tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17597367292825760442024-02-22T16:03:49.820-05:00The Morrey, The Merrier!ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.comBlogger225125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-47391719919963984352012-10-05T21:53:00.000-04:002012-10-05T21:53:25.062-04:00Just a quick baby videoNot that she's much of a baby anymore! Ellie at 19 months is walking, running, jumping, talking, and lots of fun!<br />
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ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-24763391621694380372012-05-17T16:26:00.002-04:002012-05-17T16:26:56.432-04:00The napping babyEllie is asleep in her crib (can you hear the angels singing too?) and I'm between semesters, so I thought I would catch you up on our family! I know I haven't posted in 6 months but it seemed like time to try to resurrect this blog. There has been some guilt-tripping about it lately and about how no one gets to see the pictures of my kids or hear about how they're doing. Unless, of course, they're on Facebook and read about them everyday. Ahem.<br />
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Our family has grown again! You might recall that we had Nietzsche put to sleep on Valentine's Day 2011. He was 11 1/2 and could no longer go up and down stairs. It was devastating and we miss him every day. His brother, Caesar, was really lonely. They were littermates and had always been together. In January, for my birthday, we got a new beagle named Austin. He's nuts. He is the sweetest little (and I do mean little, he's only 20 lbs as opposed to Caesar's almost 70) dog but man, he can chew through anything. He's very clever and wants to play all the time. It's strange having a dog with lots of energy around again! He likes to sleep on the bed with us and we often find that he has slowly and stealthily wormed his way up between us by the time morning comes.<br />
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Jason started a new law firm in February. The first two weeks, he got three clients. "That would be a good rate," he said. "If I can get three clients every two weeks, I'll have about 70 a year." Then his marketing started working and he got 24 clients the first month. What a surprise--but a good one! He's been working hard and it is really nice to see him fulfilled professionally again. He's also been able to keep up with the family and managed to do all of that with Ellie home all but one day a week. It's been really special to see the bond that they have together. Jason's been really busy with the boys' soccer, as well. Now that the season's over, I'm sure we'll find other ways to spend that time.<br />
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Patrick underwent some major changes in the last six months! He'd been growing his hair for four years and decided to donate it to Pantene's program in which they make wigs for cancer patients. You can see his hair on the left, right before our wonderful hair stylist Royer cut it. (FWIW, Royer almost cried. He loves Patrick's hair. He's done every haircut Patrick has ever had. If it hadn't been for a donation, I almost think he would have refused to cut it.) Anyway, now he looks like this:<br />
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It took me a week to get used to it--I'd look at him and think "Who is that?" He got it cut right after his 8th birthday. He wants to grow and donate it again. It looks so much lighter when it's long.<br />
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Patrick is <i>just</i> about done with second grade. He has less than a week remaining! He's gone through some struggles this year but all is turning out really, really well. He is an incredible kid. Aside from being sweet and kind and an awesome son and brother, he's also super smart. His teacher says she's never had another student in such a high reading group (mind you, she hasn't been teaching for long but we'll still take it). It can be challenging to find age-appropriate books for Patrick that still keep his interest. He's in the regular gifted program as well as the gifted math program, which is culled from the regular gifted program for extra math challenges. He and his partner won the second-grade math competition! They went down in the first round of the whole school competition but they were up against fifth-graders. In soccer, Patrick's coach really praised how much Patrick "gets it" with regards to moving the ball around, and how aware he is of where people are on the field. He scored a couple of goals this season and had some incredible defensive plays! He just finished his first year of Hebrew school on Tuesdays and can recognize all the Hebrew letters and vowels, and read some simple words. We are really proud of how well he's done.<br />
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Melkamu is, in a word, amazing. He has one of the most incredibly sweet personalities I've ever met. He has grown tremendously in the past bit and since he was already tall, that's saying something. I've taken to moving clothes that Patrick has outgrown directly into Melkamu's drawers. At 5 1/2, he's about 3 inches shorter than Patrick at 8 1/2. He's kind and smart and friendly, and obviously quite handsome. Last week, he finished up pre-K and is incredibly excited about going to kindergarten in August. His teachers told me that out of the fifteen boys in the class (out of 23 kids--yikes!), he was one of the few that really listened and followed directions well, though he could be swayed into some mischief sometimes ;-) He's now recognizing most of his letters, can write his name and count most of the way to 100, and I <i>think</i> he's starting to recognize some simple words also. For the life of me, I can't figure out how he's growing so well when it feels like he never eats. Breakfast is usually good. Lunch is good 2/3 of the time. Dinner is good <i>maybe</i> two nights a week. He's a bit on the picky side.<br />
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Kamu is an awesome brother for both Patrick and Eleanor. He and Patrick play together every day. Right now, he's waiting for Patrick to get home because quite frankly, being home with Mama is <i>boring</i>! He and Patrick play all around the neighborhood and it's rare to find them inside on a sunny afternoon. They helped me plant bean seeds last week, turned the front garden patch, and are going to be planting their own little plots out there later this week. I'm expecting that they're each going to keep quite busy this summer. We're joining a pool and I know that we'll be there a lot. I'm sure Kamu's swimming will be awesome by the end of the summer!<br />
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And now we get to the Wiggle Worm, little Ellie bean. My sweet, challenging, beautiful little spitfire of a girl. As you might remember, Eleanor has been a handful from the beginning.* She doesn't really sleep much, she never took a bottle, she is something of a picky eater, and she's incredibly smart. Her first word was around 4-5 months and was "Na", or "Nurse me NOW, lady!" She now has a distinct vocabulary of over a dozen words and seems to be adding new ones everyday. We hear "Num-num!" which means she wants food but doesn't want to nurse. "Uh oh" is another favorite. "Tatick" is Patrick, and "Damu" is Kamu. She says yes and no and up and down and Mama and Dada (it's rapidly morphing from Dada to Daddy) and dog and brother and a bunch of other things. She'll let you know right away if there's something she wants, and you'd better get it for her quickly! Oh, and she'll let you know if you don't or how she feels if you say no. We've already entered the tantrum-phase. They're pretty short-lived so far. On a sweet note, she hugs and kisses all the time and loves to laugh and giggle. Bathtime is one of her favorite times of the day. More splashing = more giggling and fun! She loves, loves, loves her baby dolls. "Ahbay" is her word for baby and there is usually one within a few feet of her.<br />
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Eleanor is never one to sit still when she can climb onto or into something (she's in the cereal cabinet in the picture here. Naturally, she had already removed all the cereal and rice). She stood at 8 months and now, if you come to our house, you're likely to find her standing on the coffee table or a chair or the fireplace. She knows how to safely climb up and down stairs. She started walking independently shortly after her first birthday and is trying desperately to run and jump now. Although she never took a baby bottle, she's mastered sippy cups, sports bottles, and straws already. Her favorite food remains black beans, and her ideal meal is black beans, strawberries, and some sort of bread. Yogurt is also good. She's meh on eggs and meats and cheeses. Peanut butter is a staple--she loves it. Unfortunately, she's never been a big fan of trying new foods and is iffy on a lot of vegetables. She still sleeps with us but has taken two naps in her Pack N Play in the last week! It's astounding how much she has learned to do already.<br />
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This is absurdly long already, so I'll just say that things are going well for me. It's been a very busy time lately but time does seem to be like that more often than not. I'll try to blog this summer and keep you up to date on the antics of the Morrey kids!<br />
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* FWIW, when people see me with all three kids and say "You have your hands full!" I always reply with "That's just how I like them." Because I do.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-39469357613455596702011-11-03T22:26:00.002-04:002011-11-03T22:26:19.042-04:00NaBloPoMo 2: The quick failWow, it didn't take me long to fall off the bandwagon on NaBloPoMo, did it? I thought about posting twice yesterday. The first time I was at work and my brain was on rapidfire, trying to find ways to avoid grading a set of tests--but I quashed that little thought and got the tests done. The second time I was at home, but it was late and I wanted to get a stew into the crockpot for us to eat for dinner tonight since I knew I wouldn't have time in the morning. I admit that I decided that we needed to eat more than I needed to blog at that moment, but I also figured that I'd blog after I finished putting the stew together. Then Ellie woke up and that was that.<br />
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But here I am. I refuse to give up and at some point, I will do an extra post to make up for it.<br />
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So much has happened with Ellie in the last few weeks. She got her first two teeth within 3 days of each other--they're the bottom middle ones and she is adorable. I'm very grateful that she's not a chomper while nursing. She doesn't show them off very often but they're well above the gums now. She's also this.close to crawling. She gets up on all fours as often as possible and rocks back and forth, but hasn't figured out forward movement yet (though she does sometimes end up going backwards). I also appreciate that she waited until a normal age to start crawling. She's been able to sit for a while, and also get herself onto her stomach without falling, but now she's trying to get herself from her stomach into a seated position. She hasn't managed it yet but it's coming. She can also stand on her own for brief periods as long as you give her some back support. I'm just astounded at how strong she is.<br />
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She's been talking for two months or so. Just a few words and she doesn't say them often, but they clearly have meaning. She says Mama, Dada, na (for nurse), and broh (for brother). Jason and I think she's working on da (for dog) and also heh-oh (for hello). The last one sounds a lot like uh-oh and I thought that was what she was saying for a long time but she didn't seem to care when I would repeat it back to her. When I say "hello!" after she makes that sound, she gets all excited.<br />
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The boys are just enthralled with Ellie. We chose to have another child because Jason and I wanted another child, but watching Patrick and Melkamu with their little sister is just as close as it gets to perfect happiness. They are sweet with her, always wanting to make her happy and smile. Patrick loves to hold her and Melkamu loves to make faces to make her laugh. They are excellent at trying to make her happy if we're in the car and she's crying, and she loves them more than anyone else in the world. We wanted our children to be close to one another and it's so wonderful to see them caring so much about each other.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-82533910865165526272011-11-01T11:18:00.004-04:002011-11-01T11:18:56.525-04:00Oh no, it's time for NaBloPoMo!!!I've been particularly slack about writing this year and so I'm making the committment, for the third year in a row, to do National Blog Posting Month. Every day in November, I pledge to post something on my blog. I am, as always, taking suggestions for what you'd like me to write about.<br />
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The year has been a year of transitions. Having a third child in general is pretty easy--a lot easier than I was expecting it to be. Ellie as a third child is challenging. She's got SUCH a strong personality. She's amazingly sweet and lovable but never, ever stops. Anything. I have to hold her legs still while she nurses and even so, she's windmilling her arms around when I do that. She flat-out refuses a bottle or sippy cup of pumped milk while I'm gone, which means she nurses most of the night. The idea of her sleeping through the night is laughable. Co-sleeping is saving my sanity. <br />
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I'm still sane. Shut up.<br />
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The boys are great. Melkamu is thriving in pre-K and loves it. He's learning to write and all sorts of other things, and he loves his class and teachers. He'll be 5 in less than 3 weeks and has been eagerly anticipating his birthday party (which isn't even scheduled yet) for months and months. Patrick is doing well in second grade. He's in the regular gifted program and also the separate math gifted program, and those are keeping him challenged. That's been a problem for him in the past--he doesn't like to fail and so he'll only do things he already knows how to do--but he's really starting to step up and try new things, and be persistent in figuring them out! We're thrilled. They're playing with robots and doing programming in the gifted program and it sounds like lots of fun!<br />
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Jason's been in transition all year with regards to jobs. First, his job ended in February. Then he had a temp job in South Carolina from June through July. Then he had a temp job here for three weeks in October. He's starting a new temp job here mid-month. He likes the variety of the document review, which is great, and there's a lot of flexibility with it, so it's actually working out well for us. If it were a steady job, it would be perfect for him. But the temp jobs are doing well enough for us and we're maintaining.<br />
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Caesar is in transition--we think. At his annual appointment in July, we were told that he has a splenic tumor and only had 1-3 months to live if it was cancerous. There was an 80% chance that it was cancerous. We elected not to have it removed and biopsied because at his age (he turned 12 last month), it just seemed like unnecessary pain and trauma for him without much gain. He's at the top end of his expected lifespan anyway. So we figured we'd just love on him and make him as comfortable as possible. He started getting skinny and we were watching for signs of pain or discomfort, knowing that we'd have to bring him in if that happened.<br />
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He's doing fine. We started feeding him a bit more and he plumped right back up. He doesn't seem in pain at all. He seems completely normal. Maybe he lucked out and has a benign tumor and we'll get to have him around for years to come! (I hope, I hope.)<br />
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Anyway, it's required a constant shift around here to stay balanced this year and that killed me for writing blogs. But I'm going to make the committment that BOTH OF MY READERS will find new posts every day this month. And there will be pictures. Lots of pictures.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-35592338385681751842011-09-25T21:17:00.002-04:002011-09-25T21:17:32.016-04:00My baby amuses meOr..."No one believes how hard Ellie fights sleep".<br />
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Seriously, people don't believe us when we say she doesn't nap. They think she probably naps but a little less than other babies, or a little less regularly. But it's true:<br />
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Ellie. Almost. Never. Naps.<br />
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There was one day when we thought she'd had a great napping day. She napped for about 90 minutes and we were thrilled. Of course, she did those total of 90 minutes in 5 separate sessions, none of which were longer than 25 minutes. Generally, she'll sleep for a total of 30 minutes a day.<br />
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Did I mention she still doesn't sleep through the night? 'Cause she doesn't.<br />
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To be honest, it really doesn't bother me that she doesn't sleep through the night. She'll sleep in her pack n play in our bedroom for a few hours, then I'll get up and go into her room with her. We'll nurse and co-sleep the rest of the night. It doesn't feel burdensome and I know that it's limited in time, so I'm enjoying the extra cuddling time. <br />
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But this video? That's what she does. And just so you know, she never did fully fall asleep in there. When I took her out, she acted as though she'd never been tired at all. She stayed up until 7:00, then slept for 10 minutes, then woke back up.<br />
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Her total napping time today (in 2 sessions) between 7:00 a.m. and 8:30 p.m.? Less than 30 minutes.<br />
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Watch and be amazed ;-)<br />
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ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-44297239070062726012011-08-31T22:14:00.001-04:002011-08-31T22:14:22.148-04:005-minute postJust a few things because I'm going to bed in a few minutes but it's been a while since I've posted.<br />
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My brother came to visit last week. It was great. He hadn't made it down here since Patrick was just under a year old (though we've seen him when we go to NY) and it was so nice to have him visit. The kids just loved having him here. Well, Ellie took a couple of days to warm up but the boys had a blast playing soccer and reading and generally being insane with Uncle Sean.<br />
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My camera's flash card is missing. I am freaked out because my regular laptop has already died and ALL of my digital pictures are on it. I know those can be saved, so those don't worry me too much, but every baby picture of Ellie since about 3 months on is on that flash card and I have no idea what happened to it. I'm about to conduct a completely throrough search that involves moving major pieces of furniture and/or appliances as necessary until it's found.<br />
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Melkamu loves loves loves pre-K so far. He gets to play with his friends everyday again (he's been out of daycare since shortly before Ellie was born) and is so proud to have little homework assignments to do. Yesterday he got to fill in a page all about himself and he drew pictures of our family, glued on wooden beads, and wrote his own name. It's awesome to see how much he loves school already!<br />
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Ellie's decided that moving is fun. She actually decided it months ago when she started rolling but now she log-rolls, wiggles, army crawls, and squiggles until she gets where she wants to go. It's surprising how fast she can move when she wants! Today, for the very first time, I watched her pushing herself up as high as she could on her arms and <em>also</em> trying to raise her bottom at the same time. Since she can get her knees under herself and push already, once she manages to get her bottom up with her arms also, she'll be off and crawling. I hope I'm not off on my crawling estimate of 7 1/2 months but I'll be surprised if she's not crawling by then.<br />
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OK, bedtime!ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-84688580926759831762011-08-13T00:29:00.000-04:002011-08-13T00:29:16.111-04:00Awesome things about being a parent...<div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLAdenQrFp3jPjCuxqmWvCXR9Y-VivRKZcVU0JWZAal9xh2SCzxy1S_weQR073ocomLejqV_TnoLBpmhefzu8kl50Y5DznC94_KoC58fVSZ1PO5i9n-nsAnSrb-rWTQQj4QuOAfs5N50_q/s1600/HPIM6150.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" naa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLAdenQrFp3jPjCuxqmWvCXR9Y-VivRKZcVU0JWZAal9xh2SCzxy1S_weQR073ocomLejqV_TnoLBpmhefzu8kl50Y5DznC94_KoC58fVSZ1PO5i9n-nsAnSrb-rWTQQj4QuOAfs5N50_q/s320/HPIM6150.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">1. Indoctrinating your children to be the next generation of fans to your favorite sports teams! Oh yeah, they're all wearing their Dolphins shirts! Are you ready for some football???</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">(And yes, they all also have Red Sox shirts. They may also get Falcons shirts. They will not, however, be getting Braves shirts. I grew up too much of a Mets fan for that.)</div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuZPNjMdu6CF27NLMNcOpXLlj0T-yltCMW1X3elTZpCuE38mLgNPQ2OT6DR8By9G9hjCGwGduvqyj1OptVQ1mE_8Cx7UaVEoednc2kjxtmmN8O1ooXCGLkknt8ADgaXoO722ji0ZzRCSr2/s1600/HPIM6146.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" naa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuZPNjMdu6CF27NLMNcOpXLlj0T-yltCMW1X3elTZpCuE38mLgNPQ2OT6DR8By9G9hjCGwGduvqyj1OptVQ1mE_8Cx7UaVEoednc2kjxtmmN8O1ooXCGLkknt8ADgaXoO722ji0ZzRCSr2/s320/HPIM6146.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">2. Seeing your oldest child so excited to start second grade, and to know he's off to a really good start! Patrick has a new teacher who seems great so far. We're hoping for a great year for him and know that he's going to learn a ton!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvjHFmH9DT-hrkveAWVNWd_icjyXHTJZ1eeOMsdpFd8w8EG6FUR2PIuqfPXj61zBb4UvdzZu9eYhPZlUg3nH_6WA94rAYq9amdAi3TpKyXJVIY7MTt5GZoiPaadvGiGC5mf6iW3U3OZrgh/s1600/205977_2113516070977_1037915701_32432171_4957846_s%255B1%255D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" naa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvjHFmH9DT-hrkveAWVNWd_icjyXHTJZ1eeOMsdpFd8w8EG6FUR2PIuqfPXj61zBb4UvdzZu9eYhPZlUg3nH_6WA94rAYq9amdAi3TpKyXJVIY7MTt5GZoiPaadvGiGC5mf6iW3U3OZrgh/s1600/205977_2113516070977_1037915701_32432171_4957846_s%255B1%255D.jpg" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">3. Watching your middle child write his first words on his own, without any help from Mama or Daddy! Melkamu's really wanted to learn to write for the last few weeks. We've been trying really hard not to push him until he was ready but, like he often does, he decided he wanted to do it and is figuring it out. He's been working on the letters of his name and has that pretty well--needs a little help but can write it entirely himself. Today, though, he was watching Elmo's World on Sesame Street and, after the intro was over, he went and got a piece of paper and a crayon. He wrote the "ELO" part and then asked me what it said. I knew where he was going with it and said "If you put in an M, it will say ELMO." And he did! I could not be prouder of how much he is learning lately, and can only imagine how he will blossom when he starts Pre-K in 10 days.</div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXxiItKznGKZqBQ-mL7Dxg6LAXSo3YZOyE6AjenzP5qzcIPvaw0vIeS081R_F6vFfeEepmM4-BCKyRScZOd55LUSXLxNSrYDkXM5VI5Z5yxiXbgMr2RJuLOYulUIGcI3f6Xj7LXi9t41rU/s1600/285528_2113918681042_1037915701_32432591_2644631_s%255B1%255D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" naa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXxiItKznGKZqBQ-mL7Dxg6LAXSo3YZOyE6AjenzP5qzcIPvaw0vIeS081R_F6vFfeEepmM4-BCKyRScZOd55LUSXLxNSrYDkXM5VI5Z5yxiXbgMr2RJuLOYulUIGcI3f6Xj7LXi9t41rU/s1600/285528_2113918681042_1037915701_32432591_2644631_s%255B1%255D.jpg" /></a></div>4. Realizing your youngest child can sit on her own for 20 seconds or more at a time! Ellie's been pushing up so high on her arms and I knew she could hold herself up with minimal help but I discovered today that she really doesn't even need the minimal help as much as I thought she did. I am constantly astounded by how strong my daughter has become!<br />
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It's been a good week for us, in case you couldn't tell :-)<br />
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</div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-40646056928780348642011-08-08T09:34:00.000-04:002011-08-08T09:34:13.050-04:00Ellie at 5 months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dyJbaAFxQDJmtQYk-sOn0Vhu97ygNC3cYOQ0n8A06FvdxNRJh3KFpfpkw0BcA32VtfiB9Kp1lerFihh6RtkSg' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe>I love watching my kids growing and turning into the people that they become. It's one of the most awesome things about being a parent.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Eleanor turned 5 months old yesterday and is such a unique little person in this family! She is such a big girl, so long and perfectly chubby, and is so strong. I don't think I posted that at 4 months, she was 16 lb 7 oz (93rd percentile) and off-the-charts for height...but she has my little pinhead in the 40th percentile. Those are exactly the same percentiles as when she was born, so she's staying the course! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">She was holding her head up briefly the night she was born and has continued to have fast muscle development ever since. She rolled front-to-back at 5 weeks 6 days old old, back-to-front at 3 months 12 days old, and is currently working on pulling her upper body into a sitting position (and I really mean <em>currently</em>, since I'm typing one handed with her on my lap). She can stay sitting without support briefly and is getting better at balancing like that every day. She pushes up so far on her arms while she's on her stomach that she can get her whole upper body off the floor and can also get her knees under herself and tries to push. If she puts those two together, we're in trouble ;-) I'm predicting 7 1/2 months for crawling for her. Let's see how close I am!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Jason and I have always subscribed to the belief that babies can't do everything at once--they'll develop physical skills for a while, then hold constant at that level of physical development while they work on verbal skills, and so forth. Ellie kind of does everything at once. She's doing wonderfully on physical skills, and is such a talker! She babbles all sorts of sounds--dadada, bababa, nanana, mamama--and recently has taken to blowing raspberries. The other day she was babbling "Dadadada" and then blowing raspberries. Jason said "Oh great. She's waited 5 months to tell the world that Daddy is gassy."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgYg61Hzkz3qmkkv_4WO2zNlR1wcZNsWP1Ha5sRinx8xigJUGUGcD7iDghPTdS8RO5_DfBYcIMlJJdEx8QnC9xFO1qe4VrNnK6DUO7Q4DMenqeDNKWvdj99MePBvj21rJdmEBdJUzAhjau/s1600/HPIM6112.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" naa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgYg61Hzkz3qmkkv_4WO2zNlR1wcZNsWP1Ha5sRinx8xigJUGUGcD7iDghPTdS8RO5_DfBYcIMlJJdEx8QnC9xFO1qe4VrNnK6DUO7Q4DMenqeDNKWvdj99MePBvj21rJdmEBdJUzAhjau/s320/HPIM6112.JPG" width="240" /></a>Here she is with Jason and her crinkle lion. She also has a crinkle elephant and crinkle dog, and they are her absolute favorite toys.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;">She also recognizes certain words. One of her all-time favorites is "nurse", as in "Do you want to nurse?" It calms her instantly if she's upset and frequently she'll use her "na" sound when I say that. I don't think she's *quite* to talking yet but she really, really wants to. Who would have figured that we'd have another chatterbox in this family? I figured she'd be very close-mouthed and taciturn like her brothers.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;">I think I just cracked a rib trying not to laugh. BWAHAHAHAHA!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;">Anyway...</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;">Speaking of her brothers, nothing--and I mean absolutely nothing, not even nursing--makes her happier than Patrick and Melkamu. She lights up as soon as she hears their voices, turning towards them and smiling and babbling to them. She grabs for them (especially Patrick's hair), smiles and laughs when they give her hugs and kisses, and tries to get to them if they're not right next to her. For their part, they are awesome big brothers. Patrick sings to her whenever she's upset and Melkamu always wants to give her hugs and kisses. They both adore her and the level of hero-worship that she has for them is impossible to resist!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"></div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiF-xSbaSKcPMw7jUg0pBgbE-itx1XXpYHPw7fsHEorX_Bb1IknXu80e5mfIL5v6lCJFmUpeNxaLTn3cfR5JOAb3_ERZEfgu_r_UbOrePvAy0nYdgz_5hBapB_nRSqlqAUJiRwMhTVeW8N/s1600/HPIM6046.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" naa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiF-xSbaSKcPMw7jUg0pBgbE-itx1XXpYHPw7fsHEorX_Bb1IknXu80e5mfIL5v6lCJFmUpeNxaLTn3cfR5JOAb3_ERZEfgu_r_UbOrePvAy0nYdgz_5hBapB_nRSqlqAUJiRwMhTVeW8N/s320/HPIM6046.JPG" width="320" /></a>Ellie still doesn't nap much or sleep through the night but we do think the napping is improving in the last two weeks. She's actually started falling asleep during the day and, as long as we don't move her from where she is, she'll stay asleep for a while. Unfortunately, as she usually falls asleep in some inopportune place (the couch, the floor, our waterbed), we can't leave her there to sleep unattended and trying to put her in her crib generally wakes her. Since she's nursing, we co-sleep a lot at night. We usually start the nights in our own beds (her in a crib, of course) and then when she wakes up hungry, I'll lay down with her, latch her on, and go back to sleep. She does sleep for one or two 4-5 hour stretches most nights, along with some shorter ones, and stays asleep until about 7:30 a.m. Because we co-sleep, I don't feel particularly sleep-deprived. It's not much interruption in sleep to grab her from her crib and lay down with her nursing so the fact that she's not sleeping through the night really isn't a problem.</div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">My Ellie-bean prefers draft exclusively--straight-from-the-tap or not at all, in her mind. And hey, who doesn't prefer draft to bottle? It's made things a little tough for her at times when I've had to teach in the late evenings but up until now hasn't really been an issue. It will become more of one when I go back to work in the days next week. Jason will be home with her but since she won't take a bottle and won't start solids for another month, she may be hungry quite often. I suspect they'll take some trips to my office so I can nurse her. We've also got some new sippy cups and are going to see if she will drink expressed milk from them. If not--well, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. I have heard about reverse-cyclers who won't take a bottle during the day while the moms are at work but nurse a lot more at night to make up for it and suspect that's probably what will happen. It's also the reason that I haven't worried about her not sleeping through the night. Why try to get her to sleep through now when she's going to need more nursing time then if she still refuses to take her milk any other way?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">She's changing so much every day. Her eyes are still a pretty blue-gray but are showing a little more brown, so it will be interesting to see if they stay blue-gray like Jason's or turn brown like mine. Her hair is definitely blonde and is starting to get longer. Poor baby is going to have a mullet for a while. We're about to switch to 9-12 month clothes (hello fall consignment sales!) and are getting a highchair so she can sit with us at meal times (since her current mealtime position, sitting on my lap, is harder to maintain now that she can reliably grab my plate and try to pull it off the table). She likes to be in the middle of everything and doesn't want to miss a minute of the excitement.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUtgHJababNFfEcViXElYA4bOeW8i2yy6gr_g7C7jCB0_yflXwBBs402CiHmaAl0UJesFn3qw-DbmVVjjR0iuMEaW6mpQYCqHDBlAKu6QuhwyUsYIzNEhqlmd7H3tJ7yHVqlQHb4Qq1gLF/s1600/HPIM5967.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" naa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUtgHJababNFfEcViXElYA4bOeW8i2yy6gr_g7C7jCB0_yflXwBBs402CiHmaAl0UJesFn3qw-DbmVVjjR0iuMEaW6mpQYCqHDBlAKu6QuhwyUsYIzNEhqlmd7H3tJ7yHVqlQHb4Qq1gLF/s320/HPIM5967.JPG" width="320" /></a>I love getting to know Ellie and finding out who she is! The first term I used to describe her is always "sweetie", closely followed by "strong-willed". Both of these are good qualities to have and I can't wait to see what she does with them in the future!</div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-58229550904280680852011-08-05T15:08:00.000-04:002011-08-05T15:08:15.193-04:00*Tap tap tap*Is this thing still on?<br />
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Ahem...<br />
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You may have noticed that I disappeared for awhile. I know you were anxiously awaiting another installment of The Morrey, The Merrier's antics because it is such a shining beacon in an otherwise dreary day. I'm sure that this blog signifies hope, love, light, and courage that brings you joy and happiness.<br />
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The silence coming from your end suggests that I might have been mistaken. How embarrassing.<br />
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It's been an interesting summer at Casa Morrey. <a href="http://adoptionfamily.blogspot.com/2011/06/making-adjustments.html">Jason was gone for 7 weeks</a>. It was a tough 7 weeks, though I have to admit that I feel something of a sense of pride that I managed to hold everything together on my own. We saw Jason several of those weekends and I did have a lot of help. Jason's wonderful mom came in to help me during a week when my babysitter was away, other friends helped when I had meetings, and my dad came to help during finals--but all of us were surprised and thrilled when Jason was able to come home for good at the same time!<br />
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Despite being insane with work (3 classes, 2 of which I'd never taught fully online before), I survived the summer home with the kids by not sleeping much and consuming copious quantities of sugar and caffeine. The boys say they had a good summer and that's really what matters--they were already going to be dealing with enough with Jason being gone, so I didn't want them also to have a mama that was always working during the day. We had fun with playgroup, lots and lots of playdates, trips to Charleston and Florida, and canning.<br />
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OK, <em>*I*</em> had fun with canning. I can't vouch for the kids. They had fun with the berry picking and the farmers' market outings to get the things that went into the canning process, at least!<br />
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I'm sensing thoughts of "Where are the damned pictures?" from your end of the computer. I'll just get to them, shall I?<br />
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<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1tZKB5JtCNEzE890bWwrYqBqUk3HvcyvIC1NvyCnI3iJb8caBJjRrbhyphenhyphen3TFkOoqq8vTu11Wsr-4BqfFeDlGe_iVFcNrDGh5Lc79pz1CtxlQk9mBnckM4JL2hNubW869Pmbz3Z3ELnYBgD/s1600/HPIM5916.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1tZKB5JtCNEzE890bWwrYqBqUk3HvcyvIC1NvyCnI3iJb8caBJjRrbhyphenhyphen3TFkOoqq8vTu11Wsr-4BqfFeDlGe_iVFcNrDGh5Lc79pz1CtxlQk9mBnckM4JL2hNubW869Pmbz3Z3ELnYBgD/s320/HPIM5916.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a>The trip to Charleston! We spent a day on the beach. Kamu got knocked down by a wave within the first few minutes and decided he didn't like the ocean, so he spent the day building sandcastles. Patrick was in the water, out to build sandcastles, back in the water, out to eat some snacks, back in the water, bodysurfing, out to play catch, back in the water...</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmKkIZ4dx46SQFIN6UAWrmc-Wd9_WDBpKZ4rHxqYWH0GHh0N-ZF9mxs6UPgsF52TbJYr5C7fuHsbPhuuQMVVcWl5xIDRTS_tB6yn8AK8_pNaCkOVjVH8V6hyphenhyphen3QeAU8qqCC0EjZQo-PWsmq/s1600/HPIM5919.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmKkIZ4dx46SQFIN6UAWrmc-Wd9_WDBpKZ4rHxqYWH0GHh0N-ZF9mxs6UPgsF52TbJYr5C7fuHsbPhuuQMVVcWl5xIDRTS_tB6yn8AK8_pNaCkOVjVH8V6hyphenhyphen3QeAU8qqCC0EjZQo-PWsmq/s320/HPIM5919.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Ellie looks adorable but hated the beach that day. This was about the only time she was out of my arms and not crying. But check out the hat! I am not a girly person except for accessories. Ellie's hat collection is awesome. Sadly, she's growing out of them. Happily, that means I can buy more!</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUoXhxpWEUJvUE91-23Rb_HLlXBGcHSrDQqehjwKg3xs08O2tG8ZSSnp9TQrBnvKnvn5PAwWzFaqE_8En1VExCkmZ455EjuTx55OEDw8hVVdzCBsoDnJzZTCJ5SCzAWWIMK-MNB2Q4pwOE/s1600/HPIM5937.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUoXhxpWEUJvUE91-23Rb_HLlXBGcHSrDQqehjwKg3xs08O2tG8ZSSnp9TQrBnvKnvn5PAwWzFaqE_8En1VExCkmZ455EjuTx55OEDw8hVVdzCBsoDnJzZTCJ5SCzAWWIMK-MNB2Q4pwOE/s320/HPIM5937.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">The boys were worn out after the beach.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI0umQ-L-DFIRvDD4YUccY9fYGtyRs6uhQFB2mnrNa-wLkl0mGQP4RZlFM1JVt-IDAHqvZyFSrmwZiD3GQO_bf7TY-n9EJfD9PVu0qcpD8_sazivh_3_Mw2ryo3RdqlHqzADCayKkhT5pQ/s1600/HPIM5941.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI0umQ-L-DFIRvDD4YUccY9fYGtyRs6uhQFB2mnrNa-wLkl0mGQP4RZlFM1JVt-IDAHqvZyFSrmwZiD3GQO_bf7TY-n9EJfD9PVu0qcpD8_sazivh_3_Mw2ryo3RdqlHqzADCayKkhT5pQ/s320/HPIM5941.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">We took a trip to the USS Independence the next day. The kids were awed by the size of an aircraft carrier!</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWyMy-dlyZkfNgRxB3ezYLqY2MnTUXXf8bt7IE6dvBsK2icbBWpJyG5JiyGFGt5p6XMFj2aeRjhGL_tR7C745v366fwH2ODuBJWLV1cMeesQQqqKu5bhFlgvP8bG8utkVTmDnGuf5xt5Xr/s1600/HPIM5966.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWyMy-dlyZkfNgRxB3ezYLqY2MnTUXXf8bt7IE6dvBsK2icbBWpJyG5JiyGFGt5p6XMFj2aeRjhGL_tR7C745v366fwH2ODuBJWLV1cMeesQQqqKu5bhFlgvP8bG8utkVTmDnGuf5xt5Xr/s320/HPIM5966.JPG" t$="true" width="240" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">I talk about how big Eleanor has gotten but it's hard to put that together with how tall she really is. She'll be 5 months old on Sunday. I took this picture about a month ago. She's wearing 6-9 month clothes in this picture. By now, that outfit is *almost* too small.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn3X3djg35K2vjqJ7mZVip9Zkm9rX8XhYiUx45bmFHByXpBVTVxiQYtl3xnl_A32OFcbkW9X9dv6DiW5VCFxQwqLOmfqbdUhBCCjL11FpJTgpwHxEFxFSv-owtaSfNx2yEYUp-2oe_gxMB/s1600/HPIM5988.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn3X3djg35K2vjqJ7mZVip9Zkm9rX8XhYiUx45bmFHByXpBVTVxiQYtl3xnl_A32OFcbkW9X9dv6DiW5VCFxQwqLOmfqbdUhBCCjL11FpJTgpwHxEFxFSv-owtaSfNx2yEYUp-2oe_gxMB/s320/HPIM5988.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Patrick, age 7 1/2, self-portrait.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPfGMQVFnJ9O-TD7YH5Kbo4-3lbCfloHJgUqNTrBQFHPLau8HemibXSE0FdtjCd_iBuHhRKNtKbGopUzvVKPsi_-vBEwq0K7sZx9B4SzS4u3B2KvC2RUj9KU1Dj7b8U7K7yzxL84JomW4y/s1600/HPIM6013.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPfGMQVFnJ9O-TD7YH5Kbo4-3lbCfloHJgUqNTrBQFHPLau8HemibXSE0FdtjCd_iBuHhRKNtKbGopUzvVKPsi_-vBEwq0K7sZx9B4SzS4u3B2KvC2RUj9KU1Dj7b8U7K7yzxL84JomW4y/s320/HPIM6013.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Ellie gets some quality time with Patrick's favorite stuffed animal Shamoops while laying on Kamu's bed.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg32N244yHlOzAuKH7OqK_zThAyTsnrTEDneZi1sh8bZAj2WpXnxT2niSlBCZV2fFqDmFHTj9Ug1rZ8WjXCg7PgtspNCsclmqvMJWn9nfrD7RBvU50SR_jtt0FyWY_FIPBlChYTgV4eoV9O/s1600/HPIM6041.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg32N244yHlOzAuKH7OqK_zThAyTsnrTEDneZi1sh8bZAj2WpXnxT2niSlBCZV2fFqDmFHTj9Ug1rZ8WjXCg7PgtspNCsclmqvMJWn9nfrD7RBvU50SR_jtt0FyWY_FIPBlChYTgV4eoV9O/s320/HPIM6041.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">All three of my munchkins!</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7RnOKeLaiDGdnmUHeSpNE5Yw9o9hnRhl8cErFKpt3gRIf98S0z9jbysC91HhTG4Ob50qoXxsM-fUjc8IdSyf97h7RmThxE7n0SQBo4VzhbbH77utIJytxKejHvDY8DPE3-klLP6RWsXSI/s1600/HPIM6115.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7RnOKeLaiDGdnmUHeSpNE5Yw9o9hnRhl8cErFKpt3gRIf98S0z9jbysC91HhTG4Ob50qoXxsM-fUjc8IdSyf97h7RmThxE7n0SQBo4VzhbbH77utIJytxKejHvDY8DPE3-klLP6RWsXSI/s320/HPIM6115.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Ellie meets her Great Grandma Lore for the first time. I hope I look half as good when I'm 3 months shy of 90!</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH-cJA0-uyxMG3H-bs9Tr2ey8zzY9d4x4ED_3JTDEP3HqqNW6N-hJn3iDmsXH_OdwUVB4ZwGHfqNJ970iqYecDKb9tJSrUh_AVUkv23dqt0N13yzkT3V6RnI5jihrI-ynssu8IIRRU0pSg/s1600/HPIM6116.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH-cJA0-uyxMG3H-bs9Tr2ey8zzY9d4x4ED_3JTDEP3HqqNW6N-hJn3iDmsXH_OdwUVB4ZwGHfqNJ970iqYecDKb9tJSrUh_AVUkv23dqt0N13yzkT3V6RnI5jihrI-ynssu8IIRRU0pSg/s320/HPIM6116.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">The whole family (plus an astronaut) at Kennedy Space Center. Ask Patrick about the Saturn V...but only if you have LOTS of time free!</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmLFp34dvLTRdUT9P7Sxkad0T5oI4fK5xOXdZwc79uGMCgL3f_VN4-W1JtwKrLtElVof8ePjxuWuKqI4bdx3xglEt7l8WuSK7LtuK6vzb2A904QMJQ_Y9It5mWzqXrjNsX_GNK16hfPr2Y/s1600/HPIM6108.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmLFp34dvLTRdUT9P7Sxkad0T5oI4fK5xOXdZwc79uGMCgL3f_VN4-W1JtwKrLtElVof8ePjxuWuKqI4bdx3xglEt7l8WuSK7LtuK6vzb2A904QMJQ_Y9It5mWzqXrjNsX_GNK16hfPr2Y/s320/HPIM6108.JPG" t$="true" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">And peach salsa, pre-canning! (I couldn't let the whole post go without a picture of it ;-) ) Isn't it pretty?</div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-68257988212456696202011-06-27T10:31:00.000-04:002011-06-27T10:31:41.459-04:00Got it!<div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dwMyT7RyJJf25j6b_tV-Diw3sGME2qpJMKTnWA_5Ng8KDvZFfFv_13dORXSqC6RY8tAgK9X6QvMEInr7ekBfg' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe>I finally got Ellie on video rolling over from back to front! I've been trying to catch this for the last week. It's quick, since she was already 3/4 of the way over when the camera finally turned on, but I've already posted photos of her most of the way over and so you've seen that part. You can tell from the ease with which she gets that bottom arm out from under herself once she's on her tummy that she's been practicing this A LOT this past week! Fortunately, she hasn't put together the fact that she can now roll both ways, or even that if she gets herself onto her tummy, she can also roll back off of it. (Phew!)</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;">Don't blink or you'll miss it!</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: left;">(And there will be a new post soon about our weekend in Charleston, which was great.)</div><div style="text-align: left;"></div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-47638306572989036672011-06-10T22:46:00.000-04:002011-06-10T22:46:13.507-04:00Passing time<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>The kids and I get a lot of calls from concerned people lately. We really are doing OK, though we do love having so many people supporting us through Jason's job away from home. Jason tells me that, from what he's seen of me, single parenting requires a lot of caffeine. Thankfully this doesn't seem to bother Eleanor--she doesn't really sleep much during the day anyway and I haven't noticed a decrease in that little bit of sleep, or in fussiness or anything. This is a very good thing.<br />
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We're keeping busy. Last summer I worked while being home with the boys and didn't do a great job of keeping work separate from spending time with them. I was so focused on getting the work done that I spent way more time working during their awake hours than I would have liked. That's changed this summer. I do some work during the day but mainly while they're in quiet time. Most of it gets done after they go to bed. I'm spending more time letting them have fun this summer--we've been going swimming a lot, going to our playgroup, just spending time with friends. The kids haven't gotten really bored yet (of course, it's only been 3 weeks) and I find it's easier when they're not bored. I have a couple of things I'm saving for rainy days or those times when they get really bored.<br />
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OK, I know you're not here to listen to me blather about things like that. I actually have some more substantive posts that I'm slowly writing piecemeal but it's hard to find time to do this at all. Ellie is getting more and more fun lately. She isn't screaming as much of the time, to the rejoicing of my ears, and spends an awful lot of time cooing and babbling and such. <br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi28HLG17P6loEvN4pioHYA7AawCtSNWG849kxhyEh2NijXba1er19FjA3XEY48jIlEz3ubk7xRy9nYz4HodSviV_jJstqbuTY-6PzcnEbrMxD76QA1Yk0IHwI1PUX6mqDrZV_er5kkXjRz/s1600/HPIM5830.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi28HLG17P6loEvN4pioHYA7AawCtSNWG849kxhyEh2NijXba1er19FjA3XEY48jIlEz3ubk7xRy9nYz4HodSviV_jJstqbuTY-6PzcnEbrMxD76QA1Yk0IHwI1PUX6mqDrZV_er5kkXjRz/s320/HPIM5830.JPG" t8="true" width="320" /></a></div>She's taking an interest in toys...particularly in eating them. Caterpillars are especially tasty when one is teething.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC9QToXgcUKqU6zmk66p22pCamty0QSC0VBHyflbF80lOrR2yKT0XsHy1n_XMv_h093GnvHWI8jhJyxCLvpLOB4u-mHL1ZCZ4yFho4wniXY8mYei70zffpcBXU3TibSZyJhqTc_GefiwzJ/s1600/HPIM5840.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC9QToXgcUKqU6zmk66p22pCamty0QSC0VBHyflbF80lOrR2yKT0XsHy1n_XMv_h093GnvHWI8jhJyxCLvpLOB4u-mHL1ZCZ4yFho4wniXY8mYei70zffpcBXU3TibSZyJhqTc_GefiwzJ/s320/HPIM5840.JPG" t8="true" width="320" /></a></div>She's also decided that rolling front to back is all well and good, and she'd like to find out more about this whole rolling back to front thing. In the last two days, she has managed to turn the lower half of her body from back to front and get her upper body onto the side. All she needs is a little more upper body momentum to get that arm out from underneath and she will have officially rolled back to front. Today I helped her with that last little bit of arm movement to get her onto her stomach, and she promptly rolled onto her back again. It was basically her way of telling me "I've mastered about 3/4 of rolling. One of these days, you'll look over and I'll be halfway across the room." Because what I need is a rolling 3-month-old.<br />
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The kids are particularly cute these days. Last night they were all sleeping in amusing ways, so I broke out the camera! It's 95 degrees here (76 in the house). The boys consisently choose to wear fleece and flannel pajamas. I don't get it.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9_6SNKs17s9MO_mGObiX4CxnKbDC5rbXgzKi7BzeVR3uOwsGCUEhPmkNYSYiqER_LdKKyiMzqQBVReQ9g50x5-e5WDlDdE5ABPN6r4S_62xIKbw3hOxYysXGmogxa2aWpxI5XHrHNIPdh/s1600/HPIM5833.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9_6SNKs17s9MO_mGObiX4CxnKbDC5rbXgzKi7BzeVR3uOwsGCUEhPmkNYSYiqER_LdKKyiMzqQBVReQ9g50x5-e5WDlDdE5ABPN6r4S_62xIKbw3hOxYysXGmogxa2aWpxI5XHrHNIPdh/s320/HPIM5833.JPG" t8="true" width="320" /></a></div>Last night Patrick also chose to bury himself in his blankets, because that's what you need in Atlanta in June.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaZ1Gvg_kiRGb7oVNKEgj-JrZXlnDwpk-5P51kWxYyaaiKJyJHmQZ7h4dVqWPZFJrkvABJC8YLTS38CuBY84RP39i9Yfv9fCPOUCnnOv3hVu9gMGk1BaiGHuYYiDIDbtfUgJ7jwH9c7M74/s1600/HPIM5832.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaZ1Gvg_kiRGb7oVNKEgj-JrZXlnDwpk-5P51kWxYyaaiKJyJHmQZ7h4dVqWPZFJrkvABJC8YLTS38CuBY84RP39i9Yfv9fCPOUCnnOv3hVu9gMGk1BaiGHuYYiDIDbtfUgJ7jwH9c7M74/s320/HPIM5832.JPG" t8="true" width="240" /></a></div>Melkamu slept on top of the blankets but decided his feet needed the pillow more than his head.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr4Taezo-x_nZ6XIkYlPxKVAwgLq4iTVcOneAiT2yx1e6-OAK_aX2uLltZZih3_SJ8PvhhSJ33PXNoVK6oR2-X1f2Je0CSeD3x9vgeRzoYxz4c5_alZZeE79tsSUAGvMSjGjK84loAstdr/s1600/HPIM5834.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr4Taezo-x_nZ6XIkYlPxKVAwgLq4iTVcOneAiT2yx1e6-OAK_aX2uLltZZih3_SJ8PvhhSJ33PXNoVK6oR2-X1f2Je0CSeD3x9vgeRzoYxz4c5_alZZeE79tsSUAGvMSjGjK84loAstdr/s320/HPIM5834.JPG" t8="true" width="240" /></a></div>And Ellie has been choosing to sleep sideways in the bassinet. I put her down normally every night and she immediately squirms sideways.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-4889692630234329192011-06-07T00:50:00.000-04:002011-06-07T00:50:43.551-04:00Making adjustmentsEllie turns 3 months old tomorrow. That, in and of itself, is an adjustment. She's such a fun little baby girl. Definitely still very temperamental but hey, at least you never have to guess what she's thinking! I'm not sure exactly how big she is now but at 2 months she was in the 92nd percentile for weight (13 lb 1 oz) and 96th for length (24+")--these are about the same percentages as her birth percentages, so she's staying on the same track. I think she's getting it from Melkamu's side of the family. Naturally, to maintain this rate of growth, she eats all the time still. She slept through the night on one glorious occasion last week but other than that, she wakes up twice a night or more to nurse. I don't actually expect her to sleep through the night regularly anytime soon. During the day, she nurses once almost every hour. She might go 90 minutes between nursings but somewhere within the 3:00 hour, the 4:00 hour, the 5:00 hour, the...anyway, she's probably eating. <br />
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I'm teaching two online classes and a face-to-face lab class this summer. It's a huge amount of work but so far it's going OK and I'm keeping up.<br />
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The biggest adjustment for us has been Jason's work. As you know, his job ended in February and he's been looking for a new one ever since. He got called by a legal temp agency about 2 weeks ago to do a job for most of the summer, which was great...<br />
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...except that the job is in South Carolina. We live in Atlanta. Atlanta is not in South Carolina. Atlanta is too far from South Carolina to commute.<br />
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This poses several challenges. First, a normal summer schedule at my college is two classes--the summer semester is only half the length of a normal semester, so there's twice as much work each week as in a normal spring or fall semester. I took on a third class because Jason wasn't working and it would help us financially. However, I also arranged these classes so that I could still be home with the kids in case Jason got a job (silly me expected that if he got a job, it would be here). Hence, I leave to teach my lab two nights a week at 7:30 p.m., when the boys go to bed, and do my online classes whenever I have a free minute, and most other evenings.<br />
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So basically, it's worked out like this: I am currently working 50% more than full-time, while <em>also</em> home full-time with the kids, one of whom is a newborn who doesn't sleep through the night and won't take a bottle. (Don't ask me how it works to be a full-time SAHM and a full-time WOHM/WAHM at the same time. There is no answer.) Jason is renting a room in a house in South Carolina and came home last weekend, but won't be able to come home again for several more weeks because he's expected to work on the weekends. Which means I am <em>also</em> doing everything around the house that I'd normally do <em>plus</em> everything he normally does. Like mowing our lawn. Have you seen our lawn? It's like mowing a black-diamond ski slope in 95F temperatures.<br />
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I miss Jason and his lawn-mowing prowess.<br />
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The kids are bearing up as much as possible. Melkamu says "I miss Daddy" at least 10 times a day. Patrick will be doing something and say "I have to remember to tell Daddy about this when we talk to him." We're doing all we can to keep up and keep the house together.<br />
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And we really, really miss Jason. It was such a nice surprise to have him come home last weekend--we didn't know he'd be able to but they apparently got their first weekend off--but know that he won't be able to do it often. He won't be home for Father's Day weekend, and our 12th anniversary is the next day. That's particularly hard, knowing he won't be here to celebrate his first Father's Day as a dad of three.<br />
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We'll adjust as much as we can, and hope that he's home as soon as possible.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-48724860640638522712011-05-16T22:35:00.000-04:002011-05-16T22:35:40.425-04:00Kids, kids, kids<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPkwzjILIOgspuAeDxqrPvwWFjM5m1lSQ2THPsPi6QgenfcPsN2e8drf5N7Qm3hrnAAqTTQjmYEEc8jWg08dJXgxUNrS5gMXOn6MEDFB5mbyHXwovo2ECAXAtxKMPyfrRblgIubIcPSScW/s1600/HPIM5697.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5607501743730657602" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPkwzjILIOgspuAeDxqrPvwWFjM5m1lSQ2THPsPi6QgenfcPsN2e8drf5N7Qm3hrnAAqTTQjmYEEc8jWg08dJXgxUNrS5gMXOn6MEDFB5mbyHXwovo2ECAXAtxKMPyfrRblgIubIcPSScW/s320/HPIM5697.JPG" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 240px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 320px;" /></a>I have awesome kids. <br />
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</div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-YQwVkNCDZXmekL0BI_9c0_ucTwxp0THPqo7LCNPE3GpGz41zMzLZ3HAFQiPnR8SsmzsRMPpd93XjssduliKwgr35GLiuT9Xk7KaTWfEgfWdopT8XYK5q7mh5pTLd6CaMLAszT8zKqQzQ/s1600/HPIM5748.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5607501747002767858" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-YQwVkNCDZXmekL0BI_9c0_ucTwxp0THPqo7LCNPE3GpGz41zMzLZ3HAFQiPnR8SsmzsRMPpd93XjssduliKwgr35GLiuT9Xk7KaTWfEgfWdopT8XYK5q7mh5pTLd6CaMLAszT8zKqQzQ/s320/HPIM5748.JPG" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 320px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 240px;" /></a>They are all my sweet peas...one of them almost literally ;-)<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzI_4496sqJ_W35uxpIdZopGhCuX6NVQ1EmXkeT8oh6owp-bJDykqKxe9IQx-MGT9xyT-sRVgoNjZAFO3tDYMW9xaBGaaCoTKVxVZqmBzXUpD8mcKChR9cl9lnSpM8SsMyE08edMnRaJ_d/s1600/HPIM5692.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" j8="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzI_4496sqJ_W35uxpIdZopGhCuX6NVQ1EmXkeT8oh6owp-bJDykqKxe9IQx-MGT9xyT-sRVgoNjZAFO3tDYMW9xaBGaaCoTKVxVZqmBzXUpD8mcKChR9cl9lnSpM8SsMyE08edMnRaJ_d/s320/HPIM5692.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>They are creative.</div><br />
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<div>My kids rock.</div><br />
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<div></div></div></div></div></div></div><img height="96" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjySyeW1q_QK6TPLgH7JNWDgNPP5Y1iNnAYfmpYufseDUI2az-jfslZm59btfDXcp2SXY2JJkWechKUdGreTCnqCf6uq0SBbUFIfjq8AqDwZPiqyabwXaCSLKwtMnKOm_mk8iXg8LSjau2o/s320/HPIM5741.JPG" style="filter: alpha(opacity=30); left: 335px; mozopacity: 0.3; opacity: 0.3; position: absolute; top: 674px; visibility: hidden;" width="72" />ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-28548973591045308452011-04-21T21:35:00.003-04:002011-04-21T21:43:01.571-04:00Just a quickie(As a side note, have I mentioned how much I love the movie "Mr. and Mrs. Smith"? I could watch it all the time. And "Ever After".)<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkZqFu5sissZncsb_xDG-lN438JH0QYtRHTJaZbcPS-Iwrrcb2_EZsJZuSkFjXD4ENFe2aR33VLPDUiM6BSVRlXYc_dluhQqpMAIge4j3hd7ZHZxHsXXEKiVUNlm8DPPWObm-Arf3CPAjv/s1600/HPIM5691.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5598215860386523170" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkZqFu5sissZncsb_xDG-lN438JH0QYtRHTJaZbcPS-Iwrrcb2_EZsJZuSkFjXD4ENFe2aR33VLPDUiM6BSVRlXYc_dluhQqpMAIge4j3hd7ZHZxHsXXEKiVUNlm8DPPWObm-Arf3CPAjv/s320/HPIM5691.JPG" /></a>I finally got Eleanor smiling on camera! This is the cutest picture ever. She still has her dark blue eyes but they are starting to turn a little more gray. She is such a sweet little girl. Definitely more temperamental than Patrick was as a baby, with her own ideas on everything, but sweet as can be. She rolled over front-to-back for the first time at 5 weeks, 5 days old. I told her how impressed I was and promptly told her not to do it again--she's too young to start things like that ;-) She weighed in at 11 lb 10 oz at 6 weeks old, up from her birth weight at 8 lb 14 oz. She comes with me to teach my pharmacology class each week and either stays with my department chair or sleeps in the sling while I talk.<br /><br />My baby girl is growing up way too fast, but we are loving every day of it.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-42986101328697992032011-04-09T15:22:00.005-04:002011-04-09T16:12:10.650-04:00Three is even more fun than two<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dzq8Rv5L4VFpthRCo_YXtBCG_PgxuHugupjCpmZM36ILBonRMGuSC_NVYLvV-qdQ37WI6hleJu_Rz79oMmH_A' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe>One of Ellie's nicknames is "Wiggle Worm". She was just introduced to the play gym two days ago and so far, she really likes it. It's about the only place that she's willing to be put down while awake without screaming her sweet little head off. <br /><div><br /><p></p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhYBw7_KjZy5xb0lyqge0d28-hCmZVKtx-tslZCul8KVzfBb-bHRe5psDruSCD4mQor10NstVj_hCKTX_NSeMNVxqN6No64dMUzjGHKVNz-6bwObZYzxUPY1FaHO2mn9qgEq4rFU1717QY/s1600/HPIM5638.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5593677757247582562" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhYBw7_KjZy5xb0lyqge0d28-hCmZVKtx-tslZCul8KVzfBb-bHRe5psDruSCD4mQor10NstVj_hCKTX_NSeMNVxqN6No64dMUzjGHKVNz-6bwObZYzxUPY1FaHO2mn9qgEq4rFU1717QY/s320/HPIM5638.JPG" /></a>Caesar likes having Ellie down at his level. <br /><p></p><br /><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmD3R_BNgq87z2gcna8OMDdM_dN5TO0g-zPOWmJOQY94rY7j6JT0ztkQ7z3JPrpeBcUcMacOynQd7xv8jwJ9k5dpHilVBqyKBLGuho5WLjc1je_TtvtCWjlDoUrVoVW9Wiozt21eqz5y6J/s1600/HPIM5645.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5593677759223567346" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmD3R_BNgq87z2gcna8OMDdM_dN5TO0g-zPOWmJOQY94rY7j6JT0ztkQ7z3JPrpeBcUcMacOynQd7xv8jwJ9k5dpHilVBqyKBLGuho5WLjc1je_TtvtCWjlDoUrVoVW9Wiozt21eqz5y6J/s320/HPIM5645.JPG" /></a>Patrick and Kamu love Ellie to pieces. They sing songs to her when she cries, hold her hands, give her hugs and kisses, and are really gentle with her. Kamu occasionally gets a little tired of how often she eats ("You nursing the baby <em>again?!?!?!</em>") but other than that, his transition to big brother has been remarkably easy--much more so than I'd expected. He does take advantage of anytime I put Ellie down to cuddle with me but that's certainly to my benefit as much as his :-)</p><br /><p></p><br /><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYuhUmM-gboNxGIiny7KtvS9DpnKeuJEmTK7wbxHGYpf_OVP4WFyevGCem1Po94GuIVuHc1rvBz2MxmqePUETH29E9tOJY1ei-z-1JKOGTOPYHS963hAGat6wKtS0BrTnK_LXpJ2gjELJ3/s1600/HPIM5665.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5593677763320010818" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYuhUmM-gboNxGIiny7KtvS9DpnKeuJEmTK7wbxHGYpf_OVP4WFyevGCem1Po94GuIVuHc1rvBz2MxmqePUETH29E9tOJY1ei-z-1JKOGTOPYHS963hAGat6wKtS0BrTnK_LXpJ2gjELJ3/s320/HPIM5665.JPG" /></a>Eleanor doesn't mind tummy-time too much because it gives her easy access to slurp on her fist, which she loves. (And yes, I know she's in pink <em>and</em> flowers <em>and </em>ruffles in this picture. Some of it is kind of cute. Most of it makes me itch.)</p></div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-26909665520414581892011-04-07T21:04:00.001-04:002011-04-07T21:15:14.624-04:00A little bit of Eleanor in my life<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">I've been told I'm not blogging enough since Ellie came. Mind you, I would argue that having blogged twice in the last month is pretty darned good for me but apparently <strike>my mom and sister</strike> others have a different view. I admit that it is hard to blog with a baby who refuses to be put down for more than two seconds while awake or five minutes while asleep, primarily because I can't sit close enough to the desktop to type or put the laptop on my lap. And the fact that she nurses all the time which means, at best, I have one hand free while the other holds her. </div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_pfSPlhwcfGgkedXzKns0ANjxJKdlAl9ISlKrmvRjoQW0XeUZkYVv99fcgbPypJbO7ohiKq_UmdIpQj2C1bAngC0W8EemeM-z3tVNVBxYRy-7IUYMzI3MDNAKXK6eefYaAsQr6nny9GJ5/s1600/HPIM5627.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_pfSPlhwcfGgkedXzKns0ANjxJKdlAl9ISlKrmvRjoQW0XeUZkYVv99fcgbPypJbO7ohiKq_UmdIpQj2C1bAngC0W8EemeM-z3tVNVBxYRy-7IUYMzI3MDNAKXK6eefYaAsQr6nny9GJ5/s320/HPIM5627.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Then again, I can't argue with wanting to see more of this sweet pea. She is a month old today--I can hardly believe it! It feels like she's been with us forever and yet no time at all.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYTpjOM8hNDSaUR07I_njKs7Wx-9lIc93VVydgsa5D3l7TImgmEx8wgOKQCwZwTqG_mEEUQmU8s1C-mKc1atoQvyvSX2Wbm_tLteoMrtU20GiJLIF0Gq65aV0JXsl5M___aRdJIrZj0e3A/s1600/HPIM5573.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYTpjOM8hNDSaUR07I_njKs7Wx-9lIc93VVydgsa5D3l7TImgmEx8wgOKQCwZwTqG_mEEUQmU8s1C-mKc1atoQvyvSX2Wbm_tLteoMrtU20GiJLIF0Gq65aV0JXsl5M___aRdJIrZj0e3A/s320/HPIM5573.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Eleanor is a wonderful little girl. (Look, I almost caught her smiling! She's been smiling at me for about two weeks and has just started smiling at other people.)</div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYz0X3XmNm4Rhmr-MllgYqowmQmDQHjFEhxB1CnbXK-o27blC1x0GfnXWwOlpGBZFL5Lbx3448jt396ADFmfizePEpS-Ha4GS8Ac3SeTUlww4oU0K4Ovkpmd_abIjyO_k63UtLqdBySf4e/s1600/100_0877.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYz0X3XmNm4Rhmr-MllgYqowmQmDQHjFEhxB1CnbXK-o27blC1x0GfnXWwOlpGBZFL5Lbx3448jt396ADFmfizePEpS-Ha4GS8Ac3SeTUlww4oU0K4Ovkpmd_abIjyO_k63UtLqdBySf4e/s320/100_0877.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>She's always on the go with her big brothers (though no one ever sees her since she's always in the sling).<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiSnuidXCg3z7AqG7elFhyphenhyphenmgJpepYzht91ceuRKdislkHGbxWplmCvJ2wYeCStBaZVaoy3e_RP9IOBTqcbV8r1wX52oJ0Eu1bk7ucF73Qmd-a8-pR8Ne2uMry4CsDZr4iC6pIdu-Z1GTGj/s1600/HPIM5621.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiSnuidXCg3z7AqG7elFhyphenhyphenmgJpepYzht91ceuRKdislkHGbxWplmCvJ2wYeCStBaZVaoy3e_RP9IOBTqcbV8r1wX52oJ0Eu1bk7ucF73Qmd-a8-pR8Ne2uMry4CsDZr4iC6pIdu-Z1GTGj/s320/HPIM5621.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>Here she is on top of Stone Mountain!<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I admit that I'm having trouble getting into girl-type clothes, but there are some awfully cute ones out there that are not pink <em>and</em> flower-covered <em>and</em> ruffly. Then again, Ellie looks cute in everything...</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH23JqLhTQQxBaIQKdKPoIpjtMSkfRGX7rdwCw-VDKIKpV46Vn8Xx4oRAIGkExwObsHUKNHZjaTzsLODmD17PFmP9lXu0t31VpyE8y8im84WTWvpQGrOxHa-vKF8DKGhvDfH5Xv1KbXwpV/s1600/HPIM5583.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH23JqLhTQQxBaIQKdKPoIpjtMSkfRGX7rdwCw-VDKIKpV46Vn8Xx4oRAIGkExwObsHUKNHZjaTzsLODmD17PFmP9lXu0t31VpyE8y8im84WTWvpQGrOxHa-vKF8DKGhvDfH5Xv1KbXwpV/s320/HPIM5583.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>...dressed like a little pink teddy bear...<br />
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<div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8aXlgO1faBeNgffh98Lwl09i93zHYmkiy5laeysFmMk8WmWJrRqtUm4VEboeg5nmy_-PBcPxw4m_QpovBhqvZWpzXNkcdJZa-hFjeg55ICsvgANyorYo8AnQJ-WcolbwZOcc7_u93yGDx/s1600/HPIM5579.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8aXlgO1faBeNgffh98Lwl09i93zHYmkiy5laeysFmMk8WmWJrRqtUm4VEboeg5nmy_-PBcPxw4m_QpovBhqvZWpzXNkcdJZa-hFjeg55ICsvgANyorYo8AnQJ-WcolbwZOcc7_u93yGDx/s320/HPIM5579.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>...sundresses...<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF1vbTeKLqewKSyw7gz1M2FicX-go61AwjdmkHe5iiYGW-pLCpN11hbOsqVgX6CGd_AoLzyNyVwJwoESl55vBTeKj4rH1ytsDDFoSAvTp8EFQ264iaOfYzcKoHZudxATy6hRrQnSuHgCcj/s1600/HPIM5557.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF1vbTeKLqewKSyw7gz1M2FicX-go61AwjdmkHe5iiYGW-pLCpN11hbOsqVgX6CGd_AoLzyNyVwJwoESl55vBTeKj4rH1ytsDDFoSAvTp8EFQ264iaOfYzcKoHZudxATy6hRrQnSuHgCcj/s320/HPIM5557.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>...frogs and Spiders... (She was mad at us for not having her early enough to work on her brackets. She rooted for Richmond, of course, though she cried through much of the Kansas game)<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRqfHxPMUhyphenhyphenHZ3p0nh6g2hoEg4lpegWPPdBGxj7t_Q__XIEUsUrUPGPAq6vNvUKvxzE24sc2YHvkaYfxfFkHHctvmr3IgZVKRasbVMA24xavBmxRGpW0enSoSQoZzCYwCFRFxfbatqVkcT/s1600/HPIM5591.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" r6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRqfHxPMUhyphenhyphenHZ3p0nh6g2hoEg4lpegWPPdBGxj7t_Q__XIEUsUrUPGPAq6vNvUKvxzE24sc2YHvkaYfxfFkHHctvmr3IgZVKRasbVMA24xavBmxRGpW0enSoSQoZzCYwCFRFxfbatqVkcT/s320/HPIM5591.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>...and anything else she wears. For the record, she's wearing 3-6 month sizes as of her one-month birthday. Yikes, this girl can grow!<br />
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Eleanor is starting to get onto somewhat of a more typical newborn schedule. She's up a little more often at night, to the detriment of my sleep, but we do often take a morning nap together. Actually, in the last few days she has started to take a morning nap and an afternoon/evening nap, so it's a little more predictable. She's much more alert during the day, which is lots of fun. While she still cluster nurses, she doesn't generally do it for 3-4 hours at a time anymore...it's usually only 1.5-2 hours, which is a vast improvement. Lately, she's decided that she won't cry when she's not hungry or overtired as long as you don't stop moving. "Moving" involves bouncing her, swaying, and walking--all at the same time. Sometimes it alxo involved patting her back and shushing her. This may be why I've lost weight so quickly.<br />
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We are indeed lucky to have our baby Ellie in our family!ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-81920382836521619732011-03-15T15:37:00.000-04:002011-03-15T15:37:27.650-04:00"Oh, she's going to be a delightful 2-year-old"Our Eleanor has a temper. Everyone told me girls were more dramatic than boys, but I kind of thought we had more than a week before we were forced to admit it. Silly me.<br />
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She is the sweetest, most content baby most of the time. When she is awake, as long as she's not hungry, she is happy to play the tongue-sticking-out game, the finger-grabbing game, etc. She can hold her head up for a few seconds at a time and enjoys looking all around. She likes dancing around the kitchen and prefers hip-hop to anything else I've tried, though she will tolerate country and rock. She likes to be held all the time and is sleeping with me in the nursery for now because she doesn't like to be alone in the bassinet. She'll wake up a few times to nurse at night but I fall back to sleep once she's latched on. We generally get a 4- or 5-hour stretch of sleep (after a 3- or 4-hour stretch of nursing--she is a cluster nurser to the nth degree) and a couple of 2-3 hour stretches out of her. Yesterday and today, Ellie and I got up with the rest of the family while Patrick was getting ready for school, then took a 3-hour nap after he left. Given that she's a newborn, we're reasonably well-rested. I don't expect it to last but each day she goes like this is certainly helpful!<br />
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But woe betide you if she's hungry.<br />
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Ellie doesn't cry. Ever. If she's not hungry, she's not crying--she's either sleeping or happy to be awake, looking around with her big blue eyes. If she's hungry, she <em>screams</em>. There is no warning beyond some squirming and turning red for a few seconds. Then she yells with all her might until she has no choice but to take a breath. She flails her fists (Patrick came down the other day and said "I got beat up by a baby girl!"). She arches her back. She turns bright red. She tries to nurse on your chin or arm, or any other body part she can get her mouth on. She is the angriest, hungriest baby ever because the food is not there RIGHT THAT SECOND. It doesn't matter if she's eaten 2 hours before or if I'm just switching her to the other side after finishing the first.<br />
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If the food doesn't come fast enough, in her opinion, she does what Jason calls "playing dead" (this only happens if someone else is holding her). She stops crying and goes entirely limp. She closes her eyes. As soon as I take her, she immediately opens her eyes, yells at me, and starts trying to nurse through my shirt.<br />
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Today, I had the selfish notion that I should feed myself--after all, if the food source does not occasionally get nourished and watered, she has trouble producing food for Her Highness. And shamefully, I wanted warm food--clearly, that was taking way too long. Jason was holding Eleanor. He tried rocking her. She yelled. He tried putting her in the bouncy chair. She screamed. He picked her back up and rocked her some more. She yelled louder until her voice started going hoarse, then played dead. (This all took a grand total of no more than 5 minutes.) Mind you, I'd finished feeding her right before I handed her to Jason. <br />
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When I sat down to nurse her 30 seconds later, she was all sweetness and light as soon as she latched on. She spends 99% of her day like that. It's only the other 1% of the day when she's hungry and not actively eating that she turns into this 9-lb raging red ball of baby.<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1C9VextzfamM_tQuO8gdGrZbLvCE7kjH8xOq-eVOcnaN_XYyLYEpGFcUvFZVeU-E6b9gpcz3OQyy66Yo6qxTrzsxP3HyrfSI8uNtRL1BFRvzvrmbZfCC0Njy5uAG1loikd3IXYRH42MYw/s1600/100_0898.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1C9VextzfamM_tQuO8gdGrZbLvCE7kjH8xOq-eVOcnaN_XYyLYEpGFcUvFZVeU-E6b9gpcz3OQyy66Yo6qxTrzsxP3HyrfSI8uNtRL1BFRvzvrmbZfCC0Njy5uAG1loikd3IXYRH42MYw/s320/100_0898.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>It's impossible not to be head-over-heels in love with this little girl, even when she's not so happy.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-66756946863538456122011-03-10T01:40:00.000-05:002011-03-10T01:40:31.227-05:00Eleanor Desta has arrived!We welcomed our daughter, Eleanor Desta, to the world on March 7! She sure took her sweet time in arriving but as she is such a sweet little baby, it seems appropriate that she made such a wonderful entrance. Ellie kept us guessing about when she would come right until the end--well, she kept me guessing until the end. Everyone else who was here seemed to know a lot sooner than I did :-)<br />
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I started having the contractions that ultimately led to her birth at about 11 a.m. on March 6, while I was waiting for Patrick's Sunday school to end. We got home around 1 p.m. and I told Jason that I was having contractions about 4-5 minutes apart and had been for a couple of hours. "So, just another Sunday?" he asked. "Yep, pretty much," I told him. I'd had contractions like those multiple times in the last few weeks. One of those times they were like that for 22 hours, so I didn't read anything into them.<br />
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They started getting the tiniest bit stronger and around 3 p.m. I decided to take a nap. After laying in bed for about 15 minutes, I had one and actually felt downward movement from the baby, so I thought I'd call my midwife and give her a heads-up that something <em>might</em> be happening (this will be a recurring theme). I had a contraction while on the phone and apparently my midwife said to herself "Oh yeah, she's in labor." She called her apprentice to let her know. <br />
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I got up since I didn't like being in bed anymore and just hung around downstairs for a couple of hours. My midwife called back around 5:30 to see how I was doing and said she and her apprentice would just come over and see what was going on. They came around 6:15 or so and listened to the baby's heartbeat, asked how I was doing, etc. Around 8 p.m., we'd put the kids to bed and everyone started bringing equipment in from the car. I called my friends who were coming and told them that the baby would probably come that night. Mind you, I didn't believe it but figured that if my midwife was bringing things inside, it was a reasonable thing to do.<br />
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My friends got there within the hour and we all sat around waiting for something to happen beyond the contractions. And waiting. And waiting. They were pretty regular and certainly stronger compared to earlier, but I didn't buy it. I did get into the birth tub at one point but my contractions basically stopped after that, so I got back out and went back to what I'd been doing.<br />
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<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoO4_f8yqnCnindGPagLssJ9ncmTnOTFyEiAqC3cas3-LCiF5a5PDm5BkwGvr55aKgwO7fxmQAZy0tQNnNR97Rh57iPHNPKjKLc4fpejtKrHQr-I4PJUmxVfiTdYXUirtiAuA0AQPBjql9/s1600/IMG_6017.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoO4_f8yqnCnindGPagLssJ9ncmTnOTFyEiAqC3cas3-LCiF5a5PDm5BkwGvr55aKgwO7fxmQAZy0tQNnNR97Rh57iPHNPKjKLc4fpejtKrHQr-I4PJUmxVfiTdYXUirtiAuA0AQPBjql9/s320/IMG_6017.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>I did a lot of laboring like this. Jason was an awesome coach, of course.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipPZD1Ktc60dGS17Huu3dLR2OAEKaOGFJroIBhSf7k-Kpq-3QPh8BzQrJTlc-yqelY4sAr5wnuRaBNGQbEBT5HTizYy5xgY6Of5Bj83QlNuuoV8EdBhDtuGFw1onbVyJsIHfe4XRefaSE7/s1600/IMG_6020.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipPZD1Ktc60dGS17Huu3dLR2OAEKaOGFJroIBhSf7k-Kpq-3QPh8BzQrJTlc-yqelY4sAr5wnuRaBNGQbEBT5HTizYy5xgY6Of5Bj83QlNuuoV8EdBhDtuGFw1onbVyJsIHfe4XRefaSE7/s320/IMG_6020.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>At around 1:30 a.m., I decided to lay down for a while. I was tired and nothing seemed to be happening, so Jason and I went upstairs to take a nap. I slept until about 4:30 a.m., then Jason suggested we walk around downstairs for a while. We did that for a little over an hour and the contractions picked right back up. I still thought it might fizzle out again, but my midwife's apprentice watched me labor for a while and called my midwife to come back (she lives close by and had gone home to get a bit of sleep so that her apprentice could use our guest room). It was a good thing everyone else believed I was really in labor, because I certainly didn't!<br />
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Still, we kept on all morning. I spent some more time in the tub, more time laying down, a little more time sitting. I was able to eat and drink as I needed. The kids were awesome--they watched videos on iPads and played upstairs and read some stories. My friends Rachel and Lovisa were fantastically helpful--making coffee, entertaining the kids, helping me with whatever I needed, keeping me entertained between contractions. We talked a lot and it gave Jason the freedom to help me emotionally and physically. He was the one always there wherever I was, to help keep track of how things were going, giving me lots of excellent massages, encouraging me every minute.<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrccB73mDNNZi90ozeBoruWuzCEY3_GF_yJd0BcUQP2IaiIQ6ze1HFMIoAjJy_xjVZ-ld8DxYs9EYHq5-lguo9oqz1XVxvKOYG8uZyRgCamJ5D1zAumyzd3391wRn7_48fupUrU8mrgbCZ/s1600/IMG_6034.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrccB73mDNNZi90ozeBoruWuzCEY3_GF_yJd0BcUQP2IaiIQ6ze1HFMIoAjJy_xjVZ-ld8DxYs9EYHq5-lguo9oqz1XVxvKOYG8uZyRgCamJ5D1zAumyzd3391wRn7_48fupUrU8mrgbCZ/s320/IMG_6034.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>I'm not sure when I got back in the tub for the last time but I was in there through Ellie's birth. I'd been having really powerful contractions--the last of which actually had me in tears--but when I got back in, they became so manageable! I could still feel them but they didn't hurt much anymore, even though they were clearly just as strong as they'd been. It was wonderful. I was able to eat some lunch about an hour before she came.<br />
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Everyone else knew what was happening. I, despite being the one actually in labor, didn't really believe it was going to happen. At 3 p.m., we heard Patrick's bus come by and Jason remarked that Patrick could have gone to school that day. I said "No, the baby will probably come today so I'm glad he stayed home." And immediately, everything picked up. I went into transition and had a couple of contractions that had me sobbing. My midwife checked me because I felt like I wanted to push and said "There's the baby's head."<br />
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Me (now sobbing semi-happily): "Oh, I'm so glad. I was afraid you'd check and I'd be like 5 cm." Everyone else laughed but I'd been serious--that's how much in denial I'd been all day. (Mind you, it was the one and only time I was checked.)<br />
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</div>Push #1 was at 3:02 and was so intense that I felt there was no way I could do it (I yelled a lot more this time around than I did with Patrick). My water broke with push #2. I could feel the baby's head with push #3--that was when the kids came in and I told them that it was OK if I yelled, it was hard work but I was OK. Push #4 had the baby's head out. Push #5 brought our beautiful baby out into the world at 3:18 p.m., screaming and pink and perfect and chubby.<br />
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I asked Patrick whether he had a brother or a sister and he said "Brother." Then someone moved the umbilical cord and asked if he wanted to look again, and he said "It's a girl." We told him her name so that he could share it. Melkamu came over and touched her head, smiling the whole time even though he'd said he wanted a brother. I said that she was so big and thought she was around 8 lb--my midwife said "Maybe 7 1/2 or 8 lb." And I said "She has hair!"<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPONCbT2C82fckclxwgf18R66IBk1rbONI0Nk2x_0EOUO3F3ffBLc5hrnlyXMR9KUY0iHkjaxmZxfV1SKZgxxIQcnegH3-bNEthkgtlAwmbsoLoqlhYsiv1p0eFMazQ05eMIStYCxKJmjc/s1600/IMG_6139.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPONCbT2C82fckclxwgf18R66IBk1rbONI0Nk2x_0EOUO3F3ffBLc5hrnlyXMR9KUY0iHkjaxmZxfV1SKZgxxIQcnegH3-bNEthkgtlAwmbsoLoqlhYsiv1p0eFMazQ05eMIStYCxKJmjc/s320/IMG_6139.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">We didn't weigh her for several hours but when we did, we found that she was actually 8 lb 14 oz. I can't believe I grew an almost-9 lb baby girl to 40w2d and delivered her naturally at home! (For reference, Patrick was born at 37w5d weighing 6 lb 11 oz.) Her head is so perfectly round because my water didn't break until minutes before she was born, so she was cushioned the whole time. I look at her now and wonder how she could possibly have fit inside me!</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5hf22mVys_sxFftzSUE1bJvmipnKa7WkzHypUtJZK2Pp1tRl8w9JHL78g9Krv_ohju0sIqxHTFim1FxgrJQl0RweL80wdoygLdnft2XsI2MgHYFUCdAekTXleg3VCnZsuwf2rkh_8bBVf/s1600/IMG_6096.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5hf22mVys_sxFftzSUE1bJvmipnKa7WkzHypUtJZK2Pp1tRl8w9JHL78g9Krv_ohju0sIqxHTFim1FxgrJQl0RweL80wdoygLdnft2XsI2MgHYFUCdAekTXleg3VCnZsuwf2rkh_8bBVf/s320/IMG_6096.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">We are incredibly lucky to have her. She is a cluster nurser and will nurse basically every hour for several hours, then sleep for about the same number of hours. She only cries when she's hungry or needs to be changed, and has been much more alert today. Her name, Eleanor Desta, is a very special one to us--she is named after Jason's grandmother Ellen. Her middle name is an Ethiopian name that means "Happiness", which honors Melkamu's firstmom since her name, although different, means the same thing.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimJViBj8FvEAj6s3q9ajdUQCu7bA38Br0YUWdtw7E1cS4FDcHjFT3VBNwscCgSa46Q1N48HOu1RWfWR282w9MRkIR8HXETH1BmGu0Aa2w4qpk_SWORzL2ePVITSfEuwR39wg1bPLMIojfI/s1600/IMG_6159.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimJViBj8FvEAj6s3q9ajdUQCu7bA38Br0YUWdtw7E1cS4FDcHjFT3VBNwscCgSa46Q1N48HOu1RWfWR282w9MRkIR8HXETH1BmGu0Aa2w4qpk_SWORzL2ePVITSfEuwR39wg1bPLMIojfI/s320/IMG_6159.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>My blue eyed, dark-haired baby girl.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVtKji-MFBs-NAlGIE_MM3jVOkeVKe8P4u6I6-QSc6wuA44bisV7BQgBKfwSKDKCO_2Zo9xibKLDIJeB6NfLCAMUhoBB5ZXdewoTvt94JAdb2Dv-n1xCicbNIdlq9nN3efygl7yZcSeOAj/s1600/HPIM5516.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVtKji-MFBs-NAlGIE_MM3jVOkeVKe8P4u6I6-QSc6wuA44bisV7BQgBKfwSKDKCO_2Zo9xibKLDIJeB6NfLCAMUhoBB5ZXdewoTvt94JAdb2Dv-n1xCicbNIdlq9nN3efygl7yZcSeOAj/s320/HPIM5516.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">I can't tell you how my heart filled with happiness when Jason said "Hey, how are my girls?" as I nursed her the other night.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP_V8kL84Ib2WphhzJgelstcwgBl6yXGL8-0K1Dyqt0LfQEpm6eROT9y7JylPHB6z0jZbJmVJT11EixTB5cWw9KLNlOYK3AEiJJhODFBVt4mIZ9YJzeeFN8wG8SblZE8sNoprB4hZ8xdcs/s1600/HPIM5515.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP_V8kL84Ib2WphhzJgelstcwgBl6yXGL8-0K1Dyqt0LfQEpm6eROT9y7JylPHB6z0jZbJmVJT11EixTB5cWw9KLNlOYK3AEiJJhODFBVt4mIZ9YJzeeFN8wG8SblZE8sNoprB4hZ8xdcs/s320/HPIM5515.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">The boys really, really love their baby sister.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU-XPmgGKaBQvdPmavPHgYvDk_Chev0AgTarUQkmXiTRmn3pEdhNHidHvw0bEOK1Zl5eNe7OkzNkGavVmwh-5fGwxmt7hBO1UKRKIJ9WBWFHNbAC5LCiAEflnwslSda2lcjXcpFFDnOz-I/s1600/IMG_6178.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU-XPmgGKaBQvdPmavPHgYvDk_Chev0AgTarUQkmXiTRmn3pEdhNHidHvw0bEOK1Zl5eNe7OkzNkGavVmwh-5fGwxmt7hBO1UKRKIJ9WBWFHNbAC5LCiAEflnwslSda2lcjXcpFFDnOz-I/s320/IMG_6178.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>A lot.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU8Spu4Cbh_CxiN9p7KskzI1sf4Lh4dvn7w_PyA_QekvN9p2LSOe9vonwF5PZklQzb_Faj94DvQfLcK6ofM4shpPsVb4qjtobdyohVsza6V_EgHUIUQdycB19lxBCFozr6drP9W0Dx8N2W/s1600/IMG_6103.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU8Spu4Cbh_CxiN9p7KskzI1sf4Lh4dvn7w_PyA_QekvN9p2LSOe9vonwF5PZklQzb_Faj94DvQfLcK6ofM4shpPsVb4qjtobdyohVsza6V_EgHUIUQdycB19lxBCFozr6drP9W0Dx8N2W/s320/IMG_6103.JPG" width="320" /></a>Jason could not be happier to have a daughter.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNcoUsQL22AQSD1J24SNjzr_PPDm5DAXDqrZRYB47rRezPnsjd-TwMFeZTDyUFoatPVSAHk12dvhK7r8c-c5AKVTKpvKf2LTocjlawpH4W0ujrQkqPK-ihhhbipOIEga_rbQLvKUc-54cb/s1600/HPIM5512.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" q6="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNcoUsQL22AQSD1J24SNjzr_PPDm5DAXDqrZRYB47rRezPnsjd-TwMFeZTDyUFoatPVSAHk12dvhK7r8c-c5AKVTKpvKf2LTocjlawpH4W0ujrQkqPK-ihhhbipOIEga_rbQLvKUc-54cb/s320/HPIM5512.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">She's been out for fewer than 60 hours but has already helped make our family even more complete. Welcome, my Ellie. We've been waiting for you for a very long time.</div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-80112383845770413672011-02-09T12:10:00.000-05:002011-02-09T12:10:38.328-05:00The lazy photoblogging daySome of them are kind of old but here they are!<br />
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<div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTvPOVFgR1nwfHN28q8NR-4m7bIfuofB49zU0IjMGIPy_KVykBtltTRcND3hErNCVaf-poNhLVyqHrgxp-F5-WbDLiZ3m67LLqj9O87VSXNsfE8sArJ6yNuYhS54is6rS7B1uhM_rqFFGH/s1600/HPIM5396.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTvPOVFgR1nwfHN28q8NR-4m7bIfuofB49zU0IjMGIPy_KVykBtltTRcND3hErNCVaf-poNhLVyqHrgxp-F5-WbDLiZ3m67LLqj9O87VSXNsfE8sArJ6yNuYhS54is6rS7B1uhM_rqFFGH/s320/HPIM5396.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Kamu and Grandma</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyIqvsejtqlDnJ7DM_pNejAXEer-B6F_cuPEGEfzzDK7acA3yvBS4CLGww6fPeyCLOSOAo2_vWqBqs1ZKll1_AMnlaWs5egbnYzurlEtby7acgmgAN5P7JLdjHAY-YCTNOLsU7QDn-973G/s1600/HPIM5422.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyIqvsejtqlDnJ7DM_pNejAXEer-B6F_cuPEGEfzzDK7acA3yvBS4CLGww6fPeyCLOSOAo2_vWqBqs1ZKll1_AMnlaWs5egbnYzurlEtby7acgmgAN5P7JLdjHAY-YCTNOLsU7QDn-973G/s320/HPIM5422.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Both kids and Grandpa</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3Litauw6AOy40XB_dE-bvZautVB1uLRmBUIZomI1PqQw3u8DvRYFLZHrRT591h7Py_MzQTLuAPXpy7ga-sMLAAqiA6rUzWOKgaTGhGWEoyHhalgbcdGK7GegQxBw_HfCToVP8siqTbYY-/s1600/HPIM5444.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3Litauw6AOy40XB_dE-bvZautVB1uLRmBUIZomI1PqQw3u8DvRYFLZHrRT591h7Py_MzQTLuAPXpy7ga-sMLAAqiA6rUzWOKgaTGhGWEoyHhalgbcdGK7GegQxBw_HfCToVP8siqTbYY-/s320/HPIM5444.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">The kids out playing on a white Christmas! This was not the horrible ice/snow storm from January, thankfully.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH4xVbyf_rLl2-frw6jNfrtrzTvHQLFZRCq8BGMzodVypfWQ3wJzbsZDRzlLj_8T7ZaN1-eu3ZRIayYs3YJ1yQvinloXCmcLhEhAhLdyvzkfUyGs6vm-YsI0-sruZaXNVdw94bUOlPZCrY/s1600/HPIM5445.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH4xVbyf_rLl2-frw6jNfrtrzTvHQLFZRCq8BGMzodVypfWQ3wJzbsZDRzlLj_8T7ZaN1-eu3ZRIayYs3YJ1yQvinloXCmcLhEhAhLdyvzkfUyGs6vm-YsI0-sruZaXNVdw94bUOlPZCrY/s320/HPIM5445.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Kamu likes to cuddle and our blue chair is excellent for that. He's been particularly cuddly lately (I don't think he's quite ready to stop being the baby of the family). I think I'm around 30 weeks in this picture, but it's hard to see anything.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMJ7E-Fq0LkGWe1VlnMKNXDSTSfUUVxE0PMiwtDbfreXuxNHGpvWOEA7K9GfSxbszQzF8FiZMmNTqEw9rL3kNLHVpOSNM38Uhjl46CiV1tgGRwWydUQ6nbRkzOc-gF1KHaA5vpzeg5yCw2/s1600/HPIM5454.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMJ7E-Fq0LkGWe1VlnMKNXDSTSfUUVxE0PMiwtDbfreXuxNHGpvWOEA7K9GfSxbszQzF8FiZMmNTqEw9rL3kNLHVpOSNM38Uhjl46CiV1tgGRwWydUQ6nbRkzOc-gF1KHaA5vpzeg5yCw2/s320/HPIM5454.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Patrick's packed on some pounds of muscle lately, and he and Melkamu occasionally enjoy playing "horsie". (It's also good that Melkamu's legs are long enough that he can reach the ground when he's "riding" Patrick.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-wTnfSPCLXskCv59UgX_FKFvH1xyj3sARXe37N8kGa0tQapsXBKmViImRv9XTwoAfihpLNxrM1dVCJka0tUfUJWrVE6RJz_jCMhBuFfb6iQFNQ4bF1widuoh-QejxHSOBfbyyA79iDP9Q/s1600/HPIM5457.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-wTnfSPCLXskCv59UgX_FKFvH1xyj3sARXe37N8kGa0tQapsXBKmViImRv9XTwoAfihpLNxrM1dVCJka0tUfUJWrVE6RJz_jCMhBuFfb6iQFNQ4bF1widuoh-QejxHSOBfbyyA79iDP9Q/s320/HPIM5457.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Kamu loves his dogs. Nietzsche isn't doing well (you can see how skinny he is in this picture) and can't walk on his back left leg anymore but doesn't seem to be in pain and is still eating and going up and down stairs, so we're very glad for every day we get with him.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiS8hoHSghXUoHPqXd9Jr0Dg1Rum4VRYd0WFieDaZlRzXrg_abPtNFEwiJZ9sXN_gBhkDj4HdouNoB85Y3sXwQZT6Qg0EkUQB05iWI1d48MlAC8yg3pSPNgUi1htDyT_9KNbs7T_nT9yDvQ/s1600/HPIM5460.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiS8hoHSghXUoHPqXd9Jr0Dg1Rum4VRYd0WFieDaZlRzXrg_abPtNFEwiJZ9sXN_gBhkDj4HdouNoB85Y3sXwQZT6Qg0EkUQB05iWI1d48MlAC8yg3pSPNgUi1htDyT_9KNbs7T_nT9yDvQ/s320/HPIM5460.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">The dogs love Kamu also. This is how Jason found Kamu and Caesar this morning when we went to wake them up.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKQPeg0r19FCVvhwLmkxgoqxrpMqAj0U6R_otY2KrjK4ZJMv-OiRbwAlRmlaUbRAjswpy-CsifKKEIXsmAi_vz_m76PZ1pP9hkcOLWKUY0UvBIAvjATh2DxATzJr4rp5b1oTbFD2wg5pcF/s1600/HPIM5356.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKQPeg0r19FCVvhwLmkxgoqxrpMqAj0U6R_otY2KrjK4ZJMv-OiRbwAlRmlaUbRAjswpy-CsifKKEIXsmAi_vz_m76PZ1pP9hkcOLWKUY0UvBIAvjATh2DxATzJr4rp5b1oTbFD2wg5pcF/s320/HPIM5356.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">OK, you asked for it. Me at ~26 weeks pregnant.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilOp_5aKLoE77Xpz6c9yfy7bI-jOUsc8rBhlVpWQLgWXIzcDXTos6iTLpxiL5VGuSmF5mWEa8GbVDv-kBuidMmypc6TYFjjWs0UZfaBZnxXFXWWCfzwNXnJfeIDMsigAWuOc9ut66mfNXo/s1600/HPIM5461.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilOp_5aKLoE77Xpz6c9yfy7bI-jOUsc8rBhlVpWQLgWXIzcDXTos6iTLpxiL5VGuSmF5mWEa8GbVDv-kBuidMmypc6TYFjjWs0UZfaBZnxXFXWWCfzwNXnJfeIDMsigAWuOc9ut66mfNXo/s320/HPIM5461.JPG" width="240" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Me this morning at 36 1/2 weeks pregnant. If I don't pop soon, I'm going to start growing out of a lot of maternity clothes.</div><br />
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</div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-28197115882307400112011-02-07T16:51:00.000-05:002011-02-07T16:51:42.311-05:00Home is where the heart is36+ weeks pregnant now and at some point there will be a picture of me pregnant...assuming that Jason takes one sometime before I actually have this baby. I think I've got one from Halloween and there are a couple from when I went to NY for my dad's retirement party in November but since then, I don't know that there are any at all. Then again, I'm usually the one behind the camera so pictures of me are few and far between anyway.<br />
<br />
Let's just say that I've grown.<br />
<br />
I have a lot of contractions lately. They are Braxton-Hicks contractions, since I'm not actually in labor, but that's really long to type. Today, for example, they've been about 5-10 minutes apart for several hours. Some people would get excited/nervous about that and probably not be planning to teach for 4 1/2 hours tonight, but I've learned from experience. 12 days ago, they were 3-8 minutes apart for 12 hours. It was irritating since I knew I wasn't in labor and it was the middle of the night and for crying out loud, could I not just get a break long enough to fall asleep?<br />
<br />
I'm a little cranky right now.<br />
<br />
At this point, I'm just holding out for 37 weeks, which will be on Saturday. At 37 weeks I can have a homebirth. Before then, it's not a great idea for the baby's health and we're not about to risk that! 5 more days until I do what I did with Patrick--look at my stomach and invite the baby to come out any time he/she wants. Patrick was obliging and came 5 days later. I'm actually hoping this little one will wait a bit longer, as Jason's job ends on the 16th and then he wouldn't have to worry about taking off for one of his last few days. Plus, I'm still trying to work for as long as I can. But babies have minds of their own and I know very well that I don't get a say in it! If the baby decides to come before then, I have a very nice practice of hospital-based midwives who will care for us at the hospital. As much as I like them, I still don't want to be in the hospital.<br />
<br />
I've been pleasantly surprised at how much support I've found for homebirthing. I'd heard many horror stories about the lack of support from friends and family from my Bradley students who wanted to homebirth, and I'm very happy that I haven't experienced that at all. Most people are excited, or at least surprised but supportive, that we'll be having the baby at home. When people ask where I'm having the baby, I reply "At home." I even said it to my GP when the kids went for their physicals, and her response was "Oh, how exciting--what a great experience!" (And that's why I love her.)<br />
<br />
Some people choose to homebirth because they've had horrible hospital experiences and don't want that again. We didn't. Our hospital experience was fine. I'd even venture to say that it was pretty good. We had a supportive OB last time and he made all the difference in the world for that to happen. We just didn't see the need to do it again. The idea of homebirth has always intrigued me and now that we're looking at it happening soon (I hope...not before 37 weeks, kiddo), it relaxes me. Oh, there's a lot to prepare before then...but it's at home. I know where everything is at home. If we forget to put something out, it's either in the house somewhere or there's a store within two miles that carries it. If our kids get bored or worried or anything else, we have four families on our street who've offered to take them anytime, day or night. We'll have access to our favorite foods whenever we want them. I won't have to feel self-conscious about random people watching me walk the halls because the only people who will be there will be those who love and support us. The kids can be there to see their new baby sister or brother right away.<br />
<br />
It just feels right for us. I'd been prepared to face a lot of criticism, both overt and subtle, based on what I'd heard from others who'd planned to homebirth...but it's been so nice to be wrong about that.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-1618037471600461892011-01-07T23:12:00.000-05:002011-01-07T23:12:35.242-05:00HeartbreakingI <a href="http://adoptionfamily.blogspot.com/2010/12/carrying-those-scars-inside.html">recently wrote about how Melkamu's been through a lot</a>, and how we sometimes forget it. Actually, I wrote about it <a href="http://adoptionfamily.blogspot.com/2010/11/nablopomo-15-connections.html">twice in different ways</a>. He's generally such a sweet, happy, fun-loving kid that it's easy to just see that and not think about how much he's been through. And that's as it should be. We don't ever forget that he has a firstfamily, that his Aachie is back in Ethiopia, that they love him also; but we don't focus on it every day. In fact, we rarely do--although I think about his Aachie almost every day and we do look at her picture or watch the video of Kamu with her or look at his "Aachie book" fairly frequently, we do it to remember his first family's role in his life, not to be sad. We don't focus on the losses that he's had as a routine matter because the reality is that regardless of what's happened in the past, we are a family now and we just go on about our lives as they are. <br />
<br />
I put dreams into four basic different categories: good dreams, bad dreams, nightmares, and night terrors. Good dreams are lovely or indifferent or even weird, but not bothersome. Bad dreams are slightly disturbing but not too bad--maybe they wake you up a little but you can go back to sleep. Nightmares are bad--they wake you up and then you have trouble falling back to sleep, because you're afraid they'll come back. Night terrors are the ones that you can't get out of, that seem never-ending.<br />
<br />
Kamu had a night terror tonight.<br />
<br />
He wasn't feeling great earlier, so I let him fall asleep in my bed as I read in there. About 2 hours after he fell asleep, he started to get anxious in his sleep--squirming around, fretting. Then he started to cry and shake. Then he sobbed for his mama, even though I was already holding him and trying to soothe him. Then he wet the bed. That's when I knew that he was having a night terror, not just a bad dream or even a nightmare. I can't even tell you the last time he wet the bed. It has to have been close to a year ago, if not longer.<br />
<br />
Thankfully Jason came up right at that moment and helped me get him out of bed, sobbing and anxious and terrified, so that we could get cleaned up. I brought him into the shower with me. His eyes were open but he kept sobbing "I want my mama. I want my mommy." I kept hugging him and saying "I'm right here and I won't ever leave you," but it didn't make any difference. I don't think he was even awake yet--he could not pull out of this night terror. At one point I even said "Look at me, baby, who am I?" He said, "My mama...I want my mama." I got him cleaned off and handed him out to Jason so that he could get him dry and clothed while I finished washing off. <br />
<br />
I went into his room after my shower. Jason had gotten him settled and he was finally calm and asked me to cuddle him. When I laid down, he said "I had a bad dream in the shower." I said I knew he did. He said "You were there?" He genuinely wasn't sure. I said I was and promised yet again not to leave him, that I would always be his mama.<br />
<br />
Finally he'd pulled out of it. He was OK with my going downstairs a few minutes later as he was on the verge of sleep, and gave me a kiss and said "I love you." Now he's sound asleep.<br />
<br />
Seeing him like that makes me want to sob and cry. His bad dreams and nightmares are about being lonely. His night terrors are always about <em>me</em> leaving him in particular. He hasn't had one in a long time but they're always just awful and generally, I'm not the one who can calm him down--Jason can do it but I can't. It almost feels like his brain is so locked into the idea that I've left him that he can't comprehend that I really am still there. I can't even say what might have triggered it today, as I kept him home from school since my sister is here visiting and we were together all day. Maybe it was nothing in particular, maybe it's that he wasn't feeling well, maybe I just don't know what it was.<br />
<br />
It makes me feel so helpless to see him so utterly terrified that I will leave him, and I can't even bring him out of it to tell him I'll always be there. To watch him on a daily basis, you'd never, ever know. But it's always there in him.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-83756326408474745152010-12-14T10:01:00.000-05:002010-12-14T10:01:09.987-05:00Recent changesWe're rapidly moving to the point of having a family with three children (I'm 28 1/2 weeks pregnant now) and preparing for that has been surprisingly low-key. Most of that is because we already have children and there's very little that we need. Oh sure, there are a few things that we'd either borrowed the first time around or have given away since Patrick was a baby but we have a crib, we have a carseat, and we have clothes. Since I'll be nursing the baby, that's practically all we'll need. The changes to our household until the baby actually arrives are pretty minimal. The playroom/guest room is being converted back to a nursery, but that's simply a matter of moving furniture and toys. I'm still reasonably comfortable and so our normal activities have stayed the same. <br />
<br />
One bigger change that I have noticed is the sharp drop-off in the times that we've been asked if we adopted because we couldn't have more of 'our own'. (I mentioned at <a href="http://adoptionfamily.blogspot.com/2010/11/nablopomo-day-5-yep-theyre-mine.html">one point</a> that all of my children are mine, regardless of what blood we contain, so I won't address that again right now.) Apparently the fact that I <em>could</em> get pregnant again and am now visibly so means that we clearly didn't adopt for reasons of infertility. And ultimately, that's true. We didn't adopt because I am infertile. We adopted because it was how we chose to build our family. We had the option of doing more fertility treatments and trying to get pregnant again then, we had the option of choosing to raise Patrick as an only child--we had many other options. We had already planned to adopt before Patrick was born. We chose to adopt at that time because it was the right choice for us. Living in our family now, I can't imagine having made any other choice.<br />
<br />
What makes me uncomfortable is not that view because really, it's fine that people don't look at our family and see "adoption" = "infertility". I wish more people realized that no one adopts because it's their only choice--everyone has other options. It makes it easier on me and it certainly will make it easier on Melkamu not to be hearing that all the time and wondering if that's the only reason. No, what makes me uncomfortable is that people seem to have transitioned to the view that for our family, "adoption" = "selfless rich people who saved a poor little starving orphan".<br />
<br />
Ugh.<br />
<br />
I've written about the <a href="http://adoptionfamily.blogspot.com/2009/04/in-which-i-stir-up-some-controversy.html">costs of adoption</a> in the past. That post has nothing to do with money, and money really isn't the biggest part of adoption--we are certainly not rich. We are not selfless. We wanted another child. We chose to adopt a child from another country, which means that we took him away from his home country. We also chose to adopt a child of another race, which means that he's being raised in a completely different racial environment than that of his firstfamily. We made those choices deliberately and while we feel like we can do a good job being his parents, we know we're not perfect. There are a lot of burdens to adoption that Melkamu will bear. Selfless? Hardly.<br />
<br />
Don't even get me started on "saved".<br />
<br />
It's true that his firstfamily was poor...but not all firstfamilies are poor. It's true that he was malnourished and might have starved...but not all firstfamilies lack food. And while he fits the <a href="http://adoptionfamily.blogspot.com/2008/02/now-im-just-angry.html">definition of an orphan</a> for international adoption, he <em>does</em> have a living firstmom. Many children who are adopted have living firstfamilies. <br />
<br />
When you are a family formed through adoption, you learn a lot more about the world than you might have otherwise. I've learned a lot about Ethiopia that I might not have otherwise been moved to learn, and that would have been a terrible shame because it is a beautiful and fascinating country with an incredibly interesting history. I've learned a lot about international adoption, about the ethics and issues involved in the process--much more so than I knew before we'd started the process or even when we were fully involved in it. I continue to learn more about it now. I've learned a huge amount about adoption in general, about the history of adoption and parenting children by adoption and all the issues (both good and bad) that are involved in adoption.<br />
<br />
The changes that our family are making right now have helped me realize that there's even more to learn, and I'm so glad that we chose to adopt so that I had a reason to start doing so.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-13421589820311983192010-12-12T15:38:00.000-05:002010-12-12T15:38:51.707-05:00Snow no!Yes, it's snowing in Atlanta. I don't think there's any actual accumulation predicted but it is sticking and we've got big, white flakes coming down. It's very pretty and very, very cold outside. The kids, of course, can't wait to build a snowman. I told them they could probably build a snow ant.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-36797240447482889932010-12-08T12:03:00.000-05:002010-12-08T12:03:46.691-05:00Carrying those scars insideThose of you who've met Melkamu know that he is one of the most secure, confident little boys ever. He and Jason drove separately from Patrick and I to the appointment with my midwife the other day and they were a few minutes later than us. Kamu walked in like he owned the place, immediately starting to explain what he and Daddy had been doing. His attitude was "I know I've been missed--let me tell you <em>all</em> about it!" He's really a remarkable kid to have gone through so much change in his life and to have the confidence that he has today.<br />
<br />
But sometimes, we're reminded of how badly he's been hurt in the past and right now is one of those times. I had something to do at work that kept me there much later than I'd anticipated, so I didn't get to the daycare to pick up the kids until very shortly before it closed--normally I would have been there by 5 and didn't get there until almost 6:30. Luckily they combine all the kids when it's that late and so Patrick was there with him. When I walked in, Kamu had been cuddling with his teacher and he just walked over to me with the saddest pout on his face. He was so, so sad that I was so late to get him. He also told me that he'd been sad and Patrick had kissed him, which had helped him feel better. Jason and I had talked while I was driving over and decided to take the kids to Chick-Fil-A for dinner, and that cheered him up for the rest of the evening. <br />
<br />
He fell asleep in our bed with both Jason and Patrick last night because he didn't want to be alone (even though he and Patrick share a room). Then he had a nightmare last night, which hasn't happened in a long time, and it was about being lonely. Then he didn't want to be dropped off this morning. He hasn't clung so tightly in ages. Normally when I drop him off, he'll give me as quick a hug and kiss as possible so that he can be off playing with his friends. Today he didn't want to let go of me for even a second. The teacher eventually had to peel him off me so I could get to work, and I can't even tell you how miserable I felt for having to leave him on the verge of tears when all he wanted was to stay with me.<br />
<br />
When Patrick was that age, he used to get mad at me for picking him up too early because he wanted to stay and play with his friends. Kamu loves to play with his friends but he's never once asked to stay longer. On days when I get there later (around 4:30 on my late days this semester), he always asks "Why you wait so long to get me?" I've always made a point of telling him around what time I'd come get him--not that he understands time on a clock, but I relate it to what they're doing and tell him it will be <em>after naptime</em>, <em>after snacktime</em>, <em>after Patrick gets there, </em>etc<em>.</em> Then he knows when to expect me. I'd told him yesterday that I would be a little later but not too late. When I was really late, he recognized it...and it seems to have brought back out the worry about being left by the people he trusts.<br />
<br />
He's so little still and has been through more trauma than any child should have to experience. It's easy to see his sweet nature and confident attitude and forget that he holds those scars within himself, but his vulnerability shows when something like this happens. It doesn't take much to bring it out--just a single day of getting there late to pick him up can bring it all back. His trust that we will be there for him generally seems so strong but those scars make me really just how fragile it can be at times.ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1759736729282576044.post-73333471118197665892010-12-03T20:33:00.000-05:002010-12-03T20:33:30.952-05:00Patrick turns 7!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div>It is really hard to believe, but my oldest child is SEVEN! Seven years ago, Patrick was born at Crawford-Long Hospital in Atlanta, weighing in at 6 lb 11 oz. A tiny little peanut, perfectly healthy, and very much treasured.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCuPpeH1VkZlSJG-V3lf8kgxh4-XLJzt2TuSACMkGLSP-Obp0ko9Tjl5sO2ywbK_RaWXOKrv6p8RVGhds7bI7QbHyIN5hak2T7yQzk_9Rbw0mvUQn17q391SMjEeU68UcZrLEu1Id5db2W/s1600/HPIM5361.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" ox="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCuPpeH1VkZlSJG-V3lf8kgxh4-XLJzt2TuSACMkGLSP-Obp0ko9Tjl5sO2ywbK_RaWXOKrv6p8RVGhds7bI7QbHyIN5hak2T7yQzk_9Rbw0mvUQn17q391SMjEeU68UcZrLEu1Id5db2W/s320/HPIM5361.JPG" width="240" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Now look at him. He's gotten so big! He's missing some teeth--but the adult ones are growing in and the window in his mouth is getting smaller. His hair is just below his shoulders. I'm pretty sure he's in another growth spurt (when <em>isn't</em> he in a growth spurt?) because he's been eating like a bear fresh out of </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">hibernation. He usually eats breakfast at home, like this morning's banana bread, then eats breakfast again when he gets to school. The other day he ate a whole quart of egg drop soup. Tonight he requested chicken with yellow rice for his birthday dinner and ate three helpings. His face has filled out a little and that's usually a sign that he's about to shoot up in height.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">He's a voracious reader now. I've taken to sitting in the hall outside the boys' room when they're falling asleep because otherwise, I'll come up at 9:30 and find Patrick still reading. From the kid who didn't want to read because he didn't think he was any good at it to the kid who won't <em>stop</em> reading. I'll admit, it makes me smile. His teacher says he's reading on a second-grade level already, and he's getting better with practice. Patrick loves to read pretty much anything, including Calvin and Hobbes books! He's reading chapter books on his own and we're going to be starting <em>Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone</em> together now that he's 7. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Patrick still loves to draw and do other art projects. We're pretty much limited to drawing at home (because I only let them get out the acrylic paints during the summer <a href="http://adoptionfamily.blogspot.com/2010_06_01_archive.html">when they can go outside</a>), but he draws a ton and is really getting good! The other day he showed us the origami that they'd been doing at school, and he's brought home clay-work and painting and all sorts of things.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">He loves soccer and mentioned wanting to take ice hockey lessons the other day. I'm not sure where he got that from since it's a sport that neither Jason nor I watches, but that's what he decided. We're pretty supportive of his ideas but we did veto that one since I'm not sure he's even ever seen an ice hockey game. Perhaps the first step would be to actually take him to a Thrashers game sometime.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJTXi45Q5Ng1N1wvduHMMN-GTbUb39nYAdjltOwV4PZR2M6vAUYucIwVJBkgrG1bCnuJpuB27E8sqRnf8oTQ_4Y0WpOV7qJKT2opUnjvKKT8tr4vwQKH8g4J4uMc6ba-YjbEckaDZlrPHZ/s1600/HPIM5362.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" ox="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJTXi45Q5Ng1N1wvduHMMN-GTbUb39nYAdjltOwV4PZR2M6vAUYucIwVJBkgrG1bCnuJpuB27E8sqRnf8oTQ_4Y0WpOV7qJKT2opUnjvKKT8tr4vwQKH8g4J4uMc6ba-YjbEckaDZlrPHZ/s320/HPIM5362.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">We're so proud of Patrick and the way he's developing into his own person. We are so lucky to get to be his family, and can't wait to see what the next year will bring for him!</div>ErinMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09971744619171716912noreply@blogger.com3