Jake's First Snow

All Things Santa

Jake and Grace have met Santa twice this season with dramatically results. The first time was at Old Town Spring after Thanksiving. We went with Jo Jo, Destin, Mark, and Nash and visited with Santa and then Jake got to take a train ride through Old Town Spring. When we met that Santa, Grace LOVED him. She played with his beard and smiled and smiled. Jake didn't necessarily love him, but he tolerated him alright. The highlight of that visit for Jake was definitely the train ride...he's really into trains right now and he got to sit in a car all by himself and blow a whistle.

Grace and Aunt Destin waiting to meet Santa:

Jake and JoJo waiting...what a little sponge!

Gracie meets Old Saint Nick and is a fan

Both kids and smiling...it's a Christmas miracle!

Jake riding the train...he took his job of blowing the whistle very seriously!

Mommy and Jake

Last Saturday our church hosted it's first annual Breakfast with Santa. I say first annual because it was a huge success, and I'm pretty sure it will be a tradition! We walked in the big room where Santa and the breakfast was held, and Jake froze up immediately. We kept asking if he wanted to go sit on Santa's lap and he said no each time in a very terrified fashion. We ate breakfast and then did the different activities they had for the kids (listening to "The Night Before Christmas," making ornaments, making 'reindeer food,' and making a nativity). We finally made it back to the big room and coaxed Jake onto Santa's lap. Jake was shy but did pretty well and whispered a few things to Santa. When you ask him what he wants for Christmas he replies, "Papa's boat." His Papa has a bass boat so I guess Jake has good taste in boats :) Grace was not a fan of Santa this time and cried and cried. The kids wore their pajamas for the event and had their matching pjs on, but Grace ripped her bow out of her hair, and we never found it. That's the second Christmas bow we've lost. Good thing the holidays are almost over!

All ready for the breakfast...it was a rainy day so he got to break out his umbrella

Miss Drama Queen

Listening to The Night Before Christmas with Addison and Emery

Our friends, The DeCarlo's, came to the breakfast as well. I realized I didn't get a picture of their oldest son, Travis, but we did get one of Justin. He also has a heart defect and has had surgery as well. Here's a picture of three heart patients: Justin, Ty, and Jake. They've all got pretty cool scars! Justin had surgery over a year ago now and is doing great! He's such a cutie :)

Jake finally warmed up to Santa!

Listening to Santa

And then there was Grace...she wasn't a fan this time. Good thing we got the cute picture of her with Santa earlier!

Let it Snow???

Friday, the weathermen predicted 2-3 inches of snow for Houston. Businesses and schools closed early, and parents excitedly gathered their children in the yards to experience this true Christmas miracle. Here are the pictures of our beautiful snowfall:

If you look very closely, you'll see drops of snow on Grace and Jake's heads. Look VERY closely. For all of the excitement from our weatherman, this is all we got at our house. It did come down steadily all morning, but the ground was was too warm for it to accumulate in the least. Jake was confused. I told him it was snowing and he said, "snow, snow...rain???" It didn't look much different from rain to him. Poor child from Houston. Someday I'll have to teach him there are seasons in the rest of the world :)

Celebrating Advent and other Christmas adventures

I decided to make an Advent calendar this year so that Jake could count down to Christmas. I decided this on December 1st so I only had one day to create my calendar and just constructed it from felt. It turned out pretty well for the amount of time I spent on it, but I'm determined to sew one out of Christmas material for next year. I cut out different colored "ornaments" for each day of the calendar. I ended up just stapling this one together which Jake LOVED helping me do. He's now a huge fan of the stapler! I put strips of paper with activities for everyday until Christmas, and Jake gets to pull one each morning.

So far we've made Christmas tree brownies, painted Christmas pottery with Jake's friends, Jackson and Lillie Beth:

...made Christmas cards for baskets for Ty's work, and put up Christmas decorations in the house. And about that....

Saturday was our decoration day. We got everything out of the attic and assembled the tree. I realized quickly that Grace was not going to be a big help so we put her in the high chair with some cheerios and she was happy. As I was plugging in the lights, I felt a sting. Lo and behold, I got stung in the behind by a wasp...seriously, who does that happen to??? Ty disposed of the wasp, and I complained a little but kept decorating. As soon as we had all of the ornaments on the tree, Jake walks behind the tree, loses his balance and falls into the tree. The tree topples to the ground with ornaments shattering everywhere. Jake wasn't hurt, just scared. We swept up all of the broken ornaments and got rid of all of the other glass bulbs. Luckily, our sentimental ornaments weren't breakable and survived. We put the tree up again and this time successfully. Here's Jake Sunday morning in front of the tree...(By the way, the tree skirt was an actual skirt I wore in a school Christmas play in the 3rd grade and the Paddington Bear under the tree was brought home from the hospital with me when I was born 33 year ago next week).

This morning my wasp bite was still really hurting, and I realized that it was getting redder and bigger so Ty convinced me to call the doctor. My friend Claudia graciously kept my kids for an hour, and I humbly went to the doctor so she could look at my bite. Remember this is on my rear end...slightly embarrassing. It turns out I'm allergic to wasps, and I got some steroids. The doctor told me I might want to carry an epi-pin for the future. Not exactly reassuring. Then comes the real zinger. The doctor wants to know how in the world I got stung on the behind...she asks if I was decorating my tree naked? REALLY...really??? I tried to explain that I was wearing lightweight jogging pants, and she laughed and said what an unusual situation this was. That made me feel so much better (insert sarcasm here).

What started out as a pleasant family evening where I envisioned us sipping hot chocolate and gazing at our beautiful tree ended with a wasp sting and a fallen tree. My brother has always said that I'm situationally funny and my life would make a good sitcom. I guess this would have made one great episode.

Happy Thanksmas!

This was our year to spend "Thanksmas" with Ty's family as we celebrated Thanksgiving on Thursday and Christmas on Saturday at Al and Jonesa's house with Mark, Destin, and Nash. We had a wonderful time with everyone and loved watching the three kids play. Thursday, some family friends, the Ciufo's also spent the day with us so we had the added blessing of having them there. Anna and Leah love Jake, and he really enjoyed having so much attention from his two favorite teenage girls! Jake made handprint placemats for everyone and I meant to take pictures of them, but forgot. We made turkeys from his handprint and put pictures of everyone on their placemats. I'm seeing Rudolph handprint placemats in our future for Christmas! We rested on Friday and then had "Christmas" on Saturday--opening presents and meeting Santa at Old Town Spring. Jake had been counting down all week to go to JoJo and Papa's house and it definitely did not disappoint...So Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving morning

Grace with Leah and Anna

Grace and Nash

Papa with the three grandkids

"Christmas" morning--the kids in their matching pjs...this was the best picture out of about 10!

Grace and her doll

Grace and her new rocking horse

Our little engineer putting together his motorcycle

JoJo and Grace

Gracie at 9 months

The past 9 months have gone so quickly...it's hard to believe that Grace is already 9 months old! Oh, how she continues to bring us joy. For a little girl that was a difficult infant, she's becoming easier and easier the older she gets. She genuinely loves life and loves to explore and loves new discoveries. Yesterday I was getting ready in the bathroom and she was in her room next door. I kept peeking in on her and watching her play. She had three of her dolls out and was "talking" to them. She loves dolls and loves interacting with them. My sister-in-law, Destin, says she's an old soul in a baby's body and that's so true. She never meets a stranger and is friendly with everyone. She met Santa on Saturday and LOVED him...she smiled at him and tugged on his beard.

She still is not a great sleeper, but she is sleeping through the night and she'll take one good nap a day. She crawls very fast now and cruises around using furniture as well. She loves walking behind push toys and can maneuver them quite well. This week she's started going from sitting to standing all by herself. She can only stand a few seconds, but I think she'll be an early walker. She babbles constantly and I think she's trying to mimic some words. We clearly heard her say "Yay" at Thanksgiving.

She still just has two teeth but I've started her on some table food (finely chopped) because she chews pretty well with those two teeth. She wants to eat what Jake is eating so I've let her recently if it's appropriate and she loves being like her brother. She still adores Jake but is also becoming more of a Daddy's girl lately. She loves it every night when Ty gets home, and he definitely gets the loudest laughs from her. She still nurses well and I am totally enjoying this process with her. I love the bonding we have through nursing...I'm already sad that I'll have to wean her before too long.

At her 9 month check-up she weighed 17.10 lbs. and was 27 1/4 inches long. That puts her in the 25-50th percentile for both. She's our petite child for sure :) Dr. Chandler did find a heart murmur in Grace at her last visit although she believes it's an innocent murmur and not a cause for alarm. Because she's Jake sister and of our family history, she wants to have her evaluated by a cardiologist. She said if it was any other child, she would not follow up with it, but she wanted to be safe with Grace because of the history.

So, we're going to believe that it is indeed an innocent murmur and not worry. Today Texas Children's called to schedule her appointment and I requested she see Jake's cardiologist. Irnonically, the first available appointment is on March 8th which happens to be the date of Jake's next check-up. We'll take them both that day and Grace will have an EKG and chest x-ray and meet with Dr. Altman, then Jake will have an echo and then we'll meet with Dr. Altman again... The fact that they're allowing Grace to wait 3 months and also that they're not requesting an echo reassures me even more that she is fine. Just start praying now over March 8th for our family!

I continue to thank God for our little Grace and can't wait to continue to watch her grow!

Loving life...

Enjoying some yummy chicken

In the rocking chair at JoJo and Papa's house

Talking with her cousin Nash

San Antonio

Last weekend we took a mini family vacation to San Antonio. We ate wonderful mexican food, enjoyed staying at a hotel on the riverwalk, and went to Sea World on Saturday. This was Grace's first trip anywhere other than visiting family, and she loved it. She thought staying in the hotel room with us was so fun, and our little social girl bounced up and down in her crib for over an hour each night before going to sleep. Friday it rained most of the day, but Saturday was gorgeous and perfect weather for Sea World. Saturday was the first day of their Christmas season and all of their shows had Christmas themes. It wasn't too crowded and was a gorgeous day! It was a great little getaway, and we enjoyed spending time with just the four of us.

Grace excited to stay at the hotel:

Her mishap with the bag of goldfish...oops!

My quest to take a cute picture of Jake and Grace...I'm thinking it's impossible:

The show Jake was super excited to see: A Sesame Street Christmas

Jake got to ride his first roller coaster ever--the Shamu Express. He loved it although he called it a "choo choo train"

Riding a ferris wheel--when we got to the top, Jake wanted to stand up and scared me to death. I think he needs to ride rides with Ty in the future instead :)

The world famous, Shamu!

Meeting Shamu Santa

The tired kids after a long, but fun day:

Thanksgiving Blessings

I just realized that November is already coming to an end. This tends to be a much forgotten month sandwiched in between October's Halloween and December's Christmas. It's quite unfortunate because November is host to one of the best holidays of them all: Thanksgiving! We have quite a bit to be thankful for this year and here are some of our recent highlights:

• I'm thankful that Jake and Grace have become friends. I love watching them play with one another. Jake often gets too rough with his little sister but is also quick to give her a hug and a kiss.
• I'm thankful for Grace's adorable personality. She really is a funny little thing and makes us laugh all the time. She's truly my daughter because by the end of each day she's usually a huge mess with food in her hair and all over her clothes. She knows how to live life already :) I'll write more about Grace later this week in her 9 month post.
• I'm thankful that Jake's speech is improving. This is a slow process, but he's really come along this fall with the help of his therapist. He's making two word sentences now and starting to ask questions like "what" and "where." He loves watching Mickey Mouse and Yo Gabba Gabba and can sing along to several songs on those shows. He can also sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" and some of his ABCs. This is a huge improvement from August. I'm having to be patient with him through this process but I'm so proud of him because you can see his little mind working so hard. His therapist really thinks he just has a speech delay and no other cognitive problems. He's determined and such a courageous kid. I know God has given him this determination to help with his heart problems as well.
• I'm thankful for Ty's desire to help others through our struggles with Jake's health. Ty has recently been made a national officer for the congenital heart support group, It's My Heart. He will be helping with legislation to gain support and awareness for congenital heart defects. He'll be It's My Heart's representative with our congressman and with Washington. In April he'll be going to Washington for the CHD lobby day. 1 in 100 children are born with a heart defect yet the majority of money for the American Heart Association goes to dealing with adult heart disease. We'd love to see more research done for CHDs especially through genetics and to see heart tests be more readily available for children.
• I'm thankful I got to do TWO Beth Moore studies this fall: Breaking Free and Daniel. I'm still doing Breaking Free and just finished Daniel. Both have been a huge blessing to me as they've encouraged me to be in the word more and given me a chance to talk with other women (some days adult interaction is very needed after hanging out with Jake and Grace all day!) I'm thankful God blessed Beth Moore with such an incredible talent for sharing God's word.

So here's to celebrating the often forgotten month of November and counting our blessings!