Bedtime stories

N has about a billion books.  Okay, maybe not that many, but certainly a lot.  Enough that we don't have to read the same story every night, or even the same story in the same week...  Every night we read two different books to N, and it is very possible we could go an entire month without reading the same one twice.

That said, this is the conversation we have every night after his pjs are on and we're prepping for storytime:
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Me: Whatcha wanna read tonight buddy?

N: The dino book.

Me: What about this book?

N: shakes head furiously  No, the dino book.  Not that dino book.  The other dino book.  How do dinos eat their food.

Me: sigh  Okay.  What other book?  Ferdinad?  This book about the guy with all the spots?

N: looking at me like I'm crazy  No.  I want the animal book with the zoo.

Me: You're sure you don't want Ferdinand?  Holding up "The Story of Ferdinand".

N: Sheer panic  No no no no nononono.  Looks me straight in the eyes so he's sure I'm hearing and understanding him.  The ANIMAL BOOK.

Me: Okay okay, the animal book.  Proceed to read both books without looking at any pages because I've memorized every word at this point.

N: I love this book.
--
This conversation happens nightly, but there are probably five books on the rotation:

• "How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?" - good, teach him to try new foods.
• "Wild About Books" - good, everyone should love reading AND zoos
• "The Little Red Hen" - capitolism at it's best.  You don't help, so you don't eat.
• "The Pokey Little Puppy" - I hate this book.  What is the POINT?
• "What Do You Do With A Tail Like This" - educational, but not much of a story.

Replace "Me" with "E" above, and pick any two of the above books and you've got our nightly routine with N.  If anyone needs any toddler books besides those list above, we have a ton.  I'm partial to "I Love You Stinky Face", even if N isn't.

Looking back...

 Just an hour or so after B was born - 12 August 2010...

N and B in late May (because I've become increasingly terrible at uploading pictures and am honestly too lazy/tired to go get the camera and do it right now.)

At this point one year ago I was very pregnant.  I'm going to go out on a limb here, but I'm pretty sure that at 8.5 months along there was no mistaking what I was baking.  I decided that I'd capitolize on my company's pretty awesome maternity leave policy, so even though my official due date wasn't until August 22nd, I decided to take the last two weeks before my due date as maternity leave.  That means that one year ago at this point I was prepping for my last day or work before B was born.

There's no doubting what I did with my free time that I was off - I was nesting.  I did more in the time leading up to B's birth than I do in many months normally.  I cleaned everything.  I rearranged everything.  I washed all clothing in our house.  I gutted a closet and even considered painting a room.  (E put the kibosh on painting, but I totally would have done it, if not for him.)  The day I went into labor, I planted a crape myrtle in our front garden.  All the crazy cleaning and reorganizing and tree planting caused me to go into labor 11 days early.  So 10 days before it was supposed to happen, B was in our lives.

I will never forget the feeling of absolute love and adoration I felt for both of our sons from the moment I saw their little faces.  I know this doesn't happen instantly for all parents.  But for me, the love I felt for B was instantaneous, pure, and whole.

I don't talk about it much, but this past year has been the most beautiful, wonderful, and hardest of our entire lives.  E wouldn't talk about it either, but I'm sure he'd agree with me.

Approximately 24 hours after B was born, they discovered a "problem".  When the first words the nurse says to you when she comes in is, "Now, I think you should sit down, but know that everything will be okay.", you know that everything isn't the way it's supposed to be.  At that point, we learned that B had some issues that were going to require surgery to take care of.  I had no idea what that meant.  I was 24 hours post-partum.  I was all alone.  E had gone to get N to introduce him to his new little brother.  My family was not there.  All alone, I sat in a hospital room one day after giving birth and listened to a nurse tell me that they had called for an ambulance to transport my 1-day-old son to Children's Medical Center of Dallas' NICU.

The next few days were a whirlwind of medical staff, tests, waiting, praying, waiting, praying, crying, waiting, waiting, waiting...  Finally, after 1 surgical procedure and entirely too many days, we got to take B home.  Neither of us had slept much and up until a few days before I had no idea what an ostomy bag was, but I knew that somehow, someway, there was a reason for what was happening and that everything would be okay.  I cannot possibly thank the family and friends who supported us in that time (and all the other times) enough.

The next few weeks were normal, then B got an infection.  We were back at Children's for antibiotics and rest.  He turned out to be fine, but it was scary anyway.  At 8 weeks old he endured yet another surgery.  Finally, at 4 months old, he had his final surgery.  After a painful recovery period in the hospital, we were able to go home.

Now we have two of the most beautiful (ehem, handsome!) little boys I've ever seen.  N is crazy as ever, but right now I'm talking about B.  Everyone expected him to have issues, be behind in development, potentially develop other problems.

He didn't.  In fact, he's exceeded everyone's expectations.  He was rolling over by 4.5 months.  Sitting at 6 months, right on schedule.  Crawling by 7 months.  Took his first steps at 9.5 months.  Now, at 11.5 months, he walks all the time (no more crawling for him!), has a few words, and is very opinionated.  He loves his big brother, our dog, and his mom and dad.  He's happy.  He's healthy.  He's all I could ever have hoped for.

I love him more than I can possibly say.  And I love every one of you who has walked this journey with us.  It has been a long road, and there are many many years ahead of us.  I'm just so thankful for the loving friends and family who have gone above and beyond in so many ways.

Thank you.  From the bottom of my heart, thank you.

I love this guy.

No helmet!

For weeks now my tiny tyrant has been talking about bicycles.  "That my bicycle.  I want bicycle.  Me ride bicycle..."  You get the idea.

(For the record, the tiny tyrant is N.  B is lovingly referred to as the diapered dictator.)

E and I get a fabulous idea to get N a starter bike.  We went to the bike shop for a completely unrelated matter and asked the bike experts there what was the best plan.  Trike?  Training wheels?  How do we do this people?

The experts at the bike shop actually recommended something called a balance bike.  Go on, Google it.  You'll learn about a bazillion brands and things regarding learning to balance over learning to pedal yadda yadda yadda.  We went here after extensive research and ordered an awesome green balance bike for N.  We also went out and purchased him a Cars helmet (complete with Lightning McQueen) and a bell.  He is S-T-O-K-E-D.

The bike gets here when we're away for the weekend and is waiting for us when we get back.  E brings the box inside and the following conversation ensues:

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N: A BIKE!  That MY bike.

E: Yep buddy, this is YOUR bike!

N: My bike!  I open.

E: Let me put it together bud.

N: Tears, hysterics

E: Chill out bud!  Can you help Mommy and B unpack?  You're an awesome helper!

Me: Directing dirty look at E because we (in private) refer to N as the anti-helper.

N: I help Mommy and B!

Minutes pass with me putting things away and N and B immediately taking them back out of their assigned places again while E puts together this bike.  Seriously.  Like maybe 5 minutes.  It didn't take long.

E: Hey N!  I'm all done!  Check this out!

N: MY BIIIIIIIKEEEEEEE!

E: Yay!  Your bike!  Let's put your helmet on so you can ride it!

N: Yay!  I ride it!  Put helmet on!

E: Puts the helmet on N's head and fastens the strap under his chin.

N: Climbs on bike and grabs his helmet.  Helmet OFF.

E: We wear helmets when we ride our bikes buddy.  Remember how Mommy and Daddy wear helmets?

N: No.  Off.

E: In his best dad-is-sad-about-this-voice If we take off your helmet you can't ride your bike.

N: I get off.  No helmet.  No ride bike.

E:  Looks at me.

Me: Shrugs (I'm no help whatsoever.)
---

N proceeds to get off his bike and has summarialy refused to get on again due to the helmet restriction.  I grew up riding bikes everywhere and not once did my parents enforce some kind of helmet rule (not throwing you under the bus Mom and Dad, but let's face it, my cranium wasn't protected).  I am very VERY tempted to forsake the helmet to get him to exercise the use of this $100 PUSH BIKE we got him for NO REASON OTHER THAN WE LOVE HIM.

Helmet = mandatory safety precaution.  I will not lose this battle of wills with a two year old.  This pains me.  Parenting sucks sometimes.

Litte foodies?

Before kiddos, E and I were sorta gourmands.  We took cooking classes together - even when we were in Italy.  We could tell you if creamed corn incorporated the use of truffle oil.  We tried anything and everything.  I remember one ill-fated attempt at braciola that ended with us throwing away enough food to feed 8 people.  More often than not though, our test dishes turned into delicious staples and we ended up loving them.  Cooking together was a fun, interesting way to spend time together and very conducive to talking.  Plus, what's not to love about a date where you spend the whole time actually TALKING to each other?  Oh, and there's the added bonus of wine.  Any recipe that calls for wine just begs to have the rest of the bottle taken care of.  So there you go.  Foodies.  At least wannabes.

Fast forward a few years and here we are.  Two kids, not much time, and lots and lots of things to do.  We still love food and wine, but our time to enjoy it is vastly decreased.  We've devised a system in which we cook the next night's dinner after the boys go to bed.  This results in us eating lots and lots of casseroles with side salads.  Bo-ring.  But Sunday afternoon during naptime we've started making interesting and exciting dishes again.  It makes both of us happy.  Also, we're trying to raise little epicures.  We love food - so should they.

Apparently our best attempts at getting N to love fancy dishes are ill-fated.  No matter what we put in front of him these days, he meets with the following responses - "No.", "Cheeseburger!", "Pizza", and/or the ever popular "Cracker!".  Right.  Instead of this thing we spent an hour preparing, we'll give you some Ritz crackers.  It's frustrating.  But I suppose normal, given he's almost 2.  Nothing like hearing a request for cheeseburgers at 7 am and seeing a toddler dissolve into tears because we won't provide the requested cheeseburgers and tell him that "he can eat his pancakes" to make you frustrated with food.

So we were excited to find that caching things as his favorite dishes works wonders.  He'll eat almost anything if you can throw in a label he likes.  For instance, when we served him eggplant Parmesan, he refused to eat it.  We took the plate away, brought it back without changing a thing, and told him it was "eggplant pizza".  He ate ALL of it and requested more.  Do we feed bad about this?

No.

PS - A few meals after the "Cheeseburgers!" request we actually made him cheeseburgers because - hey - he planted the seed and it sounded pretty dang tasty.  He proceeded to eat the bun and pick all the cheese off of the meat.  At least he was happy.

Water time!

We've really REALLY been loving all the nice weather.  I'm too tired to post anything witty, but hey LOOK - cute kids!

N loves this watering can.

Clearly.

All my guys.

Zoee was loving all the outside time.

N watering the plants.

Check out B's mad standing skills.

He's loving it.

They have so much fun together.

N likes to blow bubbles and B thinks it is hilarious.

For R - check out our stonework and tin roof.

Outside!

N and B love it outside. Since it's been nice, that's where we've been. We're also too pooped to be witty, so here are some pictures of beautiful children.

B is watching N play with Zoee.

N is getting pretty good at throwing the ball for Zoee. Also note my lime tree - still alive (and producing, mind you!)

Action shot!

Lacrosse in his future? Maybe!

Snacktime outside is WAY better than snacktime inside.

Zoee loves our newfound outside-ness too.

B is very smiley these days.

Undoctored photo. He just is that beautiful.

Sidewalk chalk is awesome!

Boxes are also awesome.

That is all I've got. Now to sit down.

How it flies

On Monday a friend returned a book to me - Milk Memos. When I went back to work after N was born, my sister-in-law sent me this book in the mail. It's all about nursing moms and how some hate it, some love it, and some are generally indifferent to nursing/pumping at work, and at the time I read it - a lifesaver to me for having to leave my little man to go back to work. I keenly remember the feeling of leaving him for the first time to go do work. That ache isn't something easily forgotten.

Now it's almost two years later and he's a walking talking dynamo with an adorable little brother. So much has changed in the past two years, but I'll never forget that feeling. My heart ached for her when she handed me the book back.

There are some things that you can't explain. The way you don't care that your kid with the flu just wiped snot all over your shirt and coughed into your face... The way a spilled cup of milk all over the kitchen counter (accidentally) is just all in a day's work... The way those little smiles and bright eyes make you feel like the greatest mom on the planet...

Yep, it's all worth it.

Before and after

Things change when you have kids. People tell you this. All your friends who have kids already will tell you how much things change. "Sure, sure, " you say. You can theoretically understand that there are now little people entirely dependant on you from everything from spiritual guidance to shelter to food to entertainment to education to ... You get the idea. You think you get it. But you don't. Case in point - I give you exhibits "weekend"...

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Friday night, 9 pm, pre-kids... You will find us either all dressed up sitting at a fancy dinner at a swankified restaurant about to start on a second bottle of overpriced but delicious wine OR hanging out with friends over drinks OR loudly playing music and attempting to be brilliant Wii masters without killing the dog.

Friday night, 9 pm, post-kids... We are paying our taxes. Bo-ring. We are also thinking about turning in soon. After all, it's super late. Should we have a second glass of wine? Probably not, after all, we may have some downtime, but we're still on call.

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Saturday daytime, pre-kids... Sleeping in. Hiking in the mountains. Exploring a new part of the city we've never visited before. Trying to understand the new art exhibit at the museum. Playing sports on a team of adults. Taking the dog to the dog park.

Saturday daytime, post-kids... Getting up earlier than you would on a weekday. Hiking up and down the stairs. Exploring new avenues in potty training. Trying to understand an angry toddler. Playing blocks and cars. Taking the kids to the park to just get out of the house.

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Sunday evening, pre-kids... Talking to family. Preparing a leisurely dinner together. Relaxing in front of a good book. Taking time to talk to each other. Really understanding how the week will look.

Sunday evening, post-kids... Talking to family about how stressed you are. Preparing meals for the entire week so that you don't have to cook in the few hours between getting home and bedtime. Relaxing... HA! Taking time to prepare all the kids' junk for taking to school. Having NO IDEA what the week ahead looks like.

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I wouldn't trade it. But I do miss the sleeping in.

Unconventional

What do you mean I'm wearing a WOMAN'S SOCK? They told me pink was very "now"...

Yel-woah. Yel-woah. YEL-WOAH! (Apparently the best color EVER. Period.)

N rocking some spikey hair in the shower.

Seriously Dad, I think you should consider the combover - it's an awesome look. Check out my hair. Ka-chow!

Half a decade

A lot can happen in five years...

• Two people saying yes
• One reception
• One honeymoon
• One tiny apartment in a scary part of Aurora, CO
• Two jobs
• Weekly happy hours and weekend trips
• One slightly larger townhome in a less scary part of Aurora, CO
• One European vacation
• Countless mountain trips
• Numerous weddings of friends and family
• Endless visits to Chatfield State Park and Reservoir dog park
• One dinner club per month
• One major moving decision
• One new city to explore
• Two new jobs
• One new home
• Countless home renovations
• One major family decision
• One beautiful baby boy
• Endless hours learning and executing being parents
• One more major family decision
• One additional beautiful baby boy
• Three baby surgeries, four baby hospitalizations
• First baby boy now precocious toddler with endless vocabulary and Myna-bird like skills at mimickry
• Second baby boy healthy and happy and slightly cheeky with a special affinity for rolling
• Boundless joy at the life ahead of us

It's been a busy five years. Happy anniversary sweetheart. I love you more than you know.

N points things out

I can't believe he's this big already...

Family photo op

Months in the making

We've been busy. One baby surgery + one return to work + one mother-in-law staying with us during the week + two boys + one dog + house + yard + family + friends = not enough hours in the week.

Regardless - here are some pictures of us recently.

B testing out the exersaucer!

N coloring...

We wanted to picture them together in matching shirts... It took some work. B yawns...

Smiley...

Wiggly...

Holding hands!

N's first boo-boo requiring a band-aid. He wouldn't leave it alone though - hence the tape. Notice the blood on his head. Also his doing. For such a tiny cut, we had a huge mess to deal with.

Halloween came and went. B was a very adorable bat!

N was a super cute giraffe!

Pulling through

Today we had a big big day. It was a BIG day. B had his second surgery, known as a pull through (but having a fancy pants medical name too), today in his path to correct his birth defect. Turns out it was a huge success. We left B with the very capable surgical team at 7:30 am and weren't able to reconnect with him until about 3 pm. Seven and a half hours pass before we get to be with him again. Seven and a half hours of him being under the knife. It was... Terrifying. Thankfully our family came to sit with us in the waiting room and to help with N. I know they don't feel like they did much, but having people to talk to and knowing that N was in good hands was more than they know.

B did fantastic. His prognosis coming out of surgery is wonderful. Right now he's resting, kinda doped up and looking as beautiful as the day he was born. I can't wait until we can come home. Some number of weeks after this we'll have a third (and final, fingers crossed) surgery to be done with all this.

Thank you to everyone, again. We appreciate the prayers and good thoughts and well wishes. There's still a lot for us to get through, but you know what - I know we're going to get through it just fine. We'll pull through. (Haha.)

A few weeks of changes

Okay, so it's been a while since my last post. We've had kind of a big couple of weeks. Between getting used to living with two kiddos (a chore in itself), dealing with B's stuff, and regular life, we've had a lot to deal with. We're all getting on and everything is going as well as we could hope. N is getting used to having a little guy share the attention, and B is one of the happiest babies I've ever met. Now we've just got to get him all fixed up and we'll be on track.

On Tuesday B had a procedure done to help us understand what needs to happen in his next surgery. On Wednesday night we noticed he was running a low fever. But any fever for a baby his age is a big deal, so on Thursday morning I took him into his pediatrician. She agreed that he was running a fever, and she also agreed that it didn't seem like there was anything obviously wrong with him - no ear infection, no runny nose, eating fine, good attitude, etc. Because of all this, and because any fever in a little guy is serious, she sent us back to Children's Medical Center for further testing. They drew blood, took urine, and did a lumbar puncture to get tests done. Many many many hours later, it all comes down to a urinary tract infection (most likely) that was probably due to the manipulations done in his procedure on Tuesday. He's been on IV antibiotics since Thursday night, and is due for his last dose tonight. He can only get them once a day and needed at least three doses, which translated to many nights in the hospital for us. Boooo!

The good news is that as long as everything remains as it is RIGHT NOW until 3 or 4 pm today, we can switch to oral antibiotics and go home today instead of tomorrow. We'll see. I'm taking time during B's nap to write this. E and N have been up a couple of times so that I can see the other guys in my life. It's been important, because I love them too. I have to stay here with B, because, as E puts it, I'm the chuck wagon for the little guy. It is painful to be away from N so much though, especially when all I'm doing the majority of the day is sitting cooped up in this room w...a...i...t...i...n...g. B doesn't seem to care too much, but N really misses me. I miss him too, which results in inappropriate (or appropriate, depending on how you look at it) crying jags when talking to doctors about the length of our stay here. Fortunately most of them understand that I do have a newborn and a family to care for and that makes this hard.

Once again, thank God for insurance.

In good news, we've got a date scheduled for B's second surgery, and as long as this little stay in the hospital doesn't change anything, we should get that taken care of prior to me being off of maternity leave. We'll find out more about that on Monday. It all looks positive though, and his surgeon is really happy with how things look for surgery. It's really up to the anesthesiologist if they'll do it - but we're hopeful they won't make us change.

A friend of mine put it well - if you aren't in a crisis, you can be sure you're headed towards one. The Lord has a way of making you appreciate what you have. You don't always understand just how lucky you are until you're going through something like this - and even when you're going through something like this. I know we have a lot going on and don't want to downplay how hard it has been for us, but I have learned by all we've been through just how much harder things could be. Thank the Lord that we're healthy, together, happy, and that everything with B can be and will be resolved in the next few months. We have the Lord and each other, and that's all we need to get through this.

I want to thank everyone who has been so supportive of our family through all this. The outpouring of support and love from friends and family has been overwhelming and wonderful. We really appreciate all if it, and are so glad we can count on so many people and know how much we're loved.

B and N

They're definitely brothers...

B - day 12.

N - day 12.

Both boys at home

N and B finally got to meet. It was pretty exciting. N is having a little bit of jealousy, but that is pretty much to be expected. Here are some pictures of my little guys...

B playing on his playmat... Trust me, he was looking around.

I should search, because we have a picture of me and N doing almost this same thing his first week home.

N enjoying cinnamon toast for breakfast. Everything looked better for him in the morning. (We don't normally feed him Cheetos either - those are for his "end of summer" party at school.)

Here's B testing out the swing while N eats breakfast. He looks relatively comfortable, I think.

Home at last

We've had a whirlwind couple of days. As you all probably know from E's previous post, our new little guy arrived on August 12, and everything looked fantastic with him. He was eating well, sleeping well, and generally looked like your regular guy (super handsome, of course).

On the early morning of August 13th, he still hadn't produced any stool yet, so they went to stimulate him to do it (read - take his temperature rectally). At that point they realized that something was a little bit off with our little man. He has something that is referred to as imperferate anus. Read about it on Wiki, I'll spare the details here. Because of this particular defect, they had to stop all feeds and hook him up to an IV. He was transported to Children's Medical Center of Dallas where they performed an emergency colostomy to enable him to pass stool. Needless to say, both E and I were stunned, terrified, insert-proper-adjective-here scared for B. This isn't something that can be seen in an ultrasound or any testing while they're in utero, so this was a complete shock to us. Plus, abdominal surgery on your child who is one day old is not exactly the thing you're expecting when you go into labor. He was in the NICU at Children's until yesterday afternoon, when we were discharged (hence the delay in posting).

B made it through surgery just fine, and now is wearing a colostomy bag on his side for a while. He'll undergo two more surgical procedures. The first will create an anus for him and connect all of his bowels properly so that he can go to the bathroom normally, but will leave the colostomy in place. This is so he can have an opportunity to heal before he starts pooping regularly. He'll then undergo a third surgery to remove the colostomy and reconnect everthing. This whole process will take about six months, give or take, depending on how he's doing and growing.

In addition to this, they did a number of tests at the hospital to check for things in the VACTERL association of birth defects (read at your own risk, it sounds WAY scarier on Wikipedia than what he's got going on). Essentially there are seven defects that are associated with each other, but a child with one may have some of the others, all of the others, or none of the others. They aren't really sure. But just in case, they checked him out for all of them. B exhibits a oddity in his kidneys - they both function totally normally, but instead of being on the left and right side of his back, they're both on the right. I'm thinking this gives him superpowers later in life if anyone tries to kidney punch him on the left. It was a relief to find out that even though they show an oddity, they are working perfectly, so it's just an interesting thing to know. In addition to that, one of his lumbar vertebre is shaped like a sacral vertebre, or something like this. This is something else the doctors are so not worried about, but because he shows it and the kidney thing in addition to the imperforate anus, he technically shows three of the seven characteristics of VACTERL, so he technically has this association. However, after his additional surgeries none of this should be a problem.

It's been pretty amazing how many people have reached out to us as either being related to someone who had this, knowing someone who had this, or had this themselves. It was an amazing relief to talk to a friend of ours who confided to us that she was born with this defect and we never knew it. She made us KNOW that B can have a perfectly normal life. We've just got to get through the next few months.

The good news for us is that after the next two surgeries, B should be like any other little boy. Right now he's wearing his bag, but it's not too terrible to deal with. We're really lucky in that his daycare is willing to work with us on this - so hopefully we won't have too many issues there. We were really concerned with how everything would work with me going back to work, but it sure sounds like they're going to be okay working with us on this - especially given that it's temporary.

B is otherwise a healthy little man. He's a week old today, and he looks fantastic. When he's dressed you can't even tell that he's any different than any other baby. His big brother is interested in him. I'm not sure that N really knows what to think, but he doesn't seem entirely opposed to the idea of having a little guy join our brood.

Please keep us in your prayers as we go through this. It's going to be a tough couple of months, but look at that guy? How can you not love that little face. He's perfect.

Biking and swimming

My guys lead an active lifestyle, even if it is 104 degrees outside!

A true Texan

We've had a very stereotypical weekend for Texans so far. After a bit of horseback riding...

We had a dinner of BBQ ribs, mashed potatos, and green peas.

Mmmmmm, BBQ...

After all that action it's necessary to wash it down with a big cup of milk.

Milk makes for a good skin treatment too.

It's been a good weekend tater.