A perfect day...

I know, I know. It has been forever since I last posted and now I've done two in one day. I had to take Gabriel to the pediatrician this morning and it ends up he has an ear infection, so I decided to stay home with him the rest of the day. He obviously feels so awful and I couldn't leave him. He's taking a nap and I'm taking advantage of this time by blogging. Things in the Gocha household have been good lately. Mark had to go on a business trip to New Orleans last week and we missed him a lot. Especially because I had a paper due on Friday and Gabriel was had this cold last week. But then he returned and we were happy again.

Last Saturday we went to a local tourist attraction called Old Man's Cave. It's in an area called the Hocking Hills and it's about an hour or so southeast of us. Our lawn really needed to be mowed and we had house work to do, but I'm glad we did this instead. We went with Barb and Brandon and their three kids and it was fantastic! I had decided I wanted to do this about a month ago, so I talked to Mark about it and then called Barb to set up a time. Barb and I have literally know each other my entire life and our families use to spend just about every Christmas together. We had been down to Old Man's Cave together before, but not as adults. It ended up being just about as perfect as possible. We had a nice picnic lunch, the weather was beautiful, and no one got hurt (hey, that's a big deal when you're married to Mark). The only bad part was that we BOTH forgot our cameras. Can you believe it? It's okay though. We had so much fun we made plans to go again in a month and a half.

Speaking of a month and a half... I'm graduating with my Masters degree on June 12th! I CAN NOT WAIT! It is going to be so wonderful to be at home with Gabriel every day. I have to admit I still cry sometimes when I have to drop him off in the morning. I just feel really blessed that I am going to have this opportunity.

Gabriel is of course still growing constantly. People constantly make comments about how obvious it is that he never misses a meal. I personally love his chunkiness. Along with his above average size is coming a high activity level. He crawls like a pro and he is cruising along the furniture. Last night he took a few steps from me to Mark without me holding on to him! Granted, he was very wobbly, but I have no doubt he'll be walking really soon. I just keep telling him it's too soon, but he definitely has a mind of his own. He is also trying to climb the stairs every chance he gets. I keep telling Mark we need to get a baby gate up, but I don't think he really got how serious I was until I told him I found Gabriel on the second step of the stairs the other day. I had barely turned around and there he was. We've taken a few pictures (though not of that time- I snatched him right up before he fell) of his recent escapades.