Grayson's First Haircut

Michael got his hair cut tonight and we took advantage of the appointment to also have our friend Erica trim Grayson's hair. The hair on top is still filling in, but around his ears and neck it was getting quite long.

Here are a couple before pictures:

We didn't know if Gray would freak out with the scissors by his head, so Michael held him the entire time. Erica draped him in a cape, but Grayson wasn't a fan of staying covered so we eventually had to give up on that.

Here come the first few snips!

Grayson quickly realizes it's not so bad and (luckily for us) decides to sit still and not freak out.

Here's the handsome boy afterwards. Not a drastic change, but a much-needed one.

Random Updates

I've really noticed a change in Grayson lately when it comes to his personality and nature. He's always been a happy, helpful boy but he's really starting to show that there's a silly streak inside him.

Whether it's playing made-up games or giggling with glee, Grayson has an infectious smile that I hope sticks with him throughout his life. He's become quite the wiggler, joker and all-around funny man.

He's also continuing to flex his independence and now feeds himself with utensils, helps unload the dishwasher by putting his cups and plates in the cabinet and also feeds Roxy (whom he still calls "goodgirl").

Of course as you'll see from the picture below, his helpfulness sometimes leads to more work for his parents but we appreciate the effort.

Grayson dumped Roxy's food in the water bowl instead of the food bowl (and the floor, of course)

He's really into hats, sunglasses and jackets right now too. If you try to take them off when we walk in the door he throws a fit so we just let him wear it all until he decides he's done.

This isn't the best picture ever, but it provides a glimpse into the unbridled joy that's in Grayson's smile.

Grayson is also getting better at saying words and smiling on command. Here are a couple of videos saying "thank you" and blowing kisses.

Our Afternoon Adventure

This afternoon we took a bike ride over to the Medieval Fair which is in its 32nd year in our town and quite the event. Michael and I love to people watch there since it truly is where the crazies come out en mass.

Grayson was a little over-stimulated by the whole thing (not that I blame him) so we only stayed about an hour before he started getting restless and we felt a meltdown coming on. Plus, today was the nicest weather of the three-day festival and there were tons of people, making it a bit difficult to find a spot and watch the costumed frenzy pass by on their way to consume a smoked turkey leg.

Getting loaded up in the bike trailer.

Our friends Rob, Michelle and (Gray's future BFF) Liam. (Nothing better than the baby carrier days during crowded events!)

The Inevitable

We figured Grayson would get sick and last night he proved us right. I'll spare you the gory details, but this morning he woke up like his normal self and was hungry for breakfast. So far he's managed to keep that down and we're keeping our fingers crossed that it stays that way. He hasn't had any fever and is going to school, so I really hope this is all behind us.

Hope you all have a great Friday!

Seriously?

This morning we received a phone call from Grayson's teacher that we never expected. Before I go on, I'm inclined to post a disclaimer that this is a disgusting story.

I'm serious. This is your final warning, so don't blame me if you start gagging after you read this post. It's okay if you need to click away, I won't think any less of you.

So here it goes...

When Miss Lauren called she told us that Grayson had been digging in his diaper and ended up eating his own poop. I'm not talking about a little smear on the finger type of incident, this was a full-on grab a handful and eat it situation. Disgusting.

Lately, we've caught Grayson sticking his hand in the back of his diaper to scratch his butt, however we chalked it up to dry, itchy skin. We've been putting extra lotion on his bottom and lower back to try and prevent the itching, but apparently it's become a habit and he found more than itchy skin this morning.

Michael called our pediatrician's office to see what we should do and they basically just told us to keep an eye on him and bring him in immediately if he vomited, had diaharrea or a fever.

I called the school back after lunch to check in and they said he ate all his lunch and hasn't seemed to have gotten sick from the incident. Now I'm wondering if it's a hunger issue and we should be feeding him more. Either way, it is totally horrible and gross to think about.

He's been fine this evening and managed to put away lots of Mexican food for dinner, so hopefully the worst is over.

I probably shouldn't have shared this on the World Wide Web, but them's the breaks. His 15-year-old self will just have to forgive me.

Springing Forward

Apologies for being MIA, it's been a whirlwind since I returned home from Austin, TX last Tuesday. I had another work trip on Wednesday (just for the day) and then Nana and Popper (Michael's parents) drove up from Houston on Friday.

We've had a great weekend despite the weather going from 73 degrees on Friday to snowing about three inches on Saturday. We were snow bound yesterday and had to cancel our plans to visit the new children's zoo inside the Oklahoma City Zoo, but were determined to get out of the house today. It was still too windy and cold to be outdoors so we opted for running some home remodeling errands instead.

I'm excited to say we got a lot accomplished (thanks to Nana and Popper keeping Grayson entertained for us). We found two new lamps for our living room and put in the official order for new countertops and sinks in our kitchen and two bathroom vanities. It was a shock to the bank account (and Michael had to offer commentary on how many car projects that money could have funded), but I cannot wait for everything to be installed in a few weeks. I'll be sure to share before and after pictures along the way.

We've also picked out new lighting for the house and decided on a paint color for the master and guest bedrooms. After living with hydrangea wallpaper for three and a half years, I'm determined to finally tackle our bedroom. It always seems to take a backseat to more public spaces of our house.

I guess the days of longer sunlight have made me become overly ambitious. Just wait until it's warm enough to dig in the dirt. There's a whole other set of projects planned for our yard. Now that I'm sharing all of this, I probably need to go make a deposit in my husband's car account. Bribery is looking like the key to making my plans become reality.

A Light Bulb Moment

One thing I've learned about parenting is that when your child has a light bulb moment based on something you've been trying to teach him, it is a feeling unlike anything else. Unfortunately one of these amazing moments happened while I was gone, but I'm still proudly sharing it with everyone who will listen.

We've been teaching Grayson to say thank you by both setting an example and prompting him when it's appropriate. Whenever he hands us something we tell him "thank you." When we do something for him, such as pour him a sippy cup of milk for example, as we hand it over we tell him, "say thank you" and he repeats it in the most adorable little boy voice.

Since he's still so young we haven't had a lot of expectation for him to begin saying it unprompted, we were mainly focused on planting the seed of good manners. That was up until Michael and Grayson went to our friend Eva's birthday party on Friday. I don't know all the details but somehow Grayson was interacting with one of the ladies at the party. She handed him something and he immediately told her thank you. No prompting, no repetition, totally on cue and in context.

Not only was Michael a proud papa, but he told me that the woman was so surprised by it she had to quickly recover from her shock and say "your welcome" back to him. While I don't expect him to say it every time without some prompting in the future, it's amazing to see a lesson take hold.

On a (kind of) lighter note

I miss my boys.

Like when the little guy puts his coat on over his pajamas just for the fun of wearing it around the house.

Even though they take my catalogs and rip them to shreds for their morning entertainment.

I mean come on, how can I not miss these big brown eyes?

A Complete Detour

This blog is all about our life with Grayson, but since I'm currently on a work trip and have no updates to share about our crazy boy, you're stuck with my recent ponderings.

I am attending an interactive/social media conference where you'll find everything from independent bloggers to web programmers to video & computer gamers to brand managers for worldwide corporations like Coca Cola, Adobe, Dell and many, many others.

These people's jobs are so very different from one another and from what I do every day, yet we're all connected through the power of communication. This very blog is part of the social media phenomenon and is a communication tool that connects my life with yours.

I find it interesting how easy it is to keep up with friends, family, even perfect strangers through social media tools now and to think about what it will be like in the future. One of the speakers today spent years researching the digital impact on youth. He started by asking if all of this information and technology overload is making our youth anti-social. The results actually showed quite the opposite, they are becoming hyper-social -- always connected, always in touch with their network of friends -- which has caused them to expect news, information and other things on-demand. And, just because they are hyper-social doesn't necessarily mean they are social in the traditional ways we may be thinking.

Another session talked about how the line between an individual's online persona and their employer's online brand is blurring and soon they will be one and the same. I've intentionally not written much about my employer on this blog, not because it's a big secret, but because that's not the focus of this blog. I think as the recent generations of college grads infiltrate the workforce and move up the corporate ladder, they are not only building their individual online personas, but intertwining it with the brands for which they work or represent.

There are so many implications for both employees and employers that it will be interesting to watch this relationship evolve over the next few years, decades and longer. It keeps causing me to think about passion. Whether you love or hate your job, work is a very personal thing and where you spend a significant part of your day. If you aren't passionate about what you do, it makes for a vicious cycle of discontent.

If today's speaker is right and the line between personal and company online personas is erased, I'd hate to see what happens to companies currently employing unhappy or even disgruntled employees. No company and no job is perfect, but at the end of the day there needs to be passion on a personal and professional level for all parties to succeed. That's not a result of social media coming into the mix, it's been a reality forever, but social media is amplifying the need by providing a worldwide forum to expose the good, the bad and the just plain ugly.

I realize this is way off topic from my usual posts, and if you've made it this far without moving on to another site I appreciate you humoring me. I guess the moral of the story is to find a job that makes you happy, even if it takes a leap of faith, and encourage your children to do the same. Their generation's workforce and work environment will be completely different from the current one and (in my humble opinion) will be centered on staying true to yourself and your employer since, to the outer world at least, they will be closely linked. If you can't be a whole-hearted ambassador for your employer, that should (and will) speak volumes.

The Adventures of Mr. Mom

I am gearing up for a six day work trip and on top of checking off the to do list at work, I'm also trying to get things in order on the home front. I leave Thursday morning and Michael turns into Mr. Mom.

He's a very hands-on dad, so I'm not worried about Grayson's care, I just want to make it as easy as possible because six days is a long time to be without your partner when you're used to tag-team parenting. We've stocked up on diapers, milk, human food, dog food and even scheduled a mid-trip break since my mom agreed to keep Grayson Saturday night and give Michael some relief.

We have a gift for a friend's birthday party over the weekend, the laundry is nearly done, the bills have been paid and Roxy also got freshly groomed, so the household should be in good shape for my departure.

I would ask Mike to post some blog updates in my absence, but we all know that's not going to happen so I haven't even asked. I'll try to at least update you through what I hear by phone. Last time I was gone the boys went cruising in Blauhai (the name for Mike's classic BMW) and he texted me pictures of he and Grayson out at a nearby lake. I told them no wild parties or wild girls allowed, so hopefully they'll keep the craziness to a minimum.

Duck, Duck, Goose

This afternoon we took Grayson to feed the ducks at the OU duck pond. It was windy and had been raining off and on, but we managed to have a good time.

He loved watching the ducks eat up the bread, make quacking sounds and even chase after him a bit.





I almost got goosed myself:

Happy Birthday Luke!

Grayson's big cousin Luke just turned three and we helped celebrate his birthday last night. It was an evening full of pizza, cupcakes, balloons, bouncy moonwalks and all kinds of fun.

Grayson showing Luke his cool balloon.

Hugs for the birthday boy!

The best part about birthdays is getting to lick the candles!

I think Luke liked the cupcake!

A little Mike trivia: he was a hula hoop contest champ back in the day. His skills were a bit rusty, but we blamed it on the hoop.

Here are a couple of videos of Grayson trying to figure out what to do in the moonwalk. The little girl in there with him is Marlow and they are only two weeks apart! She preferred the sit and bounce method, while I tried to keep Grayson from falling on top of her.

New Tricks

Grayson has picked up three new tricks this week which he gets a kick out of each and every time he does them:

1. Walking on his tip toes
2. Discovering the flashlight (and that he has a shadow)
3. Walking quickly backwards until he purposely bumps into something

Grayson at 18 months

Grayson is officially a year-and-a-half! We marked the occasion with another check-up with the pediatrician. Luckily there were no shots this time, but after digging out a clump of wax the doctor did find another ear infection, this time in his left ear.

Gray weighted in at 24 lbs and 12.8 oz. The skinny little man just can't quite seem to break the 25 lb. mark. He's also 33 1/2 inches tall which puts him around the 75ish percentile in height and 30 something percentile in weight (I can't keep up with all the numbers).

Developmentally he seems to be on track and reminds us everyday that he's now an independent little boy instead of a baby. From using the fork and spoon himself to undressing himself and learning more words, Grayson continues to flex his independent muscles.

The doctor ran through the normal round of questions and we talked about things like when to move from a crib to a toddler bed and (gasp) timelines to begin potty training. How can we already be thinking about this stuff?!? We're still a ways off from both of those milestones, but it's crazy to be talking about them.

When asked about Grayson's daycare setting, Michael volunteered the information that he thinks our son is a bully. No sugar coating, no context, just that he's a bully. I was completely blindsided by it and in total disagreement, so I quickly offered up the fact that there are mostly older kids in Gray's room (2+ when he first started) and that he holds his own turf but isn't a bully. The doctor made a few notes on Grayson's chart, so I'm sure he dismissed my "excuses" and recorded the fact that Grayson is aggressive on his permanent record.

As we dropped Grayson off at school I asked his two teachers if they thought he was a bully. They both agreed that he wasn't any more aggressive than the others and that he just stood his ground when kids tried to take his toys, bite, etc.

I'm not sure why I'm so sensitive about the whole issue, but I think Mike finds the situation amusing which aggravates me even a little bit more.

In other news, Gray is about to have a full set of toddler teeth. He has three out of the four one-year molars and is cutting several eye teeth as well. There are three more teeth still to cut through (counting the molar) and then he will be done until the two-year molars. Seeing him with a mouthful of teeth really changes his looks. A full head of hair will be completely shocking, but we still have a while before his wispy hair fills in.

Our next check up isn't until Grayson's two year birthday and then after that he won't need any vaccinations until he's ready for school. Man how time flies!