Red Head!!

So, G-man is obviously a red head. Earlier this week I was chatting with a family friend who is a doctor and she mentioned that little G may be more sensitive to pain due to his red head gene. We chatted some more and then, instead of getting sleep, I stayed awake until 1am researching this gene. Turns out she was only telling me part of the story! Only 2% of the world population has natural red hair (I am one of the unnatural ones, so I don’t count!) Red hair appears in people with two copies of a recessive gene on chromosome 16 which causes a change in the MC1R protein. It is associated with fair skin color, freckles, and sensitivity to ultraviolet light, as the mutated MC1R protein is found in the skin and eyes instead of the darker melanin. MC1R is short of melanocortin-1 receptor. At least 80% of red heads have this genetic mutation. It makes them more susceptible to pain, and less receptive to anesthesias! Yes, they are more prone to wake up during surgical procedures. Yikes! I am glad that we are aware of this. It’s one of those “file that info away” things. If you are a red head, how would you rate your pain tolerance? Have you had surgery, and how did the whole anesthesia –thing turn out?

Soooo close to crawling!

The little G-man is so close to crawling! He is inch-worming and getting places! It's so much fun to see him go and to watch him develop and grow. This is the most amazing journey! The difference from this to the video below is amazing! Only 11 days between the two!



Also, we had G-man's 9 month well baby check up today. Yup, he's a well baby! Dr. S walked in said, "Hey there happy boy! You're on patient who will like me, no shots today!" (because we are not vaccinating yet) G is 28 3/4" tall which puts him in the 75% (his head circumference is in the 75% too) and he weighs 19# 5 oz which is in the 25%. Dr. S is not concerned about that, he's just tall and he did say that boys are very inefficient at using calories. I think he'll just be tall and healthy and buff like Daddy!

I'm always just one prayer away from an anxiety meltdown.

Nine months, three days ago I was a secure, certain-minded, assertive professional woman who could assess a situation, research if necessary, and make a decision. And stand by said decision. And be happy with said decision. I was fearless too. I rode my Harley without a helmet for years. I climbed Devil’s Tower in Wyoming (and other tall rocks too). I did triathlons. I enter burned out homes for work. And I never worried.

That all changed 9 months and 2 days ago…forever!

Is his car seat fastened into my car tight enough? Did we get the safest car seat? Is he warm enough? Is he too warm? Is he hungry? Am I producing enough milk for him? Did I buy him the right educational toy for his age? Am I singing and playing the right songs to him? Am I missing something and not helping him develop the right skills for his age level? He’s asleep, but I can’t hear him breathing...is he breathing??? Am I going to be able to teach him to stay away from strangers and to tell me if someone hurts or touches him? What if kids tease him and bully him because of his red hair? Are the roads too wet, is my hubby going to be safe getting to and from work? Are drunk or distracted drivers going to go out of control on the interstate and kill one of on the way to work today? Are we in jeopardy of losing our jobs? What if the water heater explodes? The chimney for the fireplace runs outside baby’s bedroom wall; are we sure it doesn’t have any cracks and won’t start a fire? What if we hit a deer? Will we roll the vehicle? Are all the outlets covered? Will his allergies to the dog suddenly get worse and make him stop breathing? Is he crying because something hurts? Am I living as a good example of Christ’s love? Am I being the wife and mother I should be to these 2 men in my life? Have I denied Jesus like Judas did? Am I brave enough to tell those I love, and strangers alike about Jesus and His love for them? What if the Rapture happens today? What will happen to those I love who have not welcomed Jesus into their hearts?

Here are links about the Rapture:
http://www.bible-truth.org/myst-3.htm
http://www.bible-knowledge.com/The-Rapture.htm
http://www.rapturechrist.com/rapture2.htm

And this is all in my head before I get out of the shower in the morning. There is so much more that continues to play on a continuous loop in my head, softly running in the background, darkening each moment, threatening to overtake the joy in my heart as I hold, play with, snuggle my baby and touch, smile and kiss my husband. It’s a scary darkness and there are times when I seriously wonder if I could just stay home all day, every day, and play and teach my son there.

Then I take a deep breath, pray to God on high that we will be protected, safe and that my family will return home together each nite. I pray for peace and calm so that I can enjoy the moments we have. And I remember this:

Matthew 11:28-30 NIV "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Philippians 4:4-8 NIV “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things.”

Psalms 119:49-50 NKJV “Remember the word to Your servant, Upon which You have caused me to hope. This is my comfort in my affliction, For Your word has given me life.”

Psalms 103:10-14 NKJV “He has not dealt with us according to our sins, Nor punished us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him; As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us. As a father pities his children, So the LORD pities those who fear Him. For He knows how we are formed; He remembers that we are dust.”
1 Peter 5:6-7 NKJV “Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.”

God does love YOU! Good deeds aren’t enough to get into heaven. Let’s face it, none of us are good enough. The best part is God doesn’t care! (Ok, He does. He does want us to try) But He knows we’ll fail. We’re human, we do that. What we have to do is turn our hearts to God and ask Him to forgive us. Ask him to come into our hearts. He wants us to love Him. He loves us. He loves you, more than you can imagine. And yes, it IS that simple! I love you all and am praying that you will decide to turn to Jesus today.
-Mellissa

this is a Friday smile!

Silent Monks sing! You really need to watch this, trust me on this one, ok?

This post is all over the place!

** post edited and links added 10-23-09 8:30am **

Hey there bloggy friends! It seems like it's been a crazy busy week and it's only Thursday!

We had a fabulously fun play date with my high school friend Jen and her son, E who is only 2 months older than G-Man. It was awesome fun! It's hard not to compare babies though and I have to admit, I am intimidated by Jen's parenting and her smart-as-a-whip baby! At 11 months he is signing 2-3 words APPROPRIATELY! He holds up his hands to say "so big" and can low crawl so fast!!! I feel like I have let G-Man down by not teaching him enough. but hey, my kid has more teeth, ya, that's right, more teeth! :-) It was fun anyway and I am trying not to get too down on myself and tell myself that all babies develop and grow at the rate they are supposed to grow at.

I made more baby food tonite, beets and pears. G-Man is on his 2nd day of carrots and is going for his second nite (conicidentally?) of terrible sleep. I think we'll skip carrots tomorrow and see how that nite sleep goes. We are introducing all new foods one at a time and for 3 days so we know if each food causes food sensitivities, allergies, rashes or just doesn't agree with him. It's a slow process and we are using a guide from our ND (naturopath dr.) that lists what foods are ok to introduce during what months starting with the most hypoallergenic foods. I like that we are doing this and it makes a lot of sense to us.

We hit a HUGE indoor baby and kid consignment sale today. It was a big score! I am done with garage sales and will just be doing these from now on. Yes, it was that amazing! Super-duper organized, well laid out, they screen all items as consigners bring them in to be sure they are in good, clean working condition. Each consigner sets their own prices and each item is clearly tagged. It was nice when we found a Fisher-Price toy we wanted, we saw 3 or 4 of the same one, tested each one and walked away with the cheapest one! I recommend you click here to see if this chain hosts one of these sales near you. It really was incredible!

My girlfriends' dad died this week. He was a gentle, caring, giving man and will be so missed! It's not right that we are old enough to lose our parents yet. It's a very scary thought and reality staring at me. I don't like it.

I used the broiler on my oven for the first time, actually, I broiled for the first time in any oven tonite! And....(drumroll please) it was delish! Yes, I am becoming domesticated, scares the hell outta me even as I type it! I made some creamy parmesan crusted tilapia using a Whole Foods recipe. I will be making this one again too! Mmmm, mmmm, mmmm!

Our washing machine died tonite; Hubby thinks it's drain and motor assembly. I have already looked up and have the phone numbers for 4 parts places and will be calling at 8:01 when they open. (sigh...that's a pain with cloth diapers!)

I'd best wrap up. It's gonna be a L---O-----N------G nite, poor G-baby has been up just crying and crying like his heart is breaking every 20 minutes.

too busy playin' to post!

(taken today)

Bye! I'm "it" so I have to get chasin'!

Lotsa motion, but no moving.

Little G-Man is trying soooo hard to crawl! He does inch-worm occassionally now, so I'd better get that on video too. This was taken last week:

I feel so bad for him when he gets frustrated and just wants to go! We keep encouraging him and working with him. I know all too soon he'll be crawling all over the house (and dog, and cat and...)!

I am such a dork!

I know, you've heard me say that before. But this time it's true again. I was talking to the hubby the other day, it went like this, "So, when we take G-Man to see Santa this fall, I think we should go on Tuesday or Thursday when I am off work. We can go during the day and you can maybe meet us at the mall. I just want to do some talking to folks to see where a really good Santa is."

There was a long silence so I looked up to see Hubby looking at me with the "oh, aren't you just so cute and weird" smirk on his face.

me - "What?!"

hubby - "Ya, because G-Man will totally know he is visiting Santa and will remember it. Admit it, you are just doing this for you, not him."

me - "No, I *am* doing this for him. He won't remember it, but there will be pictures of it, he will see that he got to do this! It's the start of a tradition!"

hubby - "Mmmmhmmm, you just want to scrapbook it."

me - "No...not 'just scrapbook' it! Besides, I picked up a totally cute onesie at a garage sale that is cream colored with candy cane striped sleeves and it's embroidered with 'Dear Santa, I was really good!'"

hubby - "Ok honey, whatever you say."

Seriously, I know I am dork for having his visiting Santa outfit picked out in October. But the visiting Santa part, I am excited about! In fact (here comes another dork part) as I was thinking about it today I got a few tears. So many firsts are happening this year. it makes my head spin. I don't want to forget any of them. I want to freeze it all in time so I can soak it all in. I'd better get my tail in gear and get scrapbookin' and journalin'!

A Sneak Peek!

Tina has posted some sneak peek shots! It was a FREEZING cold day (literally, it was below 32) and windy so my poor little G-man was less than thrilled about the whole event. Still, Tina managed to get some great shots! I cannot wait to see the rest! Check them out here.

The sound Daddy HATES!

G-man discovered that he can make a funny sound when he sucks in air. It's a lot like the sound of someone who cannot breathe. I think it's hilarious and the Hubby hates it! It kinda freaks him out. I'm not "allowed" to make this sound to encourage G-Man, but I can giggle at him when he does it!

It's Winter

I think we had 2 weeks of fall. I woke up to snow on the ground and on my car. By 10:00am it had not melted off my car! I had to use the snowbrush to clean over 1" of snow off my car. It was a fun day with playing and napping, then this afternoon we all braved the 29 degree windy outdoors for a family photo session with Tina. It was a blast! We had a great time at the best location EVER! (One that we have pretty much unlimited access to, one where the food is beyond incredible too!) G-Man was not real fond of the cold, despite the layers he was bundled up in. On the way there and on the way home G-Man had settled into his car seat, wiggled a little and his hat slid down on his face...and he was completely zonked out!

I'm sure we've all been there...

G was really sinking his teeth into the apple! You could hear them scraping. He covered it in drool in short order!

I can't be the only one who has been pretty peeved at the driver behind me who is doing some serious tailgating. I know that I got upset enough on more than one occassion so I "taught" them a lesson...I slowed waaaaay down. There, that'll teach them to drive so close behind me. Of course that only proved to tick them off and make the situation worse.

Today, however, I was the tailgater. It started like this:

I was at the apple orchard with G-Man and my parents, my sister and her hubby and 2 of her kids. We had gone on a hayride, picked some apples, looked at pumpkins, fed some furry animals (llamas and sheep) and we were just making some purchases and winding down our fun little adventure. The Hubby missed our fun because he was at his folks' farm cutting wood for our stove and taking care of some trees that had gotten a little out of control. He was using a chainsaw and he is the most mindful, careful person with power tools. He really respects them and uses them properly down to the ear and eye protection ALL THE TIME!

So, as I said, we were winding down at the orchard when I get a phone call from Hubby. "Where are you?" he asks kinda sounding weird. "Um, at the orchard still, why?" "Oh, (long pause) um, ok" Alright, now I know something is up! It takes 4 or 5 times of me asking why and what's up before I finally say, "Did you get cut by the chainsaw?" long pause, "Yes, but only a little."

Ok folks, a little cut is from paper, is there such a thing as a little chainsaw cut? At this point I start making goodbye motions and tell my mom that K got hurt (she knew he was cutting wood) and I start hightailing for the car, of course remaining calm (really, I was calm). So I ask Hubby, "would a normal person be considering going to the hospital right now for stitches?" He instantly answers in the affirmative. I love him, but he's so not normal when it comes to this kind of thing. So ya, I was tailgating to get home to him. I was trying to go 70 in a 65 and someone took it upon themself to "teach me a lesson". It upset me, I backed off, then when it was safe I passed them on the left and kicked it back up to 70. I won't go faster than that with my little G-Man in the car. Anyway, I got to my inlaws, and played nurse. He should have gotten stitches, the cut is on the outside of his knee. It's about 1.5" long, as deep as a chainsaw chain and ugly! We have it butterflied shut and clean. In a day or 2 we may use the medical super glue to hold it closed, but for now, I'd like to leave it more open to keep an eye on it.

Yes, lumberjack chaps are SOOOOO on his Christmas list, at least they are on the list I am making for him! I am so grateful that he was not hurt worse, thankfully, it was just a chainsaw kiss. This could have been really bad. Oh, and I'll never try to "teach someone a lesson" if they are tailgating me. I'll just move outta their way and pray that their loved ones are ok.

My Nephew Rocks!

My nephew is a rock star, well almost. His band played at a Battle of the Bands tonite and they were so great! It was so much fun to watch him perform and listen to him play and sing. I am so proud of him! He is the musician in the family, he also plays keyboard and is learning the violin. He was in the spring musical at school last year too. You rock C! I love you bunches & tons!

photographer's note: I really need to get a good low-light lens...sigh...

Wow, it's October already & random things

Little G-Man is really loving his NASCAR scooter! He will see something he wants to get and he will get there all on his own. He loves to explore the kitchen, thank goodness we have a counter-height table! He giggles when we move the chairs and he gets to go under the table. I just marvel at everything he does. Oh, and tooth #5 popped thru yesterday too!

Ok could someone please tell me where the past 10 months have gone? Wow, time is screeching past me, I know for certain that it never ever moved this fast when I was in school (especially math class). It's so strange how our perception of time changes as we age and in different phases of our lives isn't it? Right now, I want time so slow down to a turtle's pace just so I can soak in more of my baby while he is still a baby.

We sampled a new Betty Crocker product: gluten free brownies! Oh, my, I think I have to make them again just to be sure they tasted ok...ya, that's what I'll do! We enjoyed them while watching one of our favorite shows, Castle. It's on ABC on Monday nites. Great, witty writers, good one liners, great actors.

So, I've been making tons (ok, not tons, but dozens of ounces) of fresh baby food this week. Most of it produce from the farmer's market so it's fresh, local and pesticide and herbicide free! Perfect for building a healthy little boy! This week I mass produced acorn squash, apples, carrots, green beans, bananas and avocados mixed together and beets are still left to do. I hate peeling them so I procrastinate and leave them for last. By the way, since G-Man doesn't like cauliflower we have been mixing it in with other foods. The fav so far seems to be bananas and cauliflower with a 1:2 ratio. Some folks have asked how I make his baby food, it's easy! Clean and bake, steam or roast everything (except bananas and avocados- those can be raw). Then puree, scoop into ice cube trays, freeze. Once frozen transfer into long term freezer storage containers. Most ice cube trays make 1 ounce size cubes so it's easy to portion and know how much you are serving. Be sure to peel things like apples & beets prior to cooking. Yup, it's that simple. We don't serve G-Man any fruits on their own, we are cautious about giving him a sweet tooth so all sweet stuff is mixed with veggies. So far there is nothing he refuses, other than plain cauliflower. He does love beets and beets and apples actually taste great together!

The hubby and I also got new cell phones this week. I have been playing lots with mine...yup, it's an iPhone! LOVE IT! I have downloaded a baby sign language application, baby flash cards and my favorite from elementary school: Oregon Trail! That one is for me to play! If you have an iPhone or iTouch and have a fav app let me know what it is! I love Urbanspoon and have that one too for searching for restaurants, not like I'll be using it much...but it's nice to have. Hope you are ready for fall and all the business that comes behind it. Be sure to take the time though to stop and live in the moment, hug your kids, snuggle your spouse and just take time to "be."