School's Out For Summer

Whew! What a busy week! I'll just touch on some of the highlights...

Aunt Hay graduated from High School this week and we had so much fun watching Aunt Hay "officially" become an adult. Nana did a great job running the ceremony (she is HS principal) and we all had a blast seeing friends, family and loved ones.

On Tuesday Little Man had his "4 month" visit and we've been instructed to begin adding vegetables to his diet. Little Man is already taking a LOT of rice cereal twice a day (and sleeping 8 hours at night ... H-A-L-L-E-L-U-J-A-H) and will start sweet potatoes (daddy's favorite) on Saturday.

Yesterday was the last day of Little Man's Mother's Day Out Program and the official mark of summer and so we are headed to Florida for our first FULL family vacation. Woooohoooo

Wiggle Worm

So we've r-e-a-l-l-y been trying to help Little Man strengthen his back muscles through the exercises that the doctor gave us but he has really strong legs and is such a wiggle worm that we aren't making much progress. Here is this morning's attempt at tummy time.

Before....

After...

And after that...

Yes, he went OVER the boppy...don't ask me how, I have no idea.

Happy Birthday To Me

Yesterday was my 27th birthday. I am generally the type of person who prefers people not to know when my birthday is just because it is so awkward...ok, I know I have issues. My husband, on the other hand, is the exact opposite. Trav LOVES birthdays (especially his own) and would shout from the rooftop if he could; planning birthday parties for him are a lot of fun because every year he turns 5. This year he was very sneaky and took off work early to drive home, sneak in the house, steal my keys and security card so that he could get into my office, decorate it, and get back home before he was supposed to pick up Little Man. To top it off, he asked my boss's permission first (for those of you who know what a rule-follower I am sure you can fully appreciate what this meant to me). That night Travis cooked my birthday dinner at my parents house and then they watched Little Man while Trav and I went on a mini date to the gym (my choice...we never get to work out together). It was a wonderful birthday.

Learning Curve

Travis and I have been implementing some of the directed play suggested to us by the pediatrician and have been having a lot of fun with it. Some of it is so easy that it makes me feel stupid but for the most part I am amazed at how much more stimulated Little Man is by the additions. Since Little Man started rolling over when he was 3 months old, any time we put him on his tummy he rolls right onto his back, making his tummy time very short. We added wax paper to the equation (left) and suddenly his tummy time stretches as long as 20 minutes. Who thinks of this stuff?? To increase the amount of time on his tummy even more, we have been helping him spend some time on his knees either up against one of our legs or on a boppy. It is amazing to see how much the simple changes have changed his interest and interaction.

This afternoon Travis was invited to Little Man's Mother Day Out Program to do a fire presentation for the kiddos. I think the kids were really scared of him at first because all that gear is pretty intimidating but after a few minutes of questions they were all inching forward to be close to him. Little Man and I were so proud of daddy and took lots of pictures of him in his gear.

Straight On Til Morning

Tonight Aunt Hay and her classmates took us on a much needed trip to Never Neverland for their Senior Play, Peter Pan. It was Little Man's first theatrical experience and he had a blast following along for the entire 40 minutes. Because Aunt Hay's class is so small, many of them to had to play double roles and Haylo was cast as both the storyteller and a Lost Boy. All in all the play was a lot of fun with a lot of very funny moments. My favorite was when all of the "Lost Boys" (played by high school girls) screamed their warcry...I am sure you can imagine just how shrill that was...and Little Man was so shocked by the sound that he screamed and cried in return. After a short recovery period, in the hall, we were back to enjoy the remainder of the play. The whole experience was a lot of fun and it seems that our Little Man is becoming quite the Little Renaissance Man. Look how intensely he is watching the play!

We met with the developmental pediatrician this afternoon and were very discouraged by her assessment. Although Little Man has been charting as a 5-month-old as far as height and weight are concerned, developmentally he is charting like a 3-month-old (apparently the developmental milestones that our regular pediatrician is "counting" aren't consistent enough to contribute). It isn't of great concern right now because he is still so young that the delay won't have any major affects on him but the pediatrician made it pretty clear that we are not doing our part to help him develop. We left feeling pretty crummy knowing that we could have been helping our Little Man close the gap and that if we are going to help him avoid OT/ECI we are going to have to be much more intentional about our time with him.

Mother's Day 101

Today was such a special day; not only was it my first Mother's Day, it was Baby Dedication Day at our church.

The church service was wonderful and only made better by the dedication ceremony. It was special to celebrate all of the new babies born to our church in the past year (more than 15 in all) and to know that Little Man will be growing up with the babies celebrated today. Little Man slept through the ceremony but was all smiles when we stopped by Grandma Fletta's house after church.

As if the day weren't perfect already, we joined Nana, Pop, Uncle Bud, and Aunt Hay for a Mother's Day lunch with Meme and Papa. It was wonderful because Daddy and Pop made lunch and Uncle Bud handled all the clean-up! It was so nice to hang out with the family; Little Man is so blessed to be able to snuggle 5 of his grandparents in one day!

After lunch, Little Man and I took a nice long Sunday afternoon nap together on Nana and Pop's comfy couch (daddy snapped a picture just before Little Man dozed off).

Tonight I started thinking about the challenge of raising a man of God in a world that will work against me at every turn. I thought about the relatives, friends and church members who will have an impact on the man he will become and suddenly I was overwhelmed with the sense of blessing that comes from hearing men and women of God verbally commit to supporting us in the journey. I don't know if I'll get the chance to reap the fruit of the seeds sowed in my son's life, I just pray that the decisions we make will bring forth blessing.

"Remind me of this with every decision.
Generations will reap what I sow.
I can pass on a curse or a blessing to those I will never know."
Sara Groves, Generations

And The Award Goes To...

Ok, so I am not going to win the Mommy Of The Year Award... I am ok with that.

When Travis and I first got married we made a promise to never have a television in our bedroom. When Little Man first joined our family we made a vow not to spend our evenings comatose in front of the den television so we dutifully got rid of cable and my beloved tivo. Our evenings have been so much more enriching without the constant noise and we are hoping to spend the extra time making the most of God's green earth. Really the only thing I miss about cable and tivo is "Lost". Fortunately, Nana and Pop did not get rid of cable or Tivo so when Little Man and I spend the night with them (when Trav is on shift) I catch up on that week's episode. It is really the only time that Little Man gets to watch television (which I know is horrible for kids under 2 years of age...please spare me the lecture) but boy does he enjoy it! As you can see, he can't believe that Ana Lucia and Libby were shot. He has also been known to talk back to the television (don't you hate it when people do that?) and yesterday it sounded like he responded to a question with "Ok".

Catch Me If You Can

Little Man will be 5 months old this week and will have his 4 month old checkup next week (weird, I know). We've been a little concerned for the past couple of weeks because Little Man is right on track developmentally for his age except in one area; hand coordination. Up until about a week ago, Little Man had tightly closed fists at all times and would only "hold" things if we put it in his hand. The doctor said that at some point he would just open up his hands and would then start grasping, playing, and putting things in his mouth. Even though his hands have been "open" for a week, he had yet to have any interest in touching, grasping or holding until this morning when he not only grabbed for a link-a-do, he pulled it to his mouth! I know this probably isn't a big deal for most but for us it was a BIG DEAL because he meets with the developmental specialist on Monday to determine if he will need Early Childhood Intervention (ECI).

These Arms Of Mine

I have such fun memories of Saturday mornings when all 6 of us would pile up in mom and dad's bed and just snuggle and giggle until it became so crowded that the 'rents would flee for some personal space. Although technically I only have one child, our Chihuahua, Daisy, honestly believes she is my two-year-old little girl and while fiercely protective of Little Man also suffers from a severe case of the green-eyed-monster "jealousy". My arms are so full of snuggles right now I have a tough time imagining all the love I will be able to hold when our family expands later on in life.

California Dreamin'

We just returned from a marvelous trip to California for the Pepperdine Lectures. Our good friend Tim Spivey presented the opening night lecture and Nana and I were honored to be a part of our church's representative praise team. Not only did we get to meet up with some of our good friends and relatives, Little Man had a bunch of new and fun experiences.


It began with his very first plane ride with Mommy, Daddy, Nana and the praise team. Little Man slept for most of the trip and didn't cry one single time! Little Man and I had to fly back by ourselves and although he fussed when we first got on the plane, he slept peacefully the whole three hours home. We were very fortunate to be seated next to a very nice lady who helped mommy throughout the trip.

Mommy's good friend Eva and her youngest son came out to see one of the Praise Team's performances and then stayed and had breakfast with us. I haven't seen Eva in over a year so it was really nice to see her and finally hold her little guy. Little Man had a lot of fun making a new friend.

The next day we made an inpromptu trip to the Getty Museum in between some of our performances. Little Man took a ride in the baby bjorn and had so much fun looking at all the bright colors of the paintings. He was so interested in the Italian paintings most likely for all of the bright colors but Mommy's favorite was "Noah's Ark" by Jan Brueghel the Elder.

The next day Auntie Nicky and Cousin Trey came to hang out with us in between performances. We all made a trip to a hamburger place in Santa Monica called "The Counter" for GQ's #15 burger on the "20 Hamburgers You Must Have Before You Die" list. Little Man had a lot of fun hanging out with his cousin and we had lots of opportunities to get some good pictures of the boys as they hung out together.

Since gas prices are outrageous (even more so in California) we crammed both boys into the car (and Nana and Aunt Nicky in the backseat) and they had a wonderful time riding along together. Trey seemed mesmerized by Little Man and at one point reached out and held his hand as he slept in his carseat.

That night we all met up with Uncle Troy and Grandpa Block at El Torrito for dinner. We got to take lots of pictures of the Block boys (minus Trid) then the girls took the opportunity to eat dinner uninterrupted while the daddies took care of the babies.

Daddy left for the airport the next morning so he could take a fire test but Mommy and Little Man stayed later and spent the night with Aunt Nicky and Uncle Troy. We had lots of fun hanging out with Cousin Trey and took the opportunity to take lots of great photos. Mommy and Aunt Nicky had a good ol' fashion slumber party complete with a marathon viewing of the first season of Grey's Anatomy.

The next morning we all got up and had breakfast at Roman's before heading out to the airport for the trip home. It was such a fun weekend and now that we know Little Man travels well we will have to start taking more trips!

Movin' On Up

Little Man has decided that he is a big boy now. It began this weekend on our trip to California; midway through the flight he decided he didn't want to lay in Mommy's arms anymore and would arch his back and try to sit forward. After the third or fourth time Mommy finally caught on and set him up in her lap. Sunday Little Man threw a fit when Nana tried to snuggle him like a baby because he wanted to sit up in her lap. Since he still doesn't quite have the trunk control to sit like he thinks he wants to, we brought out the bumbo chair and he is hooked! We thought after about 10 minutes that he might be getting tired of the work it takes to keep that rather large noggin sitting up straight but when we tried to take him out he cried. Guess Little Man is movin' on up!

On Solid Ground

For the past few days my Little Man has become insatiable. No amount of nursing or supplementing with bottle seems to fill that little tummy. Last night I realized that he has been eating every two hours instead of the normal 3-4 and we decided to give the doctor a call...the answer? Time to start solids! Ever the skeptic, I began researching when was the best time to introduce solids and if the "magical age" was different for preemies, etc. It turns out that each baby is different and will "tell" you when it is time to start eating big boy food. Little Man was more than ready to get started and once he got one taste of that malt-o-meal like rice cereal he was hooked. By the second spoonful he was opening his mouth like a little bird in anticipation. Apparently rice cereal is also very funny because he laughed over and over again in between bites. And yes, my little man is licking his bib, guess that cereal is yummy!

One Tooth At A Time

It seems that our Little Man is teething. We thought at first that the low grade fever was left over from the "kiddie crud" that had hit our family but now that doctor says he is over the crud, the fever remains. At first I couldn't believe he could really be teething because even though he is "technically" 4 months old (when I first cut a tooth), he should really only be 2 1/2 months old. Now I can't deny the appearance of the little bud on his upper gum, the excess drool, loose stools (sorry guys) or the constant knawing on e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g!