Lego Train Show

This weekend we went to Cantigny's annual Lego Train Show. It's always a lot of fun and the amount of complex Lego builds is amazing! Add trains running around and through all the structures, and you have crowds of delighted kids!

Ping Pong and Snow

The day before Thanksgiving, we stopped by Grandpa Cermak's office. Hardly anyone else was working that day, so we took advantage of the ping pong table in the break room. Gavin had never played before, and he did pretty well! (I love the look of concentration on his face.)

I took this picture two weeks ago, when we had the first snow that "stuck." This is the path that leads to Gavin's school:

Random November pics

We've all had coughs and colds this month and have been laying low.  I have some random pictures to share...

The first one is Gavin after his swimming lesson. He decided to comb his hair (something he never does) and this is the result. Isn't he CUTE?!

This is a floor puzzle map of the world from Grandma Cordes, which he loves to put together and then lay on. Go figure! We do discuss geography while we do this puzzle. He knows exactly where Japan is (I had to look it up) and he also knows that all the land on Earth used to be one giant continent called Pangaea.

Blast From The Past

From May 2010:

At age 2.5, Gavin only said five words: Mama, Dada, go, up, and no.

But after he passed that age, he started talking in leaps and bounds. It's like the words were all in his head, but he wasn't going to try to say them until he finished learning how to climb the couch or drive his Cozy Coupe.

I was so excited I wrote all his words down (also, I needed to let the speech therapist know). I recently found the list. I won't list everything - I stopped keeping track at 177 words - but here are his first 50 words:

Mama

Dada

No

Up

Go

Stop (“op”)

Nana

Grandpa (“Buh-pa”)

Dirty ("dah-ta")

Bye bye (“buh-buh”)

Oh no

Bump

Oh gee

There

Moon

Slow

Bee

wow

Pop

Poop

Yum

Cow

Toot

Two

Down

Pee

Blue

Pink

Shoe

Four

Burp

Dark

Arm

Knee

Purple

Beep

Black

Gray

Red

Home

Flower

Green 

Out

Water 

White 

In

Key

Hole

Fly

Juice (“jutch”)

Halloween

This year for Halloween, Gavin went as Clint Eastwood from the Dollars Trilogy movies.

We went trick or treating in downtown Naperville, and thank goodness they had it on the Sunday before Halloween. The weather was PERFECT.

It was super crowded, but at least we weren't cold!

 

 Showing me a piece of candy:

On the actual day of Halloween, the weather was horrible. It was 36 degrees and really windy, and the wind chill was 25 degrees. Gavin chose to not to trick or treating! We still had a fun day, because I got to volunteer at his class Halloween party.  I was in charge of the "Spider Bozo Buckets" game in the hallway. (We tossed plastic spiders instead of balls.) It was a fun afternoon!

Reading Night

Last week, Gavin's school had its annual family reading night. The theme was "Under the Stars," and it took place from 6:30 - 8:00 pm. Gavin was excited to stay up late! 

We went to this event last year and it was a lot of un. They had community helpers, like a police officer, read. Each reader was set up in a different classroom and the families would move from room to room.

Gavin and his friend Claire were excited to see Officer Fletcher read. He helps out at the crosswalk in front of the school and lives in the neighborhood. He read "Creepy Carrots" and "Shark Vs. Train" - neither of which he had read before that night. He was pretty entertaining.

(Gavin is on the couch, as close as he can get!)

Next we went to hear Mr. Tabisz, the PE teacher, read. He usually doesn't get to read to the kids, and he was hilarious. The kids were doubled over in giggles. He read "The Day The Crayons Quit" and "The Book With No Pictures."

(Gavin is on the left side of this picture.)

We heard one other teacher read. There was also a professional storyteller who started things off. It was lots of fun and we plan to attend every year!

Cantigny

Gavin loves climbing on the tanks at Cantigny. He always has!! This weekend he was catching up on some World War two history, specifically General Patton's accomplishments, and he just had to go see the tanks!

He LOVES the Snoopy tank:

And he loves the tiger tank:

Preschool Garden

We stopped by the twins' old preschool to add some fall decorations to Evie's garden. We were happy to see it's still so green, and the wave petunias are still going strong despite the rain and chill!

Danada Fall Festival

Every year Danada Farm has a Fall Festival. We went last year and Gavin had a great time! He loved a horse there named Shadow and really, really hoped to see him again.

We started out in the main barn, where we met a very friendly quarter horse mare named Sweet Cheeks. We almost didn't leave her stall.

But we did leave, and went in search of the guest barns to track down Shadow.

We were in luck! We found him, and his owner remembered us from last year, AND we got to see him perform. He is part of the Midwest Renegades Riding team.

His owner let us into his stall and happily answered all our questions. We learned that Shadow used to work at Medieval Times as a jousting horse, but is now "retired" to the drill team. We also learned that horses need to see the dentist every year or two, because their teeth never stop growing and need to be filed down.

 She even let Gavin feed Shadow a peppermint candy - just like the ones people eat after dinner!

Shadow and his owner in the ring. Yes, that's green and purple glitter on his rump:

Gavin is completely interested in horses now. Not just because of this event, but he also has a book about a real-life mini miniature horse named Einstein. So he loved this "chart:"

We're already looking ahead to next year's Fall Festival!

Fun Run

Gavin's school had its second annual Fun Run last week, and it happened to be on his birthday! It's an obstacle course that the gym teacher and volunteers set up on the school grounds. Each hour of the day, a different grade runs through it, as many times as they can. Gavin's grade ran through the whole thing four times and those first graders were all huffing and puffing by the end!

He was in constant motion, so some of the photos are a little blurry. But every kid had a great time!

Gavin's Birthday Party

Gavin wanted to have his birthday party this year at Chuck E Cheese....it's loud and flashy and kind of crazy, but the kids all love it. And the pizza is not bad!!

He played with all his friends and was in constant motion: 

He loved his birthday crown...

...and his birthday balloon guitar!

Grandma Cordes liked the crown, too!

He loved the ticket blaster booth and he liked meeting Chuck E in person. He was a happy kid all day!