CLICK HERE FOR FREE BLOG LAYOUTS, LINK BUTTONS AND MORE! »

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

And she's off...

Mom always told us we were growing up too fast. I laughed at her. Now, I laugh at me....I can't believe the changes that happen OVERNIGHT now with Miriam. Just 7 days ago, she wasn't rolling, sitting, and surely not crawling. Look from the videos below that indeed, Miriam is growing up too fast (and beating some of her developmental goals from being preemie, etc)!!

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Happy day and sad day...

 Happy Fathers Day to some of the great men in my life.  It's been a fun day celebrating with Jeremy (the best father to Miriam in the world!) and with TriPaw (J's dad). Unfortunately, it's one of 3 days I haven't celebrated with my dad in all entirety  of Father's Day, but I made sure he knew he was loved from afar!
And Miriam, well, she tells it like it is:


In other news, I've been kind of an emotional basketcase these last days. Within the past 6 days, Miriam has learned to sit up, roll over, pull up, stand up and army crawl a few feet. I've been cleaning and packing away the bagillion burp clothes that were attached to us for the first 6 months of her life, the bottles that she used on countless nights because of meetings at the church, and the pacis that she has little interest in now. I've changed out the clothes for seasons and sizes and have packed up over 10 boxes of the cutest girl clothes ever! I've cleaned a nursing bra and put it away, and now, with less than 3 weeks til the big celebration day, I'll be packing up the others soon (I'll no longer be subject to white bras!!!).  Snack time now consists of cheerios, strawberries, ritz crackers and blueberry waffles.  She knows how to talk, give high fives, "praise the Lord" and blow kisses.  All of this means, that our baby is not a baby anymore, and this makes me so sad. I'm ready to do it all over again -  I didn't soak it in enough the first time....

Saturday, June 11, 2011

your last MONTH-day!

Doodle bug,
I can't believe that we celebrated your last month day yesterday! We have been trying to soak in every second of you and your new tricks and skills but it's getting harder to keep up with you and everything you're learning each day. Since your last month day, there have been MANY changes!
 - You now have 2 full teeth, the front two "downstairs" - you love the Dr. Seuss Tooth Book and I'm sure more teeth are just around the corner! However, you manage pretty well to eat all sorts of foods with your gums!

Proof that you do have teeth afterall!

 - You really don't not like many foods, but some of your favorites these days have been nutrigrain blueberry bagels and yogurt, sweet potatoes, goldfish, and circle crackers.
 - now that you can stand up, you love to be on your feet at any and all times
 - You love duckie, bathtime, playing paticake, and listening to mommy play the violin
 - Lately, you've been expanding your vocabulary to include: "dada," "nana," "chicken," "paci," "duckie," "milk," and "all done"
 - You had your first trip to the zoo on Memorial Day and you loved it! Your favorites were the elephants, the koala, and the farm.
 - For the first time you saw some real baby chicks (which I'm pretty sure you thought were ducks), and you LOVED it! Almost so much that mommy almost bought one just so you could see a live "duckie"
 - You have been gaining more experience at meal and snack times lately. We're starting to move away from the pureed stuff and you like feeding yourself. I'm really surprised that you like corn, sweet potatoes, and beef (3 things that mommy DOES NOT eat!)
 - You have finally started rolling, but you still only roll using one side. We're practicing on sitting up, and rolling the other way - before we know it, you'll be crawling! (and thanks for Virginia and our help through Baby Net, you'll be getting lots of practice in the coming months!)

I think I like this rolling thing...
  - We've been teaching new things and you've gotten pretty good at them: 1 - you still use a paci for nap time and bed time, but as soon as it's time to get up, all we do is tell you to leave paci in your crib and you take it out and lay it down for safe keeping. 2 - In the car you always have to have your set of keys or, guess what, a duckie as your companion. But you know that when the car stops and it's time to get out, you have to leave your toy in the cup holder so it's there for the next car trip.3 - saying hello and byebye with gestures is coming along, and you're really starting to wave!

- You now understand a lot of the sign language that we've been teaching you: all done, more, milk, yes, please, thank you. I bet you'll be signing back to us sooner than we think!
 - You have absolutely NO social problems, other than you're the new social butterfly on the block. You get it honest :)
I can't believe that month 10 was filled with so much and that we only have one more month until your birthday. If I could bottle up any of the last 10 months, I so would, so that we could remember each and everything about you. You're teaching us what it means to love and how love can grow exponentially in seconds. Your teaching us what it means to be patient, gentle, and positive in all circumstances. You are a gift from God to us, and we praise him for your life!

Mommy's yoga partner

 

 

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Memories

“Nothing revives the past so completely as a smell that was once associated with it.” Nabokov

The past few weeks have been changing our world upside down but the most change happened on May 21. No, the world didn't end, nor did I think it was going to, sort of, but dad got married. I never would have imagined ever in my life that I would have witnessed that with him (or mom for that matter).  It was a difficult weekend to say the least, but wasn't nearly as hard/awkward as I thought it would have been.  After mom passed, we accepted the thought of dad remarrying as a reality - NO WAY could that man be happy living alone. But his happiness and that reality didn't make things any easier. It's the fact that dad remarried because his wife died. It's that simple to understand. The reason my dad was getting married that day was because my mom was dead.

Since his wedding, they've decided to live in her home while it's on the market, get rid of most of the furniture in his home and begin renovations of sorts, so they can make their new life together in the house I grew up in.  So, my sister (who so conveniently was moving into a new home) ransacked the house on Tuesday and left the great room practically empty, with the exception of a quaint little corner cabinet that housed some of my mothers most precious collectibles - her Santa Clauses.

Mom began collecting Santa Clauses several years back,in the late 90s, and she had them in all shapes, sizes, looks, and prices. Each Thanksgiving/Christmas, she'd get at least one, if not 2 (or 3!) from dad, or my sister, or me. In the later years, she began finding the Jim Shore santas (his step-daughter's husband worked with my mom) and getting them signed by him. From that, I developed my own stash of Santas since J and I have been married and on mom's death bed, she offered me whichever Santas I so desired.

So today, I treked over there with Miriam (only her 3rd visit there) and walked into an quiet and empty house.  As soon as the door creeked open, I smelled my house, the house smell I knew and was so familiar with for 20 years of my life. It was like the flood gates opened and, with Miriam in my arms, I wept.

Knowing I was there to collect the santas and wait on the arrival of my MIL to see about taking another piece of furniture, I composed myself and headed towards the santas, but checked out a picture of mom and dad from a few Christmases back, the first one that she was sick (07) and took it to Miriam and let her stare at it. She was perplexed at first, but then slyly looked up at me and gave me her cheese-ball grin like she knew exactly who the woman was (and then I wept some more).

I finally made my way back to the santas, and racked up with all 6 large santas, and 3 miniature ones, and an angel snow globe that serenaded us while I wept even more.  That corner cabinet and those Santas had "the smell" etched in them and as each one came off the shelf, I whiffed in the aromas of my past as if it was today's reality and missed mom's life lessons more than ever.