Oh Boy!

Gage's new way of getting around...



If the video isn't working, try moving the little cursor on the bottom over to the right a little bit. For some reason it won't just start playing like normal for me... and sorry about the low quality, I took the video from my phone!

He took his first steps on Saturday (while I was out of town, of course!) Luckily, his daddy got to see him. He got up to 3 steps Saturday, 5 steps yesterday, and now it's like that is all he wants to do! He definitely isn't ready for just walking everywhere, but he sure thinks it is pretty cool!

So excited!

I'm so proud of my little guy. I probably gave him a heart-attack because I got so excited!
Gage has been doing really well with standing independently in the middle of the floor, but has always done this by us standing him up and then letting him go. Tonight, we were playing with his "bat" a.k.a. wooden spoon, and ball. I had the ball hanging and he was standing and hitting it to make it fly. Then, at one point, he was sitting down and I told him "stand up!" and HE DID! I got so excited that he just stood there and stared at me instead of hitting the ball :)

A little video

First, thank you EVERYONE so much for comments to my last post. You are all so sweet, and thank you for letting me vent away! All your advice was wonderful and I feel so lucky to have such great friends! I love you all!

Lately, I've been working on putting together a movie of all the little videos I take of Gage. So yesterday I decided to take this video to put on there, so I figured I would post it here!
Some of the words have Gage's own twist on them, and some of them we just taught him weird! :) Like he signs "milk" for "bottle" (because that's what we taught him) and when he says "I love you" he is trying to do the pinky finger, pointer finger, and thumb all up type of thing (confused yet?!). Anyways, I know it's long, but I hope you like it!

My disclaimer: No, Gage doesn't just sit by himself in his highchair like this! He just wouldn't stay focused on the ground cuz he wanted to play! So I am sitting right by him to make sure he doesn't fall! xoxo

Help... please...

Okay, I need help. Really bad. I have always been the type of person to avoid making someone feel bad, the type of person to just keep things to myself to avoid contention. But, as a mommy to a very special boy, I need to stop. Here's the situation...
Girl's night tonight. I went to have dinner and play Bunco with 11 other girls tonight (most of which I have only met once or twice before). Within the first 10 minutes I was there, someone said the "R" word (for those who may not know what word I am referring to, it is "retard") and another girl actually started a joke and laughing about it. Wanting to yell at them and run away, but wanting to cry at the same time, I bit my tongue and walked away to avoid the situation (THIS IS MY PROBLEM). Then later on in the night, I actually got into a small argument with a girl because of the way she was acting about having a child with Down syndrome, she made it seem like it would be the worst thing in the world, all while knowing all about my sweet boy. There was so much that offended me tonight, and I just didn't stand up for my boy like I wish I would have. I regret it so bad. I came home and cried to Derek and told him I don't know if I ever want to go back since it is something we do every month. I deal with this same situation at work quite often and then just get so angry at myself for not knowing how to approach the situation and stand up for Gage. I feel like a terrible mom right now for it, I honestly do.
So I am asking for advice. How do I approach this without creating a huge situation, but still getting the point across very clearly? I remember one time I did approach it and a girl actually started telling me why I shouldn't be offended by it because people don't mean it that way. Seriously? Don't tell me that I shouldn't be offended. I understand that people do it and don't mean it in a rude way to my little boy, but if I tell you that it DOES in fact bother me, don't try to defend yourself!
I don't usually do ranting posts like this, so thank you for bearing with me! Please help me, I feel terrible for what I did and I don't want it to happen again. Thank you for your advice in advance.

Tubing!

Today I didn't have to work so we decided to take Gage out for his first time tubing! Although it didn't scare him or make him mad or anything, I don't think it was his favorite thing. Like Derek said, probably next year will be better!

"This isn't too bad, I just don't get why I am stuffed into all of these clothes!"

Stacking!

Gage is so into stacking lately, and I love watching him do it! He concentrates so hard, then gets so excited after! Here are just some cute shots of him stacking... whatever he can find!

YAY! I did it!!

I'm Bad! I'm Bad! You know it!

First of all, I love the fact that Gage and Derek were rocking out to Michael Jackson while I was gone, so cute! Gage loves dancing to music. Whenever he hears it, he will just drop whatever he is doing to rock out! Here is a little video of him getting his groove on with his walker!
(sidenote: please excuse the messy house, we had just gotten back from vacation!)

Christmas!

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas! I know I'm a little late on the post, we just got back in town yesterday so I've been busy! We had a great holiday. Christmas Eve, after I got off work, we went and had Christmas with Derek's family. Then we headed to our Christmas party with my extended family. Lots of food, family, and fun! We spent all of Christmas day at my parents house.

"Check out this awesome book!!" Gage thought it was pretty awesome!

Opening his "deer" from Uncle Kody and Aunt Cherri! He was kind-of confused because he is used to seeing deer on the wall, not where he could play with them! But he warmed up to it pretty quick!

Yay! Check out my new airplane! He loves being pushed around on the airplane while he makes the music play and the propellers spin. When they stop he will put his feet down to stop it so he can get the music started back up again!
We had such a great Christmas holiday, we hope your family did as well!!

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San Carlos - Mexico

The day after Christmas, Derek and I went to Mexico with Derek's family. We stayed for almost a week, and my parents watched Gage for us. It was so hard to not see him! We "skyped" with him a few times but we decided that made things harder on him. It was really nice to have a long relaxing vacation with Derek though, we really enjoyed having that time together.

Deep Sea Fishing

The dolphins swam along with the boat with us. They were so playful and would whistle back to us when we would whistle!

Out snorkeling! Check out that body suit! :) I didn't even care, it kept me so warm!

Kisses to the "starfish of death!" Really though, check it out! Kinda scary looking, huh!!
We got to go up to the lookout over the ocean, had campfires on the beach, went kayaking out to "honeymoon island", lots of walks down the beach, and of course watching the sunset on the beach with my hubby and fresh chips and salsa!

Look What I Can Do!

We have worked on hand-over-hand spoon feeding a handful of times, but Gage wasn't a big fan, so I didn't worry about it much. Then today, I decided to hand over the reigns completely and he took right to it! YAY! Yes, it was messy, but he enjoyed it!

Happy Heart Day!

Happy Heart Day to Gage!!

It was one year ago today, the dreaded yet much anticipated day, when Gage went in for his open-heart surgery. I took these pictures yesterday remembering the 'santa baby' pictures I took right before his surgery and it is so crazy to see how much he has grown! He is my little toddler now and I can't believe it! I had looked forward to today for quite some time, telling people his "heart day" was coming up, and looking forward to celebrating it! And then tonight my mom text me and asked me how his "heart day" went and I thought DUH! Spaced it! Oh well, we played lots and lots of games today and I didn't have to work so we got to spend all day together, so it was great anyway! I am so thankful his heart is all patched up, what an amazing thing to be blessed with. I love this little toad with all my heart, I'm so lucky to be his mommy!!