Still A Little Bit Little

Here are a few of my favorite recent Jayce quotes: They fall into a few different categories of being funny, and I couldn't help myself but to organize them this way, especially since it's a longish list. Enjoy. :)

Funny little sayings that seem too old to come out of a little mouth.

To a book that he ran on top of, and took his feet out from underneath him. Shaking his finger sternly,

"Hey book! You be nice! Not slip Jayce!"

After I changed him from pj bottoms to pants:

"That's great Mom."

To a house that we drove by with Christmas lights still on outside.

"A not Christmas time, people!"

To Chris,

"Dad, not talk. Just listen."

"Mom, I washed my hands, just like you showed me."

Me, to Jayce in the other room: "Jayce, what are you doing buddy?"

Jayce: "Uuuuuuum...I just kidding Mom." (I ran in there after getting this response.)

Sayings that are almost there, but not quite.

After I changed the radio from a commercial to a station with music.

"Persect Mom. This one is persect." (perfect)

At Target, where I was reading the specs on various crib mattresses:

"Ooooh, that is sooo interest. Mom, that is very interest."

To me, every day.

"Yes sir, Mom."

Correcting.

He also corrects us, especially me since I'm home with him all day, and I'll just go ahead and blame pregnancy brain for my habit of often saying the wrong thing.

I forgot the name of Snoopy (from Charlie Brown) and accidentally called him Scooby. This has become the pinnacle of my stupidity for Jayce. He brings it up often and laughs like it's completely ridiculous.

"Mom, not say Scooby Doo. It's Snoopy, Mom. Mom's so silly. (laughing) Mo-om! Not Scooby Doo Mom, it Snoopy Mom. You said the wrong thing..."

Me, as I'm putting my socks on: "We'll go as soon as I get my shoes on."

Jayce: "Mom, those are not your shoes, those are your socks. Mom, you said the wrong thing. Silly Mom. Mom, one time you said Scooby Doo. It's not Scooby Doo, it's Snoopy Mom..."

Me: "Do you want to watch that show with Baboo?"

Jayce: "No Mom, not Ba-boo, Ba-du!"

(I was actually a little impressed that he corrected my b into a d, since it's such a minor difference. And when the show came on, he was right.)

To himself, while cleaning up his room.

"I put my little books in my big box. Wait a minute. In my little box."

"Mom, I not a very big boy yet. I still a little bit little."

I agree. Sniff.

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March Part 3: The Good

I felt a little bit guilty after I posted the extended record of our sickness the other day, so I just wanted to point out that it has not been an entirely horrible month. There have been plenty of other things happening in our family, and plenty of good things among them that I'll share.

Chris

Chris has 2 more books that are finished now and about to be released/available for pre-order. The first is Jesus Among Friends and Enemies here, which he co-edited with Larry Hurtado, who is the Head of School at Edinburgh's Divinity School.

The second is Jesus' Literacy: Education and the Teacher from Galilee here. (The cover image hasn't been released yet.)

This week Chris has been in Tennesse doing the 2011 Kershner lectures at Emmanuel School of Religion.

Last week he received a contract to make these lectures into a book as well, so that was really exciting! Needless to say, he's been busy, since these books and lectures are all on top of teaching, grading, and traveling to various campuses for the Templeton lectures.

Erin/and baby

I am doing great, especially now that I'm finally recovering my energy after being so sick. Thanks for all of your consolation and "tell that doctor to leave you alone" comments after my last harassed visit with my OB!! I went for my 28 week checkup this past week, everything is going perfectly for me and baby, and my weight is exactly the same as my last visit-no gains or losses in the last 3 weeks. I was happy with this. The OB made no comment on it whatsoever. None. She annoys me. But baby and I are healthy and that is all that matters. According to Baby Center.com, the baby is now the size of a chinese cabbage.

Speaking of the little lady, last week I made one of Jayce's old onesies into a little dress and hair clip for her. It was fun...at least in theory. Actually, the end result is fun, but sewing a little skirt onto a tiny onesie is not a job for the weary. There was stress, frustration, picking out stitches and turning a blind eye to the uneven back. But from the front it is sweet and it makes me happy. I put the tutorial on LTC here.

I made her crib sheets as well, 2 sets! Both are with this fun elephant print fabric and I just love them. I do not have a thing for elephants and don't have an elephant theme in the room, but the fabric is so soft and I just thought they were too cute not to make into something big enough to really appreciate the pattern. I have finished the bed skirt too but you'll have to wait until next time for pictures of that one. The bedding and my projects are all coming together nicely and I'm thrilled about that now that I've entered the third trimester and that energy dip is right around the corner!

Jayce

Jayce is just so fun, as usual. I was going to share a few of his recent sayings that have cracked me up, but there are so many that I think I'm just going to dedicate a post to it next week. Instead I'll share this hilarious (to me, anyway) image with you.

I imagine that it is funny even without explanation, but I'll share anyway. I had set up the self timer and was testing the light and my camera settings while Jayce played nearby in the room. I didn't tell him that the camera was about to go off, so as he was running across the room after a ball it started clicking away and really freaked him out, as you can see. It was hilarious! He yelled "Ahhhhh" at first, and then slowly made his way forward, smiling at it and eventually standing right in front of the lens. In these pictures you can also see me in the background, at first waving my hand trying to get him to move out of the way, and eventually bent over laughing at the ridiculousness of it all.

I didn't bother editing and saving these pictures, but I still might do it. It's one of those funny moments that I'll want to remember, but just in case I don't, this picture pretty much sums it all up.

Happy weekend!

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March Happenings Part 2: Sick, Sick, Sick

To say we've been sick around here is an understatement. I know I promised a post about Scotland, you might be wondering what is new with Chris, Jayce or baby and I, and the truth is that this round of sickness took everything over and we are just finally emerging from it, wondering what happened to the last few weeks of our lives.

I debated about whether or not this was worthy of a post of it's own, but decided that it is worth remembering these crazy few weeks in our lives, just in case it ever gets this bad again. We can remember that we made it through and can push forward.

Where to begin?

Okay, here, the nebulizer. This trip to the doctor (the 3rd for Jayce in as many weeks) sent us home with 3 more prescriptions, (in addition to the 2 of the previous visits), which included nebulizer treatments. The doctor, (not ours, we couldn't get in to see him anytime soon) sent him home with a "Hail Mary" course of medication, with an "I don't know why his cough keeps getting worse and he still has a fever, let's just put him on everything and see if any of it works out" diagnosis. Not my favorite. I scheduled a follow up visit with his actual doctor for Monday just in case things continued not to improve.

While Jayce did not enjoy the nebulizer, he didn't hate it either. He didn't like the mask so eventually I just let him hold the little steam canister and had the steam blowing in his face instead. We pretended like it was an ice cream cone that we were licking and talked about the different flavors of that we were eating, what sort of toppings were on it, etc. We pretended it was a microphone and sang into it. Jayce pretended it was a horn. I used every trick that I could think of to try to keep the steam close enough to his nose and mouth to do some good.

The day after Jayce's not-so-helpful-doctor's visit, Chris became so sick that he finally conceded to seeing the doctor, something he never does. (He's one of those, "I'll kick it with orange juice" people.) He had been coughing and choking for a few days, was on his third day of having a fever and the chills that he just couldn't shake, but was still going to work as normal, so he was a mess by the time he got home. The fever and chills didn't go away until the 5th or 6th day, which is a pretty rough stretch. And he had bronchitis.

The day of his doctor's appointment, I noticed that he had his running clothes set out. I put them away when he wasn't looking, thinking that I'd force him into coming home to rest at the end of the day. Instead, he stopped by after his dr appointment to pick them up. The appointment where the doctor told him that he had bronchitis.

"But didn't the doctor say that your lungs sounded like you were breathing through a straw? Sooo...did you tell him you were planning to go running?"

"No, I didn't tell him that. And he just said that it sounded like I had bronchitis. And it's only 3 miles."

This is the kind of logic that I'm dealing with when I'm trying to get my boys healthy.

All along I could tell that I was getting sick too, but I pushed it to the back of my mind because I didn't really have time to be sick, and I kept thinking that I didn't sound as bad as either of the boys. (I understand that this logic is not amazing either.) Towards the end of the week my cough was getting much worse and was wearing me out, so I decided to go in on a Saturday and see the doctor who was in that day. Chris and Jayce both had bronchitis, along with whatever else, so I was sure that I probably did too. She told me the following un-helpful things.

"Well, you definitely have bronchitis, and I'll give you a prescription for a z-pack. But I wouldn't start taking it unless you start feeling worse, because it's not good for the baby".

"But then if you take it and feel a bit worse, you need to come back. You are at a really high risk for your bronchitis to turn into pneumonia, partially because you have athsma and also because you're pregnant and your immune system is already really low."

Regarding me asking about Chris being on his 5th day of having a fever: "Well, he should probably go to the ER or Urgent Care for a chest x-ray. But he really needs to get that checked out, especially since it's not good for you or the baby to be around him if he's like that."

"You really just need to be resting as much as possible."

I also discovered that I had lost about 6-8 pounds in the 2 weeks since I had last been harrassed by my OB.

I went home and cried.

It was pretty bad with the whole family being so sick all at the same time. It was more than us all just having bad cold symptoms. Chris and I were both completely fatigued and felt like we just needed to be laying down, because we did just need to be laying down, but Jayce was on a bit of an upswing so he obviously needed some interaction. We argued over who felt worse so that the other would go to the grocery store. (I won, because I felt horrible and was pregnant.) We all slept through Jayce's entire extended nap time. We got take out from every place in town because neither of us could stand to be standing long enough to cook. We thought Jayce was better until he came running to Chris that afternoon and cried, "Dad, my ear hurts!!" and then cried unconsolably for 20 minutes while we did everything that we could think of to comfort him until the Advil kicked in. That was a bad weekend.

For me personally, being pregnant while this sick added insult to injury in a major way. I couldn't sleep because I couldn't breathe through my nose, and the deep breathing that is required to fall/stay asleep sent me into regular coughing fits. Because of the pregnancy I couldn't take any medicine that would help with the coughing or congestion, so I slept sitting up. Which was bad for my poor pregnancy bladder, and even worse for my poor sciatic nerve. Instead of "resting up," I slept for 4-6 hours a night, and Chris and I kept each other awake with our alternating coughing fits.

There is more, but I'll just stop there and just say thank God we got through it! A few incredibly kind people brought us dinner. A few sweet ladies had play dates so that Jayce could run around with his friends and I could rest. We saw our own doctor, who had re-assuring words, discovered our additional infections, and prescribed medication that helped. He told me that it would take a while for me to feel better since my immune system was already so low and he couldn't put me on anything very strong. But I started being able to sleep for longer periods of time a few nights later, so I was just grateful to be on my way back to being healthy, even if it was one tiny step at a time.

We are all finally off of our meds and happy to be back among the living. Whew!

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Edinburgh

I realized the other day that after our trip to Heidelberg and Edinburgh last year, I never posted anything at all about our time in Edinburgh, and now it's almost a year later! It's not that I'm completely scatterbrained, though we did have a whirlwind summer starting with that trip, and not that I never sorted through the pictures, because I actually sorted and edited them on the return flight home. It actually has more to do with my knowledge that it would probably take a little something out of me to write about it.

Before we lived in Scotland I had never experienced missing a place before, even though I moved numerous times after graduating high school. I could say that I miss Akron, but really I just miss my family and a few good local restaurants. I could say that I miss Cincinnati, but really I just miss the great friends that were there, and all of the amenities that come with living in a big city like that. Luckily, I can return to Akron and visit my family, or we can visit with friends in Cincinnati, or whatever other city they have moved onto, and get a taste of the things that we miss. But we can't do that with Edinburgh.

It must be because Edinburgh is kind of like it's own entity in our minds, with all of those things mixed together. It's kind of like when you say, "Oh, I miss college," and by 'college' you mean spring break with your friends, a low(ish) stress part-time job, the time to exercise 5 days a week if you want, stamina to pull an all-nighter writing a paper (and goofing off), and the metabolism to eat whatever you want, among other things.

I feel like saying that "I miss Scotland" encompasses so much that it's almost difficult to talk about. We had such an incredible existence when we were there. I loved my job and my co-workers, and Chris loved the research and writing, his colleagues and his superiors. We loved the pedestrian lifestyle. Walking to church, to work, to dinner or breakfast, or to the gym was surprisingly enjoyable. We had ample time to talk about our day, what we thought about everything, and just unwind. Walking around gave us a good amount of exercise every day, and living on the edge of the city allowed us to enjoy the best of both types of the most beautiful scenery: gorgeous old buildings against blue (or gray) skies and bright green grass, or a vast park lined with a few beautiful hills. We had favorite restaurants, at which we had favorite courses, and favorite servers, including several who we became friends with.

We had a fun group of friends who we loved. We were probably closer because we all had to be closer in a situation like that. No one had family around (or those "like family" lifelong friends) to lean on when things were rough, when we failed, when we were lonely or down. We just had each other. So we celebrated accomplishments with genuine joy because we had all "been there." We rejoiced over submitted chapters, successful proposals and vivas, and well-received presentations with our other student friends. We celebrated finding jobs, or quitting that crappy job that we had originally taken just to get by. We shared news of our pregnancies, how we shared the news with our families at home, and wondered how we would cope with having our babies in such a different situation than what we had always expected. In a short time, we became each other's families and lifelong friends.

I'm feeling all sentimental this week because this is the week that we moved home, 3 years ago. Each year when mid-March rolls around I get particularly reminiscent about our time in Edinburgh, and sad that it is over. Every once in a while a job in Edinburgh will pop up on Chris' radar and he'll bring it to my attention with his eyes gleaming, and I'll say what we both know, that that stage of our life is over. Returning now would be an entirely different experience, and even though I'm sure we would love that too, we wouldn't be returning to the "Edinburgh" that we remember, with the people that we love and the lifestyle that a young couple without kids can live. But it does give us a minute to smile over those old memories, remind each other of some little tradition that we loved, and dream for a minute.

I realized a bit ago that I was worried that I would become one of those people who always talked about that "one thing that they did a long time ago," and my "one thing" was living in Edinburgh. Shortly after, I realized that even if that became true, I didn't care. Our life in Edinburgh is a part of what makes me "me," (and us "us" for that matter). It is just as much of my make up as my college, my spitfire first born son, a desire for my t-shirts to be folded tidily in my dresser or our weekly mandated pizza date. It is as likely that it will surface in conversation as a story about Jayce having a new favorite dance, Chris publishing another book or me making something for the house. It will happen, and I'm happy about that. Sharing it reminds me that it actually happened, that it wasn't just a beautiful dream, and helps me to miss it less when I want to just go visit those old friends or go for a walk on that beautiful road.

These pictures are all from our trip last May. I'll post more later in the week along with what we actually did while we were there. But as I said initially, I was afraid that starting to talk about Edinburgh would lead to a floodgate of words and emotions, and I was right. But that's okay.

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March Happenings Part 1

1.) I have said before how Jayce LOVES to help with anything in the kitchen, and loves to watch Cupcake Wars and Cake Boss with me. Well, last week I was fixing lunch and Jayce was watching his favorite show, which is on PBS right before it switches to non-kid programs. I called him a few times and he didn't respond, so I came out to this. He was entranced by this cooking show. It's not even a cool cooking show about desserts or with lots of flare, just a lady chopping up food (she's chopping broc-co-lay!) and mixing it together. He completely ignored me while I took lots of pictures like this. I just hope that he teaches me to cook some day if he does become a chef.

2.) When we registered at Target a few weeks ago they gave me a little goodie bag, which included this tiny little diaper among other things. I pulled it out and thought, "My babies aren't small enough to wear something like this." Jayce was over 8lbs when he was born so he wasn't in newborn diapers for long. But can you believe how little it is? It's the size of my palm!! I realized that I desperately needed some sweet little bloomers to cover that tiny little booty. So the next day I made these.

Look at the little butt!!

I loved them so much that the next day I made these, in the next size up!

I realize that little diaper covers come with practically every outfit when you have a girl, but boys just don't have anything like this, so maybe you can understand my excitement a bit more.

Jayce saw them and said, "These are for my sister, Mom?" and then tried to put them on. Chris was waaaaay under-excited when I showed them to him, but I keep them sitting out on her dresser and he picks them up and smiles at them sometimes when he comes in too. Little things like this are going to help me transition some of Jayce's neutral baby clothes into little girl clothes. I have plenty of other ideas too!

3.) March 1st was the 1 year anniversary of Lemon Tree Creations, which was kind of fun. A part of me feels like I can't believe that I've been a part of that for a year already, and the other part of me feels like the weekly projects have been a part of my life forever. Not in a bad way, just like it's such an ingrained part of my life now. I wrote a post reflecting on our last year together here.

I'm excited about the opportunities that the blog has opened up for me already, including the ability to make some money on the side doing something that I love, but also how it has forced me to learn some new skills. I'm looking forward to seeing what is in the future with the blog and the lovely ladies who I share it with!

That's all for today. Happy Monday!

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Chatter

Last week, as I was tucking Jayce into bed at nap time, he said, "Mom, I scared of something in my crib."

I paused, because he said it in a kind of playful way, not like he was actually scared but like he was trying to stall going to sleep. But I wasn't going to ignore something like this, so I said, "Well honey, you don't need to be scared of anything in your crib. Mom and Dad are here and we'll protect you."

"No Mom, you and Dad not a-tect me. You and Dad not policeman and not fireman."

I smiled at his solid logic. I wonder which book or tv show taught him that policemen and firemen protect you? But I said, "Well, I know that we're not policemen or firemen, but Moms and Dads protect people too."

This seemed to satisfy him for a minute. And then, "Mom, what's a-tect mean?"

"What does protect mean? It means that we won't let anything happen to you. We keep you nice and safe." It occurred to me as I was saying this how it we can't actually keep everything bad from happening to him, or always keep him safe, and was sad that some day I'll have to talk about that too. But for the purposes of whatever he was scared of in his crib right then, I can protect him from those things.

This answer seemed to satisfy him as well. "Yes Mom. You keep me nice and safe. Nice and cozy. Cozy and warm." Then he derailed a bit. "Cozy and warm. Warm and hot. And cold."

Funny little kid.

Once of Chris and I's favorite parts of the day is after Jayce is in bed and I relay little stories like this to him. We smile over the sweet mistakes, laugh over the little nuances, wonder where he picked up various ideas or phrases, and laugh even more when we realize which ones are from us. It is such a joy to experience the way that he is learning and processing the world around him through these little comments and conversations. It has been one of the most fun things about being a parent.

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Around Here

Jayce continues to crack us up every day, as a kid should.  I have told Chris on a few different occasions this past week that I just want to put this version of him in a box  to pull out whenever we need it again later in life.  He's such a fun mix of being serious, smart, and funny, without really being aware of any of them.  He's the best medicine.

I had to give him a haircut today, which always bums me out a little bit.

I hate haircut day because he looks so much older immediately afterwards!  He had this Beatles hair thing going on, which I thought was really cute, but it was getting in his eyes, so it needed to be trimmed up.

Sigh.  My much older-looking little guy.

Also, I couldn't find a good picture of Jayce's long hair that didn't give you a glimpse into a big project that I'm working on for the baby, so I'll just come out with it.

I'm giddy over this little quilt that I've been making for the last few weeks.  The last bit of fabric should be in this week, I can't wait!!

I've been receiving the fabric a bit at a time and keep arranging and re-arranging it.

Instead of sewing together the little squares and then using batting in-between the top and bottom layer, you make all of these little pillows, sew those together, and then attach that to the bottom layer.  Actually, there is still batting in there too, but this just makes for a thicker quilt, and since we have mostly hardwood floors in the house I'm excited to have a thick soft quilt for the baby to lay on.

Jayce likes to come into my room and snuggle the little pillows.  He also loves to trample them and mess up the order, but that's okay. :)  He always tells me, "Mom, these tiny little pillows are for my sister."  So sweet!

 

 

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25 Weeks Along

Well, I'm 25 weeks along now, more than halfway there. Mom was reminding me last week that she wants to see more pregnancy pictures, and since the baby is MUCH bigger than when she saw me at the start of January, I thought I'd oblige.

Speaking of the little one, I had my visit and follow up sonogram yesterday and all was fine. They got the pictures that they were looking for, baby looked good and healthy, and I got another picture of baby as well. I was excited that we got one of her sweet little face. I can't believe that you can kind of see her features! Crazy. :)

I also got a lecture from my dr on how I have gained more weight than I was supposed to since my last visit. I was pretty baffled by this because we eat pretty healthily, and there wasn't any bad eating behavior that came to mind, like "Ohhh...well maybe I won't have 3 donuts for breakfast anymore." She told me that this often happens with women in this late 2nd trimester period, because the baby is getting so much bigger and releasing the hormones that help them grow into my system as well. So basically I need to cut carbs. Ugh.

She also said, "Yeah, and do you eat a lot of fruit? That has a lot of hidden sugar, and carbs, so switch to something with more protein and start loading up on vegetables instead." Bleh. Really, it would be one thing if I ate ice cream most nights and she told me I needed to stop, because I can understand that. But I have 3 servings of fruit a day as my in-between-meals-to-keep-my-energy-up snack, and I'm really annoyed that one of the things that I was doing because I thought it was good for me and the baby is one of the things that I have been doing wrong!!! So next week I'll be switching to skim milk, carrot sticks, and utter misery-a low(er) carb lifestyle.

As we were driving home, I was thinking how ironic this all was.

-On my first dr visit I had been super sick all trimester, so I was advised to eat whatever I could keep down, take my prenatal vitamins and not to worry. "Starving women in 3rd world countries give birth to healthy babies. Your body will make the baby a priority, so just do what you can and don't worry about it."

-On my second visit I still had fatigue and was getting dizzy and lightheaded, so I was told to make eating more a priority. "Your metabolism is through the roof right now, you might as well be running a marathon. Whatever you eat is gone in an hour, so you need to have something about every 1-1 1/2 hours."

-My third visit was happy and fine. I was great, we saw the baby and she was great. No problems anywhere.

-Visit four, this one, is where the doctor weighed me, and then had me taken to another room to be weighed because "there must have been something wrong with the scale." I was told, regarding my upcoming glucose test, "Well, I'm really not worried about it. I mean, if you can gain that much weight in a month, then I really doubt that you have gestational diabetes." Thanks.

This is the sort of comment that is going to help me decide not to go sit in a lab and get the glucose test. They don't do it at all in Scotland. That is, unless you are showing signs of gestational diabetes, which I'm obviously not.

Enough of that. Sorry for the bitterness, I just keep feeling like I'm not a very good pregnant lady. I already have a hard time making myself slow down and rest, and now apparently I have a hard time finding a good balance with food. After I had Jayce I remember feeling strongly that I preferred the newborn stage, even with it's difficulties, to pregnancy. Now that it's my second time around, I think I still have that opinion.

On a happier note, I have been busy making things for the little lady, some for her nursery and some for her. I have been putting this sweet fabric, and a few others, to good use and can't wait to show off my finished projects. :) Luckily, even us chunky pregos can use a sewing machine. :)

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