Sunday = Happy Mother's Day, Mommy!

Sunday was a precious day. We woke up early in the morning, and Shawn fed Joshua while I slept a few more minutes. We went to church as a family, even though Shawn had to be there early since he was scheduled for the A/V that morning. People LOVE Joshua, and by 10:30 he had had enough "attention" and started to cry. I gave him another bottle to soothe him, which put him right to sleep...right up until they called the moms up front and I handed him over to Shawn who had just came downstairs. It was my first ever mother's day! The church gave us a CD of devotions, which I'm looking forward to hearing. Every mom present crowded together up front in the middle of the altar and husbands, kids and other women surrounded them and they prayed for all sorts of things, including protection. On a side note, I woke up in the middle of the night last night thinking about the recent murders in Manheim Township and wondered if we remembered to lock our door - then I remembered this prayer of protection and felt completely peaceful and at ease.

After we went back to our seats, the Bean had had enough for the day, so we left slightly early and came home. I don't know why, but both Joshua & I were beat. So, we took a nap. Daddy, on the other hand, emptied the dishwasher and reloaded it, mowed the yard and dug out a box of summer clothes from the garage for me. When I woke up, there were beautiful flowers on the table, a box of girl scout cookies, a little teddy bear and a balloon that said "Happy Mother's Day." I tried to thank Shawn, and he kept insisting that Joshua did it all himself. Then, last night he gave me a card:

A Mother's Day Poem from Your New Baby:

You are my mom

and I am glad.

You're too cute

to be my dad.

You give me much,

I give you little

except a lot of poop

and some spittle...

You feed me,

change me

(when I smell),

and hold me

when I'm not

so well.

You always

wipe my runny nose

and don't seem to mind

when I stain my clothes...

You calm me

when I throw a fit

and clean me

when I'm full of ... spit!

For all these

selfless things you do...

HERE'S A CARD

FROM ME TO YOU!

Happy Mother's Day!

The cutest part is that Shawn allowed Joshua to sign it with marker - his first ever artwork. Shawn said it went well until he tried to eat the marker. It's so adorable! I have the best husband and son!

We left not long thereafter to go to mom's house. Mike cooked out on the grill, making ribs, shrimp, salmon & asparagus for supper. (You'll see the pictures of Grace & Jamie, who we jokingly said had the same messy faces since ribs are hard to eat...they both seemed to enjoy them, though.) While supper was cooking, I played with the girls as Shawn fed Joshua. We played the "dance until the music stops" game with Grace shouting stop. I swung Emma around, and all the kids road their bikes in the driveway. We gave mom her gifts, which included pictures of all the grandchildren together. Grace told me she has two sisters, Faith & Emma, but she probably really has three sisters because her mommy is having a baby. I laughed - she was so cute. After dessert, I had all three of Jen's kids and Joshua on my lap reading a book. But, soon the Bean tired of this and we headed for home. I hope you had a nice mother's day, mom! I couldn't ask for a better momma!

We also bought cards for Shawn's mom (one from us & one from the Bean) and then realized that we should have sent them sooner since they're in Florida. Shawn called her last night, though. Afterward, we watched the season end to Survivor. Before we prayed at the end of the night, Shawn gave me the biggest compliment when he said there's no one else he'd rather have raising his son and no better momma for the Bean than me. It was so sweet and made me teary because I often feel like I'm "underprepared" for this job. We fell asleep after a fabulous weekend in time for Shawn to get about six hours of sleep (poor guy!).

BEAN!

A couple of notes on Joshua's progress: he now seems to enjoy sleeping on his belly, just like his daddy. We always start him on his back, just like the doctors recommend; however, he always rolls onto his belly now when he sleeps. He can roll over again anytime he wants to, so we don't worry about it. I can also tell his arms are getting stronger as I go in in the mornings and he is basically doing a push-up to see me. This morning, I increased his 'table' feedings to three times a day. He had rice cereal with bananas for breakfast, fruits & veggies for lunch, and then we'll do rice cereal with veggies for supper. (We only recently introduced fruit into his diet, and he still prefers the veggies, but that's okay). I recently re-read all of the literature on his eating, and Joshua should be taking in even more than he is now (which seems like a lot to us). He should be having an 8 oz. bottle at least four times a day (sometimes we struggle with getting exactly 32 oz into him, but he comes close), along with the solids he's eating, which is supposed to include meat. I haven't even begun to try the meat yet, mostly because I think the baby meat smells like cat vomit. My sister said I should try the mixes of meats with other things like fruits & veggies, which I will do once I think the Bean can handle it. When we were at mom's the one day, she gave him a graham cracker, which he LOVED. I was nervous, but he did just fine, and the one time he did get a piece to big to swallow, he simply spit it back out into daddy's hand. He also seems to understand some words that we say, which amazes me. We were playing this morning, and he sat up on his own unassisted for at least ten minutes to play with one of his new toys. I kept waiting for him to fall backwards or start to slide to the side, but he did really well with his balance. I see HUGE improvements every day. I read the book Grandma Good had gotten for him for Christmas - Stanley the Stinkbug - again to him today and he kept pointing to the pictures (as well as trying to eat the book, of course). He still seems to love music - even Grandma Stoltzfus commented about that - and gabs almost non-stop now. He is doing so amazingly well! I am a proud mommy. :)