The Growing Belly - Volume II, Part III

I feel huge. That's all there is to it right now. I feel bigger than I did last time. But the scale at the doctor's office today indicates that I am right on track compared to my pregnancy with Sam. I don't know, take a look at these pictures and let me know what you think - I am bigger now than I was then? I am a whole 3 days farther along today than I was in the first round of pictures...I am 33 weeks and 6 days here:
So that means we have 6 weeks left until my due date. Yikes! This entire pregnancy is absolutely flying by. I've made a long to-do list and we are, in fact, making progress on it. The crib is in place, a new dresser purchased and the gender-neutral clothes have been washed and put away. We still need to install the car seat, put all the "equipment" back together, pack bags, etc etc etc. Some days I feel very overwhelmed, but I am motivated to get it all done. I want to spend my last few weeks going out on mommy-son dates with my boy before its too hard for us to get out of the house anymore!

Babies

Over the last few weeks we've started to put some real thought and effort into preparing Sam mentally for the pending arrival of his new sibling. We got some books from the library, practiced holding Elmo, talked about what babies like and don't like, etc.

So you can imagine my swelling mama heart when I walked into the childcare room to pick-up Sam from the gym and saw this:


He was just sitting there with her. No adults around, the other kids running wild around the room. I sat down next to him and asked what he was doing. "I'm holding the baby's hand." A minute later, "I'm not ready to go, I'm still sitting with her." And then he went and grabbed a stuffed duck. Earlier in the week we talked about how babies only like to play with soft toys. And a minute later our scene looked like this:

After the animals, he went back to holding her hand. When I finally convinced him it was time to go he told the baby goodbye and promised they would play again next time. I am so encouraged that this Big Brother is really taking ownership of his role! I pray that this enthusiasm continues when the real thing arrives in just about 8 weeks!

School Picture

Isn't he a cutie?!

Big Brother Prep

When I found out that I was pregnant last summer, a whole slew of to-do's whirled through my head. Among them were the ways that we would need to prepare Sam for our new arrival. There would be the emotional preparations, of course, but I also came up with three practical, tangible changes that would need to happen in his life before our family would be ready for baby: transition to big boy bed, potty training, and kicking the paci habit. Not going to lie, I was nervous about all three. Mostly because I have heard my share of horror stories relating to them all, especially boys and potty training. But I had to give it all a shot...so we set out.

1. Shortly after Sam started school in the fall we decided to make the transition to the big boy bed. We got took the front off of Sam's crib, got the toddler rail out of the attic and set about bolting it onto the bed. And that's when we realized that Babies R Us shipped us the wrong rail...months and months ago. After a small fight with the store, we had the correct rail about two weeks later and we put it on right away. And you know what? After being told once to stay in bed when we left the room, Sam stayed did just that. He went an entire week before even trying to get out at naptime, and he only tried that twice. Since day one he has called for us to come get him when he wakes before setting a toe on the ground. He LOVED the freedom of getting in and out himself. He even respected the "paci lives in the bed" rule and would climb in and out when he wanted that comfort item. To my shock and delight, it was a seamless transition!

2. I gave y'all a good bit of detail on the potty training front when we started in November. Well, as of now I will PROUDLY proclaim that my son is completely potty trained. In fact, he now earns his rewards for completing the entire process all by himself. He has had two accidents of any kind in the last 5 weeks. I was more anxious about this one than anything else. Our success is proof of the power of prayer. I am enjoying my 4.5 month hiatus from diapers.

3. We saved that paci removal for last. I thought that he would need that security item to make it through the other two, and it turns out I was right. But I had absolutely no idea how I was going to accomplish this one. I'd been given a few ideas, ranging from trickery to reasoning, and just couldn't decide which way to go. But I new that if we didn't get it done before baby arrived - likely with paci of his/her own - than it might be another year before we could get it done. We were down to one paci (I've since found the others, go figure), and it was well-loved. So well-loved, that something started to happen. While we were living in two places, the nipple of the paci started to rip due to his habit of biting plastic items. Slowly, slowly the rip got bigger. Sam told us that it was broken, but we just handed it back to him and sent him off to bed. We began to notice that he wasn't sucking it as much in bed, half the time he just held it in his hand. And then, halfway through our Christmas trip to Florida, we realized that paci had been sitting on a bedside table and Sam had not touched it in three days. I put it in my purse and he has not mentioned it since. Slowly, slowly, Sam self-weaned himself from his Paci. Now I'm not going to lie, there are plenty of replacements in the bed - so many things go to sleep with him that there is literally barely room for him in the bed. And we have had a few issues with calling for us in the night and waking earlier in the morning, but they seem to be lessening and I find them to be totally worth it for the sake of this transition.

So there you go. We were blessed with three relatively painless transitions, and in a matter of months there is basically no baby left in our boy. Its sad, in a way, to realize how much he is growing up. But at the same time, I am so in love with the boy that he is right now. He has so much personality, is mostly so sweet, and makes us laugh so much.

He is also growing more and more interested in the baby. He has asked repeatedly over the past week if the baby is coming out now. He talks about holding the baby. Today he kissed my tummy and put his mouth up to it to say "Hi" to the baby. Then sat down next to me so that he could sit with the baby. Makes my heart happy. Now, I am under no illusions that it will all be lovey when baby comes home, but I am encouraged that he is going into it with a willing heart.

Sam's First Prayer

Last night at dinner Chris asked us all to fold our hands and he started to say Grace. Sam quickly stopped him and said that he would pray. It went like this:

"Dear Jesus, help us drive safe. Amen."

A lovely prayer, and a valid request. Out of context? Yup. It was wonderful to listen to him pray independently for the first time. We praised him, and then advised him to try again by thanking Jesus for our food and our day. Which he did successfully.

So maybe he is just repeating prayers he's heard in the past, but its a step, right? So we talked again about how prayer is talking to Jesus, and what that means. I can't wait to watch his faith grow!

Christmas 2011

Christmas with a 2 year old is fun. There's no other way about it. But let's start at the beginning.

This year it was Christmas in Florida. This was our first drive all the way to Sarasota, and it really wasn't bad at all. The DVD player was a huge help in overcoming the afternoon restless period, even if the video selection left something to be desired for the adult ears.

Anywho, we arrived early on the 22nd, which allowed us a few days to finish up our preparations and celebrate a bit. I took a nap shortly after we arrived and awoke - 4 hours after we arrived - to find my son in the pool. He wastes no time, and cares not that it was only 70-something degrees out, a whole 30 degrees colder than when we went swimming last. We hit up a psychedelic light display at a local church, did some wrapping, some grocery shopping. On Christmas Eve we celebrated Great Grandma's (Debbie's Mom) birthday in the afternoon before heading off to church in the early evening.**

Afterward we read the Christmas story from the bible, donned our Christmas jammies, listened to "The Night Before Christmas" as read by Gammi and Papa (thanks to recordable storybooks!) and tucked the boy into bed. We also explained to Sam what was going to happen in the morning: Santa will leave your stocking by the bed, we'll open it on Mommy's bed and get some presents, then head out to the Christmas tree to open even more more presents!" He looked at me and said, "Seriously?!" So cute!

I made Cheese Soup, a tradition in my family, and then we got to work assembling. We were done in 30 minutes. I have faith that our Christmas Eve assembly will not be that quick again for another 15 years.

After experiencing Sam's first night terror around 1am, I was worried that our morning would be ruined. But it was quite the opposite. He was stoked about every single item he pulled out of his stocking, alternating between wanting to play with everything and wanted to see what else was in there. And yes, he started on the candy before 8am.

When we headed out to the living room he started playing with his new basketball hoop right away! Then we all - Grammy, Papa, Mommy, Daddy, Aunt Becky, almost-Uncle Benton and Sam - sat down for what turned out to be almost 3 hours of gift opening! There were many great gifts exchanged, including a new iPad for Mommy! Once again, Sam did not finish with his packages in the morning, there's just too much to play with! And at the end we pulled out the new trampoline from Gammi and Papa and the boy jumped so much he was out of breath!

After nap we paid the price for feeding him candy and cinammon rolls all day, but once we arrived at the big family gathering we were all back to better spirits. Oh how that boy loved playing with the big kids! It was great to see everyone.

The days that followed were relaxing and lovely. Sam had an endless supply of playmates, Chris and I got to go out on a date, Chris got to go golfing, we visited Great Grandma again, we hit up a great park, etc. Sam consumed more candy than he should have in 6 weeks. We actually ended up staying a day longer than planned!

We brought home way more than we took there, but my engineer husband got it all in while still being about to see out of part of the back window! We made great time on the way back and arrived to a very cold house (we didn't need heat when we left 10 days earlier) at 4:30 am. All 3 of us climbed into the big bed, with space heater right next to us, and slept until 7:30! With that three hour nap in a real bed, the adults felt the best we ever have after an all-night drive.

We used our last few days of vacation to work on organizing Sam's new bounty - easier said than done - and beginning to plan out what baby preparations need to be made. Chris is back to work today, but it feel strangely ok to be getting back into a normal routine. It really was a wonderful Christmas!

**I cannot wait for the year we get to worship at our own church on Christmas Eve. I miss the service structure, the liturgy, and the wonderful music. I love that we budget for a full ensemble - brass and all - to celebrate both Christ's birth and resurrection! Most of all, I miss the opportunity to sing "Joy to the World" the way it was written, without being re-mixed with something trying to sound like pop music. Blah."