The Gill Family: 2018

Thursday, November 29, 2018

Thanksgiving 2018 on Anna Maria Island

It's Thanksgiving! Family Time!

We opted for a destination Thanksgiving and chose Anna Maria Island, Florida. I had never heard of this place until we booked the trip, then I realized that many people know of this gem and I hadn't been paying attention. We rented a nice big house to accommodate our growing family, and brought aunts, uncles and cousins together for a week of fun. While this vacation is a much needed break for me personally, I am still impatiently wading through my chemotherapy regiment. My blood counts are low, my treatment is delayed more often than it's not. While I'm not tied to a hospital bed, and I'm thankful that I can travel during this time, I still need to have my blood checked each week to see if it has crawled back up into the acceptable range. Two separate times during this week, my dad dutifully drove me to a lab in Bradenton, FL to have my counts read. Both times I failed the test. I packed the chemo pills with all intention of taking them, but my body said no, and I packed them up again when we returned home.

As far as the fun side of sightseeing goes, we had lots of adventures. We took a boat tour with Egmont Key Adventures where we immediately saw a pair of dolphins swimming around the docks. The water was a brisk, November temperature so I stayed on the boat, but Grammy, Uncle Chris and the girls were brave and got in to snorkel and hunt for sand dollars. They found lots of live sand dollars, which are just the most bizarre creatures, and a few shells too.

After exploring the underwater creatures, we rode to Egmont Key Island. This weird little island is on the National Registry of Historic Places, is a Natural Wildlife Refuge and a state park. There is a lighthouse on the island that dates back to 1848, when Robert E. Lee advised that the island be used as a strategic defense location. It was a holding place for Seminole natives to be held, a sanctuary for southern, pro-Union people during the Civil War and used as a military prison for the Union.

Despite it's colorful, and sometimes grim history, we refer to it as Turtle Island. There are tortoises roaming the island freely - and they're everywhere! "I found a big one!" "Not as big as this one!" "Here's the grandfather giant one!!" It was fun to roam and scout for turtles on this semi-creepy, historic place.

The "big kid" cousins

I got some sweet lovin' from my big kids.

At the recommendation of a friend, we spent a day off of Anna Maria Island at the Florida Aquarium. We were told to expect a variation on your average aquarium, this facility has a focus on saving the habitat of native species and rehabilitating injured animals to prepare them for release back into the wild.

There were tanks of colorful fish, and tanks of artificially grown coral. We saw gigantic sea turtles eat and beavers play like kids at recess.

Uncle Chris joined, and helped Alex be brave about touching the stingrays. They were almost pet-like as they rubbed their wings up against your outstretched hands. A group of stingrays is called a 'fever', now you know.

Alex got so brave after his experience with the fever, that he pet this fun little shark!

Manatees seem like the most gentle, strange and exotic creatures, I was really hoping to see one in the wild. We got the next best thing, and got to watch this rescued manatee as she swam around the tank and smooshed her whisker-nose into the glass on repeat. The kids just about matched her smashed nose on the glass in response.

We were also able to just enjoy the water. Our house had a nice pool, so the cold-tolerant folks spent time swimming in the water. For the little ones, they were more of a float, either with this cool head inner-tube for the teeniest of our crew.

Or the arm-float variety that Graham used for the entire week.

It was a special little joy to be able to watch my baby brother love on his new baby girl. This sweet little ginger was a content joy all vacation.

The fawning didn't stop at Robbie, Gretchen got a turn holding her baby cousin.

And Grammy is all smiles with this pink little girl. She was easy to hold and unafraid of having so much attention focused on her.

Let's not forget the beach!! Graham and Papa Mas were the first ones up each day and Papa Mas was nice enough to take his coffee to go so that he could watch Graham on the beach and let the rest of us sleep/wake up at our own pace.

Grammy kept a careful eye on all of our sand crabs, it was the perfect weather for enjoying the sound of the waves and digging endless holes in the sand.

We rented a golf cart from Fun and More Rentals, had a delicious catered dinner by The Loft 5 and took lots of pictures on the beach. Anna Maria Island was a great place to spend a holiday.

Thursday, October 25, 2018

Graham Turns Two

This sweet child. Our third. Our last. The punctuation mark at the end of our family sentence.

He is strong. He is stubborn. He is unbelievably cute. He melts hearts one minute and makes you want to pull out your hair the next. I've been told every family has one - and this unpredictable, precious and opinionated baby boy is our "one".

He has started speaking more, he is most definitely one of the big kids. He loves Bubble Guppies and Ernie (specifically, the Sesame Street episode #3137 which he had dubbed "Ernie Moon") he loves his owl and elephant lovies, his tickers (when he's not biting through them) and his older brother and sister (Aquis: Alex and Guys: Gretchen).

His other true love is "Ms. Ka", who's real name is Erika and is one of the most loving teachers at his preschool. He adores her and I am so very thankful for that.

As every third child knows, they do not get the one-on-one, tailored treatment that the first and second children tend to receive. In addition, our family had the rare and fantastic privilege of having Candy Miranda help us out in our Buenos Aires apartment during Gretchen and Alex's birth. Graham has taken things into his own hands, since birth, and demanded his attention in the way that only a third-born can.

Ms. Ka!

Graham has also had the experience of being a baby while his mother was diagnosed and treated for brain cancer. So, without understanding why, he was cared for by a village of family and friends when I physically or mentally could not do it myself. He did so very well with this revolving door of family and friends who helped feed him, play with him and put him down for naps and bedtime each night. Daddy is the master, but many other helpers were available when Mom just could not be. I struggle with that as a parent - lucky for me, he seemingly does not.

He walks confidently into preschool each day. He demands the things that he wants. He takes your hand, walks you to the refrigerator to show you which yogurt is acceptable for lunch - then refuses the first 3 spoons you try to give him to eat it. But he loves to laugh, and he loves to make everyone else laugh too. He always has a scrape, and pats his own shoulder when he's sad to show that he wants to be held. He will read the same 2 books before bed every night, (it's a rotating two, currently The Jungle Book: an Animal Primer and Big Red Barn) and insist that he sit in the chair and you sit on the ottoman and read the book to him while he holds it. He knows what he wants - and what he doesn't, and I love him fiercely.

So when October rolled around and our new neighbors were planning a precious, dinosaur-themed birthday party for their son (who is a week older than Graham), we joked about how we just didn't have life together enough to throw a party. We got him a few presents and had a chocolate pie out of the freezer for his birthday - I'm still undergoing chemo and I'm exhausted, have no taste for food and have pretty much stopped cooking altogether. But our neighbors are incredible - they not only included Graham in their party, but bought a "2" candle just for him AND had a custom Two-Rex shirt made for him and their son to match. Thank goodness for this village.

Our baby man is two. Hallelujah and God help us.

Happy Birthday Big Guy!

Wednesday, September 19, 2018

End of An Era

Tomorrow our big little guy turns five years old. FIVE. In my mind this is the age that begins Big Kid. In that spirit, when a new stage begins, something must come to an end, and I think we're ready to say farewell to #AlexHatesEverything.

In 2016, our sweet, sensitive, cuddly 2 year old was still pretty quiet most of the time and a real joy to be around. But there were times - when something seemingly minor would happen - and Alex would melt into a teary, drooling mess of unclear words mixed with yell-crying. Often, this was followed by long periods of pouting, anger and frustration. This is not new behavior, many parents have the same struggle, but my answer to this was to start photographing the tantrums and allowing myself a little comic release. So in January 2017, #AlexHatesEverything was born.

Over the last two years we have seen an incredible maturing of our little guy. He is now a big brother, with a full, generously used vocabulary who has his own, measured way of doing things. His tantrums have virtually disappeared, being replaced by more of a side-eye look and crossed arms. Honestly, the hashtag photos were helpful in showing Alex how silly he looked when he lost his cool. And for anyone who has seen these photos and thought they were mean or unfair, know that no one has laughed harder than Alex while looking at himself losing his mind over a sandwich or the wrong bowl or because it was time to go home. Not to mention how cathartic for mom - who often time had to spend an hour coaxing her toddler while chasing down her 4/5 year old while also (at times) very pregnant.

I want these photos to be captured in our family records to look back on, as we do with most of the items in this blog. So here's to the end of an era. Our little boy spent his last day as a 4 year old happy, reasonable and very excited for his upcoming birthDAY and celebration over the weekend.

Enjoy #AlexHatesEverything one more time.... and stay tuned.... I feel in my bones that there may be a future for #GrahamHatesEverything.