Sleeping and the heat…

With the heat lately, sleeping has sort of been a challenge. Grady is the only one with AC in his room, so he is the only one truly comfortable. The baby and I have been sleeping downstairs and Gibson had been toughing it out in his room with a couple of fans blowing on him. Well, with the heat climbing higher and higher, that wasn’t going to fly. So, since the baby and I were already sleeping downstairs, I figured we would set Gibson up down there also. So, we rolled out his sleeping back for him to sleep on top of and put him under the kitchen table so he could be inside a “fort”. I am not sure how this kid sleeps in these crazy positions, but he manages to do so. Actually, after he woke up from being on his hands and face, his arms were asleep – that was not an easy one to explain, he didn’t understand why his arms and hands were tingling and he wanted me to make it go away.

I normally swaddle Garrison, but it has been too hot for that, so he has been just sleeping in his diaper. He sleeps JUST like Gibson did with his arms up in the air. It’s so cute!

Of course you are, my sweetie, of course!

Garrison, 2 months old!

Yesterday, we had Garrison’s 2 month check-up. He is doing very well. He is up 3 lbs 11 ozs from his one month check-up to 13 lbs 14 ozs and up 2 1/4 inches to a lengthy 25 1/4 inches long!   Compared to Gibson who was 11lbs 15 3/4 ozs and 24 inches long & Grady who was 12 lbs 11ozs and 23 1/2 inches long, Garrison is a long chunky thing! The doctor was quite impressed with his weight gain. Garrison has a slight umbilical hernia, but the doctor is not worried and it should go away before too long. She also checked on his Polydactyly aka his “extra digit” and is pleased with how it has healed up. There is some slight scar tissues there and so it feels like a hard lump, but that should go away and we should never be able to tell that he had that.

Garrison has been sleeping really well still too. He is the best sleeper of all the boys. I am usually up once to twice a night once I put him to bed around 9pm and then of course, I am up for the day around 5:30-6:00am. I could set a timer by him practically, he has figured out what he seems to need and so we are going with that! Makes me much less cranky since at least I can get a few good hours of sleep as compared to life when Grady was 2 months old! However, once teething starts, I am not holding my breath that this little routine of his will last…I expect a lot more night wakings then. Although, he could surprise me and be nothing like his brothers.

It’s hot!

The weather here in the Pacific Northwest has been hovering around 95-100 for the last few days and it doesn’t look like we will get a break for a couple more. We aren’t really use to this kind of heatwave around here, but it seems every year things get a little bit hotter for a little longer and so, it seems we might need to consider getting use to it! UGH. I am more of a 75 & sunny kind of gal or a 50-60 and rain kind of gal. I don’t like either extreme. I don’t mind the snow, but I only like it for a day or two here and there and then it needs to go away.

So, what have we been doing to stay cool, you ask, since none of our houses have central air? Well, we are lucky to have 2 portable air conditioning units. We got one when Gibson was a baby and then I picked one up last year during summer for Grady’s room so that each boy could have one. It seems, we need to come up with one more, but anyway. We have the one unit in Grady’s room cooling it away. He doesn’t do well not sleeping in his own bed, and he doesn’t do well not sleeping, so he is top priority! The second unit we had been moving up and down the stairs…downstairs during the day, and upstairs in Garrison’s room at night. This wasn’t a good plan. The downstairs never cooled and his room stayed around 80, which isn’t cool enough, in my book for the baby to be sleeping. Anyway, I finally wised up and came up with a plan! I was going to leave the AC unit downstairs with the 3 desktop fans and 1 tower fans (we have another 2 towers, but they are in Gibson’s room) I have around here and we were going to leave everything running 24/7. So, that is what I did. Yesterday, it got down to 83...that was my new “low”, but then this morning, after sleeping down here last night with the baby since it was the coolest place in the house, I woke up to a “chilly” 79 degree house! Heh, chilly, riiiiight. Anyway, shortly we started climbing again and now, once again, I am sitting in an 84 degree house with a ice pack on my neck, a cool washcloth on 2 of the 3 boys and the sound of fans running.

They say, that if we reach 101 today, we will break the record of the hottest day in the Seattle area for the 118 years (that is as long as they have been keeping records). This is so not a record I care about breaking.

I think it might be time to see what it costs to get central air.  I’m melting…

The Neighborhood – OUR Neighborhood

Our neighborhood ROCKS. Seriously. This is the kind of neighborhood dreams are made of. Our street is a cul-de-sac that consists of 14 houses. We are our own little neighborhood called “Thomas Hill”. There are around 20 kids on the street (8 in one house). Most days, ok, everyday (especially in the summer!), you will find any number of us up at the cul-de-sac (our house is at the bottom of the street, so we always have to venture out) hanging out letting the kids burn off some energy before dinner. Generally we are in one of 2 driveways or after the sun has gone behind the trees, we are hanging out in the street.

We have been having some scorching weather the last couple days so in addition to playing all afternoon in the water, we decided to have an impromptu BBQ in one of the neighbors driveway. We wheeled out their grill and all brought our own fixin's. The G-clan had hotdogs, chips, blueberries and olives. The kids thought it was so much fun!

THEN – my neighbor/friend, Beth, the sewing wonder (she makes all my slings!) ran to her sewing room and threw together these faboo capes for the kids. The kids had a BLAST. Grady was a little shy about having a cape at first, but soon warmed to the idea of being Super Grady. He was too content just sitting in the pool hanging out! Which, can I digress for a minute? Grady is the kid that wouldn’t have ANYTHING to do with the water. Nothing. I would take him to water parks or whatever and he would just watch, never getting wet. We would go to the neighbors to play in the sprinklers and nothing, he would stay far away, often sitting on my lap the whole time…and last night, BAM, he gets it and now is all over the water. I am so glad he likes it. He truly is my “all in his own timing” kid. Ok, back to my post. Where was I? Oh, capes, right. Anyway, we suited all the kids up and around the neighborhood they ran talking about their super powers and their super hero names. It was SO cute. Grady and Tiernan (who are best buds!) had a great time running around together.

(notice all the kids playing and Grady just hanging out in the pool taking it all in)




Grady getting his cape so he can get in on the action!




We really truly do feel blessed to have such great neighbors/friends. It’s great for the kids too to have great friends so close. Gibson & Grady really look forward to playing with all their friends everyday and I really do love knowing that I have 4 close families on this street that I can call day or night if I need anything.

Mr Crabby…

…is oh so sweet!

 
until he has had enough and gives me this look…

Ok dude, mommy will put the camera down!

Tiernan & Garrison

Last night, I was over at George & Sonnet’s watching Kea and Tiernan for our monthly date nights! Today is Sonnet’s birthday (Happy Birthday, btw, Sonnet!) and so she and George went out for a special dinner. Gregg has a little cold and so, I went over to their house instead of the kids coming here to keep her kids from getting sick. Of course, I took the boob baby with me. Tiernan absolutely loves Garrison. He runs around saying “baby” all night and then held him for probably a good half hour. Kea, on the other hand, held him for all of a minutes and then was off doing her own thing and then Tiernan had to have the baby back. It’s so cute and he is so good when he is holding him. He just sits there and chills. He told me “bye bye baby” when he was done holding the baby which was better than Gibson or Grady who just get up and leave the baby there.


I love these 2 pictures, it looks like they are having such a serious conversation.

Garrison is obviously happy with Tiernan and his mad baby holding skills.
 
Good job, Tiernan – your hired.

The Fire Truck!

Auntie Kelli sent Grady this really cool fire truck for his birthday…it’s actually, a book, a playmat and this firetruck. Grady LOVES it. And so, does Gibson – which sort of causes a problem because Gibson thinks everything is his (but we are working on that!) but, I digress. It’s a tight squeeze with both of them in there but, they made it work and had fun playing fireman. Luckily we got these hats at the Mill Creek Festival fire truck display, worked out perfectly!
 

Cama Beach

The Gow family had reservations at Cama Beach for this last weekend and invited us along! When the invite came down, I still had not had Garrison and in not knowing what he would be like and how things would be going, we made plans for Gregg and Gibson to go along with them and that I would stay home with Grady and the baby. Knowing NOW how great of a little baby Garrison is, I totally could have gone, but it is ok, because I had a nice relaxing time with just my 2 littlest guys, so it all worked out.

Cama Beach is an old fishing resort about an hour north of us, so it’s nice and close! The cabins and bungalows have been refurbished and are really nice!

Here are some pictures from the weekend. I will have to have Gregg log in and fill in some of the commentary – or you can check out this post on Su’s blog!

Gibson had a GREAT time. It is all he has been talking about since then. He tells everyone “I went to Cama Beach…”

Local peeps – if we can pick a weekend and rent seven or more cabins then we can book 18 months in advance. We would really like to get together and do this with other families, so if it interests you at all, either comment or send me an email and we can plan something!