quick quotables

I've been meaning to jot these latest ones down. They aren't really quotes, more like mispronunciations that are super cute.

Isabelle pronounces saddle (like what you put on a horse) the "sad-la." She also calls the reigns "rangs."

Hannah was getting ready to race Isabelle around the house and she said "On your market, get set, go!"

Cute cute cute!

Winter blues

I live in the Northeast and have always loved winter. (Well, mostly. By March the snow does get pretty old.) But I'm a snowboarder and cross country skier and snowshoer and I really appreciate the beauty of a crisp "blue bird day."

Having kids makes winter a little more challenging. They get sick often, it's hard to go potty when they have 15 layers of clothing on and can't move, the snow looks really fun to play in but they get cold pretty quickly, etc etc etc. Add to that a kid with CP and the challenges escalate to new levels. Then throw in an infant and, well, I'm pretty much housebound these days.

The girls are already on their second nasty cold in less than a month, thanks to preschool. Even Sam caught this one-3 months old and he's already getting sick, poor guy. I am SO DONE with seeing crumpled, germ-infested tissues all over the house and can't bear to hear one more person ask me to wipe their nose.

I hope someday I can appreciate the beauty of winter again. In the meantime I'm just going to have to grin and bear it, and wait for spring...

SAMMY

Our little guy is now 3 months old-how is it that 3 months have gone by in the blink of an eye?! To think that almost a year ago, I found out that I was pregnant with our unexpected Christmas miracle baby. Although it's definitely been a challenge, adding another wee one to our family, it has also been such a gift.

First of all, experiencing a full-term pregnancy, birth and baby has been a marvel. I'm so relaxed and laid back about so many things related to Sam, and feel like I can just enjoy him. I love when the girls are napping or playing with B and I have some quality baby time to just snuggle with him, gaze at him while he nurses, make him smile or coo or giggle.

It helps also that Sam is such an easygoing baby. He's been sleeping through the night (7:30-5ish) since he was about 10 weeks old; he was going at least 5-6 hours for a few weeks before that. During the day, he is pretty happy to just hang out with all of us and watch the flurry of activity going on around him, only getting cranky when it's time to eat or sleep. He's easy to settle and easy to put down, which is really priceless because with the girls around, there's no way I could spend the kind of time I used to spend trying to get them to sleep. He found his thumb early on and while I'm sure parents of thumbsuckers will say "be careful what you wish for," I'm pretty psyched because I think it makes it so much easier for him to fall asleep on his own, without me having to stand on my head and go through some long, drawn out routine. I remember with the girls, not only did it take forever and they had to be sound asleep before I could put them down, but the littlest noise would then wake them up and we'd have to start all over again. Sam must just be used to all the chaos because it doesn't seem to phase him when the girls are right in the next room whopping it up while he's sleeping.

So many times as I'm taking care of Sam, I think about how different things are this time around, and how grateful I am to have this experience and to be able to really just be in the moment with it. It's going by way too fast though...and knowing this is the last baby we'll be having makes it especially bittersweet. It's definitely not easy in our house most days, trying to balance the needs of all 3 little ones, but on balance I have to say that I'm so so so happy we have Sam in our lives:)

Progress comes at a cost

Two weeks ago our wondergirl took a hard fall out of her walker and got 9 stitches in her chin; one of them was internal because it was such a deep cut. It happened right before bedtime: I was nursing Sam in my PJs, B was getting the girls into theirs, and BOOM. We were running around like the proverbial chickens without heads when we realized how deep a cut it was and that it definitely needed a trip to the ER. Thank God for great neighbors, who drove B and Hannah while I stayed home with Isabelle and Sam. Thankfully it's healing up well and she didn't seem too traumatized by the ordeal (and she had quite the story to share on Thanksgiving). A week later, one day after getting the stitches out, Hannah fell again and this time, she knocked a front tooth loose. It hasn't fallen out yet but it's pretty loose. And in the days in between, she's had lots of other, more minor spills.

It's hard to know exactly what's going on with her and hard also not to totally freak out. I think some of it is probably related to a growth spurt: as she grows, Hannah's muscles don't necessarily lengthen along with the rest of her, thus she gets more tight. And she has to learn how to maneuver a bigger, heavier, longer body. So growing can be a challenge. I also think some of it is due to all of this great stuff that she's been doing lately. With this increased mobility there are more situations when Hannah is at risk for falling. Sometimes I think she is just a hair's width away from stepping right out of her walker and standing or walking on her own, because she is barely holding on. But then she loses her balance and falls like a tree. Another challenge of having CP: Hannah's protective responses/reflexes are just not as good as the rest of ours so she is less apt to throw out her hands or fall on her tush when she falls.

Whatever the reasons, all of this falling has me worked up. Every time I hear a bang or crash I go running, thinking Hannah's hurt herself again. I keep telling her to slow down and be careful, and to pay attention to what she's doing. I need to try to find the balance between fostering her independence and keeping her safe, and it's really a struggle. Hannah was on the phone with my mom the other day and my mom asked what happened with her tooth and Hannah said, "I guess I didn't have such a firm grip on my walker." It breaks my heart to hear how matter-of-fact she is about the limits on her mobility, and I want to give her every opportunity to learn and explore and grow with the minimum amount of encumbrances. But I also don't want to take another trip to the ER...