Baby Davy isn't a baby anymore!

Oh this boy!  My little Davy is a very interesting boy.  He recently turned 2 just a week before we moved and he is learning and growing up a little here and there and it keeps surprising me as he develops into a little person with is own personality.

When we snuggle up or when I lay him down for the night I realize how long he's getting...not the chubby little bald baby anymore!  He has out stretched all his baby chub EXCEPT for his cheeks!  I love his round cheeks!  

He sure does like to be attached to us.  As I sifted through pictures I found so many of him just hanging out in his cozy spot in our arms.   He can often be found snuggled in and will "check in" with me and likes to know where I am and then will join in with whatever I am up to or head off to play some more....but if I am sitting or looking relaxed in any way, he will always opt for the cozy spot.  I don't think he is the most adventurous yet!

 

He does alright when we drop him off for a baby sitter, but nursery at church is pure torture!  Once everyone starts heading out to classes after Sacrament meeting, he knows it is coming!  And then we walk by the nursery en route to drop Katelyn off at sunbeams and the panic starts creeping in a little more.  When we get back to the nursery and I open the door for him to go in, it is just too much!  He is just so sad with nursery!  I will stay and play with him and he can keep the tears at bay, but any sudden movement by me and the tears start again.  He is a sensitive one!  I usually just end up bringing him to the 3rd hour of church with me and he very happily just sits and snuggles with me.  He would rather be overly reverent then stay in that "terrifying nursery" so we will just continue to ease into it.  Katelyn had a hard time with nursery until she became the oldest one in there and then took over as the queen of the whole nursery, so maybe he is just waiting for his time to shine.  He is just a little nervous...you know, toys, songs, snacks, and stories of Jesus are just too much sometimes ;)  He'll get there.

This boy can eat...he will eat a meal, then eat some more.  He always seems to have food on his mind!  You think he would be bigger or chubbier, but he's got nothing to show for it.

 I love these juicy watermelon pictures!  Juice is running down to his elbows and he doesn't care one bit!  And that face is one that only a mother would kiss...looks plenty kissable to me!

ANY time someone is eating, he needs in on the action.  ANY time the fridge is open, he comes bolting through the house!  Yogurt, grapes, milk, chocolate syrup for the milk, applesauce, and we can't forget about the butter!  Oh what he would do for a mouthful of butter.  He looks at me as I catch him with butter in his hand, and usually mouth too, and says "yummyyyyy" hoping I will let him keep it.  He's so hopeful!

He is also at the curious age.  He is learning...and choosing... to say words now past the car and sound effects he liked!  He went a few months there where he seemed to know some words and would say them once, and then stay silent from there on out.

The last couple of months have been so much more wonderful in our communication!  It was very frustrating for both of us for those muted months.  He has understood us for quite awhile, but the talking has just started which is normal for kids, but I am relieved the not talking phase has passed.  He is throwing in and experimenting with tones and facial expressions that are so funny to us and I have to try really hard to not just giggle at his cuteness just in case that make him nervous.  He likes to yell at the top of his lungs and really get his point across.  Reading books with him is not a reverent activity.  He likes to identify all the things he recognizes and exclaim the TREE!!! CAR!!!!  DUCK!!! QUACK!!!  GOGGY!!!! (dog)  COW!!!!  BOOO!!!! (that is the same as "moo" right?) If he isn't yelling, then he will go on repeat until you confirm what he is saying by repeating what he said back.  This is simple usually, but sometimes he is repeating with greater frustration "oy-eye-she-na" and pointing towards the table and chairs and I am just not getting it and repeating back "oy-eye-she-na" just like he said doesn't do it for him.  Sometimes I will tell him to show me, and he will lead me to what he is obviously talking about giving me no clarification to what "oy-eye-she-na" is referring too.  C'mon Mom!  He gets frustrated with how slow I am sometimes.

He has the normal boy interests, but since Katelyn has plenty of the girly and motherly interests in toys, he likes to play like her sometimes too.  So when he isn't driving his car through the house up and over the couch and across the walls, sometimes he will wrap his car up in a blanket and take it for a ride in the stroller.  He likes animals and Katelyn and Davy often battle it out for the dogs and the bears.

Davy likes music and dancing now.  This is probably because Katelyn seems to always be dancing and having the time of her life twirling and wiggling her dancing body around the house so he feels that he might as well join in.

I like to have Pandora or Spotify music playing through the day and Katelyn requests kid music often and some songs are just so so, but it seems that every other song or so is welcomed and deemed "DANCE TIME!!!"  by Katelyn and Katelyn will check to make sure everyone is at least wiggling to the beat whether they are laying down or sitting, and if you are standing she expects you to be all out dancing!  We have strict rules here and we all go by Queen Katelyn's rules otherwise we have to pay our fines in tickles (which Katelyn and Davy gladly accept)

Katelyn is a big fan of all the girly make up and nail polish and pretty things and since Davy hangs out with us all day every day he kind of likes this stuff too.  Oh the fun these two can have when they sneak into my make-up!

Davy is very loving and tries to show love but is often so rough with it!  I used to initiate rubbing our noses together Eskimo Kiss style and now it terrifies me as I am so close to getting my nose dislocated by his roughness!  He gives BIG squeeze hugs that sometimes choke Katelyn...he has good intentions but doesn't realize his strength.  He will often head butt us as he flies in for a hug.  His kisses are wonderful though!  He seems to be gentle with those, but he doesn't just give those out to anyone!

As he snuggles he often does a "mole search" and is doing almost an ID check to see if it is really me or not.  I have a raised mole right above my lip and he knows right where it is.
He touches it when he is sad and he calms right down.  He will wake up and cry at night and I have tried to send David in to calm him down but Davy will reach up for his face with eyes closed and feel all around his face for the mole and then get more sad and frustrated.  Then I will come in and he will feel my face and find my mole and drift off to sleep!  Almost immediately!  It is so odd and a little bit cute that I am his comfort item. It is almost like a stress relief button that calms him down.  He is an odd little boy, but he sure does love me so he kind of has me trapped in his own sweet way!  I don't know if his umbilical cord was ever cut all the way because he is still very attached to me!

Davy is very mellow and I don't worry too much about him being a dare devil.  He is very cautious and likes to ease into everything nice and slow.  He will climb on things, but if he has any doubt about the safety, he will usually back down and ask for help or do something else.  He is cautious with swimming even though we went to the pool a ton this summer!

He follows Katelyn's lead, but she is a good one to follow so I don't worry...hooray!

He likes to play alone and NOT SHARE anything!  He will play next to someone, but not really with people.  So when Katelyn wanted to try out this car with him, he wasn't happy.

Here he is "playing with" his friend Emma.  They are about a month apart in age so they both consider this close enough!

We celebrated his birthday the weekend before his birthday at Chris and Tricia's place...with Liam's left over cake from his party...so fancy I know!  You can call me the party planner of the year ;)

As we set up his cake and were singing this is the best reaction we got from him.  He was so annoyed/confused..."Seriously guys!  Why in the world is there hot fire in my cake?!?!?!?!!  What am I supposed to do with this?!"

Then KAtelyn and Liam happily blew out the candles and Davy was thrilled because now he could actually eat the cake!

We love this cute boy and he just wants his cake!

We will thoroughly miss our east coast family and Tricia's huge and fun family!  Her house always seems to have a fun party going on!

For Halloween we went to a party that Rosie planned for the company and we all dressed up a little.  For Davy, I knew he wouldn't wear anything too wild or crazy or dress up-y so we went with a football player.  Some people here are a little passionate about their teams and were a little miffed that he wasn't in Texas Tech colors.  I don't know if we are fans of any Texas team yet, I just grabbed the cheapest football jersey and didn't put any thought into what team it was.  I thought it was a perfect success...he wore a costume without even realizing he was!  He picked up on the whole trick or treating game and quickly realized that all he had to do was walk up to the houses and hold out his bag and he got candy!  So easy!  He usually has to find a way to sneakily climb up to the candy bowl or throw a REALLY good fit to possibly get a piece at home!  It was a good day in his eyes!

For pumpkin carving he really wanted to help and join in, but he didn't like the sliminess of cleaning it out and can't cut into it, so he was bummed he just had to stand and watch.  He's in the stage where he wants to help, but isn't helpful at all so we just try to get him to enjoy watching the production of things!

The kids were thrilled with the final outcome.  Katelyn helped with hers drawing the shapes and I cut most of her cat shapes out with Katelyn "guiding" my hand.

He loves having David around and some tears are shed nearly every time he heads out somewhere.  Sometimes David is just heading out to the car to grab something, or sometimes it is work, or getting the mail.  If Davy isn't allowed to tag along he takes it very personally!  Here he is sending David off on his first day of work.

We love this goofy boy and all his quirks!  He is learning and growing and doing more and more and isn't just my little baby anymore.  He's turning into a studly model I guess!

Moving On and Settling In

We are alive and well in Dallas!  We packed up and moved in under 2 short weeks and we squeezed in a fun weekend with Chris and ALL of the fun in-laws that came to party for the weekend...and Ryan came all the way from Germany to wish us luck in Texas ;)  We spent our last weekend on the coast running our marathon in Delaware.  That needs its own post, so hopefully I get to that soon.  Here is part of our beautiful area.  There was a park and a trail to the river in our "backyard" that we visited often.  We will miss the beauty of the scenery there!

We had to make one last pit stop in Baltimore for David to check out of Ernst & Young.  The Inner Harbor didn't have rain, but my kids like their "special" umbrella.  We enjoyed the perk from EY to go see the aquarium and museums in the harbor area for free multiple times while we have been out here on the east coast.  

Then Chris, Liam, the sister missionaries, and the elder missionaries came to help us load up the truck and pack up the last few straggling items.  They were an awesome help!!!  And to finish it all off, my dear friend Annie came and helped me clean up the place.  She is a hard worker!  She is the one that convinced me that running a marathon is a good idea, so when she puts her mind to something, she will work her tail off to get it done.  She cleaned my blinds in the dark (we packed up all the lamps) and she didn't even think twice about it.  She just used a white rag and let the white rag tell if it was clean or not!  She has been so good to me!

We headed out the next morning and David dropped the kids and I off at the airport for a direct flight to Dallas.  David set out on his road trip to Texas and didn't realize that driving the truck and hauling our car would bring so much anxiety!  He is really good at thinking of the worst case scenarios and he wasn't familiar with driving that truck so he was a little stressed the whole  22 hour drive.  He was expecting a peaceful relaxing quiet time to himself but there was much more panic involved for it to be peaceful!

Rosie and Peter let us stay with them for a week while we hurried to find a place to live before we had to return our truck.  They helped us unload and get us set up and have provided some fun stuff to do here.  They have been great for our sanity's sake and Katelyn adores them and thinks they are pretty funny!

We are still settling and trying to get our new *little* apartment to feel like home.  We went from a nearly 4 bedroom town home in Pennsylvania to a 2 bedroom apartment in Dallas.  We were looking in a particular area and just weren't finding anything we loved, so we thought we would minimize and go for something simple and hopefully save up and find a perfect house to buy in a year.  I was super nervous and bitter about moving into a small space, but have come to find that it isn't so bad!  There is less space to make a mess in!  The bedrooms are spacious so there is room for the kids toys and our office and crafty stuff.  We are making the most out of this space and I don't feel as restricted as I feared we would.

We had a week to unpack and settle in with David home before he started his new job.  We are getting there.  I feel like I dumped and decluttered as we packed up and I am still dumping and decluttering as we unpack.  It is feeling great!  I have a hard time saying no to free stuff and we have been so blessed with more than we need so it has been a good time to really think about what we will need and actually make good use of.  There is more to do, but we are getting there!

We have been a 1 car family for the last 4 years and it we have made it work.  I don't mind staying home and playing with the kids.  We have lived near parks or had space to run and play outside.  I would invite friends over if I was feeling bored of the usual, but it really didn't happen too often.  I did a preschool co-op that rotated through the homes of those participating and getting up and going for the day was tough!  I like our cozy relaxed schedule with no real plans!  I don't have to have a structured morning for another year, or maybe 2 if I keep Katelyn home an extra year and I don't feel that I need to disrupt the peace of that!  I get my time outside exercising and playing with the kids or my social interaction with neighbors we became good friends with.  So most of the time I didn't mind and didn't feel like I could justify getting a 2nd car.  It didn't seem worth the expense at all.

When we moved here, we were looking for a place to live as near to his work as possible so he could run or bike to work (don't worry, there is a 24 hour gym at his office with showers and all things necessary to look and smell professional for his job) The place we picked isn't too far from work, but more than just a quick jog so David looked into bikes.  Looking into bikes turned into looking at motorized bicycles which turned into scooters and mopeds, which turned into motorcycles.  The search stopped there and went back to the scooter/moped idea and stuck!

David took a motorcycle class for a couple days and got his motorcycle license and bought himself a "manly" scooter.  So he got legal and bought a fun new toy to ride to work and he is excited. He headed off for his first day at Dr Pepper and is excited to dig in to this new job.  The first day was full of tours and getting set up and acquainted with everything there, so it wasn't anything to be too excited about.
So I am attempting to create some sort of routine for myself since the last month has been everything all thrown together and sometimes we were scrambling and sometimes we were frantic and all the leftover "sometimes" we were soaking up all that we loved in Pennsylvania and the east coast and getting our warm welcome here in Texas from David's wonderful sister, Rosie and her equally wonderful husband, Peter.  They let us join in on the company Halloween party and then on Halloween night we got to watch the Dallas Stars hockey team from the company suite with a buffet of awesome food and drinks!  So far Texas Rosie and Peter have treated us well ;)