ONE YEAR LATER

So we made it one year. I believe in my heart that we've both grown into our roles as parents. Even though we thought we had it together at the start, we see now that we were so clueless....and will look back on ourselves in this moment and realize that we are still. But we are learning every day.

Noah had his first birthday twice...how exciting! We had the party with friends in Dallas & then came "home to Jonesboro" and had one here with friends & family, complete with more cake! It was a blast to see him playing with cousins and getting to know the family better. We welcome everyone to come and see us any time here. I am so thrilled to be back closer to our families. Dallas was great & I miss it, but nothing is as great as living near family. (especially when little people are involved)

The title of the post is a link to picasa pics from the party or click www.picasaweb.google.com/calliecabell to get to see Noah eating cake for the first time and opening presents, playing with friends & cousins, and just generally being cute as can be.

Sorry to everyone who left the party with fever, runny nose, and possibly diarrhea...that was not an intentional party favor, just extra bonus! Noah is missing school today (boo-hoo!) due to 101 this a.m. and Mommy is oh-so-sad.

question of the evening

adam looked at me last night holding a yellow plastic cup in his hand and said, "is this your cup?" i said yes, of course...but thought to myself, "two of us live here with a small person who is not yet able to drink from a cup like that. now, please, tell me....if it's not yours, and you think it's not mine, and the only other person living here drinks from a Gerber sippy cup....who's cup do you think it is?

Separation Anxiety

Just pretend I've been blogging all along...these 2 months I've not. Basically been a single mom (wouldn't recommend it) in Jonesboro for 6 weeks, so typing out my life story hasn't been top priority. Since moving the last weekend in March, I've battled a couple of colds, 2 more teeth coming in, several bad storms (fearing all along that the dead tree in the back yard could come crashing down and land on the neighbor's house), and the onset on severe separation anxiety. You think it's bad, and then the next day comes and it's worse. He has a near-death experience every time I leave his field of vision, that is, unless his grandparents are around...and then he could care less if I'm around. We were in Olive Branch this past weekend and several times, he chose Grandmother over me. Boo-hoo. Except I got to go running and he didn't care!!

So, life in Jonesboro is great. I'm missing Adam horribly while he studies his little tail off -- he's never going to want to go back to Cafe Express again after this month. And I can't wait to go visit my friends in Dallas. But all-in-all, Jonesboro is a very nice place and I'm glad we picked to live here. Our house is big and empty, but that will get better with time :) The best part is living an hour from my mom and dad. I can't even count how many times we've gotten to see them since we moved in! Noah just loves seeing them, it's so fun to watch him get excited about going in Grandmother & Papa's garden. He LOVES birds and airplanes and anything else that may be overhead...trees, etc.

We're not walking yet, but soon, I feel. He's cruising around on this little truck thing at lightning speed and going from table to couch to leg to table again...and never missing a step. When he gets to a cabinet or door facing or a human leg or whatever is in his way, the little devil just bangs it until he gets it turned the right direction and goes off on his merry way. We went to our friend Wes' birthday party this past weekend and he got a fantastic new Tonka ride-on toy that Noah just loved...hence, we now have one. I'm a sucker. But I do think he's going to use it for a long time b/c William (Wes' older brother) was very interested in it, too, and he's 3. Justification of a new toy. Do I really need to do that?

I promise myself to be more consistent in my blogging so I can REMEMBER this time!! The days keep flying by and Noah is getting so big and so smart and so coordinated...it seems like only a couple of months ago, he was a tiny, helpless newborn. It amazes me everytime he does something new. I know all kids talk and walk and do things like grow up...but it somehow seems extra special when Noah does it :)

Weather

The weather is absolutely nuts here...let me see. Last week, we were out in shorts and flip flops. This week it snowed. Not just a little snow (well, in downtown Dallas it was a little snow) but a few miles north of us got 9 inches! That is like skiing snow. (to me anyway) some kid was on the news, he had taken the wheels off of his skateboard and was using it as a snowboard on a hill in his neighborhood. Now, that is newsworthy material. That is the thing about the news...the local news, that cracks me up. "breaking news" often involves someone with 3 teeth who almost always lives in a trailer park, some kind of drugs, a rotweiler chained between 2 trees, and a gun of some sort.

Dallas' finest.

That's it. i'm moving as soon as I can. we have had more trouble lately getting Noah to sleep, both naps and nighttime. and the neighbor's dog just went nuts and then she takes him out the back door (which is right below noah's window) and slams it (which she does EVERY time she goes out). I cannot cannot take it anymore. living 4 feet from someone is something you only have patience for when you don't have a small child...and even then, it was tough. needless to say, he cried out. however, he seems to have gone back to sleep. a miracle. we'll see. when the neighbor gets back in 10 minutes from walking her menace (a jack russell terrier, which I think may be the most annoying dog ever bred), she'll slam it again and I may have to go tell her what will happen to her little yapper if she keeps it up. (I'm all talk...I'll do nothing of the sort...but it's nice to fantasize about being aggressive, which I am, but usually only over the phone...telemarketers beware)

speedracer

Let me just say that I love LOVE crawling Noah. He is so very much fun, even though I'm constantly running after him trying to prevent electrocution (loves the power strips), drowning (pulling up on the toilet is a nasty favorite), sutures (pulling up on an open dishwasher is often not a good choice), and other injuries... BUT he can entertain himself and me! I love watching him do his thing. It seems like he used to need my help last week to do things when he was a "slow crawler" and now he is practically changing his own diapers.

This is noah making a break for it...he likes to escape when I'm not looking. Adam & I have watched him climb the entire staircase (closely, of course) several times....we especially like to do it about 6pm to wear his little self out before bed. He thinks he is so big and bad when he gets to the top. He just squeals like "look at me, I'm so big, I just climbed the stairs" and wants to do it again. Another favorite of mine, which I don't have a picture of, is the Jailhouse Rock. There is a baby gate (thank God for those) in the hall upstairs and he loves to shake it and dance. I must get a pic and possibly a movie of this b/c it's too cute.

I'm ready for our move. Let's not say that I'm packing yet, but I'm definately thinking about it. Adam is constantly studying, so it's like we don't even live together anymore anyway! He lives at the hospital. And just knowing we have a big old beautiful house waiting for us an hour from shirley & jay makes living in this squeaky, tiny apartment that much more miserable! Not that I want to leave adam....I just want to move into our house....it just happens to be 450 miles from Adam.

Book recommendation for anybody who reads that reads this--The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. Not b/c it was on Oprah's list, but b/c it's a great historical fiction. Don't be intimidated by almost 1000 pages....it goes fast!

First Fever

Today is a milestone for me as a mommy...I've been through my first fever. And I feel terrible! Yesterday was mother's day out and he was acting puny before I took him. He didn't have fever but he was snotty. However, he's been snotty since November, so I didn't really think anything of that. Just to be safe, though, I had one of the anesthesiologists at Scottish Rite take a look in his ears before I took him to school...they said they were fine. In a nutshell, after I picked him up from school, he had 102 fever. I felt like such a bad mommy! And so we did the tylenol, motrin, humidifier, etc last night & I thought he would feel better this morning. 103.4 this morning, oh, he was so pittiful!!! The bad mommy feelings got worse. We have been having a stay-in-our-PJs-all-day today and I held him for his entire morning nap. Guilt goes a long way with me. I even let him watch TV....we never even turn it on, and today he watched 2 morning shows with me. (I still feel bad that someone else is probably sick in his class b/c I took him to school yesterday...nevermind the person he caught it from LAST wednesday). So, he's down for an afternoon nap, no mommy, just in the crib all alone. I hope he is able to sleep a while.







That is the thing with the first-go-round...you don't know these things. No amount of nursing would have prepared me for what it's like when your own child has a fever or is coming down with something. Looking back on the past few days, it's pretty clear that something was going on, I just chalked it up to teething or some other vague excuse that "they" always use (whoever "they" are). So now I know...if he's not wanting to eat, not sleeping well, fussy way more than usual...he might be getting sick. It seems so easy to diagnose that now. However, next time all of those things happen, it may be teething or some other such thing. I suppose you're never 100% certain when it comes to small people who can't speak English very well.

Noah & Ellie Scott at Chuy's (our favorite Mexican place in Dallas....we shall miss it greatly) He does great at restaurants...just stick him in the high chair & he's happy!

Noah clowning around trying to show off some new tricks, like standing up for a little while before bumping his little noggin on his table on the way down :)

Homeowners and Crawling

It is surreal to say "we bought a house last Friday". Really, because we can't actually move into it yet...it's just sitting there, empty, waiting for us to come home to it. But how fun is that!? Adam & I have a grown-up house now, and all of the stuff that goes with it, like a mortgage (which neither of us have ever experienced before) and the pressing urge to buy a lawn mower. Excited, but nervous. I'm excited about all of the shopping, but he is nervous. :) There are rugs to measure for, and furniture to buy...my list goes on and on. But, for now, I have to just be fine with having shelter because we have to wait on the decorating till Adam actually starts working & getting paid. Unfortunately, they're not paying residents enough to live in and decorate houses of this size. We know it's big, but we bought with intentions of filling her up with kids over the next few years. Looking around our apartment, I'd say we're about half-way full, just with Noah's stuff.

We are so unbelievably blessed with friends in Dallas that it is going to be really hard to leave...but then we're so very excited to be moving closer to grandparents and aunts and uncles and family friends that it makes the move a little more sweet than bitter. I'm just praying that we can find a group of friends in Jonesboro who are as supportive and loving and fun as our friends here in Dallas have been. Through all of my pregnancies and miscarriages and then having Noah, and not knowing what to do with him some days, my friends really pulled me through! Noah has been a little additon to my friends' families and their kids to ours & that has been so much fun!!

Speaking of the little devil...he's crawling. He's been working on it for about 2 weeks now, and I think he's got it down. He isn't lightning-fast yet, but I feel that will be here in a matter of days. Today, I was drying my hair in my bedroom and he was in his room playing on the floor. The mirror in my vanity faces out my door and into his room so I can see him playing behind me. Then I see him coming toward me. Before I knew it, he was there at my feet, trying to gnaw on the cord of the hair-dryer. Great. not only is he crawling, but he has a death-wish.

He's a happy kid from what I see. His teachers tell me (at Mother's Day Out) that he's "aggressive". I think he just knows what he wants....and goes for it. (hence, toys dragged all over my house) He's not capable of meanness or aggression, yet, in my opinion. So, I'm just going to ignore their observation for now. They also tell me he won't play alone, that he has to be held all day long. Right now, he's sitting on the mat by himself, playing with a tube of A&D ointment (his favorite toy...just try to take it away from him, you'll see. he takes it everywhere, but I digress), just talking away and smiling. I guess it varies day-to-day. And he did just get up from a nap & is extra happy. But he always does better at home with me. I need to resist the urge to take him out of the program, though, because he needs that socialization, I think. Also, he's entering separation-anxiety and it's getting worse by the day. When I see him cry for me, it just breaks my heart, and it is so hard to leave him there when he's crying. But I do. I guess I have to. And there he goes. He's had enough alone-time, needs some attention.