Our traumatic night

Little Gavin lost his two front teeth tonight... about four years earlier than we had pictured. I never in a million years thought Gavin would lose a tooth before Jacob did. So many thoughts are racing through my head ~ like every picture we take of him for FOUR years will have his two front teeth missing. Four years of people asking me how he lost them. Four years of him sticking his tongue through the gap. Four years of singing "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth."

Anyway, the story goes like this. We had just gone out to dinner with my friend to celebrate Casey's first birthday. We shared a mile high mud pie and I took a picture our five kids together. I'm not sure why, but we've never taken one of all of them. I thought that was a momentous occasion in itself. Now it is much more momentous... it's the last picture Gavin took with his two front teeth.

It happened as soon as we got home. I watched it right before my very own eyes. Gavin tripped and banged (what I thought was his head) on the handle of a wrought iron bench in our living room. As soon as I picked him up, I saw that his teeth were missing. One was lying on the living room floor and the other was jammed up inside of his gums. He was screaming and gurgling on all of the blood in his mouth.

My husband is the calm, rational one who happened to be flying an airplane when this all was happening. I am the emotional one who panics and breaks down crying in these situations. I somehow pulled myself together and ran next door to ask my neighbor to watch Jacob and Casey. Then I buckled Gavin in and sped to urgent care, which thankfully is less than a mile away from my house.

The nurse couldn't have been any less concerned about the situation, like we were there for a routine check-up. She weighed Gavin, took his temperature, and starting making small talk with us. I was thinking... "Are you kidding me? My son just knocked out his front teeth! I do NOT want to chat it up with you!" She proceeded to tell me that this happens all the time and it's not a big deal. Really lady? Because I almost called 911.

She left the room and I was holding Gavin for several minutes before going outside to ask for some ice. The doctor was at the computer, saw how upset I was, and followed me into the room. She told me there is nothing we can do and seriously, kids knock out their baby teeth out all the time. She gave him some ibuprofen and I am supposed to call the dentist in the morning to see if they need to pull the tooth that is jammed up inside his gums.

The only thing that made me feel a little better was to tell Gavin that the tooth fairy would come tonight. I tried to make it super exciting so he would see how fun it can be to lose your teeth. Until Jacob overheard that the tooth fairy was coming... and totally, completely freaked out. So here is my five year old on the couch screaming, "SHE WILL COME IN MY WINDOW? AHHHHHH! I DON'T WANT HER TO COME! NOOOOOOO MOMMY NOOOOOO!" He was totally inconsolable and wouldn't come to bed. So then Gavin was scared and started crying too. Are you kidding me? Seriously, this night has not already been dramatic enough?

Finally, I knelt down beside Jacob and told him that I called the tooth fairy and told her not to come. I convinced him that mommies and daddies can do that. They just say no thank you to the tooth fairy. She understands and will give the treats to the mommy and daddy and will NOT come in your room. My goodness!

What a night. Here is a picture of my sweet Gavin. It still doesn't seem real. But hey, one day Gavin and Jacob will take a picture together with both of their two front teeth missing... and not many siblings are able to do that, right? ;)

At least, for the time-being, he is sleeping peacefully.

Casey's first birthday

It was Casey's first birthday today, so we had a little "monkey" barbecue with family and friends to celebrate. Jacob, after looking at all of the decorations, asked me how I knew that Casey wanted a monkey party... because he is a baby and can't talk. So I told him Casey said "Oo oo ah ah" one day and I just knew! He looked at me for a minute with a smile and I could tell he knew I was kidding.

I was actually surprised Casey would let me put his party hat on, because he usually takes off any hat I try to put on within seconds. I guess he was distracted by the fun balloon. ;)

Grammy has been teaching Casey to blow everyone kisses. It's the cutest...

It was a perfect day for a barbecue

Since we have a pond nearby, all of the kids were trying to catch frogs
Then we came inside to open presents
I found a monkey cake pan online, but since I am not super artistic or much of a baker... my friend Wendi offered to make it for him. She did an AMAZING job. I felt a little bad amputating his head and letting Casey smash into all of her hard work. ;)


Thanks girl... you're the BEST.

We got Casey a little monkey pull-string pinata and each little friend got to try to find that magic string. ;)

Cousin Evan found it!
The cutest thing was when I went to put Casey down for a nap later that afternoon, I found four little candies spread out in his crib. I had a feeling that his cousin Travis wanted to make sure Casey got some candy from the pinata. I was right. When my sister asked Travis if he did it, his eyes got big and he said, "Am I in trouble?" Then when we told him how sweet it was, he had a huge proud smile on his face.

The best surprise was that my good friend was able to come to Casey's party with her baby. He was born with CDH, Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia, and just came home from being at Children's Hospital since his birth. He is such a little miracle and it truly was a gift from God to be able to have him there.

Happy first birthday Casey! It has been such an honor to watch you smile, laugh, roll over, sit up, crawl, stand, and grow so BIG over this year. You fill our hearts everyday with your joyful nature and we love you more than you could ever imagine.

One year pics

Notice that Casey's mood changes from happy and cute to screaming and puffy. This is because right after this picture, Casey plummeted face first to the hardwood floor. SMACK. Since the bench was super close to the first, I wasn't worried at first... until I picked him up and blood started pouring out of his mouth. Casey's tooth had gone through his lip and he was practically choking on the HUGE pool of blood in his mouth. We tried a few more pictures after he was iced and cleaned up, but he was done with pictures for sure. See below.

A few things...

I was showing Gavin picture flashcards when he had just turned three. I remember being a little surprised at some of his answers, but a lot of them were pretty cute too. The words on the left are what was actually on the card, the words on the right are what Gavin said they were. To his credit, there were about thirty other cards that he answered correctly. ;)

goat ~ kangaroo
cow ~ walrus (Walrus? Really?)
train ~ fire truck
whistle ~ blowie
queen ~ princess
paint ~ colors
nest ~ Easter eggs (There were eggs in the nest)
monkey ~ dragon
leaf ~ flower
comb ~ cut hair
bike ~ motorcycle (thanks to Daddy ;)
bread ~ donut

Here are some other things they have said lately:

Jacob ~ refers to mosquitos as spaquitos, which cracks me up!
"My favorite number is 1002."
"Casey just knows baby food. God knows everything."
(As the wind shakes his blinds) "I'm scared mommy! Somebody is pushing my window!"
"One hour is sixty minutes so it will be 11:00."

Jacob wanted to know what the biggest number in the world was, so Adam finally told him it was google. Now he refers to everything with oogle. "I have oogle friends. Maine has oogle freeways. (What?) I need a puzzle with oogle pieces."

Another funny thing is that he is really into similies... without even knowing what they are! He'll say things like ~
"Gavin is being loud like a monkey."
"That boy kicked me. He kicked me like a soccer ball!"
"Gavin hit me like a baseball bat!"
"Mommy, it's as cold as snow out here!"

Gavin ~
He was really upset one week when my mom took Jacob home with her. He really missed his brother and wasn't sure what to do without him. Out of nowhere, he said, "Mommy, you bring Jakey back. I too little to bring Jakey back. You bring him back so I can play."

I heard Gavin chewing on something yesterday and it sounded awful, like he was grinding his teeth. I opened his mouth to see what it was and found a rock. There he was, chomping away on an actual ROCK. That's my boy!

Look at all the cool stickers Gavin found!

Neighborhood night out

You might remember this from last year, but we were so excited to take the boys to our annual neighborhood police-community event. There were inflatables, food, spray-on tattoos, and the best part... it was all FREE! You can't beat that for sure. ;)

The kids filled up on hot dogs, chips, fruit, sno-cones, and cotton candy.



They each chose a tattoo

The newest addition was strapping the boys up so they were able to jump several feet into the air! Jacob saw older kids doing flips, so he wanted to make sure his inflatable went strictly up and down. ;) They had a blast!


There were plenty of other inflatables as well...


...unfortunately, this one had a side exit that we weren't aware of. As each of our kids came down the slide at the end, there was no sign of Gavin. After what seemed like forever (but was probably five minutes), my heart started racing. I ran around and through the inflatable several times, worried about the possibility that he was stuck somewhere under or between the walls. One guy helping with the inflatable was looking for him too. Finally, my friend Wendi left the inflatable to search for him. It wasn't long before she found him several feet away, just standing there. Not scared or worried, just standing there. He was missing long enough for my eyes to fill with tears as I saw Wendi holding his hand and walking him back. If that could never happen again, that would be great. ;)

Then we rode the little train back to our house!