Get A Life


More or less, those were the words Jason told me two weeks ago.  He said I need to get a life other than Phoenix.  How dare him.  Those words still haunt me.  For 32 years I have had a life.  A very wonderful life, might I add.  Now, my life is my son.  Is that really such a bad thing?  He insists that I never leave him (unless he is sleeping), that I no longer meet with my friends, shop, tan, etc. anymore.  Well I call that bull.  I, along with Phoenix, still have our lunch dates with friends, still meet for coffee and still run errands (all around his naps of course).  Phoenix is my life and I wouldn't want it any other way.

With all that being said, he does have a slight point....maybe.  I do realize that I have a hard time leaving Phoenix, even with him.  The few times I do, and for the short amount of time I am gone, I call every five minutes just to make sure he is okay.  I see nothing wrong with that.  I try and schedule my errands after Jason gets home and Phoenix is either napping or down for the night.  I need to know Phoenix is being interacted with and not stuck in a carseat for hours at a time.  Once he gets older and can interact more with the world, this will change.  Therefore, again, I see nothing wrong with that.

I know Jason takes great care of Phoenix.  Sometimes maybe even better than I do.  After that comment was made, I was over it.  Phoenix was down for a nap and I told Jason I was leaving.  I would be back after 8 once Phoenix was down for the night and that I wouldn't call-no matter what.    There was food in the fridge he could make and milk in the freezer just in case.  Told him to bathe him as well.  He has never bathed Phoenix before, so I was curious as to how that was going to turn out.  So that's just what I did.  I got in the car.  I had no idea where I was going to go, nor how I was going to go from 5 o'clock that night to 6:30 the next morning without seeing my baby.  I just wanted to be home with my baby.  I finally decided on Barnes and Noble.  Close to the house-just in case, coffee and books.  What more could I ask for.

I got there, ordered my regular venti white mocha, 2 extra pumps, stirred, grabbed a couple of my gossip magazines I love to read and found a few books I thought might be good for Phoenix.  Found me a spot in the kids section and plopped myself down on the floor in a nice, cozy corner.  I started reading.  Low and behold the phone rings and I answer-is everything okay?  He needed to know how to make his food.  Once that was under control, the phone rings again.  This time he tells me he is going to bathe Phoenix upstairs.  He had never bathed upstairs before.  I sat there trying to focus on my books.  All I could think about was how my son was at home getting his first ever bath in the big boy tub.  I couldn't miss this.

I gather up my things and head home.  I had decided on the way home, I would just stop in for a second to take a few pictures and then I'd head out again.  I arrive home to find Phoenix in the tub upstairs!  However, Jason had placed his smaller tub (the one we use in the sink) inside and had him sitting on the infant side.  Good thing Mama came to the rescue!  I do give Jason an A for effort though.    I was a bit perturbed that I was interrupted by "I'm going to bathe him in the tub" to him really not being bathed in the "tub."  I was there, so I took a few pictures anyways.

I then left.  Where to go now.  What better place than the grocery store.  I strolled leisurely down each and every isle.  I think I even hit an isle or two twice!  I purchased my groceries and decided I had enough.  I had to know my baby was sleeping.  I came home.  Phoenix was in his room crying.  It broke my heart.  He doesn't normally cry when you put him to bed.  As bad as it hurt, I just sat my happy butt on the couch.  He stopped a few minutes later and was safe and sound dreaming away.

What I took away from Jason's comment that still haunts me.  My son is going to be okay.  With or without me by his side every second of his life, he will survive.  Its good for him to have daddy time as well.  The following week I confessed and told Jason how refreshed I feel after having a night off.  To his approval, I told him I was going to start doing that once a week.  I haven't done it since.  However, it made me realize that Phoenix is just as happy, healthy and loved even when I'm not there.

As mad as I was at Jason for telling me to get a life, I realize he was just doing it to help me.  He is such a great husband and father.  Always putting Phoenix and I ahead of himself.  We truly are blessed to have him forever.  I enjoyed my night off, but realize that I do have a life.  His name is Phoenix.

Talking, Turning, Listening, Eating, Bathing, Sliding and 7

Phoenix is talking and laughing more and more everyday.  His favorite word is still Da Da, which sends Jason over the moon everytime he hears it.  I am constantly working on Ma Ma, but I think Jason's reaction to Da Da has him wanting to say it and nothing else!  Thats okay-I know Ma Ma will come at just the perfect moment.  In the meantime, I'll enjoy the bond between father and son and be thankful for the abundant amount of giggles I am blessed enough to hear all day long! Oh yeah-he also got his 2nd tooth exactly one week after the arrival of tooth #1!!!!  The top 2 have started progressing down, so we are sure fun times are instore for us!

We have mastered turning off light switches.  I use the term mastered rather loosely!  Everytime you take Phoenix to a light switch and tell him to turn it off, he swats at it until his finger catches the switch and flips it.  He then gets a look of amazement in his eyes (they get really big) and he turns and finds the light!  Yea, you did it!  Mama is soo proud of you!

Phoenix and I also started going to the library for Early Birds Class.  Its such a fun class and its soo good for Phoenix to interact and watch other kids of his age.  We read stories, sing songs and play.  It is definitely one of my most favorite times of the week.  Phoenix pays great attention and loves doing the hand motions, with the help of me of course, to the songs.  I love seeing the look in his eyes as he watches other kids cry, crawl, laugh, etc.

Like Father, Like Son, especially in the eating department!  Phoenix loves food.  All food.  He is now experimenting with feeding himself off of his tray and picking up crunchies out of the can by himself.  He opens big for bites and doesn't even give us time to put more on the spoon.  I am trying to stop pureeing as much and trying to chop his food finely so he gets chewing down!  Seeing him chew is the cutest thing. He chomps big and all you see are gums!

We have also graduated to the big tub upstairs.  This probably could have been done a while back, but the convenience of bathing him in the sink was just too great!  He loves taking baths and doesn't mind having a cup of water dumped on his head or even having the shower turned on.  He happily plays with his toys or reads a book.  Yes, its my fault that he is still in a ring-I'm just not brave enough yet to let him sit in the tub alone.  However, his love the for tub makes me excited about summer and swimming!

Phoenix was invited to a pajama birthday party at ijump.  He had such a great time, despite missing his morning nap.  He got to experience going down the slide with daddy and also jumping in the moonwalk.  He loved having cake and ice cream as well!  After the party we went to the "after party" where Phoenix got to hang out with his friends and play all day without, yet, another nap!

We hit the big 7 Months yesterday!  He is growing soo fast and that just breaks our hearts.  We love him more and more with each passing day.  Seeing him grow into his own person has been a true blessing to Jason and I.  We truly are blessed to have him in our lives.  He has taught us soo much about the important things and has brought us closer together as a family.  The kid is awesome!

Playing Catch-up

I am going to attempt combining the first 6 months of our precious Phoenix into 1, hopefully not too long, blog.  

It all started the end of October when I was suffering from a severe migraine.  I knew we tried to get pregnant that month, so instead of just taking my medicine, I drove my crying self to the doc in the box for a blood-drawn pregnancy test.  I told them I couldn't even wait for the results because I was in soo much pain, but they assured me it would only be minutes.  Those minutes felt like hours.  Upon receiving the news, I drove myself home, layed on the couch and cried-from the pain, not the results.  I finally convinced myself to get up and iron-on a t-shirt the word KNUCKLE.  Let me rewind for second.  Back in March when we discovered I was pregnant, we referred to the Baby as Knuckle.  That pregnancy ended in a miscarriage the first week of April.  Anyways, I thought this would clue Jason in to the fact that I was pregnant.  So I ironed the word on the shirt and assumed my position back on the couch and cried and cried and cried so more.  The pain was unbearable, but waiting for Jason to get home made it that much worse.  He finally got home and was soo worried about my head he didn't even notice my hot pink shirt!  I finally got frustrated and just told him to read it.  He didn't quite catch on so I had to explain to him what was going on.  The look on his face was priceless.  I have never seen him so happy!

We went to the doctor November 2 and again the following week.  We wanted to wait to tell people since we had the miscarriage just a few months prior, but I think we were both too excited!  We told a few people through letters sent via snail mail from KNUCKLE.  Because of the prior miscarriage, we had ultra-sounds every visit for the first 4 months.  Jason's excitement never changed with each viewing of our KNUCKLE.  He was over the moon.  We were both over the moon.

Finally the time came to find out if Jason was going to have a hunting partner or if I was going to have a shopping partner.  We asked the tech to keep it a secret, but to put it in an envelope for us to open at a later time.  The agreement between me and Jason was that since we were finding out (against my wishes), he had to let me open it when I was ready.

We left knowing the sex of KNUCKLE was right there in our hands.  The anticipation got the best of us.  We decided we would go to dinner that night and open the envelope.  Well, I decided to call Publix and have them make a cake with either blue or pink icing.  They were kind enough to get it done within a few hours.  I picked up the cake-and as hard as it was for me to not sneak a peak-I knew I had to wait.  Dinner time finally came and I met Jason at the restaurant.  He was surprised to see the cake.

He was soo excited...he was going to have a hunting partner!!!! We were both thrilled!!!  Now all we had to do was wait until the end of June to meet KNUCKLE.  Now that we knew it was a he, we started trying to decide on a name.  The nursery was set-regardless of the sex, so really the only preparation we had to do was decide on a name.  I told Jason if it was a girl, I was naming her, but if it was a boy he could name him.  BAD decision on my part.  We went back and forth on several names; I guess I should have been thankful we had it narrowed down, however; I still wasn't satisfied.  We went from having a KNUCKLE to a NO NAME LANG.  One day Phoenix came to me.  Don't ask me from where-I'm still not sure.  I sent Jason a text asking what he thought of it.  To my surprise, his text back was that he loved it.  Finally, NO NAME LANG had a name.  Phoenix Michael Lang was now residing in my belly.  

DELIVERY DAY:  As time got closer and I got bigger (yes, I gained close to 90 lbs.), my doctor and I finally started discussing an induction date.  With her going out of town the first week of July, she gave us the option of June 29th or 30th.  We decided to go with the 29th so Phoenix would have his very own day.  Our anniversary is the 30th.  We later came to find out that they cancelled all inductions for the 30th, so we would have been in big trouble had we picked that day.  Isn't funny how God works everything out!  We arrived at the hospital at 5:00 that morning.  I was told I would arrive, get checked in, IV's started and then they would break my water by 5:30.  Well, all that started happening and we were soo ready for Phoenix to get here.  My dad came by the hospital about 5:30 and stayed for a bit before heading to the restaurant.  It was nice to have him there.  They did some blood work to check my platelets before breaking my water.  Once the results came back and my levels were high enough, my water was broken and the pitocin was started.  Before that, I was about 2 cm.  After breaking my water, I was 3.  The contractions started and I was not happy.  They hurt.  They came every 1-2 minutes and they came strong.  There was no easing into them.  I opted to go ahead and get the epidural at this point. I was checked again and I was 4.  Then we waited.  My mom finally arrived, as well as my sister and my 4 sweet nieces.  It was nice to see their faces.  They checked me again.  Low and behold, I was ready to push.  Within an hour I went from 4 to 10.  This was happening a lot faster than anyone had anticipated (I guess thats why the contractions were soo close and strong).  My sister was still there (with the 4 girls), along with my mother.  My mother stayed in the room with Jason and I while I was pushing.  About 5 minutes before his grand entrance, she went in the hall and allowed my sister to come in.  She took all the pictures and videotaped the whole thing.  All and all, I think I pushed around an hour or so and we finally had our precious Phoenix.  He arrived at 1:36pm, weighing in at 8 lbs 8 oz.  and 21 1/2 inches long.  He was PERFECT.

We had lots of family and friends visit while we were in the hospital.  We truly are blessed.  We had very special appearances from Jason's brother and his girlfriend all the way from Iowa.  His Aunt and her daughter also came to meet Phoenix.  They are from Missouri.

Month 1:  This month was pretty uneventful.  We spent our days at home, other than a visit to the doctor.  Jason's family stayed with us for about a week.  It was great having them here to witness such a blessed time in our lives.  Phoenix was a very easy baby.  My sister Michele and her two boys also came to visit from Michigan.  My brother made it as well from California.   His Grandpa Bill and Grandma Tara also came to visit.  He slept for stretches of about 4-6 hours and he ate like a champ.  He only cried if he was hungry or sleepy.  He truly was such an easy baby.  He made his first outing to M & M and attended his first birthday party.  This was also the first time I left him-at my sisters while I went and had my hair done.  He attended another birthday party at Davenports.  We also went over to ReRe's to play. Phoenix was also Churched on the 24th.  My sister and brother were both in town to witness this special event in his life!

His Stats:

Week 1: 8.5 lbs, 20 3/4"

1 Month:  11.8 lbs, 22"

Month 2: Phoenix giggled for the first time.  The sound of me whistling brought it on.  He loves when you whistle to him.  He wore his first pair of shoes and attended yet another birthday party!  He took his first nap in his big boy crib and moved from sleeping in a swaddle to a sleep sac.  He was also still holding his head up unassisted and grasped his first object.

His Stats:

2 Month:  14.7 lbs, 23 7/8"

Month 3:  This month was filled with lots of "fun" stuff.  Phoenix got his first cold this month.  He also started having more trouble with his breathing.  He was a happy reflux baby, meaning he had reflux, but it didn't seem to bother him.  Therefore, we opted the no medicine route.  However, this month, the reflux started really affecting his breathing.  I took him in for x-rays of his chest.  We also started medicine to help control the reflux.  We hoped this would allow the reflux to come up instead of blocking his airway, causing him to gasp for air.  It was soo scary when he would start gasping, and we felt so helpless.  We prayed the medicine would fix this issue.  The medicine didn't help and within a week we were back at the doctor.  This time we tried 2 different meds.  Again, Phoenix is quite the social butterfly attending yet another birthday party!  He also started sleeping through the night, had his first sleepover guest, shook his rattle, and started putting himself to sleep.  

His Stats:

3 Month:  Approximately 16 lbs.

Month 4:  We took our first family trip to the mall.  Phoenix also grabbed and held on to a toy.  He began sitting alone this month as well.  We were blessed enough to hear his first laugh.  We had our first roll from tummy to back, as well as having spent some time in the exersaucer.  This was a big month for our family as Phoenix was Baptized into Christ on October 1, 2011.  What a blessed day.  He was such a good boy during the whole event and even stayed awake to celebrate at his party afterwards!  We were soo proud of our baby boy!  Phoenix also had his first "bump in the road."  Seeing that I still have nightmares about it, I'll leave it at that.  Phoenix was also able to celebrate Halloween.  Although we didn't trick-or-treat, we did carve pumpkins!  This was also a very exciting month, in that Phoenix's grandparents and Aunt came to visit from Iowa.  He got soo much loving while they were here!  We also took our first vacation to Pigeon Forge, Tn. with them.  It was such a special time for our family and the memories will last us a lifetime!

His Stats:

4 Month: 17.9 lbs., 26 1/4"

Month 5:  This month was a big one for Phoenix.  Daddy went on a hunting trip, so I took it upon myself to move Phoenix upstairs to his big boy crib (we finally got the gasping for breathe issue under control).  Daddy fought with me when he returned home to find his baby sleeping in his own room.  However, I won that battle!  He did great the first night-sleeping through the night!  I was soo proud of my big boy!  Phoenix also began really sitting my himself this month and even mastered rolling from back to front!  Our baby is getting so big!  Unfortunately, we also experienced our first ear infection this month.  However, Phoenix was a trooper and showed no signs of pain other than the 102-103 fever he was running.  We also celebrated Thanksgiving this month with family.  

His Stats:

5 Months:  Approximately 18 lbs.

Month 6:  This month was filled with lots of holiday fun!  Uncle Michael came to visit again and we loved having him here!  Phoenix got to experience Santa at the Bass Pro Shop and he didn't seem to mind him one bit.  We had our annual St. Nicholas program at church and Phoenix loved seeing Daddy as St. Nick.  He also enjoyed the evening with apples and icing!  Phoenix started eating food this month.  We have tried bananas, avacados, prunes and applesauce.  We have yet to find something this boy won't eat.  He is just like his daddy is soo many ways!  Unfortunately, Phoenix also got hives this month.  We are thinking from the antibiotic from the ear infection, but until he tries the medicine again, we won't know for sure.  Phoenix loved Christmas-the presents, the family, church, everything!  It was such a special year for us.  We also had more visitors-Phoenix's Grandpa Bill and Grandma Tara came to visit!  Big News:  Phoenix got his first tooth on his 6 month birthday!

His Stats:

6 Month:  19.3 lbs., 28"

Okay, I tried to be brief.  Not sure it worked out so well.  However, Phoenix had a wonderful first six months of life and we are truly more in love with each passing day.  He has been such a happy baby.  We also tell each other how blessed we are.  We wouldn't change a thing about the past 6 months.