year old!  craziness!

we didn't get a lot of smiles today with out photo shoot, but we did get a plethora of different kinds of shots.  so many of them were so cute they had to be all on their own.  no collages necessary! 

here's what you've been up to:

 - wearing size 4 diapers during the day, and size 5 at night

 - still fit in some 6-9 month clothes, but definitely fit better in 9-12 month clothes

- drinking about 28oz of milk (formula) a day

 - have tried many fruits and veggies and seem to like most everything.  some recent favorites are green beans, yams with apples, peas with pears, zucchini and carrots

 - starting to eat 'finger food' aka, puffs, cheerios and you even tried your first bit of diced banana and seemed to enjoy it

 - still sleeping between 10-11 hours at night and napping 3 or so hours during the day.  you've also turned into a stomach sleeper.  

 - you sit in the BIG big boy bath tub now

 - went to the pool for the first time and loved it!

 - gave mom her first medical scare...see blog post from the thursday previous

 - weight from the saturday follow-up visit....20.1 lbs!!

 - standing up with confidence when holding onto a couch, table, finger, etc.

 - getting the crawling motions down, but really only moving backwards at the moment

our little daredevil! 

sweet boy

some of my all time favorites right here!

splish splash

today we took the little dude to the pool for the very first time.  we weren't sure how he was going to react, but we thought it might be something positive since he loves his baths so much.  luckily for us we got there right as the pool opened, so there was no one else in the pool causing a ruckus for the dude.  

there was definitely some hesitation at first, i think just because the water was so deep.  but once he got used to it, he LOVED it!  he was splashing and holding onto the side of the pool.  he even did some walking!!!  seriously...he was walking in the water while holding onto our fingers!!

all in all, it was a great success.  we plan on going back everyday the rest of the week to get him used to the water.  we might even try to go in the big kid pool towards the end of the week!!

and for our next trick!

note: i am not pulling graham up by his arms. he is holding onto my hands to pull himself up onto his feet!

finger foods

we've entered the wonderful world of finger foods!!! aka, puffs and cheerios!! :) the little dude couldn't be more proud of himself when he actually gets the food in his mouth. our mealtime rituals have changed so that he can feed himself in the beginning, then we give him whatever food he's getting at that time of day (cereal, fruit, veggies, etc) and then he feeds himself a few more puffs/cheerios at the end.

the epitome of graham

okay, so this video is a little long, but it captures the every essence that is the dude in recent days.

- enjoying some alone playtime

- low pitched (dinosaur) voice

- high pitched (baby) voice

- playing with his favorite toys: car, alligator, rings and ball popper thingy

- reaching for toys

- 'trying' to crawl towards toys

- raising his butt in the air

enjoy the dude!

happy fathers day!!!

a special happy fathers day to the other man in my life, to my dad, and to my brother! i love all of you and hope you had a wonderful day!

me and the dude gave dad some time to himself this morning and played in the sunroom. he was practicing his crawling skills, and i actually captured him with his belly off the ground!!! it definitely won't be long now!! especially since he's been working on standing himself up by just holding onto our thumbs, and grady said he walked in to get him after an unsuccessful naptime and he was sitting up in his crib!!! rut roh! looks like it's time to lower the crib!!! :)

our little dude is turning into a little man!!!

oh...and ps...we went to the doctors yesterday for a follow-up and dr. bill was happier with the rate of his breathing, but he still has some mucus in his chest that he has yet to get rid of. so instead of diagnosing this as 'asthma,' i think dr. bill really thinks it might have been something viral. grady seems to have a stuffy nose, so maybe a cold set off the breathing incident? who knows?! buuuuuuuuuuuuuuut, we found out how much the little dude weighs!!!! 20.1 pounds!!! litlte chunkamunker! :)

little dragon

ever since the dude had to have his first neb treatment (which seems like eons ago, but was probably only 3 months ago or so), i've told him he's about to become a dragon. i don't think he has any idea what a dragon is,but i think it's pretty cute. he's never been scared by the nebulizer, and for the first time wore the little mask!! we used to have to hold the mouth piece near his nose and have him breath it in that way.

this afternoon he was even wearing the mask and playing with his toys. such a trooper!

ps...we also found out this morning that the dude likes yo gaba gaba....that's what he's looking at in the pictures!

crazy panic mom mode

today was the first time i entered the 'crazy panicked mom' mode! here's how the day went.

6am - graham wakes up and is a little congested, but other than that...normal.

7am - get the dude changed for school. noticed he's got some good 'candles' going, so i suction out his nose.

8am - drop off at school and he's as happy as can be playing in the padded ring thing they have in his room.

12:50pm - i get a call from one of the teachers at school: "we wanted to call to see if you were aware of graham's congestion." me: "yes. he was somewhat stuffed up this morning, why?" school: "well it's gotten pretty bad, to the point where he can't fall asleep. and then when he does fall asleep he seems to be having a hard time breathing. we think you might want to come pick him up and take him to the emergency room."

FREAK OUT in 5.....4.....3....2.....

i try to remain as calm as possible and tell them we didn't see that at all last night or this morning and that i would get there as soon as possible.

12:55pm - call dr's and get an appointment ASAP.

1:25pm - i get to school and he indeed is breathing REALLY fast and hard. all the teachers were worried. never a good sign!

1:35pm - worst car ride yet with the dude. he was crying the whole way there, but i think that was the only way he was able to breath. he would start coughing and i think it hurt him, so he would cry more and the cycle continued.

1:40pm - probably about 5 seconds away from parking in the drs office parking lot is when the real crazy panicked mom came out! i had been watching the dude in the backseat mirror the entire way to the doctors, thinking he may be getting worse. then at 1:40, with the drs office building in sight, he all of a sudden turns beet red and stops breathing!! FREAK OUT! then, not 2 seconds later (not to be graphic, but...) he projectile vomits what looks to be everything in his little tummy. and this doesn't happen once, but twice! FREAK OUT! finally, what seemed to be 100 miles away (but was only about 200 feet) i get to a parking spot. i honestly don't know how i didn't hit someone over those 200 feet. i was freaking out so bad i was probably going 20 miles an hour through the parking lot. oops, but can you blame me?! i was crazy panicked mom! i JUMP out of the car and sprint to the other side. i completely ignore all the vomit that is all over the poor dude and grab him out of his car seat. amazingly i remembered to grab my purse and i ran into the front door.

"hi, i have an appointment at 1:50, but someone needs to help me now!"

1:41pm - the nurse takes me back to a room and they immediately start asking me all sorts of questions. i knew something was wrong with the dude since he was, what i call, a limp noodle. he was just laying there in my arms and there was nothing i could do for him. we undress him, since he's disgustingly covered in his own vomit and the nurses notice that his breathing is retracted. another FREAK OUT!

1:50pm - the nurse walks over to the room across the hall: "excuse me dr. bill. i hate to interrupt, but you really need to come check this little guy out." FREAK OUT!

1:55pm - dr. bill: "oh my goodness graham. what are you doing to your poor mom?!" he takes a quick look and immediately has the nurses get a neb treatment set up for him. he'll be back in 10mins.

2:20pm - neb treatment is done, dr bill takes another look at him and the dude is back to normal!!!

2:35pm - walk out of the with a diaper clad baby (since i was not putting those clothes back on him) and drive home.

O-M-G!!!!

i was so glad to be home and able to just cuddle with the little dude. he snoozed on me for a good hour and a half and then we ventured out to get his medicine.

he's on albuterol neb treatments every 4-6 hours, steriod neb treatments twice a day (we can mix it with the albuterol thankfully!) and prednisone orally twice a day. we did our first combined treatment at 630 and it really seemed to help. thankfully the little guy ate his dinner with no problem, took his bottle at the regular time and has been snoozing in his crib since about 745 or so. we're not sure if we're going to scoop him up and let him sleep with us so we can hear him better, or if we'll just turn the monitor on REALLY loud, so we can hear everything.

i think he's on the mend and hopefully we'll get a cleaner bill of health when we go for our follow-up visit on saturday morning. i'll keep everyone posted!

sylvie's first birthday

sylvie (dark haired cutie in the white flowered dress) had her first birthday party today, and we were honored to be able to celebrate with her. kiera (brown haired cutie in the pink dress) also turns one in a couple days, along with austin (at the party, but i somehow missed taking a picture of him!). there definitely was no shortage of babies, kids and pregnant women at this party! everyone had a great time. derek (handsome dude in the orange shirt) was being an awesome big kid and playing with all the little kids.

seeing as the dude isn't mobile (YET!), he ended up chilling out and entertaining himself when everyone walked off. he's good at doing that! he's content with just watching kids play. even school mentioned that. they'll take him outside and he'll just enjoy being outside and watching everyone run around and play. i think he's secretly plotting when his big move will be, literally!

and i'm definitely diggin the foam puzzle piece mat. VERY good for tumbles and spills! we may have to look at getting one and maybe putting it in the sunroom, since the carpet on the wood floor isn't very thick. we'll see! we've gotta get some good forward motion going first i guess (yes, the dude is scooting himself backwards on his tummy).

five one

we found out on friday afternoon that the five one was playing at the herndon festival, so we had to go support them and show them some kindercare lovin! back story...each person in the five one is named a color: mr. green, mr. blue, mr. red and mr. gold. mr. blue used to work at the dude's kindercare, but has since gone to a different center. mr. green still works at the dude's school, but he's in the school aged kids room.

this was graham's first live show, and i think it's safe to say he loved it. especially since three of his most adoring fans were there...miss jodi, miss maribelle and miss samantha! i think miss samantha (one of the dude's teachers) was happy to not have to change the dude's diapers though! haha! miss maribelle is the three year old room teacher, so we've got a little ways to go before the dude will be with her, but she's definitely not shy with the lovin for the dude! and of course miss jodi was lovin on the boy as well!

we all had a great time (even if mommy and daddy got sunburned!)!