Life With Three

Lots of people ask me, "How is life with three?" Well, compared to everything else our family has been through in the last couple month, the baby is nothing.

Three has seemed easier – most of the time. We have our moments (like tonight where we just had to laugh at ourselves. At dinner, we had Jacob and Jonathan both screaming. I had Jacob, David had the baby. I am trying to hold Jacob and calm him, and selfishly try to eat before it all gets cold. David was walking around, and had given up on eating. Matthew is sitting at the table, going back and forth between complaining that he doesn’t like what’s on his plate and talking about random nonsense like someone is listening to him. We ate in shifts, with the final person finally deciding to finish  his plate as he went to bed around 8. I’m sure that was yummy…and cold. But he chose to do it…anyway….) We love being a family of five.

Here’s a little of sight into each of our kids.

Matthew: The first thing I think of with him is how much he adores Jonathan. It’s truly amazing how he is always so eager to be with him and help him in anyway. Anytime I ask for help that is ultimately for Jonathan, he jumps at the chance. He loves to “babysit” while I go do something around the house. I just genuinely loves him.

Matthew is really starting to build his overall confidence about so many things. He is beginning to read. For so long he was almost scared to try. He tends to be one that if he feels like he won’t do something well, he won’t even try it. I also think that he was scared it would change his world too much – like he thought we wouldn’t read to him anymore. But slowly he is starting to catch on to sight words and sounding things out. He surprises us all the time with figuring out what things say. We are so proud of him. I have also seen his growing confidence at dance. I am his dance teacher. And all last year, if I threw a new step at him without first showing him how to do it at home, he would get so upset. He was so afraid to try and fail. But now he has no problem attempting something, and usually doing quite well at it. In fact, he has been known to come home and tell me he was the best one….might have to work on the opposite side of the spectrum with pride ;) But for now, we’ll just let him be confident and feel good about himself.  

Jacob: The first thing that comes to mind with Jacob is his servant’s heart. Jacob is always trying to help out. He amazes me how he can see a need before I do. I won’t realize something needs to be done, and he’s already doing it. Today when some friends were leaving our house, he asked the mom if he could help her get out to the car. I made a comment tonight about some crumbs he had gotten on the carpet (that I had just vacuumed….) He offered to get his vacuum out and clean up. I told him to do it in the morning because Jonathan was already asleep. He said he’d close the door…ever the problem solver, whether we want him to or not. We can often ask him to do something and he joyfully will start at it. (Although let me remind you that he is 3…he’s not perfect!) I am so thankful for his model. I need to learn from it because I am not always joyful in my serving of others.

Jonathan: Oh his dimples. When he smiles, it’s so contagious. And it’s easy to get him to smile. He’s a sweet guy and we love him. He’s starting to really respond to things around him. He has recently started trying to reach things he sees and pick them up. Today he was playing under his baby gym, which has toys dangling over his head. He really reached and pulled at things (and did a complete 360 turn like a clock! He lifts his little bottom up and scoots around) He really wants to play, but isn’t quite at the point where he can do a whole lot, so he gets frustrated. He is a great sleeper at night. He has been sleeping 11 hours since about 2 ½ months. Amazing. However, he is a horrible napper. I NEVER would have done this with my first (okay, or my second), but he almost always naps in his swing or carseat. It’s that, or he doesn’t nap. I was and advocate of crying it out with the first two, but when we’ve attempted it with Jonathan, it ruins his day. He will cry for the rest of the day.

I told David earlier that I have noticed two little quirks about Jonathan. 1. He hates it when I talk loudly (or yell) when he’s eating. He’ll either stop eating and cry, or shoot me a disgruntled look and then resume. 2. He can’t handle overstimulation at bedtime. I ruins his evening. We’ve had people over around bedtime and he has such a hard time going to bed. Normally he will eat and go right down. But usually he’ll cry and cry and not eat well if too much goes on. If we are out too late (like after 8 pm) he’ll do the same. He’s so laid back most of the time, so I feel like I owe it to him to stick to his one consistent part of his routine!

So pictures. I had high hopes of posting a bunch. But we have super slow, horrible internet. So after typing all this, only one picture has uploaded. If I had known only one was going to make it, I would have picked a different one. Oh well. Maybe another time I’ll do more. I love my snuggles with my baby. I learned the hard way with 1 and 2 that the snuggles go away so quickly. So I snuggle all I can. And  I look horrible in this picture…so we might get a wee bit tired occasionally ;)

Rollin', Rollin', Rollin'

David and I have both noticed a huge developmental jump in Jonathan over the last week. He is noticibly stronger, more alert, and less content with being stuck on the floor. Today we put him on his tummy and this is what happened. My baby is getting big too quickly!

100 Days

Today, while I was sitting feeding Jonathan, enjoying a few quiet moments to think, I calculated that Jonathan is 100 days old today! (At least that is my calculation without looking at a calendar.) I was thinking about what an awesome blessing this little guy is, how wonderful he has been and how much we all love him. He has been a really, really good baby. I think my brain started calculting how old he was when i was thinking about how I could probably count his unconsolable fits on one hand. With the other two I remember having to put them in the car and go for a ride to get them to sleep sometimes. We have never had to do that with Jonathan (although just this past week we did have to take him for a walk twice....and by we, I mean David :) He definitely has his moments,, but really, he's very laid back. I have really enjoyed more snuggling and rocking than I probably did with the other two. It was with the first two that I learned how quickly it all goes. So if I have a baby that needs to be snuggled to fall asleep, I'm okay with that. And I'm really okay with it since he's sleeping 11-12 hours each night! He's a horrible napper, but how can I care when he sleeps that well at night!

Jonathan's favorite person is Matthew. He loves mommy, daddy and Jacob, but I think he pretty much adores Matthew. If anyone can get a smile out of him, it's Matthew. And Matthew adores him right back. It's amazing. I can't believe how much Matthew has totally embraced being the big brother. He LOVES to help and will always "babysit" when asked to watch him for a minute. He never complains about anything that has to do with Jonathan.

So we have some big milestone news...Jonathan rolled over today. I have to look at baby books, but I'm pretty sure that both of the other two were around 4 months. Jonathan is 3 months and one week. A couple days ago I saw him propel himself onto his side by swinging his feet, but I didn't think he'd figure out how to get over his arm anytime soon. Tonight he looked like he might try so I sat videotaping him for about 5 minutes. I eventually turned off the camera and walked away for a minute. When I came back, this is what I found:

Both boys claim they didn't help him. When I flipped him back over he got mad. Later on I saw him do it again. He doesn't do a quick roll, like he's intending to go somehere. He slowly wiggles his body and eventually ends up on his stomach, like he's just doing it to get comfortable. It'll be fun to watch what he does with it. Although I have to admit, I'm a little sad that he did it...it means my newborn is gone. He's getting older, which makes me a little sad. I love my little snuggle bug baby.

I had other things I wanted to say in this post, but my thoughts have disappeared amongst the tiredness. Two nights ago was a rare night where Jonathan was up for two hours in the middle of the night (which again I can count how many times I have spent hours up with him on one hand). It's amazing how quickly you get out of the routine of broken sleep- I'm still recovering.

Here are some other recent pictures I enjoy.

Doesn't he look like a bobble head? :)

On his way over!

I had others I wanted to do, but we have cheap internet and it's taking to long to upload. Maybe another day :)

Fire Alarms

Saturday morning we set out to have a great family morning. We went to the Cincinnati Museum Center, which is a place that our older boys absolutely love. When we got there, I got the two boys to agree to take me to see the Christmas train display (David had already taken them to see it, so I was the only one who hadn't seen it.) We were on our way down into the museum (which if you haven't been to our museum, most of the museum is underground), playing with steamboats along the way, when the fire alarm went off. It took a moment to figure out what it was. Everyone around us looked at each other, wondering if it was for real. We figured it was maybe a test, or someone pulled it. There were no workers around. So we found an emergency exit door near us. The people in front of us started out of it, realizing it was a set of stairs. We had a stroller. After a short moment of considering taking the car seat and leaving the stroller, we decided we weren't that far away from the top of the museum, so we just went out the way we came in (up the ramp to the entrance). I grabbed Jacob, David was pushing the stroller, and we told Matthew to go quickly. All the workers were smiling, but they were directing us out of the museum. I think as our escape went on, my anxiety heightened, that maybe it was really a real fire. But why was everyone smiling? When we got to the rotunda, we could smell something burning - so maybe it was real? Matthew seemed very worried. He almost took off, so concerned with getting out. He often turned around to make sure I was close behind, but he wasn't concerned with staying together. It was a good time to have a discussion about trying to stay together in a situation like that, where there's a lot of people. My phone was in the stroller, so I would not have been able to call David to reconnect. But we did wait for David and the stroller right outside the door. The workers at the museum ushered us outside, out by the fountain (if you are familiar with the set up). At that point we still didn't know what was going on - we just knew it was cold! We waited for a bit, trying to decide if we were going to stay or not. We were determined to have fun as a family, but couldn't come up with an alternative that didn't cost money. We were not prepared to do anything outside. David and I were just in jackets, so we were pretty cold. Within a few minutes, emergency vehicles started arriving. Because the museum is up on a hill, we could see many emergency vehicles coming from far away, from many different directions. Some went behind the museum. But some turned around before they came up the driveway. Only three trucks came up to the front of the museum, one was a huge ladder truck. We finally asked a worker what was going on. There was a kitchen fire in the food service area. The fire was out before the firefighters got there, but they had to clear the smoke. We ended up waiting over an hour, but we stayed until we were allowed it. You could definitely smell something when you went in to the rotunda. We decided to go ahead and eat lunch because at that point it was around 11:30. Then we could just play in the Children's Museum and not have to stop to eat later. We ended up still having a nice time, it was just slightly shorter than we had planned (but we had a chance to learn some lessons, too :) And we didn't go see the trains....oh well, next year!

Here's a picture from the Museum.

Well, our fire alarms didn't end there. Later that evening, for New Year's Eve, we lit a fire in our fire place. I guess some smoke had come in the house. It wasn't a lot. I don't think we even noticed it. David and Matthew were in the living room, Jacob was in his room playing, and I was in my room, feeding the baby. All of a sudden our fire alarm went off in our house. Jacob came running out of his room, so quickly. He ran out to the living room to find David or I. While he was admittedly absolutely scared, we were so proud of him that he acted quickly to get out. Bless his heart, all I could do was hug him. He was so scared. We've had our fix of fires lately. We've had lots of discussions about what to do if there is a fire. Matthew's mind is always thinking, so he often comes up with various situations and what we should do if we are in that situation. I think it's great that he does that, even if the scenarios are a little wacky. I've been meaning to have fire safety night, where we practice different escape routes. Maybe we should do that soon - maybe at the end of the week when the weather is a little warmer :)

So if you see Jacob in the next little bit, ask him about the fire alarm. He'll tell you what it sounded like. It's pretty cute.

Jacob's Quote about His Finger

Tonight I had a funny conversation with Jacob about his finger. He was looking at it with no bandaid on. There is still one stitch in it, that is kind of sticking out. He looked at it and said, "There's a bug." I said, "No, it's a stitch. That's how they put your finger back together." Jacob asked, "How it get broken?" I said, "You slammed it in a door, remember?" Jacob: "Oh. Yes."

He doesn't have his huge bandage anymore. Sometimes he wears just a bandaid, but often goes without anything. It's a pretty sight, let me tell you. And he often walks around holding his one finger up, just like it was when it was in the big bandage. Here he is when he fell asleep last night.

And, yes, he's asleep in the hallway. But, notice there's no pacifier. :)

To the ER....again

So we spent another day in the ER...this time with Jacob. Usually it's Matthew's job to go to the ER. Here's the scoop - lots of details most people wont' care about, but I want to remember. Some are nasty. And I don't have time to edit.
I was sitting on my bed, feeding the baby. The boys were running around, being boys. Matthew had just come into my room, for some reason that I can no longer recall. Jacob went running into his room and next thing I know, I hear his door slam. That's a totally normal sound to hear. He was just playing around. But right after that he comes running into my room screaming, "BLOOD!!! BLOOD!!" His finger was dripping blood all over. I pretty much threw the baby on the bed, hopped up, grabbed a towel and looked at it. At that point it was bleeding and looked purple. I couldn't tell the extent of the injury, but I could tell it looked bad. So many thoughts were going through my head (I would have expected to handle an emergency better...aren't people supposed to go into a mode where they get things done well and then crash later? Well, I didn't. I panicked.) I couldn't decide whether I should call 911, go to the ER, go the pediatrician, and whether I should call first. I called the Dr., kind of asking what to do. They said to come in. So luckily my wonderful neighbor, Shannon, was home. I ran the baby over there, threw him at her with a diaper and wipes. I had told Matthew to get his shoes on right before I walked out the door. I left Jacob standing with a towel on his hand (a nice on, unfortunately was the first thing I found! Oh well...) and he was screaming his head off ("BOO BOO!!! BOO BOO!!!"). When I got back from running the baby over, Matthew comes at me with a juice box he found, asking if he could have it. I pretty much freaked out, started yelling (aka panicking some more) and after he still wouldn't hurry to get his shoes on, I made him walk over bare foot. Yes, it's December. Bad mom. I locked the door, carrying Jacob, closed it, and went to the car in the driveway. Grabbing the keys would have been a good idea. Again, bad move, mom. Luckily we have a garage code and I got in to get the keys. I mostly buckled him in his seat (it was hard to get him in with his finger wrapped up and both of us freaking out!). I sped down Winton Road, going very fast, praying there were no cops anywhere. It's pouring. I'm calling tons of people, none of which are answering. Poor David, I left a pretty scary message. I was sobbing, saying I didn't know what to do and that I was afraid his finger was going to fall off. I wasn't in a condition to censor my word selection. I get to the doctor - I was a total hysterical mess, pretty much. I can handle broken bones all day long, but the finger hanging on by a small piece of skin, that was hard to handle. And I didn't handle it well! I walked into the doctors office, said I why I was there, explained the situation. They wanted his insurance info...I asked if we could take care of that later ;) Which was fine. I sat and waited in the office, for what felt like an eternity, but was really probably just a couple minutes. My amazing father-in-law, Russ, thankfully works right across the street and came over. He was able to be a second set of hands, and help keep me and Jacob from flipping out. I finally got ahold of David then. They took us back to the room. The nurse looked at it and cleaned it out. I was able to just hold Jacob, who was still screaming. I held his head to my chest, while I was looking the other way, and sang Jesus Loves Me over and over and over and over. I didn't know what else to do to comfort him. We then waited for what, again, felt like an eternity. Dr. Bird,  who we have always loved so much, took a look at it and said, "This is going to take a lot of work. We're going to send you down to Children's. It's partially amputated." Amputated...I didn't need to hear that. I was already struggling. So they wrapped it with a wash cloth and we hit the road. Russ drove and I rode in the back, holding his finger. He fell asleep in the car, which scared me. I was afraid he passed out. I poked him in the side to make sure he was still okay. He cried...good. Russ dropped me off at the emergency room door. They took us straight back. I guess if your injury is bad enough, they take you straight back - at least that's our experience with our last two visits! The broken arm got us back right away too! ;) So we went to triage. Nothing exciting to report there. One funny moment, though, was right after they gave him Tylenol, he said, in between sobs, "I need to brush my teeth!!". I guess he wasn't a fan of the medicine. They moved us to another room, we saw various people come in and out. I still couldn't look at it. One quote I remember was, "I can see the bone." Cringe. Every time they made us move, I carried him, but I was afraid if I bumped his hand wrong his finger would fall off. It was that bad. I have vivid pictures in my mind of it just barely hanging on, right around the bottom of his finger nail. I'm afraid they will haunt me in my sleep. We eventually were sent to x-ray. By that time David had arrived. He took over holding Jacob - I had to feed the baby, who he had brought down. The end of his bone was broken a little. But they weren't worried about it. It will heal. When the ER doctor (well, resident) came in, it was the same doctor we saw just seven weeks ago with Matthew. What are the odds?! I'm sure we look like great parents! ;) Both he, and another plastic surgeon/orthopedic came to stitch him up. They were able to do it with just local anesthetic. He cried for a couple minutes when they gave him those shots. The doctor complimented how well he did with the shots. He said he has had linebackers who you could hear down the hall. But once it was numb, he just sat and watched them do it. Russ was able to watch (again, thank goodness he was there!) David made some glances. I sat behind the doctor so that I couldn't see a thing! It only took two or three stitches. They "tacked" his finger nail back on. It will fall off, they said. But 99% of the time it grows back. It might take 9 months. They wrapped it nicely. He has a very large green bandage on his finger. His bandage is about the size of his forearm. It reminds me of when a cartoon character hits their thumb with a hammer and it gets enormous. It's that big. Then we waited some more. Papa's android phone saved the day. Jacob was navigating the phone very nicely by himself. He was coloring and shooting turkeys and laughing. They gave him some ibuprofen right around then. Then, the shot of antibiotics. Wow. It looked like she had to push the injection hard to get it in the muscle. He screamed for a long time, writhing around in pain - rolling on his hand! That was miserable for quite awhile. They had to hold off giving him his Tylenol with codine because they were afraid he was going to throw up. But eventually he was back to shooting turkeys on the phone. Eventually we were discharged.

So we left. Jacob decided he wanted chicken nuggets. He hadn't eaten since breakfast, and it was around 4pm. We went through McDonald's and got him a happy meal (a treat in our house) He just wanted the chicken. He wanted to get chocolate milk for Matthew (comes into the story later). He stayed awake the whole way home. Part way home he says, "I had fun at the doctor today!" in a happy voice. Fun? I don't call the day fun! ;) He also realized he never got a sticker at the doctor. Oh the things they think of...so after we dropped Papa off at work, we went and got our sticker. They let us have more than one. And he picked a sucker. His favorite color is green. He picked one with a green wrapper, but was later disappointed to find out that the actual sucker was red (watermelon...tricky!)

We are now home. Phew. I offered him something to drink, offering the chocolate milk, but he was so set on making sure Matthew got it. So thoughtful.

So, some blessings amongst the craziness:
1. The baby slept 10 hours last night. God knew I needed rest before the day.
2. Christy, our pastor's wife, had already arranged to bring us dinner tonight, just because of the baby. Again, a God thing.
3. Russ, who was able to spend the day with us, taking time off work.
4. A neighbor who was there to keep my kids.
5. my mom who kept Matthew
6. Rebecca, who took Matthew out tonight
7. countless people who prayed - prayer chains to let people know
8. Friends to  be there for me on the phone, and who offered to do anything for us.
9. Jacob saying, "No, thank you" in between sobs after his shot when offered a drink
10. An amazing hospital to be able to go to
11. Insurance
12. David's parents who came to help us relax tonight
13. medicine
14. pacifiers and blankies
15. a baby who rolled with the punches nicely
16. the finger is reattached, not gone
17. It's just a finger!
18. A husband who could make Jacob laugh while his finger was being cleaned out by playing with the soap dispenser. And who thinks of every little thing we could need to make sure we are taken care of. Who runs to kroger several times in one night. Who goes back to get string cheese for Jacob even though he's already in the check out line. Who makes me feel like I have every right to be exhausted and to complain of a bad night even though he's just as tired. I could go on and on....
19. Jacob who said "God healed my boo boo." about his leg, where he got his shot of antibiotics (was really painful!)
20. That I don't have to change the bandage.
I know I had other ones I wanted to put...I'll remember them later.

Hopefully we're in for a good night's sleep! For those of you that pray, pray for good rest, pray for his pain, healing without infection, and just the three year old who learns how to get around with a gimpy hand. And just pray for the well being of our family in general. We've had a rough couple months, with things going on that most people don't know! We're hanging tough, but must admit, we're drained.

29 Reasons to be Thankful on my 29th birthday

Last year I did 28 reasons...I thought it would be a fun way to remember the birthday! Here we go again!
They are in no particular order.
1. A new little bundle to love on.
2. Two other healthy boys to spend my day with me.
3. A husband who is amazing. He has been so supportive and helpful through these late pregnancy and early post-partum days where I haven't been much of a help around the house (I think helpful is a bad way to describe it. Really, he's holding down he fort and doing everything!)
4. David's day off on my birthday, and the kids at preschool for us to spend a little time together.
5. A surprise trip to the outlet malls - fresh air and a trip out of the house.
6. All the birthday deals David signed me up for online (not all consumed on my actual birthday): a piece of cake from Smoky Bones - wow delicious.
7. A free sandwich, chips, cookie, and drink from Jersey Mikes.
8. Free sundae from Graeters.
9. Free cookie from Brueggers
10. buy one get one free pretzel from Auntie Anne's
11. Various other coupons I can't remember to celebrate my birthday
12. A mom who has sacrificed and helped so much this fall to support our family.
13. A delicious dinner with family - my mom made my favorite: prime rib, and cheesecake!
14. Another dinner with David's family - I love time with family and my family is pretty awesome.
15. two boys who bought my birthday present 10 days before my birthday and didn't tell me. They actually kept the surprise!
16. 93 Facebook "happy birthday" messages - wow
17. Several phone messages and texts to tell me happy birthday
18. A good visit with dear friends the day after my birthday (although always too short)
19. A baby who has been amazingly healthy and arrived so safely - God is good.
20. So many people who have offered to help us as we get used to our new family member
21. Naps
22. A newborn who for 3 of the last 4 nights has gone six hours at night between feedings.
23. A wonderful doctor and fabulous nurses to helped in the safe arrival of Jonathan - God bless them for working so hard, even in the middle of the night!
24. Christmas music on the radio - Yep, I'm one of the crazy ones who likes it.
25. A three-year-old who is incessantly asking Daddy to get the Christmas tree out, without any incentive from Mommy.
26. Post-feeding snuggles with Jonathan.
27. Preschool - for great connections with people for both me and my kids, and for some downtime with Jonathan during these early, tired days.
28. All the meals that people are providing for us - wow what a blessing.
29. A date night that someone reading this is going to offer so David and I can actually have a conversation ;)

I could keep going, but I'm only 29 :)