For my "Christian Witness"

At the request of Sam's Christian Witness :)
Here are photos of Bubba from last night.

He tried rice cereal for the first time. He wasn't quite sure what to do with it - and frankly neither was i!

eyeing up the food

"Hold up - you want me to do what with that stuff??? Where's the boob?"

If at first you don't succeed?

Yeah, we tried again tonight. Better luck getting some in his mouth, but it was still in his ears, eyes, nostrils, hands, toes and elbow cracks. Gross.

Worth every smudge of poo

Yesterday I was kicked, punched, yelled at, screamed at, pooped on, peed on, puked on, had my hair pulled out and stubbed my toe. The toe stubbing was completely my clumsy fault, but the rest Sam is responsible for. But there is nothing I'd rather be doing than being abused by Sam.

It's not like he intended to punch and kick me. He was so excited about who knows what and he couldn't stop his arms and legs from moving at the speed of light! And the pooping on me part - really it's just not a big deal anymore. Once you have had poo on your forehead for hours without noticing, getting a little on your hands or arms is no big deal.

He redeemed himself from the torture yesterday afternoon. I was nursing him and he was staring at me with his big green eyes. I was smiling at him and he stopped eating because he was smiling, too. Then he laughed, which made me laugh and we went back and forth for a few minutes before he realized that he was in fact hungry and needed to get to business. So far, that was my favorite moment of being a mom. The look in his eyes, smile on his face, and laughter that poured out from deep in his belly made me laugh so hard I cried.

I go through my day laughing and smiling because thats how he goes through his day, too. It's a good life lesson Sam taught me - you're going to get pooped on, but laughing at it rather than crying about it makes everything okay.

Step AWAY from the stand mixer

Good morning. My name is Meghan and I'm a bake-a-holic. It started a few years ago with a few cakes or cookies and I was only a "social baker". But it spun out of control and now I can't stop. It's no longer for social events, I bake alone. A little lemon shortbread in the morning, some peanut butter crumble cookies in the afternoon, almond biscotti baking at 10pm. That was my "rock bottom" (mmmm black bottoms anyone?), almond biscotti baking while I sit on the couch alone, Phil out of town on a business trip, and my eyelids so exhausted they could hardly stay open. I felt so tired - my body drained of all energy - but the next thing I knew I was standing on the kitchen chair reaching into the cabinet above the fridge pulling out the new bag of all-purpose flour.

You may think this is ridiculous but it's definitely a problem! Just ask my thighs, butt, and bat-wings.

I have been trying to figure out what is up with the baking. I'm trying to lose the rest of this baby weight and having my gigantic, 200 calorie-per-cookie chocolate chip wonders laying around turns me into Lindsay Lohan at Chateau Marmont. Even with a SCRAM  device (mine is the scale) I can't put down the drug. (but really those chocolate chip ones are the best)

I am a good baker. I know I am. And right now, it's one of the only things I can be sure I'm good at doing. And I think it's really that simple. I don't know if I'm doing anything right as a mother, but what parent ever knows? I don't know if I am being a good wife to Phil - I certainly don't keep the house clean and don't want to make dinner and all the other things I'm "supposed" to do as a stay at home mom. I do think I'm good at photography but I want to keep learning and getting better. On any given day when there are so many things I'm doing without validation I'm doing them correctly, I know if I bake something it will be delicious. And that can be something I'm doing right.

But really how do we ever know if we are doing the right thing? Trust? Faith? Where does that come from?

For now, I'm just going to step away from the stand mixer, and walk towards the gym. I'm good at that too.

Paging Dr. House

Whoa the last 2 weeks are a bit blurry!
We went away to PA the weekend of memorial day to spend some time with Phil's side of the family. Some relatives had yet to meet Sam, so we packed the 4-runner and off the 4 of us went! It was a great time and way more relaxing than one would think considering we were traveling with an almost 3 month old!
We drove home that Monday afternoon and Phil started saying that his stomach ached. Knowing his digestive history, I was less than surprised. Tuesday he calls me from work and says he is going to drive himself to the ER after work  because he was in pain. Not wanting to bring Sam to the disgusting Hopkins ER waiting room, we waited for Phil at home. Around 2:30am he got home saying they said they couldn't find anything wrong with him but he was still in pain. Great. We decided he needed to get some sleep and we would call the Dr in the morning.
Around 8am, Hopkins called saying they read his CT scans wrong and they see something. Of course they don't tell you what they see over the phone, but I decided I needed to go with Phil and thankfully Kristin was able to come over and stay with Sam, "working" from our house. Sam doesn't really like to let people do work during the day so I think she got very little accomplished.
Long story short, they did many many tests, took some biopsies, gave Phil some meds and said, "we still don't really know whats wrong with you". We are waiting for biopsy results to come in - hopefully within the week. Phil is feeling better though which is good!

On a separate note, I realize how spoiled I am. Sam has been such a good baby, that any blip in his behavior that makes him act like a "normal" 3 month old makes me think I'm doing something wrong. The issue as of late is sleeping. Sam started sleeping 10 hours easy through the night by around 7-8 weeks. This is NOT normal. I loved it, and didn't think anything of it. It was his norm and that was AWESOME! Well now, when he only sleeps 6 or 8 hours in a stretch, I get annoyed. It's so wrong, but I can't help it. I have to keep reminding myself that when a 3 month old sleeps for 6, 7, or 8 hour stretches, that is considered "sleeping through the night". It's hard to remember that at 330am, but I try to remind myself at a more reasonable hour of the morning.
The thing is, I stay up too late these days. Sam is pretty active during the day so I don't get much done for my photography business until he goes to sleep. I think thats what caused me to get him in bed around 7p to begin with, but now, after 8 hours, he wakes up around 3 and I've only had 3 hours of sleep! We are figuring it out though. He is really good and I juse need to remind myself how luck I am to have a good baby - actually to have ANY baby good, bad or ugly! But Sam is anything but ugly....see -

and just as cute is his cousin, Carson

and while we are on the topic of cuteness, Daisy was the original cute child

I just love this one of Sam because he is trying to pull himself upright while staring at Daddy. and you can see his eyelashes- to. die. for.