Happy 5th birthday, our beautiful Elijah!

It is nearly impossible to believe that it has been five years since our beautiful oldest boy was born. I remember so vividly the night before Elijah's birth. I had been to a particularly difficult doctor's visit that day. Every doctor's visit was difficult, but this was a tough one. A doctor sat us down and "prepared" Dan and me for the worst-case scenario. She told us that there was a possibility that our baby would either die in my womb or die once he was born. Dan and I got home from that appointment and went straight to bed. I laid in his arms and cried myself to sleep. I remember PLEADING with God. I asked him to please just allow us to be "done" with that particular chapter. If our baby was going to go to heaven right away, fine, please take him! I couldn't take the wondering any longer.

As a total answer to my prayer, literally a few hours later (and exactly five years ago today), Elijah let us know that he was ready to leave my belly. The next few hours were such a strange mixture of excitement and fear and joy and anxiety. We honestly had no idea what to expect. That first day of his life was a crazy wild ride.

And you all know the gist of the rest of the story. We have experienced the journey of a lifetime together, but we are all ok. Our strong and steadfast little boy is just this amazing (strong-willed) little person, and we have managed to come out on the other side intact and stronger than ever. I cannot even put into words how proud I am of Elijah. His strength inspires me!

Elijah, we love you so very much! Happy happy happy birthday, my dear boy. Here's to many more years!



Growing up, my mom always made a big deal out of birthdays. It wasn't necessarily gifts that made me happy, but I always loved feeling special on MY day. I believe that is an important thing for every child to feel on their special day. And so we try to do this very thing for our boys.



We had a special party for Elijah yesterday. I'm telling you, there is NOTHING better in this entire world than seeing your child's face genuinely happy. Every year when we sing Happy Birthday to Elijah, there is a moment when I see pure joy on his face and it makes me so happy I want to cry.



After thoroughly enjoying his party yesterday, we continued to celebrate his actual birthday today. We started the day off with a trip to the zoo (no school today on President's Day, perfect!), and then Dan and I made a delicious chocolate chip-blueberry pancake lunch. For dinner we took a special trip to Applebee's, where I once again got to see the happy face as people sang the Happy Birthday song to him. I won't lie, I had to fight HARD to hold back those tears. I had the thought, I refuse to cry in Applebee's over a birthday song! :) It was tough, though!



For some reason, five years has really made me look back and understand what we have to be thankful for. Five years ago, I would have been beyond happy to know that THIS is where we are today. I am incredibly grateful that everything has fallen into place the way it has. I am even grateful for the tough times because it has shaped who we all are as individuals, and who we are as a family. And I do adore our little family!



This is such a unique time in our lives, with me being home with our boys and Dan not working crazy hours (yet). We are doing our best to take advantage of the time that we have together because for a good chunk of the year "time together" is not something we can claim we have much of. Later in the week we are going to surprise the boys with a trip to a big local water park for a day and night of happy-face fun! I am 100% sure that I am more excited than anyone else in this family (maybe except for Elijah). I love seeing happy faces on my boys!

(Here's that happy face I speak of!)



That's about all we have for now! Enjoy the rest of the photos and thanks for checking in.

Sammy's first haircut!

I can't believe what a big boy our Sammy is! We brought him in for his first official haircut today, and he did not blink an eye. We totally expected flailing and screaming (due to certain experiences with a certain other little boy in our house). He sat emotionless for the entire cut! Unbelievable. He is such a chill little guy, unless he wants food or cannot get a marker cap on the marker by himself.



All day Dan and I have been commenting on how different he looks. Our baby is growing up!



I thought this was super funny. In Target, he was putting his sticker on his eye, like his brother does when he has to wear his eye patch. :)



Tomorrow is Elijah's birthday celebration at our house. We are all excited about it! And Monday is his birthday. It is so much fun making birthdays special for my boys.

Potty time

Our sweet little Sammy has been sick again. It started out as a fever, then moved onto goopy snot and now has become a cough. I don't like it when my babies are sick!



Sam and Elijah spent the night with their auntie, uncle and cousin last weekend and had a blast! Elijah has asked me five thousand times when he can go back to Auntie Lissa's house. It's a fun place!



I am starting to think that we are perhaps the most frustrated parents on the planet, as we continue to try so hard to get our almost-five-year-old potty trained. Elijah turns FIVE next week, and he still continues to win the potty battle. Honestly, we have tried everything. Praises, rewards, giving him more control, trying to have total control ourselves. Nothing works! He knows how to go, and he does use the potty, but not consistently. Just yesterday I found him with a TOTALLY wet pair of underpants as if we were just starting this whole process. It is so terribly frustrating! But here is what we know about Mr. Elijah. He has one heck of a strong will, and he does EVERYTHING in his own time. I did some internet perusing and I am glad to know we are not the only ones, but it is still very very very frustrating.

Sammy is such a little man these days. He has been showing signs of potty-training readiness, so we will begin that process soon. I told Dan last summer that he would be trained before Elijah, and now it's looking like that could happen! Crazy!

I will end on a funny note! Elijah has always loved silly nonsense words, and he comes up with the most clever things to say. I wrote down a few of his silly words over the past week or so:

His nose was bothering him, so he rubbed it and said, "MOM! My nose is snopply!"

He got the back of his leg pinched on his potty chair, and said, "My leg got twinkled!"

He was having a hard time getting a page in a book to turn, so he said, "My page is tuuuurging!"

Mama llama tears

Cutie pie bath boys!



And here are a few photos from our night with cousin Kaleigh last weekend! The boys had so much fun having her over. She taught Elijah how to play hide-and-seek, we had pizza-movie night and we even went to the zoo! We can't wait to have her back soon!



Notice the cute bunnies perched on the back of our couch? That is the Rabbit family. My mom hand-knitted those for the boys. Aren't they adorable?



It seems nearly impossible that it is well into February already. We are still in the process of figuring out our "new life," and making some important decisions. It's a bit stressful at times, but mostly I feel liberated. I feel like there are exciting things in store for our family.

Isn't this little Sammy just the sweetest thing? I could squeeze and hug on this boy all day long. And sometimes I do! Thankfully he allows it. I love this little snuggle man.



I went on a field trip today with Elijah and his preschool class. We saw the play Llama Llama Red Pajama, which is based on a book that we happen to love. It was a super cute play. Every field trip I have been on with Elijah has been nothing but enjoyable. That one-on-one time is so super special to me. He even did the customary fall-asleep-on-Mama-on-the-bus-ride-home, which I adore. When we first got on the bus this morning, I saw a teacher that I hadn't seen since Elijah was a baby. She used to come to our house for physical therapy back during the time when he was extremely delayed and cried through every single PT session. When I saw her today, she pointed at Elijah and said, "It is unbelievable how far he has come!" I scooted into our bus seat and cried. Sometimes I forget. When I'm experiencing day after day after day of defiance and sass and poop, it is embarrassingly easy to forget. He has overcome so very much. You know that strong will I speak of often? That same strong will is what has helped to get him where he is today! He is one determined and willful little person, and there is a ton of GOOD in that. Please remind me of this when I'm complaining! :)

I have a ton of work to catch up on for my food blog (thanks to our Super Bowl snacks!), so I must go do that! Thanks for checking in on us!

Croup: Season 4, Round 6 (Elijah)

Elijah had two bad croup episodes in the middle of the night last night. We had to use two epi nebs (six hours apart) and give one dose of oral steroids. They were a little bit scarier than his past few episodes, but everything turned out just fine. He even had a little throw-up session, which is unusual for him. The doctor we saw today wants us to continue with the oral steroids twice/day for three days. Today he was back to dishing out the sass!

Speaking of sass, here are few gems from the past few days. Elijah is getting WAY too clever..

He has started pointing his finger at Dan and me when he's in sassy mode. I always let him know that it is never ok to point fingers like that at people. So what has he started doing? Pointing his thumb at us, of course!

He has also been heard saying "Be quiet!" to us, which does not fly, either. So what does he now say instead? He says, "Mom, you be..." and then he puts his finger to his lips and says, "Ssshhhh!"

That's Elijah! Always thinking of innovative ways to break the rules without actually breaking the rules.

Paige

One of the things that we have missed since I stopped working is PAIGEY, Elijah's very good friend from daycare. Thankfully, he had the opportunity to spend a morning with her last weekend! Also, we are thankful that Elijah does not mind playing with princess-related stuff. :) Paigey and Elijah are good buds. We are very grateful for their friendship!

(Photo courtesy Paige's mama, Marta! Thanks!)

Reclaiming my home

Sometimes I wonder what condition my house (and life and health) would be in, in say a few more years, if I had kept right on working full-time. I can't imagine what people must have thought upon entering our home even a few short months ago. It was awful! One of the many nice things about being home full-time is having time to care for my home! I have been cleaning and organizing and doing all of the things I always wished I had time for.

Please don't judge me based on this "before" picture! Here is the far corner of our kitchen before my little organizing hands got a hold of it.



And here it is after! All the boys' crafts, markers, activity books, play-doh and paper are now neatly organized. My cookbooks are organized, some of them hidden. My food photography table looks neat, and I don't want to cry when I glance in the direction of this corner of our home. Ahhhh!

Boysies

We received a visit from Auntie Lynn and sweet cousin Kaleigh this past weekend!



Elijah was beyond excited to spend time with Kaleigh. Sammy was unsure (below is his I-don't-know-you-and-please-don't-steal-me face). Give him some time and he'll be excited to spend time with cousins, too!



Sammy has been doing all kinds of cute things lately, so I better get these down before I forget them!

The other day I caught him trying to wipe Elijah's bottom with a wet-wipe. Probably because he sees Elijah's bottom being wiped quite often. He follows Elijah around with a wipe in his hand and when E stops, he starts wiping. He has even tried to do it to me a couple times. Thanks, Sammy!

Sam does NOT like receiving help. With anything! If he is struggling to get a cap back on a marker or pull off a sock or whatever it may be, he gets extremely mad if we try to help him.

A few new Sammy words: Apple (bob-bob), Bob the Tomato (Bob), Larry the Cucumber (yeh-yeh). He can do almost all of the animal noises, and they sure are cute.

Lately he goes to our front entry-way and points at the wall and does his dinosaur growl. I say, "Sammy, is there a dinosaur over there?" He smiles and points and keeps growling. So it has become a bit of a joke that we have a dinosaur living in our entry-way.

Every time he bonks a body part, he looks at me and makes his cute little kissy noise which means he wants me to come kiss his owie. And of course I do it.

He does this cute cute cute thing where he folds his hands behind his back and walks around. It's like he is surveying his surroundings and taking everything in.

A few quick Elijah things.. The bump on his head is doing just fine, and he hasn't shown any more strange symptoms since falling. He has tolerated his glasses VERY well. Much better than I anticipated! The first few days of patching were a challenge, but now he is fine with wearing the patches, too. So many people have told him how handsome he looks with his new glasses that he seems very proud of them! I can tell that they help his vision a ton. When I take them off at bedtime, he makes some funny faces and blinks a lot.

We celebrated Dan's mom's 60th birthday with her last night, and had such a nice time! It is always fun to be with family and to watch Elijah and Sammy enjoying their cousins.

That's about all I've got for now! Back to filling out health insurance applications, wee!!

Fixed eyes, a head injury and an M&M's addiction

I have much to share! I'll start with the best news. Elijah got his new glasses! Could any kid be better-suited for glasses than him? They suit his personality very well, I think. He did ok with them today, but did not like the patch at all. He has to wear a patch on his right eye for two hours every day, and I have a feeling this is going to be quite a daily struggle (like we need more daily struggles). Patching his good eye makes his other eye work pretty hard, which is good (for his eye) and bad (for those who have to deal with the complaining).



Two days ago, I was upstairs working on my blog and Dan was downstairs doing the budget (his favorite thing). Sammy was taking a nap, and Elijah was having quiet time at the computer. All of a sudden I heard chair legs screeching on the floor, followed by a splat and a murderous Elijah scream. He had somehow fallen off his chair and landed head-first onto the tile floor. A huge bump formed very quickly on the back of his head. I probably would have been comfortable not bringing him to the hospital if the bump had been our only concern. A few minutes after the fall, once he had calmed down, he started complaining about not being able to see us. He kept saying that his head was "up and couldn't get back down," and then he would say, "Mommy, I can't see you!" I brought him to the ER immediately. I know enough about head injuries to know not to waste time when neurological symptoms are present.



The ER doctor said he had a good deal of swelling and because he had complained of vision problems, a CT scan was ordered. The results were normal. He had suffered a mild concussion, but nothing was structurally damaged. The nurse told me to expect him to be "off" for about a week, but those vision complaints within 10 minutes of his fall were the only "off" things we have witnessed.



He was such a BRAVE BRAVE BOY during the CT scan. He had complete trust in me when I told him that nothing was going to hurt. He had to get "tied down" pretty tightly for the scan, and he did great. He's maturing! Just a short time ago, he would not have done well with that. I was very proud of my boy. Then we sat together on a bed in Room 16 and snuggled and talked and hugged and sang songs while we waited for the results. I don't know exactly how to explain this, but it was a weird experience for me. Sitting in a hospital with that special little boy of mine always, no matter what we are there for, brings me to tears. Happy, sad, thankful, sorrowful tears. I tried to put it into words to explain to Dan, but I couldn't. I can't explain it. There's just deep-rooted emotion there that I don't believe will ever go away. Elijah + hospitals = emotional mama.



The bump on E's head is still there, but he seems to be doing just fine. It has not hindered his sass or pooping-in-pants at all!

Our sweet Sammy needs rehab for his M&M's addiction. I had some left over from a recipe I made the other night, so I gave the boys each a small handful after dinner. Ever since then, Sammy has been asking for M-N-M-N-M (stick your tongue out on the Ns) about every 5 minutes. He gets such a funny little concerned look on his face when he asks for them. He's an addict!

And in other news, since being unemployed (or I should say since being SELF-employed!), I have been a home-organizing lunatic! After literally YEARS of carrying the I-don't-have-time-to-take-care-of-my-home burden heavily on my shoulders, I finally have time to take care of my home! I am loving this! Dan has helped me to create an office for myself in our loft, where I have been spending a few hours every day doing blog work and photo editing. We have also gone through all of the boys' toys and put three large bags in storage (aka, our messy garage). I have also sorted through my ridiculous pile of cooking magazines and organized them. Today I washed couch and chair covers. I am consistently CAUGHT UP ON LAUNDRY, which is the absolute strangest thing on the planet. When I was working full-time, I was never ever caught up on laundry. NEVER. And the best thing of all is that I get so much quality time with my precious boys. Spending this time with them is very special to me. Getting Elijah on and off the bus every day is indescribable. Snuggling with Sammy endlessly on the couch is the best. I love having this time with my boys!

I have another organizational project for tomorrow that I'm excited about! I'll take before and after pics and share. Fun!

Thanks for checking in on us! More later!

Croup: Season 2, Round 2 (Sammy)

I love this string of photos. Our boys do have moments when they appear to love each other. :)



Sammy woke up very early in the evening last night with a horrible croup episode. I didn't think anything could scare me more than Elijah's early episodes of croup, but this rivaled those times. It was scary! Thank goodness he didn't panic because he was really struggling to breathe, even being totally calm. Dan tried to take him outside, but it was freezing! Plus I don't know that it would have done much, so we opted for an epi neb which was a first for Sammy. The epi neb pulled through, like it always does with Elijah, and after about 10 minutes Sammy was breathing a ton better. We put him back to bed, but I was a nervous wreck of a mama. We have never gotten clearance from a doctor to give him oral steroids, so I wasn't comfortable giving him that. Not having the steroids as a "back-up" had me on edge for the entire rest of the night. This morning he sounded fine, aside from a bit of a cough. We're on our toes again tonight!



That's all for now. Enjoy the rest of the boy pics. :)

Limbo

Ever since Elijah's eye appointment last Friday, his left eye has remained crossed almost constantly. I cannot wait to get his glasses so we can help his vision and wandering eye.

Aside from eye issues, there are two main Elijah themes in our house lately: POOP and behavior. If we're not cleaning poop out of his pants, we are dealing with some sort of undesirable behavior (talking back, saying bad words, hitting/yelling at Sammy). Most nights I go to bed feeling like a terrible mother because I always end up losing my cool at some point during the day with that boy. He is SO strong-willed and he pushes his boundaries to the very limits, and beyond. He is such a sweet, kind, caring little boy, but when he decides to exert that will....watch out!

The past two weeks have been quite an adjustment period. We no longer have daycare for the boys since I am home full-time now, so that in itself is an adjustment! Dan is looking for full-time work and we are making major decisions regarding health insurance and finances. I am also attempting to grow my food blog and also my photography business.

Yesterday at church we were reminded how different our boys are. We attempted to drop Sam off in the nursery for the first time ever. We got paged after 15 minutes because he had been CRYING THE ENTIRE TIME. It had gotten to the point where he didn't want anyone even close to him, so he was on one side of the room lying on the floor screaming and everyone else was on the other side, watching. The second I walked into the room, he ran to me (stumbling over toys in his path) and buried his little face in my chest (and sucked his thumb, of course) and stayed like that for twenty straight minutes. He wouldn't even let Dan hold him! Then there's Elijah. On our way down to Sunday School, he started yelling, "I COMING! HERE I COME!" He couldn't have been more excited to spend time with friends.

That's all we have for now! Sorry no photos today..

I can think of a thousand captions for these photos

Eye appointment

The opthamologist found three problems with Elijah's eyes this morning: 1. The vision in his left eye is very poor, 2. His right eye is doing almost all of the work, and 3. his left eye is turning inward periodically. The doctor feels that number 3 is the least of our concerns at this point. He feels that if we take care of 1 and 2, that 3 will likely fall into place.

We ordered a pair of glasses for Elijah today! We're thinking he will need to wear them for a minimum of two years, possibly more. In addition, we will be "patching" his good eye for a few hours every day for a period of three months (minimum). The hope is that these two things will greatly reduce the amount of eye-crossing.

Since his little eyes had been dilated, his left eye basically stayed crossed for the rest of the day which was a bit alarming. I kept forgetting about it and then I'd look at him and I wouldn't have any idea what or who he was looking at!



The doctor thinks it is extremely unlikely that the eye-crossing is occurring because of anything serious. He also thinks it is unlikely that any of this has anything to do with the rest of his anomalies. In fact, I have always had terrible vision in MY left eye and my right eye did most of the work for 29 years until I got lasik. So it is very likely that it is genetic. You're welcome, Elijah!

And here are the glasses he chose! We had a handful picked out that all fit him well and every one of them looked adorable on him, so we let him choose. They should be ready in approximately two weeks, and we will be ready to fix those eyes!

Croup: Season 4, Round 5 (Elijah)

Elijah woke up with croup two nights ago. We did the standard procedure, and all was well. He hasn't had any symptoms since, aside from a few extra sneezes.

Thanks to a very kind doctor (who was probably sensing my anxiety more than anything), Elijah is scheduled to be seen by an opthamologist tomorrow morning already! His drifting left eye has caused some mama worry this week, so I am incredibly thankful that we can get answers so quickly. We are praying hard for GOOD news.

Back to the boy craziness. I just wanted to give a quick croup update. I will post details tomorrow morning after E's appointment!

New specialists and funnies

Now that we have medical insurance worries on our brains, we are needing to add two more specialists to Elijah's list. He has been a really healthy kid for the past few years (you know, aside from an open heart surgery here and there), so I'm not complaining about any of this.

For the past year or so Dan and I have noticed that when we get down at eye level with Elijah, he starts crossing his eyes. We have always thought that he did it on purpose to be silly! The other day I was chatting with Elijah about some (never-ending) behavior issues and I noticed that his left eye kept turning inward. Then he would rub it and it would happen again. For the first time, I saw him getting frustrated about it. He wasn't doing the silly eye thing on purpose! I brought him to the doctor today and Dr. J thought we should get him in to see a pediatric opthamologist. It could be that he is already developing a little bit of farsightedness, or he could have something more complicated going on. We will see what the specialist says!

Also, E has had a freckle/mole on the middle of his back that has become slightly bigger and somewhat irregular in the past few months. Dr. J thought we should get him into the dermatologist to get it looked at.

I have officially completed my first full week of unemployment! It's surreal and awesome and scary and angering. I love being at home with my boys. I love taking naps with Elijah. I love having time to blog and cook and bake and not having to do all of those things late at night or squish it in over a lunch hour. I love seeing Elijah get on and off the school bus. I love not having a time limit when Sammy wants to snuggle. We obviously have some worries, namely MONEY and insurance. But we know there is a plan and that things will work out. I am thankful to have my family, and I can't ask for more than that.

I have been compiling a list of Boy Funnies in my head, but of course I have forgotten most of them. Here are a few:

- Today I laid down with Elijah, hoping he would nap with me. He has been soooo tired and crabby since dropping his naps, so we occasionally try to get him to sleep during the day when he needs it. Today he wanted to play and tickle and giggle in bed, so I wrapped my arms around him super tight. We were drifting off to sleep and he started to speak a little gibberish. He kept whispering HOT DOGGY into my ear. :) I knew if I laughed he would wake up, so I stifled the laughs and we drifted off to sleep.

- Yesterday Elijah said, "Mom, do you call me 'Wittle Man'?" I said yes and he said, "Ok, you're my Wittle Wady!"

- Sammy started doing a funny new dance move tonight (what is with my boys and their dance moves?) that looks like he is in the gym doing squats.

That's all my brain can come up with for now. It is decompress time! Thanks for checking in!