Big Brother, Little Brother

Jacob and I spent the last nine months explaining to Brody that he was going to be a big brother. He never seemed to understand. As we were decorating the new nursery, Brody became attached to a little stuffed sock, calling it "baby". I'm fairly certain that Brody thought the nursery was for his baby. When we would go into the room, he'd toss "baby" up and over the crib railing, putting baby to bed.

We decided that it was time to name the real baby, distinguishing it from Brody's baby. Jacob and I had a solid list of 6-7 names that we couldn't narrow down. One night before dinner I was going through the names with Brody and when we got to Logan, he pointed at my belly and said "Baby Logan". From there, it stuck. Brody named our second child. With two indecisive parents, it's nice to have a 2 year old that can make decisions for us.

As we started talking about baby Logan, I'm still not sure Brody got it. He would put his hand on my belly and call it baby Logan, but then I'd catch him in the bath, spreading the washcloth across his "baby Logan". We'd introduce him to other babies, but I don't think he was making the leap from my belly to live baby. I started to wonder about the transition Brody would make from being an only child to the older brother. I looked forward to his visits in the hospital when Brody would finally get to meet baby Logan, but unfortunately because of Logan's stay in the NICU, Brody wasn't able to visit with his younger brother.

When Logan was released from the hospital, I went to pick Brody up from day care while Jacob took Logan home. I told Brody that Dada was home with baby Logan and that he was excited to meet his older brother. As we came inside and found Logan and Jacob on the couch, Brody immediately went in for a closer look and declared him "baby Loooogan".

Logan brought presents for Brody, so any remaining hesitation was lost when Brody saw the new Thomas train cars.

Now, as Brody wakes up he asks for baby Logan. Before he goes to bed, he must say goodnight to baby Logan. Brody is in love with his little brother and Logan seems to tolerate Brody as well. He hasn't fussed about Brody's attention yet, accepting the kisses, the finger pokes, and the toys that are lovingly thrown at him without complaint. I wish I could say that I expect this lovefest to continue, but I acknowledge that with two boys so close in age our house is going to be host to many wrestlemania-style battles. All that I can hope is that their love endures those fights and as they grow up they become the best friends that we hoped they'd be.

He tricked us again

When I was 20 weeks along in Logan's pregnancy both Jacob and I were convinced we were having a girl. How else could we explain a pregnancy that was so drastically different than my first? At our 20-week ultrasound both of our jaws dropped as we learned that we were having another boy. It didn't seem possible.

Well, he tricked us again. My pregnancy with Logan was awful but I'm happy to report that as of day 5 he shows no sign of the trouble we were anticipating. It's too early to let our guard down and breathe a sigh of relief, but we've had five blissful days with him. He eats well, sleeps well, and heals well. He spent 4 days in the NICU repairing a tear in his lung that was caused by a quick labor that didn't provide the pressure needed to flush his lungs of fluid, but even that resolved itself without intervention.

I retract all previous comments and thoughts I had about Logan being a trouble child in the making. He's far from it and we're so lucky to have him home with us.

Trouble is brewing

I think we're in for an interesting experience with baby Logan. He's made us worry, made me sick, made my ankles swell, and now... he's making us wait. I'm officially overdue and noticably waddling. I look forward to meeting Logan and seeing if his personality outside of the womb matches our impression of him during this pregnancy. If it does, we're in big trouble.

Bye bye frog

It's amazing how much a kid's brain will retain. We had no idea how much information was sinking in with Brody until he started talking. As I said in an earlier post, Brody was a late talker. At his 15 month checkup Brody wasn't using a single word consistently and the doctor asked us to have him evaluated for a speech delay. Jacob and I decided to wait and see how he was doing at 18 months, knowing Brody is slow to start new skills but then catches up quickly. At 16 months he started using Dada consistently for Jacob (previously Dada meant everyone, including strangers and dogs), which was quickly followed by Mama and bye bye. By 18 months he had approximately 30 words and at 2 years Brody was stringing together 3-4 words and knew the difference between a pentagon and an octagon.

Over the summer of 2008 when Brody was just over a year old we had a frog that lived under our gutter output. Whenever I was watering the lawn, Brody would come with me and I'd show him the frog. He never initiated the trip to see the frog and I wasn't sure he even cared about it. As Brody began talking, the weather turned colder and our frog disappeared. Months had passed since we'd last seen him and I'd stopped checking. One day over the winter as I was loading Brody into the car to go to daycare, he randomly said "no more frog." I let him walk over to the gutter spout and he lifted up the drain plate, saying "bye bye frog". Little things like this are great, not only to see Brody communicating but also to see how our actions over the past two years have made an impression on him. He's retaining information that we didn't even know he understood. He's also quietly remining us that his brain is a sponge and we really need to be watching what we say and do in front of him.

Nesting

I know Logan is on his way. Why else would I spend my precious moments leading up to Brody's bath ripping carpet out of the baby's room? Nesting is a crazy thing. I've had 39 weeks and 4 days to prepare for Logan's arrival, but tonight is the night that I decide the foul-smelling carpet in the nursery closet needs to come out... AT PRECISELY THIS MOMENT. It was an easy task. Tomorrow I'll pull up the tack strips and then for however long we're in this house we'll live without carpet in that closet. Because while I'm really good at starting tasks, I'm awful at completing them and I have no doubt that I won't lay new carpet in that closet until it's time to sell.

Nesting is a crazy thing.

Brody's first Easter egg hunt

My Mom was made to be a Granny. She's a great Mom too, but I can really see her love of kids now that I'm older and watching from the outside as she interacts with her six adoring grandchildren. Easter came on the last weekend of tax season this year. It's a very hectic time for my Mom and I know she has a lot of work to do. But as Jacob, Brody, and I arrived for our family Easter gathering, Mom was running the stairs hiding clues throughout the house for a personalized scavenger hunt for each of the bigger kids. She'd already spent the morning filling and hiding eggs for two separate outdoor egg hunts- one for the big kids and one for Brody and Evelyn, who were first-timers. I'm fairly certain that as I'm writing this blog entry, my Mom is back at her accounting work trying to finish up her remaining returns for the April 15th deadline. I have no idea where she finds the energy.

Brody loved the Easter egg hunt. His daycare had a small egg hunt earlier in the week so he wasn't completely unaware of the concept. He and Evelyn ran around the yard with their baskets, pulling eggs out of bushes, trees, flowers, even the mailbox. After the hunt Brody opened each egg with Jacob, excited to see that the eggs contained coins and that he'd gathered quite a bounty.


After the Plummer gathering we joined the Thomas family for the Weaver get together. Brody and I took at walk down to the lake after eating and on his way down the path, he found an Easter egg hidden in one of the plants. I suppose it was left over from earlier in the day, but Brody now has the impression that plants and trees grow Easter eggs- and a lot of them contain coins! I'm envisioning many walks in our future, during which Brody will spend time investigating the contents of every plant we pass.

That's my boy

Brody is obviously his father's son. Since he was just a few days old Jacob's family has commented on how much Brody looked like his daddy. I can't deny it; the kid has very few features, if any that I can claim to have contributed. Even his blue eyes are far too blue to have come from my blue-gray eyed side of the family. I think Brody's bright blues are a product of his Mamie, passed down through Jacob.

Looks aside, I do see a few personality traits in Brody that I think have come from me. For one, he's slow to attempt new tricks. He was a late crawler, late walker, and late talker. However, once he decided he was ready to try any of those skills, he excelled at them. It's like he needs to watch those around him and study their movements before he tries something himself. He wants to make sure he has as much information as possible before leaping into a new activity. I think that comes from me.

Like his mother, Brody also has a love of sweets. He likes chocolate, cookies, cake, sugar candies, everything. He knows the crinkle of a candy wrapper and without even seeing what's inside he'll quickly say "I want some!" Tonight was a milestone for a new candy lover. Brody had his first Cadbury creme egg. They're my favorite treat for the Easter holiday and usually I guard them with a vengence. Nobody lays a hand on my creme eggs. But as I was rushing to get ready for Lindy and Steve's wedding rehearsal, I accidently left one, my last one, out on the table. When we came back from the dinner, Brody hoisted himself up on the chair and picked it up. In an attempt to not lose my last Cadbury creme egg, I tried to convince him that it was a ball, but there was no chance. He must have smelled the chocolatey-goodness. He started the peel the wrapper and had such a look of excitement as he realized it was chocolate underneath that I couldn't take it away from him. He looked at me with huge eyes and just said "oh!!" So, tonight, at just past 9pm, Brody and I shared his first Cadbury creme egg.

Most two year olds would have crushed the egg and gotten the creme filling everywhere, making a mess and eating very little of the egg. Not my Brody. He was very gentle with the egg, taking in equal parts chocolate and creme with each bite. He savored it. I couldn't help but watch and think: that's my boy.

Confession Time

Brody is two years old. Logan is due any day. Other than pictures, I have nothing to record the first two years of Brody's life. There are so many things from Brody's first two years that made me think: I hope this lasts forever. Of course, nothing ever does. Suddenly I have a toddler and struggle to remember the adorable sigh Brody would make after a good sneeze or how he used to tremble just before he peed, warning us to take cover. I don't want to forget those details and I know it's only going to get harder to hold onto the memories after Logan is born and we have to keep up with two boys.

Obviously I failed at scrapbooking. Brody's baby book has 7 or 8 pages and doesn't include the detail I'd like to record. I gave up on the book when he was 8 weeks old and instead created an electonic scrapbook for his first year. It's nice, but the focus is on pictures, not the silly details. I want a place to record the little things- like Brody's mispronunciation of the word ketchup (keppers) and downstairs (dinosaur) and the first time he locked the car door on us and smiled from the inside of the car saying "Hi Mama! Brody lock door."

My grandfather kept a daily diary. He wrote about the family, the town, his job, the weather, everything. He has books and books that my Dad is now pouring through. Even the uneventful entries are interesting because he's written about little things that would have otherwise been forgotten. So, what's an updated version of the daily diary? A blog. And that's how this got started. It's my attempt to take a lesson from my grandfather and start recording the little details that make every day with my family interesting- even when we aren't doing anything special. Hopefully one day Brody and Logan will see this and read it with the same interest that my father has in my grandfather's diaries. Even if it doesn't last that long, I'll consider it a success if it helps me remember the little things that make me love my boys more than anything else in this world.

Weaver Family, Winter 2008: