Sunday, December 28, 2008

Santa had all kinds of tricks up his sleeve!

WOW!!!

We have had a REALLY big week around the Heim household. As if the holidays aren't hectic enough with traveling, last minute gifts, and figuring out times to see family and friends that haven't been seen all year, our little one decided to throw in a twist of his own. Gavin started walking this week! I personally think he was a little upset that he didn't have everyone's total attention all the time so he made it his mission to come up with something to direct all eyes back to him. And he did just that! Greg's mom and sisters were keeping him on Monday night and he had stumbled around a little over the weekend. I told Greg that the girls would have him walking before Christmas and sure enough I got a text from Addison that read... "GAVIN JUST WALKED ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE ROOM!!!" And of course I started crying. I couldn't get to him fast enough!

Of course Christmas was wonderful. We went to the Fort to celebrate with Greg's side of the family and my Dad's family on Christmas Eve. We got a visit from Santa at Grandma Heim's...didn't go so well for Gavin. It was his first time to see the jolly ole' guy up close, and he wasn't too stoked about it. (Hey this is Greg, in Gavin's defense "Santa" did say "Booga Booga" real loud right when he sat down and then whispered in his ear that he wasn't actually Santa Clause but Mark Curlett and just showed up cause Mom and Dad gave him a liquid thank you gift wrapped in a purple velvet bag. Ya'll know what I'm sayin. No wonder the poor guy was cryin. Seriously though, thanks to Mark for doing that. Maybe next year he can hide behind a bush outside and jump out and yell "Santa's here!" really loud and give him gifts that way).


We woke up on Christmas day, opened presents from the Heims', and headed back up to Rogers to do gifts and dinner with my parents and Meme. Santa was VERY good to all of us this year! (Hey Greg here, also notice in the background the pastel monkey riding the dumptruck and Gavin is astonished with the gold ribbon. I mean this kid has some focus. Very impressive for a 1 year old).



And my little boy (yes, he is now a little boy. :( not a baby anymore) just seems to keep adding to his bag of tricks! He is in the process of learning how to call the Hogs...he thinks it's the funniest thing EVER and is trying so hard to get the motions down! And dad is teaching him how to drive. Or at least letting him pretend to drive. Which he thinks is hysterical! Here's a sneak peak of the little man behind the wheel.


(That's right Greg here again) Yep, you better believe it ladies and gentleman, Gavin not only started walking this week he also started driving! I mean, they grow up so fast. Of course I set some ground rules such as no drinking out of the sippee cup while driving and no talking to or playing with bun bun. This video was taken at the end of our first driving lesson at the Promenade in Rogers. I will say that the older he gets the more he throws little fits and complains. For instance, he's getting particular about the baby food we give him, he cries when you leave him in a room by himself for hours at a time, and "he can't reach the pedals". I mean come on, time to be a big boy. Anyway, he did a good job with his first time behind the wheel (and may I add that those dorky little bike cops at the Promenade are such fascists, I mean how about you let me parent my own child thank you very much.) We were gonna practice parallel parking but it was cold and mommy and daddy were done shopping so we went home. Happy upcoming New Year everybody! (By the way, Kara thought the whole "leave him in a room by himself for hours at a time" made us sound like bad parents but I always make sure Savvy babysits when we're gone. I mean seriously, like we wouldn't have a babysitter.) Geesh

Friday, December 19, 2008

Hey everybody, it's Greg, I can't sleep and I figured I'd go ahead and make another post all by myself. I'm a little bit like Haley this way (and she knows what I mean) in that I get these extremely random ideas that I want to tell people about and I think they're funny so you people reading this are just gonna have to sit there and take it. So for our first picture, I want everybody to take a good hard look at the items in little G's crib below and tell me if there is anything that is a little weird.









Give up? Well the fact that there's not one glow worm but two glow worms is a little strange to me. I mean who invented this doll anyway? It's got arms but no legs, it's face lights up, and its a worm wearing a hooded sweatshirt. I mean I'm pretty sure they were around when I was a kid which is kind of strange and there's two of them here. I honestly have no clue how he aquired the second one but there they are, apparently reproducing (and glowing of course) all around my sleeping son. It, however, is pretty adorable how he sleeps like that with his bun bun. And his um worms.




For this next picture I wanted to show once again what a great job Kara did with the decorations for Christmas this year. But it's not the beautiful decorations that are the highlight of this next pic. Prepare to be awed.





That's right, Savvy's back on the blog. I'm actually really proud of myself with the way that I used the light to really bring out her muscle structure. If you look really close you can almost see where her stomach ends and her neck begins. Just breathtaking. By the way, as I type this blog right now, Savvy is snoring so loud, that is sounds like a tuba player getting in a fight with a bunch of bullfrogs. Ridiculous. After seeing this picture I realized that I need to make an effort to take Savvy on more walks. I mean I know she looks great but if she's gonna win some more blue ribbons she needs to put in a smidge more effort. So anyway I got her leash on her and she gets all excited cause she knows what we're doing, she's actually pretty smart, and I open the front door. We start to walk up the front yard, emphasis on the word up, Savvy doesn't do up, and to make a short story shorter, she's winded by the time we get to the mailbox and I'm freezing cause it's like 4 degrees so we decide to go back inside. I give her a dog biscuit, I make a white russian and we both watch TV. All in all a pretty good father daughter experience. Also, if you were wondering, she's not able to have puppies. Sorry about that. There can only be one Savvy.




This next picture is quite possibly the cutest pic of Little G ever. You see I usually have bath duty cause its just easier for me to lift him in and out of the tube. So naturally I decided to give him a little mohawk and snap a picture. Here ya go.





Pretty stinkin cute. Hey Greg, is that fireman ducky cover for the bath faucet? Yes, yes it sure is.


To finish it off I found this picture online so I thought what the hell. I figure there's at least one guy out there that might read this blog and appreciate it. For those of you that don't know, it's the characters from one of my favorite movies, Anchorman, with a little Razorback flare. Go Hogs.



Thursday, December 18, 2008

A few of Gavin's favorite things...

In my attempt to get into the spirit of Christmas, I've had to look to my little one for inspiration. Usually at this point I have all my shopping done, presents wrapped and under the tree, and stockings waiting to be stuffed. Not so much this year. Between work, life, and sick baby, things have been thrown off a little. A lot. Thrown off A LOT! However, I'm trying to recover and my goal is to have my shopping done by Saturday and presents wrapped by Sunday. Monday is my last day of work for almost 2 weeks, and I want to enjoy my time off with Gavin and Greg ( and the rest of our family and friends, too!)


I just read my friend Sarah Thomas's blog and she decided to "reflect" on her daughter's favorite things. What a great idea! So here are a few of Gavin's favorite things...


Bun Bun. His little blue bunny blanket.
He chews on it, loves on it, sleeps with it, eats with it, you name it. It's Bun Bun or bust.




Girls. He LOVES girls. Especially DeDe (my mom), Aunt Hay Hay (Haley), GiGi (greg's mom), Aunt Addi( Addison, greg's sis) and Aunt Anni (Annalise, greg's sis). And any other pretty lady you send his way!

That being said, he loves guys, too. His face lights up when he sees Bob-O(my dad), Pappa Skippy ( Greg's dad) and Uncle Kyle. And all of his uncles for that matter. I'm pretty sure he knows who loves him. :)

(Double whammy in this picture. Uncle Kyle AND Bun Bun.)


Floor vents.
He is obsessed with the vents in our floors. Nothing you can say will keep him from pulling them up. I guess it's just that they're so shiny and warm...and the fact that we constantly freak and shout "NO!" when he pulls them up...he just can't help himself! (Hey this is Greg, found him with the vent cover off the other day and his arm up to his elbow down the vent. I guess he thought Bun Bun was makin a run for it. He's quick for a tiny person. Oh and he thought it was hilarious of course.)

TOUCH.
His favorite word. And action. He must touch everything. The ornaments on the tree, the TV when he's watching "Jack's Big music show" on Noggin (if you don't have kids you will someday understand that this is an essential channel), the light fixtures....he is so intrigued by everything. I love it. (Yeah this is Greg, hell I like Jack's Big Music Show. I mean they had a Bongo Bird on there the other morning actually playing the Bongos. I mean it looked like a puppet but you never know.)

Trucks.
This is a fairly recent discovery. He is officially boy. Trucks are his favorite toys. (Hey this is Greg again, I like trucks too cause lets face it they're just cool. I mean they got big wheels, you can put stuff in them, I get it.)

His daddy.
He is just as much a daddy's boy as he is a momma's boy. And he should be. He has the best dad ever! Greg is so good with him and I couldn't imagine a better father for my son!

ME.
He loves ME. I love it. It's the best feeling EVER. It's hard to explain, but if you've experienced it you know exactly what I'm talking about. TOTAL UNCONDITIONAL LOVE. Wow. (Hey Greg one last time, just wanna say I have the most beautiful wonderful wife in the world. She puts up with me so I know she loves me! Hey, what if I walked around with a giant bun bun, that would be weird. Or if I had a fascination with floor vents, I mean at my age? Even weirder. Anyway, Peace out and Merry Christmas!)












That being said, I need nothing for Christmas this year. All I could ever ask for was given to me almost a year ago in this sweet, precious, (sometimes ornery) little boy!

Sunday, December 14, 2008

Disco Elf!

For those of you who don't know me well, I would have LOVED to have been a part of the disco scene in the 70's. Disco is my favorite! Well, since I didn't get to live it then, this is the next best thing. Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/GTUeWCFx61EbJbrRTWlJ

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Parent's night out!

Somebody LOVES the camera!
Greg and I took a night away this past weekend to go to Little Rock for my work Christmas party. Uncle Kyle and Aunt Hay Hay were kind enough to volunteer to keep the little man. He obviously had a GREAT time! We don't get out very much since we've had him...he didn't seem to mind that we were away! He loves being with them. He has a HUGE crush on Haley. Anytime she walks into the room he becomes completely oblivious to anything else that is going on. His one and only goal is to get her undivided attention! Needless to say, he does a pretty good job. I'm pretty sure he has her wrapped around his little finger.

Poor little guy has 2 ear infections right now. He has been such a trooper considering the circumstances. I woke up to him and the monitor this morning at 6 o'clock and he was saying "touch...touch..." Touch is his new word...and after "Mama " it's his favorite! He has to touch EVERYTHING! No object is spared. I love it! He is constantly trying to talk to us and communicate. It just keeps getting better everyday!

Monday, December 1, 2008

Yes he's real and no you can't have him.










Hey everybody, Greg here again. Hope everybody had a great thanksgiving. A couple of weekends ago, we went and got some Christmas Pics done up in Rogers and it turned into "how cute could we make Gavin day". As you can see it wasn't very hard. We also dressed Kyle (my brother in law) in the same outfit but they just didn't come out quite as good. Not sure why.












Here's another one of Little G. Merry Christmas everybody.







Here's Little G at Thanksgiving with Uncle Kyle. Apparently Bun Bun has been injured and/or sleeping and he's very concerned. Kyle is of course reassuring him that Bun Bun is just fine and will be his very special friend for a long time. Footnote: Bun Bun is Gavin's little bunny blanket that he has become attached too and sleeps with every night. Hence the concern with Bun Bun's well being.




Whooo Hooo! Bun Bun is just fine and everything is ok. Never in my life that I thought I would type the words Bun Bun multiple times on a website but everything changes when you have a child, trust me on that one and he loves that little blanket.




And this ladies and gentleman is the one and only Emily Heim (formerly Barry) doing air guitar at Papa's Pizza in fort smith. That would be Eric's wife of course. I assure you that she was high on life and um not partaking in anything else. Of course not. We had a great time that night and its always fun to go out in the fort during the holidays cause you get to see random people.




This picture was taken by Kara monday morning. Apparently Gavin really likes milk a whole lot. It's always funny cause he seems to understand that what you hand him is something you drink out of so he always does this. He's a smart little thing.





And I just wanted to highlight the wonderful job my beautiful wife Kara did on our Christmas tree. It is the by far the best tree we've ever had and I was especially impressed with the ribbon look.

Merry Christmas everybody!

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

I know you've all been waiting for it. Greg's first post! Let's do this.


Yeah, I thought it would be nice to start my first post with a video. It's amazing how fast Little G learns things. I literally did this little trick with him that morning and after like the 3rd time he knew exactly what I was gonna do. Daddy's little sponge. Anyway, Kara has been doing a great job with the blog and I promise I'll start doing it more so you can get our different perspectives on things.

Like the fact that I'm probably not gonna be the, what shall we call it, the "discipliner" in the family. My job is to make sure everyone is having a great time and is well fed. One example of that is when mommy is getting ready in the morning, daddy puts Little G in his walker and puts a large amount of cheerios on it and he proceeds to walk about the house dropping cheerios everywhere and the dogs follow him around and finish them off. It's all about teamwork.


AND NOW ITS TIME TO MEET THE REST OF THE FAMILY ON THE BLOG













This young lad is Woogie. Woogie is a Boston Terrier and Gavins future partner in crime. The story behind Woogie is an interesting one. Hank, my best friend, and myself both mentioned that we wanted Boston Terriors one day long ago and some time after that Hank out of the blue calls me up and says that he found a litter of Boston Terrior puppies and figured we should grab a couple. So I got Woogie and Hank has Ollie, both brothers and happy little dogs, as you can see. A couple of things about Woogie, he has a freakishly long tongue that doesn't quite fit in his mouth. It's impressive. Also, he has gas, common for the breed. Astonishing evil, obnoxiously audible gas that could be bottled up and used as a dangerous weapon. You don't even know.
















And here he is in his favorite place in the world. Our bed. Seriously, he spends most of the day there.










This little lady is Ellie Mae. She was technically Kara's dog and got here shortly after I got Woogie because her dog at the time, Princess, went to live with her parents, Bob and Debbie.
There's not a sweeter dog in the world and every night she sleeps in our bed. This pic was taken one morning, you can tell because she always gets her bottom half wet because of the dew.



I know, you're shocked by the intense beauty of this divine canine specimen. This is my first true dog and her name is Savvy. Savvy is about 7 years old and was born in a ditch when I was in college. My neighbor at the time gave her to me for free. Savvy is not exactly um a pure breed. Could be some fox in there, possibly some groundhog or large muskrat or something. Definitely some hound though, because she's got a pretty good howl and nose. One thing Savvy is however is a great dog. She's follows me around everywhere and has pretty much never done anything wrong. She sheds like its her job, which Kara just loves, but even that can be overlooked. I have no doubt that she'll live to be like another 15 or 20 years and there I'll be walking her proudly around the neighborhood and explaining to my neighbors what the hell that roundy reddish gray thing on the leash is. That's just Savvy and no she's not for sale.



And I thought I would just throw this in here. Just really blows me away how big my little jammer has gotten. Now he's waving and talkin and doin other stuff. Those boots were his newborn boots and now he has brown ones in size 18-24 months...mind you he is 10 months old! I just love this picture and he seems happy, even from the beginning. I think he was just a couple weeks old here.
Big G will be posting a lot in the future cause I'll admit this was fun. See ya'll later!





Sunday, November 23, 2008

I'll get whatever I want for Christmas....


Talk about a happy baby! We had our family Christmas pictures taken today at Picture People in Rogers...the first time all seven of us (Mom, dad, Kyle, Haley, and the three of us)have been together for pictures! We got a ton of great pictures and Gavin had a great time and was soooo good...as you can see from the above pic!

After we finished up, we went to my mom and dad's for dinner and a family night. Gavin is absolutely mesmerized by lights, and the Christmas tree is his favorite! Here's a cute pic of him and Bob-O playing with the tree.


He's also discovered a favorite new food...mashed potatoes. If they are on my plate, I don't get to eat any of them! It's not a bad deal for me. I don't need to be eating them anyway! But he can't get them in his mouth fast enough! Both of our clothes were covered in potatoes by the end of dinner! Look closely at his face!

And here's a cute pic of my handsome boys watching some football. Daddy loves his boy time with Gavin! He's definitely ALL boy.





Sunday, November 16, 2008

Say Cheese!


It's quite possible that I have a future model on my hands. Whenever Gavin sees a camera, he immediately smiles as big as possible until you've taken the picture! And I'm pretty sure he looked at me tonight before I took the shot and said cheese...WOW! It's adorable! Here are just a few examples...






And for those of you that might be wondering where he is, we had to get him a "cage" to keep him contained so we can actually get a couple things done during the day! He loves his new little play space. I highly recommend it!



Here's a pic of Gavin and his friend Jonah playing in the cage! Too much fun!

Friday, November 14, 2008

Maybe Vegas needs a new slogan...

Ok...so for those of you that don't know us well, we go to Vegas every year. We got married there and it has become a yearly tradition for us. We knew immediately after we got married we were ready to add to our family, however we were having a difficult time. I developed a pretty bad shoulder injury, and found out I needed surgery, so I decided to get it taken care of before we got pregnant. I scheduled my surgery and checked in and had all of my pre-op stuff taken care of. The anesthesiologist came in to talk to me and was on his way back in to put me under and...SURPRISE!!! The nurse rushed in to tell him to stop because my pregnancy test was positive. I didn't get to have my surgery. That will explain the picture below...



Need I say more? I know I'm a little biased, but I'm pretty sure this is the best jackpot V EGAS has to offer! Thanks to Uncle Greg and Aunt Kathy Nichols for my cool t-shirt! 2 years later I'm still trying to figure out the best time for my surgery. I'm thinking January...Greg will be the big 30 on the 4th and Gavin turns 1 on the 7th. After that, it's time to fix Mommy

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

What a fun weekend at the river!




We decided last week to take a much needed R&R weekend to Greg's parents river house on the King's River. We haven't been in almost a year, and we were ready for a reason to kick back and relax! Drew and Britani, Greg's parents, and his little sis Addison were all there with us. We had a great time! We didn't do much...it was too cold! Greg and I went for a short hike to the river but it was too cold to take Gavin along. He had fun zooming around the house in his walker!
We did get to have a bonfire after he went to bed and make smores...YUM! Pretty low key, but all in all a great family weekend!
Gavin and Greg with Uncle Drew and Papa Skippy!



A beautiful view of the King's River


And another...


Making smores with the fam!



Sunday, November 2, 2008

Where to begin...






I'm not exactly sure where to start. I haven't done a post in FOREVER! Reason being that our hard drive on our laptop crashed, then we went to Vegas for a long weekend...I planned on doing a post right when we got back but we got a virus on our desktop so NO COMPUTER for over 3 WEEKS! I've about gone crazy! It's kind of sad how dependent we've become on these things. We finally have our laptop back and were able to recover all the important things...i.e videos and pics of Gavin! I was very relieved!




Let's see...we'll start with Vegas 2008. So much fun! We've been every year since we got married there. Our best friends Hank and Hollie Hankins joined us (it has become an annual event for the 4 of us!) And even better, we had another couple this year to make the trip even more fun! Wilson and Katy Ward made the trip complete! We had such a great time. It was our first adult trip as parents, and while we enjoyed it we were ready to get back to our little monkey!







Our first night...immediately went to Fat Tuesday's for a tasty beverage and then to Trader Vics for some appetizers and more tasty beverages!




















Our second night...went to PRIME with Hank and Hollie for a fabulous dinner overlooking the fountains at the Bellagio! After dinner, we met up with Wilson and Katy and went to JET nightclub at the Mirage. We had free drinks all night...so much fun! Pictures not included.















Friday night we had dinner at Treasure Island at Social House with the whole crew and watched the Pirate show from the deck. Very fun! After that, we went to PURE at Caesar's Palace and had a great time! Here's a cute pic of Wilson and Katy!












I have not given Fat Tuesday's appropriate credit...let's just say we went there a minimun of 2 times a day. They knew our names by the time we left! For anyone thinking about going to Vegas soon...the Fat Tuesday's in Caesar's is the best! We very much enjoyed it!




Our last day was definitely the most adventurous. One of Greg's friends lives in LA and found out we were in Vegas. After a hard core night in LA, he decided to hop the red eye and surprise us. We were awakened to a phone call about 7:15 from him telling us he had hooked us up with a cabana and suite at Mandalay Bay and we were all going to get to watch the Razorback game poolside at the topless pool...don't get too excited. Only part of it panned out! He called Greg and got our room number at Caesar's and told us someone would be up with the info...and about 15 minutes later he busted in and had us pack all of our stuff and we headed over to Mandalay Bay for a change of scenery for our last night! Hank and Hollie had to leave Saturday afternoon, so we were ok with a change after 3 nights of Caesar's. We went up to Mix at the top of TheHotel at Mandalay Bay (65th floor...incredible view!) and had a couple of drinks. Great way to finish off the trip!




To finish off a great long weekend, I had some success (finally!) on the slots at the airport on our way home. Greg gave me $10 to play on Wheel of Fortune ( a family favorite). I decided that I should probably go with a quarter machine given my lack of success thus far on the trip...the dollar machine wouldn't have lasted long. I got down to my last 3 quarters and bet them all...and won $400! I was pretty pumped. At least enough to make me want to go back again next year!




VIVA LAS VEGAS!











Sunday, October 5, 2008

Daddy's little Mini-G!






This is quite possibly my favorite picture ever! Talk about two handsome boys! Gavin is looking more like his daddy every day! I never thought I'd have a child with dark blonde hair and hazel eyes. He is definitely his daddy's son...right down to his widows peak! Gavin's latest discovery is that he can put things in his mouth and then crawl around with them. His favorite is a little football that Greg got him at a tailgate a while back...He loves his new little adventures!



He was pretty excited about church this morning, too. He is always so good at church! Really, anywhere that he can see other people and flirt he is happy!


Mom and dad were so nice and kept him last night so we could go out. We don't get to do that much anymore! Eric and Emily were in town, so we met up with them and Drew and Britani and Kyle and Haley and had dinner at Bordinos and then went out after that. I should have probably gone home after dinner...I can't hang like I used to...but we had a great time! That should hold me over for a while...at least until we go to Las Vegas in a couple of weeks!




Today was very low key around our house. Just family time and enjoying the weather! Kyle and Haley came over for pizza tonight. FYI...if you are trying to be healthy and think about ordering whole wheat crust think again! It's totally worth the extra calories to get the real thing. I was craving pizza so bad and got the wheat crust and it was such a bummer because it was NASTY! That was our weekend...nothing too exciting but I love our life!