new word: "truck"

I suppose it was inevitable, with one grandfather working for Caterpillar, and the other grandfather buying tractors off of ebay, that Elijah would be deeply interested in trucks.

When his Oma bought him his Truck Book a few months ago, it was instantly a favorite, the first book Elijah noticeably enjoyed. This week when reading the book, he has been saying “Twa, twa, twa.” It sounded suspiciously like “truck,” but we weren’t sure if it was just his sound of the week. Then he pointed to a truck in his Colors book and said, “twa.” Hmmm.

This morning David brought in a little ride-able truck (with steering wheel, very important) that his Professor Mavretic’s grandsons have outgrown so passed on to Elijah. Elijah figured out how to climb on it (gleefully proud), and started saying “Twa, twa…” and looking at me intently.

“Truck?” I inquire.

“Twa, twa, twa, twuk.” He responded seriously.

I think we can count this as a word.

On our morning walk, Elijah was happily singing to himself in an impossibly high voice (his latest form of self-entertainment,) when I see his little finger point out from the side of the stroller, and his feet start kicking.

“Twa, twa, twa!” he yells. Sure enough, two semis are turning onto the street. He really does know the word!

We watch the trucks for a while, and then continue our walk. We pass a house under construction with excavators and skid steers in action. Elijah’s mouth forms an “o” and he whispers in awe, “Twa!” over and over.

So, Elijah has his third word, after Mama and Dada. And I had a flash-forward of my life spotting and examining trucks, cars, and construction equipment. Boys!

David and Elijah check out the excavators at Singing Beach.

update: We went to the beach later, and saw a dump truck and an excavator working on the beach erosion. Elijah and a couple toddler boys spent most of their time admiring the machinery. Elijah kept telling the boys it was a "twa."

Graduation and Dad and Mom Voss Visit

The past week has been a wonderful time of visiting with family and my PhD graduation. After a great visit with Dad and Mom Otten, I dropped them off at the Logan airport and continued on to the Providence airport to pick up Dad and Mom Voss. Dad and Mom Voss came in for my "hooding" at BU to celebrate the six years of grad school.

The ceremony was short and sweet with my advisor, Dr. Fritz, placing the hood on me. In addition to Dr. Fritz coming to the ceremony the project manager of our research project, Dr. Mavretic, attended as well. In the following picture Dr. Fritz is second from the left and Dr. Mavretic is on the far right. A fellow member of my lab Doug Carssow also graduated.

After the ceremony there was an excellent reception for the graduates, professors, friends, and family. It was so wonderful to have my dad and mom there, but it was also so wonderful to have my amazing wife who has supported me through the entire process.

Elijah did an excellent job making it through the ceremony, though as soon as the speaker began, Elijah stood up in Jamie's lap, raised his arm as if he was giving a speech and began to babble loudly and distinctly at the speaker.  The speaker actually stopped his talk, waved at Elijah, then made a joke about Elijah being a future phD.  Elijah even made it into the reception, though it was getting late, but eventually gave into the magic grandpa hold and fell asleep.

Dad and Mom joined us at Park Street Church on Sunday and afterwards we went to Starbucks and the Public Gardens.

It was a great time with family, friends and a great conclusion to a great program.

May visit with the Ottens

We enjoyed a great visit with Mom and Dad Otten, who were able to be with us for Elijah's 1st birthday.

He liked opening his presents, though he liked shaking the tissue paper much more.

Lucky baby got another cupcake.  He took a taste or two, smeared it on himself, then went after the Cheerios on his tray.  Fine with me.  He'll get a sweet tooth soon enough.  Poor kid has a rich heritage of sweet tooths...

Great Aunt Debbie and Great Uncle Larry sent Elijah his first set of golf clubs.  He is fascinated by them.  Expect some snazzy golfing pictures soon.

Dad read Elijah his favorite "Truck Book" complete with sounds, and of course, pointing out the pictures with Caterpillar tractors and excavators.

I enjoyed taking Mom to "Glazed" to paint some pottery.  Dad entertained Elijah while we painted, and snuck Elijah his first taste of donut.  I guess that's what grandparents, do, right? :o)

Mom's plate

Family picture (finally, one with David in it!)  taken in the garden outside our house.

my 1st Mother's Day

Mother's Day being so close to Elijah's birthday made this such a great day for me.  This week was so special celebrating the wonderful adventure of this past year.

It was even more special having my parents with us on my 1st Mother's Day, and my mom's 1st as a Mother-of-a-mother!

Last year, on Mother's Day we enjoyed the sunshine in the Public Garden and kept noticing all sorts of kids (and adults!) dressed as ducks.  We grew curious and followed an especially elaborately dressed family to the start of the annual "Make Way for Ducklings" Parade held on Mother's Day!  The parade starts at the State House and ends at the Public Garden ducklings statues honoring the famous children's book set in the Boston Public Garden.  (In "Make Way for Ducklings" the family of ducks make their way to live in the Garden pond, famously crossing the busy street with the assistance of the Boston Police.)  At 9 months pregnant I told David that next year I wanted to do the parade with our little baby.

so we did!

Some people were very elaborately dressed!  Elijah just wore his duck towel, holding rubber duckies.

Lily and Elijah chillin' in the strollers

Happy Mother's Day to Ruthie and me!

No parade would be complete without riding the statues

1 year!

Elijah at 12 months

22 lb 14 oz

31 inches

pulls himself to stand and "cruises" along the couch and furniture

It still catches me by surprise to see him standing!

plays much more, and more independently

rolls a ball back and forth

can set his baseball on top of his little t-ball set-- good fine motor skills!

spots a cheerio on the floor across the room, crawls to it, picks it up with fingers and eats it

very interested in gravity.  drops things from his high chair and stroller. (We think he's saving his cheerios on the floor for later.)

loves repeated play-- Yesterday he "answered" his toy phone and handed it to David again and again with a big expectant smile on his face.

loves the beach: He cheers when we round the corner and he sees we're there.

 loves sampling sand, loves finding seaweed, loves crawling in the sand

that's seaweed he's holding-- not a scorpion! :o)

loves charming people-- will watch them until they look his way, then he smiles and babbles to them.

starting to sleep for longer stretches-- 5 hours or so at a time at night

takes 2 naps a day unless family or friends are visiting, then he can't bear to miss the action 

is proud to feed himself.  He's not so interested in being spoon-fed, but loves crackers, puffs, cheerios, cheese slices, apple slices, toast strips... things he can bite and hold himself.

snuggles with his monkey lovey at night

has started pointing.  I love looking down and seeing his little finger pointing out things from the stroller on our walks.

recognizes and enjoys playing with his little friends at small group and nursery

babbles to himself... sometimes it almost sounds like singing

"dances" when he hears music-- bounces, nods his head or shakes his hips with a big grin

Elijah's 1st birthday party

We celebrated Elijah's 1st birthday with a safari-themed party on Saturday.  The birthday boy wore a shirt that said "1st birthday" on it with a giraffe and monkey.

I made bunting for the Safari theme

Emily and Phil sent us some pictures of animals that they took in Kenya.  We had them enlarged and framed, and plan to hang them in Elijah's room to update it from a nursery, now that he is a "big" one year old!

My parents arrived from Illinois an hour before the party and I put them to work helping me finish decorating cupcakes.  It was a little ambitious, I know, making 3 kinds of animal cupcakes, but I really wanted to, and it was totally worth it with how cute they turned out!

lions and elephants and monkeys, oh my!

Happy Birthday, to you!

Even after his first taste of frosting, Elijah isn't so sure about his cupcake.

He enjoyed mashing the cupcake, but was a little overwhelmed by all the people watching him, so didn't approach it with his usual gusto.

Ready for a bath! (the water changed colors, and there were sprinkles floating in the tub... he thoroughly enjoyed his bath, though!)

 Clean birthday boy, and back down to socialize!

Elijah enjoyed playing with his little friends.  Keenan and Lily taught him how to play baseball.

Opening presents... his favorite part was pulling out the tissue paper.  (Again, he was a little in awe at being the center of attention...)

As you can see, Elijah had plenty of help with opening his presents.  We had a wonderful time!

p.s. You'll notice there are no pictures of David.  This is an increasing problem as he loves to take pictures, and I never think to.  He was there!  He was just behind the camera.

milestones

Our little baby has his first birthday party tomorrow!  As I look over our preparations for the big bash, I'm amazed at this year.  David put together a slideshow of pictures to be cycling through on our computer screen, and I did some updating on the baby book.  Looking at the pictures over the year made us realize how blessed we are, and what a full, wonderful, challenging, crazy, delightful year it has been.  Our lives have changed in a way we never could have imagined.  Much richer than I expected.

Sunday will be my first Mother's Day.  Last year, I was 9 months pregnant, and working through such feelings of unreality, "Am I really going to be a Mother in a week?!"  and feeling totally scared about everything from holding an infant to raising a child to going into labor.  But God brought us through the labor and delivery.  I couldn't have done it without Jesus and David (and the Lamaze we learned from Mom Voss helped!)  This Mother's Day, I'm ready to celebrate.  To make it sweeter, my mom will be with us to celebrate her first Mother's Day as a mother of a mother!

Thursday is Elijah's 1st birthday.  Looking at pictures of our newborn, so tiny and strapped with tubes at the NICU, made me so thankful for this moment... we have a healthy, amazingly happy, playful little boy.  God saved him and healed him.  I didn't even dream it could be!

A week from tomorrow will be David's PhD graduation.  God gave David amazing perseverence, and now I can't wait to celebrate.  His parents are coming into town, and we're going to cheer as David gets "hooded."

A week of milestones is ahead of us, and I am reminded of 1 Samuel 7:2.  Samuel takes a stone and makes a monument of it, to remind the people that "Thus far the Lord has helped us."  Has He ever!

Mother's Day-- one year ago this week!

God doesn't sleep

It's been a rough two weeks for us.  Elijah got sick with a virus and upper respiratory infection.  The poor baby's eyes were red, swollen and leaking, his nose was constantly running, and his little body was wracked with an awful cough.  He refused to eat any solids and just wanted to nurse.  In fact, nursing was the only way he could be comfortable and the only thing we could do to keep his cough down. 

I spent some long nights rocking him thinking on how God, our Heavenly Father who watches over us, doesn't sleep.  As I watched over Elijah, my heart understood God's heart a little bit more...  God watches us with the eye of a loving parent, comforting, protecting, not minding the lack of sleep because He is making sure we are OK.  And we rest better knowing He's there and taking care of us.

Certainly, the lack of sleep has been a major challenge of parenting for me to date.  You could say I'm tired of being tired.  But what amazes me is that God doesn't even need sleep.  He's the Perfect Heavenly Father, who watches with us because He loves us, and does it every night forever without getting weary. 

It was inevitable that I got sick after a few days of this, then David got sick, and that's when I felt God's power kick in.  I was weak and tired, David was weak and tired, and Elijah still needed a lot of comforting.  I felt like my Heavenly Father was keeping watch over me as I was keeping watch over Elijah.

Health is definitely on the horizon for us.  Elijah is back to full energy, with a stray cough every now and then.  David's energy is a little low, but he is better.  I still have a cough at night, but the last few nights of Elijah sleeping well has allowed me to sleep well.  Amazing how restoring sleep is!

My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber;

indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

The LORD watches over you—
the LORD is your shade at your right hand;

the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.

The LORD will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;

the LORD will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.
(from Psalm 121)