Quick Vacation

I know I have not written in a week which is not like me. That's because we just got home from a vacation since last Thursday. We were invited to spend the last few days with friends of ours (Todd, Kristen and Saige) at a lake house and had a great time. The lake house was a 3 bedroom, 3 bathroom condo that overlooked the lake.

We arrived Thursday evening after getting supplies from a local grocery store. After making and enjoying dinner on the patio (spaghetti), Collin had a bath in the kitchen sink. He really had a good time splashing around and playing with is favorite bath toy, "fishy fishy". It's tail winds up and swims in the water (you can see it in his hand). Saige just had her bath in the sink and she probably said he would have a good time. After the babies went to bed, we stayed up and watched movies. Yep, there was a TV and DVD player. There is no way Chris would survive without a TV. hahaha

The next day, we had a lazy morning and it was great! We got up and ate breakfast. Then, the kids took naps. Daddy had to "help" Collin take a nap for a few hours more than once that day. I even took a nap. I know that's surprise for a few of you that know me really well. Yes, I did relax by spending most of the day reading a book out on the patio. The sight from the patio and the breeze was really nice. Later in the evening after it cooled down a little (to around 97 from 101), we all went to the pool. Collin borrowed Saige's pool float after she finished using it since it had a cover to protect him from the sun. He really enjoyed playing in the water that collected in the front part of the float and with dad pulling him around the pool. We then took him out to swim a little. Daddy threw him in the air a few times and he really liked that. He practiced getting in the pool from the ledge once but the side was a little rough so we did not do it again. I think took him swimming around the pool a little and let him splash around. He had a great time and it wore him out that night. He went to bed an hour earlier than usual. The adults played several games of Rummikub after the kids went to bed.

The next day, the guys rented jet skis while the mommies hung out with the kids. I look Collin for a walk around the pool and found a beach near the lake (see the pic on the right). We hung out there for a few minutes thinking we would see daddy go by on a jet ski but we did not see him. We walked back near the pool and saw some hammocks and some much needed shade. I took a little nap in a hammock while Collin slept in his stroller. We both really enjoyed the breeze. When we got back to the condo, Collin wanted to look out the window to see if he could see his daddy while we waited for Kristen's parents to arrive that afternoon. They live near and came over to watch the kids while she and I went to the pool for about an hour to have some "mommy time". We took our books to read but ended up people watching most of the time. We had dinner that night with her parents and then watched more TV.

This morning was spent cleaning the place up after having breakfast. Here is a picture of the kids enjoying a moment after breakfast. After we left, we drove around the city to check out a few of the local bike shops. We then stopped by Collin's paternal grandmother's house to give him a break from his car seat and so he could spend some time with his grandmother. Some of his cousins live with my grandmother. One is a spunking 3 1/2 year-old name Samantha. She was really excited to have visitors and wanted us to see her new gymnastic tricks. I spent some time reading to both Samantha and Collin after she wore herself out with her tumbling.

We are home tonight. We all had a fabulous trip and spent so wonderful quality time with the family and our friends.

Momma's Helper

Lately, when I am in the kitchen cooking, Collin is right there at my feet. He discovered the one cabinet that does not have a lock on it which is "Collin friendly" and decided to pull almost everything out it...mainly Tupperware. Before the the bowls and lids hit the ground, he had to taste them to figure out which one he liked the best. This kept him occupied until I finished dinner. He is usually pulling up on the back of my legs to help which REALLY slows down the process (if you have ever seen me working in the kitchen, I typically have several things cooking at once while I am cleaning up behind me). He is either doing that or pulling out the drawer under the oven...which I don't like for him to be near. The lids made him happy for the day....he is already bored with them though.

If you have been keeping up with the blog, you know that he is fascinated with electronics. My laptop is no exception. I have to now write the blog when he is asleep. If not, he is right there to "help" me write the next entry by adding several spaces, pressing the Enter key when I am not ready or other keys to make up words. I thought I could sneak an entry in last Friday when he was really concentrating on "reading" one of his books. As soon as he heard my fingers on the keys of the laptop, he was right there.....looking too cute and telling me what to write (notice the open mouth). I had to finish the entry later that night.

Here he is inspecting a gift I bought for a friend this afternoon. Instead of opening the truck and putting it in the back, I laid it next to his car seat and then took his diaper bad off my shoulder to put it behind his seat on the floor. When I looked back up, he had grabbed the gift bag by it's handle and already had his hand in the bag to see what was in there. He took his hand out because he could not reach to the bottom to get at what was inside so he turned the bag over so the contents could fall out. Little turkey. He's quick! He did tell me he approved of the gift.

Shy?

So far, so good with Collin and Stranger Anxiety. He will let anyone hold him that wants too and will not want to go immediately back to mom, dad or the person holding him before. However, I think he is shy around strangers starting about a week ago. If I (or another family member) is holding him and someone else walks up to talk to him, he puts his head down on the shoulder of the person holding him while still looking at the person that just walked up to talk to him. At first, I thought he was getting tired or was still tired if he had just woken up from a nap, so he was putting his head on my shoulder. Then, I noticed he did do this when a male would walk up to us and start talking. Yesterday, Chris had Collin at the bike shop and was introducing him to a male customer and he did it then too. Collin was not sleepy so I assume it's because he did not know the person. I thought I was onto something about him being shy around males but he broke that when he did it yesterday in front of a female at the other bike shop. He did quickly warm up to her and even let her hold him for awhile before he came back to me. We are going to a friend's house tonight for dinner and so Collin can play with their 6-month old daughter, Amelia.

Cat door or Collin door?

As you have probably read already, we did Collin-proof the house a few weeks ago...or we thought. Part of the baby proofing was to add gates at the top of the stairs and one gate that blocks off the 2nd floor bathroom, laundry room and office (which is where the cat food has been moved too). This gate has a cat door so the cats can have access to the litter box and the cat food. It did not take long for Collin to figure out how to crawl through the cat door so he could access the off-limit area. I was cooking Collin's dinner one evening, and I heard him at the gate with the cat door. I looked over and he was playing with the gate by opening and shutting it. I stepped back in the kitchen for about 5 minutes and then realized I did not hear him playing with the gate anymore. That's because he was ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE GATE. The little turkey figured out how to fit through the cat door and crawled through the other side. He was headed to the cat water bowl when I caught him. So much for the gate keeping him out.

Here are some pitures I took later that day when he did it again. Here he is just getting started through the gate and struggling a little to get his butt through (see daddy, his head is not THAT big).

He did not give up and figured out how to move one leg through at a time.

Here he is almost through. I did not get a picture on the other side of the gate since he started crawling as fast as he could to the cat water bowl. He almost made it....mommy is too fast for him....right now at least.

Tuesdays With Daddy

This was another completely fun filled day with Collin. First Collin woke up and played in his crib reading a couple of books he has carried to bed over the last couple of nights. He likes books(obvisously he gets that from his mother) Then after reading the books he went back to sleep for another 30 minutes(I do that after reading to) Then he got up and ate and we were off to run some errands and head to the shop. He played in his crib at the shop for a while then we ran a few more errands and came home.

When we got home we played chase on the second floor like him and mommy do then I spent most of the afternoon teaching him how to climb down off of the automununun(Padded table in front of couch) which was interesting. He did this without promting the other night in front of the two of us but would cry and get frustrated because I would not help him today. But after a few cries out he would evnetually climb down. Then get mad when I would put him back up. Being up there was funny to watch because he had a good vantage point to scream at the cats as they walked by. I am not sure he understands they do not like being yelled at. But that is another story.

So after playing for a couple of hours Collin and I took a nap on the couch together. Man that boy sweats. But it was a good nap except for his snoring but I assume he would complain about my snoring if he could talk, so turn about is fair play.

So then we were off to Luby's. This is a great place for Daddy day because I can push him in the high chair and he gets a Balloon. Although today he was not so sure about that ballon, it was not red. But the strawberries were good. Mostly he wanted to play with my silverware. Laura hates it when I let him play with the forks, I don't see any problem in it and after he poked his eyes a couple of times he quite, so see he learned. He's a smart baby, he learned a similar lesson with the fire stick I gave him. Although that may leave a little mark. But heck wounds heal, and chicks dig scares. So I am just helping him out for the future. Believe me, he will thank me when he is older.

Anyways he is asleep now after helping me get his bathwater ready and fighting me when I tried to put him in the patatoe sack, but once we started to read he settled down. Although for some reason the monitor is making this loud screetching noise I think we may have to replace it. Oh well I am glad he is sleeping quietly all bundled up. Oh I just heard a big thud on the floor probably just a cat..........

Happy Father's Day

For daddy's first Father's Day, we all went out for breakfast at a local restaurant. There were two other 10-month old's there with their daddy's that early in the morning. That's because the other clientele were probably still asleep....hahaha. There's no sleeping in on the weekends...or any morning...now that we have a baby. When we got home, the boys took a nap while I....I....I don't know. I cannot remember. That happens a lot too now that I have a baby!!! After daddy woke up and before he went to work, he did open his present from Collin. We both made it at one of those pottery places. It's a big cereal bowl for daddy. I painted it and then painted Collin's hands to put his hand prints along the outside of the bowl and two places on the "lip". Daddy loved it! Too bad we did not have milk in the house or he probably would have tried it out before he left.

When daddy left for work, Collin and I went to the park to swing and then hang out on a blanket for about an hour. He crawled around the blanket and actually ventured off of it this time. I could not get his attention away from the tires on the jogging stroller, he is still fascinated with these, so we left.

Later, when daddy got home, I played chase-Collin-around-the-floor. It was hilarious! Collin would crawl ahead of me a little, stop to look back at me, laugh because I was crawling toward him and then take off the opposite direction. You would have thought I was tickling him by the way he was laughing so hard. I scooped him up a few times to blow on his belly or hold him up in the air before I put him back down to do it all over again. I have never done this before and it was a lot of fun. Daddy enjoyed watching us play.

So, Mr. Collin has a little 'tude. Whenever he is playing with something he is not supposed to be playing with, we take it away from him and let let's us quickly know that he is not happy with it. He will either throw his head back and scream or at least scream for a few seconds to let us know that he was not happy with that. If he is headed toward something that will get him into trouble (like splashing in the cat water bowl), I pick him up to point him in a different direction. He will arch his back and start to throw a fit. What are the Terrible-Twos going to be like for us? I was a really well-behaved two-year old....hehehe Did I just hear most of my family members cough?

Family Reunion

Yesterday, Collin and I attended a family reunion for most of the day. It was a two hour drive each way which was great for Collin because he was able to get a much needed nap before the reunion and sleep most of the way home because he was exhausted from the events. Since he was the youngest family member there by about 2 1/2 years, he got a lot of attention. Besides knowing when he was hungry and changing his diapers, I did not have to hold Collin or worry about were he was because someone either was holding him, he was playing with his cousins or he was people watching (takes after his mommy on this).

Here he is surrounded by some of his second cousins. The older cousins were not as interested and were outside in the pool. Kyler is in the green shirt learning to tumble forward for the first time so he was practicing most of the day, Samantha is watching Collin and Kendall is the one on the right posing.

Collin took to one of his cousins named Alex. From what others told me, Collin grabbed his favorite book (one of them that Grandma H gave him on her last trip), crawled to Alex who was sitting on the floor next to a couch, pulled up on him to sit in his lap and gave him the book. I looked over and Alex was reading the book to Collin and I thought it was cute but had no idea that Collin initiated it. At one point, Collin rested his head on Alex's shoulder. I tried to capture this moment but I missed it (refer to the postings about Collin and his fascination with the camera. You have to be quick taking pictures because once he notices the camera, all he is interested in at that moment is getting it to put in his mouth). Alex read the book to him twice before Collin was bored and on the move again.

We both had a great time even though it was a long day. On the way home, he slept for about an hour and then cried for most of the remaining hour home. I even pulled over to change his dirty diaper thinking that would help. I gave him his pacifier and then headed home. There was peace for about 15 minutes until he sneezed (like his momma) and blew his pacifier out. I suspect he was not feeling good because all four of his top teeth are coming in at once. I did not think he was hungry because I feed him a 6oz bottle right before we left. He played with daddy awhile when we got home before his bed time ritual. He had another 9oz of milk before going to bed. Growing boy!!!

Awwwww!!!!

When Collin was at Matthew's the other day, they were both really fascinated with the window. I think Maria said that Matthew had either not noticed the window or was not interested in it until Collin came over and showed him were it was. That's one of Collin's "things" these days is to stand in front of a window, look outside and knock on it. He was doing this at Matthew's house and Matthew's decided to join him....there was a struggle at first mainly because the guys are not that sturdy on their feet yet.

Then, they settled down and enjoyed the birds outside and each other's company........awwwww.........

Maria and I started laughing and commenting about how cute it was. She captured the moment and I am sure this will be used later in their life. She also took this next picture and I joked that it's Collin saying "Shhhh....don't tell anyone about the hug and I won't either....it's not that big of a deal, right?"

Gas Powered?

Apparently, our son is learning quickly what's is like to be a Holmes. We have noticed lately (it' probably been the entire time) that he is a little gaseous. It's been really noticeable in the last week though. When I took him to the pool Sunday afternoon with Maria and Matthew, it was not his "raspberries" I was hearing. He was making bubbles another way. I thought for sure I was going to see a surprise when I took his swim diaper off....but there was nothing there. (Thank you!!! I could not imagine changing a wet swim diaper full of poo....I am sure I will one day soon though). Mom also noticed this week that he is a little toot. She wrote in one of her summary emails about her day and keeping him: "At least twice he did not go to sleep or was awaken by his farts that were louder than a drunken sailor."

Daddy's proud of his son...."that's my boy!!!"

Sunday, Learning Day

Collin and I ran a ton of errands this morning before it got too hot. The purpose of one errand was to go to the grocery store to find some more finger foods for Collin. So far, he has had cooked baby carrots and some Cheerios. He plays with the carrots more than eats them before they end up on the floor. He did like the Cheerios. I gave him some melon this morning and he did not want to have anything to do with it. I knew he was hungry because he drank a 6 oz bottle after he pushed all of the melon pieces aside. I know I need to teach him how to feed himself, but I need to find some finger foods he likes...so off to the store we went. I came back with some crackers, Cheerios and fruit. He did eat some of the cracker when I gave it to him. He was at least willing to try it compared to the melon earlier that morning.

Later in the afternoon, Collin was getting fussy and was not interested in a nap. I thought it might be fun to go to the park and enjoy the breezy outside. I brought some of Collin's books with us and he "read" one of his favorite books for at least 15 minutes. I really enjoyed watching him stare at the pages.....in between chewing on them, of course. I tried to read one of the other books to him but he was not interested. He did pose for a few pictures for me before he was interested in chewing on the camera. Remember, he is fascinated with electronics, especially small ones that he can eat like cell phones or cameras. Watch out! You have been warned.

This picture was my favorite of the day. I love that smile.

More Teeth

If Collin could talk, he would have said that the reason he was cranky earlier this week was because he has new teeth coming in on the top. Makes sense now. I saw his "bud" of a tooth Friday afternoon when I picked him up at mom's house. I just happen to have been holding him in a perfect spot to see the tooth. It's not one of his top middle teeth that are usually next to come in after the bottom, middle two. It's to the left. Since Collin is not fond of anything next to his mouth (probably because of 2 1/2 weeks of medicine from his ear infection), I have a hard time prying his mouth open unless I wanted to tie him down.....not that desperate. I did not feel any other teeth coming in but they are probably not that far behind.

Da Boys!!!

Collin had lots of male bonding time today. While I was riding my bike this morning with the group at the bike shop, Collin and daddy hung out before having to head to the bike shop. After Collin woke up and daddy feed him, they played in the house little before getting bagels to bring to the bike shop.

I worked at the shop a little after returning from my ride....and then the fun began. Collin and I went to Matthew's house and hung out most of the afternoon. The guys played with Matthew's toys before they really warmed up to each other. Collin was apparently a bad influence on Matthew because he showed a few spots in the house that Matthew had not thought of playing in. One was the baby jogger near the entry. Collin LOVES tires for some reason so as soon as he spotted the tires on the jogger, he crawled over to start touching them and playing around him. Matthew followed and his parents really did not want him to play in the entry where the jogger was.

We then went swimming. Both of the boys have been a few times before so this was not new to either one of them. I bought Collin a little float to lay on and he was not too interested in this first. He did want me to hold him in the water on his tummy so he could kick and use his arms. He did a great job kicking....and needs MUCH more practice with his arms. He loves it when I bounce him up and down in the water. He tried Matthew's float out that he could sit in and had a good time with it. I will have to find him one similar to that one. He was then OK with his float after this which was good because my arms were getting tired from holding him and bouncing him in the water.

We left the pool and went back to the house to feed the guys and let them play some more. They were both really tired but did not want to take a nap probably because they did not want to miss out on anything. We put Collin in Matthew's Pack 'n Play while Matthew took a nap in his crib. Collin never did sleep. We all met daddy for dinner that night and really enjoyed the meal and the company. What a great day!!

I am Innocent!!

We finally have gates in the house! Collin now has more area to explore and he did it yesterday. It did not take him long to "find" the patio door. He immediately pulled up on it to a standing position and knocked on the glass (knocking on glass and doors is his thing...see prior blog entries). He quickly got tired of that because he noticed other parts of the house that did not look familiar.

I will have to make some changes. No longer can I go up or down the stairs with my arms loaded down with stuff because I at least need to have a free hand to open the gate. These are not quickly releasing gates either. You have to squeeze the top part while pulling up at the same time. I am coordinated but I tend to loose that coordination when I am tired....which seems to be the case all of the time now. At least I will be a little more comfortable the Collin will not fall down the several flights of stairs that we have if I happen to turn my head for a few seconds.

The cats will have to get used to the gates. I can see them getting "stuck" on a floor they don't want to be on if they don't pay attention and follow one of us when we are leaving the floor. There is at least a pet opening in the smaller gate next to the laundry room so they can get to their food and the litter box...that's if they are not stuck on another floor.

Swimming

Late this afternoon, Collin and I met Addison and her mom to go swimming in their community swimming pool. Collin had not been swimming since his ear infection so I was curious to see what he would do in the water. He took only a few minutes to remember what this water was about....having Addison there helped a lot with that. We started out in the baby pool and then got in the adult pool during the break. This is a picture after swimming and after we put their dry clothes back on (thank goodness for swim diapers!).

The kids had a great time. We cannot wait to do it again. I bet he will sleep really good tonight. I know I will....that wore me out.

Cruising is Fun!

Now that Collin has mastered "cruising" (walking using objects/furniture), he has found a few places in the house that he had not discovered before. One of them is in our master bathroom. Collin used to be fascinated with the "other baby" in the mirrored closets doors. Now, he crawls to the corner of the tub and the end of our bathroom counter. I have no idea why he is intrigued by this area., but he is. Maybe it's because of the noise he can make with the towel holder by knocking it back and forth on the side of the sink cabinet. Maybe it's because he can used both hands while he is back there because he has three sides/walls to hold him up. Whatever the reason, you can see from these pictures that he is really happy he found this spot.