Life- January.

getting little brother ready to switch car seats. 

silly boy

even sillier boy

One, two....

Oops! (no one was hurt!)

Gav loves to go outside!  All you have to say is "let's go" and he runs for the door or to you if you have his coat. 

She was sitting on the couch talking to me and all I could think about was- she's growing so fast!  I can see glimpses of the big girl she will be.  

The Baker's Visit

When I lived in Haiti I worked at QCS with my friend Deborah.  We watched as she and Kyrk started dating and then got married.  (it was so fun!) The lived at the Baptist Haiti Mission.  We had many fun weekends at Deborah's house scrapbooking and being cold in Haiti.  We were there when her oldest Naomi was born.  Well, not "there" but in Haiti.  Ha! :)  When Shane and I went to Haiti on our honeymoon we stayed with Kyrk and Deborah for a few days.  It's been so fun to watch her family grow.

The Baker family comes back to the States and Canada every year and a half or so and when they do they try to stop by on their travels.  I'm so thankful that they include us in their busy schedules.  It's always such a fun visit.  They have five kids so that makes for a busy crazy house with our three and then four adults! But it's great.

New Years

When we returned from Michigan Grace had the surprise of her life.  My friend gave her all this American Girl doll gear for her dolls.  She LOVES it!

And our friends the Gernands visited!  Libby and Gav have a love hate relationship.  Gav loves to bug her and Libby loves to get away from him.  Ha!  

I hope they grow up to be good friends.

And we celebrated New Years with our friends!

Christmas

This was a fun Christmas.  To be honest, the last few Christmas have been a blur.  Not having Ella here for this special time always hurts a little but the first year without her was so hard.  Last year we had JUST had Gav and so that was a blur, but this year I really enjoyed it.

Look at those sweet faces who woke up at our house ready to celebrate!

The aftermath.  Shane lets them make a crazy mess and then we pick up.  The kids love it.

No, Julie is not really hurt.  She got some new "gear" for Christmas.  ha!

Then we went to Michigan.  This is my sister's cat.  My kids LOVE her cats.  Lucky sometimes humors them and lets them get close.  But to be honest, it's probably because he's too lazy to move.  ha!

My sister saved lots of her kids toys and when mine get to her house that's the first thing they go for.

All the grandkids.  It's a little dark but a nice pic! 

bowling fun.  They loved it!

Saying goodbye to grandpa on our way out of town.  It was a quick trip but always fun!

Gavin is ONE!

Gavin turned one on Christmas Eve.  Shane's parents were coming to celebrate Christmas with us so of course we had to have a little party for Gav at our favorite pizza place- Snappy Tomato!  

I know that in future years we will have to do things differently but this time we wanted to go to our Christmas Eve service so we celebrated at lunch.

Gav is a smiley little boy.  He's almost always content and happy.

He loved having the extra attention! 

I look at this picture and I am happy.  I am so thankful to the Lord for the people in this picture.  This last year has been a bit of a blur but it's been so so good.

Cake!  He actually didn't eat much of it.  I am not sure he liked the feeling on his hands and was not about to dive in, although the picture suggests otherwise!

At 12 months Gavin:

• is 20lbs and 27 inches
• loves toast, cheese, and scrambled eggs
• loves his bottle (we stopped them about two weeks after and he was sad!) but takes a sippy with milk well.

• does everything he can to get into tight spaces and at bookshelves and upstairs.  It's his life mission.

• claps and waves bye bye and signs more.  We are working on please and all done and "hi".

We LOVE you Gav!  Happy First birthday buddy.