Will: 18 Months!!!

How is it that my sweet baby boy is a year and a half old!!!! No!!!! Stop the clocks people! I am not ready for him to get any bigger....but bigger he gets! Will is handsome, funny, smart, determined and very very active!

We had Will's 18 month appointment on Monday and he did great! Praise Jesus, no shots at this one. The moment the doctor arrived he started talking up a storm. Pointing at everything and starting each sentence with "Oh!!....." Sentence is a lose term because the rest of what he said was only certain to him and certainly not English! But, none the less, the doctor was very impressed by how conversational he was. She said we may be in trouble if he truly has that much to say haha... the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.  I only wish I had videoed it! But getting back to business...

The Skinny on Will:

Weight: 27 lbs, 6.4 oz (79%) The nurse we had was in training and documented his weight wrong (26 lbs) so I think this percentile may be higher, but let's be honest he's big enough either way!

Height: 33.5 in (84%)

Head: 48 cm (67%)

Eating: Well...at our house this has become the most dreaded part of parenting. The battle of the wills that comes at mealtimes. But after a long discussion with the pediatrician about how Will is slinging food and refusing to try things I think we have a better game plan. Cut back on the amount of milk and cut out snacks. The doctor said that any time she sees a toddler slinging food it's usually because they aren't hungry enough at meal times. In the last day or so I have noticed a remarkable improvement by limited his milk intake to 18 oz per day and cutting out the snacks before lunch and dinner. Peas continue to be the vegetable of choice, he eats ALL fruits, loves chicken, fish sticks, hot dogs, pizza and pork, but is not a fan of the lunch meats. He refuses to eat cheese unless its in a dish or on pizza and in general his mood towards meal times is as unpredictable as the weather, but we press on! We still give him a sippy cup of milk at bedtime and he drains it every night. Not sure when we will give that up??? Unfortunately we were so traumatized by sleep deprivation in the early part of Will's life that if he didn't eat, he didn't sleep. But that's our issue not his. My goal for the next month is to make sure that meal times are pleasant and NOT child centered. We can no longer try offering him everything in the refrigerator just to get him to eat! Lord help me!

Sleeping: Can't complain in this area. Will goes to bed between 7:30 and 7:45 and has been consistently waking up around 7:30. I do think some developmental growth has made it difficult for him to fall asleep as most nights he talks for 30 minutes before falling asleep and that is definitely a new thing. Naps have been pretty straight forward. Will goes down at 1:00 pm and if he doesn't wake up on his own then I go in and wake him up by 4:00 pm. What a treasured time of my day!

Development: Honestly, I don't even know where to start. He is talking up a storm and his vocabulary seems to grow by a handful of new words every day. It truly is an amazing thing to watch. He loves loves loves to play outside, blow bubbles and dancing has become a nightly occurrence in our house. He loves for me to play music and his favorite show is Curious George. Some days, Curious George is the only way I am able to get a shower. He has an amazing attention span as he will sit through long books patiently enjoying the pictures and the story. He also loves to grab a stack of books, hop up into one of our living room chairs and read books to himself which I absolutely love to watch as he expressively describes what he is seeing. He also loves to play this game that Cee Cee and Pop taught him where he counts "One...Two...Three.. Go!" and runs to the other side of the room! I can't believe how soon he will be counting to 10!

Currently, we are hard at work on manners and sharing. He says "Thank you" every time he hands someone something or receives something and has started saying "Sorry" when he disobeys, doesn't share, or has attempted to hurt one of the cats by chasing them with his golf clubs. He recently started saying "I love you, Dada" or Mamma and blows kisses to everyone! He is a huge snuggler and loves for me to hold him at night and sing to him. That has definitely become a cherished time for me. I can already see what a helpful big brother he will be! He tells me when that cats have jumped on the counters or table and firmly scolds them "No, No Charee!" (No, No Charlie).

On the flip side we are also in the thick of discipline as we are hearing a lot of "Nooooo!!!" and several tantrums or trying to hit us out of frustration. I hope this child does not follow in my footsteps for the amount of spankings I got, but he certainly gets plenty of pops on the hand for either telling momma no or disobeying. We are trying to bathe every day in prayer. Prayer that I would be gracious towards my sweet little boy, but also to love him enough to "train him up in the way that he should go" (Proverbs 22: 6). Such a weighty task!

Definitely time to get the camera out and capture the many faces of Will! But that's all we've got for now!

The beauty of CHURCH!

How blessed we are with our awesome church, The Summit! Praise God for what he is doing!

The cost of our insecurities

I read this blog post, and it nearly brought me to tears. How completely true, and convicting! For those of us with kids who may always have a few extra pounds to lose, this is worth reading!!!

http://myfriendteresablog.com/so-youre-feeling-too-fat-to-be-photographed/

Date Night

Zak and I decided we were well overdo for a date night so we called the grandparents to see if they were available. Originally, we had planned to go have a nice dinner and walk around Chapel Hill for a change of scenery but because the weather was going to be terrible, we quickly moved to plan B.

We called one of my favorite restaurants, Cafe Luna and made reservations for 6:00pm. We were dropping Will off at Mom and Dad's at 3:30 so we definitely had some time to kill. The convention center just happened to be having some home show expo so we thought, hey that can't be so bad. Oh were we wrong. It was the equivalent of meeting all the vendors of Home Depot: roofers, siding guys, hot tubs and decks. Booooring! We were in and out within 10 minutes and decided to venture around the Marriott that connects to the new convention center.

We picked up some Starbucks (peppermint hot chocolate and caramel apple sider seeing as we are NOT coffee drinkers) and sat and talked and laughed....uninterrupted by a toddler!

It. Was. Heaven.

We took some goofy pictures with our phones and then headed to a delicious dinner with no interruptions! It was that night we decided we would make date night once a month a priority and we would alternate planning what we would do.

In the hustle and bustle of parenthood it is so easy to lose sight of the importance of connecting with nights like these. So from me to you, go ahead, pick up the phone and get a date night on the calendar! You'll be so thankful you did!

...and then there was Ellie!

Ellie Anne Stokes, 7lbs 11oz

Yesterday morning, I woke up to Will and Zak overhead with Zak saying "I've got some news." I shot out of bed and said "No! I missed it?" and he said, "well I thought I would let you sleep in since its been a rough few nights with Will" (because of his painful double ear infection). I couldn't be too mad, because the night before I had left my phone downstairs thinking we had all the time in the world. But no sir ree, Ellie had arrived.

I quickly took a shower and headed to the hospital to meet my beautiful new niece  Ellie Anne Stokes! Ellie was born without the need for a C-section. Kelley and I both had had prior C-section that we felt could have been avoided and both wanted to try with our seconds for successful VBAC's! (Vaginal Birth After Cesarean  As soon as I got there I found out that Kelley had arrived at the hospital 9.5 cm dilated and ready to push. They actually thought she was going to deliver in the car!!! Yikes! The whole process only took 2 1/2 hours and she was out! No time for epidurals or pain meds. They injected morphine in her leg and within minutes Ellie had arrived. As silly as it sounds not only was my whole family praying that Kelley would be able to have a VBAC but so was our small group and my parents small group as well! It meant so much to Kelley so we were all thrilled!

Miss Lucy finally got to meet her baby sister yesterday afternoon after her nap. She was a little unsure about seeing Mommy in a hospital bed holding another child! Totally understandable!

We couldn't be any happier that you have arrived Miss Ellie, welcome to the family!

Saying Pop!

Well we are three down and one to go for calling the grandparents their name. Will has been saying Nana and Cee Cee for a long time now, still no Grandpa but this week he just started saying Pop!

Will's 1st Haircut...

To say my little monkey was past due for a haircut is the understatement of the month. (much to the disagreement of both sets of grandparents) See exhibit A. After planning a day, Zak and I decided to take Will several Saturday mornings back to the Holly Springs Barbour shop (after strong recommendations of our friends) for Will's first haircut. As silly as it is, I was really excited! Excited to document one of a thousand firsts in our little boys life. 

Ever since I was a little girl, I LOVED going to get my hair cut. I would always sit really still and feel just like a little princess. All to say, I had high hopes for my little man. I knew we would have to hold him down and I knew he might be slightly uncomfortable, but I had NO idea the disaster of an experience we were about to live out.

After arriving, we saw there was only one hair stylist working. We waited for probably 15-20 minutes for it to be our turn and Will enjoyed playing in the nicely laid out kids room. The Asian woman finally called us up and I promptly let her know that this was Will's very first haircut and asked her what we should do. She frowned a bit and said " hmm You sit here and hold him!" (to Zak) Much of this story is very difficult to tell without hearing it but I'll do my best....

...from there, everything went down hill. After draping both Will and Zak she immediately took out the scissors and demanded that Zak pin Will's chest and head down. Will was TERRIFIED! He immediately started sweating and screaming. The woman DID NOT CARE. While he was screaming she kept saying "Oh boo hoo hoo, boo hoo hoo, poor baby poor baby" in this mocking voice. It was then that I felt my blood pressure rising and I promptly put the camera down. Hind sight I should have snatched Will up and marched all of us right out of there. It was unbelievable. Both Zak and I felt like it was border line abusive as she had both of us firmly pinning his head down as he was screaming helplessly....

That was the first of what I am sure will be many occasions where I felt like the worst mom in all the world. We left with Will in tears, followed by me in tears. Never again. Did we leave with special clippings of his first hair cut or fond memories? NO! We left with great resolve that we would never ever let that happen again!

Just last night Zak and I decided that we would tackle the hair cutting on our own and I have to say I did a darn good job. We put on some Elmo, strapped him in his portable high chair, gave him a sucker and Viola success with NO TEARS!!! Praise Jesus. 

I snapped a few quick pictures this morning after cutting his hair last night!