Birthday Boy

December 8, 2012

Dear Logan,

     I cannot believe that I’m already writing this letter to you. I honestly don’t know where to begin. You have brought your Dad and me SO much joy this year! I remember when you were born that I couldn’t believe that we were blessed with this perfect gift. You will never truly understand the amount of unconditional love that we have for you. It’s really all encompassing. You stole both your Daddy and my hearts instantly. It’s been so much fun watching you grow and learn this year. SO much has happened to you! You started out as this little, tiny baby boy who depended on us for everything. Then, you began to smile, make noises, laugh, roll over, sit up on your own, eat baby food, push up on all fours, crawl, pull up, walk, eat “big people food”, talk, talk, talk, and get into anything and EVERYTHING. J You have learned so much & you’re so curious about things…which is something I love about you. You have an amazing attention span for your age. Nana thinks you’re a genius! J You’ll sit and listen during the children’s message at church, and you really like to watch Sesame Street (particularly Elmo) and Sid the Science Kid, and Charlie Brown. You LOVE books! At first your favorite books were Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? , Maddy, the Alaskan Moose  (a gift from Grandma & Grandpa McReynolds from their trip to Alaska), and your Sesame Street books, but honestly at this point the list of books that you love is endless. What a wonderful thing for this Mommy!! I LOVE reading to you (and so does Daddy)! You love Nuzzlebuttons, & will give him kisses. You also like your baseball bat, baseball, stacking cups, and everything you’re NOT supposed to play with (remote control, dvds, stereo system, pots and pans, etc., etc). J I love to watch you say “doh” for dog whenever you see or hear a dog, know who Nuzzlebuttons (your white polar bear…Daddy named him) is, and comprehend what we’re saying to you. I also love to watch you “dance”, make your excited face, and get kisses and squeeze hugs from you. I hope that you grow up to fall more and more in love with God and Jesus and want to help others along the way. Your Daddy is a good example for you to look up to (I hope you realize how fortunate you are to have him as your Dad). You really are the perfect gift to our family. Everyone loves you… and I mean EVERYONE! J Happy 1^st Birthday, sweet boy! Remember that you’ll always be my baby, no matter how old you are. I can’t wait to see what’s in store for you and us this next year. J

                                                  Love,

Mommy/Mama/Mom

(whatever you choose to call me) J

29 years & 11 Months Old???

Nope....no one is that close to 30 just yet. ;) Today is Scott's 29th birthday, and it is also Logan's 11 month birthday to boot. I realize that I just posted some Logan information just the other day, but I had to share some of my favorite things right now that Logan is doing at 11 months old.


1.) He LOVES to eat shredded cheddar cheese, and almost everyday, Logan & I will share some cheese as a snack. We'll sit in the floor with the bowl of cheese, and he will lean over with his mouth open just waiting for his turn for a bite of cheese. He loves it, and I love sharing it with him! :)

2.) Just tonight, Logan began throwing his head back and laughing/squealing whenever we laugh and throw back our heads. He just kept doing it over and over again, and I kept laughing and throwing my head back because I was laughing at the fact that he was doing it. We all had a good laugh. Love my family!

3.) As I said in the previous post, Logan is walking EVERYWHERE and into EVERYTHING! Although this isn't always my favorite thing, it's so much fun to see how curious he is about the world around him & how clever he is about what he can figure out how to do.

4.) I love cooking with Logan. Now, obviously Logan doesn't aide too much in the cooking process, but he will sit on the kitchen counter in front of me & just watch everything that is going on. He will even imitate things that I do. When I add salt or other seasonings to a bowl, he will pick up the salt shaker and shake it over the bowl in the same way that I do. Super cute.....until he figures out how to open the salt & salt ends up everywhere. You'd think I'd learn to take the salt shaker away from him before he opens it.

5.) Logan loves to read books. He will hold up a book into the air toward me (or Scott) and make this noise that clearly means "here...take this & read it to me". Then he'll listen intently for a short period of time before he's off onto something else (unless it's a favorite book of his & he'll listen to the entire thing). Some of his favorite books right now are: "Maddy, the Alaskan Moose", "Bubbles, Bubbles", "Hands and Nose, Fingers and Toes",  "Elmo's Count to 10", "Time for Bed", "All the Ways I Love You",  "I Love You Through and Through", and "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?". HE LOVES BOOKS!!

6.) Logan also loves to sing songs. We can literally sing songs FOREVER! He loves it! If he really likes a song, he'll clap at the end of the song (with a big smile on his face) to let you know that he approves. He also will put his little fingers together when he wants to sing "The Itsy Bitsy Spider". It's really sweet.


If you'll remember from earlier on, I mentioned that today is Scott's birthday. I can't imagine where I would be in life right now without him by my side. He makes me smile everyday, and he brings such joy to my life. He really is my best friend, and he is such a wonderful Daddy. I love seeing Logan and Scott interact together. Logan loves his Daddy so much, and his face is priceless everyday when Scott gets home. He's always so happy to see him. :) I'm such a lucky lady to have these two wonderful guys in my life. I am blessed for sure beyond anything that I deserve! :)

Is Anybody Out There?

What to say, what to say? We're not even sure if there's anyone out there reading our little blog anymore due to the less than frequent posts that are made. Several weeks ago I was talking to Scott about how I missed writing. He had no clue what I was talking about. I told him that all through high school, I was certain that I was going to be a journalist. I loved writing in school. It didn't really matter the topic. I loved having journal time in class, and I enjoyed writing papers just to see how all of my thoughts and words would come out on paper. I honestly didn't consider teaching to be where I was headed (although, now I don't know that I can imagine not being involved in a school system in some way in the future). Scott reminded me that we have a poor, neglected blog that I could turn my attention to if I desired. So, here I am. We'll see just how frequent these posts become. Quite honestly, I have a tendency to be fired up for something & then bore with it quickly. Hopefully that won't be the case here. Even if there is no one who reads this, I think it will be a good outlet for me. Just talking about our little life here in Kansas City with my two favorite people in the world. So here goes......



Logan is at such a fun age right now. I'm sure that I will probably say this again and again until he reaches the age of the "backtalk". I'm pretty sure that Scott never went through that stage, but let me tell you, this girl did. I'm hoping Logan will take after his dad. Haha! Right now there is no sassy talk, but he does wear me out on a daily basis (in a good way). He's into EVERYTHING and he is ALL BOY. No doubt about that. I definitely get in a workout everyday chasing him around the house & getting him out of places where he's not supposed to be. Just recently, I began shutting the doors to the bedrooms and hall bathroom in order to keep him out of things. Not that that stops him....he just makes his way to the kitchen. He's walking everywhere, too. I had hoped he'd wait until he was at least one before starting to walk, but he showed us that ten months was just too long to be confined to crawling around the floor. :) It's been such a fun year watching him grow and change. He's learned so much & surprises us all the time with what he already understands. He knows what several of his toys are when we ask him to go find them. It's so cool to see him comprehend what we're saying to him. I'm planning to write him a letter on his first birthday (and every birthday following) to keep to give to him when he leaves for college. I'm not sure what all I'll say. There's just too much I want him to know about how he's changed our lives since being born. I also want to give him an idea of what he learned each year & how he changed. He's truly a gift from God....even on the nights when sleeping doesn't sound too appealing to him. We love him bunches and bunches, forever and ever. I guess that's all he really needs to know right now.

Milestones

Since we never filled out a baby book, we thought it would be a good idea to get some of Logan's milestones written somewhere besides just the loose paper in the drawer.  So not to brag, but here's what Logan has been up to the last 10 months.

Rolled over from stomach to back - 1st time at 1 week, 1 day, consistently at 18 days (12/26/11)

Started "talking" - 2 months old

Laughed out loud,  3/20/12 - 3 months

Sitting up, May 2012 - 5 months

Rolling over from back to stomach, 6/15/12 - 6 months

Up on all fours, 6/24/12 - 6 months

1st tooth (bottom middle), 6/25/12 - 6 months

Pushing forward (army crawl/the worm), 7/28/12 - 7 months

Started Crawling, 8/7/12 - almost 8 months

Pulling up, 8/9/12 - 8 months

Says "mama" & "dada" (doesn't really know what he is saying), August 2012 - 8 months

Able to use sippy cup by himself, August 2012 - 8 months

Clapping when someone says "Yay" or "good job" , Labor Day weekend - almost 9 months

Standing alone for short periods of time, 9/4/12 - almost 9 months

Waving and says "buh bye", September 2012 - 9 months

Clapping after a song, September 2012 - 9 months

Says "dada" and knows who that is, September 2012 - 9 months

Feeds himself puffs (similar to Cheerios) and claps afterwords, September 2012 - 9 months

First steps, 10/11/12 - 10 months

Talking to Mom and Dad

2-16-12

A Baby Story

For the short and sweet version go here.

Dear Logan,

This is the story of the first week of your life.  Hopefully, one day you will be able to read it and appreciate how you came into the world.  This is also to help mom and dad remember all the details.

The date that the doctor anticipated you being born was November 30, 2011.  Since mom couldn't travel for Thanksgiving, Grandpa and Grandma Mac came up to help us celebrate.  We even thought you might make your arrival when they were here.  But you didn't come on Thanksgiving.  When you hadn't come on your due date, we made plans with the doctor for an induction on December 9, 2011.  We made plans to go in the hospital early Friday morning and let everyone know to get ready.

You had other plans, however.  Mom woke up early Thursday morning feeling uncomfortable.  After unsuccessfully trying to get more sleep she decided that she might be having contractions.  I finally convinced her to call the doctor and they told us to come on in.  When we made it to the doctor around 9am, they sent us back and hooked mom up to a monitor to check your heart rate and see if there were contractions.  Your heart rate was good and mom was having contractions about every 3 minutes lasting about 50 seconds apiece.  The doctor came in to check how dilated mom was.  At previous appointments she was dilated 2 centimeters, but now she was up to 5 cm.  They put her in a wheelchair because her blood pressure was a little high, and we went on over to the hospital. 

We were in the hospital room around 10am.  Mom was ready for an epidural, so the nurses started getting an IV ready.  It took a couple tries and a blown vein to get it in correctly but they got it in.  I had to leave the room after feeling queasy, but I made it through without passing out.  Next came the epidural.  The anesthesiologist got it in without any issues and the next few hours went well.  Before we knew it all of your grandparents were here or on their way and mom was dilated to 9 cm by around 3pm.

Things started to slow down after that, but we were ready to start pushing at 6pm.  Mom started pushing and was doing a great job, but things weren't moving very fast.  You were trying hard to come out and making a little progress, but not enough.  Over the next three hours we saw several different doctors, midwives, and nurses.  Mom hung in there while I tried to encourage her.

At 9pm Dr. Martin started his shift and came in to see us.  He said we could try the forceps or the vacuum, but he couldn't promise that would work.  We talked about it and decided to go ahead with a C-Section.  I put on an awesome hair net and some scrubs and mom was wheeled off to the operating room.  Before we knew it, we could hear your first cry coming from the other side of the room.

You were born at 9:54pm.  You weighed 8 lbs, 9 oz and were 20 inches long.

Mom was sewn up and taken back to the room.  Your grandparents patiently waited while mom fed you for the first time, but the time finally came when they were able to hold you for the first time.  After a couple of hours they took us to a new room where we would spend the next few days.  It was around 1:45am by the time we finally got to sleep.

The next day there we lots of people that came to visit you.  Grandpa and Grandma Mac and Papa and Nana Horton were there.  Aunt Connie also brought your cousin Emma Kate.  Lots of our friends from church came.  Travis and Tawny, Chelsea, Lindsay, Lacy, Jim Dalton, Doug & Angel Couch, and Melissa all came to see you after you were born.  Josh, Holly, and Conner also stopped by.

We originally thought that we would get to take you home on Sunday, but we had another thing coming.  Overall, you were a healthy baby.  You started to lose a little too much weight so we started a little bit of formula to supplement nursing.  After that, things went well for you.  You were actually released from the hospital before mom was.

Since you were released before mom was, I got to take you to your first doctor appointment by myself.  While this could have been an adventure fit for a sitcom episode, you were a very good boy and we didn't have any issues.  You were measured and were around the 48th percentile in height, weight, and head circumference. 

Mom's blood pressure was high all during labor and after you were born.  It reached as high as 180/120, but was typically less than that.  However, the doctors weren't comfortable sending us home until they felt is was under control.  They put her on medication and increased the dose and added a second medicine to try and figure it out.  By the time we left the hospital, mom was on 1200mg of Labetalol and 90mg of Procardia. 

After mom's blood pressure was averaging about 150/90, we were able to talk to the doctors and they let us go home Thursday morning.  After we got home and got some rest, mom's blood pressure went down significantly.  We are still monitoring it, but we are down to 400mg of Labetalol and 30mg of Procardia.  It is likely that that will be reduced again when we see the doctor.

After all was said and done, we spent a week in the hospital, which was about 4 days longer than we hoped, but we left with a beautiful, calm, sweet little boy.  If you asked either one of us, we would do it all over again.

Love,

Dad