Sunday, December 16, 2012

Heartache.


I know I'm not alone in being absolutely heartsick at the events that happened at Sandy Hook on Friday morning.  I cried several times Friday night and as I sang lullabies to my two little boys, snugged in big brothers bed, I couldn't stop the tears.  Ben asked me "you sad, mommy?" and I had to be honest and tell him I was a little bit.  When he asked me why, I told him I was just so very thankful for all I had.

We take a lot for granted in our lives.  We all assume there's going to be a tomorrow.  And you know, I think that's good.  I certainly wouldn't want to live like every day could be my last.  That sounds exhausting.  But I don't want to ever forget to tell my guys I love them.  And when I start to get frustrated because my nearly 3 year old clamps his lips tight so I can't get the toothbrush in and insists on swallowing that mouthful of toothpaste, instead of spitting it in the sink - I want to gently remind myself that he's just a little boy and there are so many parents out there that would gladly take a night time tooth brushing battle over the absence of their child.

I can't imagine how those parents feel.  I can't imagine hearing there's been a shooting at the school and racing down to gather my child close, breathe in the sweet smell from the top of their head and cry blissful tears of relief... only to not have that child greet you.  My heart breaks even thinking it.

I want to raise my boys with open minds and open hearts.
I hope my kids know it's okay to be different.
I hope my kids can be okay with not being cool, if it means they're still alive.
I hope they stand up for what's right and are mostly kind (because, let's be real: we're human, we're not kind all the time).
Saying 'please', 'thank you', 'I'm sorry' and 'I love you' are important phrases in our home.
Being respectful, even if we disagree.

And from my humble little slice of the internet, may the souls of those little babes and their brave teachers be at peace.  May their family find some measure of comfort in knowing the world mourns with them.  And may those lucky enough to still have our children, gather them close and show them they're loved.

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

4 Months!

So let's pretend this picture is of him looking very cute on the next calendar image for November, sintead of my dirty carpet.

Okay?

Because guess who completely let this slip by?  It's not like I forgot about it.  I kept remembering and then getting way too involved with other things and pushing this off to the back burner and the next thing I knew, he'd turned 5 months and it was too late to do it (and no, I haven't yet done it for 5 months... ugh).

Anyway, at Matthew's 4 month check up he weighed 14 lbs, 12 oz (which put him in the 48th percentile), he was 25" long (55th percentile) and his head was 42 cm (43rd percentile).

I kept thinking (and still do think) that he's SO BIG.

And then I went back on the old blog here and looked up Ben's 4 month stats.

Nearly identical.

Ben was 14 lbs, 6.3 oz (which was, oddly, the 53rd percentile) and 25.5" long (which was the 72nd percentile).  So funny how a few ounces or a half an inch can make such a huge difference on the growth chart...

Doctor gave the okay to start rice cereal but we decided to wait for now (I've actually started him on solids but I'll save that for the 5 month update I'll get around to posting some time next February, ha ha).

At 4 months, Matthew's favorite things:

  • Eating
  • watching Ben
  • Eating
  • smiling at everything
  • being cuddled
He dislikes:
  • the car seat, still
  • being swaddled
  • tummy time
He can roll from back to tummy and back again but he doesn't do it often.  

And that's it!  


Halloween!

So let's pretend that I'm not blogging about something that happened over a month ago.... ;)

Halloween kicked off the start of the crazies at our house.  First, we had the trunk or treat I organized for my mommy group.  It turned out so much cooler than I could have imagined - the mom's that donated their trunks did such amazing jobs.

And here begins the craziness.  The day of our trunk or treat, I received a phone call from the hospital saying they had my grandma as a patient - she'd fallen earlier in the day and broken her hip.  She was due to go in for surgery in a few hours and the nurse finally convinced my granny that some one (family) should be there for her.  This made me late to the trunk or treat (my own event - UGH) and because of my panic/stress over granny, being late and frustrated with myself, my mood was less than ideal.  Ben must have picked up on that because we only got to stay for the event for like 15-20 minutes before we entered melt down and multiple time outs.  And this started our downward spiral of the yucky behavior we'd nearly gotten rid of back in April.

Anyway, I dressed by boys in matching costumes.  Instead of going to the consignment store and getting a barely used costume for $5, I went to Target and was looking at their $20+ costumes and I could not make myself pay $30 for a really poorly constructed, nearly sheer costume tat would surely be ruined by the end of Halloween.  Since I needed Ben in his costumes for about 4 events, I wanted something that would last.  I discovered Ben could still wear the fluff, designed for babies costumes (they went up to size 2T, I think, but he was able to fit in it, so it's a generous 2T).  I decided I'd rather pay $20 on a fluffy costume that would keep him warm and last through multiple events than $20 on a cruddy one.  So Ben was a monkey and his little brother was his banana.


We went trick our treating in our subdivision.  Ben had so much fun.  He said "trick or treat" and "thank you" at each door, loved ringing the bell and only got scared/worried at a few houses.  We just did our best to remind him that it's just decorations and none of it was real and that seemed to help a little.  He was super accepting that his bucket of candy went up on top of the fridge and he could only have a little bit of candy each day.  We're still working on it.  ;)  I'd wager 30-40% of his candy got dumped into our candy bucket and the rest he's been getting a piece each every other day or so (basically as he asks) since.

And that was our Halloween!  You know, over a month later... ;)