Graduation Circuit

My new crib!

The family has been hitting the graduation parties this year.  It's been a while since we've had family members old enough to graduate.  It's been nice for the family as we have been traveling to the farms so Quinny has lots to be entertained by.  A couple of weekends ago we checked out Carrie's God daughter's party and Quinny got to see all the tractors.  It was a rainy and therefore muddy day so he and I ended up getting all slopped up but we had a nice time.  While out checking the barns Quinny inevitably needed to go to potty so we taught him how to do it on the farm; drop trow and let er' rip.  Shockingly, he loved it.

This past Saturday was Carrie's younger brother's graduation party.  Steve and Sue pulled out all the stops.  The garage was completely cleaned out.  Seriously, that was a chore within itself.  They have lived there for 35 years so you can imagine what it was like to literally get every last scrap of collectibles out of the garage.  They rented tents, chairs and had a massive spread of food.  We dined on multiple cakes (chocolate, white, and carrot were the ones that Quinny sampled by himself), pork, chicken, potatoes, corn from the farm and plenty to drink for all.  As usual Quinny stuffed himself over and over sparing no expense.  Towards the end of the party I caught him going from table to table eating the M&M's out of the bowls of trail mix.  By 5pm there wasn't an M&M to be found.

He also enjoyed the farm mentality when it came time to go potty.  The first time he went inside, but with the party outside he wanted to go outside. "Daddy, how about this tree or on this flower right here?" I was walking the back forty with him one time so we went way out of sight.  The next time he was in the front yard but moved behind a massive pine tree.  The third time he went right in front of the house for all to see.  After that he decided he didn't need anyone and in the middle of the yard without any supervision he just dropped his pants and started going.  The crowd loved it.  For us it was a moment of, "Yup, that's my son!"  So we went and claimed him and told him he should have a little modesty even if on the farm.  You want to use the back yard, not the front going forward.  Life's little lessons...

My first teeth!

Gavin is growing up and is pretty close to crawling.  He's officially scooting, mostly backwards and made some nice progress across the living room floor this morning.  He has two front teeth on the bottom and Carrie said she found two more coming in but I haven't confirmed them yet.  Check out Q's first tooth here.  He's really a good baby.  He was passed all around yesterday and I don't think I heard a peep out of him all day. He's so happy to get attention and has a tough time just sitting on the sidelines.  We are dreading childproofing the house again because what we have in Florida won't fit here. We can't block off the kitchen (dog bowl, cleaning supplies, etc.) because it's open instead of just one doorway.  The stairs are much wider and not separated by a wall, just a railing so we are trying to figure out how we can block that with a gate.  It's going to get interesting around here. 

Q checking out the new digs with baby brother.

Quinny is a pistol!  If that child doesn't get to spend as much time as possible outside he's bouncing off the walls.  We're so proud of his potty training.  He's done an amazing job and has very few accidents.  We still need to keep a pretty good eye on the time to remind him but we can't remember the last time he had an accident at home or school.  It's when we are somewhere else like these graduation parties or a store that we have to remember to keep an eye on him.  It's been great not changing diapers!

I'll continue with the blog.  I have a lot of stories I need to get down on paper.  Thanks to those that responded encouraging us to continue.