Wonderfully Made

It's so fun for me to watch the kids develop as individuals, and amazing to see what a strong role Nature (vs. Nurture, that is) really has to play in who each one is.  As siblings, the kids have lots of similarities to each other, but I love the differences too.  I wanted to share my latest favorite example of how different Caleb and Hayden are from each other:

Hayden, not yet 3 1/2, is teaching himself to ride a two wheeled bike lately.  A few days ago he decided he was done with training wheels.  I should mention that he's only had this bike of his own for a month now (it used to be Caleb's).  Hayden likes to practice without ANY assistance.  The first day, he practiced for a few hours (seriously!) in the backyard, never getting discouraged and really enjoying this new challenge.  He is making great progress, and it might not be long before he's mastered the two-wheel bike.  And I just love him for it!

Caleb, as he watched Hayden practicing, said to me, "Do they make adults bikes with training wheels? Because I NEVER want to take off my training wheels." And I just love him for it!

Newest Member of our Family

Made you look! hehe. No, I am not pregnant. No, we did not get a new pet.

Meet George.  He spends lots of time at our house.  He drives a blue Chevy Suburban as well as a white Chevy 2 door van.  The police once caught him driving in 100th gear and he spent some time in jail.  He parks in the street in front of our house, but lately he's been asking us to move one of our vehicles to the street so that he can park in the driveway instead. He also follows us in his car wherever we go.  George prefers that we choose routes with only a few turns so that it's easier for him to follow us.  And when we park in a lot somewhere, we need to choose a spot where George can park next to us. He's 5 years old, and the other day when he left his jacket at preschool by mistake, he used his jet-pack to fly back to school to get the jacket.  He eats at Soft Order- his favorite restaurant- almost every night.  George used to always eat bones and poles, but now he's not quite as fond of bones, so it's just poles at Soft Order for now. 

Caleb has enjoyed hanging out with this new friend of his, and it's been fun for all of us as we get to know George.  What I like most about George is how neat and quiet he is.  It's like he's not even here!

It's Not Easy

Lately I have been missing the days when the boys were little (under 2) and parenting was relatively easy. I could trust my gut instinct when making decisions and feel confident that I was doing the right thing for the kids.  The older the kids get, the harder I find good parenting to be.  More and more I find myself in situations where I feel at a loss.  Usually I can think of several things NOT to do, but that's not good enough.  I wish my knee-jerk reactions were more trustworthy, but the fact is that if I do what comes natural all the time, I'll be teaching the kids things I don't really want them to learn. It's not easy to learn new habits and patterns of interaction (for myself), and it's not like I get the chance to retreat for a few weeks while I try to change myself before coming back to the kids and interacting with them. This is real time!

I know that in reality there are some things -probably a lot of things- I am doing right, but there are days when I feel like I'm just making one mistake after another. It's pretty discouraging, except that I have hope that God will fill in the gaps.  Never have I more appreciated God's promise of wisdom to those who ask for it than now as a parent.  This parenting thing can be H-A-R-D, but it's nice to know I'm not doing it alone!  It's comforting to have hope that God can change me and it's comforting to know that God can work in my children in spite of me.

A Puppy Dog Tale

Subtitle:  My BA in Psychology Really Is Good For Something

Over the past few months, Caleb has become increasingly afraid of dogs.  He didn't have a particularly bad experience or anything, but there are several things about encountering an unfamiliar dog that freaks out Caleb.  Recently his dislike for dogs escalated into an interfering-with-daily-life type of phobia.  He didn't want to play  in our backyard because he was worried the dog next door would jump over our 6 foot fence.  He didn't want to go to the playground because we might see a dog.  If we were at the playground and there was a dog within sight (even if it was 300 yards away), Caleb would climb to the top of the play structure and hide until the dog was gone.  Not cool. Caleb was bursting with anxiety, feeling uncomfortable even at his own home, and not able to relax and enjoy physical activity outdoors.

Caleb and I would talk through things rationally.  How many times has the dog jumped over the fence? Zero.  How many days have we lived here when the dog did NOT jump over the fence? A lot. What would happen if the dog did manage to jump over the fence? It might run around and try to lick me.  And what would happen if it licked you? I would get wet. And what happens if you get wet? I would have to dry off.  Caleb seemed to know that the things he disliked about dogs didn't really warrant the responses had had.  But the anxiety persisted.

It seemed that a bit of systematic desensitization was in order.  (This is the part where my psychology degree comes in, BTW.  Always a nice feeling to use some of that stuff I learned in college!) I put the word out among my friends that if anyone happened to get a small, young puppy, or knew of a dog with a newborn litter, to please let me know.  It was a long shot, but I just wanted Caleb to have the chance to be in the same room as a teeny tiny puppy without (hopefully) feeling threatened.  I also took Caleb to Petco, where there is a glassed in room for grooming.  The first time we went Caleb was shaking with fear, even as we stood outside the grooming area looking in.  The second time we went he was able to stand outside the grooming room and watch the dogs.  He was actually somewhat interested in it.

At Caleb's 5 year well check, I talked with the pediatrician about the dog phobia.  She and Caleb brainstormed together, and they came up with the idea that whenever Caleb went outside or to the park he would choose a towel to bring with him.  This way he had an easy way to dry himself if he happened to get licked. So now every time we go to the park, Caleb likes to bring a towel along.  (Fortunately he's not too rigid about it... if he forgets the towel, he is ok when I offer to use my shirt as a replacement if he needs to dry off!)

Our next step was to visit the humane society.  There were about 20 doggie "apartments" at the humane society with glass windows and doors that we could peak through.  Caleb did great looking at each of the dogs there.  The barking was still scary for him, but he could cope. After checking out the adoptable dogs in their apartments, we went outside and watched some dogs running around in the dog park. Again, we were at a distance and protected by a fence, but Caleb was calm and even enjoying our time there.

Caleb was really making progress here! He even went so far to say, "Maybe we can get a puppy.  And then when it gets bigger we can keep it if I like it, or if I don't like it we can give it to somebody else."  We aren't exactly ready to be a dog-owning family, but at least Caleb was opening up.  In the last week or two, Caleb has been a lot better about passing dogs when we go for bike rides (as long as they're leashed), and not nearly as paranoid on the playground when a dog is within a quarter mile radius.

The BIGGEST breakthrough came yesterday at the park.  A 7 year old girl was there with her 4 month old chihuahua.  The dog wasn't on a leash, as it was supposed to be at the park, but the girl was holding it tightly in her arms as she used the swings. Rather than running and hiding, Caleb slowly approached the girl and dog, and was asking her questions about the puppy.  I don't think he came any closer than 5 feet, which was kind of funny to watch.  Any time the girl moved and it looked like the dog MIGHT wiggle through her arms, Caleb ran a few feet back toward the safety of the tall play structure. But then eventually he would come closer again.

I am so proud of Caleb and quite happy about how much he's improved lately! Hopefully we can continue building on each of these steps.  I don't care if Caleb never likes dogs, I just want him to be able to go about his business without worrying about dogs. Keep up the good work, buddy!

Avery is Weaned!

Hopefully this post doesn't jinx anything, but I am excited to share that it has been 5 days since Avery last nursed.  I started cutting back on nursing sessions in January, and alas, 3 months later we seem to be done! 

How did I manage to wean a child who LOVED nursing in a reasonably gentle way, you might ask?  Certainly we did things gradually, for one. In January, I cut out Avery's evening nursing session by using the clock as a guideline.  I made goals by saying to myself, for example, "This week I won't nurse Avery past 6:45pm." And then I worked to move that time earlier and earlier until Avery no longer asked to nurse in the evenings. 

Next I worked to cut out the pre-nap feeding.  I thought the post-nap feeding would be the second one to drop, but it proved more difficult than the pre-nap session.  The pre-nap feeding was pretty easy to drop, I just had to help Avery learn a new nap time routine.  It turned out not to be a huge deal.

The post-nap feeding was the hardest for sure.  I tried distracting Avery with all kinds of snacks when she woke up, with games, going outside, all kinds of things.  And I abandoned all zip-up shirts/jackets during this time in favor of high-cut shirts and Matt's thick sweatshirts! What worked best was putting the kids straight into the car as soon as Avery woke up from her nap and going out to do a quick errand or two.  The car ride was a big enough distraction that when we got home, she wasn't upset about missing out on nursing.

The last session remaining was the wake-up nursing session.  I didn't really have a genius plan for eliminating this one, and I had basically resolved myself to not completely weaning Avery until our Hawaii trip in June (more on that another time!).  Matt and I will be away for 4 days, and that would give Avery several days to learn a new morning routine. 

However, this past weekend Avery more or less decided on her own that she didn't want to nurse in the morning!  The first day, last Friday, our morning routine was a bit different than usual and Avery was distracted and simply didn't ask to nurse.  The next few days I intentionally did things in a different order in the morning, and I used a bit of distraction as well.  Like when Avery started dragging her blanket over to me for nursing, I used it to hide her, Hayden, and myself under it for awhile and play games. Overall though, I feel confident that Avery just hasn't been very interested in nursing. This is comforting to me, because at times I felt guilty about redirecting her away from something she loved so much. (Even though I know leaving behind old favorites and replacing them with new things is an important part of growing up.)

Today and yesterday there were one or two times when Avery indicated she wanted to nurse, and I asked her if she wanted a snack, to which she said, "snack", and was very agreeable to me taking her to the kitchen for a snack. So I think she is well on her way to forgetting about nursing.  And now that we are 5 days into NOT nursing, I am not about to revert.

We had several times in the past few months when Avery was sick and/or teething and those times felt like huge setbacks.  During those times, Avery would want to nurse quite frequently.  At first it bothered me, as it felt like we were taking one step forward and two steps backward.  But for each time that Avery was sick/teething and regress, she would return to her normal (new) nursing routine as soon as she felt better. So it wasn't a lasting regression.  Avery still has more teeth on the way- molars, in fact- and I'm a bit nervous about how she will be when the teething pain starts back up again and she no longer has her favorite comfort tool available.

There you have it- my weaning story.  Probably not as interesting to you as to me... but writing it down is the only way I will remember it.