Drumming with Dada

Joe's been playing drums since he was three, so it looks like Gavin will also pick up some rhythm at an early age!

Growing Like a Baby Should

Gavin just had his nine month check-up, which I cannot believe. He's now as old as his time of gestation! I won't bore you with how incredibly cute, amazing, and brilliant-for-his-age he is. That's a given with any of our children--right, ladies? But I will tell you that he can now sit very well, wave hello (thanks for working with him on that, Grandma), eat cheerios and other "real" food, and say Mama and Dada and "hey." He also has a sunny disposition and a great sense of humor and works really hard to make us laugh. Like today when I peered into the french door leading into his bedroom to see if he was napping and caught him staring at me through the window pane, pacifier in mouth. I stared back at him for a minute and made a funny face and then we both started laughing. Really, how can a nine-month-old understand non-verbals so well? It just amazes me.

I should be writing all of this down more than I do, but it's hard to keep track of all of the precious little "firsts." Like the fact that he stood for a few seconds today, leaning against the couch for support. Or that he crawled backwards just a little bit yesterday. Tiny things that are seemingly insignificant in the grand scheme of life, but can make a mama so proud in the moment.

Gavin's nine month stats were on track with his personal growth curve and he is now 18.6 lbs (10-25%) and 29 inches (75%). His head is in the 75-90%! Must mean he has a lot of brains. Funny, I always thought his head looked big in the ultrasound pictures.

Sundance Revelry

I am a Blog Slacker, but Happy New Year Anyway!

Kron kids with Gavin

Nieces Sara and Breann with Gavin and Grandma

Happy New Year!

It's true. I am a blog slacker. I guess there have been a few things happening over the past month, but my sad addiction to sound bite snippets posted to Facebook has usurped the much more revererent form of communication called blogging.

Let's see...over the past month we celebrated Christmas in Utah, where I successfully traveled with Gavin by myself on the way there. We were snowed in the first couple of days after our arrival and weren't sure if Joe would make it for Gavin's first Christmas, but thankfully God had other plans. Joe and I had a great day to ourselves skiing at Sundance while visiting , and we really appreciated my parents taking Gavin for a few hours to make that possible (and a big shout out to Beck for the use of some ski pants--too bad I only made one run. The lift lines were unusually long and I was woefully out of shape). Another highlight from our trip to Utah was visiting with my roommate from Atlanta, Grace. Her family lives in Utah as well and actually introduced us years ago. Grace is battling bone cancer and doing very well against all odds, so it was particularly great to see her.

Apart from Christmas in Utah, we enjoyed several other holiday celebrations, including Christmas with the Chicago grandparents and Christmas at our home (we didn't want to lug our gifts out of state just to open them and then bring them back again). Gavin attacked each celebration--and gift--with gusto, taking special delight in the wrapping paper and ribbons. He was so much fun to watch and it was such a pleasant surprise for Joe and I since we didn't think he would be so responsive at his young age. We loved it and as much as he did!

We capped off our holiday celebrations with a fun New Year's Eve celebration with our good friends, the Krons. Their three kids, Mackenzie, Josh, and Madeline all clamored to hold Gavin (so sweet!) and we took some awesome photos of the four of them all dressed in their pajamas and ready for bed. We adults stayed up to talk and snack on some yummy treats.

December was eventful from a medical perspective as well. I underwent my first root canal just six days before Christmas--yuck! Those of you who know my history with dental mishaps (dentist that couldn't get my mouth numb, drilling that I could feel, drill slicing my lip open) can imagine my state of mind going into what I perceived as an hour-long pain fest. Fortunately, the endodontist showed a lot of sensitivity to my past trauma and even though my mouth began to "un-numb" twice during the procedure (my adrenaline powers it through my body at a crazy rate), he immediately stopped what he was doing and shot me up again with some pretty good stuff. Now I'm just sweating the next part of it since this was a two-part procedure. I have to go back to have the hole in my tooth permanantly closed after medicine has been sitting in the tooth for the past few weeks. Weird. I could never be a dentist and deal with such nastiness as people's inflamed teeth.

A good bit of medical news recently is that my famous fibroid has shrunk down to practically nothing. Hurray! This is great since it could have gone either way and caused some problems for a future pregnancy (hey, don't get any ideas yet!). But the fibroid is now officially 2 cm--down from 6.7 cm during pregnancy. I had an ultrasound to find this out, and unfortunately didn't get $5 this time. But the appointment was a wonderful reminder about God's provision through what was probably the most stressful and potentially serious circumstance of my life so far. While I was there I was talking to one of the nurses that assists my doctor and she mentioned that she remembered me since my case had been a really big deal in their office. She said, "Dr. Herndon was really nervous before you delivered. Well, really nervous since it was such an ususal case, but she had three backup plans." I'm glad I didn't know how nervous she was before Gavin was born and I'm so thankful to all of you who encouraged me and prayed for me. As I look back on 2008, Gavin's successful delivery is the single thing I'm most thankful for.

And I thought December was busy? Wow, what a year!