Friday, September 30, 2011

the many moves of micah

the many moves of micah

i thought i'd show you some outtakes from yesterday
oh, who am i kidding, these are the ones that actually turned out.
the rest were just a blurry ball of boy as he was moving and grooving on my bed.
the boy doesn't hold still.
at home and with people he's used to seeing a lot he's a giggly, funny baby
but get him around strangers he's just perfectly content staring you down.
except grandmas. micah can spot a grandma, anyone's grandma a mile away and he'll always give a grandma a smile
i think it's something in their voice and demeanor - it is adorable though
one of the ladies at church always comes up to say hi to micah with the cutest voice, and it never fails and she always gets a huge grin out of my serious boy.

so, i'm not really sure what i was planning on posting about - except to show off my kiddo.
he woke up yesterday with a broken blood vessel in his eye poor guy
i think he scratched his eye in his sleep, but Curtis thinks he was pooping too hard in the middle of the night :)

last night we said adios to his infant car seat/carrier and installed his new big boy carseat. this thing is a beast. too bad it was pouring rain the day (today) on our first outing in in. i was drenched as i learned how to loosen the straps and buckle him in with his handsome little puffy vest on. i should've chosen a sunny day to inaugurate my guy into big boyhood.

what else.

micah likes to eat Everything! i'm not kidding. the kid will suck on a lemon wedge until you have to rip it out of his death grip fingers. he likes avocados and cantaloupe and spicy hummus and lentil soup and sweet potato curry and brown rice. the kid is a monster and if i wasn't so scared of him choking i would be giving him a lot more. last night he cried for food as we ate dinner even though he had just eaten. we like to sit him in his high chair while we eat even if he's not partaking. family dinners are important to us so we've started young. as he was flipping out over our food (fresh veggie fritatta, spinach salad and toast) we was momentarily satiated by those puff things though.

hmmm...

oh, and sad story (from Monday but whatev)
Monday morning i was going down the basement to get something and noticed that the freezer door down there was ajar. everything was smushy and defrosted, but worse than the food - almost all of my pumped breast milk had defrosted. i was crushed. and immediately called Curtis sobbing. luckily some of it was still kind of slushie, so i put it in the fridge and let it defrost completely to use up that day, but the rest had to be tossed. heartbreaking. ugh, still hurts my heart. i worked so hard for that 'liquid gold'. but as my mom reminded me - don't cry over spilled mild - haha, very funny! :)

micah did however take four bottles that day, which gave me the opportunity to pump a bunch so i'm trying to get a small stash going again. we were giving him a bottle every day or two, just to keep him familiar with  - which was depleting my stash faster, but worth the risk of him rejecting the bottle completely like he used to do. i just wonder if when i'm all out of pumped milk, will he take a formula bottle and still want to nurse. he's only had formula once, in the hospital when he was born, when he wouldn't eat right after his circumcision. it was barely an ounce, but i hear the stuff is like baby crack. it's sweetened and babies scarf it down. and i'm just so proud of the fact that he's gone this long on pure momma's milk. not that choosing not to nurse is wrong, or formula is bad, but for me, i decided before he was born that my goal would be to nurse as long as i could, but with a year being my goal, and so far, at almost 8 months old we're still going strong, so i don't want a couple formula bottles to stop our streak.

but i will say, it's not easy. breast feeding is a commitment and whew, it takes a lot out of me and is time consuming, and i spend a lot of time in other rooms and alone with him and it's not always fun or convenient, but it's awesome. and as much as i've had a love/hate relationship with nursing, i do think i will miss it when he is eventually weaned. but man, some nights i say to micah before i put him to bed. 'baby, today you have literally sucked every ounce of life out of me." haha

anyways, what a tangent i've gotten myself on.

anyways...all this to say, my baby isn't so much a baby anymore :( he wears skinny jeans and puffer vests and sits up by himself and doesn't nap while running errands anymore and eats foods that most kids would gawk at and it makes me happy and sad all at the same time.

sigh.







my fingers hurt



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yesterday micah took two loooong naps and i was a tornado
my tornado days are few and far between these days
i'm more like a steady breeze of productivity these days
there isn't a day that i don't go to bed wishing i had one more hour to get stuff done, but usually happy that i don't have that 25th hour, because i'm usually tired and ready for bed by 10, 11 at the latest.


but yesterday was different - tackling items on my to do list like a tornado (a little bit of coke - the soda, not the drug - helped too i think!) 


and then something got going and all i wanted to do was get crafty
so i did


we were planning to go visit my cousin and his wife last night - they just had their first baby - a little girl - and although i got her a shower gift, i don't like visiting the maternity ward empty handed, so i got down to embroidery business.


queue photo #1


as you can see, her name is Romy (different but cute - a family name i think?) and it took me about an hour to do the first two.


then i got to making a card to go with the little gift.


i don't have pictures to show you but let me tell you, i carved a little triangular bunting flag into an eraser and stamped little colorful bunting flags across a blank white card. i ended up making like 8 of them, all different - it was fun, and fast (nothing beats a fast project!) and i now have lots of cards to go along with these burp cloths i'm now addicted to making.


then last night, after Micah was in bed, we turned on the t.v. to watch The Office (which i must say is slip sliding down the drain fast) and i decided to whip up two more burpers. This time for a friend of mine at church who just had her second little one - a darling baby boy named Joshua. 


queue photo #2.


as you can probably see from the dark and blurry iphone pictures, i'm not THAT good, but it is a super relaxing little craft and now that Micah is taking two really nice (and long) naps a day instead of a few shorter ones, it affords me more time to have some creative me-time.


last night i kept saying, "my fingers hurt," to Curtis.
and in typical Happy Gilmore fashion he would respond with:
"Oh, well, now your back's gonna hurt, 'cause you just pulled landscaping duty!"







Friday, September 23, 2011

on potty training and nightmares


ever since Curtis snuck a little potty into our cart at Ikea in July, he's wanted to potty train Micah.
i laugh and blow him off, even when i come upstairs to help with bathtime and find this:




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it sure was cute, and funny when Curtis got so excited when Micah farted on the potty! He was certain pooping would come next (which of course it didn't!)

but all this potty talk i think crept into my subconscious and yesterday morning, right before i fully woke up i had the most heart-pounding nightmare i think i've ever had.

i hesitate to even write it because it still gives me goose bumps. I told it to Curtis last night, and when the words came out they sounded more foolish than the realness they felt when i woke up and had to repeat over and over louder than my thumping heart,

it was just a dream, jess. it was just a dream. 


we were at my mom's house. Micah was seven months, just as he is now, and i guess we were potty training him.

I wasn't in the room, but in my dream i could see my mom sitting Micah on her toilet in their downstairs bathroom. Then she walked over to me, in my dad's office, across the house from the bathroom and we were talking...

(my heart is thumping as i type)

then it hits me to ask her, "Where's Micah?"

and she says, "I put him on the toilet."

And my heart stops. begins to thump in my ears like it is now.

And i run. Through the house to the bathroom at the back of the house.

And there he is, slumped into the toilet, the roll of toilet paper off the cardboard roll, sprawled our around him in the bowl and he's blue. His eyes are closed and he's not breathing.

And i scream a blood curdling scream

and just like that i am awake.


it was just a dream, jess. it was just a dream.




and as much as i know it was, it was the closest i've ever gotten to the panic of harm to my child.
it was horrible. my heart is still thudding, through my fingertips. in that one brief moment i thought i lost  him.

and when i heard him kicking his feet, awake in his crib as i was mumbling to myself how it was just a dream i breathed a steady breath and got out of bed.

but it's stuck with me. the gratefulness that he is here when other parents lose their babies every day. And the only thing that gives me peace when all the what if's start to creep in is the belief that God loves him more than i do and that even as i try to cushion falls and thwart dangers and sharp corners is the fact that i am ultimately not the one who keeps him safe or healthy or even alive. And while that may not seem like a comfort to some, to me it's the only comfort i have as i find myself the caretaker of this little, fragile life. knowing i am not ultimately in control and that i can place my trust, not only for good outcomes in bad circumstances and healthy reports for scary tests but for whatever comes. Because, as my high school friend tattooed on her skin after her dad died - God is good, all the time, no matter what.





Thursday, September 22, 2011

first cold


IMG_4091, originally uploaded by jpenick999.



last thursday i went to bed just not feeling right and by friday afternoon i had a full blown cold. but there's no rest for the weary when there's a baby involved. that and Curtis' parents were in town for the weekend. by tuesday morning i was feeling better.

then... yesterday i put micah down for his nap and when he woke up he was sick - how does that even happen?

since then i've been sucking boogers, wiping his nose and taking pictures of my cute drippy boy - because he may not feel good but he's still happy as a puppy with two peeters :)

and, if that wasn't enough - our dog has freaking fleas! ugh. i took her to the vet yesterday after a week too long of biting her back and tail raw. i thought they'd tell me she had doggy allergies, but nope - fleas. so gross.

so last night after sick boy went to sleep, sick puppy got a bath and blowdry, and our house got a good vacuuming. ick.

luckily today was nice enough to open up some doors and windows and let the fresh first day of fall air come blow some germs out with summer's end.

he thinks he's so big


IMG_4083, originally uploaded by jpenick999.





sometimes i'm sad to see my baby growing up, but my arm that has been lugging around his twenty pound self in the baby car seat definitely isn't.

Monday, September 19, 2011

and how...

story time with daddy

how he sat in his highchair in the kitchen tonight, watching me cook -
making guacamole and fresh corn and black bean salsa and hard tacos
with spicy meat

and how he likes lemons and cantaloupe and bananas and avocado but
can't quite seem to figure out how to pinch those puff things and get
them into his mouth before dissolving into nothing

and how he giggles at his reflection in the mirror and looks at me
like he's asking if it's okay to look and laugh at himself

and how he's sitting up on his own so well, until he gets distracted

and falls helplessly, sometimes laughing, other times crying

and how he loves books, until he's had enough and he arches his back

and he's over it just like that

and how lately he's ready for bed at dinnertime but we keep him ups so
he can have time with his dad, attempting to play while pushing his
bedtime past 7, getting a giggle every so often between tired cries

and how i take him upstairs to feed him cross-legged on our bed, him
on a pillow on my lap - our nighttime ritual, nursing in the dark

and how I can lull him to sleep with this routine, he knows, closes
his eyes and eats

and how he was asleep on my lap having taken his last gulp a few moments ago

and how as I pulled back down my shirt he whimpered and immediately
brought his thumb to his mouth and even as I burped him and plopped
him belly first into his crib, his suck never waned

and how he doesn't cry it out at nap time or bedtime anymore, just
looks up at me from his belly, lays his head down and gives up for the
night

and how now it's quiet except for the dog chewing a toy. he on the
ipad, me on my laptop, working until eyes get tired, or distracted or
both.

and how it's another monday night and the day is almost over and i
made it through, again, having never gotten out of my sweats from last
night.

and how tomorrow morning i will shower and dress and even put on some
makeup even though we have no plans until the evening and we will
start our week on tuesday like we always do.

hopefully a better mother than a blogger

...that's my goal, is that too much to ask?


it's been brought to my attention that it's been over 10 days since i've written last.
i don't really have many excuses except that i've been mothering (that's a pretty good excuse if you ask me) one super cute seven month old (as of yesterday) and i've been taking little bits of Micah's nap times to do a revamp of my closet (my giveaway pile is awesomely huge and growing) and i've been sick (cough, sniff, cough) the last three days and today i'm working up a storm (just taking a little blogging break to get my creative juices flowing).


but there are no good excuses in blog land where moms seem to blog the second they pop out a baby or the minute they move into a new house (how do they do that?) on second thought, i think i was better at blogging while i was still in the hospital having just birthed my boy than i am now (how is that possible?)


i was actually just going through those (seven month) old posts yesterday. (february archives anyone!?)
man, was that a hard, exhausting, amazing time. feels so long ago, but so recent too. sometimes i still can't believe i have a kid and i get to stay home and play with him all day long (except for Mondays) and it's just so awesome. we have so much fun together, me and my little funny sidekick (he seriously makes me laugh all day long!)


anyways, enough words - here's what we've been up to the last few days:

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i love this, the light, the clear white cloudy sky - cutest piggy back ride i've ever seen

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Sunday Micah turned 7 months old - closer to his first birthday than his birth-day - sigh
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spend Saturday at Patterson's Fruit Farm - seems a little confused as to why he's sitting with pumpkins, but i think he looks so handsome in his skinny jeans and big boy shirt
and today - he played in his highchair when i was working, now he's napping - crap i jinxed it - now he's awake (literally as i typed that)

Hopefully i'll get better at this blogging thing again, but if i don't, just know that when i'm not on my laptop blogging, i'm somewhere on the floor, helping him practice sitting up without falling over and smushing up avocados and bananas and reading board books and doing laundry and dishes during naps instead of writing (because i'd much rather be living than writing now and days anyways)


Thursday, September 8, 2011

he told me to write so i'm writing


j & m baby m c & m


last night we were sitting on the couch after Micah went to bed.
i was "pinning" on my laptop (find me here) and Curtis was surfing the web on the ipad.

he must've checked my blog to see if i had written anything lately (which i hadn't) and he looked at me and said:

"you gotta write, woman!"

"i know." i said flatly, more inspired by lovely photos of food and the creative endeavors of others than by my own words lately.

but write i will, lest i lose the few followers i have attracted.

today i skipped a shower because Micah had already been up for a while, babbling to himself if his crib and i had the choice to make - coffee or a shower. i chose the coffee. Which i sipped as i put on makeup anyways, and deodorant - always deodorant.

i am almost out of diapers, so a trip to the store is in order later.

during morning naptime i read. first morning and evening by Charles Spurgeon. Then i finished Romans. Then One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp. He kept sleeping so i kept reading...page after page on thanks and grace.

she writes, "Contemplative simplicity isn't a matter of circumstances, but a matter of focus..."

"I pay tribute to God by paying attention..."

"The life of true holiness is rooted in the soil of awed adoration. It does not grow elsewhere," J.I. Packer says, and she quotes.

"I am a wandering Israelite who sees the flame in the sky above, the pillar, the smoke from the mountain, the earth open up and give way, and still i forget. I am beset by chronic soul amnesia. I empty of truth and need refilling. I need come again every day - bend, clutch, and remember - for who can gather the manna but once, hoarding, and store away sustenance in the mind for all of the living?"


by the time Micah wakes up again, i am filled.
but just for today, maybe even only just enough to finish off the morning.

i read "From me is thy fruit found." (Hosea 14:8)

then i close my books, go make a rested boy giggle, make a trip for diapers and let all these words, other's words, seep into my very being and try to remember to pay tribute to God by paying attention. to each moment, as meager or meek as they are.





*photos: Labor Day play time...oh how we love him!




 
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