Growing Pains

Every once in a while, Noah says his “legs are hungry”….which I think means that they are hurting. :) Apparently teaching him that stomach pain means he’s hungry translates to other body parts as well.

I’ve heard that growing pains are common at this age, so I guess my little man is growing yet again…although I’m not sure he can get any bigger! The boy is mistaken for a 4-5 year old almost daily. He’s tall! But he’s still my baby boy. And he still loves to snuggle on occasion. Today when we were reading books before nap, he smiled up at me and said “I’ve got lots of happy mommy!” I do too, sweet boy, I do too!

The other reason this post is titled growing pains is because my other baby boy is growing up, and I'M having the growing pains. At the same time, though, I LOVE watching him learn and develop. Bittersweet.

Gabe understands a lot more now. Recently he's been bringing us his shoes when he wants to go bye-bye. He'll then sit in our laps for us to put them on, as if thinking “what are you waiting for”....then he'll walk to the door. The other day, I grabbed him off the stairs and said let's go change your stinky-stinks (aka poopy diaper). I set him down while I locked the ghetto stair gate, and when I joined him in the living room, he had gotten the wipes out of the diaper box and was waiting for me to change him. Just this morning, Noah was yelling that the happy monster band was on tv and asking us to come dance with him. I said, "Gabe go dance with Noah!" And he got a huge smile on his face and quickly walked into the playroom. Granted, dancing is one of their favorite things to do (and one of my favorite things to watch.)

The other thing that amazes me about our growing little one is his interest in drawing/coloring. Noah was only interested in eating crayons at this point, but Gabe seems to love it and he sometimes even holds it the right way. I’m crossing my fingers, hoping that maybe, just maybe, I’ll have a child that enjoys quiet activities for longer than 10 seconds. We’ll see…

Here are some pictures of my growing boys. Love them to pieces.

Gotta love watermelon pictures…

I thought he needed some protein, so I gave him a spoon with peanut butter….If I was a "good" mom, I would have put some peanut butter on whole grain toast or a whole grain cracker...but I just gave him the spoon. ;) It was a hit.

Fourth of July

Noah, Max, and Benjamin In Concert

Bedtime Stories by Noah

Future band in the making…Gabe on lead guitar, Noah on drums

I’m pretty sure this goes over the weight limit…

Gabe’s First Hair-Cut

I gave Gabe his first hair-cut the other day.  As sad as it was (meaning not sad at all) to say good-bye to the baby mullet, it was time to say adios.  I was planning to take him somewhere for his first hair-cut (like Noah) but decided to cut it myself for several reasons. 

First, the thought of bringing both boys to the hair-cut place made me break out in hives. 

Second, several friends have talked about how bad the kid hair-cut places are here…and I didn’t want to pay money for a bad hair-cut when I could do it for free! ;) 

Third, I was too lazy to make an appt with my hair person…and assumed it was too expensive anyway.  But really it all came down to the first reason.

So, I was cutting Noah’s hair (which is easier because it’s long and therefore forgiving) and decided, what the heck, we’ll give it a shot.  So I waited for back-up (Eric coming home), grabbed some gummies, put on a dvd of a certain Australian kids’ band, and strapped him in to his booster.  And a few (LOTS) snips later, voila!  No more baby!

The back looks pretty good…the sides aren’t perfect, but you can’t really tell (that or Eric’s just telling me that so I don’t make it worse).  The left is a little longer than the right because when I messed up the right side, I didn’t want to make the same mistake on the left.  Oh well.  Next time.

Mission Accomplished.

Ready for his hair-cut.

Both ears intact.  So far, so good.

Scissors and a one-year old...that seems safe.

BEFORE SHOTS

From a few days back…the mullet’s kind-of tucked under:)

AFTER SHOTS:

Gabe playing with cords…goodness, I should be awarded safe mom of the year.

Noah wanted a picture of himself yelling. Noah, be sweet.

Brothers.

My assistant. ;)

As a side note…check out these next pictures.  No wonder Noah was afraid of puppets for a while!  Freakin’ creepy!

On another side note, Gabe has yet to climb out of his crib again…whew!  That was a close one.  Not sure I’m ready for two boys in big boy beds.  We may get the crib tent just in case…