Mother-Daughter Road Trip

Several weeks ago, I got the idea that I wanted to take a mother-daughter road trip to west TN where my family lives. It's been quite some time since we visited there. My parents make the trip to see us every 5-6 weeks. But my sister rarely has time to travel and we wanted to see her as well.

In addition to wanting to see my family, Michael Paul was really needing some alone time. And I really wanted to give him some extended solitude before the new baby comes along. It is really hard being an extreme introvert when your wife is a stay-at-home-mom who hates to leave the house. It means you rarely get the recharging alone time introverts desperately need. He's also one of these guys who is generous to a fault. So if he is off work, he feels like he needs to be spending quality time with us. Which of course I love. But I know the only way he is going to get some peace and quiet (have I mentioned that both Keziah and I talk nonstop?) is for us to get out of the house for a while.

And then I was thinking of how Keziah only has a few more months of being an only child. We never took a vacation this year. And I thought it would be nice for us to make some memories just the two of us. So despite her absolute hatred of long car trips, I was determined to make this work. It took quite a bit of creativity to figure out how we could make the trip easy on Keziah. Traveling form western NC all the way to western TN is a pretty long drive. I didn't want to do it at night without Michael Paul. Plus I was scared I would fall asleep at the wheel. So we had to figure out a way to do in the day and not have Keziah scream nonstop for 4 of the 7 hours.

So a week ago Saturday morning, we loaded up the van and headed west. Keziah still had a rash from having Roseola the week before, but she wasn't contagious and was in much better spirits. This was the first time she had ever really been sick, and 3 days of 103 fever had worn her out. So I was hoping for her getting some extra sleep in the car. Which of course would make the trip easier on us as well. She never takes a morning nap but she did fall asleep after an hour in the car and between that and the morning snacks I had packed for her, we made it to Knoxville with only 20 minutes of screaming. Knoxville was our first stop where Naomi, my friend and roommate from college lives. Naomi and I have always had parallel lives. We're both teachers, we got married the same weekend, we each had our first child, both girls, three months apart, and when she called a couple of months ago to tell me she was pregnant again, she guessed that I was too before I told her. She is due in January just a few weeks before my baby is due. Needless to say we were anxious to hang out and let our girls play together.

Ariana had lots of fun toys Keziah had never seen before. They played really well together, even if they did fight over the slide a bit.



After lunch that included a chocolate desert,

the girls played outside in the water.

After Keziah was good and tired, we got back in the car and continued westward. Keziah quickly fell asleep. About 45 minutes down the road I stopped at a little airport where my Dad had flown with my Mom. The plan was for my mom to ride the rest of the way with me to help entertain Keziah. She brought presents including a magna-doodle. How did I not know that those things are magic for car trips? Having my mom ride with us is what made the trip possible. There is no way I could have driven all the way there with no one to help with Keziah. Having a Dad who flies has major major perks! Of course all the perks go away if the weather doesn't cooperate. I'll come back to that in a moment.

So when Keziah woke from her nap, there was a surprise visitor in the car and we were less than an hour from Nashville, our next stop. This was the hardest part of the trip for Keziah. And we did have to suffer through some major screaming. But soon we were at the Titan stadium, where we got to change into our Titan gear and head in to see the pre-season game against the Bears. I'm a little disappointed I wont be getting to watch my TN Titans much this year as I doubt the NC stations are going to carry many if any of their games. So I was glad it worked out there just happened to be a home game last Saturday and we got to go. And it provided another great break from the car.

Keziah loves to cheer and had an absolute blast!

Unfortunately we had to leave at halftime because Keziah was getting super tired. It was past her bedtime already. But this meant she would sleep all the way to my parents' house. And sleep she did! Plus, my mom drove and I got a break from driving and even dozed off a bit. So that's how you take a 7 hour drive with a toddler who hates the car and make it doable. Our trip took 14 hours total when you add in the visit with Naomi and the Titan game. But they were necessary long breaks from driving.

After arriving in Jackson the fun continued. Unfortunately my mom still had to work every day. But we did go up to school and have lunch with her. Keziah loved drawing on the white erase boards and getting stickers. My mom's class thought she was adorable. But with my Dad being retired, we still had lots of fun during the days. We went to parks but found the 105 heat index made it impossible to play outside. I have been spoiled living in the mountains. I forgot how miserable the west TN heat is! So we played in the sprinkler at home instead.

Keziah loves to water plants and play in my parents' huge back yard. She desperately wanted to get in the pond the first day. She has settled for helping Grandaddy feed the huge catfish and koi that live in the pond. He's still hoping to teach her how to fish soon. We've also been blowing a lot of bubbles.

And of course we had to play with Maynard, my sister's Great Dane. Keziah LOVES dogs with a passion. She is never afraid of them no matter how big or how loud. She giggled like crazy as Maynard licked her face. And his tongue is the size of her face. Even after he knocked her down twice, she still gave him hugs and kisses and squealed with glee as they ran through the house together.

And she was really interested in helping him eat, shouting "uh-oh" whenever he spilled kibble out of his bowl.

You can really see just how big he is compared to her in that last picture.

It was a wonderful week and exactly what I was hoping for. Lots of memories. Lots of time with my family. Lots of delighting in watching my daughter enjoy playing in and around the house I grew up in. But we were really starting to miss home. Every time my phone rings, Keziah jumps up and asks, "Daddy?" She loves talking to him on the phone and hearing his voice. Then on Friday after my mom's phone rang and I had to tell Keziah, "no that's not Daddy", her bottom lip started to quiver and tears welled up in her eyes. "You miss Daddy don't you?" I asked and she shook her head yes. A week is definitely our limit on being away from home. It was a great week but I was glad to be going home ... or so I thought! And then stupid hurricane Lee hit and the whole state of TN is covered in heavy rain all weekend. We were really planning on doing some sort of repeat of the creative travel plans where my mom was going to ride with me a lot of the trip and then my Dad could fly over and meet us and take her back home. But he can't fly in this weather and my mom can't miss school this week because she really wants to save her personal days for when the baby comes in February. So my options were to try and make the trip alone with Keziah in the pouring rains, or wait until next weekend. So we are stuck here for another week and really missing Michael Paul. And that's really the reason for this super long post with lots of pictures. Michael Paul really wanted to see some new pictures of his baby girl. So this post is for him. But I hope the rest of you enjoyed it as well!

On the up side, Keziah is definitely enjoying the cooler wetter weather. She loves to play in the rain and has been out on the deck getting wet a lot lately.

World Breastfeeding Week

Today is the last day of World Breastfeeding Week. I couldn't let the week go by without posting something about nursing. Last year I posted some random thoughts. I was still kind of new to breastfeeding then. Now I've been doing it for 19 months and it just seems like a natural part of my life- like eating, sleeping, and brushing my teeth. The hard first months are a distant memory now. Here's a little bit more about my personal nursing story:

Most of my readers know that we struggled with 3 years of infertility before Keziah. Although we were very open to adoption and even started pursuing it, I still spent a lot of time reflecting on everything I would miss by not carrying and delivering a child myself. When it came to breastfeeding, I was hoping that would be something I wouldn't have to miss out on. I did a ton of research on nursing adopted children and found a lot of encouraging information. I researched various methods of inducing lactation and reveled in testimonies of women who were able to successfully nurse their adopted babies, some even exclusively. So when I finally got pregnant, I was thrilled to be able to experience pregnancy and relieved that breastfeeding would be easy and natural now - or so I thought. I guess because I had done so much research on inducing lactation, I felt like I was really informed on breastfeeding and didn't really do any research while I was pregnant. I just assumed that since I was having a child naturally, breastfeeding would come easy. hahahahaha!

We started off great. Keziah was a natural and had a perfect latch from the beginning. She started rooting within minutes of birth and was nursing at 15 minutes. Nothing to it, I thought! When my midwife visited me for my 24 hour postpartum checkup, she talked a little about how nursing would change once my milk came in. She asked me what nursing books I had read, and I was like, books? what books? I didn't really think about nursing much at all during pregnancy other than, yeah I plan to nurse. All of a sudden she started talking about engorgement and how to prevent mastitis, and I felt overwhelmed. What was even more overwhelming though, was when 5 days later, I still had not experienced any engorgement, and Keziah had not pooped yet. I concluded my milk had not come in. At one week postpartum, I still thought my milk wasn't really in, because I was not experiencing anything like what I was told was normal. My milk had, in fact, come in - there just wasn't much of it. Looking back, I now realize it was a blessing that I didn't read a lot of books. It was better that I not know all the ways my body was, (yet again) not normal.

Convinced that I needed a larger supply, I started pumping along with nursing Keziah pretty much around the clock. Fifteen minutes on the pump would yield about 3 drops and I was convinced I was starving my baby. Still, we pressed on. I was determined to not give up. At her one week check up, she had lost a lot of weight. I'm pretty sure the pediatrician wrote down 'failure to thrive?' in her chart but he didn't tell me this. He wanted me to come in for weekly weight checks. I didn't do it. I decided the last thing I needed was to obsess over numbers on a scale. Keziah was a very happy and alert baby. My mom kept reassuring me that if she was hungry, she would not be so happy and alert. Thankfully, I had read that supplementing is the worse thing you can do when struggling with a short supply of milk. I decided to press on, even if I had to nurse around the clock. I decided to gage my supply on how happy my baby was rather than on the numbers on a scale or how much I was able to pump. And nurse around the clock is what we did. We settled into a pattern of 45 minutes on one side, 45 minutes on the other side, 45 minute break, repeat - 24 hours a day. I never did experience engorgement. I never even felt like my breasts were 'full'. I very rarely leaked a drop and never needed to wear nursing pads. And I never did get good at pumping. But Keziah continued to be a very happy and alert baby.

One of my most vivid memories of those early postpartum days was my mom waking me up from a deep sleep to tell me Keziah was hungry and she couldn't pacify her anymore. I started weeping because I was just so tired and so sore. Nursing hurt like crazy, despite her perfect latch. My nipples were raw and cracked. I sat on the edge of the bed and took Keziah. I didn't even have the energy to grab my boppy pillow and prop myself up against the headboard. I cradled my precious newborn and latched her on as I cried silently in pain. The next thing I remember, I woke up, still sitting on the edge of the bed. I had fallen asleep sitting straight up without anything behind me. I checked the clock and an hour had past. It's a wonder I didn't drop Keziah on the floor. And that's when I noticed she had delatched herself and was sleeping peacefully in my arms. That was the very first time she had ever delatched herself. I concluded she must have finally felt full. That was the turning point for me. For the first time I felt confident that I was going to be able to do this, and that my body was indeed capable of making enough milk to feed my baby.

Oh how far we've come. We went on to exclusively breastfeed for 11 months and are still going strong at 19 months. I've tried offering Keziah other types of milk. She refuses cow's milk (I've tried both whole and 2%). She refuses almond milk. Secretly, this makes me proud. I must have some really tasty milk! We've had a few more challenges along the way, but nothing like that first month. We had to break the biting habit and the twiddling habit. I've had a few plugged ducts. Currently we are working on nursing manners, like asking for nummies rather than pulling at mommy's shirt. But overall, I have loved every precious moment I get to spend cuddled up with my baby nursing.

So what's next? Well, to my delight, my milk did not dry up when I got pregnant. As far as I can tell my supply hasn't even gone down. Statistically 70% of nurslings wean themselves when mom gets pregnant, because the taste of the milk changes. Keziah has shown no signs of weaning. If my milk has changed, she doesn't seem to mind. I really had hoped to make it to two years, as this is the minimum recommended by the World Health Organization, the La Leche League, and other experts. If she weans herself in the next 6 months, I'll be fine with it. But if not, I am actually really looking forward to tandem nursing. Many moms who have tandem nursed testify that it can be a beautiful sibling bonding experience as well as really help the jealous feelings toddlers often feel when a new baby joins the family. Plus, I've heard that it's really nice to not have to deal with those sore, cracked nipples in the early postpartum weeks. So we'll see what happens. In the mean time, I'm just going to keep on delighting in the miraculous ability to feed, comfort, and bond with my sweet baby Keziah, while looking forward to the arrival of a new little nursling.

Happy Breastfeeding Week!

Keziah has a secret...

yeah, that was mommy and daddy's reaction as well!

100 Posts

This is my 100th blog post. I just wanted to take a moment to be proud of myself. I was really nervous that I would never be able to stick to blogging. I'm one of those people who starts journals, writes consistently for about two weeks and then the next time I pick it up, I realize a year has passed. I was afraid blogging would be the same way.
I was reflecting on what is different and how I have miraculously been able to keep up with posting on a semi regular basis. And I have decided that number one, if I really don't feel like writing I can just post a cute picture. That's gotten me through a few months where I didn't have the energy to think of something to say. And number two, knowing there are actually people who look forward to my posts gives me a little accountability to stick with it. This is especially true of my sister who is known to complain to my mom when I haven't posted in a while. And then of course I get wind of it and am reminded that people are actually genuinely interested in what is going on in my life and are eagerly awaiting the next post. It always makes me feel special.
I've never felt like I had anything really important to say and what is important, I feel someone out there has probably already said, and said it better than I could have anyway. But I do delight in getting to share cute pictures of our little family and little updates on our lives with the friends and family that we rarely have opportunity to see and talk to. So thank you my readers for reading. I hope to keep on blogging for another 100 posts and beyond.

Keziah: 18 months

Keziah recently turned one and a half! Here's a little of what she's up to recently:

She's never met an animal she's afraid of. She loves them all!

She is talking more and more. Actually she talks ALL. THE. TIME. But recently you can understand more and more of what she says. She's said her first sentence: "I got it" which of course was said as she grabbed something she was not supposed to have. And her first question: "What dat?" She loves to say "dank you" and "bye bye." And she recently learned "too me" which is baby talk for "excuse me." (she loves that phrase because she gets to use it when she passes gas - which she thinks is absolutely hilarious.)

Playing in the dryer!

Keziah loves the park and lets nothing hold her back. She's determined to do everything she sees the big kids doing. More and more she is resenting any help we try to offer her. Her independence is really starting to come out. She's a girl who certainly knows how to persevere to solve a problem. When she decides she wants to do something, she will work and work at it until it is accomplished. It is such a joy to see her figure things out and be so proud of herself. Recently she got herself stuck behind some furniture. When I got up to rescue her, she screamed and pushed me away. So I sat down and said, "ok figure it out." And she did, 20 minutes and a few shed tears later. But the look of pride and accomplishment on her face was worth it. I just love watching her little brain work as she figures out her world.

Conquering the slide

Keziah loves music and loves to dance. We have an evening ritual of putting on music and dancing. she loves jazz and blues and despite Michael Paul's attempts at only exposing her to "good" music, she loves Taylor Swift more than anything. Other loves include her doll, her books, and legos. In fact, we haven't gotten out any toys other than books and legos in a month.

Her special reading chair:

And my favorite part about this stage is that she copies everything I do. She is constantly surprising me by taking the initiative to do things without me showing her or teaching her. When she spills something, she runs to get a towel and wipe it up. When we go inside a building she pushes her sunglasses up on her head (just like mommy). And my favorite copycat behavior is recently she has become very interested in the potty. When ever I go to the bathroom, she wants to come in and sit on her little potty next to me. She pulls off toilet paper, wipes, and drops it in. She hasn't actually done anything in her potty yet. But I'm hoping we'll get lucky soon. She does know what the potty is for though, because as soon as she wets her diaper, she points to it and runs to the bathroom to sit on the potty. I'm crossing my fingers for easy potty training!

Keziah is very affectionate. She gives the best kisses and the tightest hugs. Sometimes when she hugs me, she'll gently pat me on the back. It truly melts my heart. She loves her snuggles and cuddle time and still loves her nummies. She's showing no signs of weaning which is fine with me as I really want to make it to two years. As big as she's getting, she's still my baby girl!

We love our little Keziah Rain.

Father's Day Pictures

Yes, I know it's really late. It's been crazy around here and I've had next-to-no computer time. Another friend of mine posted Father's Day pictures today, so I am not the only one who's super late! ;) So here they are:

And here are some more that weren't taken Father's Day but just this past weekend. My darling Keziah who use to be terrified of water has recently decided that playing in the creek with Daddy is tons of fun. She's not scared at all and would gladly jump in without him if we didn't grab her hand! I'm amazed at how quickly she is growing and changing.

Father's Day Tribute

In conservative Christian circles, I'm seeing a backlash to the extreme feminist movement. There's a lot of talk these days about men stepping up and being the leaders of their families. (This is usually in the context of women getting back in the home and submitting to their husbands.) And I do understand where they are coming from. I do believe that extreme feminism has emasculated many men and some Christians are extremely passionate about getting us back to traditional roles. And they do have some good points. Unfortunately, I see many men missing the point of Biblical leadership and using their Biblical role of leader as an excuse to be the 'boss' who barks orders at his family all day and expects everyone to do things his way all the time. Jesus Christ had a very simple definition of leadership: Service. The King of Kings came to serve, not to be served.

It's in this context that I'd like to pay tribute to my Dad this Father's Day. You see, my Dad modeled servant leadership superbly. My Dad is a man of few words and big actions. His love language is acts of service. His spiritual gift is serving. And I know no one who does it better than he does. My Dad never led family devotions or preached to us. I guess I should clarify that he never preached with words, but he preached the Gospel daily with his actions. My Dad led his family as Christ leads us - by serving us.

My Dad is an engineer (and really really smart), and really handy as well. Those are great traits for a life of service. A repairman never entered our house because my Dad could fix anything. Our cars never went to the mechanic because my Dad could always fix them. And he always just took care of things. As a child I didn't really give it much thought. I took it for granted that Dad could fix anything. When something broke, I would just hand it to him and say, "will you fix this?" And he would say, "yeah, leave it on the steps so I'll see it." The next day it would be good as new sitting on the steps for me to have back. There were very few words exchanged and no thanks required. As an adult, I have reflected on what a good illustration this is for how we should relate to God. God says we should receive the kingdom like a little child. I believe we make the Gospel too complicated sometimes. Maybe it's as simple as saying, "God, here's my broken heart, will you fix this?" and God saying, "sure, just leave it out where I can see it." And like magic it gets fixed. That's what a good and loving Father does. When I look back, I realize that every time my Dad changed the oil in my car, or fixed my broken toys, he was saying "I love you." Furthermore, he was modeling for me the way my Heavenly Father delights in fixing my own brokenness.

I had the coolest toys growing up. Store bought toys just weren't good enough for Daddy's girls. Sure I had a Fisher-Price phone like every other kid. But my Dad bought a pair of old office phones and wired them to really work. Playing telephone with my sister meant we could go to different rooms and really call each other, and then really hear and talk to each other through the phones. (The phones have since been passed on to Keziah who already enjoyed playing with them with her cousin.)

The plastic toy kitchens that every young girl has were nothing compared to my toy kitchen. My Dad built us a kitchen out of wood that is at least twice the size of those other play kitchens. It had plenty of cabinet space, a real-looking stove with a glass door, and a real metal sink. And did I mention that the faucet really worked? Yeah he put a pump-faucet on the sink so you could hide a bowl of water under the sink and actually pump water out of the faucet. It put those store-bought play kitchens to shame. When my sister and I got into competitive gymnastics, my Dad built us a balance beam to practice on in the basement and a bar that he concreted in the ground in our yard. A lot of the furniture in my childhood home was built by my Dad. He built a bookshelf and toy box for Keziah before she was born. My Dad delights in making stuff for us. It's a gift of his time, a gift of his talents, and another way to say, "I love you." Furthermore, he was modeling for me the way my Heavenly Father delights in giving me good gifts, gifts far better than anything the 'world' could give me.

You've probably heard it said that little girls grow up and marry their fathers. While not always true, it is true for me. My dad had a huge influence on the man I married. Before I met Michael Paul, I had a three page list of everything I wanted in a husband. Not being able to change the oil in a car was a deal breaker for me. I knew I could never be happy with someone who didn't measure up to my Dad. When Michael Paul and I were engaged and my parents had gotten to know him, my mom pulled me aside and said, "you know you're marrying your father, right?" I smiled real big and said, "uh huh!" She returned a knowing smile that wore 25 years of the ups and downs of marriage and replied, "just wanted to make sure you know what you're getting into!" I hope my Dad takes it as a very high compliment that I wanted to spend my life with someone just like him.

My Dad with Julie and me making great family memories on our sailboat:

The proud Grandaddy with his first grandchild:

Happy Father's Day!