Mushy Monday

So I realized the other day that I made Tommy a whole month older than what he actually is, he will be 21 months, this month. I changed the past blog to read 20 months, that way if I read it in the future it will be the real time line. I've been telling all kinds of people he's 21 months but he's actually 20. Oh well. I'm glad he's a month younger than I thought!

My pregnancy so far is going really really smoothly. Praise the Lord! I will be 20 weeks on Tuesday, so I'm halfway there! I can't believe it! We had an ultrasound this past Thursday morning, we did not find out the sex of the baby. And I'm glad we aren't finding out, it is fun this way. But I still kind of want to know. I want to know more with this baby than I did with Tommy! The baby looked beautiful! He/she has really long fingers. They did find one small thing during the ultrasound, it's called a choroid plexus cyst. It's a cyst on the brain, which sounds really bad but it's of no consequence to the brain or the baby's thinking. The cyst is located where the spinal fluid is held and in most babies the cyst disappears but even if it doesn't it will not harm the baby. However, this used to be considered a marker for Down Syndrome and with our history of Tommy having Down Syndrome we will do a special ultrasound to check for any other signs. Our OB does not think that the baby has DS, that's actually one of the reasons they looked at the hands and fingers, to see if they looked shorter (we found that out later). The doctor said she would be shocked if we had another baby with DS and is not concerned about the cyst but it's her job to have it looked into further considering our history. And we actually had planned to have the exact same special ultrasound done for the baby to check out his/her heart b/c of our history and our family history of heart defects. We had the special ultrasound done with Tommy too, and his heart problems didn't show up there. I read a statistic that only 1% of the babies with the cyst end up having DS. So we'll go have the ultrasound done on the 19th of this month, to see if the cyst is still there, and to check out our baby's heart. We are not worried, obviously it is something to think about but we know the Lord is in control and that there's no need to think too much into it until we find out more information.

So this week Tommy's vocabulary has more than doubled, in sign language that is. He now knows 8 signs (and I'm pretty sure this is the order he learned them in) more, daddy, all done, please, dog, eat, mommy, thank you. He also participates in the song, "If you're happy and you know it..." now and he claps his hands, stomps his feet, and pats his head! Tommy is just flourishing and it is such a joy to watch! He has just amazed us with how quickly he is picking up on things and learning to mimic us now. For the longest time he had NO, ZERO, NADA desire to repeat what we were doing, but now he LOVES it, b/c he gets praised when it happens! And he has also developed a little bit of an attitude/temper. When he doesn't get what he wants, especially when eating, he will start to whine/scream/cry. But so far he is responding really well and obeying when I sternly and loudly say, "STOP" and then he stops screaming and I look at him and praisingly say, "GOOD LISTENING!" and he starts smiling and is so proud of himself! I hope he continues to respond well to discipline, as well as responding well to praise! I'd much rather teach him how to behave properly by getting excited over him doing good then having to reprimand him, but I know it's good for him to know boundaries, etc. I do sound like a crazy person though when these times happen - b/c I have to change my tone and sound intentionally stern and then seconds later - smile big and happily say good job! Haha it's pretty funny, but hey it works...for now at least! And when this doesn't work I try to remove him from the situation to distract him, but if either of those don't work we've decided to do time out in his room, but so far we haven't had to do that.

In other news, we are still waiting on cousin Eli to be born! He could be here any day now, and we're all anxiously awaiting for Jeanne's phone call or text to let us know we need to be on our way! We've been able to skype a lot with Aunt Jeanne lately and Tommy loves to stand at the couch and listen and laugh at his aunt! He's been showing off his new signs and song skills!

That's all for now!

Mushy Monday

I am very excited to brag on my husband and how he has been intentionally cleaning up after himself more and more. I love to spoil Kyle and take good care of him, but there are times when this treatment is taken advantage of, sometimes intentionally to be funny and push my buttons, but other times unknowingly.  Anyhow, I'm very impressed with his new motivation to be intentional to love me in this way and I hope that it stays. I tease my mother in law all the time asking her what she got me into by spoiling this boy, and she always apologizes to me! Haha!

But from my perspective as well, I want to be willing to serve my husband and love him by caring for him in what seem to be menial tasks - taking his dishes, cleaning them, throwing away trash, putting things back where they belong, etc. - and I want to do it with a good attitude. I do a lot of mental grumbling and I don't like it. So I've been trying to pray when that happens that I would remember that it is a joy and honor to serve my husband and son and that I would do so joyfully; and that I would remember that I am ultimately serving the Lord. I don't want to sound holier than thou by saying that - trust me there are days when I pray that back to back b/c right after praying I start complaining again. Or there are days like today, when I forget to pray it all together.

It has been heavy on my heart lately for a sweet friend at our church who recently lost her husband in a tragic car accident. My heart literally aches for her at times and I am overcome with emotion to put myself in her shoes. I can't imagine her grief, nor do I want to. But it makes me want to cherish Kyle all the more, even the the quirky things I complain about b/c I know I would miss them terribly if they were suddenly gone. And knowing that our friend who passed away was such a great husband and father, makes me associate him with Kyle even more.

Kyle has such an important and strong presence in our home. I love seeing how much he has grown and changed as he has become a dad. The Lord has increased my love for him so much in the past year and a half and I'm so thankful he is my husband.

Tommy's new tricks

So pretty much in the past month our little boy has started to do so many new things and it's been so fun and such a joy to watch him grow and flourish.  He is walking with his walking "toy" all by himself and he LOVES it. It's still has to be an intentional thing that we do though, and at times he has to be coerced with a book, but once he gets going he squeals and laughs while he walks. He gets around so fast, he moves like a little monkey. He sits down and leans forward on his hands and swings his butt in whatever direction he wants to go. Everyone tells us they love to watch him move. Tommy's getting really good at his aim when it comes to throwing things, he'll use a small toy to knock down a tower of blocks and can usually hit it dead on. He's pulling up on everything and is getting super fast at cruising along whatever it is he's pulling up on.  His speech has grown tons in the past month - he signs more all the time now, he is trying to verbally say the word more, he says MAMAMAMAMAMAMAMA! FINALLY! While I'm super thankful he's saying it, it wasn't quite as exciting as I thought it would be b/c it was kind of gradual. He started making the "mmm" sound forever ago and then every once it a blue moon it sounded like he was saying ma. Then came, mawwm, followed by mama! And it is now his favorite sounds to make - that part makes me very happy! He now knows the sign for daddy but has no interest in signing mama. He can say dada but goes through phases where he says it a lot and then stops, and since mama is the new favorite sound dada and baba/byby have taken a back seat, but trust me they had their day. Tommy will point to your eyes, nose (his favorite), mouth, and ears. He knows where his belly and his head are. Funny story from Christmas weekend - we have never asked Tommy where his head is or taught him where his head is but he was playing at my in-laws' house and his Grammy saw him playing with a little table that wasn't very sturdy. So she went and moved it and told him, "I have to move that so you won't bonk your head." And out of no where he starts patting himself on the head! We started cracking up and clapping our hands telling him, "Yes, head! Good job!" Then we asked him several times after where his head was and he kept patting his head. He's so stinking smart, and pretty dang cute!

Tommy was not interested at all in opening his presents. I thought he would be, but he just wanted to move around. He did however get excited when we got home and I was taking all the toys out of the boxes and wiping them down. I'd throw them to him on the floor when I was finished. And at one point he came over to the couch, pulled himself up in front of a couple of toys that were still in the box, and was signing more! Haha he wanted more toys to play with! He cruised down the couch to my lap and took the toy I was wiping off out of my lap!

Tommy loves to sign more, but is starting to get upset when you tell him all done or no more and he still wants more. One of the cutest things is when Kyle tickles Tommy or plays with him, and in between tickles Tommy will look up at Kyle and put his hands high in the air and sign more to him, b/c he wants Kyle to keep tickling him! Precious, precious boy!

Okay I will leave you of a video of Tommy's signs. And one of him walking with his toy (it's a walker his Physical Therapist is letting us borrow)



Mushy Monday?!

Even though it's Tuesday it doesn't sound like a catchy title to say Mushy Tuesday. And I think mushy is kind of a weird word - it reminds me of squishy and in that sense kind of grosses me out.

This week I want to talk about how thankful I am for our church. A few weeks ago on a Wednesday night I decided to keep Tommy with me for our church business meeting b/c he had broke out in a rash on his chest and belly. I was 99% sure it was an allergic reaction to raspberry juice but just to be safe I didn't want to the other kids to be exposed. (He had no other symptoms and it looked like an allergic reaction, big welts) Anyhow it was a lot of work. I was trying to keep him quiet and sitting still in my lap, Kyle was working so he wasn't there for me to pass him off. It was pretty exhausting. This experience made me so so so grateful for our church nursery and all the people who work in it. Honestly if there were no church nursery I don't think Kyle and I both would be able to go to the same service between the ages of like 6 months to 3 years old (and that's being generous). But thankfully our church family serves each other well by serving in the nursery.

Tommy has also grown to know and love the nursery workers during Sunday School. Josh and Emily serve consistently in that class and Tommy now knows them. Which I really love! I think apart from Tommy's therapists they are the first two people he's come to know, remember, and like apart from family. He remembers them and he doesn't even cry when I leave him in there with them.

The sweetest thing happened this Sunday morning though. Tommy could tell we were going some place and didn't even want to finish his breakfast, he was ready to go. Well when we pulled into the church parking lot he got so excited! He was screaming/squealing in excitement when I was getting him out of the car seat. It made me so happy to know that he recognized where we were and that he enjoys being there.

And then when I went to pick Tommy up Emily told me that Tommy had walked with the walking toy all by himself four different times! His walking "toy" at home that he walks with was given to us to borrow from his PT and is a very sturdy walking assistant. Basically that means that Tommy is learning to walk even better b/c he was able to walk with a regular toy that isn't as sturdy as what he's used to. And all the people that saw him do it in the nursery were bragging on him and telling me about it. It was so encouraging to me to know my sweet boy walked so good and then to have our friends celebrating with us over his accomplishments.

I am thankful for our church for many reasons, and not just for the ways they can serve us, but that we get to serve along with such wonderful friends and to know that they are intentional to love our children.

20 Months of Tommy

Lots of blogging between yesterday and today. But I had to do a quick one on our Tom Tom who was 20 months as of yesterday.  In the past two weeks he has started doing so so so much. It seems like out of no where this boy is just taking off.

He is cruising wonderfully! He gets faster each day. He is pulling himself up in any place he has the opportunity. He is kind of walking with his walking toy (he only needs help keeping it from going too fast). He is appropriately signing the word "more" he had his own version of the sign before and would only do it occasionally when eating. Now he will do the right sign and he does it when he's playing too. He's dancing and enjoying music. He seems to be out of his shy stage for now, I'm sure it will return. He's been a huge daddy's boy for about a week now. He has mastered giving high fives and even double high fives. He knows where our eyes, nose, and mouth are, and he knows where his thumbs are. His receptive language is so strong and continues to grow. He will say "mama" or "mom" every now and then but usually only when something is wrong or he's whining. He scoots around on his butt or rolls to get where he wants to go, occasionally he'll belly crawl. He only naps once a day now, which can be tricky depending on the day. He's still a wonderful eater and drinker as long as he isn't teething. He holds his cup all by himself now when he drinks and we're working on teaching him to hand it back to us when he's finished (as opposed to throwing it). We're starting to work with using a spoon, where he holds it, while he eats and he thinks it's so fun. But we are no where close to being able to put a bowl or plate on his tray where he can reach it, he just thinks it's there for fun to put his hands in and throw. I think he's getting better at understanding discipline for the most part, he will typically stop if I can him to stop doing something, but he might only stop for a few seconds and then try again; it's a big improvement b/c I can see with his eye contact and facial response that he's intentionally listening and stopping even if it's only for a second. I think I had a little too high of expectations in disciplining before. Tommy is really into books right now, he loves turning pages, closing books, kissing the pages. Tommy is very good at learning transitions in his physical therapy activities (for example he knew how to sit himself down before he knew how to stand up on his own, this is helpful when your child learns to stand b/c they have to know how to get down. And more recently he just turns naturally when he's cruising along our sectional couch. Some kids have trouble figuring these things out but Tommy has been blessed with a natural ability to just do it) He's also really good at falling properly, sounds weird - especially if you aren't a parent, but when he's doing something and starts to fall he just rolls into it. So far, thank the Lord, no big, hurting falls b/c of his stunt man abilities. His attention span is growing when it comes to playing with a specific toy or a specific game and he's also getting way more interested in the TV, he sat with me the other day and watched a whole episode of Curious George (he was also teething so he may have just needed some snuggle time).

Tommy has so many sweet characteristics and quirks to his personality that keep us constantly entertained.  Oh how blessed we are to be his parents. God spoiled us by giving us such a wonderful and for the most part easy boy to take care of.

This weeks mushyness...

I was watching Tommy play a little bit ago and he was taking this little ping pong size ball that goes with one of his toys, putting it up on the coffee table and watching roll around and off the table with such precious concentration. This week he has figured out how to pull himself up to standing at this table, he used to just pull himself up to a kneeling position. Well every since he's been able to kneel there he has loved putting his mouth on the table. He even bites it sometimes, and has some teeth scratch marks along the edge of the wood. 

The sweet part about this is that this isn't just any coffee table, Kyle made this coffee table with his two hands. He spent hours cutting, piecing, sanding, and shaping this masterpiece of a table. Kyle is a perfectionist so this table does not look like it was made by an amateure woodshop student.  It looks like a nice table you would pay lots of money for in a furniture store. Kyle took two semesters of woodshop during his last year of college and he really enjoyed it. I remember when he brought his first project home for the end of the first semester, it was a beautiful end table, he had it covered in a sheet or towel and he had to explain to me how to take care of it, and how to pick it up if I was to move it, etc.  He had spent a lot of time and energy into making this table.  Well then came the next semester and I had always wanted a coffee table b/c for some reason we never had one growing up (which I think I figured out why, they take up a lot of room in the middle of the room).  So Kyle made me a nice, big coffee table.  He was careful when he brought it home, we did not put our feet on it (for a while).  Needless to say these were two valuable pieces of furniture to Kyle b/c he knew how hard he had worked to do them and was pleased with his finished product.

Well when Tommy first started trying to chew on the table, I'd always stop him and say, "No, no Daddy worked hard to make this table. Don't chew on it." Once I saw the teeth marks were already there I just kind of gave up on it (they aren't very obvious either). And the table it just Tommy's height, so I know why he'd love to play with it. Now he loves to throw his toys up there, and he throws them hard. He bangs with his drumsticks on the table. Thankfully Kyle chose a beautiful grain and type of wood that is very durable.

But I told Kyle the other day that he might as well just accept it, this coffee table is going to end up being our kids table and we might even end up getting little chairs to go with it b/c it really is the perfect height and size for a kid's table. He just shrugged his shoulders and said, "Probably so."

Oh how I love that our priorities have changed. Those little teeth scratches will someday bring joy to my heart!  He's going to grow up and get big and I'll quickly forget about these precious days that we have together, but I will cherish those little reminders around our home and on our furniture that he left behind. Tommy knows he has to leave his mark. And with his new brother or sister coming I'm sure there will be many more teeth marks, and probably even worse things, to mark that they've been here.



Fearfulness

One of my more apparent big weaknesses and sins is being overly fearful. I have struggled with this all of my life. Growing up I was constantly afraid of being home by myself and someone breaking into the house, or even if my parents were home, someone breaking in and hurting them and me being left alone not knowing what to do with a strange attacker coming after me. It sounds so weird to type that out, but I was seriously afraid. In fact one time, I think I was around 8th or 9th grade, I remember I was home sick during the day by myself (I clearly wasn't that sick or I wouldn't have been home by myself). My dad and mom both worked close to home and my dad would come check on me at lunch. Anyway we lived in what I think people refer to as a quad-level house. Most of the bedrooms were upstairs and the family room was downstairs - well I was in the family room watching TV and I heard a big bump noise upstairs. I knew it was an intruder. B/c logically an intruder would choose to get a ladder, climb on top of our porch roof, then somehow break into the window, and climb through to break into our house. (Before Kyle logic rarely entered my brain). No I knew someone had broken in, I heard it. So I sat completely still for a few minutes (probably really seconds) freaked myself out even more as time went on; grabbed the cordless phone, ran out the front door, called my dad and sat on the neighbor's front porch until my dad got there.

There was no intruder - the globe of my fan (the glass thing that covers the light bulb) and fallen off and rolled across the floor. I really didn't feel that silly either. After all something really did make the noise. There had been so many other times I'd gotten scared and worried but had no real reason other then psyching myself out.

Anyway my fearfulness continued and continues through out my life. It wasn't until a year or so that after Kyle and I were married that I recognized this as a sin. I was not trusting the Lord or His Word as to what or who it says I should fear. God does not say I should fear a crazy, scary, strong, killer man - He says I should fear Him. And He also says that if He is for me, then who is against me? So around that time I started finding verses and writing them down, I didn't really memorize them but memorized the main point of them. Also I remember one night when I was home by myself thinking, Satan doesn't have to even work at getting me to sin - I completely do it on my own. I scare myself, I need no help with that. And I also thought about how the Lord protected Paul while he was in prison, and I was scared being at home, in the free country I live, with the gun we're allowed to keep for protection. So very silly.

Well the Lord has been very kind to me and granted me grace to be able to handle with the fear of intruder breaking into our home. I still struggle with it from time to time but overall Kyle and I can both see the Lord's goodness to me in this.

But I've recently discovered that this fear has moved. Ever since I've had Tommy, I've had an outrageous fear of something happening to him - mainly in his sleep. I realize this sounds crazy - I'm just being honest with you. I have been so scared of SIDS, but really I've been scared of not having control over his safety. And then of course that means I am fearing b/c I'm not trusting the Lord. I fear the Lord will choose to take Tommy away from me. For a while I would go check on him every couple of hours while he slept to make sure he was breathing. But that resulted in waking him up sometimes and I had to learn to stop that. I would have tons of dreams right after he was born that I put him in bed with me and then I couldn't find him. I would wake up and have a wad of blankets cradled in my arms, thinking "this is too light to be Tommy!" And here's the thing I never put him in bed with us but for some reason my subconcious was overtaken by the thought. So recently I've been praying for the Lord to help me to trust Him more, and to change my mind to think of being grateful for the time I have with Tommy - with any of my loved ones for that matter.

This year has brought about a lot of loss, not necessarily for my family, but for many friends we know - there have been children who've passed, grandparents, parents, spouses. And it was actually another mom, who lost her three year old son, who helped me realize how backward my thoughts were. She didn't say anything to me directly, but it was her posts on facebook that spoke of their family's gratefulness of the time they had with him that really touched my heart. Sadly I thought, that wouldn't be my first thought - to thank the Lord for the time He gave me. I thought I would be thinking, "Why? We needed more time. We deserved more time." But that's not reality, God is good and He is sovereign, and it is a gift the time that we get with those we cherish.

I can already see some little ways the Lord has helped to change my way of thinking and to calm my irrational fears. And to think about enjoying and being thankful for each day I have with my family and friends who I love so much. I've wasted so much time fearing such frivilous and silly things; I'd rather rejoice in my time. I hope to rejoice in a great, sovereign God; an amazing growing family; and the many friends we are blessed to know.