Day 3. No more thumb sucking

On Monday the older 2 boys went in for their dental checkup. I am still amazed at how fast their Dentist is. We got there at 8:25 am and were walking out the door by 8:45. X-rays, cleaning, fluoride and consultation all done.

Since Noah still enjoys sucking his thumb, and does not want to give it up, the Dentist and I discussed putting a plate in his mouth to get him to stop. The plate they would put in would have holes in it, so that when he tried to suck his thumb, he would not get any suction, and it would take all the fun out of it.

He sat there and told the Dentist he wanted quit on his own, so we have 2 weeks to give it one last try. Of course in the waiting room as we were leaving he asked me "Mom, the two weeks does not start today, does it?" Sorry Buddy, but I am afraid it does.

Night number one was bad, as I fell asleep in the recliner with Ben, and when Randy took Noah up, he could not find the glove that we had used in the past. Last night we got him a set of gloves, that he put on by himself and said he would wear, but he took the left glove off after he went to bed and sucked his thumb anyway. This morning he said that he did not know how his glove got off last night. It must have slipped. Nice try Noah!

Tonight we are going to have to find the glove where I crocheted an edging to hold a zip tie that will keep the glove on. He does not like this glove, as the ties have to be tight enough to keep him from pulling off the glove, and then they are uncomfortable. If we leave the tail of the zip tie on, he can pull it tighter, to the point of cutting off his circulation, so we have no choice but to cut it off and waste a zip tie. So I usually cut the tail of the zip tie off, but there is no real way to make it smooth, so it scratches him. Of course there is always the problem of finding where he hid the glove, then catching him, and holding him down so we can get the glove on in the first place. Hopefully he will be cooperative tonight.

Merry Chritsmas!

As I sit waiting for a couple of free songs to download for my new MP3 player, I thought I would write about about our day. It started early- about 6- when I could hear whispers from down the hall. The boys were debating if it was late enough for them to wake us up. After rolling over to look at the clock, I told them to go back to sleep until at least 7:00, since it was only 6:00. Of course they were not going back to sleep, although I think I did manage to nod off until Ben got wind of them being up and decided he wanted to be up too. About 6:50 I gave up trying to sleep so we all got up.

The first gift Noah opened was a sweat suit and socks. His reaction was "Oh great! Clothes! He did enjoy his new clock radio and Webkinz and a new game for his V-smile. John got the same except he got a Pocket Dog game for his Game Boy. Ben got a walker that will turn into a wagon, a signing video, and a stacking toy. This afternoon Alyce, Gary and Pam came out for a short visit. Otherwise it was just a laid back day spent playing with all our new toys.

A new funny memory from today came this morning as I struggled to make Monkey bread. My brown sugar was hard, and I got off track and ended up doing way to much improvising. Anyway it did not turn out right, and I over cooked it a bit. Noah got his and said "Thanks for making Monkey Bread, Mom. It tastes good, but it looks like turd. Nice! Later this afternoon Randy found some old Kiss concerts being shown on VH1 Classics. When they played the song -I want to Rock n Roll all Night, and party every day, it took me back to when John was younger and he was singing the song in the car one day. He argued with me that they were really saying I want to Rock and Roll all night, and PART of every day. We all got a good laugh, although I have a feeling that John still thinks that he has the correct lyrics and that we are all doing it wrong.

Ben showed of his new sitting skills for Aunt Pam. He has also been doing a very good job pivoting lately. It helps when I put his favorite toys just out of reach beside him. It does not take him long to get them when sitting or laying. We were working on side sitting, to help him move from another position into or out of the sitting position. He was doings a good job of sitting back up, but would not go down to the floor from the side sitting position. We are encouraged though, becuase it seems like he can do just a bit more every day.

Hope everyone had a great Christmas full of memories to cherish for years to come.

The Christmas Play

Sunday was the Christmas program at the Elmwood Christian Church. A few weeks ago, 7 year old Abraham whose Mom Joy was organizing the program, said "Baby Ben needs to be Jesus". We were not sure how it could happen, but then things started falling into place. About a week later I was doing a load of whites and pulled out an old strip of a white sheet. Not quite sure how it got in the wash, but as I pulled it out, I thought to myself that it might work if I put a onesie on Ben and then wrap the sheet around him. The next week we figured out that Ben could sit in his Bubmo seat but needed a way to turn it into a manger. That's when I remembered all the boxes we had over at Dad's left over from the auction. On Saturday, I cut the top to kind of look like straw and drew a manger on the box, then John, Noah and I painted it. It turned out pretty good. It was a bitterly cold day on Sunday but it was warm and toasty in our little church. I realize I am biased, but I sure do think that Ben was the cutest baby Jesus in Elmwood. :)


John was Joseph and Alice was Mary. Ben of course was baby Jesus.

The entire Sunday School got in on the program.

Santa

Saturday was the DSAF Christmas party. We had a lot of fun even though I had a killer migraine. The boys got to play around and wrestle with a few of thier friends that they have not seen since late summer. The highlight of the day, of course, was when Santa came. Ben was doing pretty good when Santa got there, but by the time his turn came to sit on his lap, Ben was asleep. John and Noah were a bit bummed because Santa was not asking anyone what they wanted for Christmas. Here are some pictures or our boys and some of our new friends.

Holiday Extravaganza

Last Saturday was the Holiday Extravaganza in Elmwood. There were lots of activities going on that day, including a visit from Santa, and a free family movie. At the last minute I decided to sign up to have a booth at the craft fair/garage sale at the roller skating rink. It was tons of fun. John set up his "bead your own bracelet" table again, and the kids had a blast. I had my jewelry, crochet and some Christmas crafts.
Across the isle from me was Kelli from Whoa Nellie Jellies. She has the most wonderful fruit and jalapeno jellies. You would think they would be hot, but they are not. Anyway the name of the product seemed familiar to me, and I thought she might be the sister of a girl I used to work with. So I asked her if she had a sister named Shannon and she did. I have not seen Shannon in years (she quit work after having a baby), but I remembered her bringing in the jelly. Kelli's daugher Olivia, was fond of beading, so she hung out in our booth with John and his friend Wyatt most of the day. She became my little helper ( John bailed pretty early and went to play pool).
Just after Lunch Randy brought Ben and traded him for John. The older boys had to go to church to practice for the youth led service that was being done the next day. Olivia was really helpful with Ben. There was one questionable moment when Ben spit up on her, but she held together well. She strolled him around and finally got him to sleep.
Today when I got my copy of the Elmwood newsletter, I was surprised to see picutres of Ben, Olivia, Kelli and myself among the craft fair picutres. Click here to link to the Elmwood Newsletter. Our pictures are about half way down, so keep scrolling.

Here are a few pictures from Thanksgiving. The first picture is of 8 month old Sam on a rare occasion when he was laying still. He is quite the little go getter. The next picture is of Emma on the swing. She had her hair all curled, and it was so pretty. The next picture is of all the cousins and the last one is of my boys.

Ben's second, 1st Haircut

Here are pictures of Ben's second, first haircut. Ben's real first haircut was done by Grandma, a week and a 1/2 ago, when she was watching the boys for us. There were no pictures taken when she snipped off 2+ inches his comb over. I was very sad, as I had been planning to take some fun pictures of how his hair fluffed up after his bath, but I guess it was not meant to be.
Ben sat in his high chair patiently watching while his big brother John demonstrated how to sit nice and still for a haircut. (It helps when you bribe the older ones with Play Station minutes.) He did not cry at the sound of the razor, and was quite interested in the cord. Near the end he started to get a bit upset as the pictures show, but that was because he was getting hungry. Anyway, now Ben has two snips of hair for his baby book. These pictures were taken by our newest award winning photographer John.

Barn Quilt

Yesterday a group of gentlemen came to the John Family Homestead to hang the Barn quilt, in conjunction with the Cass County Barn quilt project. Here is the address for the Barn quilt brochure.
http://www.elmur.org/downloads/barn_brochure.pdf.

At first when the FBLA approached us, Dad did not want to put a quilt on the barn. But I said, "Well Dad, if you put one up, some day a nice little old widow might drive up you driveway and ask to take a closer look at the quilt. I kind of forgot about it, until about a week later when Dad brought me all the paperwork completely filled out to apply for the quilt and asked me to help him pick out a quilt block. I guess the possibility of attracting a nice widow to the farm was too good to pass up. Too bad Dad did not live long enough to see it put up.

The name of the quilt is Harvest Star. Dad picked out the quilt because he liked the red, white, and blue in it. Above is a picture of the quilt and below is the sign. The quilt is a bit hard to see from the highway, but it is visible.

First Blog

Lesson learned today. You must stop bouncing to throw up. However, once you are done it is fine to start bouncing again. As I was sitting here thinking of what to write about in my first blog, I noticed my 8 month old son (who LOVES his bouncer) had just stopped bouncing for a second. I looked up just in time to see him spit up his excess supper. He did not seem to care, though, and did not even wait for me to wipe him up before resuming his bouncing. Now he is smiling and bouncing all the harder.
Ben is the sweetest baby. He was born March 20, 2008 with Down Syndrome and always has a smile on his face. His heart is good, and other than a couple of colds, has not had any other major health issues. He is truly a wonderful baby. He sleeps great and has since he was 2 months old. He rarely cries, unless he is starved, or just got run over by one of his big brothers. Developmentally he is about a month behind, but is working hard to sit up with out support and to get up on his hands and knees.
Ben's big brothers are John and Noah. They both adore him, even if they don't adore each other. They are both good students in 4th and 1st grade, and enjoy playing sports and Play Station in their spare time.