Garrett is 11 months old...and more!

We've seen quite a few deer and rabbits in our yard lately and the boys just love to watch them.

Garrett has always been our little snuggling ostrich and loves to bury his face in your arms when he sleeps.  When I found Daddy and Garrett snuggling in for a little nap, I had to get a picture!

We went to a Carroll basketball game last weekend and Bryant was so excited to get to hang out with his cousins.  When we went to dinner, he had gotten three suckers and told Travis and I that we couldn't have them and he was going to eat all three.  When he asked for them at the game, I told him he either had to wait to eat it or share them with his cousins.  He promptly chose to share and he looked so happy when he gave the suckers to his cousins.  I didn't really pay attention until I downloaded the pictures, but it looks like Bryant is actually taller than Reagan, who is a whole year older!

Garrett had fun too!

The cousins had a sleepover at our house the next night.  Bryant hasn't been sleeping very well at night lately and always wants someone to come sleep with him.  I was more than happy to have the cousins come sleep over because someone else could keep him company at night!  I loved watching them play together...even Garrett was playing with them:)

The kids slept so well in the theater room!

Garrett woke up in the middle of the night so we brought him into our room and he apparently wanted to use Mocha as a pillow.  And yes, Mocha is in diapers...poor thing isn't doing so well and the cold weather is probably making things worse.

Our big boy likes to hold his own bottle now.

Bryant has been really into experiments or as he says 'spearments'.  In this picture, he got to see what happens when you add vinegar to baking soda and we also built a lava lamp.

Garrett is getting closer to showing interest in walking.  But he still likes to jump when his feet first touch the ground...maybe that's his version of the roadrunner in the cartoons!

He loves to play with his brother and Bryant really wanted to take Garrett for a ride...

I can't believe Garrett is 11 months old!  It didn't seem like that long ago that I was out on maternity leave with him.  This past month has flown by and he does more big kid stuff every day.  He likes to do high fives and loves to feed himself.  We allowed for him to just eat the regular menu at daycare instead of baby food and daycare said he loves it.  They had coffee cake for snack the other day and he had 3 servings!  This morning he got blueberry pancakes and I'm pretty sure he ate more than Bryant...and Bryant had 2 big pancakes...

He also had another tooth pop in over a week ago, so you can see all 5 of his little teeth pretty good in this picture

He's been practicing walking so much; I think once he gets the confidence to try without holding on to something, he's going to take off walking and never look back!

Bryant was helping him and walking next to him.  Although Bryant doesn't always want to play with Garrett (because he wrecks whatever he has set up), I absolutely love how much they love each other.  Last night Bryant was pretending to prepare invitations for his friends, so he wrote all over sticky notes and put them in envelopes.  He invited Garrett and Garrett's friend Jon-Jon from school.  When he read Garrett's invitation to him he said "I love you Garrett.  You are invited to my birthday party".  Absolutely melted my heart!

December

December was such a blur this year.  It came and went before I even felt like I could blink, but it was so much fun and I wouldn't have wanted it any other way.  The first weekend in December, we started decorating for Christmas.

Bryant remembered that he got his own tree in his room last year, so of course he wanted another tree in his room this year.  And there's a lot of negotiations about what ornaments go on his tree.

The next day we celebrated Trav's birthday with his parents.  Garrett managed to stay awake to try some of this ice cream cake and both boys loved it.

Garrett is getting more and more hair.  It makes it super cute when he wakes up with bed head in the morning:)

Such a happy little guy!

Garrett still wakes up in the middle of the night at least once for a bottle and Trav and I are usually too tired to put him back in bed, so he sleeps the rest of the night with us.  And Garrett usually wiggles around in his sleep until he gets all cuddled up with Mocha.

Obviously the weather has been colder in Montana, so we pulled out Bryant's hat from when he was a baby.  I've always loved that hat!

In the picture below, you can see Garrett's teeth coming in.  When I wrote my Christmas letter, I said that he had 2 teeth.  He got his top right one first, then his bottom left.  A little before Christmas, his top left tooth popped through and last night (New Years Eve), his bottom right tooth popped through.  We had no trouble staying up until midnight on New Years  because we had a kid that couldn't sleep!  Garrett doesn't follow the mold of a typical kid for teeth and although he's getting his teeth later (and in different order) than most other babies, he got them way sooner than Bryant.

The reindeer flew into Helena again this year, so we took the kids to go see them.

Bryant loves to see the reindeer, which always generates a lot of questions.

Garrett on the other hand...he made this face the entire time.

The reindeer are at Murdochs, so we went exploring and tried on some cowboy hats. 

Garrett and Bryant are so different in so many ways.  Garrett sticks everything in his mouth where Bryant hardly ever did.  I don't know how many pieces of dog food I've had to get out of Garrett's mouth.

The other day, Bryant was playing zoo in his room and Garrett and I were supposed to visit all the animals.  Then Bryant decided it was nap time for his animals and his tricks to put the animals to sleep, also worked on his brother.

I got a report at school that Bryant didn't want to participate in the painting activities for a couple of days and they weren't sure if he just didn't like getting his hands dirty.  So I had him paint at home...looks like he does fine with getting his hands dirty.

Our neighborhood had a Christmas party and had Santa come for a visit!  Garrett was not sure what to think of Santa, but was not a big fan.  It was odd to me because Garrett doesn't have stranger danger with anyone...except Santa.

Bryant was over the moon excited to see Santa.  He asked him for a Transformer, which he had been saying he was going to ask for that from Santa for at least a month.

At the Bobcat games, they have parents hold their kids up like Simba in the Lion King during a timeout to show the babies on the camera.  We did it at the football game and have done it a ton at home afterwards because Garrett loves it.  

This big boy doesn't get shoulder rides very often because he loves to pull hair.

Garrett's balance is getting so good.  Look at him standing without holding on to anything!  I'm guessing he's going to walk before he turns 1.

Each year, we go to bake Christmas cookies with Grandma Susie.  Aren't our melted snowmen cute?

Garrett melted into the couch too;)

The Thursday before Christmas, Bryant had his Christmas program at school.  That morning, his school brought Santa in and Bryant asked for a Batman Flyer (1. because he was shopping with me earlier in the week and I refused to buy it for him and 2. because he already asked the Santa at the golf course for a Transformer)

They sang 3 songs.  The Reindeer Pokey, Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer, and Up on the Housetop.

Afterwards, we celebrated an early Christmas with my brother and also skyped with my Aunt Sheri's family.

Garrett was exhausted by the end of the night, so this was the best I could do for a cousin picture.

The next day, Bryant was all excited to dress in his new clothes.

He took a nice picture and then he wanted one with his mean face....looks mean, huh?

Garrett was super stylin' in some new clothes too!

How can that possibly be comfortable to sleep like that?

Getting ready for Santa on Christmas Eve.

Here's a little clip from Christmas morning.  Bryant is always excited to first see if Santa and his reindeer ate their treats, then he was excited about Garrett's gift from Santa, then his own.

Then the craziness of opening presents began.  

This was about the extent of Garrett's interest in opening presents.  Bryant was more than happy to help him open them.

I have no idea what Garrett was doing here besides taking a little break, but the reindeer bum was too cute!

Garrett normally takes his nap around 11:30 am and he made it until about 1 pm before falling asleep in Grandma Susie's lap.

Time for more play

And then time to eat.

We are so fortunate to have both sets of Grandparents so close - these boys had an absolute blast!

 We were absolutely spoiled this year with clothes and toys (for us big kids too).  We are truly blessed to have such great family and friends who help make everything so special for us and our boys.  

To wrap up the end of my December post, I got up this morning to take a shower and saw some deer hanging out in our yard.  The boys loved seeing them, so the saying in our house this morning was not the typical Happy New Year, we were saying Happy New Deer:)  Even the little things are so fun; I'm so excited for all the adventures that this new year will bring for our family.