As Gavin's second year comes to a close, I'm amazed by how much he's grown, learned, and accomplished in the past 12 months. In 2009, Gavin...

• celebrated his first birthday.
• enjoyed his second Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.
• saw the Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic Ocean, and Appalachian Mountains.
• grew 3 inches and gained 6 pounds (a far cry from 2008 when he grew 10 inches and gained 14 pounds!).
• visited museums, outlet malls, parks, a school, toy stores, swimming pools, a pumpkin farm, a gym, and went hiking, hiking, and more hiking!
• played in the snow - twice!
• started the year with 8 teeth and ended with 16.
• fell in love with books. He began the year only tolerating a few rhyming books. A few nights ago, I read to him for two hours.
• started the year confidentally walking and is ending the year running, climbing, jumping, and mastering stairs.
• learned to feed himself, weened from a bottle and all baby food, and no longer uses a highchair.
• celebrated as both Dad and Mom turned 30.
• grew from LEGO novice to LEGO master.
• moved to a new house and into his own room.

... and otherwise kept us thoroughly entertained by his adorability, in awe of his growth and development, and in love with him more every day!

My mom and I have unintentionally started a holiday tradition: We take a photo together along with grandkids, born and unborn, in front of a mall Christmas tree. This tradition is turning out to be a great way to document our changes and the growing family. It started two years ago while strolling around the Bell Tower Shops in Fort Myers:

Mom and Traci with three-days-overdue Gavin in the belly - December 22, 2007

While shopping at Triangle Town Center in Raleigh the day after Christmas last year, we took several pictures in front of the tree in the outdoor promenade. It was only after returning home that it reminded me of the picture we'd taken in Florida the previous year.

Mom and Traci with nearly one-year-old Gavin - December 26, 2008

So, this year, I had to continue the tradition.

Mom and Traci with nearly two-year-old Gavin and 22-week Baby Brother in the belly - December 27, 2009

Gavin really does not do posed photos these days. I was shocked when I downloaded the photos off my camera and found this photo because I didn't think we captured any smiling, posed shots (Jeff sure is quick with the shutter!). Here is how the shoot actually unfolded...

The principal subject was protected by his body guard as the photographer tested the lighting (awful bright, sunny conditions, hence the less-than-desired quality of these images)...

Gavin tolerated a few pictures with Mommy and Daddy, but only because he had a few trucks to hold.

He didn't want to stand in front of a tree posing for the clicking black box. Boring! He whined and pouted at the tree, but always smiled as he escaped.

A few poses on the shoulders produced some smiles and laughter...

Sure is a honey of a tree...

This cute little girl crashed our photo shoot. Gavin was surprisingly social enough to shake her hand (after being prompted, of course) and wasn't afraid of her...

This is what Gavin would have rather been doing the entire time...

Whenever he can, Gavin now likes to try on adult shoes and walk around, much to everyone's delight.

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In a house made for chasing, Gavin can't resist.

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Gavin never seemed to understand what was going on Christmas morning. He quickly learned how to open presents, sure, but I think the never-ending stream of excitement was wearing on him by the time he got to his big present from Mommy and Daddy, a wooden train set. Lighting and space issues led me to stop the video early, so I'm afraid you can't view the second wind he got when he finally saw and understood what was in that big box. Oh, and the first thing he grabbed from the box? The train cars, to be taken to the windowsill, of course! The train set is now spread out over  half of our daily play area. I'll shoot another video to share once I get a table built for it and Gavin can easily play with it without knocking it apart by climbing over the edges to get to the middle.

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Despite the alluring smells of scratch-made cinnamon rolls and woodsmoke; despite the radiant warmth of the blazing fire; despite the soothing crackle of burning wood and the soft tinkling of instrumental Christmas music, Gavin still shows mixed feelings about going downstairs until I mention the word "cars". He does his version of "excited" for the camera too, with a big toothy grin and fists so tight his body shakes. He is not dissappointed, finding an entire giant sock full of cars waiting for him. He promptly sorts out all the cars, even noticing that we accidently got him two of the same fire truck, and then takes them all to The Place Where Cars Go: the windowsill. The only problem, we haven't gotten down all the Christmas decorations yet, and he's been checking his stocking where it still hangs to see when we're going to refill it with more cars.

After a quick breakfast, Gavin headed downstairs to see what Santa left in his stocking before the rest of the family arrived. Gavin must be on Santa's list of good little boys because he filled the stocking with 17 Matchbox cars and trucks! Wow!

After pulling each car from the stocking one-by-one, Gavin transported them two-by-two to their new home on the window sill (where all toy vehicles belong, according to Gavin).

Cinnamon roll break! I first made Alton Brown's cinnamon roll recipe for Thanksgiving and they are now officially a holiday tradition we must continue for years to come! They are divine! Melt-in-your-mouth sugary, cinnamony goodness - the perfect companion for gift opening on Christmas morning!

Gavin helped Daddy open his new Duplo recycling truck from his Highsmith grandparents.

A truck... made out of LEGOs! Oh, boy!

The new truck joined the other new vehicles on the window sill.

Gmummy and Aunt Kristen ... yes, there were other people there on Christmas morning, believe it or not!

Gmummy's "Handy Manny Christmas" for Gavin began with Flicker, the real working flashlight!

I think he liked it...

What is it about boys and flashlights? They're so fascinating!

Gavin opened a recycling truck made out of recycled plastic from Aunt Cindy and promptly placed it, you guessed it, on the window sill!

Baby Brother's first Christmas presents...

... and Baby's First Christmas tree ornament.

After opening Fabian Escapes, a sequel to one of Gavin's favorite books, he had to read it right away.

Then, the Handy Manny Christmas continued...

Handy Manny, himself!

Oh, yeah. The rest of us were opening presents, too. Aunt Kristen opened a package while wearing her new slippers.

But, back to Gavin... ;) A toolbox filled with all of Handy Manny's herramientas...

This is why I never ask Gavin to smile at the camera...

Gavin's last present was his "big gift" from Mommy and Daddy - a train set. First, he picked all of the train cars out of the box. Do I even need to say where he put them?

Daddy set up most of the track, but we need to take down our tree so there is more floor space in the living room!

Gavin and Grandpa played with the train for a while...

Gavin thinks his cars drive on the track just as well as the train...

Gift opening complete, Gmummy and Aunt Kristen sat down to play a new card game.

Gavin stuffed his recycled recycling truck with Matchbox cars...

Gavin missed his second consecutive holiday meal (not that he would have eaten any of it anyway) when he took a nap shortly after noon. The rest of us munched on Aunt Kristen's lasagna rolls, Gmummy's salad, and Mommy's rosemary bread. Holiday dinners are great when you split up the cooking!

Jeff brewed some coffee with his new coffee-making gadgets. I have yet to decide whether he is a coffee snob, a coffee geek, or perhaps a little bit of both!

Fast-forward a few hours... We all headed over to GGma and GGpa's place for cookies and a game. Then, we took Gauntie Faye with us back to Gmummy and Grandpa's house for the evening. Gavin had fun chasing Aunt Kristen again (video-taping in progress).

Gavin has a new habit of trying on grown-ups' shoes. Here, he takes Aunt Kristen's shoes for a walk.

After a simple homemade soup dinner, Gmummy, Mommy, Daddy, and Gauntie Faye sat down for a game of Settlers of Catan. Gavin climbed onto the chair at the end of the table and started unloading the Hershey Kisses bowl, meticulously placing the candies in a line.

When Aunt Kristen left, Gavin blew her a kiss...

... and got right back to his chocolate Kisses...

... until he got a phone call. It was Monkey calling from his crib at home. "It's bedtime, Master Gavin!"

So, we left when our game was over and Gavin finally settled down for bedtime at 10:00 - his longest day in quite some time! It was a Merry Christmas, indeed!

A few snapshots from this month...

One afternoon, Gavin was not in the mood to be woken from his nap. This was his response when we told him it was time to wake up. See, he communicates quite well without speaking words!

After we kept pestering him, he sent Monkey to negotiate...

Gavin had trouble falling asleep several nights ago so we let him rest by the fire. Few activites are as relaxing and hypnotic as gazing into a fire!

Yesterday afternoon, Daddy constructed another tent. This time, he used a pool fun noodle suspended between the sofa and Gavin's easy chair, and draped a blanket on top. They read books by flashlight inside.

While making pizza for dinner, I showed Gavin how to punch the dough after it had risen. He kept gently knocking on it as if knocking on a door.

On December first, I began assembling an advent nativity scene with Gavin. My family has had this Christmas countdown since I was a little girl and it has always been my favorite Christmas decoration. I was so excited to share a piece of the Christmas story with Gavin every December day and am thrilled that he enjoys it as much as I do!

When we get home from our walk each morning (which explains our hair in these photos - a combination of bed head and hat head!), I ask him if he wants to put the next piece on our advent scene. He always smiles and immediately runs over to the wall where it hangs in our living room. I read him a snippet of the Christmas story as we place a new person or animal on the board.

In the beginning, we add stable animals. Then, Mary and Joseph arrive on their donkey and baby Jesus is born. Angels then sing overhead. We add sheep and shepherds followed by camels and kings until, finally, we add a star over the manger on Christmas Eve.

My mom and a friend made these sets in the early 80's for a church bazaar. It consists of a blue felt board with a brown stable and felt pieces backed with sand paper that adhere to the board. The pieces are kept in a manilla folder with the story sheet glued to the outside.

This was the scene several days ago before we added the kings and camels...

Baby Jesus with Mary and Joseph in the stable...

Gavin placed the second king on the board. I think the king is either mounting or dismounting his camel. ;)

Gavin knows every piece on the board and correctly identifies each one. After we place the new piece on each morning, he makes me review all of the pieces in the scene.

He also "counts" the sheep and angels.

Today was another stay-at-home day for Gavin and, as usual, Daddy helped make the best of it. Again they played with Daddy's favorite toy (rope) to make a tent with a sheet in the upstairs hallway.

Cheval guarded the entrance...

No girls allowed, Mommy!

Later, Daddy taught a "which one is different?" lesson with LEGO soldiers. 

Pick out the soldier wearing a backpack...

Which soldier is standing?

Yep, that's him!

Gavin has recently become fascinated with Daddy's little LEGO toys since he started a LEGO advent calendar this month. Gavin likes to pull the hats off the mens' heads and snap them back on.

Or, sometimes he pulls off their heads entirely...

But he always puts the men back together again!

Gavin has a bit of a cold again so he stayed home with Daddy today, playing upstairs for most of the day. When they started playing a new game by lassoing stuffed animals from the stairwell, I had to grab the camera!

May I interject here with a side note already? See Burt? I dare anyone to find a cat sweeter or friendlier than Burt. He's Gavin's buddy and that certainly takes a special kind of cat! However, he's proving again here that he's really not the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree. Really. Would a remotely intelligent animal choose to stand where he is right here?

Woo hoo! Daddy lassoed Cheval!

Pull him up, Gavin!

Keep pulling!

All right! Safe and secure again at the top of the cliff!

Happy dance!

OK, let's try Nemo this time...

Argh! Gavin grunted as he pulled up the mighty fish with all his strength!

Almost there...

Another animal rescued from the ravine!

The happy cowboy danced a victory dance...

... and he danced ...

... and danced!

As the sun dropped lower in the sky, the intrepid cowboys decided to call it a day and coiled up their rope.

Jeff says this is an "alpine coil." He's quite particular about coiling his ropes and cables. I had no idea there was even a "proper way" to coil a rope until I met him. It's one of the many things he has taught me that is useful on a daily basis ... obviously.

Gavin was clearly as interested in proper coiling technique as I am...

Ah, the finished coiled rope. Now that's exciting!

And then he rode off into the sunset ... sort of. He's grown a bit since first saddling up!

This morning, we had our 20-week checkup to see how Baby Brother is growing. These prenatal appointments are starting to feel like deja vu in a very good way! Like all of Gavin's prenatal appointments, Baby Brother's was perfect again today. My tummy measured twenty centimeters, I've gained ten pounds total, and Baby's heart was beating strong at 150 beats per minute.

The closest appointment with Gavin for comparison is his 22-week check-up. That blog entry sounds very similar to this one!

Since I can't post a blog entry without a picture, here we are with Auntie Beth roasting smores over the fire and drinking hot chocolate after Gavin went to sleep on Sunday night. Beth is back on the east coast after spending four months working at the Grand Canyon. We're so glad she's here for a few days before heading back home to Florida!

While we prepare for our walk in the morning, Gavin often turns on the tiny television in our bedroom to watch the Disney Channel until we're ready to leave. He got a little comfier than usual this morning...

We moved the table the television used to sit on downstairs several weeks ago and have never gotten around to finding a new location for it yet. So, it remains on the floor where the table used to be, quite convenient for Gavin to operate by himself.

When we're ready to go downstairs, we ask him to turn the television off. He always does and quickly leaves with us. He's not a TV addict yet!

Today, we continued a new holiday tradition: the second annual cookie baking marathon! We spent the day at Aunt Kristen's while Daddy worked and baked about ten batches of cookies (more or less, we lost count).

Gavin had little interest in the baking activities for most of the day. All of Kristen's new Christmas decorations were more exciting.

He was upset that we didn't let him taste more cookies...

Gavin seems to find his reflection everywhere these days ... even in small kitchen drawer knobs.

Baby Brother belly bump's first blog appearance...

Kristen works on batch #6 or #7 or something like that.

Every time we visit Aunt Kristen, Gavin loves to look at the pictures on her refridgerator. He noticed the new birth announcement right away.

Sisters... Sisters... There were never such devoted sisters...

Gavin and Gmummy, official taste-testers, compared cookie testing methods...

Gavin was really much less interested in dough making than he appears to be...

It's tough being a chick magnet...

Oven, stovetop, counters, dining table... cookies everywhere!!!

The calendar may say that winter is still over a week away, but the weather here in Raleigh doesn't agree. Yesterday morning, the temperature was 32 degrees for our morning walk. It was the second morning of the season that Gavin wore his snow pants and boots to keep warm (in addition to his heavy toggle coat, thick mittens, and a Monkey to hug!). Obviously, the cold temperatures don't bother Gavin!

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I bought Gavin his first robot today, a Hexbug Nano from RadioShack. It's really nothing more than a toothbrush head with the vibrating motor from a cellphone attached. They are easy to make, which I will have a blast showing Gavin and his little brother how to do some time in the future when they are old enough for me to take my robot-building supplies out of storage. Oh, the fun we will have! I'm not going to stop at bristlebots, either, I'll plan out a whole robotic curriculum building and programming Lego Mindstorms, BOE-Bots, and custom from-scratch robots of their own designs. Not that I'm excited or anything, mind you.

Yesterday afternoon was sunny and cold, the perfect weather for heading out in the front-wheel drive sleigh to pick out the Highsmith family Christmas tree. I'd read that trees at the state farmer's market are cheaper than the ones found in neighborhood lots. Whoever posted that bit of information on the internet was wrong, but we still found a great little frasier fir grown right here in the great state of North Carolina - Newland, near Gauntie Faye's house, to be exact. We'll just stay in our neighborhood to select a tree next year!

Before Daddy even snipped the netting to unveil the Highsmith Family Christmas Tree, Gavin promptly stuck a LEGO in the tree. Now that I see this picture, I'm reminded that I still have no idea where that LEGO is!

Without any prompting, he opened the big box of lights and ornaments, and started unloading the contents onto the couch.

Last year, Gavin helped unpack boxes but otherwise didn't participate much in tree decoration or appreciation. He hadn't been walking for long and we were concern he'd poke an eye on a branch or eat an ornament, so the baby fence surrounded the tree all month. Oh, what a difference a year makes!

Then, he stepped away for a while after receiving a phone call. Good help is so hard to find...

Gavin found a ribbon in the box and tried to hang it on the tree. This surprised me since nothing had been added to the tree yet. I think we tend to give Gavin less credit for his receptive communication than we should since he doesn't speak back to us! It's quite clear he understands everything we say!

Then, I strung the lights on the tree and the evening really got exciting!

He was still looking for the perfect place to hang that ribbon...

... but forgot all about the ribbon when I gave him the first ornament to hang on the tree, his first new ornament of the season...

Oh, and boy, does he like it!

The ornament is Mr. Ray and the fish classmates from the movie Finding Nemo including Gavin's favorite, Pearl the octopus! I was so excited when I saw it in the Hallmark store on Saturday and immediately snatched a box!

After adding more ornaments, Gavin quickly discovered his new favorite: a New York City taxi cab I bought at Rockefeller Center almost three years ago.

I got a little choked up seeing him play with this ornament (it is a car, after all!). That trip in March of 2007 was our last fling as a twosome before we tried to have a baby so it was heartwarming to see the baby we hoped for admiring that ornament!

Gavin had a hard time containing his excitement over the whole tree decorating experience. This is so much fun!

He seems to think that the tree itself is his Christmas present, covered with so many wonderful little toys.

He examined every single ornament after it was hung on the tree...

... and pulled off a few. Look at this cool little ball I found, Dad!

Finally, the finished product!

Jeff kept the fire burning all evening while the tree was trimmed. There's nothing like the smell of evergreen and wood smoke in the house. It's like we're camping in the forest!

All of the ornaments on the tree are keepsakes from the past thirty years. Every year, we'd get handmade ornaments (I love the ones made by my grandmothers) or purchase ornaments depicting the current phase in our lives (like a tennis-playing Santa). My mom kept papers indicating the year we received each ornament and who made them. There are a few of Jeff's the tree, too! ;)

This tiny puppy is one of my favorites, from my very first Christmas.

I've always loved this bell, also from Christmas of 1979.

Our first married Christmas... :)

Gma used to give us dated Hallmark ball ornaments every year. I didn't appreciate them nearly as much twenty years ago as I do now, and I'm pretty sure my mom told us back then that we'd appreciate them someday!

I was nearly the same age as Gavin when this ornament first hung on the Ziller Christmas tree.

So, I am continuing this tradition with Gavin. He already has a half dozen ornaments on the tree from last year and I started his papers. :) Here is Mr. Ray and Nemo's class to start the list for Christmas 2009.

Just one more month to go until Gavin's birthday! Priority numero uno for this last month of his second year: Teaching some manners! Seriously, who told this kid he could eat lunch with his feet propped up on the table?! What's a mom to do? Grab her camera because it's so stinkin' cute, obviously!

We flipped Gavin's car seat around this week. He's facing forward now!

Note that Gavin isn't excited in the photo above because he's facing forward. He has a tiny flashlight in his hands. He loves flashlights (gee, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, does it?). He likes facing forward, too.

In addition to every other book that has been mentioned in the history of this blog, Gavin added Curious George books to his list of favorites. We scored a stack of used Curious George and Berenstain Bear books for a dollar each at the Wake County Library book sale several weeks ago (an entire ex-supermarket jam-packed with books for sale!). They are his go-to books every night (and morning and afternoon).

Gavin could care less if someone gives him a manicure (especially if he's distracted by a Handy Manny episode) but hates pedicures.

As soon as we mention that he doesn't eat oatmeal anymore, Gavin is back on the oatmeal bandwagon. Now that he's a little older, Daddy adds a touch of sweet honey to his oat-flax meal-wheat germ-cinnamon concoction. It's his daily late breakfast again.

Gavin and Daddy play with a flashlight in a fort built out of a blanket and a piano bench at Aunt Kristen's house (see previous paragraph about flashlights).