tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-68806272289131057492024-03-13T16:44:53.751-04:00And Then There Were FourLife after babyShelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.comBlogger111125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-7233486292108002022014-03-10T17:00:00.000-04:002014-03-10T20:34:53.280-04:00Loving the People of Walmart<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I'm a wife. I'm a mom. I'm a woman. I'm a friend and daughter and granddaughter and sister and aunt. I'm a church member, a choir singer, a youth worker. I'm a neighbor, a homeowner, an employee. And I'm a me; an individual who is influenced, motivated, and shaped by all those roles I just mentioned but also separate from them in many ways. I don't think they are supposed to fully define who I am. I think who I am should define how I approach each of those relationships and functions. </div>
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What defines me is my relationship with Jesus. Yes, this is another one of those spiritual posts, but it's something that's been on my mind lately. It's so easy to get lost in or consumed by any and all of those roles I play. It's easy and perfectly understandable to see how a mom can become nothing more than a mom. Children are all-consuming, self-centered, soul-sucking little creatures that require so much, but you love them with a sacrificial, unconditional, proud love that seems to come naturally. Or being a homeowner, that can easily become the definition of me... the constant housework, chores, and maintenance that need to be performed, not to mention the desire to decorate, remodel, replace, and improve, all of which create a never-ending to-do list. Or church member; I go to church three times a week, serve in different ministries, and participate in church events. It's easy to start to think those are enough, to think that I've done my job if all of the different hats I wear are juggled just right and worn long enough to make everyone happy and meet everyone's needs. </div>
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But that generally never works out because it's very difficult to give 100% of yourself to 15 different things, to make everyone happy, and complete every job or task perfectly all the time. There's a reason that the cliche "There are never enough hours in the day" exists. It's because there is too much to do and not enough time or willpower to do it. And lately (mostly due to a sermon my brother-in-law recently preached), I've been realizing that I'm sort of standing behind all these roles and responsibilities and using them as monuments, as my trophies that I hold up to God to say, "Look, I'm doing enough. I'm taking care of all these things. I couldn't possibly add anything else. Maybe when this season in life ends I'll have more time to serve others and share your love with people outside my immediate circle of acquaintance." </div>
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I stand behind the monument of motherhood and being a wife and homeowner and think, "How could I serve one other person? I have a house to keep in order (or at least, you know, the couple of rooms that are accessible to visitors). I have a family to feed and plan for. I have two children under the age of three. Surely, that is enough." And I hear this little thought in my mind that says, "Shelby, Shelby, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary" (an adaptation from Luke 10:38-42). That one necessary thing? I think it's just loving my Savior. I think God is trying to show me that I'm putting the cart before the horse, that I'm working and serving and letting my roles define me, then feeling like there is nothing left to give so I settle for just enough and offer that up to Him to try to justify that I'm worthy and that I'm doing what He's called me to do. But all that He really ever asked me to do is to love Him, to realize the depths of what He has done in my heart and my life, to recognize where I would be without Him and to allow that love and gratitude and joy to fill me up and flow out of me to my family, to my friends, to my job, to my fellow church members, to my neighbors, to the people of Walmart.</div>
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Maybe right now I can't pick up and run off to some third-world country to share the gospel (though there are days that it is very tempting). But what I'm finally figuring out is that if I truly understand the gospel and allow it take hold of my heart, then there are opportunities every day to show the love of Christ (the gospel) to the world around me. And I can start with my family. I can start with my neighbors. I can start at Walmart.</div>
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That elderly man parked in his powered grocery cart right in front of the freezer section I need to access. Instead of hating him because he's an obstacle to my path, I can love him by asking how I can help him. That mom with her screaming children getting groceries at 9:30 at night. I can hate her by being critical and thinking her poor children should be at home asleep, or I can love her by having compassion and realizing that this may be the only time she is able to get groceries because she may not have anyone to help her at home, and offer her a kind, encouraging word as I pass. The employee who drops some items he's restocking. I can hate him by walking past and going about my own business, or I can love him by forgetting myself for a second and helping him pick up the packages. The cashier who decides to tell me her life story while the line is backing up. I can hate her by not listening, by not caring, by mentally putting her in some predetermined category of people (me-monsters), by worrying more about the people in line behind me than about the words this woman wants to share, or I can love her by showing empathy and not judging, by asking her name and telling her I will pray for her (and then actually praying for her), by maybe doing something within my means to practically meet a need for her.</div>
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I'm learning these things are important because anyone can be kind and considerate, but if I name Jesus as my Savior, then my life should definitely be marked by kindness, compassion, consideration, love, and self-forgetfulness. My sister-in-law who has only been a believer for a couple of years showed me at dinner last week what it looks like to treasure Christ and show him to others. Our waitress was rude and short with us before we had even said a word. She was clearly not interested in doing her job with excellence, and I was irritated before she had finished taking our drink orders. I gave a knowing (read: critical/judgmental) glance at my sister-in-law who just smiled, and when it was her turn to order, totally surprised me by stopping the ordering process and saying to the waitress: "How are you doing tonight? You seem like you're having a rough evening." What?!? That was not what I expected from my bold, sometimes sharp-tongued friend. And it humbled me to the core. I hadn't even thought about this girl and her situation. I hadn't taken one second to consider that she was having an awful night. I thought she had a job to do, and she should be doing it without projecting her anger from a previous situation onto us. So instead of loving her, I hated her. But Lee's simple gesture of kindness and thoughtfulness, asking her name and if there was anything we could pray about for her when we prayed for our meal... it softened that waitress. I hope it showed her there is kindness and love in this world. I hope it gave her hope, and most of all, I hope eventually God uses that encounter in some way to draw her heart to Him. But one thing I know for certain is that it gripped me and showed me I live too much for myself, for my own desires, needs, expectations, wants. </div>
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That one small interaction has opened my heart to see just how much of a mission field there really is all around me if I can get outside of ME and all those monuments I've put up. And I'm starting at Walmart.</div>
Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-26750263334092079592014-03-04T22:57:00.002-05:002014-03-04T22:58:37.630-05:00Roman - Nine Months<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XXqcyqWGKZk/UxaMuV8My1I/AAAAAAAABI0/ZLkC2DNuF6s/s1600/9+month.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XXqcyqWGKZk/UxaMuV8My1I/AAAAAAAABI0/ZLkC2DNuF6s/s1600/9+month.jpg" height="320" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">I realize these are not very good pictures (in the technical sense). </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">They are four of about 60 that I had to take this time to try to get just ONE decent monthly picture. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">He's a busy guy these days.</span></td></tr>
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Roman turned nine months old back in February. I find that I'm getting excited about the first year coming to a close in just a few months because it means no more monthly updates, which means I will no longer feel guilty for posting monthly updates three weeks late. If we have a third child, his or her monthly updates will probably all just be in one big post at the end of the first year.<br />
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But I still find them valuable, even if they are a little laborious and take up my precious <strike><i>Downton Abbey </i>watching</strike>, <strike><i>World War Z </i>reading</strike>, <strike>nap</strike>, um, Bible study time. So I press on... three more months.<br />
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At his checkup, Roman was only about 18 pounds and 28 inches long (I think, or it may have only been 27 inches... I forgot to write it down). That was a little surprising to me because he seems heavier than that. Brock was 20 pounds by 9 months, and Roman eats a lot more than Brock ever did, but he's much more active than Brock was too. He's healthy so that's really all I'm worried about.<br />
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Anyway, these are some of the things he was doing between the eighth and ninth month:<br />
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<li>He started becoming very impatient when he wanted something, and he learned how to throw real tantrums, particularly for food. You can't put him in the highchair unless the food is right there ready to go on the tray. Well, you can, but you'll have to listen to him scream and cry like someone is torturing him if you make him wait five seconds. Seriously, you see me right here opening up your jar of peas and getting a spoon; you know it's coming; why are you freaking out? Such an inefficient use of your energies, my sweet son.</li>
<li>He dropped down to two consistent naps this month, each one about an hour and a half long. He was taking the first one around 9:30 or 10:00 and the second one around 1:30 or 2:00. He's gotten very predictable with his daytime sleep now, so that's nice.</li>
<li>He started sleeping pretty consistently from about 7:45 at night to 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning. Usually if he wakes any earlier than 6:30, he just eats and then goes back to sleep for another hour or two. There were a couple weeks this month when he would wake up around 3:30 or 4:00 every night, and at first I would go in to feed him, but then I realized that it was most likely just teething not hunger, so Blaine took over the comforting for a couple nights in a row, and then he quit waking up after that (apparently it's not worth waking up in the middle of the night if it's just for Dad). </li>
<li>He finally dropped the dreamfeed this month. Yaay. He just wouldn't wake up enough when I would go to feed him for it, only nursing for maybe two minutes or not at all, so I knew it was the end. He kept it a lot longer than Brock, so I was glad to see it go.</li>
<li>He also moved to a four hour eating schedule this month. Another yaay. He just wouldn't be interested in food before that four hour mark (sometimes 3.5 hours), and he was able to stay awake longer (about 2 hours) before naps, so it was an easy transition.</li>
<li>He's crawling all over the place now and is no longer content to sit still (note the picture at the top). Gone are the days of the peaceful, observant baby. He wants to participate in everything now. And like his brother, he doesn't have a normal crawl either. He tucks one leg underneath himself and only crawls on one knee while scooting on the other leg. It gets him where he wants to go though, so whatever works.</li>
<li>He figured out how to move from sitting to laying down, and he can sit himself up really well now. He was trying to pull up from sitting to standing around the middle of the month, and by the end of month, he could pull himself up in his crib or on anything else that was pretty sturdy and could bear his weight. Sitting back down was a different story. Just like every other irrational development, he had some kind of physical compulsion to stand up when we would lay him down for naps. As soon as his back hit the crib, he would flip over, crawl to the rails, lift himself up, laugh and smile and talk for approximately 30 seconds, then begin screaming like someone had just put him on the world's scariest roller coaster until one of us went to lay him back down. Ok, maybe that wouldn't be so bad if he did it once each time then went to sleep, but we had to go through this cycle about 15 times for each nap for about a week and a half. Lay him down, watch him flip and crawl and smile, walk out the door, wait outside door 30 seconds, 3...2...1... SCREAM, go back in, lay him down... lather, rinse, repeat. Babies. Are. Ridiculous.</li>
<li>Moving on. He definitely knows his name now. He especially likes it when his name is followed by the word, "No." Not that he responds correctly to that word. He smiles or even laughs when he's told not to do something, which is actually really cute and funny, but he can never know that we think that because it quickly becomes not cute and not funny, so we can't positively reinforce it now. (There's a lot of smiling behind our hands or with our faces turned).</li>
<li>He said his first word this month: Bye bye. It's also the first (and only) sign language sign he learned because he started waving bye bye too.</li>
<li>For my future reference, he still spits up occasionally, but it is much less frequent now.</li>
<li>Finally, he started showing some of the normal separation anxiety stuff this month, but it has not been nearly as bad as Brock's. It was interesting because I got one of those BabyCenter emails that said, "You're baby may start showing signs of separation anxiety soon" and then the next day he didn't want anyone other than Blaine or me to hold him. He would act more wary of strangers and even family members, and he would have to examine people for a few minutes before he was willing to go to them. But by the end of the month, it wasn't affecting him much at all unless he was in a bad mood or tired. This was much different from Brock, who still gets anxious when we drop him off at church if it's not with his normal teachers or in his normal room. I guess Roman will be a lot more flexible and extroverted than Brock.</li>
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Now, on to the pictures:</div>
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Brock wanted to have his "monthly picture" made too, and he wanted to act like Roman while I was taking the pictures, so that first one is him trying (pretty successfully) to dive off of the front of the chair. The bottom two show how both of our boys love their little blankies. This is how they self-soothe (Brock, with the covert thumb-sucking, and Roman, with the heavy metal rock band fingers).<br />
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(I couldn't get a smile out of him because he was mad at me that I wouldn't let him climb all over the chair and fling himself into the floor)</div>
Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-65520116137910749182014-01-21T22:33:00.000-05:002014-01-21T22:33:04.774-05:00Roman - Eight Months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The babe is now eight months old. We are two-thirds of the way through the first year. That's a little crazy to my mind.<br />
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Anyway, the past few months (from about the 4th or 5th month) are my favorite stage of the first year. Their little personalities start blooming, and they're so curious and happy and friendly. You start to figure out some of their preferences (sleeping with socks, using a blankie to self-soothe, etc.), and they seem to go through this really easy period where they're content to sit and watch all the action, and everything is just peaceful for a little while. That's going to end this month (I'm not a fortune-teller... We're just already a week and a half into the ninth month as I write this, and the peacefulness has ended, but more on that in his nine-month post), but it was really nice while it lasted.<br />
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No doctor appointment until his nine-month checkup, but these are some of the things he was doing between the seventh and eighth months:<br />
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<li>He's starting to try to crawl. He will lean forward from a sitting position, almost to a crawling position but still hesitates and won't go all the way. He inches and scoots around, and he could get up on his hands and knees by the end of the month. A couple of times when I would go to get him out of his crib, he would hear the door open and just pop right up on all fours, then rock himself back and forth like he thought that would get him somewhere. This is a new experience for me because Brock never crawled on his knees. He always did the army crawl where his legs just kind of dangled behind him, and he looked slightly like a paraplegic who had fallen out of his wheelchair. So to see Roman figuring out how to move into that "normal" crawling stance has been fun.</li>
<li>His second tooth finally came in about mid-month. It took forever and was stupidly disruptive and apparently caused him all sorts of anguish. (Refer to his <a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2013/12/roman-seven-months.html" target="_blank">seven month post </a>for my unsympathetic complaining about how, to my children, teething seems worse than dying a slow, painful death). So he has both of the bottom front teeth, which means no more using our fingers as teethers. It also means there have occasionally been a few incredibly painful nursing moments, which nearly resulted in me punching him in the face (not really, but maybe). I think he's learned not to do it anymore now though, and I've learned to pay close attention to any signs that he's finished eating.</li>
<li>On the subject of eating, he's experienced a lot more finger foods this month. I can't remember everything we've introduced, but some of his favorites are avocado, blueberries, graham crackers... eh, I'm sure no one is really interested in this list. He does love to eat though. Blaine gave him a whole avocado one night, then just kept feeding him random stuff because "Hey, if he wants to keep eating, why not keep feeding him?" Then we figured out that's probably not the best philosophy after he threw up half-digested avocado and other randomness all over me, his freshly bathed and pajama-ed self, and his bedroom rug right before I put him to bed.</li>
<li>He started waving at the beginning of month. Mostly it's just random, but occasionally he'll do it in response to our waving bye-bye to him. It is definitely his sign for "more" though when he's eating. If you don't get him his food fast enough, he starts opening and closing his fists frantically like, "more, more, MORE!" I was trying to teach him the sign language sign for the word "more" (it's basically the only one I know, other than "please" and "poop"), and Blaine said, "I think he already has his own sign." </li>
<li>He learned how to dance this month. We're not doing the waltz or the quick-step by any means, but he will bounce his little body up and down when he hears music. It reminded me of Brock's dancing back in this <a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2012/02/friday-photo-in-motion-boogie-fever.html" target="_blank">little video post</a>.</li>
<li>He is starting to occasionally respond to his name when we call it, but that's not very consistent, and it could just be a response to the sound of our voice, so... not sure about that one yet.</li>
<li>He sits up great now and can move from sitting to lying down on his stomach without just falling over. I like being able to plop him down on the floor with a bunch of toys and let him go to town without worrying about whether he's going to just topple over and bust his head.</li>
<li>He finally quit waking in the middle of the night after that second tooth came in, so I'm pretty sure that was what messed him up last month. By the end of the month, he was back to sleeping from about 7:30pm - 6:30am again (with the dreamfeed at 10:30 still; he hasn't given it up yet, boo).</li>
<li>He's gotten really consistent with his naps. His awake time has extended to about 2-2.5 hours between naps (a little more like 3 or 4 hours in the evening before bed), and he sleeps from about 9:45-11:00ish and then 1:30-3:00ish every day (give or take 30 minutes). I love when they get to this consistent schedule because it makes things a lot easier. I especially love that his and Brock's afternoon naps line up at about the same time every day, so I can get my own little free time after I get off work.</li>
<li>And last, as can be seen in one of the sets of pictures below, this kid is very active. There is no more leaving him on any elevated surfaces like our bed or the couch (I mean, not that any responsible parent would ever do that, of course). Even without being able to crawl, he can move, and move quickly. He loves to jump and bounce and has mastered the doorway jumper thing in ways I've never seen before... seriously, he sometimes looks like he's performing some kind of ballet routine in that thing. So he's a lot more physically inclined than Brock really was at that age. Brock has always been more focused and skilled with the verbal/intellectual development and less in the gross motor skills department, and now I'm interested to see if that will play out in different pursuits for each of them later on. But that's enough about all that... On to the pictures.</li>
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These are the crazy, active shots I was referring to. I could barely take a decent picture because I kept having to put my hand up to keep him from diving off the edge of the chair.</div>
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Anyone who is ever on the fence about having more than one child, I give you the following as evidence in favor of taking the plunge. I love the relationship between these two, and it's a pain in the neck (literally... my neck is killing me right now) having multiple children, but nearly every day, I think how thankful I am that we didn't stop with just one. Hopefully I'll be saying the same thing five or ten years from now.</div>
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(Unprompted and unscripted... I promise!)</div>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-2722323278582546302013-12-30T16:03:00.000-05:002013-12-30T16:03:28.731-05:00Roman - Seven Months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Well this one is sort of close to on-time. I was determined to get back on track after his six month update was so late because I'm afraid I'll be tempted to just give up altogether, and then Roman would never know how he developed or grew after 6 months. Wouldn't that be tragic? I must press on. The world needs to know of my second-born child's monthly progress.<br />
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So here we go. This is some of what went on between months six and seven:<br />
<ul>
<li>He got his first tooth! That's fun right? No, it is absolutely not fun. Where can I get myself a baby who pops out teeth like it's nothing because both of my children have acted like someone is cutting off their limbs with a dull pocket-knife when they get a new tooth. I mean, I don't doubt that it's a little painful and irritating, and maybe there is room for some whining and fussing, but come on boys, man up! No, really, I'm not that heartless. I do hate that it bothered him so much, and I offered plenty of soothing remedies (Tylenol with codeine anyone?). Then the bottom right tooth in the front finally made an appearance. The left one is on its way out too but will be featured in one of the following monthly updates because it didn't show up before the 7-month mark. Anyway, one down, five hundred thousand more to go.</li>
<li>While we're on the topic of manning up, it occurred to me this month after Brock and Roman both got the flu (or something like it) and then Blaine got sick a week later, that I have three males in this house. Three males. My female friends all know what it's like when a man gets sick. And I realized this month that they are all three probably always going to get sick at the same time. Yes. This will be fun.</li>
<li>Moving on from my pity party. Roman is eating three meals of solid foods a day now and started some finger foods like Puffs (the slightly more palatable, significantly less messy cousin to the Baby Mum Mum), Cheerios, and crackers. He started doing really well with his pincer skills (yes, I had to double-check that it wasn't supposed to be "pincher," but "pincer" is apparently the correct spelling) by the end of the month. </li>
<li>He also gets really impatient now when it's time for his food. We can't put him in the highchair unless everything is ready to go because he starts screaming and throwing a fit. He basically yelled at Blaine the other day because the food wasn't moving from the container to his mouth quickly enough. </li>
<li>Night sleep started going really well at the beginning of month six, and for a few weeks straight he was sleeping from about 7:30 pm to 6:30 or 7 am every night. I was so excited, but as Charlie Brown so eloquently puts it, "Whenever I get too happy, something bad always happens." He got that flu virus thing I previously mentioned and has been out of whack ever since. It could also be the other tooth trying to come through. He's been waking between 1:00 and 3:00 every morning and won't go back to sleep until I feed him. So that's been fun.</li>
<li>His naps have been great though at least. He usually takes 3 a day, sometimes only 2 if he starts the day later, and they each generally last about an hour and a half. </li>
<li>He started being able to sit up really well without any assistance this month. He is still pretty stationary in whatever position we put him though; he's not pulling up or trying to crawl or anything like that yet.</li>
<li>He loves Piper (the dog) and squeals at her very excitedly whenever she comes into his line of sight. She mostly keeps a healthy distance from him since he likes pinching (interesting, it's not "pincing") her eyeballs and trying to rip her throat out.</li>
<li>He has learned how to pitch a fit now when you take something away from him that he wants. Funny how you don't have to teach babies this skill.</li>
<li>I still kept the dream feed all month, so he nurses about six times a day usually, but he seems to be moving toward a 4-hour schedule so that will eliminate one of those sessions, and hopefully we can also drop the dream feed soon. </li>
<li>The 6-9 month size clothes are fitting much better now, and he's wearing size 3 diapers (size 4 at night). Side note: I love the Garanimals clothing brand (despite the fact that it's only at Walmart). Every piece of Garanimals clothing that Roman has had as a hand-me-down from Brock has seemed to be in the best shape of all the hand-me-down brands, and I also like that they fit longer than other brands because they run just a little large. He can still wear the 3-6 month size in that brand, but the 6-9 months size isn't too big either. And they're really cute clothes. And they're cheap! I am not getting paid for this endorsement, mostly because no one really cares about my opinion, but if this blog post makes its way into the path of any Garanimals Incorporated employees, I'll gladly accept your offer of free clothes.</li>
<li>Roman loves blankies just like his brother. I make these little satin/flannel combination blankies (here's a <a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2011/07/dusting-off-sewing-machine.html" target="_blank">post I did on them</a> back when Brock was tiny), and both boys are soothed by them for some reason. </li>
<li>With Roman's increase in solid foods, he started having some problems with constipation this month. Brock had the same issues if I fed him too many servings of bananas or apples, but his usually resolved itself with a helping of prunes. Roman has had a little more trouble though, so we bought some Miralax and give him a teaspoon or so in his solids every few days so he doesn't get so painfully stopped up. And that's probably more than anyone ever wanted to know about my sons' bowel movements.</li>
<li>We started Roman on a daily iron supplement (per the pediatrician's recommendation) this month to prevent any iron deficiencies since breastfed babies sometimes don't get as much iron as formula-fed babies. We had to do this with Brock too and found that liquid iron is really gross. It smells metallic and tastes even worse. But if anyone else happens to be in the market for infant liquid iron supplements, I found <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0013NFXXM/ref=oh_details_o08_s00_i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1" target="_blank">this brand</a> on Amazon and it's great. Cheaper and a larger size than the ones at the store with the vitamins, no nasty smell, not a dark, staining liquid, and it doesn't taste bad. </li>
<li>Roman loves the bouncy, jumper seat thing that you can hang from the doorway, the Johnny Jump-Up toys. He gets so excited when we put him in it, and he'll just hop and jump all over the place. It's one of my favorite things.</li>
<li>Finally, I noticed this month that I've lost track of how many weeks old Roman is. You'll note in this post that I didn't use weeks to mark out any of his milestones. That's because I barely know what week it is on the calendar, so I am no longer aware of the specific number of weeks Roman has been alive. Months seem to work just fine though. </li>
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Oh, one other thing... Look how happy this little boy is. I think I talked a lot about his grouchiness in this update, but that really isn't the norm for him. He's a smiley, friendly fellow the majority of the time.<br />
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-32496803430855377602013-12-29T22:47:00.000-05:002013-12-29T22:47:07.161-05:00Roman - Six Months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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He's seven and a half months old. I'm posting his six month update. It's clearly not getting any better. Poor Roman.<br />
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At his six month checkup with the doctor, he weighed 17 pounds, 3 ounces and was 27 inches long. So he gained a little over two pounds and had grown an inch in two months.<br />
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These are some of the things he was doing between the fifth and sixth months (they really are... I had written them all down at the time because there's no way I could remember now what he was doing a month and a half ago. I'm even looking at some of these and thinking, "Oh, I forgot he did that." This explains why people end up having multiple children... long-term memory loss):<br />
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<li>I was giving him oatmeal cereal once a day by about mid-month. He tried sweet potatoes at 23 weeks, then squash, carrots, peas, green beans, peaches, and all the rest that are left after that. He loved solids from the first bite. I guess that may be an advantage of waiting until they're a little older to introduce them. They're ready and there's not as much refusal because they want it and can eat it well. I still took it really slow though and only gave him a little of each food once a day just to let him taste them and make sure he wasn't going to have any reactions to them (he didn't). I wasn't enthusiastic about starting the whole solid food process because it was just something else to add to my slightly overwhelmed mental list. But it went well and by the start of the sixth month, he was eating solids 3 times a day.</li>
<li>We introduced a sippy cup with water at about 22 weeks. Of course he kept trying to drown himself and nearly choked on the overflow multiple times, but hey, that's how they learn right? </li>
<li>He finally figured out how to roll from his stomach to his back (only to the right) at 23 weeks and the next week figured out both ways. We had some horrible sleep interruptions for a couple of days during this whole learning process, but once he figured it all out, his little empowered self went back to the regular routine.</li>
<li>Somewhere around mid-month, he started reaching for me or for Blaine when one of us was holding him and the other approached. I like that milestone because it makes you feel really validated and you can say things like, "Yes, it's clear that you like me so much better than your daddy and want to come to me, don't you?" Just kidding. I never say that. I prefer, "Look Daddy! He's reaching for you. Hurry, take him so I can go back to stalking my friends on Facebook."</li>
<li>He's still very entertained and amused by Brock. In the car, he has started peeping his head around the edge of his carseat to watch Brock, which cracks Brock up and makes him belly laugh, which makes Roman chuckle, which makes Blaine and me look at each other lovingly and think how amazing our two little sons are and how perfect our life is, and then the record scratches and Brock starts being a maniacal toddler again and Roman gets tired and starts screaming, and we're back to reality. I need to record this.</li>
<li>I tried dropping the dream feed a couple of times this month, but he wakes up in the middle of the night wanting to eat if I don't do it, so I'm just keeping it for now.</li>
<li>This is literally what I wrote down about the time change that month: "Time change - kill me" Clearly, it didn't go so well, and I was not a fan. We apparently survived though, so that's something. And I think it actually only took about a week to adjust, so I might have been a little overly dramatic, but I just really like my sleep.</li>
<li>He got his first cold this month, which isn't too bad considering he went 6 months without getting sick.</li>
<li>Sometimes he rolls around in his crib so much that he gets himself kind of jammed up in the corner so then he gets really angry and frustrated and can't solve the problem. And I'm like, "Well, screaming and crying about it isn't going to help the matter." But he hasn't learned to be reasonable yet, unfortunately, so I just have to help him roll back over.</li>
<li>We introduced him to Baby Mum Mums at the end of the month, which he loved because it was something else to eat. If you are not familiar with Baby Mum Mums, they are just some kind of baby finger food that I think might have Asian origins and that are ridiculously overpriced and resemble communion wafers or thin slices of styrofoam (in taste and appearance). My favorite thing about Baby Mum Mums is the little bullet-point on the front of the box that says, "Great taste, <u>No mess</u>." LIES... so much lies. They're a sticky, soppy, messy mess waiting to happen. Be warned. <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I noticed this month Roman has less sensitivity to sensory things than Brock did. Brock never liked to play with my hair that much and Roman likes to eat it. Roman loves to grab Piper and pet her and Brock wasn't as interested in touching her. The sunlight doesn't seem to bother Roman, and it always seemed to hurt Brock's eyes. Just interesting little things that I thought were common to all babies when Brock was little but that I see now were actually more unique to Brock.</div>
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<li><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Last thing. He finally took a bottle from Blaine at 25 weeks. That's terrible. Poor Blaine was so frustrated and upset that Roman would never take it from him, especially because he would take it from the next door neighbor's cousin's uncle who he'd never seen before (not really, but almost), but wouldn't take one from his own dad. Not sure what that was all about because we had tried it since he was a newborn, and he just refused until this month.</div>
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And the pictures...</div>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-38222733879127234822013-11-09T14:54:00.002-05:002013-11-09T16:56:45.943-05:00Roman - Five Months<div>
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This is Roman's 5 month post. Yes, Roman is actually 6 months old this month. Yes, I'm just now posting last month's update. I sat down to post this a couple weeks ago and got distracted because it said my blog layout design would be expiring soon unless I wanted to purchase it (which I did not), so I spent an hour trying to find a new, free design instead of posting the update. I was a little sad that there weren't as many cute options out there anymore, but this will work for now.<br>
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Another thing I'm sad about. My wonderfully fantastic $500 digital SLR camera that I got for my birthday four years ago is starting to malfunction. Something is wrong with the shutter release, and all the pictures are dark. It worked just long enough for me to get Roman's 4 month pictures taken for my last post and then gave me its "I. Just. Can't. Go. On." speech. So starting this month (or, well, last month) I'm having to use my phone to take Roman's monthly pictures, and they just aren't the same quality.<br>
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Oh well, life goes on... The chunky monster is still growing and changing whether I write it all down or not. I do keep up with his little developments throughout the month. It just takes me a while to sit and put them all in a readable format. So without further ado, here <strike>are</strike> were some of Roman's fun facts between months four and five:</div>
<ul>
<li>He started trying to roll over from his back to his stomach at the beginning of the month and then accomplished that feat at about 20 weeks, which of course disrupted his sleep and made him angry when he would wake up. Apparently, this is why I should've been doing tummy time all along. Since I never really made him do it at all, it took him FOREVER (ok, maybe more like 2 weeks) to get used to being on his belly. I love that they are compelled to roll themselves over even though they absolutely hate it and don't want to be in that position. They just have no control over their little bodies, which is irritating even to me, so I'm sure it is super frustrating to them.</li>
<li>He rolled from his stomach to his back a couple of times, but couldn't really get the hang of it. I practiced with him a lot during his wake time and made him just roll back and forth until his eyeballs started looking a little dizzy (not really), and I think that helped him develop some muscle memory for it. </li>
<li>Around about week 18, he started taking a long time to fall asleep; he would just lie in the crib talking to himself. One day during a nap he laid in there quietly chatting and cooing and babbling for an hour and 20 minutes. I just kept waiting and waiting for him to drift off, but he was on a roll, so finally I moved him to his swing and he instantly fell asleep. This seems to happen every few weeks or so, and I'm thinking it's probably a developmental thing because it seems he'll learn how to make certain new sounds or noises, and it's like he keeps himself awake practicing them.</li>
<li>We stopped putting him in the woombie at 19 weeks since he was starting to roll and since I realized from looking back at my posts that Brock was out of it by 18 weeks. He actually did great without it! I was so nervous because he had been sleeping well, and I just knew it was going to mess all that up, but I think it actually helped him because he wanted to self-soothe by sucking his fingers. Once he was able to put his fingers in his mouth, he started sleeping longer. By the third night, he slept from 8:00-7:00.</li>
<li>His routine is much more inconsistent and erratic than Brock's was at this point. Brock was an amazing sleeper and by 5 months would take several 1.5-2 hour naps every day and would sleep 11 hours at night without any waking. Roman will take great naps some days and other days be fine on just a few short catnaps. Some nights he'll sleep straight from 8:00-7:00, and other nights he will wake up early around 5 or 6 a.m. like he's starving. I would say 4 out of 7 days usually have a regular, consistent pattern, but those other 3 days he usually throws me some kind of curveball. He is going to be the child that defies my OCD, Type A, schedule-oriented personality I guess. </li>
<li>He kind of, sort of reached for me a little bit at 19 weeks while Blaine was holding him. Probably, if I'm honest, it was more just like he leaned toward me and his arm automatically lifted up, but it was more than he had done up to that point, so I clapped for him.</li>
<li>After we dropped the woombie, he started using his fingers as a soothing instrument. He still hasn't enjoyed a paci at all and just won't take one, but he played around with some different fingers and then seemed to finally decide he liked a combination of his middle and ring finger the best. So it always looks like he's giving the "Rock on" sign when he's self-soothing (see picture below).</li>
<li>He tries to do sit-ups when he's laying at any sort of incline, and he can pull himself forward some. He's nowhere near the point of getting into a sitting position though.</li>
<li>We took the newborn sling out of his bathtub this month since he's sitting up a little better and steadier now.</li>
<li>He started wearing size 3 diapers sometime that month, and 3-6 month clothes are a little snug on him, but he's not quite big enough for most of the 6-9 month sizes yet.</li>
<li>At 20 weeks he started nursing for only about 5-7 minutes total, which made me nervous because I feel like that can't possibly be enough. According to my scientific research (translation: many Google searches), this can be normal at his age because they are more interested in what's going on around them, and some babies become a lot more efficient nursers at this stage. I remember Brock significantly decreasing his time too, but I didn't have my precise nursing timer apps back then (how much changes in 2 years) so I wasn't aware it was such a short amount of time, I think.</li>
<li>I wanted to hold Roman off until closer to 6 months to start introducing solid foods, mostly because I'm lazy and didn't want to add that component into our daily routine. I introduced foods at about 17 weeks with Brock, but I was excited to do something new with him since he was a first-born, and it's old hat this time around. I did, however, let Roman try some oatmeal cereal at 20 weeks, and he loved it. I didn't start giving it to him consistently though, just a couple of experiences with it at the end of the month.</li>
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I think that's mostly all the developments for the fifth month. And here are the pictures. This first collage I loved because it shows the progression of him sitting (kind of) to falling over and lying down. He likes to wiggle around so much that he can't stay sitting up for very long.</div>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-7679516163238756342013-09-26T21:54:00.000-04:002013-09-26T21:54:32.860-04:00Roman - Four Months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Roman is four months now. Actually, Roman is a little over four months now. I'm about a week and a half late, but that's just going to be the norm I think.<br />
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He had his four month checkup last Monday and now weighs 15 lbs (a 2.5 pound gain from his two month checkup) and is 26 inches long (a 3 inch gain). The change in length kind of shocked me because it seemed like a lot. He's growing well and, as evidenced by the pictures, is clearly getting enough to eat too.<br />
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These were some of the things that went on between the third and fourth months:<br />
<ul>
<li>At about week 14, he suddenly started going down for naps and bedtime much easier. He would cry very little and sometimes not at all when we laid him down. I looked back at Brock's 4 month post and this happened the same week with him. So apparently, if you are putting them in the same place to sleep and doing the same type of routine for the first couple of months, it starts to click for them at about 14 weeks.</li>
<li>He would go down easily to sleep, but his naps were not very great from about the 12th week to the 16th week. He would wake at about 40-50 minutes into every nap, which was frustrating because then he would want to eat much sooner than the 3 hour mark, which would just kind of throw the whole day off. I struggled against it for the first couple of weeks, changing his awake time and adjusting things to try to figure out what the problem was because it felt so chaotic. Then I looked back at a sleep log I had kept for Brock for a couple of months (yes, I kept a sleep log; yes, I am that kind of person; yes, I <strike>probably</strike> do have issues), and I realized that Brock had sleep problems around the same time, waking early from naps and not sleeping like he should. I looked up some info online and found that this period is kind of a developmental shift for their brains as they become more aware and more capable of doing certain tasks, so it often affects their sleep. Realizing it was just a phase helped me mentally cope with the frustration of him not sleeping, and I decided we would just start moving him directly from his crib to the swing when he woke early because sometimes he would finish the nap out in the swing. It also taught him that it was kind of pointless to wake up early because he wasn't going to get to play yet. Everything started getting better around 16 weeks though, and even though his naps are still nowhere near as consistent or as long as Brock's were, he generally gets at least three one-hour naps and then usually a longer one in the afternoon. </li>
<li>He can stay awake for about an hour or a little more before getting fussy and tired now.</li>
<li>At night, he's been sleeping from about 8:00-5:00 (with a dreamfeed between 10-10:30 where I feed him without really waking him up) so he goes about 6-7 hours with no feeding. Probably once or twice a week, he will still occasionally wake around 3 or 4 am, and I try to let him cry it out back to sleep but usually have to end up feeding him because he's stubborn. This is another area that is different from Brock because at this point Brock was going from about 8:00-7:00 every night and very rarely woke in the night for feedings. Brock loved sleep a lot more than the average baby, so that may be why he did so much better. Blaine says we let Brock cry more than we do Roman, which may also be true... Roman seems so much younger to me than Brock did at this age, so I'm not as concerned about making him do things that I made Brock do at the same age (sleep without a swaddle, sleep 12 hours without a feeding, etc). This is probably a significant benefit of being a second-born.</li>
<li>He can sit up with support now, like propped up on the couch or in a chair. He likes to sit in the living room with us in the evenings and just watch everything that's going on. He also tries to do sit-ups all the time, even just when he's laying flat. The pictures up above show what happens when I try to sit him up straight... he leans forward and then falls over sideways. I love the one in the top right corner. This happens all the time; he just falls over and then is stuck there until someone helps him, and most of the time he doesn't even mind; he just waits patiently on someone to notice.</li>
<li>He's chewing a lot on his fists and burp cloths and anything he can get in his mouth, which made me wonder if he is teething. It seems like I can kind of see his two little bottom teeth under the gums, but I'm sure it will probably be six more months of pain and restlessness and fussiness before they pop through. I'm convinced that teething is a torture tactic devised by Satan to make parents lose their minds. He also gags himself all the time with his fists and fingers, then looks around like, "Who just stuck their hand down my throat?!" </li>
<li>Around about week 13, he started nursing for only 10-12 minutes total. Up until this point, it was usually an average of 15 to 20 minutes, but he just refuses to eat for very long now. I'm assuming he's getting what he needs, so I don't really stress out about it.</li>
<li>He had some projectile spit-up episodes again in week 14, and that's when I noticed that they seem to coordinate with the times that he's going through growth spurts. He usually eats more during a growth spurt, so maybe he just takes in too much and then vomits it all up. Classic binge and purge it seems (not that I would know anything about the purging part myself... I always stop after the binge step).</li>
<li>He's in 3-6 month size clothes now but by the end of the month has gotten just about too long for those. He's in size 2 diapers during the day and size 3 at night (since they hold more and prevent me having to change him before morning).</li>
<li>He's gotten a lot better with his arm control. He plays with objects hanging down from his playmat, and he can hold and play with the <a href="http://www.toysrus.com/buy/outdoor-play/outdoor-play-toys/throw-toys/oball-4-inch-colors/styles-vary-1024-11430008" target="_blank">O-ball</a> now (one of my favorite toys for babies). Dr. Smith acted impressed with him being able to hold a tongue depressor and move it to his mouth because apparently moving objects to their mouths is something they don't really do until closer to 6 months. I'm pretty sure if he is advanced because of that skill, it's only because he's a fatty and is trying to eat everything. Even with the better arm control, we're still swaddling him in the Woombie swaddle for now because his hands still have a mind of their own (see the gagging issue mentioned above). I watched him one day with his arms out of the swaddle, and literally, his fingers start poking him in the eyes or his hands flail around or he starts to doze off and his fist inserts itself into his mouth, and he will get so angry like someone else is doing it to him and keeping him awake. It's bizarre to me that controlling your arms is a skill we have to learn (and that it takes so long!).</li>
<li>He's taking a bottle much better now (at least once a week at church and occasionally a couple times during the week). Those contraband latex orthodontic nipples really seemed to do the trick. He still won't really take any other kind.</li>
<li>He's doing a lot of cooing and making lots of noises. He loves to talk, which surprises me with as much noise as his brother makes. But I guess he wants to contribute to the conversation too. He's also learning how to blow raspberries, which I always think is cute... until they do it for 30 minutes and get themselves all soggy with drool.</li>
<li>He can roll onto his side but not all the way over yet. He will lay on his belly for a few minutes now before getting upset, and he can hold his head and part of his chest up. I didn't make him do tummy time practically at all for like the first three months, so I'm glad to see that I didn't totally damage him, although he does have a spot on one side of his head that is flatter than the rest. Oh well, he'll just have to keep his hair long.</li>
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I think that's mostly it, and I'm sure that's mostly stuff that no one other than myself might care about. I just like having a record of it all. And now for the fun part, pictures! </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zJ8MWxa4h0o/UkSINc5rHDI/AAAAAAAAA6I/YsE7ZLdwMuE/s1600/DSC_1905.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zJ8MWxa4h0o/UkSINc5rHDI/AAAAAAAAA6I/YsE7ZLdwMuE/s320/DSC_1905.JPG" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">I love this face </span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Always very amused by his crazy big brother</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_dcntjbehak/UkSITxmt9aI/AAAAAAAAA6k/spdSFucKQhw/s1600/Starred+Photos9.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_dcntjbehak/UkSITxmt9aI/AAAAAAAAA6k/spdSFucKQhw/s640/Starred+Photos9.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Apparently, these monthly posts will show Brock's growth too unless I start taking Roman's pictures while Brock is asleep. It was harder than it should have been to get just a few pictures of Roman by himself. </span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Brock showing "Bubigi" (Luigi from <i>Cars</i>) to a very fascinated Roman. I'm pretty sure Brock was also in the middle of saying, "Bubigi" when I snapped the picture.</span></td></tr>
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And then the monthly pictures... I can't really see much of a difference between the third and fourth month pictures. He looks like he sits better in the 3 month, but it's only because of the whole leaning forward thing that I mentioned he does now. I looked back at Brock's 4 month post, and he has almost the same issue with those two pictures. Just interesting to me :)</div>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-46827513000661039142013-09-13T15:22:00.000-04:002013-09-13T15:22:41.628-04:00Lessons from the Terrible Twos<div>
I am fairly certain that the specific events, situations, and phases we experience in life help shape the type of people we become. I have written before (<a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2011/07/i-am.html" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2013/06/the-little-foxes-lesson-in-marriage.html" target="_blank">here</a>) about times that I believe God has used my current circumstances to teach me lessons and make me more like him. I really believe that the different seasons we go through (whether they are hard times, big milestones, new adventures, joyful moments, or just everyday monotony) are opportunities for us to improve ourselves, to grow, and ultimately to learn more about God and his relationship to us.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FMtnEbFyqm4/UjNcwu215OI/AAAAAAAAA5o/ti4MereqWGw/s1600/images+(1).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FMtnEbFyqm4/UjNcwu215OI/AAAAAAAAA5o/ti4MereqWGw/s1600/images+(1).jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Winter is nothing, in comparison ;)</td></tr>
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The <strike>trial</strike> joyful venture Blaine and I are living through right now is toddlerhood. The terrible twos are upon us and are threatening to break us at every turn. I thought I hated the newborn phase... <i>that </i>is a cakewalk. Give me thirty newborns over one 2 1/2 year old any day. </div>
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No. Not really. Don't give me thirty newborns. <i>Ever.</i> Please. </div>
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I just went into a really dark place thinking about multiple newborns at one time.<br />
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Anyway, I digress. I knew today wasn't going to be the best of days when Brock woke up at 6:40 this morning. The child used to sleep til 9:00 every day, but once his brother was born and he moved to a toddler bed, he now apparently wants to wake before the sun rises every morning. I was prepared for a difficult day. I was not prepared for a day filled with epic proportions of the terrible twos. Whining and screaming and crying (a little from both of us) and disobeying and defying and flipping out for no reason at all. That's what our day has looked like. And all of it <i><b>before</b> </i>nap time! But during, quite possibly, the one peaceful moment we had at lunch time, I had a little revelation that kind of grew and grew in my mind (and eventually turned into this blog post).<br />
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A little voice said to me, "You are often like this toddler, Shelby." Not an audible voice. I'm not crazy (I don't think). Just kind of a thought that popped in there. I have been praying for patience and wisdom and calmness all day long, in my head and out loud. I have been praying for the past three weeks that we would love Brock well even through this difficult phase, that we would guide him and help him learn, that Blaine and I would be slow to anger and compassionate and understanding but consistent and right in our discipline. I swear it seems the more I have prayed, the more I have been tested and my patience has been stretched to impossible limits. But today, I looked at my defiant, disobedient, overly irrational, emotional little toddler and got a small glimpse of how I might look to God.<br />
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These are the things I want to say to Brock as a toddler or as a grown man, the things I want him to understand. But each one of these also seemed to be a truth that God wanted me to see about myself and about who he is. So these are the lessons (for Brock and for myself) from the terrible twos:<br />
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<ol>
<li><b>I am far more patient and merciful toward you than you deserve. </b>If you were not my child and if I didn't have this deep, abiding, unconditional love for you, I would probably tolerate a lot less of this nonsense and willful disobedience. My mercies are new every thirty minutes in my responses to you. There are some moments (like when you threw the tantrum of all tantrums because I put a shirt on you) that the only thing that keeps me calm and reasonable and not murderous is the fact that you are my son and I care deeply about you and love you more than you know.<br /><b><br /></b></li>
<li><b>It's okay to have bad days; It is </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">not</i><b> okay to treat </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">others </i><b>badly on your bad days. </b>Not every day is going to go well. Frustrating things will happen to you that you can't control. You may not feel great every day. Sickness, sadness, and crappy stuff will come. And I don't expect you to always have a happy face painted on. I don't expect you to fake your emotions and pretend you feel something that you don't actually feel. I want you to be real and genuine. But you do need to understand that you are not the only person in this world. You are not the only person in this family. There are others who have needs that must be met, even as you are having your bad day. There are others who need you to show mercy and compassion and patience toward them, even if everything isn't going your way. And there are probably others who are having much worse days than you are. So, on those bad days, stop focusing on yourself and see what you can do to make someone else's bad day better.<br /><b><br /></b></li>
<li><b>Patience and whining do not go together. </b>We tell you all the time to be patient. Sometimes I can't give you something the very moment you ask for it. Sometimes there are preparations that have to be made (like when I have to find a clean cup to put your milk in) or things that have to be put together (like that awful toy that I thought would come out of the box looking like it did in the picture but took an hour to build) or situations that are more urgent than yours (like your baby brother screaming his head off because he hasn't eaten in three hours). In these times, when you can't have what you want right when you want it, please know that patience is going to do a lot more than whining will. If I tell you to be patient, I want you to know that I have heard your request and I am going to act on it, but in the meantime I need you to wait contentedly and peacefully. Wait on me without whining or complaining or questioning or being angry or pitching a fit. Wait for me to get you what you need, and wait with a good attitude because if you are whining, you are not being patient.<br /><b><br /></b></li>
<li><b>My discipline comes from my love for you. </b>I know you feel like you get in trouble for everything (please refer back to number 1 though for the truth). I want you to know that I care about you and I love you and those are the reasons I create rules and boundaries and why you receive discipline. My love for you makes me want to help you learn how to be a good person, a loving person, a person who other people enjoy and want to be around. My love for you makes me persevere in my efforts to discipline you rather than handing you over to a pack of wild animals to fend for yourself. Sometimes the discipline is to develop your character (like when you have to share your toys with others). Sometimes the discipline is to correct your bad or wrong behaviors (like when you get a spanking for screaming at your parents). Sometimes the discipline is to teach you new things (like when you have to sit still and listen to instructions before you get to do something fun). And sometimes the discipline is to protect you from harm (like when I tell you not to stand in that chair that is looking wobbly and precariously close to falling over). The discipline is for different reasons at different times, but I want you to know that it always comes from a place of love and care for your well-being.<br /><b><br /></b></li>
<li><b>Your way isn't always the best way. </b>I know that's hard to understand. I know you think you've got it all figured out. I know you don't always want to do things the harder way, or the not fun way, or the tedious, boring, tiresome way. But sometimes the way I tell you to do things is better for you. It's a better plan, even if it doesn't look as appealing or as satisfying as what you have in mind.<br /><b><br /></b></li>
<li><b>You can trust me and my intentions for your life. </b>On the differences between your way and my way of doing things, I want you to be able to trust that my plan is for your good. I know you would rather eat five bags of gummy bears for dinner than anything I put on your plate, but I need you to realize that I know a little more than you and that I don't want you up at midnight puking sticky, half-digested gummy nastiness all over your sheets. I want something better than that for you. If I don't allow you to do something, it's generally because I am looking out for you. If I tell you not to run through the house with that butter knife, it's not because I don't want you to ever have any fun. It's because I don't want you to lose an eye when you inevitably trip over the dog or run into the kitchen cabinets. I have the best of intentions for your life, and you can trust that I am looking out for you.<br /><b><br /></b></li>
<li><b>You don't have to worry. </b>When you are hungry or tired or cold or sick, I feed you and give you a chance to rest and provide you warm clothes and get you medicine. When you have a need, I have always done and will always do my best to fulfill it. Remember last week when you didn't feel well and I held you and comforted you and gave you ibuprofen? Remember this morning when you said you wanted breakfast and you didn't have to worry about whether or not there would be food to eat or whether I would actually give it to you? Well, keep those things and all the others in your mind when you start to get upset and impatient and distressed about something you need. I always do my best to take care of you, and you have no need to worry.<br /><b><br /></b></li>
<li><b>I love you. </b>This is probably not even necessary to say since it has been mentioned in just about every other lesson above, but I'm going to repeat it one more time in case you didn't get it. I love you. You are a part of me. You stole a serious portion of my heart when you were created almost three years ago, and you continue to amaze me every day with the things you learn and the person you are becoming. Everything I do for you, every action I take, every lesson I teach you, and everything I give or withhold or take away is done out of a deep, incomprehensible, unimaginable love I have for you. You are mine, and I want you to know that although I am not always pleased with your behavior and I am sometimes exhausted and frustrated by your inability to do the right thing or remember the lesson I have tried to teach you 2,000 times already, there is nothing you can ever do to earn or lose my love. You are and always will be my child, and I love you.</li>
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I am, by no means, remotely close to being as patient, merciful, wise, just, and good as God the creator of the universe, but if I can feel these things toward my children (even in an imperfect, limited sense), how much more are they likely to be true about God the creator of my soul and very being. Now, I need to try to start acting less like a toddler and more like an obedient child who brings honor and glory and joy to her Father. </div>
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Interesting, refining process this whole parenthood thing can be.</div>
Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-28500834882448221712013-09-02T20:39:00.000-04:002013-09-02T20:39:33.413-04:00Conversations With a 2 Year OldBrock's verbal skills have really been fascinating to Blaine and me over the past month. He has been a talker from kind of an early age (this was <a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2012/08/a-b-c-easy-as-1-2-3.html" target="_blank">him saying some of the alphabet</a> at 17 months), and it has always been neat to me to hear him learning new words and new rules of language. Over the past few weeks though, it seems like his speech has become so much more grown-up. It's nothing for him to string together a 10-word sentence now, and we can practically have whole conversations with him. It has been really interesting to us because it's like we occasionally get a look into his little mind. Sometimes he just gets stuck in repeat mode though and will only copy what we are saying, which is a little frustrating because it goes something like this:<br />
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<span style="color: #e06666;">"Do you need to go potty?"</span><br />
<span style="color: blue;">"Need to go potty"</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue;"><span style="color: #e06666;">"Is that a yes or no?"</span></span></div>
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"Yes or no"</div>
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<span style="color: #e06666;">"Brock, do you need to potty?"</span></div>
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"To potty?"</div>
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<span style="color: #e06666;">"Ok, go sit on the potty, Brock"</span></div>
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"Noooo, Brock's not need to go potty!"</div>
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Aside from those episodes though, we've heard some interesting little sentences lately. I wanted to post them to the blog, one, because I think they're pretty entertaining, but also because I really want to remember what his little toddler self talked like (in case his little teenager self says much less endearing things).<br />
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span>
<i>Sometimes we will ask him to pray before bed or before our meals. This is how that goes:</i><br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: blue;">"God, fanks for today, fanks for the food, fank you for Mommy and Daddy and Roman and Brock and Piper. Fanks for play. Amen"</span></div>
<i>He prays the same thing every time (thanking God for the food even at bedtime). I also like how he thanks God for himself. And that last one, "thanks for play" took us a while to figure out. We thought he was thanking God for the time he got to play or something, but after I blessed the meal one night, we realized what it was he was trying to say: "In Jesus' name I pray"</i><br />
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<i>While eating a snack together in his room one afternoon:</i><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">"Mommy, eat the cheez-it!"</span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d;">"They're all gone."</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"Mommy, eat the cheez-it!!"</span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d;">"We ate them all Brock. There aren't any more in the bowl."</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"Mommy! Go downstairs and get some more cheez-its out of the box."</span></div>
<i>Oh, I wasn't aware you had figured out how that works.</i><br />
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<i>One of my least favorites:</i><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">"Hey Mom, Brock's poo-pooed in da floor! I get a BIIIIIGGGGG treat!"</span></div>
<i>No, son, I'm not sure you've quite figured out how this works yet.</i><br />
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<i>Blaine and I like to ask Brock on random occasions who loves him, and he'll usually go through a list, "Mommys wuvs you; Daddys wuvs you; Jesus wuvs you; Romans wuvs you; Pipers wuvs you" (he always adds an 's' at the end of everyone's name for some reason). This was how it went the other day:</i><br />
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<span style="color: #38761d;">"Hey Brock, who loves you?"</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"Tow-maters wuvs you"</span></div>
<i>We're very into the </i>Cars<i> characters right now.</i><br />
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span>
<i>While having a discussion about how to act around other people:</i><br />
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<span style="color: #38761d;">"Brock, when someone says hi to you, say hi back. If someone is talking to you, be nice to them. Don't say, 'Mommy, Mommy, Mommy' over and over. It makes you seem like a weirdo."</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"No, I not a weirdo."</span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d;">"I know you're not, but when your family or your friends talk to you and you just say Mommy and hide behind me, they might think you're a weirdo."</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"No, Mommy, I not a weirdo. Weirdos at church."</span></div>
<i>Hmmmm.... that is not where I saw this conversation going.</i><br />
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<i>Upon finding a store receipt in the floor:</i><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">"Hey Mommy! Here's your twenty-hundred dollars!"</span></div>
<i>No clue where he got that, but every receipt he finds is "twenty-hundred dollars"</i><br />
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<i>Blaine has always told Brock that blood was just cherry juice, I think in an effort to lessen the fear that comes from a busted lip or scraped knee. The other night at dinner Blaine was trying to explain to Brock why he needed to sit still in his booster seat:</i><br />
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<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #38761d;">"Son, if you keep rocking forward like that, you might break the strap on your chair. Then if the strap breaks and you're throwing yourself forward, you're going to either fall out of your chair or fall forward and hit your face on the table, and either way there will probably be a lot of cherry juice."</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"Oooh, cherry like a ICEE! Can I have a ICEE?"</span></div>
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<i>Blaine always gives him long, detailed explanations and then shakes his head in dismay when he realizes what Brock takes away from them.</i><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">"Mommy's gotta eat Roman"</span> <i>when I have to feed Roman</i></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"Look Mommy, Roman's dripping"</span> <i>when Roman spits up</i></div>
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<span style="color: blue;">"Hey little brother. Did you sleep good?"</span> <i>when Roman wakes from a nap</i><br />
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<i>And finally...</i><br />
<span style="color: blue;">"Hey Mommy, Brock's making milk. Vooo-tish, voooo-tish..." </span><i>as he sticks one of my breastpump parts to his stomach and pushes his belly out. (Vooo-tish is a robot/machine noise he learned from his daddy's plethora of sound effects)</i><br />
<i><br /></i>I can't wait to see what else we hear from that mouth in the future.<br />
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-89578002055077066002013-08-27T15:06:00.000-04:002013-08-27T15:06:41.633-04:00Roman - Three Months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aNffxXvCsDo/Uhzt6tfA2RI/AAAAAAAAA5Y/EOFS4RrGYug/s1600/3+month.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="425" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aNffxXvCsDo/Uhzt6tfA2RI/AAAAAAAAA5Y/EOFS4RrGYug/s640/3+month.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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No doctor appointment this month, so I'm not sure how much Roman weighs or how long he is now, but he's definitely gaining and looks like a little like this guy<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IWKyESVCsJk/UhyxhrW_UrI/AAAAAAAAA4Q/RucFBvWe7kI/s1600/1002569-ghostbusters_stay_puft_marshmallow_man_bank_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IWKyESVCsJk/UhyxhrW_UrI/AAAAAAAAA4Q/RucFBvWe7kI/s200/1002569-ghostbusters_stay_puft_marshmallow_man_bank_1.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
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Here's some of the stuff that was going on between the second and third month:<br />
<ul>
<li>He started wearing 0-3 month size clothes at the beginning of this month (or around the end of the 2nd month, I can't remember), but he's really about to outgrow those. I had to get out the 3-6 month sizes and wash them up for his little fat self. He seems to be growing at a faster rate than Brock did. Or maybe I just let Brock's clothes get uncomfortably small before I moved him up to bigger sizes. Who knows. </li>
<li>Roman also moved up to size 2 diapers this month. A word on diapers: I thought that I preferred Huggies over Pampers and have even mentioned this to a few friends who are expecting babies. I remembered Brock always having explosive poops that would go up the back (and out) of his diaper when he was wearing Pampers. This doesn't happen with Huggies because they have a little tab across the back of the diaper that kind of catches the poop (which indicates this must be a common problem with babies). I also feel like Huggies are more absorbent with pee. However, I am finding with Roman that Huggies diapers leak really bad around the leg openings and Pampers are much better at holding it in down there. So we apparently need some kind of Huggies/Pampers hybrid that will combine the best of both worlds. I also came to the definite conclusion this month that I could not do cloth diapering (not that I was ever really unsure, but ya know). Brock is potty training and has done pretty well with it, but he did have a really large, messy number 2 accident in his underwear a few days ago. Blaine and I were both cleaning it up, and I was gagging and trying not to be grossed out about picking it up after it fell out of his underwear (how do you take them off without it going everywhere?!). As I was standing there holding the dirty underwear as far away from myself as possible and trying to determine what I should do with it now (spray it with a hose? put it in the dirty clothes? soak it in the toilet?), I just decided we could buy more underwear and this was not worth salvaging, so it went in the trash. Yes, I know, that is so ridiculous and wasteful, and this is the reason that our landfills are overflowing, and I'm so selfish not thinking about the future generations and all that. I'm sorry... I just don't like dealing with poop. If I can't flush it or wrap it up and throw it away, then I don't want to know about it. </li>
<li>Anyway, back to Roman... he became super social this month. He constantly talks and coos and makes all kinds of vocal noises. He will stop nursing just to babble, like he all of a sudden thought of some great story he needs to tell me about. It's one of my favorite things. Brock didn't really get vocal until closer to 4 months and even then it wasn't constant, but Roman is a little chatterbox.</li>
<li>A few times this month, he woke from his naps happy and talking rather than screaming for food, so that's kind of fun.</li>
<li>This is not a very Mom thing to say, but I think Roman has gotten a lot cuter this month. He's outgrowing the odd alien newborn features and starting to look more like what the movies show newborn babies looking like.</li>
<li>He's gaining more arm control and likes to stuff blankets or burp cloths in his mouth with his hands. We're still swaddling him, but we started using the <a href="http://www.woombie.com/" target="_blank">Woombie</a> swaddle during the second month because it gives him more wiggle room. I had tried using it from birth, but with both of my boys, I had to wait til closer to the one/two month mark before we really liked it. So we used the velcro swaddles or just blanket swaddles first then graduated to the Woombie. I tried swaddling Roman with one arm out a couple of times this month, but for now he still sleeps better with them both in.</li>
<li>The projectile vomit/spit up has stopped I think. He hasn't done it in a while. In general, he is spitting up less frequently too, though it's still on a daily basis. Gas doesn't seem to bother or affect him as much now either.</li>
<li>We've still been having problems with short naps this month. We experienced the 45 minute intruder a lot, which is something I learned about <a href="http://www.babywisemom.com/2008/01/45-minute-intruder.html" target="_blank">here</a>. I think he had a growth spurt in the middle of the month because he was wanting to eat more, but then he just kept waking early after it was over. Figuring out a good amount of wake time has helped some (usually no more than 50 minutes to an hour), but we haven't quite gotten it perfected.</li>
<li>He found his fists and fingers and started chewing on them a lot this month. It makes a big, soggy, drooling mess, but there's no stopping him. I should also mention that he has always disliked the pacifier. Other than the first few days after he was born, he absolutely will not take one. I have tried over and over to get him to accept one, but it just makes him angry and he gags on it, so I guess we'll probably have another thumb-sucker.</li>
<li>While Brock all of a sudden started sleeping through the night at 9 weeks, Roman has been slowly extending his night sleep over time. At 12 weeks, he started consistently sleeping 6-7 hours a night with no feedings. Brock was more abrupt about it, so that's what I was expecting with Roman, but he has been more gradual. </li>
<li>This month Roman started to show a little more interest in and fascination with Brock. He's becoming more aware of his surroundings and all that's going on around him (which makes it fun to feed him), and he seems to really like watching his brother. Brock loves to put on shows for him too, so it works out pretty well.</li>
<li>I'm really happy that we have another pretty content child. Right now he is even better than Brock was because Brock was always really happy only until he got hungry or sleepy, then there was no consoling him. If someone is holding Roman, he is pretty much content and happy even if he needs to eat or sleep, and if he has been fed and had his nap, he'll just chill wherever you put him. This probably means we should stop having children because there's no way we can get lucky and have a third good one.</li>
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I think that's mostly all that has happened over the past month. Some of the boring details I'm recording are for my own future reference because there have been things with Roman that I couldn't remember whether or not Brock did too, so I'm just writing it all down now (in case we are dumb enough to try our luck on that third baby). </div>
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And now some pictures...</div>
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<span style="text-align: center;">Brock was insistent on getting in the chair with Roman while I was trying to take Roman's 3-month picture. Once I took a few of just Roman, I let Brock get up with him and these are what resulted. </span></div>
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<span style="text-align: center;">This is the "Staring off into space in opposite directions" shot...</span></div>
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This is what happened when I told Brock to put his arm around Roman...</div>
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<span style="text-align: center;">This is what happened when I said, "Say cheese..."</span></div>
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<span style="text-align: center;">This is what happened when I told Brock to give his brother love...</span></div>
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<span style="text-align: center;">And this one just happened spontaneously...</span></div>
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Finally, the monthly photo comparison...</div>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-52005678015442053872013-08-13T20:55:00.002-04:002013-08-13T20:55:30.410-04:00Cell Phone Photo Dump (2nd Edition)<div class="separator" style="clear: both;">
It's probably hard to believe if you're my Facebook friend or Instagram follower, but I don't actually post EVERY picture I take of my kids. I do post a lot, but I try to limit myself to only a couple a week and only the most amusing ones because I know that no one else really cares how long my toddler's hair has grown or how chunky my 3 month old is now. Anyway, I was clearing off some space on my phone tonight and found a few little gems that I wanted to save but didn't want to leave on my phone and didn't want to overwhelm my friends' Facebook news feed with. So to the blog they go...</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5LkQhBSojvNOqoaIYDEypqKsx1DBega14fLD5fImmXFI6_1KLDEII0AbV9L7nPJrKtWMQseJhY9qlLLifJk7b1LKHPvVMpm0q3DBFPAeq9O6FcqxPM2ayPo3PqHRGsV-FzEahCmXpXqg/s640/blogger-image--1416047623.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5LkQhBSojvNOqoaIYDEypqKsx1DBega14fLD5fImmXFI6_1KLDEII0AbV9L7nPJrKtWMQseJhY9qlLLifJk7b1LKHPvVMpm0q3DBFPAeq9O6FcqxPM2ayPo3PqHRGsV-FzEahCmXpXqg/s400/blogger-image--1416047623.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKOuE01zTEEyFpoINdi2Nv6pi0B_ZFYZNX3IVKJatufvzMlTKeBnpMkx4ffZqNQLHkW2I5ZOBr35vLzpKa-x6411G_yLaIlhMgiuDyZ3Q-9mEFpxhzaab4sIdkiF_6PVVjtcyi_AAi00Q/s640/blogger-image-989541814.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKOuE01zTEEyFpoINdi2Nv6pi0B_ZFYZNX3IVKJatufvzMlTKeBnpMkx4ffZqNQLHkW2I5ZOBr35vLzpKa-x6411G_yLaIlhMgiuDyZ3Q-9mEFpxhzaab4sIdkiF_6PVVjtcyi_AAi00Q/s640/blogger-image-989541814.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small; text-align: start;"><span style="font-size: small;">Brotherly affection... This will probably only last a short, short time unfortunately</span>.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNye-EHSxmjTTh_Bgv85q1e1cKL9uvFnyFX1l3wxjkS-39hVfTqNCm-IlwtWtR8AXPFTdaPWr8TCYczpeKKJhUaRFFpMeZP-hTGUWOfvUgzGDWjUbrFpeK6zqcTsIlaqQsjnVQXUoKrgo/s640/blogger-image--1134223115.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNye-EHSxmjTTh_Bgv85q1e1cKL9uvFnyFX1l3wxjkS-39hVfTqNCm-IlwtWtR8AXPFTdaPWr8TCYczpeKKJhUaRFFpMeZP-hTGUWOfvUgzGDWjUbrFpeK6zqcTsIlaqQsjnVQXUoKrgo/s640/blogger-image--1134223115.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">All swaddled up</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDZf396YARFuF5l1tiOOjkq4GTY217iU0hkT1qmnoQQXEdZSJZWDOuvOq9NTu6Qs_LgtqYZtI7mRTXjA0mPQMYnYeFqXkS33DJSbE2r7OlrB42otOihoocG2tAZMVfeRpA5S6SdWWYpqU/s320/blogger-image-1096825075.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="240" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">Pondering deep philosophical thoughts while watching Yo Gabba Gabba or Pocoyo</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">I love this one. His cousin Anna has a baby doll stroller and then this little miniature baby stroller. She was pushing the normal-sized one and he grabbed this one and started following her. A video would have been funnier, but this was all we could get.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">This one and the one below go in the "Monkey See, Monkey Do" series. He loves imitating his dad. Blaine was doing some special kind of push-ups with his legs on the couch so Brock went to the stairs (in the background) and put his legs up to do his own version of the push-ups.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">Blaine, for whatever reason, laid down in the driveway one afternoon and Brock ran over to do the same.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">He likes squishing himself into Roman's car seat, along with his buddy Pocoyo.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj60rSHx4ZSDTLL8ZgkWmdoixjPtb3k8SGySKuelf860uWjzVbfNCsBPBJGV7AMI7Evs1ZthpeYQMV5yS6HEJltQLIAkUFn-YCYPVrA6Yqr8_KgWOO0R-nvj8rVcNIAauuVguvgbBYG4m8/s640/blogger-image--1270195061.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj60rSHx4ZSDTLL8ZgkWmdoixjPtb3k8SGySKuelf860uWjzVbfNCsBPBJGV7AMI7Evs1ZthpeYQMV5yS6HEJltQLIAkUFn-YCYPVrA6Yqr8_KgWOO0R-nvj8rVcNIAauuVguvgbBYG4m8/s640/blogger-image--1270195061.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">This one is a little hard to see, but I peeked in Brock's room one day during his naptime and he had fallen asleep sideways with his whole body on his pillow (note his feet sticking out through the slats of the safety rail). Also, he apparently covers his face with his blankie to sleep now.</span></td></tr>
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I feel I should point out that I am completely aware of the unbalanced ratio of Brock pictures to Roman pictures. This is not (as Brock may try to claim in the future) due to the fact that I like or love Brock more. It is simply because Roman does little else but sleep for about 18 of the 24 hours in each day, and when he is awake, he doesn't have quite the variety of photographic moments that his brother does (meaning all he really does is just lay there and smile on occasion). But no worries, I love you too, my little second-born. </div>
Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-4137455974160497042013-08-12T15:47:00.000-04:002013-08-12T22:48:07.841-04:00Roman - Two Months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5XcjK6ip1ZQ/Ugk4_peQ3zI/AAAAAAAAAzY/qwzxZcsBxu8/s1600/2013-08-12.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5XcjK6ip1ZQ/Ugk4_peQ3zI/AAAAAAAAAzY/qwzxZcsBxu8/s640/2013-08-12.jpg" width="640"></a></div>
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Roman is 3 months old now, and I am just getting to his 2 month old update. So goes our life these days. Between a toddler and a <strike>two</strike> three month old, working a full-time job, keeping my house in minimum living condition, and being a wife, there are days when I feel like it is all I can do to keep my head above water. There are also days when I'm tempted just to go under and drown. Only kidding... kind of. I'm still adjusting to everything and still working on finding our groove, but we're getting there.<br>
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I am not a big fan of the first year. There are just so many constant changes and developments that always seem to throw them off and mess up their sleeping or their eating. It seems like after the first year, everything kind of falls into place and things get easier. So, I'll just hang in there for another 9 months... Of course, then they turn 2 and make you want to tear your hair out and run from the house screaming, "Stop saying Mommy!!!!" Ahhh, so much fun these little people are.<br>
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Anyway, all that to say, here were some things that were going on with Roman between months 1 and 2 (I kept track of things but just never got around to putting them all together in a post; his 3 month post will hopefully be on time).<br>
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<li>At his 2 month checkup, he was 23 inches long and about 12 and a half pounds. He had to get his first set of shots at that appointment, and I don't know why I didn't remember how miserable they made Brock, but I didn't give him Tylenol immediately afterward and he woke up from his nap screaming inconsolably. He wouldn't eat and barely even wanted to be held, and he kept making the most pitiful face I've ever seen which broke my heart. After about 24 hours or so he seemed to be over the worst, but I have got to remember to pre-medicate him before the pain really sets in.</li>
<li>His first real smile was at 5 weeks, and he has barely stopped smiling since. He's a really happy baby for the most part.</li>
<li>His first laugh was at 7 weeks. I didn't write down what it was that made him laugh, so I can't remember, but usually he just gets tickled by some random face or noise we make.</li>
<li>He slept through the night (10:00-6:00) once at 9 weeks (which is actually in the third month I think), but then he went back to a pattern of waking once in the night to eat around 2:30 or 3:00. He usually would go 4-5 hours at night and 2.5-3 hours during the day between feedings that month.</li>
<li>At some point during that month (maybe like 6 weeks or so), he stopped taking a bottle. He just wouldn't latch on and would gag on the nipples. I did some searching online and spent $15 on a set of bottles called Breastflow that have some fancy nipple that is supposed to mimic breastfeeding, and Roman basically said, "Sorry, but you just wasted $15, Mom." Then I did more online searching and found some people had success with the Playtex orthodontic latex nurser nipple for Playtex drop-ins (which is the type of bottles we had originally used). Of course, no one sells those nipples anymore... I think maybe because they're not up to the non-BPA standards or something. But being the bad mom that I am and not caring too much about BPA but caring very much about not being the only person able to feed my child, I found some on eBay (they were unused... I'm not that bad of a mom). So for like six bucks, I ordered those and they seem to be working well so far. Except that he won't eat for Blaine... He'll take a bottle from anyone else (even me!) but refuses to eat when Blaine tries to give him one. Odd.</li>
<li>Naps got kind of crappy this month. The first month was great; he'd take 2 hour naps and sleep perfectly. Then during the second month, he started waking every 30 to 45 minutes crying. Usually it was because of gas or spit up, but once he was awake he wouldn't really go back to sleep in the crib. So I started just moving him to the swing to finish his nap and he would usually get at least another hour or so.</li>
<li>Because of the gas and spit up, I thought I'd try gripe water. I never used it with Brock. The Mylicon gas drops seemed to be enough for him, but they didn't really do much to help Roman, so after some more online searching (thank goodness for Google), I decided to give the gripe water a try. I spent like $12 on a big bottle from Amazon which only resulted in him projectile vomiting all over the place. He had been having projectile spit up about once a week and the doctor said it was nothing to worry about as long as he didn't do it after every feeding. I tried the gripe water 3 or 4 times and every time, it made him throw up, a lot. So.... that was apparently another $12 wasted. I did, however, find that dipping a pacifier in it and letting him suck it off would instantly cure his hiccups, so maybe it wasn't a complete waste.</li>
<li>He had some really dry, flaky skin on his face and scalp that month and the baby Aquaphor cleared it up pretty well. I have to use Aveeno baby wash on him because the other kinds dry his skin out pretty bad.</li>
<li>This is more related to myself than to Roman, but I wanted to make note that pretty much all the pain/discomfort associated with nursing went away during that month (probably by about 6 or 7 weeks). This was sooner than it was the first time I nursed (it took more like 3 months with Brock).</li>
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I think that's mostly all that was going on up to the 2nd month mark. I was kind of complaining a lot up there at the beginning of this post, but I should say that I am not suffering from postpartum depression, and we are all doing well. It's just a lot of work, and sometimes I miss being a teenager (when I thought life was hard) and getting to sleep in all the time and not worry about anyone but myself. But I really am grateful for my two boys, and they make me smile more than they make me cry (or scream or say bad words or want to curl up in the fetal position). They bring us a lot of joy and pride, and Blaine and I wouldn't trade them for <i>anything </i>in the world, not even an all-expense paid, year-long vacation in Hawaii where we could just sleep and eat all day and never do anything and still not gain any weight (although we might deliberate on it for a day or two before we made the decision).</div>
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(Confession: His 2 month picture was actually taken closer to 2.5 months, but it's still within the month, so it counts)</div>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-23755958622144716462013-06-20T22:37:00.002-04:002013-08-13T21:40:30.926-04:00Roman - One Month<div>
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I really like having Brock's monthly posts to go back and look at, so I want to try to do the same for Roman over the course of his first year. I'm a week behind already, but Brock's first monthly post was late too so I'm just being consistent.<br />
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We went for Roman's one month checkup last Thursday, and he now weighs 9 pounds, 10 ounces! He was 6 lbs, 13 oz at birth, dropped down to 6 lbs, 7 oz before we left the hospital with him, and then gained back up to 7 lbs by his one week checkup. But in three weeks, he has gained almost three pounds, the little fatty. I think this is mostly due to my overactive milk supply (it's ridiculous really and slightly unfortunate for me because I think I'd have to feed an entire continent of babies in order to actually burn any calories from breastfeeding). But he's clearly a good eater, and I'm thankful to have had two babies who did well with this whole nursing thing. He also measured 21.5 inches now, so he has gained an inch and a half since birth. I'm not looking up the whole percentile rank thing this time around because I really just don't care as much anymore about comparing my children to the averages (I also haven't googled any milestone checks this first month either or worried that Roman might be autistic because he won't look me in the eyes yet. I'm a completely different mom this second time.)<br />
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Here is some of what Roman has done this first month:<br />
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<li>He eats every 2.5-3 hours for about 20 minutes at a time. The pediatrician told us to feed him every 2.5 hours during the day and don't let him sleep more than 2 hours at a time so that he'll get his days and nights straightened out. That worked pretty well because he had several nights where he would go 5 or 6 hours between feedings. I've moved him more to a 3 hour schedule during the day now though because I felt like all I was doing all day long was nursing him.</li>
<li>I wake him for the last feeding at about 10:00 at night and then I let him wake himself. He usually wakes up sometime around 2:30 and then again around 6:15, so he goes about 4 hours between feedings at night.</li>
<li>He had a growth spurt around 3 weeks so he was waking up more frequently to eat. Since I knew to watch for it this time around and knew not to fight against it, I just fed him more often, and it was over after about a day or so.</li>
<li>We moved him out of the bassinet in our room and into the crib in his room at about 3 weeks. Here's a distinct difference between the first-born and the second-born. Brock stayed in our room until he was 5 weeks old. If I hadn't had a c-section and had been more mobile, Roman probably would've been in his room the first week. He'll be better off for it though. I can't wait to see how his little personality will be, but I already think he'll be more resilient and confident than Brock just because it has become clear to me how much we coddle and worry over our first babies.</li>
<li>He spits up, a lot, just like his brother did. I'm going through 4 or 5 burp cloths a day. This is another symptom of my hyperlactation, and it's annoying, but I guess it's a good problem to have.</li>
<li>He usually poops after every feeding, so we've almost gone through 250 diapers in one month. Literally. I have a 106-count box of diapers that we've just about finished off, and we used up about 5 packs with at least 25 diapers in each of them. It's a lot. I'm sorry to the future generations and to the landfill. But I'm not cleaning 8-10 poopy cloth diapers a day in my sleep-deprived, exhausted state. I'm just not doing it.</li>
<li>His umbilical stump (yuck) fell off after about 2 weeks, so he had his first real bath after that. (I'm only recording this because I didn't write down when Brock's fell off, and I kept wondering with Roman how much longer it would take.) I felt guilty because I kind of kept forgetting to give him his sponge bath those first two weeks. Three days would go by, and I'd be like, "Oh, crap, Roman needs a bath!" But babycenter.com made me feel better when I read that newborns really only need to be bathed every other day. We've gotten into a routine now, so he should smell baby fresh to anyone who holds him in the future (or he might smell like spit up because he particularly likes to do that after I've washed him).</li>
<li>The newborn size clothes started fitting him at about 2 weeks. Before that, they were just enormous on him, which is crazy because they looked so tiny before he was born. He outgrew the newborn size diapers (they started leaking) around 2.5 weeks so he's using size 1 now.</li>
<li>He does NOT like for me to pick his nose, which is a shame because I really enjoy it for some reason. But he will scream if I don't get the booger out on the first try. I went back and read one of Brock's monthly posts and saw that I loved picking his nose too. So... I'm a weirdo.</li>
<li>He might be an even easier baby than Brock was, and I felt like Brock was a pretty easy baby. He is really content and only cries if he has gas or if he's hungry (or if I'm picking his nose). He sleeps great and is just really easy-going so far. And I am counting my blessings because I thought for sure I used up my good-baby card on my first one. But he's great!</li>
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I don't want to always compare them to each other, but I did want to put their one month pictures side-by-side. Roman is a lot more alert than Brock was at this age, but Brock was born three weeks early, so I think he had a little catching up to do. My two little guys...<br />
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Now, a few things about me I want to record in case there is a next time (the verdict is still out on whether we can have any more babies and keep our sanity):</div>
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<li>I could lay on my side about 3 days after coming home so about one week after surgery. What is ridiculous is that I had to lay on my side for like the previous 8 months and really just wanted to be able to sleep on my back or my stomach again. Then I have the baby and can only lay on my back but just want to be able to sleep on my side again. The grass is always greener...</li>
<li>I started being able to move at normal speeds by about 1 week after surgery but still had to take it easy. If I moved or walked around too much, I would be more sore.</li>
<li>I stopped needing the prescription strength ibuprofen (I didn't fill my prescription for the heavier pain-killers) around 2 weeks post-op, and the majority of my pain was mostly gone by 3 weeks.</li>
<li>My incision healed up by the 2 week checkup, and you can't even see anything there now other than a faint little line.</li>
<li>Nursing pain was starting to ease up by the end of the month, and I wasn't having to use the Lanolin as frequently, but it did hurt a lot in the beginning like it did with Brock. Most of my engorgement issues resolved themselves after a couple of weeks too, but I didn't pump at all this time around because I wanted my supply to base itself solely off of Roman's demands.</li>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-63910704821480656832013-06-20T16:46:00.002-04:002013-06-20T21:07:19.650-04:00The Little Foxes (A Lesson in Marriage)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Marriage is hard.<br>
Marriage with one kid is really hard.<br>
Marriage with two kids is really, really hard.<br>
Marriage with more than two kids... I can't say from experience, but in my opinion, these are the real superheroes who should be having blockbuster movies made about them.<br>
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Having my husband home with me on summer break the past month has been a huge blessing. I'm so grateful that he has a job that has allowed him to be here while we have a newborn, so that we all can adjust with a little more ease, and I don't feel like I'm having to handle it all on my own. As much as he is my best friend and I adore him though, we <i>can</i> drive each other a little crazy and really get under each other's skin. Being together pretty much all day, every day for the past month has provided more opportunities for us to get irritated with one another and more chances for us to vent that frustration to each other. Now, those of you who are reading this because you think I'm about to air all of the Vandegriffs' dirty laundry, you'll be disappointed to find out that that is not, in fact, what this blog post is about (and then I want you to examine yourself to try to figure out why you were so excited that you thought that's what was about to happen). Unlike that one special Facebook friend we all have who loves to post the ridiculous dramatic happenings in their relationships every ten minutes, I actually have a working filter, and I know that it would not benefit anyone to talk specifically about the negative things in my personal life. Suffice it to say, there <i>are </i>negatives. And I think it's okay to say that because I am a human. Blaine is a human. I'm assuming you are a human too if you're reading this (unless maybe this is 40 years into the future and our artificially intelligent computers have finally gained sentience). So as humans, we all know we are imperfect, and as imperfect humans, we are all going to make mistakes. And when there are mistakes, there are negative outcomes. So, yes, shocking as it may be, I don't have the perfect life. I am not the perfect woman. My husband is not the perfect man. And our kids are not the perfect kids. (Although if you've ever read any other blog posts I've written, you would have no reason to have thought any of us were perfect in the first place).<br>
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So if I'm not about to tell you all the ways Blaine and I have gotten on each other's nerves this past month, and I'm not about to publicly vent any specific negative details about my husband, you may be asking (if you're actually still reading and weren't just here for the drama), "What is the point of this post?" Well, this post is the result of a thought process that started when my husband and I got really frustrated with each other today, and I stormed off to take a shower and stew on my angry thoughts but while in the shower came to some conclusions about myself and my marriage that I wanted to write down to remember in the future.<br>
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My general thoughts when I got in the shower were along the lines of: "How dare he?" "Look at all the stuff that I do and take care of," "I would never say such and such," "I would never do such and such," "I am such a selfless, good, thoughtful, [insert any other positive adjective] wife and mother," "What a jerk," "I'm going to stay in this shower for an hour and let him deal with our offspring himself," "I am giving him the silent treatment the rest of the day" (big punishment, I know).<br>
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Then in the midst of that self-affirming, husband-accusing stream of consciousness, this thought quietly inserted itself: <i>Catch the little foxes</i>. But I kept going with that other flow of thought for a few more minutes because it made me feel good. Once again the phrase interrupted me: <i>Catch the little foxes</i>. I still resisted, but the thought was getting louder, and the husband-bashing was making me feel guilty now. <i>CATCH THE LITTLE FOXES</i>. Ok, Ok, I've got it!<br>
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Now, before you think I'm clinically insane and have multiple personalities or hear voices, let me explain. There's a book called Song of Songs (sometimes Song of Solomon) in the Bible that is about a couple and their love story, their courtship, their marriage, their intimacy, and even some of their struggles. In chapter 2 of that book, there is a verse (vs 15) that says, "Catch for us the foxes, the little foxes that ruin the vineyards, our vineyards that are in bloom." There are, of course, different interpretations about what this means and what exactly the foxes are, but several years ago I listened to a sermon series on the Song of Songs, and one of the messages was about this particular section in the book. (<a href="http://marshill.com/media/the-peasant-princess/the-little-foxes" target="_blank">Here is a link</a> to the specific message I'm talking about, and you can also access the other messages on the entire book from that website. It's really a great series worth listening to, married or unmarried). In that message, the pastor refers to the little foxes as, "those seemingly small sins that sneak into a marriage and create disunity." My little foxes were running amok while I stood there in the shower mentally proclaiming my innocence and my husband's awfulness. My little foxes, upon closer examination, were feelings of pride and arrogance, unrealistic expectations, selfishness, a dishonest or unrealistic view of my own self and the role I play in our disagreements or differences, and the forgotten realization that I and my husband are imperfect humans with a nature of sinfulness that has to be overcome on a regular basis. Those little foxes were having a field day in my head, and I was just opening the gate wide and welcoming them into our vineyard (our marriage). Once the realization sank in and I knew what I was doing was wrong and harmful to my relationship with my husband, I prayed to God right there to help me catch those stupid foxes.<br>
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So I set out to catch them one by one. I calmed down, I stepped outside of the focus on ME, and I gained a new perspective. Was I justified in my frustration? Maybe. Did I handle the situation appropriately? Not really. Did I contribute to the problem? Definitely. Was I some innocent victim? Nope. Was I trying to play the part of an innocent victim? Yep. Would staying angry about this benefit anyone? Absolutely not. Then I went into the specific details (which I will not go into here) and examined why I reacted the way I did, what was I really upset about, and how could I have handled it all differently and more productively?<br>
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Clearly the shower ended up going a little long, but it really wasn't out of spite. It was a cleansing process (Ha Ha).</div>
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I would like to go ahead and insert a little disclaimer here that our argument wasn't about some earth-shattering, marriage-ending problem. It may or may not have had something to do with nap time and a turkey sandwich. But that's how tricky those little foxes are. We know not to cheat on each other or lie to each other. The marriage-ending potential for those actions is pretty clear. But fighting about a turkey sandwich and our 2 year old's nap time, well that's a little more sneaky but can have just as devastating effects.</div>
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So I caught the foxes and was then reminded of the passage in the Bible I had read only 3 days ago during my devotional time. I'm going through the book of 1 Corinthians and read chapter 13 just this past Monday. When I stood there (yes, still in the shower) thinking about how I was acting toward Blaine, it wasn't measuring up very well to the standard of love laid out in the Bible (vs 4-6):<br>
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<li>Was I being patient? (No)</li>
<li>Was I being kind? (No)</li>
<li>Was I being jealous or boastful or proud? (Definitely proud, and I definitely boasted in my mind about how great I was)</li>
<li>Was I rude? (Yeah)</li>
<li>Was I demanding my own way? (Ha! That was the start of the whole problem!)</li>
<li>Was I being irritable? (Yep)</li>
<li>Was I keeping a record of wrong? (Yeah, if I'm honest, I think I had actually been mentally tallying up every time he had done this specific thing over the past few days)</li>
<li>Was I rejoicing over injustice or rejoicing when the truth wins out? (I didn't want the truth to win because then I would have to admit I was a little wrong)</li>
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But the passage concludes: "Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and <i>endures</i> through every circumstance." (vs 7) </div>
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So here's what I concluded... I wasn't acting lovingly toward Blaine, but I do love Blaine, and I needed to change my actions to truly show it. </div>
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Here's what I concluded... I can't control Blaine; I can only control myself and how I react. I tell him this all the time when he's driving and he gets mad at another driver, but I wasn't listening to my own obnoxious advice as I tried to control how <i>Blaine </i>should've acted and how <i>he </i>should've handled our argument instead of focusing on myself and my contribution to the problem. </div>
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Here's what I concluded... It's really hard to love the right way. It's easy when things are going the way I want them to, but when circumstances don't go the way I expect, when I haven't had more than 3 hours of consecutive sleep for over a month, when I have a demanding toddler and a demanding newborn, when I just want to sit down and eat a whole cake but I don't have the excuse of being pregnant anymore so I have to practice self-control... well, those are the times when it's a little bit harder to love the right way. But it's no less important in those times if I want my marriage to "endure every circumstance".</div>
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Here's what I concluded... I'm a sinful person. Even though I have been saved from those sins by Jesus' redeeming work on the cross, and I am no longer a slave to sin, and even though my heart has been made new and has forgiveness, I still have a human nature that seeks its own comforts and its own demands and its own happiness. I have to ask God every day to help me keep my sinful inclinations in check, to help me promote and desire the happiness of others over my own selfish desires, to show love to others like He showed love to me by allowing His Son to die for me.</div>
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Here's what I concluded... my marriage is worth that effort. I made a covenant with Blaine to love him and be committed to him and to our marriage for the rest of our lives, and it takes work. It takes more work with two kids than it did when it was just us. But the reward is worth the effort, and I refuse to let the foxes win.</div>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-73271854797836482332013-06-19T14:55:00.000-04:002013-07-06T14:36:39.085-04:00Son of a Biscuit Eater (Roman's birth story)I've been meaning to write out the birth experience we had with Roman like I did for Brock (<a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2011/03/not-according-to-plan.html" target="_blank">found here</a>) but just haven't taken the time to do it yet (mostly because any free time I get to myself I'd rather spend watching Netflix reruns of <i>The Office</i> or taking a nap). Then I keep having these visions of the future where Roman throws in my face that I didn't care enough about him to record his birth, or Brock constantly antagonizes him by saying, "Mom loves me more. She wrote about my birth story but didn't care about when you were born." As a first-born, I know that is prime mocking material right there. So I'm going to write down some of the details (even though it's a month late), and I'm going to go ahead and give a disclaimer to Roman that he will probably not have as many stories or blog posts written about him as his brother did, but his brother was the practice round for my mothering abilities. He gets the 2.0 version of Mom, which is much improved from the version Brock had ;)<br>
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Anyway, since I had to have a c-section with Brock, I decided to schedule another one for Roman. My doctor gave me the option to try to deliver the "normal" way (normal might be an offensive word for women who have had c-sections, but I just don't want to use the "v" word here, as immature as that may sound), and part of me hoped I would just go into labor and it would progress so quickly that I wouldn't be able to have a c-section. The other part of me, however (the swollen, miserable, 35 weeks pregnant part), just wanted a specific end date and a clear-cut plan to work with. The date was set for May 14th at 7:30 in the morning. The planner in me really liked knowing exactly when and how everything was going to happen. I could make arrangements for Brock, have my house cleaned (a serious source of anxiety when I went into labor with Brock), and just have a peace of mind about the whole process because I knew the plan. Of course, plans don't always go according to plan... You'd think I would've figured that out from the first birth experience, especially since that was the title of the post I made about it.</div>
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<b>May 13th, about 2:30 pm: </b>My friend Kerri texts me and asks if I've had my emotional meltdown yet. I've been in serious nesting mode and have been cleaning out Brock's closet and sorting clothes and straightening the house for the past hour, and I tell her (probably a little smugly) that no, I'm not really that anxious, and I feel a little more prepared for this baby because I've experienced it before and also because we have it all scheduled and planned out. I give the disclaimer that I might just be in denial though :) She replies and says that hopefully my meltdown will come before I get to the hospital parking lot (which is when she had hers). I laugh it off and don't think much else about it.</div>
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<b>May 13th, about 6:00 pm: </b>Blaine wants to take Brock to get frozen yogurt as a last little outing before he becomes a big brother. I stay home with happy plans of taking a nice, long bath and getting a little rest and relaxation before the big day. I turn the water on only to find that it is barely lukewarm and isn't heating up. That's a huge bummer because I hadn't actually had a shower that day, and I really was looking forward to that me-time bath. Normal Shelby would be disappointed. Pregnant, hormonal, weirdo, irrational Shelby felt like sitting down on the bathroom floor and crying about it. But I collected myself and called Blaine and told him I thought the pilot light might have gone out on our gas water heater. After he got back home, he lit the pilot and I waited about an hour to let the water heat back up, but it still wasn't hot. He went back downstairs to check, and it had gone out again. I'm starting to think, <i>Oh great, we have a problem with our water heater the night before I'm supposed to have a baby</i>. And I'm starting to feel less and less in control of the emotions that are threatening to break through.<br>
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<b>May 13th, 8:30 pm:</b> We're doing our nighttime routine with Brock and putting him to bed, and as the three of us sit there together singing "The Wheels on the Bus," the thought pops into my head that this is probably the last night that our routine will be like this. In a few days, we'll be bringing home a new little baby, and I don't know how our bedtime routines will go then. This slightly rational concern then snowballs into pregnant madness as I start over-dramatizing the whole thing in my mind. Will I still be able to sit in there with Brock and Blaine and sing lullabies and read stories, or will I be stuck nursing Roman and isolated from everyone? Brock is totally unaware that his little life is about to change completely, and it is all my fault! We decided to have another baby and didn't even consult how he would feel about it or whether he wanted a sibling. We are going to change so much about his life, and he's just happily singing along to "The Wheels on the Bus" without any understanding of what's about to hit him. It's going to be <i>awful</i>! He's going to hate his life. What kind of parent has more than one child? We're so cruel! As I look at his little oblivious, innocent face, I just start crying. The lights were off fortunately, so he had no idea it was happening, but Blaine immediately clued in to the fact that my voice was quivering and I could barely get out the words, "The wipers on the bus go swish, swish, swish." It had to have been the most preposterous song ever for someone to be crying during. But there I was, beginning my meltdown.<br>
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<b>May 13th, 8:45 pm: </b>Blaine finishes up the bedtime routine, and I quietly slip into our bedroom and allow the tears to flow freely. I feel so guilty for having another baby, and I am apparently so afraid that it is going to scar Brock for life. I text my sister-in-law Erica who has three kids and ask her if it's normal to feel like this and if I need to be concerned about poor, little Brock. She reassures me and brings me back to a certain degree of sanity. I also text Kerri and tell her how much I appreciate her planting the meltdown idea in my head because it has started. Then I hear Blaine downstairs clicking the lighter again, and I realize the pilot light has once more gone out. I'm supposed to have a baby tomorrow morning, we're about to completely ruin our firstborn's life, and I haven't had a shower today! The water heater was the straw that broke the camel's back. I can't even hold back my sobs anymore. I'm just crying and crying and sniffling and snotting and gasping and totally freaking out. I was trying to avoid letting Blaine see me in freak-out mode, but I go downstairs to ask if we should call a plumber (at 9:00 at night, no less). He just stands up and hugs me and lets me wipe my snot all over his shirt. He's a good man.<br>
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<b>May 13th, 9:15 pm: </b>Blaine calls a 24-hour plumber but gets an answering machine. We discuss it, and he talks me back down out of my hysteria and says, "Look, the worst that will happen is that we have to take cold showers in the morning. We can call a plumber tomorrow if it's still not staying lit, and I'll take care of it." There really was no need to get all panicked and worked up, but my pregnant brain couldn't understand that for some reason. Blaine says a little prayer with me and specifically asks God to please just allow me to have a hot shower in the morning and just to calm my nerves and anxiety. Then we pack the rest of our bags and go to bed.<br>
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<b>May 13th-14th: </b>I don't get much sleep that night.<br>
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<b>May 14th, 4:00 am: </b>My doctor told me I needed to be at the hospital about an hour and a half before the surgery was scheduled, so I get up to get ready around 4:00 that morning. I have a hot shower! (See, you can't tell me there is no God). I feel like dancing (but since I am the size of a Smart Car, I refrain from doing so). We get ourselves ready and leave when my mom gets to our house.<br>
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<b>May 14th, 5:30 am: </b>We're a little early since we don't have to be at the hospital til 6:00 so we run by Hardee's to get Blaine some coffee and breakfast. I ask him to get me a biscuit and a Sprite. As we get our food, I jokingly say, "I hope it's okay for me to eat this." But in my head, I assume it's fine because if I was going to be having an emergency or unplanned c-section, I might have eaten something before the surgery and they wouldn't be able to control that, right?<br>
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<b>May 14th, 5:45 am: </b>After we get our food, I get a call from the hospital asking me if I am still scheduled to have my c-section today. I laughingly reply with a little confusion, "Yes. We're on our way right now." Then the nurse asks how far away I am, and I start to get nervous. I tell her we will be there by 6:00, the time my doctor told me to be there. She informs me that I am supposed to be there 2 hours before the surgery time, so I am already 15 minutes late. What?!?! Apparently, someone from the hospital was supposed to have called me yesterday to give me the details and to make sure I knew what time to be there. Well someone dropped the ball because no one called me. So now I'm starting to get anxious again.<br>
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<b>May 14th, 6:00 am: </b>We get to the hospital right on time except not on time and do all the check-in stuff.<br>
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<b>May 14th, 6:20 am: </b>I head back to the labor and delivery unit with Blaine and am immediately made aware of how much I have inconvenienced these nurses with my delayed arrival. They were slightly rude and started rushing me around and treating me a little like I was an inconsiderate child who had intentionally shown up late. I start to feel guilty and upset and then, of course, emotional. As I go to the bathroom to change and get a urine sample, I hear Blaine making it quite clear that the way they are talking to me and treating me is unacceptable. He tells them that he doesn't care how late we are, that I am pregnant and having a baby today, and I don't need to be made to feel guilty or ashamed of anything. I start to cry as I think how thankful I am for this guy who is standing up for me and saying these things I would never say myself.<br>
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<b>May 14th, 6:30 am: </b>The nurses (with a remarkably different attitude and much more compassion) start prepping me and getting my blood work and asking me all sorts of questions, like whether I've done any drugs in the past 24 hours (no), whether I've smoked or drank alcohol during the pregnancy (no), whether I have AIDS or STDs or any other serious diseases (no), and when was the last time I ate? I innocently answer that I had breakfast about an hour ago and immediately regret that decision. The nurse stops, looks at me, and says, "You ate before you came here? What did you have?" With much more hesitation and doubt I meekly answer, "Yes? I had a biscuit and some Sprite." Her reply, no kidding, is, "O. M. G." Now it becomes clear to me that I wasn't supposed to have eaten anything, and I'm pretty sure I have just become the worst patient ever. This tells you a little bit about my people-pleasing personality... my biggest worry here was that all the nurses were going to hate me and that my doctor was going to have to readjust his entire day around me. I felt terrible. Apparently that call I was supposed to get from the hospital yesterday would have given me details such as "Don't eat anything after midnight." I still felt guilty though because I probably should have known better and refrained from eating anything, just in case.<br>
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<b>May 14th, 7:00 am: </b>I have been crying for about 20 minutes, and the angry nurse at the beginning of the process has become like a mother hen hugging me and telling me not to worry about anything, that it's no big deal. A very sweet anesthesiologist comes in and gives me the good news and the bad news. The good news: I will be having baby Roman today, for sure. The bad news: It's going to be at least 6 hours later than what we thought because they can't risk giving me anesthesia with the food in my system. The day shift nurse comes in and introduces herself and must be able to tell what a fragile state I'm in because she is just oozing compassion and gentleness. She says I don't need to worry about anything and that I should be thankful that I got to eat because usually the women are starving when they come in to have surgery. Then she asks, "Well, was it a good biscuit?" I laugh and say, "Not that good!"<br>
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<b>May 14th, 7:30 am: </b>Blaine notified all of our family who were in the waiting room expecting Roman to be there within the hour that it was going to be pushed back to later in the day. It would now either be 2:00, if the doctor could rearrange his office schedule, or 5:30, after his office hours were over. I felt awful for inconveniencing everyone who had gotten up so early to come and see Roman, and now they were all going to have to rearrange their day. Then the jokes start coming in about how I couldn't restrain myself and just had to have a biscuit. It actually made me feel a little better because they were trying to show me that it wasn't a big deal, but I did feel a little like the fat kid in the room then. Why couldn't it have been a salad or a cup of fruit that I ate?<br>
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<b>May 14th, 8:00-1:00: </b>Blaine and I just sat in the tiny little <strike>holding cell</strike> pre-op room waiting to find out when we were going to be able to have the surgery. At about 9:00, it suddenly hit me and I looked over at Blaine and said, "Roman is a son of a biscuit eater!" If that phrase means nothing to you, don't worry about it, but I thought it was pretty humorous. Around 1:00, I was tired of lying in the bed and being confined to the room, so I put on some clothes (instead of the open-back hospital gown) and asked Blaine to walk around with me. We left the room and looked for my nurse to let her know, and as we were turning to leave, she says, "Oh wait! They're about to start your pre-op stuff. He's doing your surgery at 2!" Well, that would've been nice to know before I went through all the effort of putting on my clothes (that sounds melodramatic, but believe me, it was <i>a lot</i> of effort; I was really huge). But I'm happy that we don't have to wait til the end of the day, so I get back in the room and get myself ready before any staff member can be upset at my delay. (Really, we were over all the drama from the morning... several staff came in and apologized for how things went down, and they told me I shouldn't feel bad because they were the ones who messed up in not calling me to give me all the instructions. I wasn't upset or angry; I just didn't want them to be upset or angry with me and think I was some jerk patient who just did whatever I wanted to do regardless of what the rules were. I think all the crying might have helped a little - either that, or it just made me look unstable and they wanted to be very careful with me).<br>
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<b>May 14th, about 1:30 pm: </b>They get me all ready, and my sister-in-law Lee gets there to take pictures. She and Blaine get suited up in their super attractive scrubs and face masks (Lee is really enthusiastic about her hair net too).<br>
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<b>May 14th, about 2:00 pm: </b>I've had my spinal block (which I liked much more than the epidural I had with Brock because I didn't feel ANY thing with it, and I had a lot less shaking), and they've got me laid out on the table ready to go. Blaine comes in and sits by my head, and they start the process.<br>
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<b>May 14th, 2:26 pm: </b>I hear a little baby start screaming, and I know my second child has now arrived. Roman Ellis Vandegriff was born, and we are now a family of four.<br>
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I never understood how parents could love all their children equally and feel the same kind of affection and pride over each baby. I still don't understand it because logically it seems like you would need time to develop an attachment with the new baby that is as strong as it is with the one you have had for two years, but somehow the love of a parent defies logic (I guess any kind of love defies logic really). I loved that little boy from the moment I knew he was being knit together in my womb, and finally I was able to put a face to that love when he came into the world that afternoon. Once again, I think God was trying to help me realize that even if I make my plans and have my expectations set on a certain path, I can't control everything around me, but He does. Proverbs 19:21 says, "Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand." I think I needed that reminder again that I am not the one calling the shots here, and I am not the one who has all the wisdom and understanding and awareness of the world and the future. This next paragraph I'm putting in was the concluding paragraph for Brock's birth story, and I think it was what I needed to learn once more because of my slight arrogance that I knew what I was doing and that I had everything under control this second time around. Maybe eventually I'll have a birth experience that I don't need to learn a lesson from.<br>
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From Brock's birth story: <span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Molengo; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">Nothing about that day went according to my plans, but at some point God put an impression on my heart that made me realize I am not the one in control of my life. I told Blaine that this was my first lesson in parenthood: I am </span><strong style="background-color: white; font-family: Molengo; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">not</strong><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Molengo; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;"> in control. We will be this child's guardians, his disciplinarians, his protectors. We will love him, teach him, scold him, and direct him, but we will </span><em style="background-color: white; font-family: Molengo; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">never</em><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Molengo; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;"> be able to control him. He is his own individual, and he will make his own decisions, and we will guide him and pray that he makes wise ones and that he will seek to honor us as his parents and that he will one day recognize his need for a Savior, </span><strong style="background-color: white; font-family: Molengo; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">but</strong><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Molengo; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;"> we have to trust God to be in control and take care of this little person from now on for the rest of his life. So ultimately, all those things that I thought went wrong about that day served to show me my smallness and to magnify the greatness of our God. What a day!</span></span><br>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-19947584145334290192013-02-05T14:36:00.002-05:002013-02-05T14:36:36.099-05:00Poor Second-BornsHere's the problem. When I started this blog a little over two years ago, I had no children and plenty of extra time on my hands. Even during the first year of having Brock, there were multiple nap times (mostly his, occasionally mine) during which I could get things done. Unfortunately, those multiple naps have dwindled down to one, and usually it takes place before I even get off work, so it doesn't really help me out any. And not only have the naps disappeared with my growing toddler, but the housework and the cleaning necessities have increased as well. So if I do happen to get a free period, like a late nap or someone kidnapping Brock for a couple of hours, that time usually has to be devoted to clearing a walking path in my living room or washing the dishes that are starting to grow foreign substances on them. Even with a very helpful and conscientious husband, there just aren't enough child-free hours in the day to get everything done that I would like to get done.<br />
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One of those things that never gets done anymore is blogging. I still think of things on a regular basis that I could write about, and I still have a desire to make new posts, but generally if I am given a moment where I could enjoy some leisurely activity, I tend to choose the path of least mental exertion and find myself watching <i>Downton Abbey</i> or taking my own nap.<br />
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As I was eating lunch today and being punched and kicked from the inside by little Roman (yes, that is a blog post I never made... We found out baby #2 is another boy and his name will be Roman Ellis Vandegriff), it occurred to me that my poor second child has only had <a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2012/10/news-and-name-change.html" target="_blank">one blog post</a> dedicated to him. And even that one wasn't exclusively his post because it featured a bunch of Brock's pictures and talked about Brock becoming an older brother. It also occurred to me that it's been 4 months since I've written a post, so I felt ashamed of what my blogging has become. In order to keep the blog from becoming completely comatose, I thought I'd share a little list that has been accumulating in my mind about the differences I already see in the way I will parent my second-born based on how I've handled my second pregnancy. Roman, I'd like to go ahead and apologize to you in advance for any negative outcomes this has on your personality or success in life.<br />
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1. Obviously, the first difference is that there are fewer blog posts written about him. Mostly this is because his brother consumes the majority of my free time, but admittedly it's also because everything is less new and unknown so I don't think about things in the same way or with the same frequency that I did during my first pregnancy.<br />
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2. I'm not counting down the weeks in excitement or anticipation like I did the first time. With Brock, I remember being so anxious to get my weekly updates and find out what fruit his size was comparable to during that week of development. This time, I've actually found myself hoping the pregnancy will slow down and give me a little more time to prepare myself mentally. Of course, while my first pregnancy seemed to last forever, this one seems to have flown by.<br />
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3. I haven't read any parenting books or treated the <i>What to Expect</i> book like it was a second Bible. I guess having experienced it all now, I feel like I know what to expect and there's nothing that I need to read about. I've probably actually forgotten everything though and will be taken completely by surprise when he gets here.<br />
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4. I've been eating deli meat. I don't think I touched a turkey sandwich the whole time I was pregnant with Brock. I remember reading that it could be unsafe for pregnant women and could cause some kind of medical problems, so I didn't eat a bite of it and was so proud of myself. This time around I think I have had a turkey sandwich at least twice a week. I can't help it though really... it's what I've been craving. I will feel very bad if it does cause some kind of complication, but I think the root of it is that I'm just not as worried or nervous about things with this second child.<br />
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5. While I don't think I bought a single used item for Brock when he was born, poor Roman will barely have a single new item that he owns. I remember going to consignment sales to shop for Brock but not being able to bring myself to buy used things for my little, clean, untarnished newborn. That is no longer my philosophy as I realized last week while I was sorting out Roman's hand-me-down bibs from his brother according to whether the stains were noticeable or not. And I'm finding that it's just more economical to buy used stuff. Roman will probably just be less snobby than Brock.<br />
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I do have a lot of nervousness about whether I will treat my two children fairly, whether I'll have a favorite, whether I'll give them both the right amount of attention and affection, whether I'll totally screw up their personalities with my parenting techniques, whether Brock will have a mental breakdown when he realizes he's not the only child anymore. But even though I know that things will be different this second time, I can't imagine loving Roman any less than I do Brock, and I hope that whatever differences there are in the way I respond to my second-born will enhance his life more than they cause problems. Or at least I hope that he will be successful enough in life to afford the therapy he might need later on. ;)Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-19111984565851150822012-10-29T14:08:00.002-04:002012-10-29T14:29:54.177-04:00News and a Name Change<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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In case you didn't notice the blog's name change, and in case Brock's t-shirt hasn't quite clicked in your brain yet, I'll go ahead and state the obvious... We're having another baby :)<br />
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I'm about 11 weeks pregnant, and we've known for a few weeks now, but I wanted to wait until I got Brock's t-shirt in the mail to announce it. Then when I got the shirt, Brock came down with that <a href="http://babyvandegriff.blogspot.com/2012/10/a-rash-by-any-other-name.html" target="_blank">nasty rash</a> and I didn't want to make the announcement with him looking like he was a leper. So finally I got some pictures this weekend to let everyone know our news. As you can tell, B is super excited (his face in that picture makes me laugh).<br />
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Here's the ultrasound picture we got at the 8-week appointment. <br />
Very enlightening, I know. But it does amaze me to see a little heartbeat and to look at that tiny little bean-shaped human and know that it's my baby and that eventually it will be as big as Brock is now and will add so much more joy to our family.<br />
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In the meantime, I'm trying to keep my meals down, trying not to be depressed that my pants are already getting tight, and trying not to think about the long, slow, painful process of training another baby to sleep 12 hours a night. We wanted our kids to be fairly close in age, and the timing will be perfect because Blaine will be on summer break for a couple of months, but I have to admit there are days when I think, "Oh crap, what have we done?"<br />
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It should all make for some interesting blog posts at least. P.S. If we're taking bets, I'm pretty sure this one is a girl because I have had so much more sickness and discomfort already than I ever did with Brock.<br />
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Here are some random pictures I got while trying to get the perfect shot of Brock (which I never accomplished since he would never smile when the shirt was visible). These make me smile though.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">"No more pictures please, Mother"</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">"Ok, just one more since I'm making this sweet face"</span></td></tr>
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-53318174167812065272012-10-23T14:18:00.002-04:002012-10-23T14:20:23.479-04:00A Rash By Any Other NameI have one reason for writing this post. I am a WebMD / Google Image self-diagnoser, meaning any time one of us gets sick, I immediately check the internet to figure out what the sickness might be. Granted, I usually end up with concerns that I have some rare form of cancer or genetic disorder, but it saves a trip to the doctor and a bit of money. Anyway, I'm posting this entry to potentially help any self-diagnosers like me out there who might be searching the internet trying to figure out what is wrong with them or their child (Disclaimer: Please do not really base your diagnosis off of my blog; call your doctor. I don't want to be sued by anyone).<br />
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Brock started running a fever last Thursday and was acting really tired and clingy and fussy. My maternal instinct must have been in overdrive because I kept feeling like I needed to take him in to the doctor. Actually, it's probably just that I was already off work and had taken a shower that day so I figured I should go ahead and take him in while it was slightly convenient for me. After an hour and a half, a traumatic finger prick, and an equally traumatic (but overly dramatic) reaction to the doctor's exam, the doctor told me, "He is fussy and unhappy because he doesn't feel well (gee, thanks, I had no idea). It's just a virus and should go away in a few days." So I went home swearing to myself I'd never go see the doctor on the first day of a fever again; from now on, I'll wait until someone is clearly dying or in need of medication.<br />
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Fast forward to Friday evening. While changing Brock's diaper, I noticed several red bumps that looked like mosquito bites all along the backs of his thighs. After checking with Blaine to make sure he hadn't taken Brock pants-less through an enormous swarm of mosquitos, I figured it was just some kind of diaper rash... until Saturday morning when it had spread all down his legs and up to his arms. I put on my doctor's coat and started googling things like "red spots on legs and arms," "multiple bumps resembling mosquito bites that aren't mosquito bites," "fever then red spotted rash." None of these turned up anything substantial, but by the time I was done, my guess was that he either had hives, Rocky mountain spotted fever, or bed bugs.<br />
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My mom suggested it might be chicken pox, which I immediately dismissed because he'd had the vaccine at 12 months. I googled it anyway though, and the images did look similar to Brock's condition. I also found out from the internet and friends on Facebook that, while less likely, you can still potentially get the chicken pox even after having the vaccine, but it is a less severe form of the virus. The rash didn't seem to be bothering him though and he hadn't had a fever since Thursday so I decided to give it until Monday when the doctor's office was open again.<br />
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<b>Here is what the spots looked like on Saturday evening:</b><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-o0nabcdmo0c/UIbWuI0lL-I/AAAAAAAAAmE/KBiJjQ37eJE/s1600/DSC_1006.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-o0nabcdmo0c/UIbWuI0lL-I/AAAAAAAAAmE/KBiJjQ37eJE/s320/DSC_1006.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Those under his eyes were the ones I was most concerned about <br />because they were so close to the eye and like large patches.</span></td></tr>
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<br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9YqTMyNYq6w/UIbWpe0P7_I/AAAAAAAAAl8/h_KNUhpCOqk/s1600/DSC_1005.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9YqTMyNYq6w/UIbWpe0P7_I/AAAAAAAAAl8/h_KNUhpCOqk/s320/DSC_1005.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-P6mpmxvlM1w/UIbWxqSHcOI/AAAAAAAAAmM/yJ7IDxCQPuY/s1600/DSC_1007.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-P6mpmxvlM1w/UIbWxqSHcOI/AAAAAAAAAmM/yJ7IDxCQPuY/s320/DSC_1007.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">The backs of his legs had it the worst (which may be because he had a patch<br />of eczema on the back of his legs before the rash ever popped up).</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-OUc_wIb4PDo/UIbW1443zvI/AAAAAAAAAmU/uEvS9DYoMkU/s1600/DSC_1008.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-OUc_wIb4PDo/UIbW1443zvI/AAAAAAAAAmU/uEvS9DYoMkU/s320/DSC_1008.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">What was weird is that there were practically no spots on his stomach, chest, or back.<br />It was all on his arms, legs, and face.</span></td></tr>
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<b>Here is what the rash looked like by Sunday evening:</b><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZxiSWj1Giow/UIbYFy6AFSI/AAAAAAAAAmk/kHSIS-MxSXw/s1600/DSC_1010.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZxiSWj1Giow/UIbYFy6AFSI/AAAAAAAAAmk/kHSIS-MxSXw/s320/DSC_1010.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">I know his eyes look sickly in this picture, but it really was just the flash that made him look that way.<br />He had been acting completely fine all weekend, other than maybe a little extra whining.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6V_qr27cxEE/UIbYIXT8AbI/AAAAAAAAAms/w2Lgku9FQzY/s1600/DSC_1011.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6V_qr27cxEE/UIbYIXT8AbI/AAAAAAAAAms/w2Lgku9FQzY/s320/DSC_1011.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">They had spread more on his arms by Sunday and had moved to his hands and feet too.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eXg49jby28w/UIbYLN062ZI/AAAAAAAAAm0/dIQFLQQAsOo/s1600/DSC_1013.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eXg49jby28w/UIbYLN062ZI/AAAAAAAAAm0/dIQFLQQAsOo/s320/DSC_1013.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">They look really terrible, but I promise he wasn't scratching at them or anything.</span></td></tr>
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By Monday, the biggest spots had faded some but he was still getting new spots. They weren't turning into blisters like chicken pox either, so I wondered if it was because he had had the vaccine or because it was something different. I called the doctor that morning and took him in for a visit. After having to be quarantined in the hallway and seeing several parents warily looking at us while shielding their children behind them, we finally got tucked away safely in a private room. Dr. Smith came in and examined him (a no less traumatic or dramatic exam than Thursday's, I should add), then concluded that Brock had <a href="http://kidshealth.org/parent/infections/skin/erythema_multiforme.html" target="_blank">Erythema Multiforme</a>. Oh... that old thing (??). Apparently it's a rash that is the body's reaction to a virus. The fever Brock had Thursday was some sort of virus and this was the way his body reacted to it. It can also show up as an allergic reaction to medicines (particularly antibiotics), but I knew that wasn't the issue since he hadn't had anything new recently. It is usually itchy I think, but luckily it didn't seem to affect Brock in that way. So Dr. Smith told us it would go away in 7-10 days, it was no longer contagious since he hadn't had the fever for over 24 hours, and then he sent us on our merry way. Wouldn't it be nice if you didn't have to pay anything for a doctor visit if there was nothing they could do for you?<br />
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Today (Tuesday, 4 days after the rash first appeared, 5 days after the fever) the spots are mostly gone. He still has a few small ones on his legs and arms, and one on his face, but they look much better. And now I think he's getting a cold (it's always something!), but we'll just be toughing this one out because I've had enough of the "There's nothing we can do for it; it will get better on its own" to last for this month. I did want to post about our scary-looking rash and its fancy name though, in case anyone else out there is doing a Google search, trying to figure out the same thing.Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-90754993149585186732012-10-16T15:25:00.000-04:002012-10-16T15:25:16.780-04:00Cell Phone Photo DumpI had some random pictures on my cell phone that I needed to delete to open up some space, so I thought I'd dump them all here because they make me smile and I may want to remember them. Nothing fancy about this post, just some recent candid photos of my goofy boy.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-MEsHs3fqH7g/UH2yI8rwtYI/AAAAAAAAAlw/XhHNC-Ll3D8/s1600/IMG_20120721_113207.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-MEsHs3fqH7g/UH2yI8rwtYI/AAAAAAAAAlw/XhHNC-Ll3D8/s320/IMG_20120721_113207.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">He put on his hat all by himself</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bdojbOwX5a0/UH2yDenyVbI/AAAAAAAAAk4/SFHZQKA9a2g/s1600/IMG_20121008_171626.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bdojbOwX5a0/UH2yDenyVbI/AAAAAAAAAk4/SFHZQKA9a2g/s320/IMG_20121008_171626.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">A big, poofy coat and it was only like 65 degrees outside. </span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bLbaV65Ab1Q/UH2yDyJCPUI/AAAAAAAAAlE/q04ikVGQhLI/s1600/IMG_20121005_125704.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bLbaV65Ab1Q/UH2yDyJCPUI/AAAAAAAAAlE/q04ikVGQhLI/s320/IMG_20121005_125704.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">I heard him giggling in the back seat and turned around to find this </span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uapmjN6Qfqk/UH2yE-o2YFI/AAAAAAAAAlI/GTviRmZyLzA/s1600/IMG_20121005_123148.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uapmjN6Qfqk/UH2yE-o2YFI/AAAAAAAAAlI/GTviRmZyLzA/s320/IMG_20121005_123148.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Riding the choo choo at Northgate Mall with cousin Anna.<br />I love how gender specific we are with their clothing.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NY1i7ujlyVY/UH2yF5-dpPI/AAAAAAAAAlU/5R-LtS8WLLg/s1600/IMG_20121004_114128.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NY1i7ujlyVY/UH2yF5-dpPI/AAAAAAAAAlU/5R-LtS8WLLg/s320/IMG_20121004_114128.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">He found some cheez-its in the pantry, pulled the bag out of the box and<br />hoisted himself up on the couch to relax and watch <i>Ellen</i> with me.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jImk9qLsjyU/UH2yGQexdCI/AAAAAAAAAlY/_6JXHMZBv5g/s1600/IMG_20120903_093413-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jImk9qLsjyU/UH2yGQexdCI/AAAAAAAAAlY/_6JXHMZBv5g/s320/IMG_20120903_093413-1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">In no way is this truck supposed to be a riding truck, but he made it into one</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-z7FwpQ-b4HQ/UH2yG-WRYHI/AAAAAAAAAlg/K6ic6R80bdc/s1600/IMG_20120811_171833.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-z7FwpQ-b4HQ/UH2yG-WRYHI/AAAAAAAAAlg/K6ic6R80bdc/s320/IMG_20120811_171833.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Playing together nicely... at least that's what I'm assuming.<br />I didn't stand there long enough to find out for sure.</span></td></tr>
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<br />Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-4140760616582048802012-10-15T13:47:00.001-04:002012-10-15T13:47:47.399-04:00Eighteen Months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I figured I'd do an 18 month update just to be able to post something on the blog and to record some of Brock's milestones at this stage. We haven't been back to the pediatrician since his 15 month checkup, and he was about 25 pounds then but I don't even remember how long. We don't have another checkup until 24 months, so all I know about his height and weight at this point is that he is getting taller and he is too heavy to carry for more than a minute or two. The biggest physical change since twelve months is just that he has a lot more hair now.<br />
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Eighteen months has been a fun age to me. Really from about the 12 month point forward, every month seems to be a little easier and a little more fun. Actually it may not necessarily be easier, but just that certain challenges go away and are replaced by different ones. We don't ever really have sleep issues anymore, but we do have occasional issues with temper tantrums and throwing fits. We don't have much trouble with teething now (they're all almost in), but we do run into problems with eating (eating anything other than chicken and cookies, that is). We're figuring it out as we go though, and it's an interesting process.<br />
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Here are some of the things Brock likes and has learned to do between 12 months and 18 months:<br />
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<li>He started walking at 16.5 months. Kind of a late bloomer, but that's pretty much how every other physical milestone has been for him. He's either lazy like his mom or a slow, methodical learner like his dad.</li>
<li>He likes to wear shoes but not clothes as you can see in the picture above. He loves to get in his shoe drawer and bring them to us to put on. He'll do this over and over until he's tried on every shoe that he can. And most of the time he is happy with just one shoe on his foot. He is not a fan of getting dressed though and gets really frustrated if it takes more than a second for me to put his shirt on, which it usually does because his head is so large.</li>
<li>He can say almost all of his ABC's now. He needs a little help to get through the whole alphabet, and he still leaves a few of them out, but he can remember about 19 out of 26 of them.</li>
<li>He can also do almost all of the numbers 1-10 now. He leaves a couple of those out too, but he's got the majority of them. Whenever he finishes saying the alphabet or his numbers, he always congratulates himself and says, "Jood job Brock!" (He can't make the right G sound yet so it sounds like Jood instead of Good)</li>
<li>He can correctly pronounce most of the sounds of the letters now. We're still working on G, L, R, V, and sometimes C & K, but the rest of them he can pretty much say. This has been an interesting developmental process to me because I'll notice that he has trouble with a letter one month and then the next month can say it fine, so it is neat how they slowly develop the abilities to talk. We have an alphabet book we go through where we'll say, "A is for Apple, ahh, ahh, apple" and that has helped a lot with his pronunciations.</li>
<li>He knows pretty much all of the basic shapes now (except rectangle and square) and can say them by name. He also can tell you what most of the common animal sounds are, like, "What does a dog say?" These are really useful distraction techniques when we're getting groceries or when we eat out and he needs something to entertain him while we're waiting for our food. He hasn't completely figured out his colors yet. He knows purple and sometimes blue but those are the only two he can consistently identify so far.</li>
<li>One thing Blaine is really excited about is that Brock is learning some German. We have a German DVD that he has watched since he was just a few months old and that teaches basic German vocabulary. The other day Blaine started counting in German and Brock just picked right up and started saying the German numbers. We were both pretty shocked because we had no idea he had learned this, but he could almost do all of the German numbers from 1-10. His favorites are Zwei (2) and Funf (5). He also knows the German words for "eyes", "hair", "nose", and "sweet dreams". It is really clear that his brain is like a sponge right now because we tell him something and you can see him just adding it in to his data files and then he'll throw it back out perfectly later on.</li>
<li>He says A LOT of English words now too. At about 17 months, he really started repeating <i>everything</i> we say and was adding a new word it seemed like every day. He's starting to put together two word sentences also like, "Daddy work" for "Daddy is at work" and "Piper treat" for "Piper needs a treat because we called her a good dog" and "Go outside" for "I want to go outside now because, much to my mom's dismay, that is the only place I ever want to be and it is all I ever talk about" (or "Outside Mimi" if I won't take him out because he knows his Mimi would let him play outside all day long so he wants her to come get him).</li>
<li>He's a picky eater, unfortunately. Up until about 13 months, he ate anything we put on his plate, then something changed and he only wanted certain foods so I stupidly started giving him only those foods so he started only liking those foods and now won't even touch anything new. Not even cotton candy! I have to be tricky and buy applesauce or yogurt that has vegetables in it or make smoothies so he can get a serving of spinach. It's annoying. I'm hoping he'll grow out of it soon.</li>
<li>He still uses his blanket and sucks his thumb (pictured above; he's covertly sucking his thumb, hiding it behind the blanket) to sleep, but here in the past couple of weeks he has wanted his blanket more frequently. Normally he only had it at nap time or bedtime, but lately he'll whine for it and wants to carry it around with him. We haven't yet had to take it out in public with us; it's just been an at-home thing for now, but I don't know why he started going through this phase.</li>
<li>Just this past month he has started getting over his separation anxiety and now he will play and have fun at church when we drop him off. He still has a little bit of stranger anxiety and needs a minute to warm up to people, but he's getting a lot better about it.</li>
<li>He loves treats but hasn't quite gotten the concept that you only get one treat and that it is for good behavior; you don't get more treats by whining and throwing a fit and saying "Treeeeaaaaatttt" over and over. I told him yesterday that he was never ever again getting a treat, and Blaine told me that I probably should not say that unless I meant it. </li>
<li>He has had to have a couple of pops on the leg in the past six months (I believe in spanking). Once it was for kicking me because he didn't want his diaper changed, and once it was for smacking at his daddy because he didn't want to sit in his high chair. There may have been a couple of other scoldings but those were the two most dramatic. Amazingly though, he has not once kicked at me again, and he has caught himself a couple of times when he wanted to hit out of anger and turns it into a flailing hand thing instead (like, "Oh I wasn't going to hit; see I'm just waving my arms around).</li>
<li>He loves <i>Yo Gabba Gabba</i> still; as a matter of fact, we're all dressing up as <i>Yo Gabba Gabba </i>characters for Halloween. He has also recently become a big fan of the show <i>Pocoyo</i>. I still try not to let him watch a lot of TV, but he'll watch an episode or two of those shows each day and he learns from them too so they can't be all bad.</li>
<li>He loves to read books. He would probably be happy if we did that all day long, especially if he can have his blanket while we're reading. </li>
<li>Since the time change in the spring, he has gone to bed around 9:00 and sleeps until about 8:45 or 9:00 every morning. He also takes a nap from about 1:00-3:00. When the time goes back an hour, bedtime will fall back to 8:00, which I'm a little excited about because that means I'll have more time to myself before I have to go to bed. But our summer hours have been nice because we can stay out longer and don't have to rush to get home for bed. </li>
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Those are most of the highlights and the things I can remember for now. His developments are more mental than physical these days, but it still seems like he learns something new every week. I've enjoyed finding activities on Pinterest to make for him to play with, and it is neat seeing his coordination and his fine motor skills become more advanced. But that's what our 18 month stage looks like for the most part. He's growing up really quickly now it seems.<br />
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Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-2015439000889494102012-08-02T22:19:00.000-04:002012-08-02T22:19:17.247-04:00A-B-C, Easy as 1-2-3I haven't posted to the blog in too long. Our summer schedule has been hectic and non-stop. Now that Brock is only taking one nap a day and stays awake til about 9:00 at night, I barely have enough time to keep myself and my house cleaned, so blogging has kind of been put on the back-burner for a little while. I do hope to get back into it soon, but in the meantime here is a little of what we are doing these days.<br />
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Brock learned how to walk this week (Finally, geez! 16.5 months, what a lazy bum). Crawling is still his preferred mode of transportation because he's still faster and more efficient that way, but I imagine in the next week or so he'll make the full transition. Here is a little video we took tonight of his new skill. (Please disregard all the junk laying around our living room; I have about 5 different projects going on right now.)<br />
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So there's the physical development. Now for the mental side of things. Blaine has been watching these YouTube videos with Brock all summer long. They're really simple and use trains to introduce different things like the alphabet, numbers, shapes, fruits, and animals, and Brock loves them. Blaine would watch them with him every day, and then one evening we were saying some letters and Brock started saying the ones that followed. Like I would say B then he would say C, and he could even pick out some of the letters on his letter blocks when I would ask him. The only way he could have learned this was from those videos, so I'm now telling all of my friends about them so they can teach their children without having to actually do anything ;) Here is the link to the channel that all the videos are on: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/vidz4kids/videos" target="_blank">Vidz 4 Kidz</a>.<br />
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While I had the video camera out tonight, I went ahead and got a video of Brock saying some of his letters and numbers. I videotaped him in the bathtub because that's his favorite time to do the alphabet. He gets his bath crayons and draws on the tub and pretends he is writing his ABC's, so when you can't see his face in the video, that's what he is doing. (In this video, please disregard our ugly concrete bathtub walls. That's on our future projects list.)<br />
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So, no need to worry, life is continuing on, even with my lack of blog posts. Maybe I'll have more in future days (because I'm sure everyone is dying to know about our lives).Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-79074596078877095762012-06-08T09:27:00.003-04:002012-06-08T09:27:29.168-04:00Learning TimeBlaine has an app on his iPad that he uses to make video lessons for his students, and he was doing some experimenting this week while he was watching Brock for me. He googled pictures of some of Brock's favorite words/objects and put them into a video, with a little audio help from Brock. Blaine, the language fanatic, wants to teach Brock to speak German as well as English, so when you hear the foreign words in the video, those are the German vocabulary.<br />
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Brock has learned how to say "Hey" and it's probably my favorite word of his because it sounds so sweet and is so clear. You'll hear it a few times in this video. He particularly likes to say it to cats and dogs so listen for it when the picture of the kitten comes up. He also says "baby" and "choo choo" and "airplane" although that sounds more like "ah-tuh". And listen for his little squeal when the picture of the TV comes up and Blaine says "Yo Gabba Gabba". Brock does that every time we say Yo Gabba Gabba.<br />
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Anyway, that's enough with the description. Here's the link to the video. Enjoy! :)<br />
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<a href="http://www.educreations.com/lesson/view/more-pics-by-brock-and-daddy/947388/?s=SCyhKC&ref=appemail" target="_blank">Learning Time with Brock and Daddy</a></div>Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-3955587295674259582012-05-11T15:49:00.005-04:002012-05-11T15:49:47.857-04:00Friday Photo in Motion - LearningBrock can't say a whole lot of words yet. His vocabulary consists mostly of the following: truck, star, dog, shoe, dada, mama (occasionally), drink, ouch, apple, and achoo. And even most of those he only really says the first consonant (like "ch, ch" is truck, and "sh, sh" is shoe), but I count them as words anyway. He may not be able to say a ton of things yet, but he does seem to be understanding more and more every day. My favorite is when he learns something without us even intentionally teaching it to him. Like one evening after bath time, I asked him where his brush was, and he grabbed it and then attempted to brush his hair with it. I knew he knew what a brush was, but I didn't realize, until he did that, that he knew what you were supposed to do with a brush, and I guess he had just seen me doing it and figured it out. We have a little picture book that Blaine picked out before Brock was born called <a href="http://www.amazon.com/First-100-Soft-Touch-Words/dp/0312510780/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1336765270&sr=8-1" style="font-style: italic;" target="_blank">First 100 Words</a> (shown below), and it seems like every week Brock can show me where a new object is, and it's interesting to see him figuring these things out.<br />
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Last Saturday morning, I recorded him playing in his room for a few minutes after breakfast. He doesn't really interact with the picture book here as much as he normally will, but I thought I'd post this video as the Friday Photo because it shows some of the words he's learning and some of the things he understands. Also note that he is no longer doing the army crawl and can now get around on all fours like a normal baby... still waiting on the walking part.<br />
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<br />Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-49772484251383252202012-04-30T13:08:00.002-04:002012-04-30T13:08:49.804-04:00Love Thy NeighborI thought I'd branch out a little and start writing about some things that maybe aren't directly baby-related but are more just life-in-general stuff. My reasons: One, because (contrary to what this blog seems to imply) my life is about more than just my child; Two, because not everyone cares about my child and that he learned how to honk the horn on his riding car last week (which, incidentally, he did); and Three, I think I'm running out of original material with the child, so I thought I'd develop some other topics of interest to blog about.<br />
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First on the list, <b>Our Neighbors</b>. Don't worry. This is not a post where I rant or complain about everything that drives me crazy about the people who live around us, although I can't promise it will be completely free of complaining because sometimes it slips out without me even realizing it. Rather these are just some observations I've made and some entertaining little anecdotes I wanted to share.<br />
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We bought our house in Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia a little over three years ago in January 2009. It was the very first house we looked at, and I fell immediately in love with it but someone else outbid us on it so we had to continue our search. When we couldn't seem to find anything else that we (mostly me) loved, a miracle happened and I saw that Our House (because it had already become that in my head) had been put back on the market. At the last minute, we put a new bid on it and it was ours! I have loved our neighborhood, our community, and our city ever since we moved in, and while we may eventually have to upsize (if we have the 10 kids that Blaine wants to have), we really look forward to many years in this house.<br />
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Of course, when you buy a house, you get the neighbors as well (unless you live in some distant and remote land I guess). Fortunately, most of ours turned out to be pretty good, and even though we only know three of their names, I thought I'd introduce you to our neighbors as we know them:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEdynNtWSwyfqqvuPRwy37q9Yau3AblBJnyV40-B-uf3gC2-YtUTruUMw0YQNoX87YTO3LMnrCqfqOvWgnSGkP4y3Y5Wg4zgQagJAakbAiQwqf3vXioNnHhsGAdaRsa4zCj0UZ40fzYhw/s1600/264.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEdynNtWSwyfqqvuPRwy37q9Yau3AblBJnyV40-B-uf3gC2-YtUTruUMw0YQNoX87YTO3LMnrCqfqOvWgnSGkP4y3Y5Wg4zgQagJAakbAiQwqf3vXioNnHhsGAdaRsa4zCj0UZ40fzYhw/s320/264.jpg" width="231" /></a><b>First there's John</b> - He was the very first neighbor we met because my nana asked him to come help us light the pilot light on our water heater. He's the only neighbor that we know both his and his spouse's name, or their last name for that matter. And he's the one we talk to the most, meaning he always comes over to talk if he sees us outside. He's very nice and even gives us vegetables from his garden sometimes, but he's one of those that never really ends the conversation so you always have to do it yourself. I can handle that, but Blaine sort of has the same problem so he sometimes gets trapped into standing outside forever with John, just suffering through the awkward silences and trying to think of what else to say (as I look out the window laughing at him). One little problem with John is that he thinks Brock's name is Blake. I didn't correct him the first time he said it and so now it's gone on too long that I can't tell him! You know when that happens? You just don't really know how to break the news to them that they've been wrong all this time. I figure I'll just wait until Brock can say his own name then he'll probably correct John himself, and then John will think Brock is dumb and doesn't know his real name. What a predicament.<br />
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<b>Then there's Mr. "Cathy"</b> - That's not actually his name. Cathy is his wife's name, but I don't remember what his name is, so I just call him Mr. Cathy (not to his face though). I like Mr. Cathy because he gives us things that he cleans out of his garage. He brought us a huge bag of cookie cutters one day that his daughter used to cook with, and he gave us four big plastic tubs to put Brock's toys in. They have an older son in the military who graduated from high school last year and a daughter still in high school. Nice people.<br />
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<b>The neighbor who formerly hated me</b> - I've mentioned her a<b> c</b>ouple of times in the blog (<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6880627228913105749#editor/target=post;postID=8773434711324271089" target="_blank">Here </a>and <a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6880627228913105749#editor/target=post;postID=1562330092584337635" target="_blank">Here</a>). In hindsight, I don't think she actually hated me. I think she's just more of an introvert like me and doesn't really talk to strangers. The interesting thing about Molly Maid (as Blaine refers to her, since she used to have a sticker on her car because she worked there or something) is that somehow she knew Brock's name and how old he was. We've never actually had a conversation before, just a "Hey, how's it going" here and there, but Blaine said he was outside with Brock one day not too long after his birthday, and she stopped and said, "Brock just turned a year old, didn't he?" I just thought it was strange because we've never talked to her, and I know she didn't find out from John because then she would have thought his name was Blake. Maybe she found the blog and reads it, which would be kind of embarrassing to me considering those first two posts.<br />
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<b>Mr. "Talker" </b>- Again, not a real name, but we've never actually introduced ourselves. He lives toward the beginning of our street and likes to sit outside and fiddle with his bicycles and fix stuff in his yard. He's a sweet little man and loves to talk, hence the nickname. I always pass him when I'm taking Brock on a walk, and Mr. Talker will usually start up a conversation as we're approaching his house and try to wrap it up by the time we pass, or maybe I wrap it up for him since I don't stop walking. That sounds kind of rude now that I think of it, but I'm just trying to get my exercise in and he seems to understand. He always starts off by commenting on the weather and ends by telling me to have a good day. I became a big fan of his the day he told me I was getting a lot of exercise walking Brock around but that I didn't even need it! I love you Mr. Talker!<br />
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<b>Mr. & Mrs. Artificial Flowers</b> - This house has been slightly amusing to me since the first day we moved in because they have all these bright, pretty, artificial flowers in window flower boxes and around their mailbox and their outdoor water fountain. I don't know why I find it funny, but I think it's because I never thought of it myself. I mean, how much easier and cost-efficient is that?! Quit worrying about digging and planting and putting in new flowers every season and just use artificial ones. Not to mention, you can have spring flowers all year long, even at Christmas or when there are 6 inches of snow outside. Mr. & Mrs. A.F. have a really pretty rock water fountain by their front porch and they keep it all lit up at night. It's always flowing, and Mr. A. F. is always tinkering with it. It seems like every evening I see him out there doing something to the fountain. I've always been curious what the inside of their house looks like for some reason.<br />
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<b>The Meth House</b> - This house, right across the street from ours, is on my neighborhood watch list because there are constantly 7 or 8 different cars parked in the driveway, and there are always different people going in and out. Ok, I don't really think it's a meth house (though I admit Blaine and I both had serious suspicions for a couple of months). The elderly lady who lives there has Alzheimer's and apparently her condition has gotten worse in the past year. She apparently also has about 10 children and 20 grandchildren with a million friends who come to check on her and take care of her because that house is busier than a train station. We met one of the granddaughters (and by "met", I mean we recognized her from across the street and observed her at work) working at Chick-fil-a one day, and she was very well-mannered and hard-working, which eased our concerns about whether she was a meth dealer. And after talking to John, who I forgot to mention is kind of the go-to guy for anything going on in the neighborhood, we realized that they are mostly all family helping out with their elderly mother/grandmother.<br />
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<b>Brenda & The Screamers</b> - In the house to the left of ours lives Brenda, Brenda's husband/boyfriend/lover?, and Brenda's grandchildren. Brenda's grandchildren like to play outside and scream like they are being murdered, particularly during Brock's nap time. Brock loves watching the little boy play basketball. Piper loves scaring the little boy to death by running after him and barking; poor kid. Mr. Brenda is an inspiration because when we first moved in to the house, he was quite large (yet unashamed, as he loved to walk around shirtless in his yard) and had a massive beard and long hair. At the beginning of last year, he started walking the neighborhood every day with Brenda or the kids and eventually cut his hair all off and shaved his beard. Blaine and I saw him one day a few months later and didn't even recognize him. He had lost at least 50 pounds and was no longer a hairy beast of a man. I was so impressed how he just kind of set his mind to it and drastically changed his appearance for the good. Now I think of Mr. Brenda every day when I start my walk with Brock and hope that my efforts will be rewarded like his were.<br />
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<b>Finally, Mr. Landscaper</b> - This man has THE most beautiful yard you've ever seen. He has rose bushes lining one side of the yard, tulips and daffodils blooming in huge patches in the Spring, a fountain in the backyard (you can see it from the road, I didn't trespass), a white trellis and swing, and flowers everywhere. I seriously love this yard and am so jealous of it. What's funny is that the man is probably 70 years old at least, but I see him out there planting and watering and pruning all the time. He's amazing. Anytime Blaine walks with us, I always point it out and say, "See, don't you want a yard that looks like that?!" One day I remarked to Blaine, who hates even mowing, "It's interesting to me as much as you love the outdoors that you don't like to do any landscaping in our yard." To which he replied, "I like the outdoors as <b>they are</b>; I like to leave them untouched and unadulterated by human hands." Which is fine if you're in the wilderness, but not so great if it's your lawn! Anyway, if I ever have a daughter I have plans to build a friendship with Mr. Landscaper and see if he'll let me have her pictures made in his yard (it's kind of too feminine for Brock with all the flowers, but it would be great with a little girl).<br />
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<i>So, what can we take away from this post?</i></div>
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<b>A.)</b> I am a weirdo neighbor stalker who knows way too much about the people I live near since I've never actually met most of them. I'd say I'm a pair of binoculars short of being a freak.</div>
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<b>B.)</b> I need to be a little more sociable and friendly and introduce myself to these people who I've lived around for 3 years and don't know their names.</div>
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<b>C.)</b> There are some really fascinating people in this world, from whom I could probably learn a lot, and many of them can be found right across the street.</div>Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6880627228913105749.post-3625146626844802732012-04-27T10:37:00.001-04:002012-04-27T10:41:13.353-04:00Friday Photo in Motion - Hi Brock<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
I often think about the amazing technology we have in our world today and how much it helps us, entertains us, teaches us, and allows us to procrastinate and put off real life yet still feel like we've accomplished something (thank you Pinterest and Facebook). Last week, I was once again fascinated with technology when my sister-in-law used her phone to videotape her daughter Anna (my niece and Brock's cousin) saying hi to Brock and then emailed it to us to watch. Anna and Brock have recently gotten to know each other a little better, and it is fun to watch them interact together. I'm hoping Anna will show him the ropes and inspire him to start walking soon. Anyway, here is the video of Anna saying hi to Brock. </div>
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/4VO28OOsIa0?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
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And here is Brock's reaction to the video. He loves the end where she brings her face in close to the camera and it makes him laugh. As you can tell, he wants to watch it over and over again and has almost figured out how to press the play button to make it work. You can also hear his version of her name. It comes out more like "Atta" than Anna, but he's working on it. Now we just need to teach them how to Skype each other. Our kids are definitely growing up in a privileged world!<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/UuEZM0qy9FA?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
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<br />Shelby Vandegriffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02446066740009451680noreply@blogger.com0