Brotherly Love

Despite the loud crying, Tripp loves to spend time with Lily. Hopefully that will always be the case (the time together, not the crying)!

Whatever works

Who said you can't spend an hour playing with trucks in the bathroom? Apparently Tripp thought that was a good idea! Good thing I have to keep our house clean all the time!

Evolution of a Smile

Good news, bad news

Good news first: Lily's hips are doing pretty well! The orthopedist said that while they are not normal, they will probably become normal with minimal intervention. For now, she just has to wear two diapers at time. When i first heard that this was a possible solution, I must admit, I was skeptical. It seems like something the CEOs at Pampers and Huggies came up with to make more money. But apparently it is a legit thing because it is an easy way to keep babies legs abducted (the position they need to be in for the joint to form correctly). So double diaper we will! We go back in a month for another ultrasound and follow up with the doctor. We are praying for a great report.

Now for the bad news, ok, it's not that bad, but a little bad. Lily is supposed to go two mornings a week to moms day out and then with my mom when I go back to work. She has not had the best time at MDO so far, and today showed her true colors by not taking the bottle. My mom happened to be at our house when I go back from picking her up from MDO so she tried giving her a bottle. And in true Lily style, she refused. So there go our plans to go out tomorrow night! I am not exactly sure what I will do come Tuesday, my mom may be driving her to my work to eat! So I am adding that to my prayer list as well.

One of the most amazing things about these past 11 weeks is God's sustaining power through it all. I sometimes wonder how I am going to make it through the next ten minutes, yet, by God's grace, I somehow do. It is not usually pretty, and there have been a fair share of tears but He is faithful. My cousin-in-law (is there a such thing?) put it perfectly when talking about our daily bread that God gives us. Sometimes it is manna, sometimes it is an artisan loaf, but He always provides. For that I am thankful and am thankful to be called His child.

Dallas

After a crazy week and weekend getting our house ready to list, we got to spend the week in Dallas enjoying family and just resting and relaxing! I flew down with Tripp and Lily on Sunday, Nelson joined us on Thursday and then we all flew back on Monday. We got to celebrate Weston's third birthday, spend a lot of time playing, and even some great time outside (yes, there were some days when it was 70 and sunny in the middle of January. I have to admit- it was pretty great). I of course forgot my camera, so we got some pictures from Winsor and some from Nelson's phone. Maybe one day, I will have it all together (most likely not, but I like to tell myself that anyway) and we have pictures of our vacations, our second child and other important events in our lives!

Waiting for Daddy

The other day, after Tripp's nap, he informed me of this: "I am going to wait for Daddy to come home. When I hear a knock, it will be Daddy. I will run to the door and Daddy will be here. Actually I will just wait for him by the window. Or maybe the gate."

And wait he did:

So while Lily may prefer me right now, he sure prefers his dad!

Little Lily

Since Lily turned two months old a while ago and is now closer to three months than two, I thought it is was appropriate to finally give up an update on her. I do not remember her actual stats cause those are on a paper somewhere put away in an attempt to keep the house clean, but she is the 95th percentile in length and 73rd for weight. She finally started to smile which has made quite a difference for us. It is amazing how encouraging something happy from her is! The doctor ordered another hip ultrasound to see if the ligaments were tightened up yet. We went yesterday for that. After a lot of screaming, and a bottle full of sugar water to placate her, they were able to see how her hips were doing. They are definitely better than they were at the first ultrasound but are still loose and come out of the sockets. So we have an appointment with a pediatric orthopedist on Thursday to see what we will need to do to fix her hips. We are hoping for something that is not too crazy and disruptive to her daily life (read: something that will not make her more fussy than she already is). So you can pray with us that whatever the solution is will be effective but not crazy. Honestly, there have been a lot of days recently when I feel like I can not really take much else, and while I know that the Lord will give us the strength to handle whatever he brings our way, I am hopeful for an easy solution.

Lily has quite a strong preference for me, and so I am already struggling thinking about going back to work and what it will mean for her and the people watching her. Thankfully, both my mom and her teacher at mom's day out are more than ready and willing to make it work.

Even though she and Tripp look a lot alike, they are nothing alike in personality. Tripp took whatever bottle, whatever was in it, would go to any person, hardly cried, and Lily is pretty much the opposite of all these things. She does not do great on the bottle, will not take formula, and cries a lot (if she is not with me and sometimes when she is with me too). However, unlike Tripp, she has done a great job sleeping at night (she is down to mostly waking up just once) and prefers to just be put down and go to sleep on her own (which is a HUGE benefit for us)! She also has been taking 2 or 3 hour afternoon naps, generally around the time that Tripp takes his nap. So on days like today, when he gets up around 5:15 and I desperately need to take a nap, I usually have some time to rest in the afternoon. I am working on getting her on a more predictable schedule, but I do worry that whatever we have to do for her hips might throw everything off (or maybe she will be just fine with it, which would be awesome). So we will see.

I love this girl like no other, and it is hard for me to see her unhappy. So I just continually pray for her, for us, and that her big brother will continue to not be phased by her crying, especially every time we get into the car!