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For the 4th we were in Alpharetta visiting my folks.  We had a great time being there and did some great stuff!  To hightlight a couple items…

We went on a bike tour of Atlanta, lead by my Mom’s Friend Robin who owns Bike Tours of Atlanta.  It was a solid 15-20 mile ride through different parts of ATL and a fun way to spend the day with the fam!  We saw all sorts of stuff that normally we blow right by in the car.  If you’re in ATL and lookin’ for something to do, check it out!

Bicycle Tour of Atlanta

My folks’ neighbor, Mr. Frank, rents jump castles and so for the 4th, well…we rented a jump-slide!  I don’t care how young or old you are, this thing is awesome and will have anyone laughing!  Good times and great call Mom and Dad!

The Slide!

Finally, here’s a slide-show from the weekend with more photos.  Enjoy!

M, J, & E

Now that it’s daily pushing 100 degrees and 100% humidity in Charleston, we thought Kelsey would appreciate a haircut.  Not to mention, I’ve been going crazy vacuuming since Eli started crawling, because he constantly has a wad of hair in his hand.  Gross!  So without further ado…

 

Before

 

After

 

I think she's happy about it!

Eli is lovin’ life these days. His happiness is such a blessing! We often find ourselves thanking God for his contagious smile, because life has drastically changed since the dark days during his first few weeks of life. I know we seemed like everything was fine during that time, but that’s how Matt and I get through tough times–hold it together for each other and focus on the positive. Don’t get me wrong–we have loved our sweet boy more than we could have ever imagined since the moment we first saw him, but let me provide a little background for those of you who weren’t around during that time.

From the time we brought Eli home from the hospital, we felt like something wasn’t quite right. We were told that we would have a week or so of a honeymoon-like phase, where our new baby would be so sleepy that we may not even be able to keep him awake for feedings. Well, that phase never occurred in our house, to say the least. The first couple of weeks were manageable, but things really got rough a couple of weeks in. Eli would scream on and off for hours during the day. Matt and I would sit in his nursery holding him, rocking him, doing everything we could think of to try to comfort him. He rarely slept during the day at all. And if he did sleep, he would only sleep while being held upright. If we tried laying him down, he would wake up screaming 90% of the time. If he did stay asleep he would wake up screaming after 20-30 minutes. The crazy thing was that he slept well at night from day one. He only woke up every 3-4 hours to eat and would immediately go back to sleep. Matt and I were just talking yesterday about how blessed we are that we’ve never had a bad night with our boy. We talked to his pediatrician several times trying to figure out what was going on. She assured us that he was fine. She said that any kind of medical problem would bother him at night as well, which made sense to us. We thought we just had a baby who hated life and was going to grow into one of those people who is just inherently grumpy. We never said it out loud, but we were both thinking, “What have we gotten ourselves into?” Finally, we decided to switch pediatricians when Eli was 6 weeks old. Our first visit was a “sick visit” to figure out what the heck was going on. I was on the verge of snapping. Seriously. Based on what we were describing, Dr. Graham (who is an angel in my book!) diagnosed Eli with reflux. Just like that. REALLY?? (Just an FYI-Acid Reflux is a common condition and an abnormal one in which acid in the stomach rises up into the esophagus. This occurs because the valve separating the contents of the stomach from the esophagus does not function properly.) We started Eli on Prevacid that day. Within a week the percentage of time he spent screaming was cut back. Two weeks-drastic difference. He was still struggling with naps. As he would start to fall asleep, he would kind of gag and then cry out. He just couldn’t relax enough to get into a deep sleep. Dr. Graham recommended that we add Zantac to see if that would make a difference. Within a couple of weeks, Eli was taking naps! Thank you Jesus!

We can’t pinpoint the moment in time when things changed, but Eli is like a different little boy these days. He loves life! He smiles with his whole being! There’s not a day that goes by that some stranger doesn’t stop me to ask if he is always this happy. Reflecting on this journey is extremely emotional for me. I can’t stop crying and praising our Heavenly Father just sitting here at the desk as I think about how He has blessed us through all of this!

Ok, so that “little bit of background” turned into an epic reflective journal entry. I just have to publicly acknowledge that God’s hand has been with us through this journey. We sincerely believe that Eli was healed, even if that healing involves medicine at this point. I also want to say that I firmly believe that the medicine won’t be needed one of these days. We try about once a month to wean E off of one of the medications. At this point he still needs both to keep the pain at bay, but I know that our attempt will be successful one of these days and he’ll be medicine free!

If you’re still reading, thanks for hanging in there! The original point here was to post these pictures of our happy boy. These smiles are typical, but we’re usually in Whole Foods or Target and I don’t have the camera to capture them. I thought Eli was taking a nap yesterday when Matt called me upstairs. When I walked into his room, this is what I found. Matt couldn’t resist getting the camera out. So yeah, he STILL doesn’t always take naps like he’s supposed to, but these days it’s for a very different reason…

Am I in trouble?

I promise I've been sleeping.

Oh good--we can play!

Kelsey, I'm gonna getcha!

Look Dad. I'm a lion! Rrrroar!

Ok ok. I know it's time to go night night, but first let me give Mom a kiss!

The last week has been packed full of developmental milestones and firsts for our boy. In the last 7 days Eli has cut three teeth, gone to the lake for the first time, spent his first night away from Mom and Dad, tried “finger food”, and learned to crawl! The first part of the video shows Eli rocking back and forth on the verge of crawling less than a week ago. Then you’ll see him in full force, which we captured last night. He’s growing up so fast we’re afraid to blink!

This morning I walked into Eli’s room and in the faint morning light I could make out two hands gripping the crib railing and a big ole grin looking right at me – Eli had pulled himself up and was peering out of the crib!  It was almost like he was proud of himself and was saying Look Dad! It was awesome and a moment I’ll never forget.  But, our immobile little boy is starting to figure out there’s much more to life than sitting in one spot.  In fact, there’s a whole world out there and he’s ready!

Later this morning I told Jenna what I had seen and we both agreed – it’s time to drop the crib.  (For you fellas out there…the height of a crib mattress is adjustable so you can have your child up closer when they’re younger, and farther down when they start to cause trouble.)  A few hours went by and I spoke to Jenna again; she said she tried to lower the mattress but it was too complicated for just one person.  Unless that person has special powers, that is…

You see, when a guy becomes a dad, he inherits the ‘Dad superpowers’.  Because there is nothing a dad can’t do!  Growing up, my Dad could always tighten the screw just a little tighter, get the lawn mower to crank after I had been fooling with it for 30 minutes and swore it was broken, and countless other things that always made me wonder…Did he takes classes on all this junk, or what? And over the past 3 years that Jenna and I have been married, there have been many “dad preparation” moments in which I have tackled some seemingly-impossible task – our ceiling fan, that’s 16 feet up, comes to mind.  But it’s true, there’s a certain edge that dads have that allows them to do anything.  And I’m proud to say, that I single-handedly tackled the task of lowering Eli’s mattress.  However, rearranging the crib-skirt appropriately is a different story…

Quick update:
Eli’s third tooth has just pushed through – which has brought on even more drooling (if such a thing is possible) and quite a bout of neediness.  But I can’t say I blame the guy!  Also, he now can sit up on his own!  I walked into his room to get him from a nap and found him sitting there playing with a toy.    And, speaking of him in his crib…we walked in another time today and found him holding on to the rails, half-way standing up.  I have a feeling change is on the horizon, not to mention he’ll be crawling any day now!

This past weekend we met up with my family in Hilton Head for a few days at the beach!  It was a nice few days of R&R and a great visit!  Here are a few shots of our little man…

I am one blessed girl!  Matt is such an amazing man!  He always laughs when I tell him that, but it’s so true.  I’m not naive.  I know he’s not a perfect human being, but he really IS perfect for me and for our family!  He balances out my weaknesses in so many ways.  I THOUGHT I loved him more than anything before Eli came along, but seeing him take care of and interact with Eli takes my love and appreciation for him to a whole new level.  Eli may want me when he needs comforting, but he typically prefers his daddy, which is fine with me!  We can be having a miserable day with teething pain, reflux issues, no napping, etc, but as soon as Daddy walks in the door, that little boy’s face lights up like he’s the happiest kid in the world!  It feels like my heart is going to burst with love for him every time!

So, to an unbelievable daddy, a great photographer, a selfless provider, a thoughtful friend, my sweet husband, Happy Birthday!   Mattie, thank you for being an amazing man!

And to think it all started here…

Hi!

It’s Saturday morning.  Eli’s sleeping and Jenna’s downstairs making babyfood.  You should see the production line she has setup and the spread she’s making for our boy.  Some of what will be on his menu: pears, apples, avocado, zucchini, sweet potatoes (so rich in nutrients that they’re purple!), and probably a few more I’m forgetting!  It’s awesome to know he’s getting the best food possible and is a blast watching him try new things.  Thus far there hasn’t been anything he hasn’t liked!

This morning, before his nap, we tried snapping a few pictures of E to document a few things.  There’s this hat that has a special meaning, and a funny story, that he has just about out grown and he is just about to start crawling…so we wanted to document it.  However, we were growing close to nap time so his patience wasn’t all there, but we’ll continue later.  Here’s a preview of what’s (hopefully) to come!

Sometimes changing perspectives is so much fun!

Seriously...how many pictures can you take?