dance machine

Luke loves to move his body and "dance." As I was getting his bath ready last night, Keith checked his e-mail after getting him undressed. I heard some music start playing down the hall. Luke found the stash of his birthday cards that I'd saved and the one from Keith's cousin Josh played music. Thank you Uncle Josh for the card! For some reason, I think of Stef every time I watch the video. Maybe it's the sweet moves...

Maybe Luke does have a future on So You Think You Can Dance. So there, Keith.

the chair

Right after Luke was first born, Jeannie told me about how she used to put Keith in the same chair each month and take his picture to track his growth over the year. I thought that would be a neat tradition to carry on and a cool way to document Luke's growth. So here they are all lined up together:

Brand New-0 months old

(I know that it isn't in the same chair, but I wanted it in here for comparison sake.)

1 month

2 months

3 months

4 months

5 months

6 months

7 months

8 months

9 months

10 months

11 months

12 months

par-tay

On Saturday, we got to celebrate Luke's 1st birthday at his parties. I'll be honest-I felt we had to separate the group into two. The first party was for our families and the second party was for friends and a lot of the little kiddos Luke sees and plays with. Each party still felt overwhelming to me with the amount of people, but Luke had a great time and that's what matters. Luke was blessed with so many gifts and we are grateful for every single one. Everyone was so generous; he'll have clothes for the next year and toys for the rest of his life!

Between Keith, myself, and my sister, Beth, we took an amazing amount of pictures, but I'm posting just a few here. Enjoy!

The birthday boy getting ready to open gifts.

Let's get the party started!

Luke has a thing about tissue paper. Someone could have given him a package of tissue paper and he would have been content for hours.

Luke received this cup as a gift from the Hildwine's. I didn't take to sticker off or fill it up with anything to drink, but he proceeded to suck on it for the remainder of the time opening gifts.

See?

Luke's new big boy chair from Nonna.

Feeding Nonna some yummy cupcake.

family photo

Luke's main goal for both of the cupcakes was to smash them and spread them, not eat them. Apparently Luke isn't a huge fan of cake just yet except when he gets to put it in his hair, his ears, all over his face, his body...you get my drift. Cupcake was a decoration, not a food.

mercy

On Friday, Luke made his first, and more than likely not his last, trip to the emergency room. We had just made it to Lille's birthday party at a local park. I've been to this park a few times before for other parties, but Keith had never been.

It was so sweet how excited he was to show Luke around. Since we had just gotten Luke a slide toy for his birthday, Keith thought it would be a great idea to take him down the slide. Luke loves the slide at home, so a bigger one here would be better. They never even got to go down the slide. As Keith was sitting down, Luke's shoe caught on his belt. Keith didn't know this and kept going. He heard a loud pop and Luke started screaming.

After only being at the party about 10 minutes, we were off to find the E.R. I already knew that the pediatrician's office was closed and I have no clue where the closest urgent care is, so we made our way to the hospital near our home. They were nice enough when I gave birth there, why wouldn't they be equally nice to treat him, right?

Luke calmed down pretty quickly and Keith and I started second-guessing whether we had made the correct decision in leaving and going to the hospital so we took him home first. When we set him on the ground in a sitting position, he was fine. Normal smiley happy baby. As soon as he started to crawl or put any weight on his foot, the screaming started again. Definitely going to the hospital now.

The staff at Mercy Gilbert were wonderful. Even the others in the waiting room were nice to us. Since Luke didn't have to stand there, he was his usual bubbly self. He laughed, he talked loudly, he squirmed, he watched. When we went back to the triage area where the doctor checked him, I think he thought we were crazy. He didn't flinch when the doctor touched his leg or foot and let him move it around. Luke just watched him with a stink-eye making sure he didn't make any sudden movements. When the doctor asked us to have Luke walk from Keith to me, he finally understood why we were there. Luke crumpled to the floor, a sobbing mess again.

After some x-rays, some Motrin, and 2 and a half hours in the E.R., we were set to go home. Luke has a sprained ankle and just needs to rest it. We verified the diagnosis with the pediatrician today and Luke is well on his way to a full and speedy recovery.

Of course I took pictures.

smiling while not standing

standing now...not smiling

Happiest in Mom and Dad's arms

Seeing your child hurt is one the worst things I think a parent can go through. I know I had a hard time dealing with it and seeing a baby that was once so happy and carefree turn into a crying, needy guy was tough, but Keith had it worse. Hopefully next time we'll be able to handle it better, but we'll just have to see.

12 months

It's official. Luke is 12 months old and this marks the last of my month-by-month posts. This year has flown by and it's hard for me to understand that this much time has actually passed already.

I remember the 3 am feedings thinking that they would never end. I remember when he could hardly stay awake for an hour at a time. I remember when it was cause to celebrate when he ate more than 3 ounces at a single feeding. I remember crying myself home from the pediatrician when I was told he wasn't gaining enough weight. I remember wishing that he wouldn't get bigger because I was afraid of what was coming.

Now I know he sleeps through the night and I know that he can eat like a maniac if he wants. We no longer have to worry about his weight gain because he's doing just fine in that department now. In fact, he's much taller and usually heavier than most kids his age. Every stage and every new thing he's done has been an adventure, whether it be good or bad. It has been an amazing learning and growing experience for not only Luke, but myself as well. I no longer fear what's coming, but look forward to seeing what happens next.

He's walking like a champ now and is becoming so much more independent. If he's able to do something on his own, you better believe he'd like to do it just that way: on his own. He's quickly becoming able to hold a fork, poke his food, and get the food to his mouth. He enjoys walking himself from the bathroom to his room at night after his bath. Luke has also figured out how to close his bedroom door. I'm sure I'll be regretting this ability in about 12 years when the door slams in my face, but for now, I think it's pretty cute.

Luke loves to explore and try to figure things out. He still loves to go under the table; only now he's walking under the table instead of crawling. He stared to put toys back into buckets and containers and gets a kick out of sharing his toys with people. He'll take the toy back fairly quickly, but he gets such joy out of giving something away in the first place.

Luke adores his dad. Keith and Luke play a mean game of "I'm gonna get you!" where Luke walks aways and Keith chases him. If Keith doesn't follow fast enough, Luke will slow down and start to peek behind himself, waiting for Keith. He still gets incredibly excited every day when Keith gets home from work. He's almost in a run to get to where his dad is.

He still likes to sing. Doesn't matter where we are or even if there isn't a song playing, he takes any opportunity to belt out a tune. He's also started to display more boy tendencies. He loves him a truck and will play with any kind of ball for hours. Maybe he just likes things that move because it seems the older he gets, the less he stops moving.

For all the good and the bad and everything in between, being this kid's parent is one of the best things I've ever done with my life. He is such a blessing and a joy in our lives and I thank my lucky stars each and every day I have him. My Luke.

april 15, 2009

Wednesday was a big day in our family; Luke turned one and Keith took the day off of work to spend it with us in celebration! We started off our fabulous day of fun by getting Luke in the morning by singing Happy Birthday to him. He was still really groggy when we woke him up so it took him a second to get what was going on.

After he was dressed, he was ready to go! So excited for what's in store...

After breakfast, our first stop for the day was the doctor. When Luke was first born, he did so well with Dr. Chang. Smiled at him, gurgled and made cooing noises at him, the works. Well that didn't happen this time. He's not sure of the good doctor anymore. By the time he finally warmed up to the situation, it was time to clean out his ears. This required him being restrained, which he did not like AT ALL. It is one of the hardest things in the world to hear your child in pain. The only thing more difficult was knowing that he hadn't even gotten the three shots that were coming next. Needless to say, Luke couldn't get out of the office quick enough.

As he was taking his morning nap at home, Keith and my dad put together Luke's gift from us. I was impressed at how quickly the thing went together. Keith almost didn't need instructions. Doesn't mean he didn't try to do it without them at first. Good thing I was there to regulate.

We were so excited to show him his new castle. He wasn't quite sure at first, but he loves to go down the slide now. And someone has already taught him how to go down head first too. Dang.

Our original plan for after lunch was to take Luke to the Phoenix Zoo for the first time. Since Luke's birthday also fall on Tax Day, our plans changed. Anyone who knows very much about Keith knows that he is a political nut and he always likes to stay current with the news and goings-on of the political stuff. Across the country on April 15, people who were fed up with the government and the bail-outs staged Tea Parties reminiscent of the original tea parties in Boston to protest the crazy amounts of taxes that we will be hit with to pay for all these bailouts. Keith had initially wanted to go to the party at the Phoenix capital, but with Luke's birthday dinner being at the same time, that was impossible. Instead, I found out about a local tea party being held at the Gilbert Municipal building, so we went. It was a very neat experience and I feel like Luke attended a little piece of history on his birthday. This is us and one of my favorite signs out there:

My only requirement for attending the Tea Party was that we would get Luke some ice cream after it was over, so off we went to Dairy Queen. Luke has this crazy thing about ice cream; he never looks happy when he's eating it and it's the only thing he's ever had that he gets so completely angry about if you don't get it into his mouth fast enough. The pictures don't make it look like he enjoyed it, but I promise he did.

After the ice cream, he also got to spend some time in the play area. Please don't think I'm a bad mom because he isn't wearing any shoes. Keith was rushing us to get out of the house to make it to the Tea Party and he wanted to be the one holding Luke. In my mind, the reward of being the holder also entails making sure the child is fully ready to go. Another situation where Keith needed more directions than I assumed he did. Oh well.

We finished off Luke's birthday with having the Seibolt's, Andrew, Donn, and Holly over for a birthday dinner. Luke got to open a few gifts and got to be his normal ham-like self. Cute shoes dude!

As Keith and I went to bed that night, we counted our blessings for having such an amazing day with or little man. Hard to believe he's one, but so ready to see what the next year brings!