This week brought to you by the letter C

The last couple of weeks we could tell Matthew was on the verge of starting to crawl. Monday he moved forward twice towards the wireless mouse that operates our Home Media Center in the living room. Btw Daddy, being the computer engineer he is, was very proud that was his first thing to motivate him. By Monday night, he was going half way across the room by sheer arm strength, His tummy is on the ground, it's a very impressive army crawl. It's so neat to follow his line of vision to see what he has in his sights. I've taken some pictures but I traded cameras with my brother in law this week and haven't figured out how to download them yet. I could get spoiled with all the neat features of this Pentax K100.

I was able to upload, pardon the blurriness. I'm not used to the camera. I did capture him briefly up on all fours


Matthew started having a runny nose on Tuesday night. His throat was getting scratchy but other than that Wednesday he was his usual self:, great appetite, regular potty habits, grinning and army crawling that he started doing on Monday. That night he went to bed like usual but needed comfort from 3:30 to 4:30 in the morning. That was the first time I heard a single barking (Like a dog with an angry bark) cough. By Thursday afternoon it was apparent he was getting worse. Not napping, runny nose much worse and the coughing became a little more frequent. At 7 pm Billy did his usual night time ritual of giving him his last bottle and rocking him to sleep. As I was doing my evening pumping Matthew woke himself up scared from the sound of the loud coughing coming out of him. By 10 pm, His breathing was audible, so we went to the Acute Care place that is thankfully 5 minutes from our house. They were efficient, thorough and kind to Matthew. We were out of there 30 minutes later with a breathing treatment for croup, prescription and notification was made to our primary pediatrician. Following their advise, we picked up a cool mist humidifier on our way home. Matthew finally fell asleep at 11 pm on the way home. We spent the night in newborn sleep mode. He would sleep about an hour and a half, wake for two hours and start again. Normally rocking him just agitates him and he gets himself to sleep much better on his own rolling over to his side or tummy for his naps during the day. We definitely got quite a bit of cuddle time last night. I got to rock and hold my baby and even though it wasn't under the best of circumstances, I treasure any excuse. So it was a rough night, but it's in those moments that it's a precious reminder, we are not babysitters. We are Matthew's parents. That's the dirty work, the nitty gritty bonding events. Changing two blow out diapers, bulb syringing his nose when he would wake, before I'd feed him and after I would change a dapper., rocking, walking, singing, getting him fluids, entertaining him at 2 am. It's emotionally draining, physically exhausting and tears were shed watching my precious boy struggling. I wouldn't trade a moment of the experience. As I walked him in the middle of the night soothing him, I kept repeating a scripture (that I can't remember this afternoon) and just thanked God for our precious gift.

Look at the pink around those tired eyes. Even sick, he's still such a even tempered sweet baby.


Thank you to:

Robin W and Robin E for the Acute Care recommendation.
Amy for your advise yesterday and calling this morning to check on us
Indee, Jill, Kristen and Anna for checking on Matthew this morning.
Ben and Sarah for picking up pedialyte for our little guy this afternoon.
Most of all to my best friend and love of my life Billy. He's an amazing father and I can't imagine being a parent with anyone else.

Raising a child surrounded by the love, encouragement and support of friends and family is a priceless gift.

7 months

Our special boy is 7 months old today. I am so thankful to mother this little guy. Being part of his learning and growing is such a delight. His sweet smile and friendly eyes brings a smile to strangers young and old. I pray to be the mother he deserves.


Sleep:
He sleeps 12 hours at night from 7pm to 7 am with 3 naps during the day still. The greatest change is that two of them are now 2 to 2 1/2 hours long :-) Thank you Kristen for the suggestion!!



Clothes:
He is growing out of his 6-9 clothes already because of his length. Especially the cute footed pj's when he stretches out, it pulls on his neck. He needs 9-12 months for that now. Size 3 diapers. My non medical measurements this morning have him at 28 1/2 inches and just under 20 pounds. His next well baby visit is at 9 months.


Food:
He eats five times a day. Meal one- 8 oz formula. Meal two-rice and 6 oz breastmilk. Meal three- stage 2 veggie (carrots, squash, peas, green beans, mixed veggies) 6 oz formula. Meal four- rice and veggie mix with 6 oz breastmilk. Meal five- 4 oz formula bottle and rocked to sleep. We just tried a finger food last night and he he kept throwing them on the floor. I am looking forward to rice cakes, puffs and Perky O's (gf version of Cheerios) since our little guy can't do bitter biscuits and cracker fare..


Socially:
Shares his what we call 'friendly eyes' with everyone who looks his way.
There is an organized summer play date that starts next week we are very much looking forward to. He has spent some time with his younger friend Tanner and I'm not sure he understands when mommy says gentle and tries to show him what that means, but I'll keep doing it anyway. We are looking forward to teacher friends being home for the summer and others coming in town traveling on vacation. I am just starting to see signs of separation anxiety, if he can't see me he'll cry and then as soon as I'm back in his range of sight, he 's fine. We also just got back from a long trip too, so that may be part of it. He's sensitive to the mood in the room. He will cry if it's tense.


Developmentally:
Large Motor skills are coming along great with standing on our laps and varying positions with help. He can slide back from a sitting down to his back, then flip over to his tummy.
Tries to mimic our facial expression, sticking tongue out, etc...
Rotates 360 degrees on his tummy.
Everything goes in the mouth
Is still a VERY happy spitter
Unsupported sitter now. He happily picks things up, plays with them for quite some time turning it around in his hands and putting it in his mouth.
Fine motor skills, he can move an object from one hand to the other.
Word recognition wise, when I say hungry ( as in asking him if he is), he stops crying. He's done this a few times.
He smiles now when we start playing patty cake.
He is starting to object when we take an item away. He's okay as long as we replace it with a safe alternative.
If we play peek a boo and change from where we pop out from behind a blanket, we he will start looking in the last place he saw us. If we do it every other one, he anticipates the change then.
He has only done this once, but we were both there and it was so cool, I have to mention it. He stood for about 4 seconds by himself. He does stand holding on to the furniture.

May Pics

This officially says goodbye to May and 6 months old :-)

Grandparent Fun :-D

May 23rd Matthew and I (Billy was on call) went with my brother and sister and celebrated my mom's birthday
Matthew getting sugars from the birthday girl.

Belated Mommy's day gift from my beautiful neice Joan to me, her mom and grandma:

Also that week, we had lunch with bonus grandma. So sweet watching her show Matthew off :-)

We headed over to chow down with Sheribeari and Grandad
Then the 27th Papa came in town to help some people move and he drove with us to spend a long Memorial Weekend at their house.

It's normally an 8 hour drive to get to their house from ours. This time, it took 11 hours to arrive there. I'm glad we didn't make this trip back in March when it was originally planned. This mommy would have gone coo-coo. I spent a couple of days just compiling the list of things to take to care for him. The trip was good in that it showed me I can be more mobile than I have been It just requires more planning.


The part that was the hardest on my heart is that our sweet fellow normally takes 3 naps during the day totaling almost 6 hours a day. While traveling he slept for 40 minutes all day, he was really tired and worn out. The elevation change, time change, him being a side sleeper and bright sun ( I tried a blanket covering him, didn't work). We stopped 3 times to feed him, 2 times to change awful diapers and twice to stretch our legs. We were glad to arrive and I was tempted to have all of our things shipped and just move out there, just so we wouldn't have to get in the car again...

Fun hat from Nana

Memorial Day cook out. Nana's home made apple pies:

Papa's shish kabob's
Great Aunt Jacque
Great Aunt Kathy

Nana with LOTS of sugars.

Matthew with Papa and Nana
We were in NM for 4 days, so about the time Matthew recovered and got back on his nap schedule it was time to go. On the way back, it took us 9 and a half hours to get home. We'll take that gladly. I think he just resigned himself to it this time. Papa wasn't in the car this time so maybe... Naaa ;-)

Billy and I got a bit of time to ourselves, what a treat. Maybe there is something to living close to grandparents ........
Matthew in the little guy chair at Nana and Papa's

Matthew is truly blessed to have so many grandparents that love him :-D
He says thank you and he loves all of you too!!

Quilts

Billy's mother passed on a sweet treasure I had to blog about. Here are a couple of squares done by Turnbow's close up:








A couple of them actually had the date hand embroidered on them:

Thank you, I will treasure this piece of family history :-D

Speaking of quilting, walking around Billy's parents home I kept admiring all of the pretty quilts. Since I dabble a bit and have made a few myself, I really appreciate all the time, effort, planning, materials and skills that go in to a well made one.



The quilting on this small one makes up for the simple piecing.
This was on the bed we slept on.
spare room:

I like the clean bright colors in this one: I went shopping while I was at my in-laws and bought 4 yards of fabric for $6, great deal !!

Here is one I made for little Brooke's 3rd Birthday
We love you girls!

Splashing Fun

On your mark....

Get set...
Splash!!

First time in a pool, it was like a big bathtub to him. It was overcast and a bit chilly and he had a blast :-D