Please Pray for a Friend

Dear Family and Friends,

I know everyone who reads the blog is a great pray-er.

In fact, several months ago, I asked everyone to pray for a friend and his wife because their little boy was born super early. And now, many months later..that little boy is doing great! And I know it is because lots of people were praying for him.

But today, I want to ask you to pray for a family at Good Shepherd who lost their little girl to SIDS yesterday.

She was one month old, and needless to say, her mom and dad are in a state of shock.

I cannot come close to imagining how they must feel right now. And even if I could imagine it, the reality would still be a thousand times worse.

Pray for healing for their brokenheartedness, and for understanding and attentiveness to God as He makes his love manifest to them in this difficult time. God didn't cause this to happen, He didn't do this to the baby. God doesn't bring death, but life...so pray that everyone who is grieving can look to Him to sow seeds of life amidst the gloom of death.

Pray for the mom and dad, for the grandparents, the aunts and uncles, and family and friends. Pray for the repose of the soul of the little girl.

Sitting Up and Reading

We have been practicing sitting up on our bed (where it is soft when he falls)....


But it's easier using the Boppy Pillow so he is somewhat stabilized:


He likes to sit up and read books, turning the pages....



...and sniffing the..animals...
Sometimes he gets tired....



...and needs a rest....



But all in all..he likes it!

Becoming one of *Those* Moms...

Tonight, I ran out to the grocery store while Michael Sr went to bed early and baby Michael slept...

Though Michael has always been perfect at the grocery store and a good little shopping buddy, it is nice not having to play grocery jenga, piling things around his car seat (sometimes, I just don't feel like hauling him around in one of those baby carriers strapped to me. Hey, I did my time for 9 months, and Lord knows he ain't getting any lighter!)...so I just put his whole car seat in the basket and pile things around him. It's always fun when the checkers/baggers try to strategize where to put the groceries that are all bagged up.

So, going by myself has the benefit of just throwing everything in the cart and not worrying about Michael...and it is also kinda nice sometimes not having to make buying chicken broth sound like the most exciting thing in the world.

But as I was leaving, I saw a lady in the parking lot standing with a little girl, probably around Michael's age chatting with a lady.

I thought to myself bitterly:

Lady! It's 10:05!!! Get that poor little girl to bed!!!

Then my second thought was,

Oh goodness! I just did it! I'm becoming one those moms who judges all the other moms! Aack!!

I immediately felt bad for being so judgmental of that mom...and then my repentance turned towards self-pity:

I bet that baby sleeps soundly all day and sleeps through the night! I bed that mom can keep her baby up however late and it doesn't matter. Meanwhile, I have to bend over backwards, do a backflip and walk on eggshells to get a 30 minute nap from my boy, and if we're lucky, only two night wakings. Life's not fair!


Then I reflected once again on what a good boy Michael is when he's awake, even if he seems short on sleep and probably could stand a few more Zzzz's. Like today for instance, after Sunday Mass which was right during his naptime (he did snooze a little bit in Daddy's arms during the homily--Sorry Fr. Michael!), he was patient during the next 1.5 while I was at RCIA, and even tolerated without the slightest whimper, my delaying his lunch by 30 minutes...what a trooper. Where do I get off complaining?

But back to the mom in the parking lot....

Swiftly, my self-pity turned into pity for the little girl, because as I was getting in the car, I heard a long, loud, blood-curdling shriek come from her as she was being strapped into her car seat. She continued to cry for several minutes, in fact, I drove away and she was still crying. That kind of cry only comes from a tired kid who wants to cuddle up with her blankie in her warm bed.

Of course, that mom could have been out for any number of reasons...maybe she's visiting her friend and hardly ever keeps her out late....maybe that little girl just happens to go to bed later than Michael..I don't know...

Whatever the case, I feel somewhat ashamed of my judgment, but somewhat justified that maybe I was a little bit right when I heard that poor kid cry...and somewhat desperate (if folks didn't know how hard I tried, they might look at Michael and think I'm not doing enough to get him enough rest)...but all in all, A LOT grateful for my little boy, in all his Michael-ness. Crazy sleep patterns and all.

Hairstyles

If Michael were the son of a Hollywood couple....



If Michael were a Little Rascal




If Michael were a child of the late eighties (note the hair wave)...


If Michael were just a darling little boy:

How would Aunt Tracee feel about this?

Michael's aunt Tracee is, in addition to her regular career, a certified cosmotologist (is that the right title, Tracee?)

I've been thinking about her regularly for the past few days as we have been trying to deal with Michael's dry scalp issue.

Many of the baby books have had some suggestions which entail moisturizing the scalp with olive oil, or Vaseline.



Gross, right? Imagine slathering Vaseline on your hair...reminds me of a movie....


Pomade, anyone?



Well, needless to say, Michael's hair style has been kind of....greasy for the past couple of days, and it has taken about 4 shampoos to get it back to normal.



It has been a little embarassing taking him to places like Michael's office. What if they think we never bathe our baby?

Tracee, can you forgive us?

Spoons

Sometimes, all you need is to give a boy a spoon and something to hit with it:

New Pictures Up

I finally posted a bunch of pictures up on Flickr (the link is on the right) and there are some cute photos!

I have a few new videos I have to upload, but I think with the HD, it may take some time!

Michael went to bed SUPER early today after a rocky sleep weekend. Though he slept all the way through the night, from 7pm to 7am on Friday night, Saturday was not such a great sleep day, which meant Saturday night was not such a great sleep night.

You see, sleep is kind of a strange thing for babies....the more they get, the better they sleep ("sleep begets sleep") and the more tired they get, the worse they sleep. So it's not like a baby who doesn't nap will just sleep better at night. That's rarely the case....rough sleep days typically mean rough sleep nights, which then yield rough sleep days....it's a crazy cycle!!

I am hoping his super early bed time with be a way for him to reset the cycle tomorrow and get a good day's rest.

Well, it's a process and I'm seeing improvements, so just because we had a rocky couple of days doesn't mean it's not working...it just takes time to settle into a good routine. Unfortunately, Sundays are kind of rough days since we have Mass right during his nap time, and then I had RCIA right afterward, which meant he went from 6:00 am (yeah, he was up early) to 12pm without more than a few very brief catnaps. Yikes! Poor kid. I spend all this time training him to sleep in his bed, and now that is the only place he really can sleep!

So, here's to tonight and tomorrow, and hoping that going to sleep at 5 PM doesn't make him wake up at 5 am!