This has been a packed past few weeks for our family. Silas has been enjoying the (sporadic) warmer weather, Jordan is getting settled into his busy lesson schedule at work, and I am soaking up this time while I can enjoy the new baby from inside my tummy and relish my days while it is just me and Silas. Both Jordan and I are loving his expanding vocabulary. This stage of development is so rapid that each day brings new phrases and declarations.

Mostly we are just cracking up at everything that he says, and we spend the evening recapping all of the hilarious things he has said to us. My favorite recently has been his gently way of telling me that my mess ups or short comings are not a big deal to him. Last week when Silas and I were in the kitchen, I dripped some water on the floor, to which Silas said "That's OK Mom, we can clean it up." Later, he got some hand-me-down Thomas the Train toys, and he asks me constantly "Who's the name Momma?" when he wants to know what each train is called. Well, I am not up to date on those things so if I tell him I don't know, he simply says "I'll just have to ask Aiden," who is of course his best little pal and who is apparently far cooler than me. We went through a little relapse with potty training in the last few days, and had multiple accidents throughout the day and at night. One evening I had put him to bed and I had a couple girls from my moms group over to do a planning meeting. Silas was having a hard time winding down, so he was playing noisily in his bed. I had the monitor on, but turned the volume off so that we could work without listening to his antics upstairs. A while later he was REALLY jumping around in his bed so I went up to tell him to relax and go to sleep. When I got up there he had wet the bed and was yelling "potty, Mom!" so I took him to the bathroom and stuck him on the toilet. I was exasperated due to all the accidents he had been having, so I just said "Oh, Silas, you need to keep your bed dry, our potty goes in the toilet." He looked at me and in a totally annoyed tone (if he could roll his eyes he totally would have) says "Mom, I yelled, and I yelled and I yelled." He was probably right and then I felt really bad. I wouldn't have heard him calling me since I had turned the monitor off. Oops.

We also got to have a visit from Shilo and her three kids this last weekend. Silas loved playing with his cousins and having the company at the house. The weather wasn't great, but we made the most of it and ventured out to the park anyway (although we also watched a few shows, which clearly made Silas and Hudson very content)

We greatly appreciated the trip Shilo made by herself with all three kiddos to hang with us while Sean was on a youth group trip. It was well worth the journey and the sleep deprivation :)
One of Shilo's kids slept on our air mattress. So of course after they left we had to put it to good use. Sunday afternoon Jordan and Silas made a fort and climbed inside for some special book reading time.
Then Sunday night our friends Devon and Aaron (Aiden and Connor's mom and dad) came over to watch the Blazers narrowly lose...but although the game was sad, the boys stripped down to their skivies and jumped and wrestled on the bed until the bed time crankies came on. It was great entertainment for the parents, and we decided toys are highly over rated.

Finally, here is a little video clip of Silas using his new Tball set. This is evidence to Silas' great athletic ability, his entertaining personality, and why it is so important that this one man show get a sibling ASAP. Most of our home time consists of the Silas show. In fact, after all of our weekend activity Silas and I spent Monday relaxing at home. He went through the majority of his toys saying to himself "This is mine, this is mine, this is mine and this is mine..." Enjoy the spotlight while it lasts!

Being Two is Cool

I know that we are fresh into our "terrible two's" and we have a lot of ground to cover, but I think I am storing up some survival techniques for when things get ugly. So far, two has been fabulous.

I am sure part of what makes it great is that we gave back the pacifier. Yes, fully. He just isn't ready and we have other priorities than fighting this battle at this time. Ultimately, in the scheme of his life, pacifiers are probably not that big of a deal. So, we sleep better, he sleeps better...every one is happy.

Second of all, he is the cutest kid to hit the planet. So even when he is naughty, one look at his little face and my ability to forgive and forget is replenished.

Secondly, he is hysterical. Most of the time when I tell him we are about to do something, he responds by saying "ok, cool."

And seriously, cool this kid is.



















This may actually be some form of baby gang signs. Not that I think gangs are cool, nor would I be happy if Silas was ever in one, but give this kid a pair of shades and who knows what will happen. I got him sunglasses because this Oregon boy complains about the sun in his eyes if one single ray happens to break through the clouds. He covers his face and says "Too Sunny!" So this was my solution, little did I know there was a side to Silas I had never seen before...just waiting to be released.









Check out this kid's moves... I mean I know I will have more to say about the two's later on...but for now we are really enjoying them!



and for your viewing pleasure, a little bit of dancing from the "Elmosize" work out video :)

Well, now what?

So, although Jordan and I have felt like Silas is making progress with the new "no pie" trend, we have still been struggling. He generally gives a great nap in the day, but I know it is because his night time sleep is so fractured and the kid is just totally wiped out. Here's why...

Our nights go like this:
7:30: with the pie- Start bed time routine (teeth, jammies, stories, pray together, sing songs)
without- Start bed time routing as Silas begins crying routine (read 8,000 stories to help him calm down, pray together, sing songs that are now requested...without the pie he is very vocal about which songs to sing, Psalty of course, and when to stop singing "turn it off, Mom")

8:00: with the pie- Lay Silas in his bed after multiple smooches, he snuggles down, all is quiet.
without- Peel Silas off of me as he is frantically asking for potty, water, songs, and anything else he can think of...Thomas the Train, watching a movie, his basketball...and so on.

9:00: with the pie- The kid has been out cold for at least 45 minutes.
without- Talking, playing, jumping, and just craziness can be heard over the monitor.

10:00: with the pie- All is quiet and we are getting ready to head to bed
without- No one is considering sleeping, including Silas who is just now starting to lose steam with the jumping.

11:00: with the pie- Jordan and I are soundly sleeping, so is our precious little boy
without- Silas has finally fallen asleep and Jordan and I are trying to fall asleep as fast as we can.

2:00am: with the pie- Everyone is sacked out (well, maybe I am taking my pregnant self to the
bathroom)
without- The first wake up has occurred and he wakes up mad, only wanting Mom, we basically start the bedtime routine over (at the prayer time) and when I put him back in bed we have another 30-60 minutes of restless awakeness.

3:30am: repeat 2:00 am

8:00am: with the pie- Silas wakes up happy to a Mom who has been up since 6:30 or so and is
ready for the day.
without- We both wake up at 8, exhausted, cranky, counting down hours until nap time.


So, last night at the 2am waking, we broke down and gave it back. By broke down I mean that we had talked about it before bed and decided if he had another hard night we needed to help him out. He smiled a HUGE smile when he saw the pie, snuggled into my shoulder, got into his bed with out any fussing or mommy soothing, and we didn't hear a peep out of him until 9:30 this morning. We are still formulating the plan from here, but we are all thankful for the full sleep we got last night, and right now I am thankful for the pie.

A whirwind of a week

This has been a week of trial and triumphs for us, so I thought I would briefly share what's been going on...

Monday: Well, you saw the last blog post, it was night number one without the pie, and let's just say it was a tough way to start out the week.

Tuesday: I had my 16 week appointment at the doctor which went very well as far as the baby and I are concerned. The baby looks and sounds very healthy, and this is a relatively nice time of the pregnancy for me because I am beyond the miscarriage phase and not yet into the early delivery phase. However, we did find out that my doctor was planning on sending me to the ultrasound clinic for all of my cervical measurement appointments, which because of our insurance situation was going to cost us around $400 an ultrasound. I had these measurements done every two weeks starting at 18 weeks with Silas, so lets just way we were looking at a lot of money!! So, we decided I would need to look for a new doctor who could do the measurements in their own office. This is a huge deal as finding these doctors can be tricky and I knew the process would be time consuming and frustrating. Not to mention, Silas barely slept 45 minutes for his nap on Tuesday coming off of a night of less than 7 hours total.

Wednesday: We remembered and celebrated the birth and death of our first born son, Miles. My totally amazing and treasured friends Lisa and Devon came over in the morning with coffee, treats, and a giant bouquet of flowers. The reason this is amazing to me is that they did not even know me when Miles was born, but they are such an expression of God's love and care for me that they have made his little life important to them as well. I am so thankful for them. This is a highly emotional day for us every year, but doing it on little sleep while trying to figure out how we were going to get the help we needed for this pregnancy was brutal. Silas was an absolute mess the entire day, and I was little help to him in my fragile state. Jordan worked the whole day so our only time to spend together was after Silas went to bed (or should I say after he fell asleep, at 10pm). Then we were able to sit down together, talk about our day, remember our sweet baby Miles, and have a really good hard cry together. It was after midnight when we crawled into our bed totally emotionally and mentally exhausted. Three hours later Silas woke up, wet his bed, and stayed awake until almost 5am. I was delirious and nauseous with lack of sleep as I rocked and sang to him. Yet somehow on that day still very aware of my thankfulness that I have a little boy at home to sing to and rock, no matter what the time of day or night.Thursday: We have our Mom's Bible Study, so I have to wake Silas up at 8 after only 8 hours of sleep (his normal 12 is lost somewhere in last week at this time). The topic was discipline and training our children and my heart is totally not there. I know it is a good topic and important, but I am barely hanging on emotionally and my pregnant body is beyond exhausted.

But this is where things started to turn around. My doctor had offered to let me come back on Thursday so that he could give me a 3D ultrasound on their new machine (crazy I know because he can't tell me anything from the ultrasound, but he can do them for fun, and therefore free since there is no official information given). So we took Silas and went to see the baby on TV :) The 3D imaging was incredible and made the baby seem much more realistic than the normal alien skeleton seen on a 2d scan. The doctor did tell us that he had an idea to the sex of the baby, but so far we are sticking to our guns that we don't want to know! It was such a huge blessing for me to see the baby freely scooting and jumping around in my uterus. 16 weeks is a great time for an ultrasound because they still have so much room to move, but they look like a fully developed baby. I didn't include any of the ultra sounds, because the pictures were not as clear as they were on the screen. When we got home all three of us were able to take a good long nap. Silas went down without a problem, went right to sleep and we ended up deciding to wake him up so that he would sleep ok at night. We spent the evening together watching movies and playing at the park, Jordan made dinner than night, and I was starting to feel like a human again. Silas went down that night again without any problem and slept through the night without waking up once. After getting Silas into bed I checked my email to see the following picture of my little brother, Vincent, with my mom in San Diego at his graduation from the Marines! This was a GIANT blessing for our family and such a joy to see. The picture really says it all!


Friday: This morning I wake up to an email from a friend of mine from high school. She had seen my post of facebook concerning needing a new doctor so she sent me the link to a mutual friend of ours from high school who is a nurse in the area. I then got a message from this mutual friend saying that not only is she a nurse in the area, but in February she had a healthy baby boy after enduring a high risk pregnancy herself. She has an early thinning cervix as well! Now, I am not glad that she shares this risk with me for her sake, but for me I was thrilled. She recommended a clinic and doctor to me and told me she would love to help me out in anyway she could. I just cried! God totally knew what I needed and gave it to me in such a special way. I was able to share my excitement with Jordan, my friends who I knew had been praying for me, my cousin Shilo, and with my sister Heather. Then it was nap time, and my precious little Silas reminded me he did not need his pie because he is a big boy, and he snuggled up on my lap and fell asleep in my arms. This was especially wonderful to me because this used to be more of our nap time routine, that he would occassionally fall alseep in my arms before nap time, but since taking the pacifier it hasn't happened. I was sad that we were giving up that time and I felt like I didn't really have a chance to prepare myself for that. So it was such a gift to rock him in his chair while I silently praised the Lord in my heart for all that he had done for us. And this time, just for all of you, I risked the photo op.


Now, if that doesn't make your heart happy, I don't know what will! I am so thankful this week for both my trials and the triumphs. I can see in all of this that God knows my needs so personally and perfectly. He knows what I can handle and what will sustain me. Thank you, Lord, that you love that much to know me so fully.

oh, the woes of the pacifier

So...

Jordan and I took the plunge yesterday and after many weeks of procrastinating decided to take Silas' pacifier away. He is OVER two now, he doesn't technically NEED it any more, it could be damaging his teeth... our reasons were solid. However, by 10:30 last night when there was still crying going on, I couldn't remember any of them. All I was thinking about was who cares if he has a pacifier? So what if he needs it to fall to sleep, he is ONLY two, he'll probably need braces one day no matter when we take it away, he does look super cute sleeping away with it in his mouth... ahhh, the sleeping is what we were mostly missing.

We had done a test run a couple weeks ago and poked holes in his pacifier one night (a commonly known suggestion for weaning them because the sucking power is gone). He fussed and then cried for a while and when Jordan went up to check on him he was standing in his crib, holding out his paci, saying "a new one Dad, I need a new one". We figured we better go all or nothing and decided to give it up for that night.

I thought we had a great strategy this time, building up the "big boy" status, we even got him his own indoor basketball hoop that is of course only for big boys. We went on and on about how pacifiers are for babies and he doesn't need one. This was a huge success in the potty training department, so I was really hoping it would at least ease the transition for him.

Not so much.

We put him to bed at 8:30, knowing that we would be gracious to him on his first "pie-less" night. We took turns going up and singing to him again, rocking him some more, reminding him what a big boy he was and how proud we were of him. At 10:30, we turned to stronger forces and gave him cough medicine to help take off the edge. It did nothing. at 11 he was still going strong, cycling through crying, yelling for his pie (his affectionate name for the pacifier), and then pep talking himself that he was a big boy and pies were for babies. Finally, Jordan and I were at the end of our ever loving ropes. So much for this kid crying himself to sleep (as we had heard they would), he was going to stay awake all night! Many of my friends had recently pulled the pacifiers from their two year olds and had minimal resistance followed by no problems at all. We struggled between feeling like it wasn't worth it, and then feeling like we were in it too far to back out now. Shortly after 11, Jordan went in for another pep talk. He walked Silas around the room reminding him what a big boy he was and that he did not need his pie anymore. The lack of response from the over-worked tot was evidence that he was running out of steam (or the meds were really kicking in). So he put him in the bed, tip toed out of the room, and we both raced around like little mice silently getting ourselves into bed as fast as we could not knowing how long the quiet would last.

3:45 AM...I hear stirring over the monitor, then whimpering. I am starting to whimper myself. In the next hour I was in and out of Silas room 4 times. Taking him to the bathroom, rocking him, soothing him, encouraging him to be tough. It was again Jordan to the rescue around 4:30, he went in and told Silas to put his head on the pillow. There is just something about that Dad authority. I heard him tell Silas that I would be in to rub his back. So Jordan went to bed (thinking of his full day of work only hours away) and I went in and hung myself over the side of the crib nearly squishing my unborn child while my arm was going numb, and rubbed his back until his breathing was heavy and my back was throbbing. He fell back to sleep, I limped into my bed and prayed God be gracious on the rest of our night. It was nearly 5 am.

I got up to get ready shortly after 7, and my guys slept heavily until nearly 9. Silas topped off our night of struggles with wetting his bed this morning... nothing quite like that kind of icing on the cake.

I am at a loss. I know, we are just in the beginning stages, these things take time, give him a few days...blah, blah, blah! I am feeling pressured by thinking this is "the time" to get rid of it, "we've already taken it away, we can't give it back now", and "it will only get harder to take it the longer we wait." But then, the other side of me remembers that I sucked my thumb until longer than I would like to admit (so I won't), every kid develops differently and maybe he really just isn't ready to give it up, and it really makes all of our lives soooo much easier!

It is nap time now, Silas has been in his bed for an hour, and he is just now quiet and starting to wind down. Maybe this will get better as the days go on. But what if it doesn't? My sister in law, Mandy, took the pacifier away from her 2 1/2 year old last summer, and he essentially quit napping. Three friends of mine from church have told their kids that they are all done with the pacifier, taken it away, and not had a problem since. My cousin Shilo pulled pacifiers from her kids, they had a few days of rough naps and bed times, and then totally fine after that. I also fear replacing one habit with another. If I have to rock him to sleep every night to help him calm down, have I accomplished anything? What if he takes up sucking his thumb? That is even harder to quit than the pacifier (I speak from experience here, as noted earlier). To top it all off, I have no conclusions for the next baby. I still really think some kids need a pacifier, I'll probably still give one to the next baby. Do I take it away sooner, do they eventually just give it up on their own, is their a better way to wean them? I am at a total loss here! Plus, we have more transitions to come... a big boy bed one day, a new sibling in September... I feel like we both need some recovery time in between these things. All I can say was potty training, the whole three days and every accident that has happened since then (including the one this morning) all combined were NOTHING in comparison to last night. I think it is the crying... I cannot take listening to my baby being so miserable!

Well, I am open for suggestions, prayers, getting the sense knocked into me... whatever it takes. As of now, he is sleeping, and this pregnant momma, running on a chopped up 6 hours of sleep, is going to take a nap!

*By the way, I have no pictures to post with this, because if any of you think I am risking entering his room once he is asleep to capture him sleeping without his pacifier, you are totally wrong. You'll just have to imagine his cute little face, sound asleep, with no "pie". :)

My precious son

Life with this little boy is the most amazing I can imagine. At this stage of constant talking and inquiring, our days are so entertaining. This super smile rarely leaves his face, and his joyful and easy going personality makes even going to the grocery store a fun trip for us.

Sure, I could brag about his advanced sports skills. He has Tiger Woods potential in golf, to be honest. He can actually (as pictured above) throw a ball into the air with one hand and hit it with a bat, or racket, with the other. He and Jordan are avid soccer players and he has been seen dribbling his miniature soccer ball from one side of the field to the other. He knows how to "hike", "dunk it", and yell "gooooaaaal" at all the right times. He is amazing.

Or I could brag about his darling good looks.

But what really excites me up about this kid is his insides. We are reaching new levels of comprehension and it is starting to show in our conversations. While we were in Tucson, I asked Silas to come into the bathroom and brush his teeth to which he replied "OK, Mom" and came bouncing to me. I was telling him how much I appreciated his obedience and his happy attitude and that it really makes me happy because when he obeys me he is also obeying Jesus since Jesus says "children obey your mom and dad" (mom's daily bible translation). We started brushing and then the following exchange happened:
Silas: Obey Mom and Dad
Me: That's right, you are doing such a good job obeying Mom and Dad
(more brushing)
Silas: Obey God
Me: Yes, when you obey Mom and Dad you are also obeying God!
(more brushing)
Silas: Or get a spank on the hand.
Me: (trying not to smile and being totally impressed at his conclusion) Yes, sometimes Mom has to give you a spank on your hand to remind you to obey.

I mean seriously! These are now daily conversations we have. This morning I thanked him for obeying quickly in another circumstance, and he replied "I obey Mom and Dad...my parents." Their little minds are so busy thinking and figuring things out it is so amazing!

We have the alphabet down, abc's are memorized and most letters can be recognized and named. Counting from 1-10 is a breeze along with identifying the numbers. He has memorized the "B-I-B-L-E" song and Judges 5:3 which says "I will sing to the Lord", but to get the colors down is just too much for this kid. For months everything has been red, and once he started naming other colors they were totally random and never matched what he was pointing to. Today he wanted to brush his teeth with Jordan's toothbrush (which I of course NEVER let him do...) so he pointed to it on the counter and said "the green one". I about fell over when I saw the toothbrush is indeed green! So I said, "It is green, Silas! Good job!" And he of course replies "I smart Mom"

Silas got several scrapes while playing outside when we were in Arizona. So when Jordan went to get him out of bed after his nap, he was holding his little bear up to all of his owies and making the bear kiss them saying "and kiss it right here, and right here..."

We took him to Toys R Us last night to pick out a toy with his remaining birthday gift card. Of course we ended up playing with the riding toys while we were there. Silas hopped into the first car, got settled into the driver seat, reached over to the radio and said "I turn Psalty on."

His other latest deal is asking who everyone is and then doing his best to remember their names. This was a trick in Arizona as we saw and stayed with a lot of people while we were there and all of them wanted Silas to know exactly who they were. So he frequently asks me "who's that momma?" and I answer. Well, this has now carried over into all areas of our lives. When we drive down the road he points to every person he sees asking me who it is. I am running out of creative things to say! The best is in the grocery store. Every time we check out, as soon as we get up to the register he says "who's that Momma?" while pointing at the clerk. I am at a stinking loss here. Of course they are wearing name tags, do I say their actual name? Do I say, "that is a worker who is helping us get our groceries"? Do I say "I have no idea, ask them?" And then he wants to introduce himself to them by saying "I Silas". When we leave, he says "bye!" to them until we are actually out of the store, as long as he can see them, he is yelling "bye" to them and waving.

I am so excited to see where all of this leads my little boy. Today he is only two, but what will all of this develop into when he is 20? I am so thankful that I can stay home with him and experience all of these priceless moments. Soon we will share our little lives with a baby, so I am soaking up each available moment while it is just the two of us. At dinner earlier this week he said he wanted to pray for the baby in Mommy's tummy, and then he specifically said "to be healthy and strong". Of course those are the words that Jordan I and I frequently use, but to hear him repeat them back was precious. I am so thankful that God is preparing his heart to be a big brother.

He woke up a little early this morning, so instead of putting him back in his bed or letting him get up, I wrapped him up in his blanket and we rocked for a while in the quiet darkness of his room. He loves to listen to music or to hear us sing to him so he asked for a song. I started singing "Jesus, lover of my soul" and got to the part where is says "I will worship you until the very end" and I could tell he was really listening to the words. He repeated that line to me so we started talking about worshipping Jesus to tell him that we love him. And that is what Psalty does (it really all comes back to Psalty), he sings songs to tell Jesus how much he loves him. Then we sang "I love you Lord" as another example. He asked for more songs so I told him that we also sing songs to tell Jesus thank you for loving us, and we sang "Jesus loves me". I reminded him of our verse and that the Bible tells us to sing songs to Jesus. So he said "I will sing to the Lord".

Seeing these things sinking in with him gives me such passion for the task of motherhood. I am thankful for the grace God gives me in that I do not have to be perfect, but I feel challenged to take hold of this impressionable time and train him up in the way he should go, so that when he is old he will not depart from it. What an amazing gift I have.

Grandpa and Beppe's house

And to wrap up the trip, we spent 4 sunny days at my parents house. At first I was surprised as I looked through my pictures to see that the only ones I really had were of Silas with the family inside the house. He played outside so much I don't know how I missed that. And then I remembered that while he was playing I was working on my tan and not at all thinking about my camera.

Silas LOVED his time with Everett and Adeline. They looked at books with him, jumped on the trampoline with him, and loved all over him. Shockingly he was a fan of all the attention. :)

As a family we also had an incredible time of sharing, prayer and communion together. I am so thankful for the foundation set by my grandparents (Pake and Beppe were there with us as well), carried on by my parents, and now established in the families of my siblings. It was such a blessing to share our lives which are generally spread out across the country, and then surround each other in prayer.

It is good and bad being in Arizona all at the same time. Of course we love to be together as a family, and we love to see ALL the kids playing together, and all the pregnant mommas together, but with so much activity sometimes there is a remaining desire for quality time with individuals. One long walk with my mom didn't seem like enough. Short conversations with Shad and Sheila in the sunshine between meals and just great big hugs for Pake and Beppe in passing were great but left me wishing for more time with them. I guess we are going to have to start sending invites for time at my house this summer when the Arizona heat is too much for everyone to handle. I will lure them here with promises of a coastal trip and sunshine at 75 degrees :)