A day with the fishies

Carter and I thought we would be ambitious and venture out to the Seattle Aquarium with Gavin over the weekend. The ambitous part was going there on a beautiful, sunny Seattle afternoon with our 9 month old and hanging out amongst 85 million people with their kids:) We kind of wondered if we were a little crazy when we were heading down, but we had a great time and I think Gavin really enjoyed himself!

Truthfully, he could have cared less about the exhibits (duh), he was so happy looking all around, checking everybody out and trying to make friends. He was pretty funny laughing and trying to get the attention of several little kids, I think we have a social butterfly on our hands!

This was really our first "kid" oriented outing as a family, and Carter and I had so much fun pointing things out and watching Gavin's reaction to some new things he had never seen before.

Thanks Mom and Dad.....now when are you taking me to the zoo????

Uggalish

These boots have changed my life. Okay maybe that's a little dramatic but seriously, they are amazing. I may never wear regular shoes again. I mean, once your feet have been swaddled in sheepskin and wool that feels like a sweater on your feet, how can you go back from that?




A little slice of heaven :)

9 month stats

Gavin had his 9 month well baby check up yesterday, here are his stats:

Height - 29 inches (85th percentile)
Weight - 18 lbs (20th percentile)
Head - 18.25 inches (75 percentile)

So I guess with these kind of stats maybe he's destined to become the first male winner of America's Next Top Model?? Carter will love me saying that instead of "basketball player" :) His pediatrician says he is perfectly healthy, just genetically made up to be tall and skinny (I remember those days!)

A sleeping update......I am happy to report that after a week now of letting him cry a little at night, he is doing much better and last night actually slept from 7:30pm to 7:30am!!! It was unreal, I am SO hoping that this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship between my precious baby and Mr. Sandman :)

Dear Sleep.....I miss you

So we have been in a new "phase" at the Stevenson household. And by phase that's just what I call something new when I have no clue what the hell is happening. The phase I speak of is Gavin and his sleeping, or lack there of! Let me back it up.... By 6 weeks old he was sleeping through the night, around 9 or 10pm until 5:30am. This went on until he was about 6 1/2 months old. I of course assumed this was just normal behavior for babies, either that or I lucked out with a baby who loves sleep as much as his mom. Apparently I was mislead.

For the last roughly 2 months things have COMPLETELY changed with his sleeping. Yes, I understand that babies just change on a dime, but that leaves me little comfort at 3am! At first I would of course just go in and rock him, usually getting him back down and sometimes that would be enough for the rest of the night, sometimes not.

For the last few weeks he has been up literally EVERY 1-2 hours at night! It's like having a newborn again, except I don't have any of that "post-pregnancy-mommy-adrenaline" left over. So over the last weekish I have been working on the old cry it out method. I tried this out a few months ago, and quickly discovered it was not for me, but some time has passed, he's a little older now, and quite frankly I am at my wits end - so we are giving it another whirl.

I would like to this we are making some progress, and I think we are, last night we managed to go make it all night only waking up once which was a HUGE feat! But now we are having some issues with going down for naptime, which we have never had a problem with! I swear this mommy stuff is no freaking joke! It is so mentally and physically exhausting sometimes, and my lack of sleep does not help matters.

Another thing (maybe a little tmi but oh well) Why does no one talk about post pregnancy periods?!?! Maybe I'm the only one, but HOLY CRAP! I've only had a couple so far (still breastfeeding) but I have not only been breaking out like a 14 girl....but the mood swings and hormones are out of control. On one hand my cramps seem to be better, but I'm so weepy and emotional! I guess it was a good thing Carter has been out of town for the past few days so he could avoid the trainwreck that is his wife :)

I suppose this is all just normal new mommy stuff, but when you are in the trenches it's a little hard to gain perspective sometimes! So wish me luck that Gavin sleeps well tonight....and that my pms goes away before the hubby gets home :)

We're on the move!....well almost

Gavin officially starting crawling! Army crawling that is, and in our house I guess it's marine crawling:) He has never been too big on the whole "tummy time" concept, so at nearly 9 months old he is finally getting comfortable with the idea! He loves too sit on the floor and play with all his toys, he's getting so independent! It's amazing how just overnight it seems he is quite content playing for a little while on his own and doesn't seem to be as needy for mommy :)

I think he's enjoying his newfound freedom!


We had some pictures taken about a month ago for his "6 month" pictures. I wanted to wait until he was fully sitting up before we had pictures taken so technically they are more like 8 month pics, oh well :)

I could just eat this little guy up! I know everyone thinks their baby is the cutest in the whole entire world, and I am certainly no exception! Keri Meyers Photography was who we used for our pics and I couldn't have been happier. She really captured his little personality. He is just such a HAPPY baby, all smiles and laughs (well except maybe at 3 am). He is such a joy!

To Blog Or Not To Blog......

That has been the question floating around in my brain, so I decided what the heck? I figure it will be a good way to update friends and family on the happenings of the Stevenson household, upload a few pics, and perhaps share some groundbreaking insights from the world of a stay at home mommy.....or I can just upload some pics :)

May 5, 2010 was the day this little bugger came charging into our lives, Gavin Robert Stevenson, and boy has he completely changed our life! I mean, what in the heck did we do before he arrived??? It's only been 8 months but time has just flown by and I do find myself saying all of those cliche mom phrases "it goes by so fast!", "it seems like only yesterday.." and so on. We have spent the last 8 months with Gavin just soaking everything up! He has been SUCH a great, easygoing baby. I swear he didn't even cry until he was 3 or 4 months old, and he just loves to be cuddled, especially by his mama :) I think we have a bit of a mama's boy on our hands, but I am soaking it up because I know that could change very quickly!

So far 2011 has gotten us off to a pretty good start. We have recovered from the holidays and are back to the grind. I was lucky enough to have an AMAZING spa day yesterday with my fabulous friend Heather, and we literally spent 7 hours inside of a spa being pampered and having all sorts of wonderful treatments. I think we were both pretty much in spa comas when we left, but it was so great to have an entire day off and enjoy some spa time with a great friend. Carter stayed home with Gavin to watch the Seahawks lose (boo), and I love that I have a wonderful husband to enjoys a whole day by himself with the baby :) :) I am a very lucky girl!!

Here are a few pics from Christmas!

This looks like it's going to be a lot of fun!

Just making sure everyone is watching him open his stocking

No, I didn't intentionally match my baby with the wrapping paper...who would do that?!?