another little cash update

micah called and asked me to post a prayer request for baby cash on thursday night, of course, i never check my messages and didn't see that she had called until friday night! cash had to have surgery on his tiny little left eye (i think left) because he has stage 3 retinopathy which can occur in preemies like him. the surgery actually went really well. had they not done the surgery he would no doubt be blind in that eye. they will soon test the other eye to see if they have to do surgery for that eye as well. those must be some masterful surgeons to do this on a 3 pounder. cash was incredibly uncomfortable from the procedure, etc. so they have him on some pain meds to help him rest, so he won't burn more calories. anyway, continue to pray for them and for cash, that he would start gaining weight and would be able to take nutrition from a bottle without too much effort. thanks. :)

update and prayers for baby cash

i wanted to post a little update on some friends of our's little one. as previously posted, baby cash was born to micah and jeremiah at 25 weeks 4 days gestation, weighing 1 lb. 3oz. micah, lyss and i went out for drinks and soup last week and she showed me one of his diapers. it was the same size as my cell phone. get out your cell phone and look at it, and imagine a baby diaper that is the size of your phone. its on our fridge now so we can remember to pray for baby cash when we see it! anyway, cash was recently put in isolation because one of the micro preemies in the NICU came down with necro something.. i don't know how to say it..only that its bad. anyway, cash was in isolation for a couple weeks and just came out of it and has tested negative for the necro stuff which is wonderful. however, the little guy keeps losing weight. he was up to 3lbs. 10oz. and is now down to 3lbs. 4oz. they have tried adding calories in, but he is burning more calories just eating from a bottle than he is taking in, if you can believe that! and then when he has a fussy fit, he burns even more calories. this week they are trying MCT oil, which is just vegetable fat basically. micah's words to me were "they are running out of options", so please pray that this little guy will start to gain some more weight, and that the MCT oil will help. and that he will be calm and have less fussy fits so he won't burn any calories. i'm going to go take some pics of him in the next couple weeks so i'll be sure to post a couple, i can only imagine that he is just the tiniest cutest little guy. micah and jeremiah thank you for your prayers. oh, and pray for their other little guy, jameson. he's only 4, and his little world has been rocked by this whole experience. they don't live here, so he's having to adjust very quickly to a whole new environment of hospital living! and one more thing, they have micah on a medicine to increase milk production and it makes her fidgety and tired all at the same time, no fun at all. pray that it will stop having that effect or that she won't need to be on it anymore. thanks for the prayers, i will keep updating.

a year ago

was she really this little? so hard to believe...

no more brokies....

so this is what having a cast looks like for a one year old boy....and this is what it looks like to have it removed....



we got a good report yesterday so they cut that big ole red thing off, which grayson did NOT enjoy by the way. i don't know if you've experienced this particular cast removal tool, but it looks like a table saw for your hand. the first thing i said was "are you going to cut my son's skin?" she said "no no, it doesn't cut, see.." and she put it on her hand to prove it. it horrified me. and grayson too. after it was off he just would wiggle it and stare at it. he still can't walk. he has no strength at all in his leg. he takes a couple steps, whines and then collapses. he crawls with his leg to the side as if his cast was still on. they said this was normal, it would be a few weeks before HE is back to normal. so, while we're excited, he's mostly just wanted me to hold him still and carry him places. :) but it will pass and he will be as active as ever very soon! thank you LORD that his leg healed so wonderfully in only 3.5 weeks!

welcome little ashon

some our good friends, j & e, had their precious angel boy yesterday afternoon FOUR WEEKS EARLY!!! however, this preemie was 7 lbs 5 oz. thank you LORD that she didn't go four more weeks!! congratulations guys, he is such a precious little thing. thanks for letting me take pictures of him even though yours would have been much better. :)

flushing...

first of all- let me just say i'm so bugged because i just typed this entire post and when i went to "publish" it gave me an error and it all disappeared. so this is the less descriptive boring version. i wanted to share a funny aislynism from today.

me- "honey, you've been doing SO great on the potty today!! i'm so proud of you! but why don't you try and go poo on the potty too?"

aislyn- "i don't want to go poo on the potty because i might fall in and you will flush me."

thats all. and its enough.

mugshot

i totally think he gives nick nolte a run for his money. the bruise helps.

dinosaur eggs and socks

just wanted to share one of the munchkin from a few weeks ago. i failed to write about this, but he got a goose egg the size of a dinosaur egg on his head from falling off a chair. a chair that was only a foot or two off the ground! it was the most awful thing i've ever seen and i've intended on posting pics from our phones of it, but its really disturbing how far it stuck out. it was even disturbing to dr. steffan who came over to inspect it. :) anyway, here are the remnants of it on his head. :) the socks on the crib; i put socks on his hands before bedtime to try and keep him from scratching them off, which he promptly takes off and hides somewhere in his bed or shoves them behind his crib bumper towards the wall. then he finds them and gets so excited. that's what this one is about.. :) i think its cute.

mom don't look at this one...

kenny: "look! i caught a whopper!"

backtrack

i can't post new ones, so i'll post this one. i took this LITERALLY about 30 minutes after delivering this child, which took THIRTY HOURS by the way. (don't worry elaine, it doesn't take everyone thirty hours...) i wanted to get one of kenny and grayson while he was fresh out... they have the same look on their face, one of utter tiredness, and it makes me laugh. so here ya go...

no picture... again

i'm getting so boring. who wants to read the ramblings of a stay at home mom? i'd rather see a picture. but none for now. the camera is still down til midweek, so i will just have to give you a visual picture.

grayson has started walking with his walker dragging his cast along. its SO funny. you just hear this clank noise every couple seconds. i fear that when we get it off (SIX DAYS), its going to be some major bad skin going on. he is just this week starting to scratch it like nobody's business. foodwise: today, i am crazy... i have been giving him sweet potatoes this week because i am sick of not feeding him. they didn't hurt him before, and i now know that even OFF ALL food he still struggles with his skin, so there must be more to it. so i have made him sweet potato fries and he is in heaven. today for lunch i gave him cauliflower, sp fries and jasmine rice. OH, and applesauce. he cried a mighty cry when it was gone. i am only trying one new thing a week (except that today i added cauliflower AND apples), so we'll see how it goes. i'm doing things that he tested a low allergy to. my allergist said it was ok, don't worry. :) we are going to another doctor too, who helps allergies like crazy, but it is alternative medicine and requires its own post. however, i have not the time nor energy to broach the subject now. (is broach a word? it sounds like it would fit in that sentence...)

aislyn is hilarious. she has taken to performing as of recent. the other day, she, emma and liam, put on a play for us. at the end of the play of which i have no idea what the subject was, the other two had run off, and aislyn said "thank you" and TOOK A BOW. for real. kenny and i were incredibly entertained.. best part of the play. today, she was trying to get my attention and i was doing something else, so she said "excuse me mommy". SHE HAS MANNERS!!! i pray that happens again. thank you to emma for rubbing off her sweet manners on my daughter. she also, this afternoon, called me aunt mommy. i have no idea what that was about, but it was weird. do we live in the deep south? HAHAHAHA. bad bad joke. but i'm totally laughing.

another funny one.. (well, to me, and to her in ten years when she reads this).. last night, her grandma put her to bed because kenny and i went to old town to have ice cream and walk around. she was still putting her to bed when we got home. just after grandma came back downstairs, the power went out and aislyn's sound machine, which is set on rain, turns off. when it comes back on (5 seconds later), it is set to birds chirping, which FREAKS her out, and for good reason. so i ran upstairs to calm her down, and she wanted me to rock her so we could "talk". she proceeded to tell me about the bear that bwoke the chair, and the powwidge and, goldicox. i finally figured out, after she said goldicox five times, that she was telling me the story of goldilocks and the three bears. i cannot possibly type how cute it is when she says goldicox. i wish i could type the intonations in her voice, its so great. oooh, i should get it on video... anyway, i guess grandma had just told her this story and she wished to recant it.

and grayson sings now. when he hears a song, he opens his mouth like andrea bocelli and sings one note for a loooooong time. with a straight face. it is SO awesome.

i think that's all i can remember for today... and please, always refer to goldilocks as goldicox for the rest of your life.

potty woe victory?

well, just one, out of millions. thanks for the comments jen, anna and debbie! i SO feel you. i wanted to tell you, but wasn't sure why you would look back at the comment page, that this morning, aislyn wanted to wear a princess pull up.( i told her awhile ago i wasn't buying them anymore if she didn't actually TRY to pee in the potty.) i bought her more, she found them, wanted to wear one. and then this morning she says "i'm going to the potty. you go that way. don't come in here mommy." so i hear her get situated, and lo and behold, i hear the tinkles! her pull up was dry and she got it all out in the potty by herself. WOW. however, i'm not holding my breath. that was only once. but i'll TAKE it... for today.

potty woes.

my daughter will not use the potty. unless she wants to. which is rare. forcing her ends in utter destruction and i'm certain is not the pc way to do it. a couple days ago, she told me she wanted to wear panties for the morning. (i wish it were spelled pannies, because really, who pronounces the 't'? i don't, i doubt that you do. so for all intensive purposes and for the rest of this post, pannies it is.) ok, i said. but you HAVE to go on the potty if you 're going to wear pannies and no diaper. ok mommy. so, every 5 minutes i would ask her if she had gone yet, and remind her that 'now' might be a good time. an hour and a half passes, she still hasn't gone, i'm getting concerned. she tells me she wants to go wash her hands, which she does several times a day, very well i might add. she's in there for a couple minutes and i hear, "mommy! i wet!" UUUUGGGGHH i think to myself. well, it wasn't actually to myself, i definitely let out a frustrated sound. she is standing in the hall with the typical "i just peed my pants" wet marks down the insides of her capris. "HONEY- why didn't you go on the potty like mommy told you???" "my sorry mommy (she says "my" for "i" most of the time- its way too cute to correct). but i did go on potty. see! i standing on the potty!" translation- she uses her little potty as a stool to wash her hands. so TECHNICALLY she WAS on the potty when she went. she was standing on it. seriously? she is going to kindergarten in diapers. because i certainly do not know where to go from there.

my camera is so broken...

if grayson's leg wasn't broken, i suppose i would say that i feel as if my leg were broken without my camera that is... but since his leg IS broken, it makes me sad to make reference such as that to it. i know, i'm so ridiculous.

tonight, for the first time since the break, he pulled up on his walker and walked a little!! i mean, its hard with a bent knee cast from thigh to toe, but he hobbled around the patio so proud of himself! i'd post a picture if i had one... (violin...) anyway, this little man is the master of adaptation. he remains so happy and is figuring out how to manuever his ginormous red cast everywhere he goes. you can always hear him coming on these hard floors. bang slide.. bang slide.. bang slide.. he's only kicked aislyn a couple times with it. but so far she hasn't minded. maybe somewhere deep down she feels sorry for him. i say deep down, because she knocks him over from a pulling up position at least 10 times a day.

funny cast story to remember. after grayson broke his leg, he had a couple nights where he just wanted mommy. of course, he also had 4 other diseases and/or illnesses. so he would end up in bed with us in the middle of the night. he likes to sleep attached to me in some manner which is super fun. well, i was dreaming, which is amazing that i even fell asleep with him in the bed. and in my dream, kenny was rubbing a knot out of my back, but he was rubbing it SOOOO hard that i was crying. but i couldn't tell him to stop and he couldn't see my face and it hurt so bad that i couldn't get any words or sounds out. so he just kept pressing as hard as he could right on this knot. well. i woke up, WHIMPERING with tears in my eyes, and noticed that grayson's cast foot was jammed so far into my right kidney that i'm surprised i didn't have to be hospitalized. you would not believe how good it felt when i moved it.

oh and to tie it back into the title.. my camera broke. and i am sad.

creating memories

my mom sent me this article, and i think its a great idea, so i thought i'd share. aislyn is already saying funny stuff. today she put her tennis shoes on and told me:

"mommy, i'm goin to work".
i said, "where do you work?"
"with ian and liam".
"oh" i said, "well, what do you do for work?"
"play".
"wow, i'd love that job. well, be sure to bring me all the money you make so i can pay the mortgage".
"ok, mommy, here it is."

her hands were empty, but her mind certainly wasn't. i love make believe.

anyways, here's the article:

When we least expect it, kids say the most hilarious, touching and clever things. When my son Jesse was 3,I corrected him gently for saying for the umpteenth time "regot" instead of "forgot." My son looked at me as if he couldn't believe my ignorance and sighed. "Mom, regot means you regot again. Threegot means you regot three times. Forgot means you regot four times. I just regot."

As parents, we go crazy capturing memories of our children. Armed with cameras and camcorders, we stalk our kids like paparazzi. We scrapbook and save every piece of artwork. But we trust our memories to hold the gems our kids say. While we can't imagine forgetting our children's precious sayings—which offer a rare glimpse into their hearts and minds—we do. Unfortunately, most of us don't think to record these treasures.

For 12 years I struggled to keep journals for each of my children. This soon became another chore. But four years ago, I discovered an easier way to capture my kids' words. I began recording them on a beautiful calendar. Since the small boxes force me to be brief, I usually had time to jot down the words immediately. But I learned quickly if I wait until evening, those little gems often would be lost.

In six months' time, my calendar had dozens of entries. One evening, while everyone lingered around the supper table, I asked my family to listen to what I'd written. I read the first page. Then the second. No one wandered away! Instead, they leaned forward and shushed each other. And smiled and chuckled. And when I read Jesse's "regot" tidbit, they howled with laughter and asked me to read it again. As I reread this entry, Jesse stared with wide eyes from one smiling family member to another. His grin grew and grew, and his eyes sparkled. Before I could finish, he threw back his head and shrieked with laughter.

After that first reading, I knew I had a treasure. So I put a small notebook in my car and another in my purse so I can scribble down quotes almost anywhere. Then I transcribe them onto my calendar as soon as possible. I also began recording a few quips of my own, along with those of my husband and other family members and friends whose words have enriched our lives.

It wasn't long before my family started prompting me, "Mom, you should write that down," and asking, "Mom, can you read from the calendar?" We pack the calendars when we're planning our annual summer road trips. They're the perfect distraction when nerves are frayed and a brawl is imminent.

I take my calendars out two or three times a year when our family needs some closeness or when one of my children needs to be reminded how special he or she is. Recording a child's words is a wonderful way to say, "What you tell me is important and valued. I love being with you. I want to remember our special times together."

I'm careful about which entries I share, too. I don't read about any of my kids' faux pas until several months have passed, and I'm sure he or she won't feel laughed at.

I've also discovered my calendars have another wonderful benefit. On those worst of days, when my son busts loose with a tirade and I'm down to my last nonsevered nerve, I shut myself in my bedroom and snatch my calendar. I flip through the pages and begin reading. "Jesse, on his first day of kindergarten: 'I hate school. It's rules, rules, rules. I don't get any choices.'" At least it's not just me. He really does have a mind of his own, and that's not all bad.

And I read one more entry. "Jesse told me after I stubbed my toe: 'It's OK, sugar hon.'"

I close my journal and listen. It's quiet again. I take a deep breath and head for the door. I can do this! Thank goodness for those memories.