• You are a solid little boy. As of your 15m check-up, you are in the 90 percentile for height, and in the 70th percentile for weight. When I took you in for pinkeye a couple of weeks ago she said you weighed 27lbs. No wonder I get tired holding you.
• You are still a champion sleep and have been since 5-6 months old. THANK YOU! You were not the best sleeper for the 1st 5 months of your life, so I appreciate the about-face. Up until 2 weeks ago you went down for the night at 6:30pm and woke around 8-8:30am everyday. Just before you turned 1 you began taking 1 nap per day. It usually last around 3 hours. You are just like your Dad. You both love require hours and hours of beauty sleep. Now you are hitting the hay around 7:30pm.

• You love spinning and spinning and spinning. It’s so cute. Sometimes you fall down and that’s when it gets really funny. You find falling on your bottom hilarious, and so you will repeatedly spin just so you fall on your tush.

• You are a grandpas’ boy to no end. Mommy and Grandmas just don’t get the massive smile out of you these days like Daddy and your Grandpas do.

• You at times have a nasty litte temper, but usually only show it when we are at home or getting in or out of the car. Don’t worry you still have the masses fooled into thinking you are a sweet little angel. I on the other hand know better.

• One of your favorite things to do is take either your bubble mower (sans bubbles) or one of your riding toys and push it, while running and screaming “run, run, run, run” “run, run, run, run”, around the the house chasing the dogs or ramming these toys into doors or walls, and the baby gate. The dogs are less than thrilled about this game. You are all boy I tell you, all boy.

• You still love your Giggy (that’s what you call Wrigley and Cohen sometimes) more than words can say. I truly believe you leave food on your face/body just so she will come and lick you. Anytime you are near her you smile real big, squench up your little face, point your fingers at her, and start squealing her name over and over her. Then you hunker down, tuck your chin into your chest, in hopes that she notices you and comes to lick your face. Sometimes you even walk like that towards her to help her out a bit. LOVE. THIS. As a matter of fact, most of the time you call BOTH of the dogs “Giggy”. You can say “CoCo”, but I guess you choose not to.

• You love to vacuum. It use to be that you made me hold you when I vacuumed, and now you won’t let me touch the thing at all until you’ve had your fill. It’s quite cute really. You turn it on and off and push it anywhere your little arms can carry it.

• I’ve been working with you a bit on sign language. You don’t know a ton of signs, because I don’t know many and forget what they are to often to use them all the time when I talk to you. You do know a few basics that help us know what you want. So, that’s nice. I’ll continue to work with you in effort to help you tell us what you want instead of throwing a fit. That’s always nice. Here is a list of the ones you know currently. There might be a few more, but I’m drawing a blank.

• more
• all done (a.k.a.- finished)
• eat
• drink
• fan
• hot
• ball
• brush teeth
• bath
• milk
• juice
• apple
• baby
• O’s (for cheerios)

• You love knocking on things: doors, windows, walls, tables. Really, anything that makes noise when your tiny little knuckles hit it. While knocking you also say “knock, knock, knock”. It’s pretty stinkin’ cute, Kiddo.

• You give kisses with your lips puckered, and afterwards you say “mmmmuuahhh!” I beg for kisses these days just to to see you pucker up. I love it.

Looks like I may want to rethink my pantry organization I tackled yesterday. Within 10 minutes of waking someone had already helped himself to two GIANT graham crackers. Maybe he was just trying to tell me that he wanted breakfast………….nah.

This head tilt cracks me up. It started last week. If he thinks something he is doing is funny or when the theme song to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse comes on the head tilt comes out. I crack up everytime.

Since Gray hasn’t been throwing things as much lately and the kid was in desperate need of having a poopy diaper changed, so I allowed him to play with my iPhone while I changed him. Lets just say he knows how to unlock it and access the camera. I say this because I opened my photo stream to find a photo play-by-play of what it looks like to have your diaper changed by me.

See that big green empty wall to my right? I’ve got big plans for it.

And the grand finale…

Wow! I look like Shrek.

Wow. That was a giant weekend of NOTHING for me. If you consider nothing a blinding, mind numbing, I can’t even function to care for my own child, trip to the minor med (but only at night) migraine nothing.

Wednesday evening I felt my standard “a weather front is coming through” sinus headache coming on so I took some Advil and hit the hay. Thursday I woke up thinking I wasn’t going to make it though the day. This bad boy of a sinus headache, we’ll call him Karl for kicks, had intensified. Derek had a dentist appointment that morning so I told him to give me a call once he was done to see if I needed him to come home.

I guess I should tell you a bit about my sinus headaches. They are intense. I am like a human barometer. I can tell you if it’s going to rain or if a low pressure front will move though the city I am in typically within a 24-48 hour window. My more severe sinus headaches, in my not-at-home working days, required me to take a sick day because I just couldn’t function. Now that I have no sick days as a SAHM I rely on the availability on my super busy husband to take a day off from his job and take care of Squishy Baby.

Now back to Karl. On Thursday afternoon I decided to pop a couple advil and take a nap while the kiddo napped. Karl no-likie. Luckily, Gray decided to take a 5 HOUR nap that day. I know right?! Derek arrived home around 4:30pm and Karl was rockin’ out full force on my brain-hole. I stayed in bed the remainder of the evening. Derek even slept on the couch to make my night a bit easier.

Here’s a peak at what my windows looked like for about 5 days.

Yup, them my good bath towels blockin’ out that ole sunshine.

Friday morning it was ON! Oh, I forgot to mention that all night long this stupid sinus headache was morphing into a full-blown migraine, and kept waking me up every 2 hours or so. Not cool, Karl. When the alarm when off Friday morning Karl was large and in charge. Derek called into work for the day off and began life as a single daddy, and nurse to my pending doom.

For whatever reason I could only sleep on my sides. I couldn’t sit up, walk, see any form of light, even the normal smell of my husband made me want to blow chunks. Gross, I know. That night my in-laws picked up Gray and kept him over night so Derek could take me to the minor med. By this point, taking a swig of water made me do what my husband’s musk almost made me do a few hours before. Ugh! I told Derek I would try going to the doctor, but only at night. Even the light from the screen of his cell phone made Karl put on his clogging shoes and dance a little ditty on my eyeballs AND brain.

After the peps at the minor med put two shots in my tush, three prescriptions in my hands my husband’s hands, and sent me on my not so merry way I was home and back in bed still hating Karl. Needless to say things slowly started getting less painful, but weren’t even remotely tolerable until Monday morning. I was in a black hole for days on end. No phone, no computer, no TV…I mean nothing.

So that’s where I’ve been.

The good news is my boys had a blast together. My sweet hubs to pics and videos of the two of them hanging out so I could see what they were up to while I was having my brain abused. They had a blast with stickers. Of course a fit or two occurred. I mean that’s a given.

They did a little gaming.

They played in the back yard. Gray even did a little yard work. I can’t wait till this “fun game” actually works in our favor.

They went to the zoo Sunday morning since going to church was out of the question for us. The zoo is super close to our house, and we have a annual family pass so it was really easy for Derek to get home to me if I needed him. Church…not so much. Sorry God. Next week.

Dang, that kid is even cuter than a panda.

And as always…Grayson took a ton of self portraits of himself with Derek’s iPhone.

I just have to say, there is no way I could have taken care of that sweet little butterball while enduring the pain I was in. I am so thankful to have this amazing man in my life that is there for me when I fall, or when I just can’t stand at all. I love you, Derek. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking care of not only me everyday, but our little guy too. You totally win the Husband of the Year award.

I was snapping a few pics in the bathroom, for something I’ll tell you about later, and then I heard it….silence. That is never a good sound when Grayson is up wandering the house. I was letting him roam/play for a few more minutes before I put him down for a nap. Bad idea. Very. Bad. Idea.

I yelled for Grayson. As if he would answer me. Silly me. I put down the camera and scurried on into the kitchen. I didn’t see him, so I headed to the pantry. He loves shutting himself in our pantry. He rearranges my spices and canned goods at least 3 times a day. He also likes to take my canned goods and stack them into a tower and then topple them over. Crazy kid.

I heard a rummbeling coming from behind the door so I opened it. Only to find he was treating himself to a pre-nap snack.

BUSTED!!!!!

He had nabbed one of the little chip baggies, and figured out how to open it. Unfortunately, he didn’t quite figure out how to get the chips from the bag to his mouth. Looks like the chips made a little pit stop on the floor first. I’m so glad that I just steam mopped in there a couple of days ago.

Oh, and please don’t judge my pantry. It was totally organized before Grayson was born and since has become a wasteland for things that just don’t have any other place in our kitchen. I promise I am in the process of figuring out some new organization tactics for it. It’s scary in there.

I strapped Gray into the highchair the other evening in an attempt to trim his hair. I use a spray bottle to wet his hair before I begin trimming. The keys and various other objects I gave him entertained him for the 1st few minutes, and then he caught a glimpse of the spray bottle. If letting him play with the spray bottle would keep him from moving his head as I moved sharp pointy scissors around it than so be it.

At first it was no big thing, and then he figured out how to make it spray water. Most children hate water being splashed, sprayed or poured on their face. Not my kid. This child sprayed water in his face (for fun) for almost 10 minutes. No. Joke.

Did you catch the part where he told the spray bottle “No No”? It’s around 34 seconds in. He turned his head to look at me and I guess his tiny hands have a mind of their own and pressed the trigger and sprayed him. Hehe. He even would hand me the spray bottle, because he wanted me to spray water in his face.

Oh the things kids find entertaining. We finally made him stop, because it looked like his little eyes were turning red. I emptied the spray bottle and now he walks around the house and “tries” to spray water in his face. Crazy kid.

Grayson got to spend this afternoon with two of his favorite people, Jeremy and Rachel. Jeremy and Rachel are two of our very close friends, and lovers of G-man. Due to the holiday season, Jeremy being in a Doctoral program, and Jeremy and Rachel being out of town we haven’t been able to do much with them this past month. Which is really odd for us four.

Rachel offered to take Gray for the afternoon on Sunday so Derek and I could catch a movie, and so they could get in some much needed time together. After our movie we met up with Rachel, Jeremy, and Gray for dinner, and they told us about their afternoon.

Grayson LOVES their cats, Madison and McLean. He seem to love the cat tower even more though. That’s Jeremy standing next to Grayson. Jeremy is at least 6ft tall. That should give you some idea of how tall that cat tower is. Looks like I know what to get the kid for his birthday.

After pretending he was a cat, and probably torturing their cats the three of them headed to the park.

Grayson has never really played on a “real” playground. My friend Meghan and I attempted to take our boys to a playground once, but it was so crowded with big kids our little ones didn’t stand a chance. The ones around my house are less than awesome. He has been on a slide once, but it was in our friend Bobbie’s backyard.

Well, he got to go on the slide again, and as you can see…he loved it! Rachel said he kept going down head first. Every. Time. It cracked me up. This is totally Grayson. Boy to the bone. I have a strong feeling I should start loading up on band-aids now.

I can’t wait to take him myself. Look how tiny he seems next to the playground.

I’m so glad Gray got to hang our with his big people buddies today. After playing all morning in sunday school and all afternoon with these two that poor baby was so tired he couldn’t see straight by the end of the evening. I have a feeling he’ll sleep magnificent tonight.

Thanks for watching him you guys. Sorry if he wore you out. At least you now know why we have increasing dark circles under our eyes.