Spring is here!

It has been an amazing, sunny week here.  Mayson learned all about hopscotch and had a great time showing off her hopping skills.  We have been having some fun conversations.  Today she asked me, "What do you love?"  I asked her what she loved and she said, "Daniel Tiger (cartoon) and her friends at Angie's house." After I asked her if there was anything else, she said, "Mama, Daddy, and Baby Gray." She's been paying a lot more attention to Gray lately too.  She's been helping by giving him his pacifier, and she even helped me sing to him and help him learn how to smile.

Two Months Old

Grayhm is two months old already!  He has been so fun this week, he is now an alert, happy little guy!  He has been having a great time watching Mayson, and has intentional coos and smiles all day. If you watch the video, I even think he knows how to say "mom!" :)  Check out that great smile at the end! 

 

7 Weeks

Grayhm celebrated his 7th week and Mayson has been having a blast.  Grayhm has started to do some cute little smiles, and is taking everything in around him.  Mayson has started calling us "mom" and "dad" which I am not too excited about because it makes her seem like a teenager already! We've been having fun playing hide and seek, where I close my eyes and count and Mayson stands about two feet away and then jumps out and says, "Here I am!"  Her vocabulary is pretty impressive, including words like stethoscope, and she now knows her right and left.  She has also learned to spell her name out loud.  Her favorite sentence is still, "Mommy, what are you doing?" which she asks more than I can say.  She makes me laugh all the time when she pretends to be mad or upset and then sneaks out a huge smile and laugh.  We had a fun week this week with lots of visits with friends.  Rowan and Amanda came over to play, and Brandon and his parents came for dinner.  She had a great time with the boys!  It was a beautiful sunny spring weekend so we enjoyed some fun new playgrounds.  She also went crazy running around at Jenny's house with Hope, and grabbed Hope's sparkly belt and purse to accessorize.  We ended the week with Passover dinner at Grandma and Grandpa's where she got a new little dancing dog.  

 

 

 

 

Grayhm's California Adventure

Grayhm made his flying debut at 6 weeks old as we joined Katie to celebrate her spring break.  The three of us headed to California to find some sun and take advantage of having time off!  We rented a big house with a pool, and lounged our days away, enjoyed watching HGTV, and eating at our favorite organic restaurant (we went three times).  One of my favorite activities was waking up to eat a delicious fruit salad and coffee poolside.  Grayhm did great on the plane and slept the whole time both ways.  He even earned his flying wings!  He did not however give me a break on sleeping, and woke up three times each night. Now that we are home of course, he is going back to sleeping 10-5.  While we were gone, Mayson and Keri had a fantastic time.  They played soccer, went to the Children's Museum, and checked out the playground at St. Edwards park. 

Grayhm 5 Week Update

Grayhm is definitely becoming more alert and staying awake longer.  He is becoming more sensitive to the sounds around him, and doesn't love it when Sesame Street comes on in the morning to interrupt his sleep.  We have had a few nights of sleep where he will go for 5+ hours.  We're even starting to see a pattern where he eats around 8pm, goes to bed around 10, and will sleep until 5! 

Mayson has been doing great with her routine of going to Ava and Aliza's house on Monday and Wednesday, and Angie's on Tuesday.  Mimi has been giving Mayson a great report when she spends the day with her and the girls.  We get a paper every time we pick her up that tells us how she did that day.  Here's some quotes from her reports:
The other day, Mimi noticed that Mayson was recognizing shapes in her pretzels.  She said, "Look Mimi, a triangle!" Then she made an E out of some of her other pretzels. 

She has been doing great at her swimming lessons too.  Mimi reported that Mayson learned to close her mouth and go underwater, and she tried on her goggles.  Teacher Hannah reported, "Mayson is going to be the fastest mermaid ever!"

Mimi also says, "Mayson is a 'goer.' She likes to encourage us to keep going and says, 'Let's go!" They definitely do a lot and are on the go.  While with Mimi and the girls, Mayson walks over to 3rd Place Books and the library, checks out Starbucks and gets samples at the bakery, and does art projects.  She gets to pick out books, have picnics, does crafts, and goes to story time. 

 

1 Month Old

Grayhm is 4 weeks old!  He loves sleeping in his vibrating chair and definitely prefers that to his pack n' play for extended hours of rest.  It's hard to want to put him laying down when he sleeps so much better sitting up!  Mayson has become a puzzle-master!  She has impressed us by being able to use her logic to find pieces that match each other and then is able to turn the pieces around until they are able to fit. So far she has mastered her ABC puzzle, a Dora puzzle, and two featuring Sesame Street.  Today when we were playing with stickers, she decided to put them all back on the sheet according to the silouette of their shapes. 

3 weeks of Grayhm

Grayhm has been napping away and Mayson Bea is as busy as ever. In addition to her usual passions of playing with her Little People animals and art work, she graduated to her big girl bed!  We thought we would put the bed in her room and just let her decide when she was ready, and to our surprise, she jumped in right away and was excited to sleep on it her first night.  She has Kermit, the birdie pillow, giraffe, monkey, and 2-4 animals join her each night (along with her customary 2 soothies we haven't been able to take away yet).  Mornings have been a little different than with the crib.  Now she pops up early and knocks (bangs) on her door to let us know she is awake and ready to play.  There have been a couple of early mornings where we have had to take her back to bed and tell her that it wasn't time to get up yet.  She'll go back to sleep for an hour and then is ready to go all over again.